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Alaskan Bush Star Oddly Posts His Own Death Announcement

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A reality star’s fake obituary sent his own fan base into a panic overnight.

On Tuesday, July 17, 2018, Solomon “Bear” Brown of Discovery Channel’s Alaskan Bush People posted what looked like his own death notice on Instagram, complete with a “1987=2018” lifespan and language calling him a “loved son and devoted brother.” Fans reacted exactly how you’d expect — confusion, grief, and a scramble to figure out what had actually happened to the 31-year-old. Brown deleted the post within hours and clarified that he was very much alive.

• Brown’s now-deleted Instagram post described him as a “loved son and devoted brother [who] will be missed,” listing the dates “1987=2018.”
• He followed up with a clarification: “Hey everybody!! Sorry about the confusion. Death [is] very serious! It’s definitely not a joke!!”
• Brown said the post was promotional content for “a homemade movie” he’d been working on since his time in Los Angeles.

The Post That Sparked Real Panic

There was nothing subtle about the wording Brown used. A fake obituary format, a closed date range standing in for a lifespan, and no context attached — the combination read as a genuine death announcement to anyone scrolling their feed. Given that Brown has spent years building a following through the Brown family’s Discovery Channel show, his followers took the post at face value and started sharing condolences almost immediately.

The reaction spread fast enough that Brown felt compelled to address it directly rather than let the confusion linger. He deleted the original post and posted an explanation clarifying he hadn’t died, coupled with an apology for how the message landed.

“Those posts are from a project! I thought I made that clear!! I’ve been working on a homemade movie since my time in LA!”

Brown’s Explanation

According to Brown, the fake death notice wasn’t a prank at fans’ expense — it was tied to a personal creative project he’d been developing since spending time in Los Angeles. He described it as a “homemade movie” and said the post was promotional material meant to build intrigue around that work, not an announcement about his real-life status.

He thanked fans for their concern while reiterating that death is “very serious” and “definitely not a joke,” acknowledging the tone of the original post had crossed a line he hadn’t intended.

Renewed Scrutiny for the Brown Family

Even with Brown’s clarification, the stunt reopened old wounds for a show that has weathered its share of authenticity questions. Alaskan Bush People has previously faced skepticism over storylines that critics called staged, disputes about the circumstances surrounding a cabin fire, and legal trouble tied to falsified Alaskan residency claims. A fake death post — however unintentional the fallout — gave critics fresh ammunition to question how much of the Brown family’s on-camera and online life is genuinely spontaneous.

That skepticism tracks with a broader pattern across reality television, where cast members occasionally blur the line between promotion and reality until backlash forces a walk-back — the kind of behavior chronicled in pieces like Reality Stars Who Treat Their Co-Stars Like Trash. Social media missteps by public figures trying to generate buzz have also become their own recurring story, something covered at length in Actors Who Ruined Their Careers On Social Media.

Brown never named the “homemade movie” or gave a release timeline, so for now the fake obituary is the only piece of promotional material anyone’s actually seen from it. Whether that project ever surfaces publicly, or just quietly disappears the way plenty of “indie” side projects do, is the only loose thread left dangling from this one.