Character Analysis
Derek is your average super-star. He looks good on camera, which is what viewers expect, but off screen, he is fat, lazy, and demanding. Derek's main life goal is to become as rich and famous as possible, while doing as little as possible to earn it.
Super-Stardom, Unmasked
If you have ever daydreamed about meeting your absolute favorite movie star, Derek just might make you think again. Though larger than life in many ways, with tons of die-hard fans, in reality he is rude, obnoxious, dim-witted, greedy, foolish, and superficial on every level. When he is not on camera, Wahoo notices that, "The man's eyelids were puffy, his pale cheeks were blotched and his hair—more orange than red—was matted and oily. He wore […] an untucked safari-style shirt that failed to hide his roundish belly. He looked more like a groggy tourist than a sturdy survivalist" (4.38).
Wahoo is surprised that in reality Derek isn't a die-hard survivalist, but a "groggy tourist" traveling easily through life, letting others do all the work for him. This vision emphasizes how TV—especially reality TV—falsifies life, tricking audiences into believing people are different than they really are.
Just Desserts
The real Derek is unhealthy, ignorant, and his 'tude ain't pretty either.
Like the narrator says, "The caution and common sense that would govern the actions of a clear-thinking person were in his case overpowered by a blinding hunger for more fame and wealth" (12.127). So Derek is a fool because of his fame.
In a way, Derek only behaves the way he does because he gets paid so well to do so, and because his show is wildly successful. Does this mean people want him to lie to them? Well, no. The audience doesn't realize they are being lied to, and they fully believe that he is starving each time he eats a creature on his show. We know this because of Tuna. Since Derek finds no fault with killing or harming innocent animals for his own profit, he gets what he deserves.
Thespian, Shmespian
Derek acts well enough to trick millions of people into believing he actually knows what he is doing in wild, dangerous settings. He even tricks Tuna, the young taxidermist-in-training. When she admits that, "All those times on TV when he swallowed some little mouse or salamander, I thought he was really starving. Am I stupid or what?" (12.101). Tuna shows us how convincing Derek can be on screen, because we like and trust her, and we know that she is smart.
Derek doesn't do much to earn this fame, though. He relies entirely on his assistant to arrange everything perfectly for him so that all he has to do is speak Aussie and eat gross critters.
Twilight, or Redemption by Full Moon
Since he is such a menace to all things natural, we do not feel at all bad when he gets bitten by the poor frightened bat and contracts an exotic infection. However, our feelings may begin to change as he does. Once he is on his own, learning how to survive in the wild for real and questioning whether he may be turning into a vampire, we might just begin to feel a bit of pity for the poor lad. And at the end, Derek really comes through for everyone at the right moment, which is the coolest thing he has ever done. So, yeah, maybe we forgive him. And so does Wahoo. Do you?
Derek's Timeline