#Blue planet deep sea creatures yellow series#

It reveals bubbles of methane violently erupting from the ocean floor in front of a submersible’s headlights, like rockets launching in front of an angry sun. It shows how abundant life can be in belching underwater volcanoes and the cold depths of Antarctica. This species of shrimp, as larvae, will waft into a Venus’s flower basket sponge, and grow up trapped within its crystalline walls. It features a love story between two shrimp. But it also considerably ups the ante on its predecessor.

#Blue planet deep sea creatures yellow series#

In some ways, the sequel series treads the same ground as the 2001 original, featuring similar locations (the original ended on a brine lake), similar creatures, and even the same structure, sinking deeper and deeper as the minutes tick by.

It even showed us species that were new to science, like the Dumbo octopus, so named for the earlike flaps that protrude from its head. It avoided the usual menagerie of clownfish, penguins, and sharks in favor of oddities like the improbably dentured fangtooth, slimy hagfish, and Phronima, a parasite that inspired H. It took us to fantastical worlds, from belching hydrothermal vents to a whale fall-the decaying carcass of a sunken whale. And its low temperatures and crushing pressures make it so inaccessible that it has barely been explored, much less filmed.Īnd yet, Blue Planet succeeded amply.

Its perpetual darkness does not exactly make for compelling cinematography. To devote 50 minutes of television to exploring the deep ocean seems, at first, like lunacy. It follows in the tradition of the original Blue Planet from 2001, which also voyaged into the abyss for its second episode. Two weeks ago, I described Blue Planet II as the “ greatest nature series of all time.” I stand by that, and I’m also crowning “The Deep” as the greatest of the series’ seven episodes. Some are so overwhelmed by the salt that they go into shock, their sinuous bodies twisting into convulsing knots. Illuminated by submersible headlights, and accompanied by choral music, cutthroat eels wriggle from the “shores” of the lake and dive into its midst for reasons unknown. One such lake features in “The Deep”-the second episode of Blue Planet II, which aired Saturday on BBC America and other networks. It sinks, pools, and refuses to mix with the surrounding seawater, creating perception-defying lakes that, despite being hundreds of meters deep, have their own surfaces and shorelines. These are places where the water contains far more salt than usual, making it extremely dense. There are lakes at the bottom of the ocean.