Planet Earth

2006 • Discovery Channel
4.7
942 reviews
TV-PG
Rating
Eligible
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Season 1 episodes (11)

1 From Pole to Pole
3/5/06
The lives of animals and plants are dominated by the sun and fresh water which trigger seasonal journeys. The latest technology and aerial photography enable the Planet Earth team to track some of the greatest mass migrations. In the Arctic spring, a mother polar bear and cubs emerge from their winter den. They have just two weeks to cross the frozen sea before it melts and they become stranded. Share the most intimate and complete picture of polar bear life ever filmed. Further south, time-lapse cameras capture the annual transformation created by the Okavango floods.
2 Mountain
3/12/06
Tour the mightiest mountain ranges, starting with the birth of a mountain at one of the lowest places on Earth and ending at the summit of Everest. One of Earth's rarest phenomena is a lava lake that has been erupting for over 100 years. The same forces built the Simian Mountains where troops of gelada baboons live, nearly a thousand strong. In the Rockies, grizzlies build winter dens inside avalanche-prone slopes. The programme also brings us astounding images of a snow leopard hunting on the Pakistan peaks, a world first.
3 Fresh Water
3/19/06
Fresh water defines the distribution of life on land. Follow the descent of rivers from their mountain sources to the sea. Watch spectacular waterfalls, fly inside the Grand Canyon and explore the wildlife in the world's deepest lake. Planet Earth captures unique and dramatic moments of animal behaviour: a showdown between smooth-coated otters and mugger crocodiles, deep-diving long tailed macaques, massive flocks of snow geese on the wing and a piranha frenzy in the perilous waters of the world's largest wetland.
4 Caves
3/26/06
The Cave of Swallows in Mexico is a 400m vertical shaft, deep enough to engulf the Empire State Building. The Lechuguilla cave system in the USA is 193km long with astonishing crystal formations. Caves are remarkable habitats with equally bizarre wildlife. Cave angel fish cling to the walls behind waterfalls with microscopic hooks on their fins. Cave swiftlets navigate by echo-location and build nests out of saliva. The Texas cave salamander has neither eyes nor pigment. Planet Earth gets unique access to a hidden world of stalactites, stalagmites, snotites and troglodytes.
5 Deserts
4/2/06
Around 30% of the land's surface is desert, the most varied of our ecosystems despite the lack of rain. Saharan sandstorms reach nearly a mile high and desert rivers run for a single day. In the Gobi Desert, rare Bactrian camels get moisture from the snow. In the Atacama, guanacos survive by licking dew off cactus spines. The brief blooming of Death Valley triggers a plague of locusts 65km wide and 160km long. A unique aerial voyage over the Namibian desert reveals elephants on a long trek for food and desert lions searching for wandering oryx.
6 Ice Worlds
11/5/06
The Arctic and Antarctic experience the most extreme seasons on Earth. Time-lapse cameras watch a colony of emperor penguins, transforming them into a single organism. The film reveals new science about the dynamics of emperor penguin behaviour. In the north, unique aerial images show a polar bear swimming more than 100km. Diving for up to two minutes at a time. The exhausted polar bear later attacks a herd of walrus in a true clash of the titans.
7 Great Plains
11/12/06
After filming for three years, Planet Earth finally captures the shy Mongolian gazelle. Only a handful of people have witnessed its annual migration. Don't miss the bizarre-looking Tibetan fox, captured on film for the first time. Over six weeks the team follow a pride of 30 lions as they attempt to hunt elephants. Using the latest night vision equipment, the crew film the chaotic battles that ensue at close quarters.
8 Jungles
11/19/06
Jungles cover roughly three per cent of our planet yet contain 50 per cent of the world's species. Our cameras enable unprecedented views of animals living on the dark jungle floor. In the Ngogo forest the largest chimpanzee group in the world defends its territory from neighbouring groups. Other jungle specialists include parasitic fungi which infiltrate an insect host, feed on it, and then burst out of its body.
9 Shallow Seas
11/26/06
A humpback whale mother and calf embark on an epic journey from tropical coral paradises to storm ravaged polar seas. Newly discovered coral reefs in Indonesia reveal head-butting pygmy seahorses, flashing 'electric' clams and bands of sea kraits, 30-strong, which hunt in packs. Elsewhere plagues of sea urchins fell forests of giant kelp. With new ultra high-speed photography, the lightning ambushes of great white sharks on seals are slowed down as they leap out of the ocean to catch their prey. Huge bull fur seals attack king penguins, who despite their weight disadvantage, put up a spirited defence.
10 Seasonal Forests
12/3/06
The Taiga forest, on the edge of the Arctic, is a silent world of stunted conifers. The trees may be small but filming from the air reveals its true scale. A third of all trees on Earth grow here and during the short summer they produce enough oxygen to change the atmosphere. In California, General Sherman, a giant sequoia, is the largest living thing on the planet, ten times the size of a blue whale. The oldest organisms alive are bristlecone pines. At more than 4,000 years old they pre-date the pyramids. But the baobab forests of Madagascar are perhaps the strangest of all.
11 Ocean Deep
12/10/06
Life goes to extraordinary lengths to survive this immense underwater realm. A 30 tonne whale shark gorges on a school of fish and the unique overhead heli-gimbal camera reveals common dolphins rocketing at more than 30km an hour. Descending into the abyss, deep sea octopus fly with wings and vampire squid use bioluminescence to create an extraordinary colour display. The first ever time-lapse footage taken from 2,000m down captures eels, crabs and giant isopods eating a carcass, completely consuming it within three hours.

About this show

This jaw-dropping, award-winning, landmark series from the BBC's Natural History Unit presents the epic story of life on Earth. Four years in production, over 2000 days in the field, using 71 cameramen filming across 204 locations in 62 countries, this is the ultimate portrait of our planet. Using a budget of unprecedented proportions, HD photography and unique, specially developed filming techniques, Planet Earth shows you our world in a way you've never quite seen it before. Once purchased please find your episodes under My Movies & TV.

Ratings and reviews

4.7
942 reviews
Oliver Emmett Knox
July 15, 2021
BBC's "Planet Earth" is a worthy documentary series that looks at the animals and plants in remote areas on Planet Earth and the ever-changing ecosystems that look prone to collapse in the near future. Each episode focuses on the wondrous pristine natural world and on creatures and places that had never been captured on camera before. The camera-work was truly breathtaking and perfectly captures incredible animal species and their colorful and beautiful habitats. The variety of animals and ecosystems that BBC team manage to film is very spectacular. From the deepest oceans to the highest peaks, the coldest winters to the hottest deserts, Planet Earth makes the viewer feel like that he/she is experiencing the most incredible things that Planet Earth has to offer us. Each episode provides some of the most humbling images of rare animals rarely spotted in the wild, incredible time lapses and beautiful panoramic shots from space. David Attenborough provides informative and engaging narration for the viewer. This is truly a remarkable documentary series about nature ever produced by BBC! A must watch for anyone who is a fan of BBC's nature documentary series, loves nature and animals and wants to protect Mother Earth and her animals.
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Ahmed Eldawy
June 12, 2013
I bought two episodes of this series and then magically my purchase disappeared. It turns out that they reuploaded the season under a different name ("BBC" instead of "BBC America"). The old season is still there but without any episodes and it doesn't appear in search results.
29 people found this review helpful
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Harry Yu
August 23, 2013
It's possible that Chris had paid for the episodes. I've heard that some people's episodes disappeared. If that's the case, Chris has every right to complain. Plus, I do think that the episodes are bundled in with the Nexus 7 as a promotion. In that case, Planet Earth technically becomes yours to watch without extra fees. BTW I love this show; they need to make more.
52 people found this review helpful
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