How the Earth Was Made

There's a lot of information in How the Earth Was Made, but perhaps the most interesting relates to time. Quite often, the numbers are so staggering that scientists refer to it as "deep time," an appropriate term when one grapples with the notion that our planet is 4.5 billion years old, or that the oceans were formed by rainfall that lasted literally millions of years, or that 700 million years ago, Earth was completely covered by ice that was a mile thick, with surface temperatures reaching minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit. On the other end of the scale are numbers that seem surprisingly small: for instance, it wasn't until 220 years ago that the accepted church doctrine regarding the planet's age (no more than 6000 years, according to the Bible) was seriously challenged and that the key to its past was found in rocks, not scripture, while the discovery that dinosaurs once ruled the Earth came considerably later than that. Using a combination of computer graphics and animation, various drawings and diagrams, photos, location footage, and expert commentary, this fascinating, 94-minute History Channel production takes us from the very beginning, when the planet was formed by meteors colliding in space, through numerous major events (including the appearance of water, granite, and oxygen) and mind-boggling catastrophes (such as mass extinctions caused by volcanic eruptions or the enormous meteor that wiped out 75% of all living things, including the dinosaurs, some 65 million years ago), right up to the present; there's even a glimpse into the future, when Earth will likely end up as barren and lifeless as Mars (no need to hit the panic button yet, though--a few billion more years will pass before that happens). Bonus features include additional scenes and a documentary entitled "Inside the Volcano." --Sam Graham

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  • TheTVDB.com Series ID 85168
  • Status Ended
  • First Aired February 10, 2009
  • Recent March 2, 2010
  • Airs Tuesday, at 9:00pm
  • Network History
  • Average Runtime 45 minutes
  • Genres Documentary History
  • Original Country United States of America
  • Original Language English
  • On Other Sites EIDR IMDB TMS (Zap2It) TheMovieDB.com
  • Episode Screenshot Format 16:9 Screencap
  • Favorited This series has been favorited by 149 people.
  • Created February 17, 2009 by
    Administrator admin
  • Modified December 30, 2022 by
    WilliamsJD
Season From To Episodes
All Seasons
Specials September 2007 April 2008 4
Season 1 February 2009 May 2009 13
Season 2 November 2009 March 2010 13
Unassigned Episodes 0
Season From To Episodes
All Seasons
Season 1 February 2009 May 2009 13
Season 2 November 2009 March 2010 13
Unassigned Episodes 4
Absolute ordering places all episodes in a single ordered season. This is generally used for anime.
Season From To Episodes
Season 1 0
Unassigned Episodes 30

No actors for this record.

Name Number of Episodes Dates
Peter Chinn 21 02/10/2009 - 05/12/2009

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