Genre Documentary No. of episodes 50 | No. of seasons 4 Running time 24 minutes | |
Narrated by Ben Gazzara (Season 1), Nick Schatzki (Season 2 and Season 3) and Ted Maynard (Season 4) Original network The Learning Channel (TLC) | ||
Paleoworld is an American documentary television series that aired on The Learning Channel from 1994 to 1997. The series focuses on paleontology and comprised a total of 50 half-hour episodes. It was the first television series dedicated to paleontology that spanned multiple seasons. The series is now owned by the Discovery Channel, along with other documentaries such as Beyond T-rex, Valley Of The T-rex, Dinosaur Planet and When Dinosaurs Roamed America. Paleoworld currently airs in reruns on Science.
Contents
Spin-off
Paleoworld never returned for a fifth season. However, TLC released a new series about dinosaurs the following year (1998) as a spin-off to the Paleoworld series. It was called "When Dinosaurs Ruled" ("Jurassica" in some countries).
Reception
Season 1 (1994) featured a smooth style to it and was narrated by Ben Gazzara. This series had lots of musical scenes, which resulted in what some consider to be an extremely calm and relaxing show. It also uses a lot more Paleoart than later series. Season 2 (1995) and Season 3 (1996) lost the musical element (as well as changing narrators), which resulted in a more conventional style nature documentary. Even so, seasons 2 and 3 were still perceived as maintaining the quality standard. For season 4 (1997), the series changed narrators again, and viewers felt the show suffered a drop in quality, shifting from musical and calm, to full-on and repetitive. Consequently, season 4 was cancelled mid-season. The show never returned for a fifth season.
Release
Many DVDs and VHS tapes have been made with episodes from the series, however most have been discontinued and are no longer available to buy anymore. 3 DVD's of Paleoworld with 5 episodes on each were released in Australia in 2002 and a 5 disc set with 15 episodes from the series was released in the US and Canada. A link can be found below to a site where you can still buy a copy of this 5 disc set. However, a 3 disc set containing the same 15 episodes from the 3 DVDs at the top of this paragraph is now being released again as a 3 disc set on 13/1/10.