Well, so we do have areas of agreement! The Mayan decipherment is great science, a great story, and well told by the Nova episode.
My favorite Nova is the one that retells the events of Cliff Stoll’s book The Cuckoo’s Egg, “The KGB, the Computer, and Me.”
Although “Submarines, Secrets, and Spies” sticks out in my mind, also.
I was wondering if it was just me. David Pogue would be fine for a children’s science show but I too am usually disappointed when he is doing the episode.
One of my favorites Nova episodes was http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/nature/lord-ants.html
Pogue and his attempt at funny is there to appeal to a younger crowd. While a worthy goal it distracts from significant learning.
Yeah, every episode he does seems to feel dumbed-down and not of the quality you’ve come to expect from Nova.
Any pilot / aviation enthusiast would at least feel a pang in their guy when that B29 goes into flame…
Brian
“Vikings in America” has always been a favorite of mine—for sentimental reasons, if nothing else.
I was lucky/unlucky enough to know what happened to that B-29 long before the episode came out…I’ve never been able to bring myself to actually watch it. 
Off the top of my head and fairly recent I’d like to second this mention/nomination. Good stuff.
“The Case of the Bermuda Triangle”
That recent episode about the Chelyabinsk meteorite. I found it quite interesting that it did not collide with Earth; we collided with it. And when the story first aired, I surmised that a lot of people who spoke Russian had a good chuckle at all the profanity that aired on American television, and this was indeed addressed in the meantime. There were a LOT of bleeps on that show!
Back in the 90s they did a great episode about the first Hubble Space Telescope repair mission. Followed the astronauts through training, and then the mission itself, which was dramatic.
The Miracle of Life is available from Netflix, as well as a bunch of newer stuff.
I coulda sworn Miracle was earlier than '82/'83. Huh. 
Horizon, the BBC Science documentary that has worked in co-production with WGBH, is on BBC 2 tonight at nine fifteen GMT.
You may have to do some slightly duplicitous stuff to watch it live!
Tried to give a link to the Guardians site but it seems the papers Cat has been let lose around the back of the Server!
Peter
You really couldn’t write the plot more dramatically without including Nazis or aliens.
I have not seen it yet but did find that YouTube has it – a 58min video, and haven’t watched that yet but if it’s 58mins then I’m guessing it’s the entire show.
Wikipedia has a page on it, for the B-29 named Kee Bird. Am reading that now…
ETA: link to YouTube’s mobile version of the video. Or just search on B-29 Frozen in Time – it’s easy to find the 58min version, and its smaller sub-parts.
Just a heads up for anyone looking for “The Case of the Ancient Astronaut” on you tube: I found three different videos, and all them came from the same VHS tape with really bad sound and video quality.
If anyone has a link to a better quality video, I’d love to see it.
Just about all of them (and I’ve watched them starting in the 1970’s). With so much junk science on the air, it’s nice to see some good explanations of interesting science.
But: cuttlefish! It was just so unexpected and different.
Also anything debunking conspiracy theories (JFK, 911, etc.)
A non-Nova episode I really liked with the Inside Nature’s Giants about sperm whales.
Well that was a weekend well spent for me!
I watched the cuttlefish one, the mayan one, and re-watched the Fabric of the Cosmos series.
I got about halfway into the Case of the Ancient Astronauts but then got annoyed by the old-timeyness of it. Plus, knowing that there wasn’t going to be onscreen flip out kind of took the wind of enthusiasm out of it for me.
Now I want MORE! MOOAAAR!!! Specifically, any suggestions for architectural ones?
Has there ever been a Nova episode where they were wrong? I don’t mean outdated, but wrong? I recently realized that I’m highly skeptical of any documentaries that aren’t Nova related. I got about halfway through a documentary about the Great Pyramids which started out sane enough, but ended up with all sorts of “proof” on how there was a world wide conspiracy to the great structures being built by people with “high reasoning” and “advanced technology”.
One of the ones I posted about earlier, Ancient Computer, is about an artifact found in an ancient shipwreck. It’s really an amazing find–a mechanical device that was 1,000 years ahead of its time. The NOVA story is very much about how researchers spent decades studying the device and eventually unlocking many of its secrets.
^:smack: You said “architectural” and I was thinking “archaeological.” Sorry. :o