Our Planet

Netflix's Our Planet arrived in April 2019 with a simple but urgent question: what does life on Earth look like right now, and what are we doing to it? Narrated by David Attenborough, the series pairs the scale of a nature epic with a climate-change thesis. It is not just a parade of pretty animals; it is a report from the front lines of a changing world. Across two seasons and 12 episodes, the show moves from frozen poles to deep oceans, from grasslands to rainforests, always circling back to how warming temperatures and habitat loss reshape the story. The creative team behind Planet Earth and Blue Planet brought their usual craft: long lenses, patience, and a knack for finding drama in a hunt or a migration. Attenborough's narration gives the footage a steady, avuncular gravity. He can make a walrus haul-out feel like a thriller and a fungal network feel like a revelation. The tone is family-friendly (TV-PG), but the content does not soft-pedal the bad news. Scenes of shrinking ice and depleted fishing grounds sit alongside moments of startling beauty, and the show expects you to hold both in your head. Audiences responded. An 8.53 rating from nearly 500 votes on the usual trackers puts it in the upper tier of nature docs. The first season drew praise for its photography and its refusal to separate spectacle from consequence. The second, arriving in June 2023, doubled down on solutions as well as problems. As a critic, I would call it essential viewing for anyone who thinks they have seen it all in this genre. It is ambitious, occasionally preachy, and often stunning.[edit]