Review of Future Is Wild, The: 5 Million Years In The Future

Introduction

If man and all his ecological blunders were wiped from the face of the earth-hopefully without causing any lasting damage to the environment how would the earth fare without him? The answer, in this programme, is very well thank you and as we won`t be around to see it here`s some speculation just how interesting it gets five million years in the future.

Getting together scientists from across Europe and United States they were given leave to speculate just how evolution might turn out for some of the current species on the planet.The result is three programmes set at 5, 100 and 200 million years in the future.

This is the first programme and set closest to the present. It is still fantastically far away when you consider as the programme does that man has only been the dominant animal on the planet between the ice ages- a mere 10,000 years. Not even an eyelash on the face of eternity.

Using modern computer modelling techniques and definitely learning from `Walking with Dinosaurs` and `Beasts`, this programme takes a giant leap forward.

Video

Considerable use of animation and CGI some more realistic than others. The stock footage used to demonstrate animals currently in existence is not so satisfactory. Some of it looks rather old and this lets down the work that has been done on the future section.

The presentation of the scientists also left something to be desired and the programme would have been much tidier if they had voiced their opinions off camera.

Audio

The sound is 5.1 and there is an interesting collection of animal sound effects in the extras. It came across well but I found the music a little on the cheesey side.
The animal noises are more atmospheric than the music and benfit from an increase in volume for creepy feeling of being surrounded by weird and wonderful creatures.

Features

I can only report on the contents here due to language difficulties on the review copy. However it looks to be a good selection that offers additional value to the disc.
Making of Documentary.
Picture gallery-featured animals
Sound Gallery-sounds from individual animals
3d Animation -three dimensionally rendered models used to base the animation on.
Biographies-of the featured academics.
Adverts for the other discs in the series

Conclusion

This really is a fascinating speculation on the future life of this planet. The array of peculiar creatures that the scientists believe could be viable is amazing. Most of the images produced using computer modelling are good enough if not up to BBC standards. The programme is let down by its additional footage and poorly presented Professors.

At only 42 minutes it is a bit steep at £10 per disc and I would have preferred a boxed set of all three at around £20.

Its potential viewers are those that enjoyed `Walking with Dinosaurs` but without a terrestrial TV airing I don`t know how it hopes to sell in vast enough quantities. It does have a considerable Web presence and has already been shown in other countries. It claims to be a genuine project of considerable scientific merit and I see no reason to dispute that. It certainly appears to be a worthwhile debate and will be enjoyed by very many viewers.