The decade-long odyssey of surfing pioneer Garrett McNamara, who, after visiting Nazaré, Portugal in hopes of conquering a 100-foot wave, pushed the sport to ever-greater heights and alongside locals helped transform the small fishing village into the world’s preeminent big-wave surfing destination.
The cinematography in the series is excellent, and there is enough suspense to keep you watching; particulary what will happen with the lead character, a 50+ big-wave surfer. My main complaint is the seemingly non-stop violin background music.
The first season of 100 Foot Wave, which debuted on HBO in 2021, set up a hard act to follow. Those six episodes covered almost a decade of the evolution of big-wave surfing, specifically around the work Garrett McNamara and others did to establish Nazaré, Portugal as a location, and this writer described it then as “the best documentary series I’d seen in some time.”
