Mysteries of the Terracotta Warriors

50 years ago National Geographic did an article about the terracotta warriors. I was a teenager and swore some day I'd go there. I did, in 2015. This documentary brought back all the excitement and wonder of actually standing and looking down on those thousands of warriors. The place is truly magical and this documentary does an excellent job of illustrating that.

I cannot imagine the dedication it must take to spend most of your archeological career painstakingly reassembling these statues. The fact that they survived at all is astonishing, considering how delicate terracotta ultimately is.

Seeing pictures, and even this video, is just a tiny example of how incredible the place really is.

As an archaeologist and an educator who visited the terracotta warriors site, as well as the other places in this documentary, over 10 times in the last 13 years, I was really excited to watch this historical mystery puzzle slowly putting pieces together. James Tovell, the documentary director behind Secrets of the Saqqara Tomb, delves into the enigmatic world of the Terracotta Warriors in his latest project. Tovell, known for his work on shows like I Am Killer and Cradle to Grave, brings his expertise to unravel the mysteries surrounding these ancient artifacts.

Excellent job presenting the topic and highly informative documentary!

Its an instersting documentary to watch. But you realize very quickly that the CCP had some say in this show. The people looked a little to staged and a bit frightntened. Every supposed academic had some way to make sure they talked up china as the greatest country ever in the world for ever and ever. The production value was pretty great for this small documentary also making me think it was finaceced by the CCP. Its also obviouse that they dont want to give up to many secrets to anyone that is not chinese. The keep saying there is so much more to go but then they dont mention it again its weird.

This one is better if only compared to the many poorly done Netflix 'documentaries'.

As usual, what mars all these so-called "documentaries" are the inclusions of totally unnecessary and distracting theatrics which add nothing except to eat up time so as to cover up for the lack of more interesting factual information.

The chunks of time taken up by cringy re-enactments (of which there are already plentiful Chinese movie saga that do much better) could have been much better spent to provide graphical clarity on the inter-relationships of the historical characters involved and their placement in China's history in that period, as well as provide better visual understanding of the layout of the sprawling burial complex.

This one does provide more focussed interviews on the subject at hand compared to the meandering pointless interviews of the Saqarra Tombs that doesn't relate directly with the content at hand.

Both could have done with more properly written and professionally narrated content that link up the things talked about in the various interviews - as it is, much of the content seem rather incidental hotch-potch rather than following a clear focussed narrative thread that a good documentary should have.

Still hoping Netflix will one day come up with actual real professional documentaries without the glob of cheap theatre plonked in.

Giant infomercial for China, how great they are, how great the archiaological dig is, the big building, etc. Lots of hyperbole. It's a little insufferable.

The main narrator/ researcher resembles and speaks like an animatronic character at Chuck E. Cheese. He sounds like a voiceover, but it looks like he speaks English, so it wouldn't have been necessary to translate the speech. It's very disturbing. Several methods are used to translate Chinese into English but it's inconsistent doesn't make sense. Some Chinese doesn't get translated at all.

I'm sure that China is very proud of the terracotta warriors, and rightfully so, but this whole production should have been a documentary instead of this ham-handed drama.

The bottom line for me is that this site was discovered during the cultural revolution when people lost their heads for talking about or paying homage to old things or old people. Who know how many of artifacts just disappeared because they showed China in some unfavorable light?

Hard pass.