PBS Distribution is releasing the next title in its Nova series this June: Australia's First 4 Billion Years, an overview of the history of the planet via an exploration of the land Down Under. The 2-disc Blu-ray edition of the four-hour documentary series streets on June 25th.
Official Synopsis: The story that emerges in Australia's First 4 Billion Years is a history of Earth, from its fiery birth to spectacular explosion and evolution of life. Climates change. Seas come and go. Mountains rise and fall. Entire kingdoms of life triumph and then disappear. Viewers will "meet" some of the colossal dinosaurs and giant kangaroos, sea monsters and prehistoric crustaceans from this starkly beautiful island adrift in southern seas. The expansive series' stunning aerials and remote locations also reveal Australia's remarkable geology, diverse environments and rich fossil record. "Australia is a puzzle put together in prehistoric times," says host and scientist Dr. Richard Smith. "Nowhere else can you so simply jump in a car and travel back to the dawn of time."
The series hunts for scattered clues across the vast Australian landscape to unlock the pieces of that puzzle in four distinct parts: "Awakening," "Life Explodes," "Monsters," and "Strange Creatures."
Awakening: NOVA and host Dr. Richard Smith hurtle down the Road of Time to the very beginning of the Australian story in Awakening. First stop in this road trip through time is Western Australia, around four and a half billion years ago, where we encounter the Earth shortly after its fiery birth. It's a violent, poisonous planet, but not all is what it first seems. Hidden in the red hills of Australia are clues to the mysteries of when the Earth was born, how life first arose, and how it transformed the planet into the world we now live on. Experts unveil the earliest forms of life: an odd assortment of bacterial slime. It was life like this that would flood the atmosphere with oxygen and spark the biological revolution that conquered the planet. With oxygen, a world with animals was possible. NOVA meets the cast in the first scenes of the great drama of life on Earth, as unfamiliar creatures prowl across an ancient Australian sea floor. The stage was set; when you can move to eat you can hunt for prey. And the world would never be the same again.
Life Explodes: How did life storm the beaches and dominate Planet Earth? Ancient Australian fossils offer clues to how land-lovers like us got our start in Life Explodes. Half a billion years ago, Australia was still part of the super-continent Gondwana. While the oceans were teeming from the ongoing explosion of weird and wonderful animals, the world above the waves remained an almost lifeless wasteland. All that changed in the Silurian period, when the conquest of the land began. Host Richard Smith introduces Planet Earth's forgotten pioneers: the scuttling arthropod armies that invaded the shores, and the waves of green revolutionaries whose battle for the light pushed plant-life across the face of a barren continent. Revolution continued underwater as well, with armor-plated fish experimenting with teeth, jaws, sex and lungs. NOVA's prehistoric adventure continues with four-legged animals walking onto dry land and the planet poised for disaster.
Monsters: This episode begins at the dawn of the Mesozoic Era, about 250 million years ago, just in time for the Age of Dinosaurs, Down Under. Host Richard Smith comes face to face with the previously unknown reptilian rulers of prehistoric Australia. NOVA resurrects the giants that stalked the Great Southern Land, and discovers that some of these animals were among the largest ever to have walked the Earth. Others were some of the most dangerous. In the dry desert heat, scientists unearth an ancient inland ocean, full of sea monsters. Opalised fossils of some of these beasts paint a colorful picture of the Cretaceous seascape, where long-necked plesiosaurs snacked on shelled cephalopods that grew as large as truck tires. Lord of all was the fearsome Kronosaurus, with a skull twice as long as T. rex. But reptiles didn't have the world all to themselves. Mammals like the enigmatic platypus lived alongside them, ready for their moment in the sun. And 65 million years ago, they saw that day arrive.
Strange Creatures: In the wake of the catastrophe – the asteroid impact 65 million years ago believed to have wiped out the dinosaurs – Australia was set adrift on a lonely voyage in southern seas. With host Richard Smith at the wheel, NOVA travels this walkabout continent to uncover how it became the strange island it is today. Australia's many unusual creatures, such as the Kangaroo and the Cassowary, tell a tale of isolation, change and resilience. Australia's long history has seen mountains rise and fall, seas come and go, and whole kingdoms of life triumph and disappear. In this final episode, NOVA races down the last 65 million years to the present day. A mere blip perhaps in the long geological eternity that has gone before, but it is now that we can reveal the events that shaped the Australia we know today. Prehistoric jungles retreated to be replaced by eucalyptus forests, grasslands and deserts. When humans first arrived, giant marsupials dominated the land and the Great Barrier Reef was yet to form. This is a tale of calamity and conquest; how a conspiracy of climate, biology and geology shaped the Earth we now call home.
About NOVA: Now in its 40th season, NOVA is the most-watched prime time science series on American television, reaching an average of five million viewers weekly. The series remains committed to producing in-depth science programming in the form of hour-long (and occasionally longer) documentaries, from the latest breakthroughs in technology to the deepest mysteries of the natural world. NOVA airs Wednesdays at 9pm ET/PT on WGBH Boston and most PBS stations.
Tech specs and special features have yet to be detailed.