Walking with Monsters
Encyclopedia
Walking with Monsters (also distributed as Before the Dinosaurs - Walking with Monsters or Walking with Monsters - Life Before Dinosaurs) is a three-part British
documentary film
series about life in the Paleozoic
, bringing to life extinct arthropod
s, fish
, amphibian
s, synapsid
s, and reptile
s. As with previous Walking with...
installments, it is narrated by Kenneth Branagh
, and by Avery Brooks
in the American
version. Using state-of-the-art visual effects
, this prequel to Walking with Dinosaurs
shows an epic 300 million year war between creatures before the dinosaurs. The series draws on the knowledge of over 600 scientists and depicts Paleozoic history, from the Cambrian
Period (530 million years ago) to the Early Triassic
Period (248 million years ago). It was written and directed by Tim Haines
. As with some of the other BBC
specials, it was renamed in North America, where its title was Before the Dinosaurs: Walking with Monsters. It has also aired as a two-hour special on the Canadian and American Discovery Channel
with yet another narrator. At the 58th Primetime Emmy Awards
in 2006 it won the Emmy Award in the category Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming One Hour or More).
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
documentary film
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
series about life in the Paleozoic
Paleozoic
The Paleozoic era is the earliest of three geologic eras of the Phanerozoic eon, spanning from roughly...
, bringing to life extinct arthropod
Arthropod
An arthropod is an invertebrate animal having an exoskeleton , a segmented body, and jointed appendages. Arthropods are members of the phylum Arthropoda , and include the insects, arachnids, crustaceans, and others...
s, fish
Fish
Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...
, amphibian
Amphibian
Amphibians , are a class of vertebrate animals including animals such as toads, frogs, caecilians, and salamanders. They are characterized as non-amniote ectothermic tetrapods...
s, synapsid
Synapsid
Synapsids are a group of animals that includes mammals and everything more closely related to mammals than to other living amniotes. They are easily separated from other amniotes by having an opening low in the skull roof behind each eye, leaving a bony arch beneath each, accounting for their name...
s, and reptile
Reptile
Reptiles are members of a class of air-breathing, ectothermic vertebrates which are characterized by laying shelled eggs , and having skin covered in scales and/or scutes. They are tetrapods, either having four limbs or being descended from four-limbed ancestors...
s. As with previous Walking with...
Walking with...
The Walking with... series is a collection of shows that are produced by the BBC and are made by Impossible Pictures. The aim of the series and specials, along with its books, is to recreate extinct animals and presents them as a wildlife documentary...
installments, it is narrated by Kenneth Branagh
Kenneth Branagh
Kenneth Charles Branagh is an actor and film director from Northern Ireland. He is best known for directing and starring in several film adaptations of William Shakespeare's plays including Henry V , Much Ado About Nothing , Hamlet Kenneth Charles Branagh is an actor and film director from...
, and by Avery Brooks
Avery Brooks
Avery Franklin Brooks is an American actor, television director, jazz musician, opera singer and college professor. Brooks is perhaps best known for his television roles as Benjamin Sisko on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and as Hawk on Spenser: For Hire and its spinoff A Man Called Hawk, and in the...
in the American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
version. Using state-of-the-art visual effects
Visual effects
Visual effects are the various processes by which imagery is created and/or manipulated outside the context of a live action shoot. Visual effects involve the integration of live-action footage and generated imagery to create environments which look realistic, but would be dangerous, costly, or...
, this prequel to Walking with Dinosaurs
Walking with Dinosaurs
Walking with Dinosaurs is a six-part documentary television miniseries that was produced by BBC, narrated by Kenneth Branagh, and first aired in the United Kingdom, in 1999. The series was subsequently aired in North America on the Discovery Channel in 2000, with Branagh's voice replaced with that...
shows an epic 300 million year war between creatures before the dinosaurs. The series draws on the knowledge of over 600 scientists and depicts Paleozoic history, from the Cambrian
Cambrian
The Cambrian is the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, lasting from Mya ; it is succeeded by the Ordovician. Its subdivisions, and indeed its base, are somewhat in flux. The period was established by Adam Sedgwick, who named it after Cambria, the Latin name for Wales, where Britain's...
Period (530 million years ago) to the Early Triassic
Triassic
The Triassic is a geologic period and system that extends from about 250 to 200 Mya . As the first period of the Mesozoic Era, the Triassic follows the Permian and is followed by the Jurassic. Both the start and end of the Triassic are marked by major extinction events...
Period (248 million years ago). It was written and directed by Tim Haines
Tim Haines
Tim Haines is a screenwriter, producer and director who is best known for his work on the BBC popular science shows Walking with Dinosaurs, Walking with Beasts, and Walking with Monsters...
. As with some of the other BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
specials, it was renamed in North America, where its title was Before the Dinosaurs: Walking with Monsters. It has also aired as a two-hour special on the Canadian and American Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel is an American satellite and cable specialty channel , founded by John Hendricks and distributed by Discovery Communications. It is a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav...
with yet another narrator. At the 58th Primetime Emmy Awards
58th Primetime Emmy Awards
The 58th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards were held at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California on Sunday, August 27, 2006 on NBC at 8:00pm ET with Conan O'Brien hosting the show...
in 2006 it won the Emmy Award in the category Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming One Hour or More).
Camera interaction
As in the entire Walking with line of films, the animals sometimes interact with the camera:- A Brontoscorpio stings the camera and breaks it.
- Another Brontoscorpio bumps the camera with its claw as it crawls onto land.
- A Hynerpeton knocks the camera while he is swimming, so does a Hyneria.
- A Hynerpeton breathes on the camera.
- A Hyneria splatters water on the camera while diving back into the water.
- A Mesothelae crawls on the camera, and so does an Arthropleura.
- A Mesothelae kicks dirt on the camera when she crawls over it.
- A Dimetrodon shakes intestines to avoid eating the fecesFecesFeces, faeces, or fæces is a waste product from an animal's digestive tract expelled through the anus or cloaca during defecation.-Etymology:...
inside, and most of the feces and blood splats onto the camera. - A Dimetrodon digs up some dirt, and it lands on the camera.
- A baby Dimetrodon splatters some dung on the camera when it jumps in a pile of it.
- A Gorgonops sniffs the camera.
- A Gorgonops splatters water on the camera when it jumps in some water.
- A Diictodon looks curiously at the camera.
- When the herd of Scutosaurus comes to drink, one throws dirt onto the camera.
- A Proterosuchus knocks the camera while it is swimming.
- A Lystrosaurus bumps and sniffs the camera.
Evolution according to the programme
- HaikouichthysHaikouichthysHaikouichthys is an extinct genus of craniate believed to have lived c. 530 million years ago, during the Cambrian explosion of multicellular life...
→ CephalaspisCephalaspisCephalaspis was a genus of armored goldfish-sized to trout-sized detritivorous fish that lived in freshwater streams and estuaries of early Devonian Western Europe...
→ HynerpetonHynerpetonHynerpeton was a basal carnivorous tetrapod that lived in the lakes and estuaries of the Late Devonian period around 360 million years ago. Like many primitive tetrapods, it is sometimes referred to as an "amphibian", though it is not a true member of the modern Lissamphibia...
→ PetrolacosaurusPetrolacosaurusPetrolacosaurus was a small, long, reptile, and the earliest diapsid known. It lived during the late Carboniferous period, the Joggins strata where it was found are dated to 302 million years old....
→ EdaphosaurusEdaphosaurusEdaphosaurus is a genus of prehistoric synapsid which lived around 303 to 265 million years ago, during the late Carboniferous to early Permian periods. The name Edaphosaurus means "ground lizard" and is derived from the Greek edaphos/εδαφος and σαυρος/sauros... - DimetrodonDimetrodonDimetrodon was a predatory synapsid genus that flourished during the Permian period, living between 280–265 million years ago ....
→ GorgonopsGorgonopsGorgonops is an extinct genus of therapsid which lived about 255-250 million years ago, during the latest part of the Permian Period. It was a typical representative of the suborder Gorgonopsia, the dominant predators of their day, which in the largest forms grew to over four metres long... - DiictodonDiictodonDiictodon was a genus of therapsid, roughly 45 cm long. It belonged to the sub-group Dicynodontia. These mammal-like synapsids lived during the Late Permian period, approximately 255 million years ago. Fossils have been found in Africa and Asia...
→ LystrosaurusLystrosaurusLystrosaurus was a genus of Late Permian and Early Triassic Period dicynodont therapsids, which lived around 250 million years ago in what is now Antarctica, India, and South Africa... - EuparkeriaEuparkeriaEuparkeria was a small African reptile of the early Triassic period between 248-245 million years ago, close to the ancestry of the archosaurs.- Palaeobiology :...
→ AllosaurusAllosaurusAllosaurus is a genus of large theropod dinosaur that lived 155 to 150 million years ago during the late Jurassic period . The name Allosaurus means "different lizard". It is derived from the Greek /allos and /sauros...
Episodes
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