Planet Earth is a 2006 nature documentary television series created by the BBC Natural History Unit, BBC Worldwide, Discovery Channel, NHK, and CBC. It took five years to make and was the most expensive nature documentary ever made by the BBC. It was also the first series to be filmed in high definition. The series won several awards, including four Emmy Awards, a Peabody Award, and an award from the Royal Television Society.

Planet Earth first aired on BBC One in the United Kingdom on March 5, 2006. By June 2007, it had been shown in 130 countries around the world. The original version was narrated by David Attenborough, while some international versions used different narrators.

The series has eleven episodes. Each episode focuses on a different biome or habitat found on Earth. After each fifty-minute episode, a ten-minute feature shows how the series was filmed.

Ten years after its first broadcast, the BBC announced a six-part sequel titled Planet Earth II. This was the first BBC series made in ultra-high-definition (4K). David Attenborough returned as narrator and presenter. A second sequel, Planet Earth III, was announced and aired in 2023.

Background

In 2001, the BBC broadcast The Blue Planet, a television series about the natural history of the world's oceans. The series received high praise, a large number of viewers, positive feedback from audiences, and many awards. It also became a very successful worldwide brand, eventually being sold to 150 countries. Audience feedback showed that people especially enjoyed the grand scale of the series, scenes showing new and unusual species, and the high-quality cinematography. Because of this success, programme commissioners wanted a follow-up series. Alastair Fothergill decided that the Natural History Unit should use a similar approach to create a series about the entire planet. This led to the idea for Planet Earth, which was commissioned by Lorraine Heggessey, then Controller of BBC One, in January 2002.

A feature film version of Planet Earth was also commissioned at the same time as the television series, following the successful model used with The Blue Planet and its companion film, Deep Blue. The film, Earth, was released worldwide from 2007 to 2009. There was also another television series, Planet Earth: The Future, which explored environmental challenges faced by some of the species and habitats shown in the main series in greater detail.

Broadcast

Planet Earth first aired on BBC One in the United Kingdom on 5 March 2006. Around the same time or in the following weeks and months, the series also began showing in other countries.

Planet Earth was broadcast internationally on various channels, including Australia on ABC and GEM, Canada on CBC and CTV, New Zealand on Prime, the Philippines on GMA Network and GMA News TV, and the United States on Discovery Channel, Velocity, Science, Animal Planet, Destination America, and BBC America.

Each episode is one hour long and includes the main program and a 10-minute segment called Planet Earth Diaries, which explains how a specific event was filmed. In the UK, the series was divided into two parts, shown in spring and autumn 2006. The first five episodes aired on BBC One at 9:00 pm on Sundays, starting on 5 March 2006. These episodes were repeated the next Saturday on BBC Two during the early evening. Along with a 2005 dramatization of Bleak House, the BBC used Planet Earth to test high-definition broadcasts. The first episode in this format was shown on 27 May 2006 on the BBC HD channel.

The first episode of the autumn series, Great Plains, was first shown publicly at the Edinburgh International Television Festival on 26 August 2006 on a large screen in Conference Square. The remaining autumn episodes began airing on 5 November 2006 on BBC One during prime time, following a repeat of the spring episodes on BBC Four. The autumn episodes were also shown simultaneously on BBC HD and repeated on BBC Four the following week.

Planet Earth was highlighted as BBC One’s featured program of the day and heavily promoted on BBC television and radio channels before and during its broadcast. The music used in BBC trailers for the series was the song "Hoppípolla" from the album Takk… by the Icelandic band Sigur Rós. After the trailers, the song was re-released due to high interest. In the United States, the series was promoted with the track "The Time Has Come" from Epic Score, composed by Gabriel Shadid and Tobias Marberger. Australian trailers initially used "Jupiter: The Bringer of Jollity" from Gustav Holst’s The Planets, but later switched to "Hoppípolla."

The BBC sold the series to many international broadcasters, including the Discovery Channel in the United States, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, China Central Television, WDR in Germany, Discovery Channel in India, Prime Television in New Zealand, and C1R for Russian broadcasts. The series was eventually shown in 130 countries.

On 25 March 2007, the series began airing in the United States on the Discovery network, starting on the Discovery Channel and Discovery HD Theater. Some changes were made to the original British version. Sigourney Weaver, an actress and conservationist, was chosen as the narrator instead of David Attenborough, as her popularity with American audiences was expected to attract more viewers. The American version used a slightly different script. The series was shown on Sundays in one 3-hour block, followed by four 2-hour blocks. The Planet Earth Diaries segments were not shown after each episode but were instead combined into a two-hour special called Planet Earth: The Filmmakers’ Story, which aired after the series finished its initial run. Later, edited versions were shown on The Science Channel, Animal Planet, and Planet Green.

In Canada, the series was not shown on the Canadian Discovery Channel, as it is owned by CTV, and the Canadian rights were exclusively sold to the CBC.

Planet Earth: The Future

The series "Planet Earth: The Future" includes three 60-minute films that focus on conservation challenges for the species and environments shown in the program. The films are narrated by Simon Poland and produced by Fergus Beeley. The series began airing on BBC Four after the ninth episode, titled "Shallow Seas."

Feature film

The BBC and GreenLight Media obtained funding for a $15 million film version of Planet Earth. This happened after the success of Deep Blue, a 2003 movie about nature shown in theaters, which used edited footage from The Blue Planet. The film was directed by Alastair Fothergill and Mark Linfield and produced by Alix Tidmarsh and Sophokles Tasioulis. Only 30% of the footage in Earth is new; the rest was edited from the television series to fit the film’s story. David Attenborough was not the narrator this time. Instead, Patrick Stewart narrated the UK version, and James Earl Jones narrated the US version.

Earth had its first showing in September 2007 at the San Sebastián International Film Festival in San Sebastián, Spain, which is part of the Basque Country. Lionsgate released the film in many countries over the next year. In the United States, it was the first movie released by Disneynature, a new nature documentary division of the Walt Disney Company. When it was released on Earth Day 2009, it earned the most money in its first weekend of any nature documentary. It became the third highest-grossing documentary ever made. Worldwide, it earned more than $108 million. In the nature documentary category, only March of the Penguins made more money at the movies.

Reception

Planet Earth received a lot of praise from critics. On the review website Rotten Tomatoes, the miniseries has a 100% approval rating based on 21 reviews, with an average score of 9.8 out of 10. The critical consensus states, "Planet Earth uses creative camera techniques and careful observation to show viewers amazing views of the world's dangers and beauty, capturing breathtaking landscapes and animals on both a large and personal scale." Time magazine's James Poniewozik listed it as one of the Top 10 New TV Series of 2007, ranking it number 4. In 2019, Planet Earth and its sequel were ranked 72nd on The Guardian's list of the 100 best TV shows of the 21st century. As of 2023, Planet Earth is ranked third on IMDb's Top 250 TV Shows.

Planet Earth: From Pole to Pole won the Science and Natural History award at the Royal Television Society Programme Awards in 2007. The RTS also gave it a Judge's Award and a Photography Award at its Craft and Design Awards. The series received two awards from the Broadcasting Press Guild for Best Documentary Series and Innovation in Broadcasting, and won Best Documentary Series at the 2007 Broadcast Awards. At the 2007 BAFTA Television Awards, Planet Earth was nominated in the Specialist Factual and Pioneer Audience Award categories but did not win. It received three nominations at the BAFTA Television Craft Awards later that year. George Fenton's original score earned him Soundtrack Composer of the Year at the 2007 Classical BRIT Awards. Planet Earth was also nominated for the NTA for Most Popular Factual Program but did not win.

Planet Earth was recognized by the American television industry, winning the Nonfiction Series award at the 59th Primetime Emmy Awards in September 2007 and receiving three additional prizes in technical categories at the Creative Arts Emmy Awards. It also received two awards from the Television Critics Association in Los Angeles in July 2007 and a Peabody Award in April 2008.

The series was celebrated at wildlife film festivals worldwide, winning multiple prizes at the Wildscreen Festival 2006, the International Wildlife Film Festival 2007, and the Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival 2007.

The experience of the filmmakers, the large scale of the production, a strong marketing campaign, and a prime-time BBC One broadcast helped Planet Earth attract many viewers when it first aired in the UK in March 2006. The first episode, "From Pole to Pole," was watched by more people than any natural history program since Attenborough and Fothergill's previous series, The Blue Planet, in 2001. The first five episodes had an average audience of 11.4 million viewers, including early evening repeats, outperforming even The Blue Planet. When the series returned to British screens after a six-month break, it remained popular but did not reach the same audience levels. The final six episodes had an average audience of 6.8 million viewers, much lower than the spring episodes but still higher than BBC One's average for that time slot. The BBC's 2007 Annual Report noted that the series "received the highest audience appreciation score of any British programme on TV this year."

In the United States, Planet Earth had strong ratings when it premiered on Discovery and Discovery HD Theater on March 25, 2007. The first three episodes (shown back to back) averaged 5.72 million viewers, with a peak of 6.07 million, the network's third-highest audience ever. It was also the most-watched Discovery program since The Flight That Fought Back in 2005.

Sequel

In February 2016, the BBC announced that a six-part follow-up series, called Planet Earth II, was ordered for release in late 2016. Sir David Attenborough was chosen to return as the narrator and host. Similar to the 2006 series, the trailer for Planet Earth II uses the song "Hoppípolla" by the band Sigur Rós.

Merchandise

The popularity of the television series Planet Earth around the world led to strong sales of related merchandise. In the United States, the series became the fastest-selling and most popular documentary DVD in Discovery Channel's history. High-definition (HD) discs generated $3.2 million in sales within two months. By the end of 2007, U.S. sales reached over 3 million units, making it the highest-grossing HD title and one of the top ten DVD titles of the year.

The Planet Earth brand was licensed to other companies to create children's books, calendars, board games, jigsaw puzzles, stationery, and cards.

A five-disc DVD box set containing the complete series (BBCDVD1883) was released in the UK for Regions 2 and 4 (PAL) on November 27, 2006, by 2 Entertain. The set includes 5.1-channel Dolby Digital surround sound and 16:9 widescreen video. Bonus features include Planet Earth Diaries (shown after each episode, as in the original TV broadcast) and Planet Earth: The Future.

In the United States, two versions of the five-disc set were released as a Region 1 (NTSC) DVD on April 24, 2007. The BBC Warner version included David Attenborough's narration from the original British broadcasts, while the Discovery Channel edition used an alternative narration by Sigourney Weaver. In the United States, the Attenborough version sold better.

Except for a small amount of rare footage, Planet Earth was filmed entirely in high-definition, making it one of the first television series to use HD disc formats.

The series was released in both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats as a five-disc Region B box set on November 12, 2007. The fifth disc replaced the standard-definition DVD's bonus features with two episodes from the BBC's Natural World series, Desert Lions and Snow Leopard: Beyond the Myth, both in high-definition.

In the United States, the series was released as a four-disc set in both high-definition formats. The Blu-ray version used single-layer BD-25 discs, and the HD DVD set used dual-layer HD DVD-30 discs. The first U.S. high-definition releases did not include the bonus disc from the standard-definition boxed set, though these extras were later added with new material in a special-edition Blu-ray released in 2011.

Four official books related to Planet Earth were published by BBC Books in 2006 and 2007:

• Planet Earth: As You've Never Seen It Before, written by Alastair Fothergill with a foreword by David Attenborough, was published in hardback on October 5, 2006 (ISBN 978-0563522126).
• The paperback edition Planet Earth: The Future was also published on October 5, 2006 (ISBN 978-0563539056). It was edited by Fergus Beeley and Rosamund Kidman Cox with a foreword by Jonathon Porritt.
• Planet Earth: The Making of an Epic Series, written by David Nicholson-Lord, was published as a paperback on March 9, 2006 (ISBN 978-0563493587).
• A hardcover collection of still images from the series, Planet Earth: The Photographs, was published on October 7, 2007 (ISBN 978-1846073465).

On November 20, 2006, a two-disc soundtrack CD was released, featuring a compilation of music composed by George Fenton for Planet Earth. The music was performed by the BBC Concert Orchestra and used during Planet Earth Live events in the United States and the United Kingdom.