Planet Earth: Complete BBC Series [Blu-ray]

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Editorial reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
Not only is Planet Earth one of the most jaw-dropping, ambitious, nature documentaries the BBC has ever produced, it's now taken on another role: as a superb demonstration disc for the potential of HD DVD and Blu-ray.

Spread over a good ten hours, the series charts life and nature in dozens upon dozens of differing locations around the earth. Diligently and warmly narrated by Sir David Attenborough, Planet Earth calmly goes close in on its subject matter when required, and then pulls out some stunning perspective shots that are simply breathtaking. It's hard to come up with the right superlatives to do the photography on the programme any kind of justice, and that it's married to such fascinating subject matter is all the better.

And if you think the original broadcast of Planet Earth was something special, or you were gobsmacked by the picture quality on DVD, just wait until you see it in 1080p HD glory. Particularly some of the broader shots here are all but without parallel, and it's a real reward for those who have invested ahead of the crowd in high definition technology.

Presented over five discs, and matching wonderful content to spot-on visual presentation, Planet Earth is now not just a landmark in nature documentary film making. It's also a chartermark of quality for just what HD DVD and Blu-ray can offer. A stunning release, in more than one sense. --Jon Foster

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Customer reviews

review by: travelmike date: 2008-05-24 rating:
Blu-ray customers are being short-changed.
A warning: It seems that the BBC has been cheese-paring and, as a result, the disc 5 extra included with the blu-ray version of this excellent series, entitled 'Natural World', is not at all the same as the disc 5 extra included with the standard DVD version of the series. Let me explain: Disc 5 of the blu-ray version, entitled 'Natural World', contains two separate documentaries; one entitled 'Desert Lions', and the second entitled 'Snow Leopards'. These two middling documentaries, also narrated by David Attenborough, although certainly watchable, do seem rather like an add-on, almost to fill space. In my opinion, they fall well short of the outstanding viewing quality of the main series, as shown on the first four discs in this five-disc box set.

However, the disc 5 extra included with the standard DVD version of 'Planet Earth' is entitled 'The Future', and this contains three excellent documentaries. These three documentaries (namely; ' Saving Species'; 'Into The Wilderness' and 'Living Together') amount to one complete whole: namely, a cry for action to save the future, our future. This is about global warming, habitat destruction, poaching, pollution, global overpopulation - all the threats to those magnificent animals and habitats - and ultimately ourselves - that we have just seen in the main series. The use of film footage from the main series (and some new film clips) - supported by a superb commentary both from the film-makers themselves and experts, including David Attenborough and others - carries a real impact. To give one example, the polar bear and global warming. Blu-ray customers never get to see the full picture about how this magnificent animal faces an increasing struggle to survive as global warming destroys its habitat - because this disc 5 gem is included as part of 'The Future' documentaries on the disc 5 extra with the standard DVD boxset, but not with the disc 5 extra of the blu-ray DVD boxset. Yet, in my opinion, these 'The Future' documentaries are essential viewing. So it really is inexcusable that they have been excluded from the disc 5 extra included with the blu-ray version of the 'Planet Earth' series.

The BBC are completely out of order. Why did they do this? They have no excuse; there surely would have been plenty of room on a blu-ray disc to have included these - as well as the two films about desert lions and snow leopards. Buyers of the blu-ray version are being short-changed by this omission.

My advice: Buy the standard DVD version of this outstanding series. You will then get the complete series - with the addition of the three excellent 'The Future' documentaries on disc 5, which are excluded from the blu-ray version. And furthermore, as I found, the viewing quality of the standard DVD version (which. like the blu-ray version, also includes 5.1 surround sound) will be outstanding on a standard DVD player. (And those with a HD TV could always consider buying a cheap multi-region DVD upscaler like the Philips DVP5980, or similar, rather than a blu-ray player).

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review by: puppydogmkii date: 2008-05-02 rating:
Jaw-dropping
Watching this release on a Full HD set is, for lack of a better word, astonishing. I watched this series with my jaw open, and at times was actually moved to tears by the stunning beauty of the images of our planet on show here. This is what I invested in Blu ray for, and time and time again, hi def proves not be a marketing gimmick but a genuine next-step experience in home entertainment; the amount of pin-point detail, dimensionality and scale takes you into the images, so that you feel as if you are there, and in this regard Blu ray is involving in a way DVD cannot match. The wonderful thing about Planet Earth on Blu ray is that the stunning image actually makes clear the filmmakers intentions-not necessarily to give an in-depth education, but to remind us of the beauty and awe inherent to our troubled planet, and the vast open vistas, mountains, plains on show here are enough to make anyone remember why our planet is so very special and worth saving. If that isn't reason enough to invest in this set, I don't know what is.

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review by: DTA date: 2008-04-25 rating:
Should have been better
This is a very disappointing release & it should have been much better. The biggest let down is that the UK version runs at 1080i NOT 1080p as some reviews state. A "flagship" release like this should be 1080p. Also - due to technical restrictions during filming, many scenes show no discernable difference in quality to the conventional DVD release. The making-of segments are also missing & when you consider that at the time of writing this is twice the cost of the DVD, I would advise any potential buyers to buy that instead.

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review by: date: 2008-02-29 rating:
Brilliant but not better than HD DVD!!
I have watched the whole of this series, I must say it was fantastic and the HD quality is second to none. But...I have watched the series on Blu-ray and HD DVD and HD DVD is far superior to Blu-ray by a mile. It is a shame that HD DVD has died a death and Blu-ray has won the battle in the end. It was like the VHS & Betamax war..VHS won but everyone knows that Betamax was the better player and the same goes for HD DVD v Blu-ray. I give it 5/5 on HD DVD and 3/5 on Blu-ray.


review by: date: 2008-02-25 rating:
Amazing, yet with some image quality issues
NOTE: The following review only concerns the footage from the original series (Disc 1-4). Disc no 5 is sub par both in terms of image quality (I'm 80% sure most of it was filmed in standard definition) and content itself.

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I bought this collection not knowing what to expect. I haven't seen it before in SD or on TV, and I was expecting the average documentary various wildlife TV channels offer now and then. However, it goes beyond that in all aspects: image quality, amount of information (and the way it ts presented) , and degree of novelty. Even for the average Discovery viewer this collection has so much to offer: from surreal, breathtaking landscapes presented in a superb quality 1080i format to footage of rarely seen predators pursuing their prey. Whoever is still unconvinced of the benefits HD video has to offer should rent or buy this one... in fact it's so revealing that for somebody like me - watching this for the first time in HD - it's almost impossible to imagine this documentary is standard DVD format (the few scenes shot in SD are quite easily spotted).
And this brings us to the cons... although the series was advertised as being almost entirely shot in HD (1080i on the box and 1080p as mentioned by various Internet sources), on one or two occasions the image clearly degrades to SD quality (presumably 576i). That is, thankfully, only for a few brief moments. What happens more often is a certain degree of softness/blurriness in the footage occasionally accompanied by grain-like noise artefacts, which doesn't quite match the top quality characteristic to the rest of the documentary. It definitely not DVD material, but it's not full HD stream either... my guess is that they either shot in 720p format (which is still high definition, alright, but not to the fullest) subsequently upscaling it, or the footage was rather old. It might not be noticeable on those "HD ready" TV sets (e.g. 1366x768) because their resolution is only slightly higher than 720p format, but if you have cutting edge LCD display with resolution of 1900x1080 or higher you'll probably see this. Given the price of this collection (already substantial in SD), I don't think they should get away with it that easy...
But, don't get me wrong, for more than 70% of the documentary the image stays clear and sharp, and the colours are so rich and intense that there's no better way to experience the transition from winter to spring... other than being there, of course.
Also, please have in mind that some footage is reused from one episode to another. Arguably there will be some overlap between "From Pole to Pole" and "Ice Worlds", but the fact that they used the same footage for certain action scenes gives the impression of sloppy, cheap work... 40 £ cheap that is!

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