The Dinosaurs didn’t even have time to come out on Netflix before it was already at the top of the charts worldwide. It’s been a triumphant success for the miniseries produced by Steven Spielberg and narrated by Morgan Freeman, which offers us a spectacular journey into the past, helping to raise the bar for what we see on the small screen.
Another journey among the great giants of the past
The Dinosaurs is the result of a collaboration between Amblin Documentaries and Silverback Films, the same companies that gave us Life on our Planet four years ago, which made history in popular science and changed its aesthetic and narrative parameters forever. This four-part miniseries draws on the same arsenal of stunning CGI combined with live footage, Morgan Freeman at the microphone (so to speak), and a tone that combines engaging fiction with meticulous examination of that distant past. The protagonists are the dinosaurs, the terrible lizards, whose unparalleled reign is divided into four chapters: Dawn, Conquest, Empire, and Fall. These are 135 million years about which we still know much less than we would like, than we should, and for this reason they continue to fascinate and enchant us, with new pieces added every year thanks to new technologies and hypotheses. The Dinosaurs episodes last an average of 45 minutes and appear much more immediate than Life on our Planet.
In addition to being one of the smallest discovered so far, it would represent the missing link in finally explaining the evolution and spread of Alvarezsaurs.
The Dinosaurs may not have the colossal power that amazed everyone at the time, but it is more accessible, with a less gloomy or serious atmosphere. The effect will remind many of what competitor BBC did with Prehistoric Planet, later distributed on Apple TV+, and it is curious to note how the two products are very similar, but also very different. Netflix aims more for an adventure atmosphere, lining up a huge number of dinosaurs, constantly moving between sea, sky, and land, between different eras. The ultimate goal? To talk to us about evolution above all. The first eggs, the first dinosaurs, the first feathers, the first glaciers, and the first snow. Fans of the genre will recognize Edmontosaurus, Pachycephalosaurus, Vulcanodon, and Sinraptor, although these may not be familiar to the general public. Of course, there are also the absolute stars from Walt Disney’s Fantasia, such as the T-Rex, Triceratops, Ankylosaurus, Stegosaurus, and Spinosaurus.
A myth that shows no sign of abating
If there is one criticism to be made of The Dinosaurs, paradoxically it is the brevity of the series, obviously linked to the high production costs. You can never get enough of series like this. But it’s not as if things were much different in the days of series such as Nel mondo dei dinosauri (In the World of Dinosaurs) or I predatori della preistoria (Prehistoric Predators). The Dinosaurs also confirms the universal appeal of products of this type. Dinosaurs are loved by adults and children, males and females alike. They have been a scientific legend ever since William Buckland accidentally discovered the Megalosaurus on February 20, 1824, which gave rise to a new vision of life on our planet and, above all, of our role within it. Two centuries have passed since that English gentleman, a theologian as well as a geologist, the father of modern paleontology, who, however, had to wait for names of the caliber of George Cuvier and then Richard Owen for his work to be recognized in all its importance. The Dinosaurs gives us a more complex image of those creatures.
These would be plateosaurs, herbivorous dinosaurs that lived in the Late Triassic period. Here’s how they were found
This concerns behavior, attitude, mating rituals, and the ability of many of them to bridge different habitats and eras. However, theirs remains a world that Morgan Freeman’s voice describes as extremely dangerous, unstable, governed by adaptability and chance. Obviously, the last episode is the one that everyone has always hated, which is strange considering that the disappearance of the dinosaurs allowed mammals and us to take over. The result of the series ranking first among Netflix TV series was widely predictable, not only because of Steven Spielberg’s name, but because nothing has fascinated us as much as dinosaurs for two centuries. They are the total negation of the anthropomorphism with which we constantly decline creation, turning measurements and dimensions upside down, our definition of elephants as titans when compared to certain sauropods seem like domestic kittens. For this reason, above all, The Dinosaurs makes us feel like children again, because only they can make us feel tiny.
