Ever since The Blue Planet debuted greater than twenty years in the past, we’ve been residing in a very fruitful period of nature docs from the likes of the BBC and all the numerous streamers. With all of that celebrity-voiced competitors, it’s laborious to do one thing new within the house, however Apple TV Plus managed it by taking a look at one thing previous — actually previous.
The primary season of Prehistoric Planet had all the trimmings of a conventional wildlife documentary, proper right down to the reassuring voice of Sir David Attenborough, however used them to discover the lives of dinosaurs 66 million years in the past. And it labored, providing such a completely realized imaginative and prescient of the previous that it virtually appeared actual. So naturally, now we have a sequel, which doesn’t do so much new except for providing much more (and sometimes a lot stranger) creatures to look at. Then once more, it doesn’t actually have to vary a lot. I imply, have you ever seen the feathered, fuzzy raptor infants?
Have a look at this man:
Picture: Apple
Like the primary season, Prehistoric Planet 2 is a weeklong occasion, with a brand new episode releasing day by day beginning on Might twenty second. Every is constructed round a selected theme, like swamps, oceans, or badlands. Primarily, they’re very dramatized variations of animal habits. You’ll see infants born, creatures searching, and many mating rituals. The distinction, in fact, is that Prehistoric Planet 2 isn’t primarily based on actual footage of animals however CG recreations of dinosaurs and different prehistoric creatures.
A part of what makes it work is the acquainted formulation. It’s structured similar to the massive nature docs, most notably Planet Earth, so it each appears and seems like a wildlife present you’ve in all probability already seen. The visuals are notably key. The creatures on this present are so efficient that you simply don’t actually should droop a lot disbelief as a result of it appears such as you’re really watching actual animals on digicam (no less than more often than not).
That was all true final yr, and it stays true with Prehistoric Planet 2. However the brand new season does add a couple of wrinkles to the formulation to maintain it attention-grabbing. For starters, it actually expands past the dinosaurs we’ve all seen loads of instances to make for some attention-grabbing tales. The second episode has an enchanting thread a couple of herd of Isisaurus, which increase their younger in a crate surrounded by volcanic exercise with the intention to maintain them secure from predators. A few of the most attention-grabbing creatures aren’t even dinosaurs: the primary episode contains an lovely vegetarian crocodile (Simosuchus) and some mammals, together with this huge fella known as Adalatherium:
Picture: Apple
There are flightless seabirds, 17-foot-long predatory fish, primitive geese, and even swarms of hundreds of thousands and hundreds of thousands of flies. The ocean episode spends a superb chunk of time devoted to Ammonites. That’s to not say there aren’t “basic” dinos. You’ll nonetheless see loads of T. rex and different big predators searching, together with an unbelievable number of various kinds of raptors. However the second season does an amazing job at balancing the anticipated with detours into the stranger and lesser-known areas of prehistoric life.
It’s nonetheless largely a present extra centered on leisure than training, however Prehistoric Planet 2 does go a step additional in explaining a number of the science behind the present. In season 1, Attenborough would finish every episode by directing viewers to a web site the place they might study extra. This time, the episodes finish with numerous consultants explaining how they know a sure factor, whether or not it’s the best way gigantic flying reptiles hunted or how a whale-sized predator was capable of transfer so quick. You even get some perception into the triceratops’ distinctive horn.
Actually, what Prehistoric Planet 2 reveals is that the primary season wasn’t profitable purely due to novelty. There are a lot extra attention-grabbing tales to discover 66 million years in the past — and one of the best ones are the strangest.
Prehistoric Planet 2 begins streaming on Apple TV Plus on Might twenty second.
