The video: On Wednesday night, TLC, the cable network that brought us Virgin Diaries and Sister Wives, aired what may just be its "craziest show to date." The one-time special called I Cloned My Pet (watch a clip below) featured three animal lovers looking to bring their beloved pets back from the dead — and willing to go to desperate lengths to do so. One woman, Danielle Tarantola, was so upset about her dog Trouble's death three years ago that she hasn't thrown away anything Trouble touched — even a piece of chicken (she keeps it wrapped in foil in the freezer) and some water left in his bowl. "The water really, really means a lot to me," she says, "because it was the last thing that Trouble actually got to drink. His mouth was in there." For a fee of $50,000, South Korean scientists cloned Trouble — though the new "Double Trouble" is hardly a spitting image of Tarantola's beloved original.
The reaction: "It doesn't take a degree in psychology to realize that these people need help," says Lindsay Mannering at The Stir. Obviously, "this woman secretly always wanted children and her obsession with her pet is a manifestation of that burning, unfulfilled desire." Regardless, the show fails to address cloning's many downsides, says J. Woestendiek at Ohmidog! "And, worse yet, [it] seem[s] to accept the bogus idea that clones are reincarnated versions of the original." In reality, genetic copies don't necessarily act the same — or look the same, as you can see with Trouble. Check it out: