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.