Discovery is Making it Possible to Watch Bits of Shark Week in VR

Next week, Discovery will begin broadcasting its annual Shark Week, providing viewers coverage of the truck-sized fish for around four hours every night from Sunday, June 26 to Sunday, July 3.

The program reeled in around 2.5 million viewers last year, but that hasn’t stopped the bigwigs at Discovery from baiting their hooks with an even more tempting reason to watch: virtual reality.

That’s right: by going through Discovery’s VR app, Shark Week fans can watch clips and special behind-the-scenes footage of the programs in full virtual reality.

One of the week’s shows, Isle of Jaws, features shark cinematographer Andy Casagrande and marine biologist Dr. Johnathan Werry traveling to a remote island to discover a recently populated great white breeding ground.

VR-capable viewers will have the chance to tap into their headsets as the two “get up close and personal with a dozen large great whites in the hopes of solving two of the most closely guarded of all the great white’s secrets … where they mate and where they have their young.”

In addition, Discovery has partnered with the Blake Lively-consuming film The Shallows to offer a brief video showing “one of the world’s most powerful apex predators” swimming around a helpless you.

Shark Week 2016 has already kicked off with Sharktacular, an hour-long special hosted by horror director Eli Roth featuring Shark Week best-of’s and sneak previews. Revisit last year’s Shark Week beer pairings here in proper pre-game preparation, and live every week like it’s Shark Week.