Curiosity about the world around us is what drives our thoughts and facilitates learning. At any stage of life, this curiosity about the world can be inspired through various mediums, whether it is through books, movies, museums, etc. One of the many fascinating topics that we have all at least touched on in our lives is the rise and extinction of the dinosaurs. Now, we’ve all heard of evolution (though it is a surprisingly debated topic!) and dinosaurs, but have probably not gone past learning the basics in some science class. My personal experience with dinosaurs had not exceeded seeing fossils in museums. However, in presenting the rich history of dinosaurs, a recently released Netflix documentary has piqued my interest.
“The Dinosaurs” is a docuseries produced by Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Documentaries and Silverback Films that was released on Netflix on March 6th of this year. I casually clicked on it to have something to watch as I was eating my dinner, but ended up being fascinated with what it had to offer. I have to preface by saying that I am not well-versed in nature documentaries. Although I do watch a lot of documentaries, most of them are historical/political or true crime. That being said, this was my opinion of “The Dinosaurs” as someone who hasn’t really been exposed to nature documentaries or dinosaurs.
The documentary mainly covers the history of the dinosaurs from the Triassic period to their extinction in the Cretaceous period. It frequently jumps in time to cover the major changes in the development of the dinosaurs. The visual effects were created by Industrial Light & Magic using various techniques such as photorealistic CGI and environmental reconstruction. Viewing these graphics on my projector took me into another world entirely, creating a surreal experience which was only amplified by the music scored by Lorne Balfe and narration by Morgan Freeman.
The main reason I found this documentary to be especially enjoyable for me is because of my fascination with evolution. The process of natural selection and evolution in the context of the history of our world has greatly interested me. Watching this documentary was reminiscent of the pure amazement I found myself in walking through the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and seeing the evolution of different animals. This documentary managed to showcase this extraordinary phenomenon in a visual format that I hadn’t experienced yet. “The Dinosaurs” appealed to me in that it makes a conscious effort to mention specific favorable and unfavorable traits in certain species of dinosaurs, and what role this played in the evolution of different species. It also addresses the effects that the changes in Earth (e.g., shifting tectonic plates) and other devastating events (e.g., the infamous asteroid, volcanic eruptions) had on the progression of the dinosaurs. Most importantly, there were many moments that not only left me in pure wonder at the workings of nature, but also left me questioning how us humans even came to discover such details about these prehistoric creatures. It also led me to think of the world differently by understanding the plants and animals we see today as the result of such a rich history of events.
As I previously mentioned, exposure to such extraordinary phenomena works to inspire curiosity in our minds, a driving factor for learning and innovation. Providing an entertaining account on a platform like Netflix makes this information easily accessible and attractive to those who otherwise would not be bothered by such information, especially young minds. In this way, I believe that “The Dinosaurs”, along with other documentaries on such platforms, serve a greater purpose by inspiring curiosity about the world around us.