The Planets is also a 1999 documentary series by the BBC, taking nine episodes to outline the nature and exploration of the solar system. It is without a doubt the most fascinating, well made and beautifully written documentary I have ever seen, this coming from a kid brought up thinking that TV = David Attenborough. The level of information presented was extremely impressive. Interviews with astronomers, astronauts and engineers are long and detailed, often providing narration for a significant portion of an episode - a far cry from the "here's our sound bite of some dude in a lab saying something cool" approach taken to scientists in too many documentaries. At least half of the series is dedicated to the history of exploration and the space race, including all the early Soviet robotic missions to the planets. The invention and engineering of the missions is mixed in with the discoveries the missions actually made.
The episodes are:
- Different Worlds - the history of modern planetary explorations, and the formation of the planets
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Terra Firma - the exploration of geological activity elsewhere in the solar system
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Giants - The discovery of the nature of the gas giants
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Moon - History of lunar exploration, and why we have a moon at all
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Star - the makeup and behaviour of the sun
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Atmosphere - follows robotic missions and the exploration of the skies of other planets
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Life - discusses the prospects for life elsewhere in the solar system, the search for water and any fossil remains on Mars
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Destiny - the future evolution of the solar system and our chances for survival in a billion years' time
The writers have stayed very clear from hyperbole, cliche and sentimentality that so often afflicts modern documentary writing. The awe inspiring nature of the subject matter provides a bit of an emotional kick with the driest and most purely informative of scientific narrations. And it is extremely informative. Unless you have advanced qualifications in all the areas the series looks at, you're going to learn quite a bit of very cool astronomical and historical trivia. As far as I'm concerned, it's pretty much impossible to be apathetic about an actual photo or sound recording from the surface of another planet.
The series also does have a very impressive soundtrack, featuring the almost obligatory Holst, and snippets of dozens of pieces of great but not exactly household classical, much of which I still haven't been able to track down and identify. There is a lot of Vivaldi, some Mahler, some Dvorak, a very long section of Shostakovich symhony number 11, I seem to remember some Bruckner, who knows what else?
The Planets showed in Australia several years ago, and for the first time ever my family was watching TV every week. It's an extremely impressive series I fully recommend to anyone with the slightest interest in the science and engineering of space exploration and the geography of the rest of our solar system. They go into a lot of the geography, in a lot of detail, something incredibly cool when you consider the geography in question is on Venus or one of the moons of Saturn. Seriously, how cool is that? You can get it on video or DVD, in Australia through the ABC.