Review | What to stream this weekend: evolution, climate change and extinction in Earth on BBC Earth with David Attenborough’s heir Chris Packham
- BBC Earth looks at billions of years of life, death, climate change, mass extinction events and evolution on our planet in the five-part series Earth
- In Castaway Diva on Netflix, Park Eun-bin stars as aspiring pop singer Seo Mok-ha, who spends 15 years on a desert island, is rescued and dreams of stardom
Life on the good ship Earth is still steaming towards the rocks and an increasingly warm denouement – and the BBC will probably be there, filming until the final, fiery moment.
That said, the coup de grâce is more likely to come with a prolonged whimper than a bang, according to Earth (BBC Earth), sounding like the ecological equivalent of death by 1,000 cuts.
The messenger with the bad news this time is Chris Packham, heir to the natural history broadcasting empire of the venerable David Attenborough and another potential lifesaver sent by the corporation – if only we’d listen.
And there’s little excuse (beyond BBC production titles sometimes sounding similar and confusing) for not taking heed of Earth: a planetary biography, featuring the usual peerless photography, which makes a readily understandable confection of the globe’s dauntingly complex geology and biology.
But unlike other series in the canon, this one throws in the occasional, cheeky, devil’s advocate argument to retain our attention – such as suggesting that extinction might be a good thing because it allows new species to flourish. And then asking if we really want that on our collective conscience.
Condensing billions of years of turbulent scientific history into five hour-long chunks, with a “pivotal moment” addressed in each, it takes us from overheating to deep-freezing; from vampire amoebae and clumps of seabed slime to the evolution of elaborate mammals.
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And ultimately? The viewer feels powerless. As Packham notes, “The world is more indifferent to us than we care to admit.”
The more the series mentions the importance of interconnected ecosystems, the more one realises that we might prove to be little more than an erratum in the web of life. Because this revolving rock will do whatever it likes, without stopping to ask our permission.
Going overboard
The rock is not an isolated Pacific island. It’s on the route of the ferry service from this Robina Crusoe’s seaside hometown to Seoul, the South Korean capital, making a 15-minute stay more likely than 15 years.
But her long absence establishes the show’s themes: determination in the face of crushed ambition, obsession with sometimes clay-footed heroes and continually beating the odds in a cruel world.
Fortunately for the rescued Mok-ha, her dreams are resurrected by her lifelong idol: the series’ most colourful character, Yoon Ran-joo (Kim Hyo-jin), a sadly derided performer who once towered over the Korean pop-scape until, during her super fan’s exile, she lost herself at the bottom of a wine bottle.
It is, of course, Ran-joo, rather than Mok-ha, who is really washed up.
Their symbiotic relationship – with unsettling interjections from petulant, irritating reporter Kang Woo-hak (Cha Hak-yeon), who thinks he used to be Mok-ha’s best friend at school – spins through 12 sometimes overlong episodes.
The first Castaway Diva season recently wrapped; whether an encore will follow the crescendo could depend on the number of perceived narrative bum notes.
