Le règne animal

Absolutely stunning footage strung together with familiar voices narrating wonderful facts about the animals that we've grown to love has made for an amazing watch with this series. A total bingeworthy series that can be watched either with the whole family, just be ready for some questions you may have not been totally ready for yet, or alone as a grown adult. I found myself watching one after the other simply craving more and more content. I can say with complete certainty that I have always marveled at the animals in the series, but after watching the whole of seasons one and two, I have a respect for them that will never go away. I believe the way the series was produced had a lot to do with that! Great work! Hoping for another season.

Why is no one talking about this? Why does Animal only have 230 review scores on IMDB (at the time of writing)? One thing I can say for sure, it has nothing to do with the quality of this series.

Animal is a four part documentary series with each episode looking at a new type of animal. There's a mix of scenarios you've seen before and new things. And while the contents of the episodes lag behind the all time greats like Planet Earth and Our Planet, the visuals most certainly do not.

In fact, I'd argue that this is one of the most visually impressive nature docus you will have ever seen. Especially if you have a 4k screen to enjoy its full potential (even though it still looks great on something as small as a phone screen).

The narration is excellent. They really didn't cheap out with names like Bryan Cranston (Walter White from Breaking Bad) and Pedro Pascal (known for Game of Thrones, Narcos and The Mandalorian). But seemingly these great narrators are not enough to bring this show into the limelight, I guess only Attenborough's name can do that.

In conclusion, this is one of the best nature documentaries in recent years, and potentially the best this year. I recommend watching this, hands down.

This show is a little jumpy, and I personally would have preferred a slower pace. At the same time though, it offers images that are unlike anything I have ever seen before.

Netflix is slowly improving its nature documentary capabilities, and this is one of the best shows it's made so far. But this is a genre where they still need a lot of work, and Night on Earth is the only one so far that really competes with the old pros (BBC, NatGeo, etc).

The footage is great, but the editing could use some work. All of the somber moments are glossed over too much, either by cutting away way before a kill (so early that you are still unsure whether or not the hunter was successful) or by not giving the audience enough time and/or visual cues to allow the seriousness to settle in.

The information is good, but there is nothing presented here that hasn't already been shown in numerous other and more popular documentaries.

The voice acting is very hit and miss. Jones and Cranston do well in their episodes. Mackie isn't terrible, but his attempt at sounding mysterious comes off very dry. Wilson is horrendous to the point where the whole episode would have been better on mute.

*EDIT*: After watching season 2, I've bumped my rating up 1 star because the film and shot quality has vastly improved even from the previous year's season. In particular, some of the raptor episode's scenes were so stunning and unique that they made my jaw hit the floor. Serkis is the only voice actor this season to put some real enthusiasm into his narration, but none of the 4 narrators are bad.

Growing up with shows like Jacques Couseau and Mutual Omaha's Wild Kingdom I love animal shows. I just wish there were more of them. I hope this series has a season 2. Not for younger children because of the gore.