Prehistoric Planet

[Exalt]

Sept 10, 2023 6:36:52 GMT 5 Infinity Blade said:

Sept 10, 2023 5:59:02 GMT 5 dinosauria101 said:

I should really make the thread for that one! In fact, once this reply is finished, I will go and do just that.
Tbf, I would definitely be bummed - just not nearly as much as if a documentary like FB got the boot, hence my not particularly statement as opposed to not at all (if this is hard to understand, all of it will make much more sense with my final verdict, I promise). 

That being said...other time periods does raise a little more interest vs more of just the end Cretaceous: as many flaws as PP has to me, it would always benefit from episodes during other times in prehistory, both during and aside from the time of the dinosaurs. If against the odds we DO get S3 and it either shows those time periods or definitively paves the way for future seasons to do so, I would definitely be more excited for that.

Thinking about it, I'd like to see PhP set in the Pleistocene, and I'm not just saying that for "muh Cenozoic representation" either (even though the Pleistocene's representation in pop culture rivals the Mesozoic's in general). A good reason they're able to do two whole seasons of PhP in just the Maastrichtian is because for a Mesozoic time period, it's pretty well documented.

Everyone says this, but when it comes time to offer up good stuff that isn't the last two episodes of WWB, nobody seems to have anything. And while I do like those overall, Saber-tooth has not aged super hot on the accuracy department.

[dinosauria101]

Sept 10, 2023 6:36:52 GMT 5 Infinity Blade said:

Ah, I guess I kind of misinterpreted what you originally said.

It's all good.

Thinking about it, I'd like to see PhP set in the Pleistocene, and I'm not just saying that for "muh Cenozoic representation" either (even though the Pleistocene's representation in pop culture rivals the Mesozoic's in general). A good reason they're able to do two whole seasons of PhP in just the Maastrichtian is because for a Mesozoic time period, it's pretty well documented. Late Cretaceous western North America most definitely is, and when you add in all the other fossiliferous formations around the world that date to this time, you have a relatively good view of the world at that time. On top of this, the fauna and habitats across the globe are varied enough that you not only have a variety of lifeforms to show, but also pretty much every habitat that can be explored in an extant nature documentary can also be shown in one set during the Maastrichtian. If you tried doing the same in the Late Jurassic (~150 Ma), for example, you can't do an "ice worlds" episode.

The Pleistocene is most definitely very well documented (probably more so than the Maastrichtian). And even though it was the ice age (which did have effects on climate and habitat worldwide, whether directly or indirectly), there were still plenty of different habitats in the world at the time. There were still jungles, plains, all that jazz, so you can still dedicate a number of episodes to a variety of habitats.

The only real problem I can think of is that the Pleistocene shares many of the exact same species with those in the modern day, and if you want a good look at the Pleistocene's fauna, this would probably be hard to ignore. However, I think there would still be enough distinct, extinct species that you can put in the doc (alongside some showings of extant species), depending on when exactly in the Pleistocene you set it in (for example, you probably shouldn't set it right at the end of the epoch, in which case you won't be able to show the Australian megafauna without it being anachronistic).

I can actually think of an extra reason besides documentation and habitat variety for some Pleistocene scenes in future PP scenes: as well as dinosaurs may have fit with their narrator choice of David Attenborough, Pleistocene animals are as good as it gets in that regard because even without the animals still alive today, it's as close as you can get with extinct animals to what you see if you watch Attenborough's famous Planet Earth (so it's more immersive for the Attenborough hardcore fans, which I'd be happy to count myself as part of if things get sufficiently immersive).

That being said, my personal No. 1 choice would be a Palaeozoic season, with arcs from the creation of Earth to the Permian extinction. To my knowledge WWM and LOOP are the ONLY 2 palaeodocumentaries to cover it, period, so more would be an enormous step up.
Not to mention my personal taste: I want more WWM-analogous content above all else since it's my top pick in the Trilogy of Life.

[dinosauria101]

Sept 10, 2023 6:48:18 GMT 5 Exalt said:

Sept 10, 2023 6:36:52 GMT 5 Infinity Blade said:

Thinking about it, I'd like to see PhP set in the Pleistocene, and I'm not just saying that for "muh Cenozoic representation" either (even though the Pleistocene's representation in pop culture rivals the Mesozoic's in general). A good reason they're able to do two whole seasons of PhP in just the Maastrichtian is because for a Mesozoic time period, it's pretty well documented.

Everyone says this, but when it comes time to offer up good stuff that isn't the last two episodes of WWB, nobody seems to have anything. And while I do like those overall, Saber-tooth has not aged super hot on the accuracy department.

Didn't notice this comment until now. 

Have you ever heard of Prehistoric Predators and Death of the Megabeasts? The former has episodes which cover the dire wolf, terror birds, Smilodon and the short faced bear, and the latter is about the megafauna extinctions as a whole.





Now, I don't know just how accurate or inaccurate they are, but if they are more accurate than inaccurate and you haven't heard of them, here they are.

[Infinity Blade]

Sept 10, 2023 6:48:18 GMT 5 Exalt said:

Sept 10, 2023 6:36:52 GMT 5 Infinity Blade said:

Thinking about it, I'd like to see PhP set in the Pleistocene, and I'm not just saying that for "muh Cenozoic representation" either (even though the Pleistocene's representation in pop culture rivals the Mesozoic's in general). A good reason they're able to do two whole seasons of PhP in just the Maastrichtian is because for a Mesozoic time period, it's pretty well documented.

Everyone says this, but when it comes time to offer up good stuff that isn't the last two episodes of WWB, nobody seems to have anything. And while I do like those overall, Saber-tooth has not aged super hot on the accuracy department.

Not sure how much they know about the Pleistocene’s fauna. But, Australia was chock full of extinct marsupials, reptiles, and birds. North America, Europe, and Asia all had their own quirks in their local fauna, even if a lot of the groups were similar. South America, of course, had a mix of things from NA and its own endemic fauna (and it’s never too late to try to portray it more accurately). Even Africa still had some species that aren’t around today. And in the seas there was still one last otodontid shark until about a million years ago.

[dinosauria101]

Note: my reviews for this program are 100% based on the entertainment value. I will not be dealing with scientific accuracy, or lack thereof.

theropod , I fixed the review up some. Hopefully this review won't read like an attempt to convey that Prehistoric Planet is objectively bad!

Coasts:

-We begin each episode with David Attenborough in a museum giving us an explanation of what Prehistoric Planet is, and even if he doesn't explicitly say so (I can't remember what he said exactly), it becomes pretty obvious by way of explanation method that what you're watching isn't real - at least if your standard for realistic palaeodocumentaries is anything like mine.
Hopefully we'll get a good beginning scene to compensate.

-And thankfully we do! To begin Coasts specifically, we have the famous swimming T. rex from the popular trailer. So how well do I think this T. rex lives up to all its aesthetic-related palaeocommunity praise?

Debbie Downer alert: I'd say it doesn't. And exactly 100% of that has to do with the realistic appearance - or more specifically lack thereof - compared to my standards for top-tier T. rex palaeodocumentaries of Walking with Dinosaurs and the similarly-named Prehistoric Park.





The WWD T. rex and 2006 PP T. rex, of course, look every bit as realistic as literally any animal in the BBC's modern documentaries (at least in my opinion). Both are helped in that regard by a real-life backdrop, while the WWD T. rex is also a real-life animatronic and the 2006 PP T. rexes - be they animatronics or not - are helped in this regard by their depiction of hunting a real live Nigel Marven.
PP's T. rex, by comparison, has none of these going for it whatsoever - it's pure CGI. And that shows: for lack of a better term I would say it's the 'smoothness' that makes this particular T. rex not as real looking in my eyes as its predecessors.

Overall, while it certainly isn't garbage and is very much usable as a T. rex model, they could have done WAY better than that in terms of looking real enough for my taste - especially considering those 2 T. rexes predate this one by 16-23 years despite being my preferred choices. Not looking completely real also applies to every other model unless I explicitly specify otherwise - you will, of course, hear more about this in the final verdict.

-Thankfully, the scene this T. rex features in is a more entertaining one - he is taking a treacherous swim with his family in mosasaur-infested waters.
First things first, there's the mosasaur, and some sea turtles. What I just said about the T. rex model is of course true of these too, and they are not particularly clearly visible in the water either  - so overall it's an even bigger step down from Impossible Pictures that the T. rex took.

Next up, the plot. It does pull on the heartstrings some: the mosasaur chooses a baby T. rex as its target that's visibly falling behind (and it calls for help several times before being dragged down with a final cry).
When the remainder of the dinosaurs get to shore, we learn that for T. rex this is completely par the course: it is common for an adult to lose at least two-thirds of the original brood of 15 babies.

Last but not least, the scene has one of PP's interesting soundtracks. It picks up quickly and is an upbeat/ominous combo to my ears.

-At the shore, the adult T. rex finally arrives at a dead turtle which it smelled from across the sea and swam to reach. It is very nice to watch as a nonstandard T. rex depiction (as Infinity Blade's review alluded to), but I find the T. rex simply finding the carcass and chowing down quite lacking in entertainment for my taste.
For comparison, a similar scene in WWD (which may have been the inspiration for this) depicted Eustreptospondylus making a swim between islands to find food. But when one finds a dead turtle, it has to contend with another Eustreptospondylus for its share - a definitive addition to the entertainment that this scene lacks.

-By contrast, the babies are much more entertaining - they have to learn how to hunt for their own food, and hatching sea turtles give them an excellent chance at doing so. Through trial and error (such as stepping on the sea turtles without doing any apparent harm), they at least get the basic idea that sea turtle babies=food, and there is one baby who is apparently fed up enough with trial and error to resort to thievery (which I found mildly amusing the way it was presented).

-What's that? You wanted to watch those baby T. rexes grow up and perfect the art of hunting for sea turtles/evading hungry mosasaurs in a nice, comprehensive WWD format?

So did I, but tough luck. This arc is over now, and with its ending, we are introduced to my biggest problem in PP that's very prevalent in all episodes: the very rushed pacing/plot. Despite all the arcs in each episode, the run time minus the beginning and end is around half an hour, so individual arcs don't go over about 6 minutes and 99% of the time end the arc just as I start to get attached to the animals! It's something I find to be both frustrating and annoying.

-For the second arc, we move to northern African coastlines that are home to multiple species of pterosaur. 

-First off, Tethydraco. They look similar to the Pteranodon we all know and love, and raise their young in large colonies on the beach.

-Next up, Quetzalcoatlus-like Phosphatodraco - which is ominously introduced as a colony predator the baby Tethydraco need protection from (and thankfully they get it, it would appear the adults can keep their beaks in between their young and the danger). In my opinion this species has one of the most aesthetically appealing models in the series.

-Then our protagonist, Alcione. Some eggs have been laid on a cliff in kelp, and now that it's time for them to hatch, the babies must be ready to go it alone.

To GET ready, they must first climb to the peak of the cliff and wait for their wing bones to harden enough to support them in the air, with some practice flight as well. And when they are ready, they fly as a group towards the safety of the forest - in such a short arc, seeing this variety of things they must do is pleasing.

-But of course, someone's there to spoil the fun. Some opportunistic Barbaridactylus attack the babies, gobbling them down like tossed-in-the-air-popcorn, and to escape the babies can fold their wings and drop - which looks breathtaking to watch them do as a group.

There's also a big disappointment upon the rewatch. I thought the attempted dynamic soundtrack would have been to my taste, I guess I remembered wrong.

-Towards the end of the arc, we see the fates of 2 individual babies. The first has dropped too far down to escape the hungry Barbaridactylus and ends up making a crash landing in the Tethydraco colony where it becomes lunch for - you guessed it - Phosphatodraco. Oof.

But the second is actually lucky, making it the first hatchling explicitly shown to be so. It is able to out-fly its Barbaridactylus pursuer and get into the forest destination where it can't be followed - and thankfully some other babies have made it as well. The arcis now over.

-Overall, I feel if we're going to see the baby Alcione hatch, harden their wings, and fly the gauntlet, we might as well get some time of the arc dedicated to seeing the survivors grow up. For example, a timelapse of them growing like we got in the Olorotitan arc of Ice Worlds - this is clearly something the producers are capable of showing us but we didn't get it here for whatever reason.

-The next arc covers a species of plesiosaur: Tuarangisaurus. They're shown doing mating rituals where the males stick their necks out of the water, and a female with her juvenile swim to shallow water to find gastroliths. And these are notable additional examples of my critique that the models clearly look fake to me: they are in my opinion the least realistic animals in the episode, looking to my eyes more like plastic or rubber models as opposed to even CGI.

Not much to say about this arc. It's not a very entertaining arc compared to the arcs that came before it, in my opinion.

-The arc that follows, I'm pleased to say, is notably better. We see a big male Mosasaurus with his breeding color relaxing in a coral reef, and I love his color in terms of aesthetics.

He's now shedding his old skin to color up for breeding, and some small fish (which at first it seemed he would eat) clean him up. This part in retrospect is rather disappointing: apparently it is one of 3 times where actual objects are used instead of CGI, and two out of those 3 - including this one - suggests not as much thought as the Trilogy of Life was given to the closeups.
They apparently had some real live ocean fish eat mosasaur skin-shaped flake food, but it just looks contrived and fake to my eye - even before I knew that. Maybe it's the fact that I have my own fish and am very familiar with flake food, IDK.

-All this is very quickly interrupted by a surprise attack by another male competing for mating rights! To my surprise a significant strategy used by these males is to drown the other, and in doing this the upper hand shifts a few times.

Eventually our male succeeds in driving off his rival, and the arc ends.

-I feel as though if we're going to see the male Mosasaurus in his breeding colors, it would be fitting to see him at least attract a mate. Otherwise, the significance of the breeding colors seems diminished to me because we don't see their purpose come to be.

-Now some bioluminescent ammonites are shown doing elaborate mating rituals where the male must match the female's pattern. Although choosing ammonites as the protagonist is not particularly entertaining to me (likely because I've been conditioned to think of ammonites as secondary animals in palaeodocumentaries), I have to applaud both the aesthetics of the bioluminescence and the plot of having the male match the female's pattern to prove his worth as a mate.

-For the final arc we return to the Tuarangisaurus. Our female isn't feeling well, it seems, and a hungry Kaikaifilu (a species of mosasaur) takes notice - with an ear-catching spooky soundtrack, the other good one in this episode!

What's next is a big surprise. The YOUNGSTER of the female tries to distract the mosasaur and is actually able to stay out of harm's way despite the risk, until some adults that may or may not be related to the female arrive as backup.
I find this totally shocking. I would have expected the youngster to flee in fear or to even be the one in danger.

And so, despite the fake tuarangisaurs, this is definitely a better way to end. But there could be some arc-specific improvement in my opinion: if we're going to see the baby Tuarangisaurus be so bold as to distract the mosasaur and break expectations/standards, it would be appreciated to be told where/how he learned to do so.

Overall verdict:

For Prehistoric Planet's format, I feel a different format than usual is needed for my overall verdict. What I did and did not find entertaining will be listed/reiterated for ease of reading, and stacked up in total to form said verdict.
Importance of what is and is not entertaining is listed alongside the feature in question.

What I found entertaining:

-Aesthetics of the models, despite being visibly fake (major)
-Good storyline plots in what was available (major)
-The soundtracks that were actually to my taste (moderate)
-Attenborough's narration (moderate to major)
-Nonstandard animal depictions (minor)

What I did not find entertaining:

-Poor intro (moderate)
-Poor pacing (major)
-Clearly-fake-to-my-eye-CGI and poor closeup (moderate, given the aesthetics of the CGI)
-Most soundtracks not to my taste, although to be fair someone else may like almost all of them (moderate)
-A few arcs did not have a plot I found entertaining, although like above someone else might like them (minor)

Overall I'd say this was 60-65% out of 100. There were an equal number of things that I did and did not find entertaining, with the importance of what I did find entertaining being greater across the board (mostly moderate to major) vs what I did not (anywhere from minor to major).
So this episode is one I found worthwhile to watch, but it's the sheer consistency and variety of what was not entertaining that prevents me from calling this episode a banger as Infinity Blade did.

[theropod]

dinosauria101

This excuse, together with the fact that this is a community saying people with the same PP vs WWD preferences as myself have 'rose-tinted glasses' simply for finding WWD's strengths sufficiently greater than its weaknesses to prefer it over PP, gives a very strong impression of much of the palaeocommunity being too biased towards PP to admit that even it has serious shortcomings compared to decades-older palaeodocumentaries regardless of greater accuracy. But then again.....it's Reddit.....I suppose it would be foolish for me to expect the Redditors to recognize the problems in saying such things.

So if someone says they prefer PP, or even just say they are hard to compare due to their different narrative structures, then they are biased towards PP?
But if you say, repeatedly, that WWD was much better (not that you personally prefer it, but that is simply "is"), even presupposing, apparently, that accuracy doesn’t play a role in how good a paleo documetary is overall, then that’s somehow not biased towards WWD? You even conceded that Prehistoric Planet was more accurate, you merely don’t care about that–but that still doesn’t mean nobody else is allowed to care about it.
In fact, if we wanted to establish such a thing as objective criteria by which to measure the overall quality of a documentary, scientific accuracy should be pretty far near the top of the list (since we are specifically talking about documentaries, not feature films).

Again, it’s totally fine to personally prefer a less accurate show, even as a documentary, for entertainment reasons. But you can’t just go ahead and assume that everyone else has to have the same subjective preferences as you in this regard.. Also, just repeating how "awful" the immersion on PP supposedly is won’t make your opinion on that into a fact and everyone who things differently objectively wrong. I, for one, felt just as immersed in Prehistoric Planet as in WWD…just in a very different way.

You seem to believe that just because it’s your opinion that accuracy doesn’t matter, and just because it’s your opinion that Prehistoric Planet had "awful immersion", that everyone who doesn’t feel the same way about these things or about how important they are to make something a good documentary is "biased towards PP", while your very subjective (much more subjective than the criterium of accuracy) opinion somehow is objective fact.


I must say that I myself wholeheartedly agree with the quote from Reddit that you posted, which brings the point across very concisely. These two are very different formats of a documentary; besides both featuring dinosaurs that are/were some of the most realistic put to screen at the time of their creation, they are nothing alike, and there are valid positives and negatives as well as a whole lot of subjective preference for either of them.

[dinosauria101]

Sept 11, 2023 0:00:34 GMT 5 theropod said:

So if someone says they prefer PP, or even just say they are hard to compare due to their different narrative structures, then they are biased towards PP?

Of course not! It's the combination of the Redditors saying other Redditors who subjectively preferred WWD had rose-tinted goggles, and also saying this (which is misleading, I would agree  that they are hard to compare in some aspects, but hard to compare=/=not things that can be compared):

They really aren't things you can compare.

With the context of the rose-tinted goggle comment, it gave me the impression that they were biased towards PP. I have no way to prove that they are or they are not (if I made a Reddit account and asked them I wouldn't even be able to say for sure if they told me the truth), hence my statement:

gives a very strong impression

Surely, you would agree that someone saying someone else has rose-tinted goggles for their preferences can give a strong impression of bias?

But if you say, repeatedly, that WWD was much better (not that you personally prefer it, but that is simply "is"), even presupposing, apparently, that accuracy doesn’t play a role in how good a paleo documetary is overall, then that’s somehow not biased towards WWD?

I don't believe I've ever said that? Maybe I did, but I did a search, and I couldn't find a single comment in which I said "WWD is better than PP" - not even any comments stating my preference for it.

If I did, I would appreciate a quote and link, but I could not find anywhere that I did.

You even conceded that Prehistoric Planet was more accurate, you merely don’t care about that–but that still doesn’t mean nobody else is allowed to care about it.

As with the above, I don't believe I ever said so. 

In fact, if we wanted to establish such a thing as objective criteria by which to measure the overall quality of a documentary, scientific accuracy should be pretty far near the top of the list (since we are specifically talking about documentaries, not feature films).

I can agree with you 100% that for objective criteria to measure how good a documentary is for its primary purpose of education, scientific accuracy is paramount (after all, if it wasn't, documentaries would not be called documentaries). Likewise, in the measure of education for its viewers, I can agree that Prehistoric Planet beats Walking with Dinosaurs.
But - and to your credit, you seem to completely understand this given the statements in your comment that touch on this, like the unbolded part of the below comment - all that is besides the point of an entertainment-based review, which is what I wrote.

Again, it’s totally fine to personally prefer a less accurate show, even as a documentary, for entertainment reasons. But you can’t just go ahead and assume that everyone else has to have the same subjective preferences as you in this regard..

Like with above quotes, I would appreciate if you could point out where I said so. I'm not saying I didn't but I don't believe I did.

Also, just repeating how "awful" the immersion on PP supposedly is won’t make your opinion on that into a fact and everyone who things differently objectively wrong. I, for one, felt just as immersed in Prehistoric Planet as in WWD…just in a very different way.

Where did I repeat it? I searched this thread and there is only one "awful immersion" statement in my whole comment, if I did repeat it I can't find where I did.

Likewise, where did I ever say my opinion on this is fact and anyone's that may differ is objectively wrong? My search turned up nothing even close to that: for example, the word objectively isn't even in my comment.

You seem to believe that just because it’s your opinion that accuracy doesn’t matter, and just because it’s your opinion that Prehistoric Planet had "awful immersion", that everyone who doesn’t feel the same way about these things or about how important they are to make something a good documentary is "biased towards PP", while your very subjective (much more subjective than the criterium of accuracy) opinion somehow is objective fact.

See above: like I said there I don't believe I said either of the bolded things.

I must say that I myself wholeheartedly agree with the quote from Reddit that you posted, which brings the point across very concisely. These two are very different formats of a documentary; besides both featuring dinosaurs that are/were some of the most realistic put to screen at the time of their creation, they are nothing alike, and there are valid positives and negatives as well as a whole lot of subjective preference for either of them.

So you agree with their being things that really can't be compared? I would agree with someone who says that they are difficult to compare due to their differences, or someone who says that they can't be compared with expectations to be similar, but no comparison really being possible is a very unrealistic viewpoint in my opinion: they are both CGI documentaries attempting to show us the Mesozoic as if its animals were alive today, after all.

Subjective pro and con list:



Prehistoric Planet:

+much more scientifically rigorous

+Science is over two decades further advanced

+Far more detailed CGI models, being almost photorealistic

+Attenborough narration

+Extreme attention to detail, including many taxa (e.g. Masiakasaurus, Rajasaurus, Austroraptor) that have not been shown in any previous documentary

+Diversity of habitats shown



-Only set in the Maastrichtian

-No overarching plot, less dramatic presentation (but I acknowledge that to some people that might be a positive)

-Sometimes leaned in a little bit to much on the thought-provoking hypotheses; while the ratio between what is depicted and what there is scientific evidence for is probably better than for any other paleo documentary, there are still a few hypotheses depicted that are probably a little too outlandish (e.g. the Quetzalcoatlus scaring off the T. rex).



Verdict: Prehistoric Planet is objectively a better documentary than Walking With Dinosaurs. It presents science that isn’t merely 20 years ahead of its competitor, but is more accurate even for the time it was made in. Where Walking with Dinosaurs went ahead to make up ridiculous monster Pliosaurs because of sensationalism and some BS Dave Martill told the production team to justify it, Prehistoric Planet made no blunders that are likely to age comparatively poorly. It is also visually



WWD:

+Narrative structure with overarching plot telling the history of life (ties in with WWM and WWB)

+Subordinate plot and cast of characters in each episode and get us invested in the struggle to survive in the particular ecosystem depicted

+Very lifelike animation for the time. While the level of detail in the models doesn’t hold up anymore (they do look very fake when viewed in high definition nowadays), the movements still hold up

+Use of animatronics for the closeups (recognizing the limitations of CGI at the time; I think PP gets away quite well with doing without them, but back then closeups just wouldn’t have looked believable if they were entirely CG)

+in my personal opinion, the slightly more epic soundtrack (tying in with what I think was the more epic story), although I also liked the PP one



-Notably less scientifically accurate, both for its time and, especially, in hindsight. This applies to both the "facts" explained through narration, and the morphology of the depicted animals (such as lack of feathers, inappropriate model recycling, generally incorrect anatomical details and proportions, animatronics not really matching the morphology of the corresponding CG models etc.)

-Far inferior CGI as compared to PP

-A certain disregard for groups that weren’t dinosaurs, esp. mammals (as much as I think all mammals are useless little furballs), but also, confusingly, pterosaurs (which are depicted extremely inaccurately in the show, even though they get their own spotlight episode)

-Shorter and showing less overall biodiversity across fewer locations.

I did agree with you that in terms of how well a documentary educates its viewers Prehistoric Planet is objectively better, and your subjective preferences are objectively equally valid to mine, so I don't really have anything to say about this quote besides what I wrote here.

All this being said, I am still a novice to writing retrospective reviews for palaeodocumentaries - especially those that I do not view as top-tier. If I came off as standoffish or trying to start a fight, I do apologize, and would be more than happy to take your advice on any mistakes I may have made in stating my subjective opinions.
Any mistakes I made, just point them out and I'd be happy to fix them, learn from them, and be able to improve the quality of my reviews going forward.

[theropod]

Sept 11, 2023 1:02:14 GMT 5 dinosauria101 said:

With the context of the rose-tinted goggle comment

Well I don’t know the context for that comment, but if I put it in the context of what you have wrotten here, then I don’t think that comment is a symptom of them being biased. I think the vast majority of people would likely agree that it doesn’t even take bias to clearly prefer PP over WWD, let alone just point out that they are both great in their own way, which doesn’t strike me as a biased statement in any context. Rather, I think the "rose tinted glasses" expression matches rather well the feelings you have expressed regarding WWD’s superiority here (feelings I even share to some extend!).

Surely, you would agree that someone saying someone else has rose-tinted goggles for their preferences can give a strong impression of bias?

No I wouldn’t say so, not if those preferences are being expressed in opposition to even the notion that the two things might be equally good, or not really comparable to begin with. I would say having an absolute need to establish one’s own preference over other preferences, or even a lack of preferences, is a much stronger sign of bias.

But if you say, repeatedly, that WWD was much better (not that you personally prefer it, but that is simply "is"), even presupposing, apparently, that accuracy doesn’t play a role in how good a paleo documetary is overall, then that’s somehow not biased towards WWD?

I don't believe I've ever said that?

You may not have said it in those exact words in reference to the show overall, but that doesn’t mean you haven’t unambiguously communicated how much you think WWD was better.
I was referring to your numerous statements of superiority of WWD over PP in numerous aspects, most of which are very subjective or debatable, but also use phrases like "Could it really be? A worthy successor to the whole Trilogy of Life?", which clearly implies you did not believe that PP was one, as well as statements such as this:

Overall I'd say this was 60-65% out of 100.

…which I am certain is a lower score than you would give the Trilogy of Life from the way you talk about the qualities of these various documentaries, even not having read you explicitly state such a score in reference to it.

Maybe I did, but I did a search, and I couldn't find a single comment in which I said "WWD is better than PP" - not even any comments stating my preference for it.

So are you saying you do not have a preference for it?

You even conceded that Prehistoric Planet was more accurate, you merely don’t care about that–but that still doesn’t mean nobody else is allowed to care about it.

As with the above, I don't believe I ever said so. 

Again, not in those exact words, but you did call people biased for disagreeing with you over your preference for WWD, so that’s close enough.

I can agree with you 100% that for objective criteria to measure how good a documentary is for its primary purpose of education, scientific accuracy is paramount (after all, if it wasn't, documentaries would not be called documentaries). Likewise, in the measure of education for its viewers, I can agree that Prehistoric Planet beats Walking with Dinosaurs.
But - and to your credit, you seem to completely understand this given the statements in your comment that touch on this, like the unbolded part of the below comment - all that is besides the point of an entertainment-based review, which is what I wrote.

And I am not criticizing your entertainment-based review or the opinions it states, I’m merely reminding you that other people can have different opinions, and that they can also disagree with your opinions without them necessarily being the ones who are biased.

Where did I repeat it?

"PP has absolutely awful immersion, especially compared to WWD. I'll cover this in more depth in the final verdict."

"What's that? You wanted to watch those baby T. rexes grow up and perfect the art of hunting for sea turtles/evading hungry mosasaurs in a nice, comprehensive WWD format?

So did I, but NOPE. This arc is over now, and with its ending, we are introduced to the biggest problem in PP that's very prevalent in all episodes: the terrible pacing/plot."

"This arc would have been much more satisfying to see had we watched those baby Alcione grow up and survive. We saw all they had to do to even get past being new hatchlings, which gives us a great desire to see more...but of course the arc is then over."

"For this arc, although I didn't yearn to see a more complex storyline, I never felt that attached to the mosasaur either despite the aesthetics..which is not desirable, and is probably why I didn't yearn. I don't know if it's worse to yearn or not to be attached."

"-Constant yearning for a more complex storyline/better pacing instead of ending the arcs just as we get attached to the animals."

"-Too many meh/non attaching arcs."

Those all sound like repetitions of exactly the same criticism to me, that the storylines didn’t provide good immersion for you.

Likewise, where did I ever say my opinion on this is fact and anyone's that may differ is objectively wrong?

WHen you called them biased towards WWD simply for not wanting to compare the two (and in a way that highly praised WWD, no less).

My search turned up nothing even close to that: for example, the word objectively isn't even in my comment.

Here’s the thing with (again, repeatedly) using the argument "I used search and didn’t find the exact phrase you mentioned more (than once), so I wasn’t (repeatedly) making that argument": That something is put into slightly different words or implied in other statements (such as calling someone biased for something) doesn’t mean it isn’t being clearly expressed. If there’s anything I’d like you to think about, it’s this, since that’s a concept that’s really universally important to grasp in order to be able to learn from errors or miscommunications: Wording something slightly differently doesn’t help if in essence what you are saying is still the same, and if the problem wasn’t the wording, but the thing you were saying.

You seem to believe that just because it’s your opinion that accuracy doesn’t matter, and just because it’s your opinion that Prehistoric Planet had "awful immersion", that everyone who doesn’t feel the same way about these things or about how important they are to make something a good documentary is "biased towards PP", while your very subjective (much more subjective than the criterium of accuracy) opinion somehow is objective fact.

See above: like I said there I don't believe I said either of the bolded things.

Well generally the word "biased" is taken to mean something along the lines of "unobjective, and arguing for their opinion even if demonstrated to be objectively wrong".

So you agree with their being things that really can't be compared?

Insofar as that comparison is aimed at determining which one is better or worse: Yes, absolutely!
Which is better, a good fantasy novel, or a good scientific paper? Neither is objectively better, they are simply good at being different things. You can subjectively state that you prefer one over the other, but I would not, and I think that if anything that will make me less biased than you, not more.

[theropod]

Sorry, your quote made me realize I had forgotten to finish that comparison in the end, so here is the complete version:


Subjective pro and con list:

Prehistoric Planet:
+Much more scientifically rigorous
+Science is over two decades further advanced
+Far more detailed CGI models, being almost photorealistic
+Attenborough narration
+Extreme attention to detail, including many taxa (e.g. Masiakasaurus, Rajasaurus, Austroraptor) that have not been shown in any previous documentary
+Diversity of habitats shown is much greater, and the animals feel even more like real animals as opposed to scary monsters than WWD’s did (although WWD struck a very good balance there, and I am sort of endeared to the mild horror elements in it, such as the monstrous Kaijupleurodon)

-Only set in the Maastrichtian
-No overarching plot, less dramatic presentation (but I acknowledge that to some people that might be a positive)
-Sometimes leaned in a little bit to much on the thought-provoking hypotheses; while the ratio between what is depicted and what there is scientific evidence for is probably better than for any other paleo documentary, there are still a few hypotheses depicted that are probably a little too outlandish (e.g. the Quetzalcoatlus scaring off the T. rex).

WWD:
+Narrative structure with overarching plot telling the history of life (ties in with WWM and WWB)
+Subordinate plot and cast of characters in each episode and get us invested in the struggle to survive in the particular ecosystem depicted
+Very lifelike animation for the time. While the level of detail in the models doesn’t hold up anymore (they do look very fake when viewed in high definition nowadays), the movements still hold up
+Use of animatronics for the closeups (recognizing the limitations of CGI at the time; I think PP gets away quite well with doing without them, but back then closeups just wouldn’t have looked believable if they were entirely CG)
+in my personal opinion, the slightly more epic soundtrack (tying in with what I think was the more epic story), although I also liked the PP one

-Notably less scientifically accurate, both for its time and, especially, in hindsight. This applies to both the "facts" explained through narration, and the morphology of the depicted animals (such as lack of feathers, inappropriate model recycling, generally incorrect anatomical details and proportions, animatronics not really matching the morphology of the corresponding CG models etc.)
-Far inferior CGI as compared to PP
-A certain disregard for groups that weren’t dinosaurs, esp. mammals (as much as I think all mammals are useless little furballs), but also, confusingly, pterosaurs (which are depicted extremely inaccurately in the show, even though they get their own spotlight episode)
-Shorter and showing less overall biodiversity across fewer locations.


Verdict: Prehistoric Planet is objectively a better documentary than Walking With Dinosaurs. It presents science that isn’t merely 20 years ahead of its competitor, but is more accurate even for the time it was made in. Where Walking with Dinosaurs went ahead to make up ridiculous monster Pliosaurs because of sensationalism and some BS Dave Martill told the production team to justify it, Prehistoric Planet made no blunders that are likely to age comparatively poorly. It is also visually stunning, much better than anything that came before it (and objectively so as far as the CGI is concerned, although I do admit that the addition of animatronics for the closeups is a plus in WWD’s book that somewhat makes up for that). The narrative is flawlessly executed, in the classic Planet Earth style of a modern nature documentary. However, subjectively I prefer the narrative format of WWD, as it is simply more gripping and exciting. WWD’s format has the benefit of showing us more than a single time period, which allows its storyline to unfold over millions of years, and is firstly epic, and secondly an advantage in terms of being educational (sadly due to the comparative inaccuracy of WWD, I cannot really say that it capitalized on this advantage to actually become as educational as PP, or more so, but at least it helps a little). Preferring this narrative style is a subjective preference, but it is, imo, nevertheless the greatest achievement of WWD as compared to other, otherwise similar documentaries.

So overall, objective verdict in favour of PP, subjective verdict undecided (I enjoy watching both to an equal degree, but for very different reasons. One I can show to my students in university to educate them, the other I can watch at home when I’m feeling nostalgic), perhaps with a narrow lean towards WWD with the nostalgia factor included.

[dinosauria101]

Sept 11, 2023 3:16:27 GMT 5 theropod said:

Well I don’t know the context for that comment, but if I put it in the context of what you have wrotten here, then I don’t think that comment is a symptom of them being biased. I think the vast majority of people would likely agree that it doesn’t even take bias to clearly prefer PP over WWD, let alone just point out that they are both great in their own way, which doesn’t strike me as a biased statement in any context. Rather, I think the "rose tinted glasses" expression matches rather well the feelings you have expressed regarding WWD’s superiority here (feelings I even share to some extend!).

I will admit that the choice of the word bias to describe what I was talking about was not the best one. On second thought it would seem bias is a very inherent thing not just here: googling the meaning of the term it would appear that a more general definition is an inclination towards something (ie: a preference equals a bias), and everyone has implicit bias - which often is not a negative thing. In this context, lining up with that definition, would be reasonable, subjective preferences for one being a bias towards one because they are inclinations, be they harmless or bad.

A better choice of words to describe what I meant would probably be inability to accept other people's subjective preferences. I should link the Reddit thread for some clarification on that: this person's rose-tinted glasses statement was not in reply to a comment so it must have been referring to the general comments with those for a WWD preference. And a number of those comments had entirely reasonable reasons that certainly do not imply they'd have rose-tinted glasses - such as this one.

1. Use of practical and puppets for close ups. This makes such a difference. No matter how good CGI gets, nothing gets that sense of physicality as a practical/puppet can.

2. They explored all 3 periods of the Mesozoic, not just a snippet of the late Cretaceous. I believe in PP this was because the lead expert they consulted specialized in that period, which was neat because we got a nice deep dive of that period. But there's so much more to explore outside of that.

3. Episode long narratives as others have pointed out. As soon as you get attached to the narrative of a dino in PP, they switch to a new species.

Man the goggles are rose tinted rn

www.reddit.com/r/Dinosaurs/comments/vh4dh5/unpopular_opinion_walking_with_dinosaurs_is/

Rather, I think the "rose tinted glasses" expression matches rather well the feelings you have expressed regarding WWD’s superiority here (feelings I even share to some extend!). 

I must admit, as much as it may appear I have rose-tinted glasses for WWD...I don't, not at least in terms of Google's definition.

a happy or positive attitude that fails to notice negative things, leading to a view of life that is not realistic.

I don't want to get into this too much prior to writing my entertainment WWD reviews, but one example of what I didn't like about WWD was that its intro music (opera/dynamic hybrid) fell considerably short of WWB and WWM: ie, unlike its counterpart intros, I don't listen to it on a regular basis. There are, after all, reasons why I prefer WWM over it.

However, the positive WWD feelings we share would be undeniably shared by someone with rose-tinted glasses for it - I can definitely agree with you on that point. 

No I wouldn’t say so, not if those preferences are being expressed in opposition to even the notion that the two things might be equally good, or not really comparable to begin with. I would say having an absolute need to establish one’s own preference over other preferences, or even a lack of preferences, is a much stronger sign of bias.

OK, upon rechecking the Reddit threads, it appears I made a mistake from the get-go - sorry about that. The statement in which they can't be compared was not actually in the same Reddit thread (rather a second identically named one in R/Palaeontology instead of R/Dinosaurs I never processed was a different thread until now!) as the rose tinted goggles statement and therefore unrelated to it....meaning everything I was saying about that beyond impossibility period vs difficulty or impossibility given certain expectations, rather misguided.

At present, my only gripe with the statement that they cannot be compared is the fact that their being analogous on a basic level facilitates at least some comparison - just like comparing WWD to the various BBC nature docs like Planet Earth. It may be difficult to do, and it may be limited, but it can be done.

You may not have said it in those exact words in reference to the show overall, but that doesn’t mean you haven’t unambiguously communicated how much you think WWD was better.

I was referring to your numerous statements of superiority of WWD over PP in numerous aspects, most of which are very subjective or debatable, but also use phrases like "Could it really be? A worthy successor to the whole Trilogy of Life?", which clearly implies you did not believe that PP was one,

as well as statements such as this:

Overall I'd say this was 60-65% out of 100.

…which I am certain is a lower score than you would give the Trilogy of Life from the way you talk about the qualities of these various documentaries, even not having read you explicitly state such a score in reference to it.

Both of these phrases were intended to convey meanings besides my preference for WWD over PP. I can see now how they might have conveyed that message, but their intended meanings were as follows:

-Worthy successor to Trilogy of Life: I meant that pretty much exactly literally, and very generally as well, as opposed to preference. In fact, I even was referring to Prehistoric Park: my preferences put it about on par with the Trilogy of Life (as you may or may not have inferred from reading my comments), but in spite of that I do not believe it is a worthy successor to the Trilogy of Life thanks to its massive format differences.  

-60-65 percent: I meant that as the satisfaction score of the episode's overall verdict: it seems a little pointless to me not to give that when the overall verdict rolls around. Certainly now I can see now much lower it is than my Trilogy of Life ratings, but at the end of the day I simply meant to get the data out there with no regard to comparative Trilogy of Life ratings.

So are you saying you do not have a preference for it?

No, I am saying I did not say that WWD simply "is" better than PP as if this were objectively the case.

Again, not in those exact words, but you did call people biased for disagreeing with you over your preference for WWD, so that’s close enough.

Not only was that mistaken terminology (as explained), but it's not their disagreement with my WWD preference - it's their seemingly unreasonable inability to accept WWD preferences.

And I am not criticizing your entertainment-based review or the opinions it states, I’m merely reminding you that other people can have different opinions, and that they can also disagree with your opinions without them necessarily being the ones who are biased.

Same as above, it's not their opinions that are the problem as well as mistaken terminology. 

"PP has absolutely awful immersion, especially compared to WWD. I'll cover this in more depth in the final verdict."

Said for context, I didn't think what I said would have made sense without saying that. Of course, that was replying to the quote that I thought was relevant but isn't actually - so I suppose it doesn't really mean anything important.

"What's that? You wanted to watch those baby T. rexes grow up and perfect the art of hunting for sea turtles/evading hungry mosasaurs in a nice, comprehensive WWD format?

So did I, but NOPE. This arc is over now, and with its ending, we are introduced to the biggest problem in PP that's very prevalent in all episodes: the terrible pacing/plot."

Initial statement.

"This arc would have been much more satisfying to see had we watched those baby Alcione grow up and survive. We saw all they had to do to even get past being new hatchlings, which gives us a great desire to see more...but of course the arc is then over."

Said for context/clarification on the arc-to-arc-basis, and primarily intended to suggest what would fix the problem. 

"For this arc, although I didn't yearn to see a more complex storyline, I never felt that attached to the mosasaur either despite the aesthetics..which is not desirable, and is probably why I didn't yearn. I don't know if it's worse to yearn or not to be attached."

With the exception of the comparative cross-reference (which I included for ease of comparison to a new issue) his statement does not refer to the poor immersion I experienced. What I meant by saying this was that I never got attached enough to the protagonist to have the immersion troubles of the other arcs.

"-Too many meh/non attaching arcs."

Like with the above, I am referring to something else. The non attaching part is covered above, but the meh part means that what happened in the arc simply was not to my taste - again, intended to be a different criticism than the poor immersion.

Those all sound like repetitions of exactly the same criticism to me, that the storylines didn’t provide good immersion for you.

I will concede that may have worded the differently-intended ones too similarly to the poor immersion criticism, but as explained above those are intended to be multiple different criticisms.

And yes, I suppose I did reword the same critique a couple of times even if I didn't quite remember so at the time of my previous comment. Thinking back to that, it was intended to provide context in different arcs and such: I thought viewers would have an easier time if I provided that context but I could have been mistaken on that front.

WHen you called them biased towards WWD simply for not wanting to compare the two (and in a way that highly praised WWD, no less).

As mentioned above, not only did I not call them biased (rather get the impression that they were), that was when I mistakenly thought that bias was the appropriate term to describe my point, and that that comment was relevant to the rose-tinted glasses comment. Now, however, I realize all these mistakes - and how not to make them.

Here’s the thing with (again, repeatedly) using the argument "I used search and didn’t find the exact phrase you mentioned more (than once), so I wasn’t (repeatedly) making that argument": That something is put into slightly different words or implied in other statements (such as calling someone biased for something) doesn’t mean it isn’t being clearly expressed.

Most of this comes from the Reddit mistake, unintentionally implying more than I meant with statements meant to imply different things than what was already said, or the differently intended criticisms perhaps not being differently worded enough. The remainder was because I had been under the impression that reiteration in the different contexts would be useful for the reader given differences in each context.

If there’s anything I’d like you to think about, it’s this, since that’s a concept that’s really universally important to grasp in order to be able to learn from errors or miscommunications: Wording something slightly differently doesn’t help if in essence what you are saying is still the same, and if the problem wasn’t the wording, but the thing you were saying.

Thank you for this pointer. I can understand this premise of what you are saying: rewording does not fix a problematic statement if the problem is what the statement says instead of the way in which it says what it says.
I believe I can put this to good use down the line.

Well generally the word "biased" is taken to mean something along the lines of "unobjective, and arguing for their opinion even if demonstrated to be objectively wrong".

Refer to the very first quote.

Insofar as that comparison is aimed at determining which one is better or worse: Yes, absolutely!

Which is better, a good fantasy novel, or a good scientific paper? Neither is objectively better, they are simply good at being different things. You can subjectively state that you prefer one over the other, but I would not, and I think that if anything that will make me less biased than you, not more.

Although that comment was of course mistakenly quoted and the bias term misused, I should elaborate on what I said about comparisons not being impossible, since that would be appropriate to do so. I will need to give this particular part some thought, though - will probably address it in its own comment (and I may have a few thoughts on your second full comparison as well).

[theropod]

Most of this comes from the Reddit mistake, unintentionally implying more than I meant with statements meant to imply different things than what was already said, or the differently intended criticisms perhaps not being differently worded enough. The remainder was because I had been under the impression that reiteration in the different contexts would be useful for the reader given differences in each context.

My point of criticism: you jump to the excuse that you worded something differently, while your meaning was clearly the same
Your response: You will word things more differently in the future.

Get what I mean? How exactly things are worded isn’t the problem here, nor is just wording things slightly differently the solution.

In this case, consider the following.

You have established that you did not like the stylistic decision for the particular format that Prehistoric Planet follows. Fair enough, you have every right to have that preference.
But you can leave it at that, since you have already made it more than understood that you didn’t like it. There is no need to repeatedly complain about this issue, which affects the whole series and is not going away, every single time it occurs, as if it were a separate issue each time. The scenes on PP aren’t short because someone messed up every single time, they are that way because the entire series as a whole took the narrative decision to do it like that, so what point is there to critiquing it every single time?
After it is established that this is something you did not like about the series, and unless remarking this somewhere presents some sort of novel information, why not just move on and focus on other points, that may contribute novel points of criticism or praise besides the single central one you already mentioned, and that might actually be related to the individual scenes rather than the planning of the series as a whole?
And again, I am not telling you that you have to do that when writing your reviews (which I enjoyed reading), it’s just that if you do it like this, can you really fault someone else for thinking you mean to establish just how much you objectively think Prehistoric Planet is bad in this regard?

To give you an example, imagine saying "I didn’t like the premise of The Lord of the Rings movies because I don’t like fantasy" in the opening statement of a movie review, then criticizing every single scene because on the grounds that you think fantasy creatures like elves and hobbits and orcs are stupid. If you did that, would it not then come across as you wanting to firmly establish just how much you don’t like fantasy movies, with you not simply remarking on this once, but all or most of your criticism essentially being based on this single issue?

[dinosauria101]

Sept 11, 2023 15:17:27 GMT 5 theropod said:

My point of criticism: you jump to the excuse that you worded something differently, while your meaning was clearly the same
Your response: You will word things more differently in the future.

Get what I mean? How exactly things are worded isn’t the problem here, nor is just wording things slightly differently the solution.

As I explained, the majority of the times the meaning is intended to be something other than what was already said - hence my statement about the rewording, which would be the appropriate course of action to show that I was referring to something else.

The same meaning part has been addressed in a below quote.

However, I can understand if your point of criticism would extend to my multiple criticisms being too similar to an existing criticism in spite of meaning (or at least intended to mean) something other than what was already said. For example, my criticism of what happened in certain arcs not being to my taste getting across a very similar point to my criticism of not liking the pacing, even if they are technically different.
In which case, I can agree that that's reasonable: I can see how overly similar criticisms, even if the overall meaning is supposed to be different, may not be conveying sufficient amounts of novel information to be worthwhile.

In this case, consider the following.



You have established that you did not like the stylistic decision for the particular format that Prehistoric Planet follows. Fair enough, you have every right to have that preference.

But you can leave it at that, since you have already made it more than understood that you didn’t like it. There is no need to repeatedly complain about this issue, which affects the whole series and is not going away, every single time it occurs, as if it were a separate issue each time. The scenes on PP aren’t short because someone messed up every single time, they are that way because the entire series as a whole took the narrative decision to do it like that, so what point is there to critiquing it every single time?

In this particular case, I had been under the impression that case-by-case covering of a recurring issue for all the different arcs might have been useful for the reader thanks to being a very case-by-case basis. It would have been a more widespread version of what I have seen in other reviews: for example, this critique in the retrospective review of "Dinosaur Planet: White Tip's Journey".

Blue Brow wins the fight and Broken Hand leaves. This part confuses me: why does Broken Hand have to leave? Velociraptor packs in this universe are not like lion prides. It’s clearly established that there can be more than one adult male Velociraptor in a pack in the DP-verse, given how Blue Brow was already an established member even before his victory. So why can’t Broken Hand just stay in the pack, but as Blue Brow’s subordinate now?



A more consistent way to write this would be more akin to what we see in the Australopithecus tribe in Walking with Beasts. The dominant male for most of the relevant episode, Grey, loses to a younger adult male named Hercules in their rematch. Despite this, Grey continues to be a member of the group, just now as a subordinate to Hercules.

However, hearing from you (the reader, one of them at least) tells me that doing so is probably not necessary after all: it would appear that for the reader the initial establishment is sufficient despite the problem having come across to me as case-by-case.

And again, I am not telling you that you have to do that when writing your reviews (which I enjoyed reading), it’s just that if you do it like this, can you really fault someone else for thinking you mean to establish just how much you objectively think Prehistoric Planet is bad in this regard?

If doing so isn't necessary as I assumed it was...I suppose not. 

Glad you hear you enjoyed my reviews, I will be using this feedback to the best of my ability to make them even moreso.

To give you an example, imagine saying "I didn’t like the premise of The Lord of the Rings movies because I don’t like fantasy" in the opening statement of a movie review, then criticizing every single scene because on the grounds that you think fantasy creatures like elves and hobbits and orcs are stupid. If you did that, would it not then come across as you wanting to firmly establish just how much you don’t like fantasy movies, with you not simply remarking on this once, but all or most of your criticism essentially being based on this single issue?

I can see how this might tie in to even differently-intended criticisms being perhaps too similar and ultimately appearing to base the whole critique on a single issue - not to mention how if the context-intended reiterations I touch on below aren't needed like thought, they would be furthering this impression, yes.

After it is established that this is something you did not like about the series, and unless remarking this somewhere presents some sort of novel information, why not just move on and focus on other points, that may contribute novel points of criticism or praise besides the single central one you already mentioned, and that might actually be related to the individual scenes rather than the planning of the series as a whole?

This as alluded to in the first quote was the intent of the times in which I did so: as I mentioned, the novel information the remarking was intended to present was specific arc-by-arc improvements that would have been more to my taste, and I assumed the reader would find to be a useful addition given my established distaste. Since (like the other case) this does not appear to be the case hearing from the reader, I'm happy to no longer do so in order to give the reader a better review to read. 

Thank you once more for taking the time to go over this so I can improve the quality of the reviews I write.

[theropod]

Sept 11, 2023 16:35:34 GMT 5 dinosauria101 said:

In this particular case, I had been under the impression that case-by-case covering of a recurring issue for all the different arcs might have been useful for the reader thanks to being a very case-by-case basis. It would have been a more widespread version of what I have seen in other reviews: for example, this critique in the retrospective review of "Dinosaur Planet: White Tip's Journey".

Blue Brow wins the fight and Broken Hand leaves. This part confuses me: why does Broken Hand have to leave? Velociraptor packs in this universe are not like lion prides. It’s clearly established that there can be more than one adult male Velociraptor in a pack in the DP-verse, given how Blue Brow was already an established member even before his victory. So why can’t Broken Hand just stay in the pack, but as Blue Brow’s subordinate now?

A more consistent way to write this would be more akin to what we see in the Australopithecus tribe in Walking with Beasts. The dominant male for most of the relevant episode, Grey, loses to a younger adult male named Hercules in their rematch. Despite this, Grey continues to be a member of the group, just now as a subordinate to Hercules.

I would argue that this is a very different thing, as it’s not simply a criticism that arises as a specific example from a previous, generalized criticism of an intentional stylistic feature of the show itself. This one instead points out a specific leap in narrative logic, particular to this specific scene, which thus obviously belongs with this scene and nowhere else.

However, hearing from you (the reader, one of them at least) tells me that doing so is probably not necessary after all: it would appear that for the reader the initial establishment is sufficient despite the problem having come across to me as case-by-case.

The quote is a good example to bring up to show you what I mean, and what kind of issues require a case-by-case (or scene-by-scene) critique as opposed to one addressing the overall series.

In your case, this is precisely not "case-by-case", as there’s not really a difference in the specific cases (unlike in the review you quoted as an example, where there is that one particular scene where the animals behave in that particular, illogical fashion).

Now, if you have other particular improvements in mind for each narrative ark, other than that they are simply all too short for your taste, that would immediately change things completely.

I just didn’t get the impression that there were, since in essence there was no difference between your points of criticism of these different arks, them all just basically being "too short/not elaborate enough". So remarking this on every single ark can be however true (at least to your subjective preferences), but it doesn’t contribute any information that’s relevant to that particular scene, it merely gives examples of a point of criticism you have already made in reference to the series as a whole (and the point of examples should be to just pick a few, not to list every single case of something).
What it does do is suggest that you are, perhaps subconsciously, trying to support something by noting it again and again, despite that something in the end just being your own subjective dislike of the narrative format of the series (which you were not expected to give "evidence" for, since nobody is in denial that this series has the aforementione narrative format). But I don’t need to be told your opinion of the narrative format every single time this narrative format has an effect on the series, I already know it.

[dinosauria101]

Sept 11, 2023 17:37:42 GMT 5 theropod said:

Sept 11, 2023 16:35:34 GMT 5 dinosauria101 said:

In this particular case, I had been under the impression that case-by-case covering of a recurring issue for all the different arcs might have been useful for the reader thanks to being a very case-by-case basis. It would have been a more widespread version of what I have seen in other reviews: for example, this critique in the retrospective review of "Dinosaur Planet: White Tip's Journey".

I would argue that this is a very similar thing, as it’s not simply a criticism that arises as a specific example from a previous, generalized criticism of an intentional stylistic feature of the show itself. This one instead points out a specific leap in narrative logic, particular to this specific scene, which thus obviously belongs with this scene and nowhere else.

The quote is a good example to bring up to show you what I mean, and what kind of issues require a case-by-case (or scene-by-scene) critique as opposed to one addressing the overall series.

In your case, this is precisely not "case-by-case", as there’s not really a difference in the specific cases (unlike in the review you quoted as an example, where there is that one particular scene where the animals behave in that particular, illogical fashion).

I understand what you mean here. Although what I quoted was case-by-case because it only pertained to the case of the specific scene, what I have been referring to is not case-by-case because it ties back to my general critique - therefore stating the general critique from the get-go without having to restate it should be sufficient.

Now, if you have other particular improvements in mind for each narrative ark, other than that they are simply all too short for your taste, that would immediately change things completely.

Would these types of improvement suggestions fulfill that criteria? I may or may not have stated them in the original review, but I don't think they are necessarily related to being too short - simply what is or is not shown regardless of timing.

-Mixed pterosaur segment: If we're going to see the baby Alcione hatch, harden their wings, and fly the gauntlet, we might as well get some time of the segment dedicated to seeing the survivors grow up. For example, a timelapse of them growing like we got in the Olorotitan segment of Ice Words.

-Mosasaurus segment: If we're going to see the male Mosasaurus in his breeding colors, it would be fitting to see him at least attract a mate. Otherwise, the significance of the breeding colors seems diminished.

-Tuarangisaurus and Kaikaifilu segment: If we're going to see the baby Tuarangisaurus be so bold as to distract the mosasaur, it would be appreciated to be told where/how he learned to do so and overcome a presumably inherent fleeing instinct.

I just didn’t get the impression that there were, since in essence there was no difference between your points of criticism of these different arks, them all just basically being "too short/not elaborate enough". So remarking this on every single ark can be however true (at least to your subjective preferences), but it doesn’t contribute any information that’s relevant to that particular scene, it merely gives examples of a point of criticism you have already made in reference to the series as a whole (and the point of examples should be to just pick a few, not to list every single case of something).

What it does do is suggest that you are, perhaps subconsciously, trying to support something by noting it again and again, despite that something in the end just being your own subjective dislike of the narrative format of the series (which you were not expected to give "evidence" for, since nobody is in denial that this series has the aforementione narrative format). But I don’t need to be told your opinion of the narrative format every single time this narrative format has an effect on the series, I already know it.

This is a particularly useful statement, appreciated. I think you are probably right that I was subconsciously expecting to have to give evidence for it - for whatever reason - but at this point, it's easy to see there's no need for it.

[theropod]

Sept 11, 2023 18:08:28 GMT 5 dinosauria101 said:

Would these types of improvement suggestions fulfill that criteria? I may or may not have stated them in the original review, but I don't think they are necessarily related to being too short - simply what is or is not shown regardless of timing.

-Mixed pterosaur segment: If we're going to see the baby Alcione hatch, harden their wings, and fly the gauntlet, we might as well get some time of the segment dedicated to seeing the survivors grow up. For example, a timelapse of them growing like we got in the Olorotitan segment of Ice Words.

-Mosasaurus segment: If we're going to see the male Mosasaurus in his breeding colors, it would be fitting to see him at least attract a mate. Otherwise, the significance of the breeding colors seems diminished.

-Tuarangisaurus and Kaikaifilu segment: If we're going to see the baby Tuarangisaurus be so bold as to distract the mosasaur, it would be appreciated to be told where/how he learned to do so and overcome a presumably inherent fleeing instinct.

Those all look like valid, constructive suggestions for those specific story arcs yes.