Dog The Bounty Hunter (Courtesy Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Dog the Bounty Hunter is an American reality television series on A&E which chronicled Duane "Dog" Chapman's adventures as a fugitive recovery agent, or bounty hunter. With a few exceptions, the series took place in Hawaii or Dog's home state of Colorado.

On May 21, 2012, A&E cancelled the series after eight seasons, citing the popular phrase: "Every dog has its day".

Cast

Duane "Dog" Chapman is joined by his business partner and wife, Beth Chapman, his grown sons Duane Lee Chapman, II and Leland Chapman, and his "brother" Tim "Youngblood" Chapman (despite having the same last name, Chapman and Tim are not biologically related). In Season 2, Dog's teenage daughter, "Baby" Lyssa Chapman returns home and becomes a member of the bounty-hunting team. Justin Bihag (son of longtime family friend Moon Bihag) also helps out during Season 1 and occasionally later.

Production history

The program spun off from Chapman's appearance on the show Take This Job, a program about people with unusual occupations. Both shows are produced for A&E by Hybrid Films, a New York-based production company. Dog the Bounty Hunter captured an audience immediately by drawing viewers into the interaction of Chapman and his family/team, mixing street smarts, romance, arguments, teamwork, adrenaline-laced arrests, and a philosophy of hope and second chances.

Viewers are taken along as Chapman and his family/team locate and arrest people who have broken the terms of their bail agreements. Bounty hunts and arrests segue into the rides to jail, during which Chapman and his team show compassion and strongly counsel the fugitives to start over, leaving behind drugs and/or crime to become dependable members of their families and society. Rounding out most episodes are scenes featuring Dog, Beth, and their large family of children, grandchildren and friends.

As the show progressed, viewers were taken further behind the scenes during Baby Lyssa's training as a licensed bail bondsman and bounty hunter; Dog's capture of Andrew Luster and the ensuing arrests of Chapman, Tim and Leland in Mexico; the deaths of Beth's father (Garry Smith) and Dog's oldest daughter (Barbara Katie Chapman); Chapman and Beth's 2006 wedding; Baby Lyssa's wedding and the birth of her second child; and the shock and fear of the family after Dog, Tim and Leland were arrested by federal marshals in Hawaii to await possible extradition to Mexico.

Chapman and Beth freely invited viewers into their lives, sharing personal stories about Chapman's 1976 imprisonment; his ex-wives and custody battles; his baby son who died at one month old; Beth's son whom she had given up for adoption; Chapman's son Tucker's imprisonment for violent crimes; Beth's arrest as a teenager; Chapman's complicated relationship with his own father; and the struggle for the team to be accepted as professional bounty hunters. Conversely, some family situations have been omitted from the program, such as several family divorces, Tim's arrest (and acquittal), and details about some of Chapman's children.

The Chapmans' company, Da Kine Bail Bonds, has a main location run by Chapman and Beth in Honolulu, Oahu. Leland Chapman has established his own Da kine Bail Bonds office in Kona, Big Island, where he lives. Episodes are also filmed in the family's hometown of Denver and in Colorado Springs, where they make extended visits to bounty hunt for their own company there as well as several other companies run by long-time friends (and sometimes former rivals).

Season 4 hiatus

Production and airing of the show was halted by A&E on November 2, 2007, after an audio tape was released, featuring Duane Chapman using the word "nigger" repeatedly in a discussion about the word itself with son Tucker regarding Tucker's black girlfriend's probable sensitivity to the word. Tucker had sold the tape to the National Enquirer, and it quickly was picked up by numerous print and broadcast media outlets. This media exposure led Duane to make an apology on CNN's Larry King Live for his lack of sensitivity on the matter, educate himself and vow to make amends. On February 19, 2008, A&E announced that the show would return. Reruns of Dog the Bounty Hunter, along with never-before-seen episodes from season 4, began airing on June 25, 2008, and the show continued, along with special episodes about the arrest and fallout from the Luster situation.

Season 7 shooting

On April 21, 2009, during filming of Season 7, Chapman was allegedly shot at with a handgun while his crew, along with bail bondsman Bobby Brown, were attempting to arrest a fugitive named Hoang Nguyen in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The suspect escaped on a motorcycle and was captured by Chapman about six hours later. This is contrary to evidence shown in the A&E airing of the episode titled "Easy Rider", on December 16, 2009. According to Chapman's website and TMZ, Nguyen was arrested and charged with attempted homicide related to the shooting attempt of Chapman and the Chapman family. On May 15, 2009, the El Paso County, Colorado Assistant District attorney dropped the attempted murder charge against the alleged shooter due to lack of evidence and conflicting statements by Chapman, his son Leland, and bail bondsman Bobby Brown. The prosecutors also state that they have not received the requested video footage from the incident, which was allegedly filmed by the television crew. In March 2011, Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Chapman, Brown, and Chapman's sons Duane Chapman II and Leland Chapman. In the lawsuit, Nguyen claims he lost his job as a result of the incident and had to relocate. He also says he was injured by pepper pellets that were allegedly fired at him. Chapman's attorney, James A. Quadra, told Celebrity Crime Reporter the lawsuit has no basis "in law or fact". The lawsuit was in mediation the first week of March 2011 with a trial date on November 28, 2011.

Lawsuit and sons quit

In 2011, Leland and Duane Lee quit working with their father and stepmother and severed ties with their family. The March 21, 2012 episode showed Duane Lee telling Beth "You want me fired, you gotta fire me," and then Leland weighed in, saying "I quit too." In January 2012, the two brothers admitted leaving the show. Leland operates his own bail bond company on the Big Island of Hawaii and heads Bounty Hunter Tactical Supply Co. while Duane Lee moved to Florida. In a tweet from Beth she wrote, "It will take 6 weeks to get thru the whole thing tonight's just the beginning".

In September 2011 Bobby Brown, who appeared in 30 episodes, sued A&E Television Networks, Hybrid Films, and D&D Television Productions in Colorado federal court, claiming he was promised to be a full cast member, but received only $6,000 for his contributions. The lawsuit is for "the misappropriation of his publicity rights as well as claims of breach of contract and promises.

New CMT series

On September 25, 2012, it was announced that CMT had officially ordered a new reality series, which is scheduled to begin airing in April 2013. The series working title is Dog, and the series will feature Dog and Beth visiting failing bail bond agencies, giving them advice on how to turn business around, using a format not unlike similar series Restaurant Makeover and Kitchen Nightmares.

Books

The television series led to a 2007 autobiographical book, You Can Run But You Can't Hide, which chronicles Chapman's years before becoming a bounty hunter and some of his more infamous hunts, including the controversial hunt that took him and his team to Mexico to capture serial rapist Andrew Luster. It also delves into his criminal past as well as his family background, imprisonment in Texas, marriages and children. A second book, Where Mercy Is Shown, Mercy Is Given, was published in 2009. Its title reflects Chapman's overriding philosophy of second chances, which he writes about at length as he asks the public for a second chance of his own. The book largely deals with the fallout from two factors: the federal marshals' arrest and the scandal over his use of the word "nigger".

Cultural references

Chapman has been parodied in live action productions.

• In Season 3, Episode 13 of Boston Legal, "Dumping Bella", Chapman is referred to by Alan as one of the only two people he truly admires and as such the only candidate besides Shirley herself to be his costume for the party.
• In Season 3, Episode 9 of 30 Rock Jenna says "Now Dog The Bounty Hunter is the second grossest guy I've been with."

Chapman has also been parodied in both motion animation and print:

• In the American Dad! episode "Joint Custody", Roger dresses up as Chapman and tries to hunt down Jeff Fischer.
• In the Family Guy episode "Something, Something, Something, Dark Side", Stewie calls a bounty hunter meeting and Chapman is briefly seen.
• Chapman and the TV show were all parodied on Cartoon Network's television program, Mad, as "Frog the Bounty Hunter".
• In the 2006 season South Park episode "Miss Teacher Bangs a Boy", Eric Cartman dressed up as Chapman and had a TV show filmed of himself, Beth and Chapman's familiar crew after he was made a school hall monitor.
• In the Nickelodeon TV series The Mighty B!, Bessie's dog Happy dressed up as Chapman and tried to find the person who pulled the fire alarm at the Bee scouts' troophouse.
• The song "Dog Catchers" on Insane Clown Posse's The Mighty Death Pop! is a diss to Dog the Bounty Hunter.
• The series was parodied in the June 2007 issue of Mad magazine as Dud The Lousy Hunter.

DVD releases

DVD name	Ep #	Release date	Additional information
The Best of Season 1	7	January 25, 2005	Features Dog's episode of Take This Job, cast biographies and promos
The Best of Season 2	7	March 29, 2006	Features cast biographies and a pop-up dog hunting quiz
The Wedding Special	1	December 12, 2006	Features 5 featurettes titled: The Drama of Dog's Wedding Ring Dance Lessons Shopping with Beth The Bow Wow Vow A Tribute to Dog & Beth
The Best of Season 3	8	February 27, 2007	Features a photo gallery
The Arrest	1	September 25, 2007	Features additional scenes. Also Features The Special Double Episode Year of the Dog
The Best of Season 4	8	August 26, 2008
To Seize and Protect (The Best of Season 5)	8	September 8, 2009
Crime is on the Run (The Best of Season 6)	8	July 27, 2010
The Wild Ride Megaset	48	January 11, 2011	8-disc collection of previous releases: The Best of Seasons 1-6, The Wedding Special and The Arrest
This Family Means Business (The Best of Season 7, Part 1)	6	June 28, 2011
Christmas Has Gone to the Dog	2	October 18, 2011	Contains two Christmas-themed episodes, one from Season 3 and the other from Season 6 (Currently out of print)
Taking It to the Streets (The Best of Season 7, Part 2)	4	June 12, 2012

Music

Heavy metal artist Ozzy Osbourne sings the show's theme song, "Dog the Bounty Hunter". The song can be heard on Osbourne's Prince of Darkness box set. Many episodes feature at least one song from a band that is either unsigned or with an independent label, usually played during an action scene. These songs are plugged at the end of each episode, following the closing credits. Several episodes in season three and four have music from New York City-based dub reggae group Subatomic Sound System's On All Frequencies album. Featured songs include: "Criminal", "Doin' It", and "Ghetto Champion". Soulja Boy's music video for "Yahhh!" includes an impersonation of "Dog".

International Syndication

The show is broadcast in the United States and Canada on A&E; repeats of the series are also seen in the United States on The Biography Channel and in broadcast syndication.

The show is also telecast in the following countries:

• Australia:, A&E, Go!; previously shown on FOX8
• Finland: Kutonen
• Germany: RTL II
• Italy: GXT
• Netherlands: RTL 7
• New Zealand: Prime TV
• Norway: MAX
• Sweden: Kanal 5
• United Kingdom/Ireland: Sky2 & Pick TV; previously seen on Bravo and Virgin 1

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