Human Planet

Following in the footsteps of Planet Earth and Life, this epic eight-part blockbuster is a breathtaking celebration of the amazing, complex, profound and sometimes challenging relationship between humankind and nature. Humans are the most successful species on the planet. From the frozen Arctic to steamy rainforests, from tiny islands in vast oceans to parched deserts, people have found remarkable ways to adapt and survive. We've done this by harnessing our immense courage and ingenuity, learning to live with and utilize the other creatures with which we share these wild places. Human Planet weaves together eighty inspiring stories, many never told before, set to a globally-influenced soundtrack by award-winning composer Nitin Sawhney. Each episode focuses on a particular habitat and reveals how its people have created astonishing solutions in the face of extreme adversity. Finally we visit the urban jungle, where most of us now live, and discover why the connection between humanity and nature here is the most vital of all.

Arctic
Sixty degrees below zero. The harshest environment on Earth. Yet four million people manage to survive in the Arctic. This film follows a year in the human freezer.

Deserts
Baked, barren, deadly - human life in the desert is ruled by the relentless quest for the most vital resource of all: water.

Grass
Grasslands are the habitat that feed the world. Over thousands of years, we have learned to dominate and domesticate other creatures, as well as the grass itself.

Jungles
Rainforests teem with more species than anywhere else, but for bipedal human apes they make an unforgiving home, demanding an intimate and complex understanding of nature's many secrets.

Mountains
From lush cloud forests at lower altitudes to bare summits that literally take your breath away, the higher you climb, the harder life becomes when you make your home on a mountain.

Oceans
As land animals, we have not evolved to live in water, but against all odds, some people have found a way to immerse themselves in a life aquatic, reaping the ocean's rich bounties.

Rivers
They provide the essentials for human life: fresh water, food and even natural highways, but rivers are also often capricious and unpredictable, treacherous and demanding.

Urban
Cities are our greatest success story, made by humans for humans. Over half the world's population now lives in urban environments. They may have been built to keep wild nature out, but nature cannot be pushed away.

Narrator
John Hurt
Merlin, An Englishman in New York, Harry Potter
Series Producer
Dale Templar
Pacific Abyss
Executive Producer
Brian Leith
Ganges, Nature's Great Events. Wild China
Music
Nitin Sawhney
The Namesake

Human Planet is the first programme from the BBC's Natural History Unit to focus entirely on human beings as subject.