There are 4 DVDs, containing 13 episodes in all. The total running time is approximately 10 hours, so around 45 minutes per episode. This review was written after viewing 3 of the episodes.
The episode titles for season 1 are: San Andreas Fault; The Deepest Place on Earth; Krakatoa; Loch Ness; New York; Driest Place on Earth; Great Lakes; Yellowstone; Tsunami; Asteroids; Iceland; Hawaii; The Alps.
The quibbles first… this series has obviously been made to be shown with advert breaks. Each episode is divided into 6 sections (all accessible individually from the DVD menu), and at the end of each section there is a summary of what has just been said, then the next section starts with a bit of a verbal summary of what has been shown so far, before going on with the programme. This is fine if you only want to watch one section at a time, but it gets slightly irritating if you want to watch the whole thing through in one go. Each episode is also narrated as an 'investigation', as though these things were being investigated for the first time. However these are minor faults.
From the episodes I have seen so far, each one looks at a particular aspect of earth science based on a location. The San Andreas Fault episode looks at plate movements, how the fault was discovered, how past movements in faults can be detected, and also looks at interesting things such as the place in California where the earth has moved (as evidenced by bends in linear features such as road kerbs) but few earthquakes have been recorded. The Deepest Place on Earth looks at the Marianas Trench, and includes footage of the Trieste mission to visit the bottom (including interviews with the surviving pilot). This one had rather too much computer generated imagery of a supposed ocean trench for my liking, but then there isn't a lot of real imagery they could have shown. Loch Ness looks at plate movements, ocean closing and so on.
If you don't know much about plate tectonics and its effects, this is probably a good, easy introduction – there is not a lot of technical stuff here. If you already know most of it, the programmes are still interesting for little quirks or facts you may not have heard about, and for the historical perspective. And at around £1.70 per hour, it's not really expensive!
