Link to the announcement page:
This reminds me of the old BBC show Walking with Dinosaurs, which seriously blew my mind when I was a kid. It holds up surprisingly well, aside from some aspects of the science that have become outdated. I’m beyond excited to see what this new show is like!
That (i.e., “Walking with Dinosaurs”) was the one that introduced the Liopleurodon by having a large land carnivore leaning over the water and telling us we’re about to see an apex predator at work. Then something splashes up, a pair of jaws snap around the land carnivore, and this huge body rises then crashes back down with prey in jaw… yes?
Thanks for the heads-up. This should be great! All in one week, too.
On top of everything else, Hans Zimmer is a fantastic composer that I have long admired. From his Wiki entry:
His works include The Lion King (for which he won the Academy Award for Best Original Score in 1995), Gladiator, The Last Samurai, the Pirates of the Caribbean series, The Dark Knight trilogy, Inception, Interstellar and Dunkirk. He won a second Academy Award for Dune in 2022.
Yeah, that’s the one!
So based on the dinos we saw in the trailer and some of the marketing material, everything is late cretaceous (and we’ll be seeing quite a few tyrannosaurs* from around the world). Is it all North America/Asia too? I’m not sure what the sauropods were, are there titanosaurs in that part of the world or were they limited to the southern hemisphere by then?
The decision to limit the geographic and temporal scope is a really interesting one. I think it could be a very good decision if it lets them go extra in depth. But I really do hope we see more in the future, I’d LOVE to see what they do with Spinosaurus (although I suppose the debate may be too unsettled there, and that could be an easy way to look real dated in 20 years).
*this is the wrong term, I think. I’m looking for the group that includes T rex but also Qianzhousaurus or Yutyrannus
There’s a new trailer out, with some closer looks at some of the shots we saw before, as well as some brand new critters!
There’s a related full-length Attenborough documentary called Dinosaurs: The Final Day that is separate from this series. It’s about the amazing fossil field in North Dakota that seems to contain a snapshot record of the events immediately following the asteroid impact. A review of the documentary here:
A thread about it here:
Personally I was delighted to see an actual high-quality documentary about this amazing discovery that had previously only been discussed in a scientific paper and a couple of magazine articles.
One brief glimpse of what looked like a little critter being tongue-grabbed by a wide-mouthed thing - most likely a koolasuchus, the anomalously late temnospondyle. Its an early Cretaceous Gondwanan [now SE Australian] amphibian.
I have to say that the trailer looks superb.
PS - just saw that Koolasuchus also was declared state of Victoria’s official state fossil a few months ago. I hope all this celebrity doesn’t go to its flat semi-circular head.
Unfortunately - science and scientific research moves on. It now appears that the sise of the Liopleurodon was … slightly over-estimated in the TV series.
About 200% over-estimated.
In Walking with Dinosaurs, the Liopleurodon was pictured at about 25m long. It now seems more likely that it was about 10m long - at max.
But, yeah - it was an awesome opening scene.
I assumed it was Beelzebufo. Though they’re from Madagascar and that’s also southern hemisphere
Good call. Who will win the Battle of the Giant Gondwanan Amphibians for fame and stardom - just one more compelling reason to watch!
Well deserved!
Watched Episode 1 - Coasts yesterday. Walking with Dinosaurs has finally been surpassed - greatly surpassed, I have to say.
Loved the two mosasaurs fighting over the grooming spot in the reef. It was an awesome action sequence that nevertheless showed these creatures as living animals, not movie monsters. They really nailed the mosasaurus in general, they really felt like aquatic monitor lizards.
David Attenborough could read a math book and make it thrilling
is there any chance of this being on BBCA eventually?
Series 2 of the amazingly good Prehistoric Planet. Yes, its Beelzebufo.
Also, if you’ve been following the complete rethinking of late Cretaceous giant pterosaurs in the past decade or so, you’ll see this all visualised in this series.
Generally the series is notable in presenting a much more balanced view of the major animal groups loitering around the Earth at this time, so you’ll see marine reptiles, pterosaurs, fish, technical birds, amphibian [aforementioned Beelzebufo] and a few bugs. Five chefs hats.