Reviews Of Blah: The Curse of Oak Island S04E15

Synopsis

It’s all about the GAL this week as both the spoils from the dig and the pac-man like grabber, reveal their best finds to date.

What I thought

It’s hard when watching this show to know if you should generally raise your excitement levels in-line with the narrator and editing, or reserve judgement until the next show. The latter is what most hardcore viewers would do, having watched so many episodes when everything seems to be leading somewhere but turns out to go absolutely nowhere. Numerous times we’ve been convinced by the narrator’s 101 tales of what a hole, cavity or object could be, only to find out that it’s man-made or something that fell out of Rick’s back pocket.

So, here we are once again, foaming at the mouth, blood pressure higher than Jack shaking a metal detector about, and feeling that we’re on the cusp of something big down GAL1 in the Money Pit, not least because this is part 1 of the finale. Before the harsh winter arrives and our optimism gets frozen for another year, will Oak Island reveal anything significantly tangible that we can point at and say, yes, there’s really something momentous down there?

Once again, the island throws hints at us, this time in the form of some generally intriguing objects in the spoils of GAL1. Jack, Gary “Metal Ninja” Drayton, and Marty are picking up some hits amongst what is often some seriously thick earthy material. First up, they find a sail needle, which could have links to the myth of a ship being sunk on Oak Island. Then, they find gold! Or is it a coin? Nope, it’s actually a button, albeit a rather pretty one that was likely worn by someone wealthy or senior in the military. It’s great work to find such items amongst all that sludge. But wait, there’s more. It’s a chunk of think-ish metal with a square hole in it. Nails used to be square in shape way back, so this is all significant. What does it mean though?

Away from the dig, Jean and Joan McGinnis (descendants of 1795 Daniel McGinnis, one of three men who first discovered the money pit) arrive back on the island. They visit the McGinnis foundation, which is the remains of the building that the men constructed to live in whilst searching for gold back in 1795. Sadly, they lost their sister Joyce since they were here last year. In an emotional segment for everyone, including Rick who accompanies them, they have Joyce’s ashes encased in a glass stone and placed into the wall of that building. It’s quite touching, although hard to watch, knowing that they have cameras stuck on them at such a moment.

At the Visitors’ centre on the island, Jean and Joan have their cross examined; the same one they brought in previously which was apparently dug up in the Money Put by Daniel. Doctor Lorri Verderame (Antiques expert) is on hand and she dates the cross to 1550-1700, says it’s made of rose gold, Spanish ilk, and likely to have had emeralds in it, and is about 22-24 carat gold. Yummy. It must have looked even more special with those stones in it. The Doctor also examines some of the finds from weeks ago, confirming that buckle belonging to Oak Island inhabitant Ball but the spike they dug up in the swamp she refuses to say what it might be … for now. She’s obviously related to the production crew for this programme and well educated in suspense.

Back at GAL1, Rick, Marty and Jim see more and more wood (seemingly quite smelly and thus old) come up … before … just seconds before the credits go up … a large chunk of metal! Going by the “Next Week” segment, there is a strong hint that they think they’ve found the vault … or have they just found someone’s ancient lunchbox?

Rating 7/10 - A decent episode that hones in on GAL1 and provides some really interesting objects regardless of what might be down the hole.