‘Prehistoric Planet’ — Apple TV Plus Review
Prehistoric Planet, a documentary series 65 million years in the making, is finally here.
The five-part event, which will premiere a new episode on Apple TV Plus every night from May 23rd through May 27th, is executive produced by Jon Favreau and Mike Gunton. They teamed up with the BBC Studios Natural History Unit to travel back in time and place cameras on different places on Earth, back when the dinosaurs walked this planet. Then, they edited together all the footage and had renowned nature documentary presenter Sir David Attenborough (Planet Earth) walk us through what is going on in each scene. Or at least that’s what it feels like.
Science and technology have combined to create one of the most educational experiences on dinosaurs yet, a documentary that works both as a scientific achievement and a technological miracle. Prehistoric Planet feels like something made 70 years after the dinosaurs from Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom escaped Isla Nublar and started to coexist with humans. This is sold through both its astonishing visual effects and the excruciating details that are known about the ways they lived on this planet.
Each episode centers around a domain land dominated by the animals on the prehistoric Earth — coasts, deserts, freshwater, ice worlds, and forests. The filmmakers masterfully combined digitally-created dinosaurs with award-winning wildlife filmmaking, and sometimes it’s difficult to figure out which parts are real and which ones are not. Besides the fact that these animals no longer exist, there is virtually no difference between the way Prehistoric Planet was approached and any other nature documentary. Animals appear in their ecosystem, and we get to experience their different struggles to survive, or their sneaky ways to hunt their prey.
The only difference, of course, is that the documentarians, teaming up with paleontologists, get to create these situations at will so that they can explore all sides of how dinosaurs lived their lives. The different episodes also include state-of-the-art research, from having the Velociraptor covered in feathers, to featuring two newly-discovered species: the Qianzhousaurus from Eastern China and the Nanuqsaurus.
Sir David Attenborough, recently named Champion of the Earth by the United Nations, is another standout of the docuseries. Of course, this is no surprise, but his gentle and calm voice helps us navigate through the different episodes, and makes the experience even more rewarding. The scripts are far from technical, which makes the episodes approachable to anyone that doesn’t know the first thing about dinosaurs.
Another highlight of the docuseries is the music, which should not be a surprise either. Favreau clearly went down his giant phonebook and pulled Hans Zimmer’s number out — the two recently worked together on the highly profitable 2019 reimagining of The Lion King. Zimmer is credited as the co-creator of the (outstanding) theme, along with Andrew Christie, as well as the score, which also includes the work of Anže Rozman and Kara Talve. While it may not reach as high as Alan Silvestri’s theme for the Cosmos documentary, “All That Is or Ever Was or Ever Will Be”, it still manages to elevate the material further up and helps the audience immerse into the world the filmmakers have created for us.
If the trailer already sold you on Prehistoric Planet being an incredible experience, it will not disappoint. If you are looking for the next great nature documentary series, you have found your place. However, if you are just looking for the a new adventure with dinosaurs eating humans, I would recommend waiting a couple more weeks and instead checking out Jurassic World: Dominion, which will probably end up as the second-best dinosaur experience of the year.
Prehistoric Planet will debut each of its five episodes every night from May 23rd to May 27th, on Apple TV Plus. Thanks to Apple TV Plus for letting us see it in advance.
If you haven’t watched it yet, here’s the series’ main trailer:
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
