Deadliest Catch
Payback Time
TV Flash files “Payback Time” as hour 58 of 380 in the TV Flash guide — Deadliest Catch (2005–present) on Discovery, season 5, episode 8, aired 2009-06-02, 44 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S05E08: listed hour 58 of 380 in the Deadliest Catch guide, hour 8 of 16 in season 5. It aired 2009-06-02 (44 min). The listed hour before it is “Down to the Wire” (S05E07). Next is “No Second Chances” (S05E09).

Catalog log
Broadcast listing — not a TV Flash recap.
It's the start of the 2009 Crab Season, and things are looking up for our spectacular skippers. But will their dreams been shattered by a colossal rogue wave?
Viewer FAQ
Where does Payback Time sit in the Deadliest Catch guide?
S05E08 is listed hour 58 of 380 — hour 8 of 16 in season 5, season 5 episode 8.
When did Deadliest Catch S05E08 air?
Payback Time aired 2009-06-02 and is listed at 44 minutes.
Is Deadliest Catch produced danger?
Weather is the antagonist. Reality television where the danger is survived on camera more than invented for it — crab boats, sleep debt, the Bering Sea.
In the series
Why this series still plays
Alaskan crab boats, weather as the antagonist, a deck that does not care about your edit. Deadliest Catch is Discovery labor documentary as flagship — Captain Phil Harris lore, memorial episodes, reality television where the danger is not produced so much as survived on camera.
Deadliest Catch does not need a writers' room for weather. Thom Beers's Discovery series premiered in 2005 and became a long-running flagship: cameras riding with Alaskan crab fishermen through brutal seasons, nature and labor and mortality without a studio audience. Captains Phil Harris, Sig Hansen, Keith Colburn, Johnathan Hillstrand. A deck that does not care about your edit. Danger not so much produced as survived on camera. Workplace documentary-reality elevated into high-stakes seasonal event television.…
Filed against
- Phil Harris as Captain
Phil Harris was the captain on Deadliest Catch, Discovery’s 2000s Alaskan crab-boat flagship — weather as the antagonist, a deck that does not care about your edit. Labor documentary as series, memorial episodes, reality television where…
- Sig Hansen as Captain
Sig Hansen captains Deadliest Catch as himself — Alaskan crab boats, weather as the antagonist, a deck that does not care about your edit. Discovery labor documentary as flagship, danger survived on camera rather than produced. TV Flash…
- Keith Colburn as Captain
Keith Colburn captains through Deadliest Catch as Discovery labor documentary, not a produced dare — Alaskan crab boats, weather as the antagonist, a deck that does not care about your edit. Reality television survived on camera. TV Flash…
- Johnathan Hillstrand as Captain
Johnathan Hillstrand captained Deadliest Catch as Alaskan crab-boat weather — Discovery labor documentary as flagship, a deck that does not care about your edit, danger not so much produced as survived on camera. Captain Phil Harris lore,…