Earth Story

An absolutely brilliant mini-series which the BBC has bizarrely chosen not to release as a region 2 DVD in Europe. A friend gave me my Asian copy as a present, having located it only after doing a fair amount of online searching. As the previous reviewer said, this is the presenter's own voyage of discovery as well as our own. The programmes have been exceptionally well put together, the series is logically structured, and the subject matter is never dry or dull. I have an 8-year old nephew who asks to see this each time he comes to visit, in preference to Harry Potter or a cartoon. This should be compulsory viewing for everyone, particularly children with enquiring minds. I only have 2 small complaints: the series is too short, and at the same time it is easy to watch too much of it at once and end up with square eyes! Congratulations to the BBC: programmes like this really justify the license fee.

Earth Story is a masterpiece in the way it clearly describes our present understanding of the geological processes. If anyone had said I would sit through eight programmes about geology, watch them again and then a third time, I would not have believed them. It gives the information clearly and straight, without patronising. This is in contrast with the BBC's current hyper-active style which uses a succession of irrelevant images when dealing with scientific subjects and which has to tell everything three times. In Earth Story the camera-work illustrates the points, the people who made the discoveries explain their contributions well, and it is held together by Aubrey Manning's intelligent narrative. Would the BBC please go back to making science programmes like this? I can only suppose that the voters who gave it less than 10/10 were forced to watch it at school.

I originally watched Earth Story when it was shown for the first time on BBC2, and I'm currently watching it again on UKTV History ten years later.

It is truly a brilliant series, explaining every facet of the Earth's many geological processes: such as plate tectonics, subduction, spreading, the carbon dioxide cycle and iron deposition as well as how those processes interact with the planet's meteorology and biology in a complex dance. It also reveals how the Earth is also reliant on and affected by the other elements of The Solar System.

Personally, I don't see how you can get to the conclusion of the previous reviewer. Manning doesn't get involved in climate change, largely because the programme pre-dates the current debate and because the series sets out to be instructive about the natural life-cycle of the planet as opposed the effect of humans on that planet.

Manning is more interested in a planet that's existed for several billion years and is - as far as we can tell at the moment - unique, certainly in this solar system. The fact that humans who currently infest the planet may well cause the whole thing to go pear-shaped is outside the scope of the programme which is great because it avoids turning the programme into a polemic.

All in all, it's an instructive, well-told story that is - as previously mentioned - an example of how the BBC can make great programmes when it abides by the "mission to educate" that was the blueprint of Sir John Reith when the corporation was established.

John Downes you're right that the series is just brilliant, though wrong about this program debunking climate change, as it didn't do this or attempt to. Search and watch 'Prof. Aubrey Manning - Part 1 - Learning to Live with our Planet' and he shows the facts about climate change.

The viewer is taken on a voyage of discovery in 8 episodes from the first observations of geological curiosities and Wegener's continental jigsaw to the mechanisms deep in the Earth that drive them. The evidence is there for anyone to see if only you know where to look. Aubrey Manning is superb as a presenter, a biologist making his own discovery that life and the deep geology of our planet are intimately linked - neither can do without the other. Manning not only shows new ideas, but is taking us on his own journey of discovery, his fascination as new explanations unfold draws you into this detective story of our planet's history and the mechanisms that drive it to this day.

The Earth emerges as a quite extraordinary, unique and very special living planet which we should marvel at and respect. This is the BBC at its very best.