Plot Synopsis

Actor and wildlife enthusiast Dominic Monaghan and his cameraman Frank travel to our planet's most remote regions and exotic locales, searching for the most dangerous and elusive creatures known to man. Along the way, he encounters vibrant locals, quirky experts and a host of creatures that inhabit strange and wonderfully wild places. In each episode, Monaghan journeys to a different country, including: Vietnam, where he trudges through snake-infested rice paddies and a crocodile-filled lake, seeking the giant water bug, one of the world's most dangerous insects; Laos, where he seeks a remote underground river that is home to the giant huntsman spider, a venomous, massive-fanged creature that only a few humans have ever interacted with it in the wild; Namibia, where he braves the remote wilderness, hunting for the Black hairy thick-tailed scorpion, the continent's largest deadly creature; Venezuela, where he hikes to a remote cave that is rumored to be home to the Scolopendra Gigantea, the world's largest centipede, rumored to snatch bats right out of the air; Cameroon, where he infiltrates the black-market insect trade to locate the giant white Goliath beetle, one of the rarest animals on the planet; Ecuador, where he backpacks into the rainforest to find flesh-eating, venom-injecting army ants living in a colony of four-million members, which may be the largest ant colony ever found; Malaysia, where he faces his greatest fear when he finds hundreds of thousands of giant Malaysian honey bees, insects that live in hives hundreds of feet above the jungle floor; and Guatemala, where he immerses himself in Mayan legend while searching for the Guatemalan beaded lizard, one of the most endangered and venomous reptiles on the planet. During the filming of this series, Dr. Peter Jager, a spider expert at the Senckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt, discovered a new species of spider now called "Ctenus monaghani," in honor of host Dominic Monaghan. BBC America aired a sneak-peek episode of this series on Saturday, January 19, 2013 at 10:15pm ET, just three days before the official series premiere. WILD THINGS returned for its second season on Tuesday, March 25, 2014 at 10pm ET/PT on BBC America. In Season 2, on his trek to Kenya in search of the giant spitting cobra, Dominic and a team of African Veterinarians embark on a field-rescue mission of an elephant injured by a poacher's arrow. But when the confused elephant's anesthesia wears off, he and Frank are charged by the six-ton wounded animal and have to run for their lives. In addition, he crawls through some of the scariest and most dangerous bat-filled cave systems in the Australian Outback in search of carnivorous ghost bats and wrestles a giant anaconda in the Amazon River during his search for the Titan Beetle in Brazil. Working in temperatures from the scorching hot jungles of the Amazon, to the cold and snowy mountains of Japan, Dominic covers challenging and remote terrain by land, riverboat and even underwater -- while Frank captures all the action. Season 3 of WILD THINGS WITH DOMINIC MONAGHAN premiered on Wednesday, January 27, 2016 at 10pm ET/PT on Travel Channel. This season, comprised of 13 hour-long episodes, features new expeditions that take Monaghan diving into the emerald waters of a South Pacific paradise to face a giant crab; scouring the Peruvian Amazon for a creature that's part fish and part stun gun; and hiking through Madagascar's rich ecosystem to uncover a mythical lemur. Throughout his journeys to some of the most remote landscapes known to man, he meets with experts who help him seek out the most exotic and rarest wildlife found only in that region. But his close encounters extend beyond nature's critters; along roads less traveled, he stumbles into locals who introduce him to traditions, rituals and foods unique to each area. In the season premiere, Monaghan heads to Mozambique in search of the world's biggest fish: the whale shark. Weighing up to 42 tons, the elusive shark spends most of its time in the deep ocean away from human observation -- but Monaghan is determined to find it. His journey begins in the bustling capital city of Maputo, an emerging tourist spot due to the country's 1,600 miles of blue coastline. En route towards the ocean, he crosses through a wildlife reserve where local schoolchildren eagerly show him various creatures inhabiting the area. When they discover an angry rock python with a gaping wound, Monaghan springs into action to help save the animal. After visiting the coastal village of Vilanculos and joining the village festival's annual rowboat race, Monaghan begins his underwater search. He crosses paths with an aggressive moray eel and skittish whip ray, and encounters a rarely-seen giant manta and other massive marvels. Other locations featured this season include: Bolivia, where Monaghan pursues South America's largest land animal; Japan, where he seeks the animal that inspired Godzilla; the Philippines, in search of the closest thing to a real dragon; Venezuela, where meat-eating insects roam the lands; and Vietnam, to face an aquatic assassin, among others.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On Saturday, April 23, 2016 at Noon ET/PT, Travel Channel premiered the Season 3 finale of WILD THINGS WITH DOMINIC MONAGHAN. In the season ender, "Paradise in Palau," Dominic heads to Palau in search of the giant coconut crab, which can literally crack coconuts. He also dives into a lake teeming with millions of jellyfish and enters a cove where a species older than dinosaurs live.