Life After People The SeriesThe Complete Season One DVD (NR) +Movie Reviews

Very creative view of the world

Future Watch Writer | Washington, D.C. Area | 07/23/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is a great series. I saw the original show which has now been turned into this series (which has been shown on TV). What this does is to raise up your imagination to think on a larger scale about the future. What if so many of our leading scientists are right? What if we are creating a global disaster in environmental terms? This shows what the world will look like if all the human arrogance fails. You must remember that this series is not very likely from a scientific point of view. Sadly, humans will take a larger part of other living things with them if they really make a mess of things. However, what this series does do is make you think about time. The world, nature, is five billion years old. People have been here for a mere 30,000 years. The suicide of our species is a real possibility, although not in the exact manner shown in this series. You should also check out National Geographic: Aftermath - Population Zero as well as some DVDs I have on my Amazon Listmania list on Environment Films which may be in the Listmania section at the bottom of this page.
"

Fascinating look at earth without man

Dee Boyle | Lawrence, Kansas, USA | 10/14/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is an absolutely fascinating show that I think anyone interested in anthropology, really any type of science or humanities would love. It illustrates with astonishing detail all of the mechanisms humans build and use in order to co-exist with nature. And what would happen once humans are gone and they can no longer maintain structures and buildings, trim down kudzu and vacuum up sand to artificially build up beaches around the Hamptons, among many other examples. It is an absolutely intriguing and unforgettable series and I'd recommend it to anyone."

An Excellent Presentation of Entropy in Action

Walter R. Johnson | Cincinnati, OH, USA | 09/09/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The basic premise of Life After People is that humans are suddenly gone and it doesn't matter how such a disappearance happens. The movie explores the question of how long would it take the physical remains of human presence to completely disappear and/or be transformed.

The movie particularly resonated with me because I have often wondered the same thing. I have even done sketches of, say, the Statue of Liberty toppled over and half-covered with sand, or Big Ben in London halfway submerged, or the Golden Gate Bridge collapsed. I supposed that this line of thought was inspired by my observations, over the years, of the ruins of ancient civilizations, coupled with the realization that nothing lasts forever, leading to speculation as to what might the ruins of our current civilization look like.

Life After People is, above all, an excellent presentation of entropy in action."

What would happen if man vanished?

M. Shepherd | 12/05/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"What would happen to all the great works of the human race if there were no one to maintain them?
It is an interesting idea for a documentary and I can`t find much to fault in their conclusions. Nature, and life itself are very
rough on everything in the long term either natural or man made.
The reason I only gave it three stars instead of four or five is that it presents the same thing over and over again. It is
interesting to know what lack of maintainence will do to a suspension bridge over a couple of hundred years, but there really
isn`t any significant difference between what happens to such a bridge in San Francisco, New York, or Michigan. Same holds true
with most tall buildings, homes, ect.
More than half of each episode is basicly a repete of the others in a different location. Granted, there are some differences in
how things will fall into disrepair in a desert as opposed to a wet climate, but not as much as you might think.
The series is worth watching, but they should have found more things to examine than going over the same things again and again.
"

Educational and entertaining

M | I wait behind the wall, gnawing away at your reali | 01/07/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"After enjoying the first show of Life after People as well as National Geographic's 'Aftermath: population Zero') I was naturally excited about this DVD. If you enjoyed the previous releases of LAP or APZ, then this DVD collection should be great for you. I already have the DVDs to APZ and the original LAP.

Each episode in this series has a different theme, but sometimes the episodes deviate from these themes to concentrate on other things, which disappointed me because the original subject was then given scanty detail. For example, the episode 'Heavy Metal' told us what happened to the gold bars in the Reserve vault belowground... BUT what about the gold in Fort Knox, the gold on the surface remaining as jewelry and ingots, the gold used in paint and decorations, and what of silver, platinum, mercury, lead, etc? It would have been much better if each episode stuck entirely to what it was supposed to be about instead of wandering off into another subject and putting in more collapsing buildings (after a while, it does get old). Some episodes were more faithful to this concept than others.

001 - The Bodies Left Behind - about man's pursuit of immortality and what happens to our attempts at it (frozen sperm and ova along with embryos and cryogenically frozen bodies) as well as some of mankind's treasures. Cons - not enough about the frozen tissue samples (what happens to the vaults and vats that guard these specimen? The failure of the containers is something I wanted to see along with the failure of electricity to keep things cold) and what happens to people who died within a week before LAP and are now laying in funeral homes? I was disappointed they didn't touch on that. How long would an embalmed body last vs an unembalmed one? Or bodies and medical waste in hospitals as well as cadavers?

002 - Outbreak - A very disappointing one for me. Barely anything is said about all the animals left behind despite the title. The Queen of England's corgis were the spotlight. I have nothing against corgis, but as this episode was SUPPOSED to be about animals breaking out, why not show the struggles of household, zoo, and laboratory animals alike, instead of just the Queen's cute dogs?

003 - Capital Threat - About what happens to our nation's treasures like the Constitution and the Memorials in DC.

004 - Heavy Metal - See my complaints above. Aside gold, all metal mentioned here was for architecture like iron and steel.

005 - Invaders - Overall a highly enjoyable episode about non-native species and the havoc they would wreak without humans to keep their populations under control, along with two cities struggling against the elements that slowly invade them.

006 - Bound and Buried - Not a bad episode, but not one of the best ones either. Various treasures like the Declaration of Independence and the Mona Lisa.

007 - Sin City Meltdown - What happens to Las Vegas and Atlantic City due to sand, wind, and water. Overall a fun episode, though I have one nitpick. In the original 90-min LAP, it was said that Las Vegas would be powered for about a year due to the hydroelectric power from the Hoover Dam, bur in this episode, Las Vegas loses power within a week.

008 - Armed and Defenseless - Another very disappointing episode. It didn't even really focus on weapons that much. There was a whole bunch of stuff about dairy cows (Cows are discussed a couple of times in other episodes, making this unnecessary) and weapons really weren't discussed that much. We got two ships (both long decommissioned), some nuclear missiles, retired planes and not much else. Nothing was discussed of smaller-range weapons like handheld guns or rifles, regular bombs, or the buildings concerned with the safety of our country (Pentagon, for example). Other things that could have been discussed were tanks and planes still on active duty (with no white coat to protect them), aircraft carriers, machine guns, West Point Academy, the badges and decorations to be found on military uniforms and so on and so forth. Overall a useless episode, much like Outbreak.

009 - Road to Nowhere - overall a good episode with a fitting title for its subject matter (cars and roads). Detroit (rather appropriately) is discussed here.

010 - Waters of Death - Damaging effects of water, New Orleans and Seattle are discussed here as well as Dubai (but not much) This episode would have benefited from discussion of other water-cities like Venice and Amsterdam.

As you can see, some episodes were better than others. I was terribly disappointed in Outbreak and Armed. Others, like 'Waters of Death' were more focused on the subject at hand and therefore more enjoyable. This episode was especially poignant for me because I have been to the Audubon Aquarium in New Orleans in 2001 and since I love water and aquariums, this place was heaven to me. This episode discussed what would happen to the aquarium after people - and the fact that it already happened (in 2005, after Katrina) Thinking about the deaths of all these critters I saw there due to Katrina was very painful.

Having loved the original LAP as well as APZ, I found this documentary to be thrilling but repetitive in certain parts. In each episode, you have more and more collapsing buildings, which get old after a while, especially when most of them seem to collapse in just about the same way. This season would have been perfect if the theme of each episode was more closely adhered to, with more variety in subject and less collapsing buildings - we get the idea. Rust, water, wind, plants, vermin, etc will make the buildings collapse and so on and so forth. A wider range of research and more focus on smaller artifacts would have benefited this film greatly. I'd have liked to see what happened to smaller items like computers, cellphones, TVs, toys, clothing (hopefully these will be explored more in Season 2). Still, this is an entertaining series, and deserves a solid 4/5 stars."

Search - Life After People: The Series--The Complete Season One on DVD

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