Dynasties (TV Mini Series) Tiger (2018) User Reviews

A story to be heard of the Tigers

[vishwas_p · 8/10 · 8 December 2018]

A story that focuses on a tigress named 'Raj Bhera' and her children in Bandhavgarh tiger reserve, India.

This episode has brought them closer to me than I was before. I learnt quite a lot about this wonderful animal. I am finding myself loving the tigers after watching the episode. For their grace, strength, intelligence, alertness, beauty and also having the highest population of the Tigers in the world, there's no wonder that India has made this amazing creature as its National animal.

The lives of these tigers show that the gender discrimination is not just limited to homo sapiens but it stands upright in some of the other species like this one. How is a female cub treated differently from her other male siblings, what forces her to leave her family, how does she build a new territory of her own. This episode on tigers unfolds some of these untold facts of the animal.

As always the episode gets a whole lot of different touch with the narration of Attenborough and the camera work of crew. The filming crew has spent years capturing the minute details. They deserve a big salute.

Like every other episode this, also, has shown the hardships that tigers face. With only few of these left in the wild, it's our duty to preserve this wonderful creation of nature for our future generations.

Do not miss to be awed! Go on, watch it.

Battles of the tiger

[TheLittleSongbird · 9/10 · 25 February 2019]

David Attenborough's output is always greatly anticipated. Have been a big fan of his for a long time and he is a big inspiration. He is widely acclaimed and immensely popular, and there are more than justifiable reasons for that. Have not seen anything bad from him, which is incredibly rare, some of his work like 'Planet Earth', 'The Blue Planet' and 'The Life of Birds' (only a few examples but they spring to mind) and there are some documentaries that are definitive in certain species, especially birds, invertebrates and reptiles.

Is 'Dynasties' among his best work? Again, as said in my overview of the whole series and in individual episodes, no it isn't. Other documentaries of his are more ground-breaking and different. This is not a knock against it in any way, it is only saying that his filmography has so many treasures and it is a rare case of one with no misfires, even lesser outings are well worth watching and leagues above quite a lot of the documentary genre in general. Regardless of whether it is ground-breaking and different or not, 'Dynasties' brought an interesting new approach with a tighter focus to exploring familiar animals and is a hugely intriguing and memorable series with a lot of powerful moments. It was criticised before it began for whether it would play out as a documentary depicting familiar animals in a sometimes cute and reassuring way, for some perhaps over-humanised, amidst beautiful scenery. This has proved to be an unfair prior judgement, and it has been none of those things, a lot of it has been pretty unforgiving and taken no prisoners actually.

"Tiger" in retrospect is my least favourite of the five episodes, which set such a high bar, and a slight disappointment compared to the absolutely amazing previous four parts. One would think that "Painted Wolf" would be the least favourite, with the animals least explored and unfamiliar for many so fearing that it would not be as easy to connect, actually because of this and this approach the series adopts it was one of the more intriguing ones and one of the most powerful ones too. There is an emphasis on slight regarding the disappointment because this episode is still great. It is the least eventful of the five, the story being quite slight in comparison, and it doesn't have as many uncompromising or gut-wrenching scenes like seen in much of "Painted Wolf", Red and the hyenas in "Lion" and the penguins struggles in "Emperor". By 'Dynasties' standards, it's somewhat subdued though nobody would criticise it for being sugar-coated or trivialised, not the case for both.

However, there are many great qualities, exceptional even. Tigers are one of the more commonly explored animals in Attenborough documentaries, but one shouldn't dismiss it as being over-familiar territory. Like the rest of 'Dynasties', "Tiger" has a tighter, more personal focus than most documentaries on tigers, and with the story of the mother tiger and her cubs and their adversities it is very intimate. Which made it rather inspiring and easy to connect with. Really did root for them, and the series was brilliant in general at doing this, without remarkably over-humanising it even with naming a few.

It looks amazing for starters. The filming is not just glorious to look at and complements the beautiful yet appropriately unforgiving scenery adeptly, it is often remarkably cinematic and its intimacy enhances the more dramatic scenes. The music never came over as intrusive or inappropriate, that has been the case with some documentaries seen (and this is including a few of Attenborough's work here) but not here.

Regarding the information, it continues to be thought-provoking in "Tiger" being being rambling or over-speculating without proof, dangers in documentaries. Like the previous four episodes, there is a feel of an individual story and one does forget that they are watching an episode of a series, this is something that Attenborough's work always excelled at and have always admired that facts were seldom compromised in his work as has been seen in some documentaries without his involvement. The tigers' adversities are portrayed vividly without holding back too much, despite not as pulling-no-punches as the previous episodes it is never too cute or too reassuring, there is none of what 'Dynasties' was criticised prior to beginning. Much respect has to go to the crew as well. Once again, Attenborough delivers sincerely, enthusiastically as well as in an understated fashion, his voice as ever distinctive. One can listen to him for hours and not tire of him, no other nature/wildlife documentary narrator/presenter has made me feel this way.

Overall, slightly disappointing compared to before but still great. 9/10

Nothing happens, even for a documentary episode.

[housebeast · 6/10 · 23 February 2019]

What a let down. Last episode was one of the greatest piece of documentary ever caught on camera and storytelling of the highest order, that definitively set up the bar very high for this series finale. And we got a very boring regular life of the tiger and her cubs, not even one scene of hunting of fighting.