If you watched the earlier episodes of the documentary, which somehow turned into a mockumentary, Expedition From Hell: The Lost Tapes, you would have thought that the person with the most to say would be Matt Saxman.
During the airing of Discovery Channel’s Expedition From Hell: The Lost Tapes, we heard from almost everyone, from the expedition leader or the villain himself, Mickey Grossman, other participants such as Robert Finlay, Alex Hernandez, Kevin Jackson, and Joe Flowers, as well from the ever-patient expedition guide and Grossman’s so-called “Deputy”, Delfin Gualinga.
As you would expect, the participants had colorful and sometimes disapproving recollections of the chaotic 2012 expedition in the Amazon, aptly named Amazon 5000, and they had even more damning memories of their experience of being led (or rather bullied), by former soldier, turned baker, turned demolition expert, turned survivalist, turned expeditioner, Mickey Grossman.
The person that Mickey Grossman-led (more like bullied) the most, was without a doubt, Matt Saxman – the Mickey Grossman-appointed Videographer for the expedition.
At every turn, Matt Saxman seemed like a punching bag for Mikey Grossman’s many intemperate outbursts, below is a collection of just a few of the unhinged and crazy things Mickey Grossman said to Matt Saxman:
| What Mickey said | Context | Episode |
| “This is a huge punishment…this is what happens when stupid people do stupid things.” | Matt sprays himself with bear mace. | Episode 1 |
| “Matt has an issue with diarrhea…and he walks like a duck.” | Matt has diarrhea for four days, and is given Chia seeds after four days of pain and embarrassment. | Episode 2
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| “Your passport, I don’t care about your passport, it’s the camera that is important…I can get rid of you in the water here.” | Matt is happy to have salvaged his passport following a wet and rainy trek. | |
| “If you are not going to do what you asked to do, and you volunteered to do, you are going to leave. Go to your mama, go to you papa, and let them give you the biddie.” | Matt is slower than the rest of the group in the rain forest segment of the expedition. | Episode 3
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| “Move your ass, listen you mother… You must go, you cannot continue like this.” | Mickey wants Matt to quit. | |
| “You mother… You cannot go go home. You are far away from civilization. I do not care you better move, if not I am going to hit you, I don’t care.” | Mickey wants Matt to not quit. |
Seeing and hearing the above scenes play out, and the shocking revelation that Mickey simply left Matt Saxman in the care of some local tribesman when he quit the expedition, the person we expected to hear from the most was Matt.
Was he alive? Did he make it out of South America? Did he stay in touch with Mickey Grossman? Do Matt’s parents still get along with Mickey after what he did to their son? So many questions…
But alas it was not to be. Despite repeated attempts by the producers of Expedition From Hell: The Lost Tapes to reach out to Matt Saxman, he never responded.
Again, why would he or even another heavily bullied participant, the recruited-on-the-fly Luciana “Luci” Figueroa, care to respond?
While many of the participants had surprisingly positive views of the Amazon 5000 expedition in the end (and after 12 years), and Mickey’s role in it, it is doubtful if Matt would share the same positive sentiments of both the expedition or Mickey, especially after the abuse and hardship he endured.
Notwithstanding that Matt Saxman never returned the producers calls, we did at least get confirmation that he is indeed alive.
He is currently working at 1st-Dragon/Computers Made Effective as a Client Relations Manager, and in 2020 he even presented a webinar on behalf of the Company, entitled “Simplify Orthopaedic Workflow Using AI Speech Recognition.”
