As Episode 1 ("Land of Heroes") of "America The Beautiful" (2022 release; 6 episodes of about 45 min each) opens, we are in North Dakota, where a red squirrel is gathering food for the long winter ahead, only to be challenged by scavengers. What is the squirrel to do? We then go to the wetlands in Louisiana, where a 15 ft alligator is patrolling the neighborhood, ready to pounce at any time...
Couple of comments: there are so many nature documentaries out there, so how does this one compare? Actually not that good, I'm afraid to say. Let's start with the positives: there is some amazing footage in this 6 part series, and some of it is hard to watch (see how the grizzly bear hunts down a caribou calf that literally was born only hours before). But there is way too many aerial drone footage of massive landscapes that fly by in seconds, and the opening episode crisscrosses North America without any rhyme or reason (literally going from the Grand Canyon to the northern lights in Alaska within minutes. I couldn't make any heads or tails as to the overall direction or purpose of this. What it really felt like was a "greatest hits" collection of animals in the wild in North America. Perhaps for some viewers, this is more than enough, but I felt that the haphazard nature of the underlying script and its correlating editing didn't do this mini-series any favors, unfortunately.
"American The Beautiful" was released, appropriately enough, this past July 4 (2 weeks ago today). If you like nature documentaries, I'd readily suggest you check this out, and draw your own conclusion.
