In the Bahamas, Chris dives into one of the biggest questions in nature - how intelligence itself evolved, and how it arose in the dolphin's mind. Inside each is the result of a three-billion-year journey.
In South Africa, Chris finds out how reproduction has shaped life on Earth and the surprising evolutionary origins of sex, eggs and birds. This is a journey of innovation, adaptation and astonishing creativity.
In Kenya, Chris embarks on a journey through time to uncover how a creature as vast, complex and charismatic as the elephant came to be. It's a story of innovations, lucky breaks and unlikely partnerships.
Dan Snow sets sail across the Mediterranean in the wake of Homer's The Odyssey. This epic was written down almost 3,000 years ago, and it has been loved by generations of filmmakers, artists, authors and historians since. Now Dan re-tells the story visiting the harbours, mysterious islands and incredible ancient locations across Greece that inspired The Odyssey.
2026 • Travel
A new generation of tech billionaires believe their technologies can replace democracy as we know it and upend the global financial system. Matt Shea gets inside access to this new super-elite, visiting the sovereign nations they're building and tracing their growing political connections to the Trump administration. Are these men trying to take over the world?
2026 • Technology
Most people hear "Romania" and immediately picture Dracula, the gothic myths of Bran Castle, or the grey, concrete remnants of the communist era. But the reality of this nation in Eastern Europe is far more complex, untamed, and beautiful.
2026 • Travel
In the aftermath of Hiroshima, a group of scientists vowed never to turn knowledge into weapons again, and from that promise, CERN was born. Deep underground, researchers from nations in conflict have worked side by side for decades, driven by curiosity and shared wonder. For 70 years, CERN has stood as an act of hope, a place where collaboration transcends borders, even as the world above grows more divided. Blending poetry, music and rare archival footage of nuclear physicist Robert Oppenheimer with remarkable access to the Large Hadron Collider, the film explores how science, politics and culture collide.
2026 • Physics
Behind the billion-pound success of OnlyFans lies a hidden ecosystem of exploitation. A BBC Current Affairs investigation uncovers allegations of exploitation, coercion and violence committed by some of the hundreds of agents who manage many of the platform's creators as well as the potential for modern slavery. Through survivor testimony, undercover access to a managers' chat forum and expert legal analysis, the film exposes an industry where young women are trapped, threatened and profited from - raising urgent questions about accountability at the heart of one of Britain's most lucrative tech companies.
2026 • Economics
The story of the cloned sheep that was the first mammal to be created from an adult cell, and the unassuming lab that changed scientific history, leading to press stampedes, presidential panic, protests and even a failed kidnapping plot. As Dolly blinked up at the cameras, the Roslin science team's sleepy lab became the centre of an ethical uproar.
2026 • Science
ITER is an international attempt to meet humanity's energy needs by harnessing nuclear fusion. We take you within the ITER project to see how close the technology is to becoming a reality.
2026 • Science
Sir Tim Hunt, awarded the Nobel Prize for his discovery of the mechanism of how cells divide, recalls moments in his life that provided inspiration for his career as a scientist, from his father's intent scholarship which shaped his early methods to his mother's battle with cancer and the influence of this on his position at Cancer Research UK. Hunt recounts the events that informed his discovery and reveals his own opinions on the thought processes, both logical and emotional, that led to it.
S1E3 • Beautiful Minds • 2010 • People
We are living in exceptional times. Scientists tell us that we have 10 years to change the way we live, avert the depletion of natural resources and the catastrophic evolution of the Earth's climate.
2009 • Environment
How we finally came to understand the science of electricity.
From desalination plants to the "Billion Oyster Project," witness humankind's efforts to meet our freshwater needs.
S1E3 • Age of Humans • 2021 • Environment
Almost everything we know today about the beautiful giant ringed planet comes from Cassini, the NASA mission that launched in 1997 and arrived at Saturn in 2004. Since then, the space probe has been beaming home miraculous images and scientific data, revealing countless wonders about the planet, its rings and 62 moons - including some that could harbor life. As the mission approaches its final days in 2017, it attempts one last set of daring maneuvers - diving between the innermost ring and the top of Saturn's atmosphere. Aiming to skim less than 2000 miles above the cloud tops, no spacecraft has ever gone so close to Saturn, and hopes are high for incredible observations that could solve major mysteries about the planet's core. But such a daring maneuver comes with many risks and is no slam dunk. In fact, slamming into rocks in the rings is a real possibility. Join NASA engineers for the tense and triumphant moments as they find out if their bold re-programming has worked, and discover the wonders that Cassini has revealed over the years.
Understanding what consciousness is, and why and how it evolved, is perhaps the greatest mystery known to science.
The Economist • 2015 • Brain
Behind the billion-pound success of OnlyFans lies a hidden ecosystem of exploitation. A BBC Current Affairs investigation uncovers allegations of exploitation, coercion and violence committed by some of the hundreds of agents who manage many of the platform's creators as well as the potential for modern slavery. Through survivor testimony, undercover access to a managers' chat forum and expert legal analysis, the film exposes an industry where young women are trapped, threatened and profited from - raising urgent questions about accountability at the heart of one of Britain's most lucrative tech companies.
2026 • Economics
There are more billionaires than ever. But how does this vast accumulation of wealth affect the world?
In the second of this three-part series, Jacques reveals how fear remains one of the most powerful drivers of our spending. Visiting a neuroscience lab, Jacques hears from a consumer psychologist about how our brains are much more responsive to negative than to positive stimuli. He also meets some experts who have turned this knowledge into an art form, helping manufacturers make billions from our anxieties and insecurities. At the remote chateau of French anthropologist Clotaire Rapaille, Jacques learns how our sense of fear drives us in ways many of us do not understand - and how Rapaille's insights have helped companies sell us everything from SUVs to cigarettes. At the Beverley Hills pad of multimillionaire marketer Rohan Oza, he hears how Oza's connections to celebrities helped propel VitaminWater into the soft drink stratosphere, despite the fact that the product's health claims have been called into question. Jacques also confronts the men who say they are combating our most deep-seated fear - of age and decline. In Las Vegas, he mingles with the doctors and businessmen attending a global conference aimed at selling us ways to stay young and healthy, challenging them to justify their claims for the anti-aging business that has made them rich.
S1E2 • The Men Who Made Us Spend • 2014 • Economics
Command and Control presents the terrifying, true story of what can happen when the weapons built to protect us threaten to become the very source of our own destruction. Based on The New York Times bestseller by Eric Schlosser the film tells the story of a 1980 accident at a Titan II missile complex in Damascus, Arkansas in minute-by-minute detail through the accounts of Air Force personnel, weapon designers, and first responders who were there, revealing the incredible chain of events that brought America to the brink of nuclear disaster. In so doing, the film explores the great dilemma that the United States has faced since the dawn of the nuclear age: How do you manage weapons of mass destruction without being destroyed by them?
2016 • Economics
In this Vsauce video, Michael asks himself what is the value of Earth.
2014 • Economics
Explores various societal issues within South Korea, highlighting aspects that may contribute to a dystopian environment. The content delves into topics such as intense academic pressure, work culture, technological surveillance, and social conformity.
2025 • Economics
They defined music and popular culture like no other band ever will. But how did The Beatles make the journey from Merseyside teenagers to international pop stars in the 1960s? The Beatles: Made on Merseyside recounts how American rock ‘n’ roll and rhythm and blues dragged post-war Liverpool into one of the most vibrant music cities ever with the Mersey Sound. Featuring unique archive and revealing interviews from those involved in the early years of The Beatles in Liverpool and Hamburg, we discover the story of The Beatles’ previous band formations and why it took so long for them to achieve success. From school bands to colleges, Hamburg to The Cavern Club, The Beatles moved from skiffle to rock ‘n’ roll before creating their unique sound.
2019 • Music
When you listen to music, multiple areas of your brain become engaged and active. But when you actually play an instrument, that activity becomes more like a full-body brain workout. What's going on? Anita Collins explains the fireworks that go off in musicians' brains when they play, and examines some of the long-term positive effects of this mental workout.
It was 1985. Guns N' Roses were soon to be known as the last mammoth rock entity to come out of LA after selling over 100 million albums. Jon Brewer brings alive never-before-seen video footage of Guns N' Roses in their earliest days as a fledgling band, filmed and meticulously archived over the years by their close friend. They became known as 'the most dangerous band in the world' and retained the title for reasons this film portrays, via interviews with band members and those who were there on, and off, tour. Venture down seedy Sunset Strip to the Whiskey, the Rainbow and the Roxy, all known as 'the Jungle'.
2016 • Music
A chance to see the BBC Symphony Orchestra perform British composer Gustav Holst's The Planets at the London Barbican, in a concert from last September timed to celebrate the centenary of the premiere. But there's a special scientific twist to this concert, as before each movement, Professor Brian Cox discusses what modern science reveals about each of the planets.
2019 • Music
Dirt roads. Pickup trucks. Hip-hop? As the borders around country music shift, who decides what defines the popular genre, and who gets to be a star?
Music promoter John Giddings takes us on an entertaining ride behind the stage lights to tell the story of how live performance has become a billion-pound industry. As the founder and promoter of the modern Isle of Wight festival and one of the world's biggest live promoters, John knows more than most how to put a show on the road. And how the world of live performance has changed. Where once bands would tour to promote an album, in the age of downloads and disappearing record sales, the live arena is a huge business. Bigger than ever before.
S1E2 • Hits Hype and Hustle: An Insiders Guide to the Music Business • 2018 • Music
Who is Vivian Maier? Now considered one of the 20th century's greatest street photographers, Vivian Maier was a mysterious nanny who secretly took over 100,000 photographs that went unseen during her lifetime. Since buying her work by chance at auction, amateur historian John Maloof has crusaded to put this prolific photographer in the history books. Maier's strange and riveting life and art are revealed through never-before-seen photographs, films, and interviews with dozens who thought they knew her.
2013 • People
Worried about black holes? Consider this: Every time you accelerate - you generate an event horizon behind you. The more you accelerate away from it the closer it gets. Don’t worry, it can never catch up to you, but the Unruh radiation it generates sure can.
PBS Space Time • 2018 • Astronomy
Saturn is the crown jewel of the solar system, beautiful and fascinating. It is a gas giant, and has a broad set of rings made of ice particles. Moons create gaps in the rings via their gravity. Saturn has dozens of moons, including Titan, which is as big as Mercury and has a thick atmosphere and lakes of methane; and Enceladus which has an undersurface ocean and eruptions of water geysers. While we are still uncertain, it is entirely possible that either or both moons may support life.
18 • Crash Course Astronomy • Astronomy
This film takes a magical and widely travelled journey to discover how different contemporaries of Monet built and cultivated modern gardens to explore expressive motifs, abstract colour, decorative design and utopian ideas.
S3E4 • Great Art • 2019 • Creativity
The film shows how polar bears are adapting to changing conditions in their environment or, in some cases, failing to adapt.
The Nature of Things • 2012 • Nature
We investigate the emerging threats posed by plastic pollution to life on Earth. The hyper-convenience of our modern way of living produces staggering volumes of plastic waste daily. Scientists now know that this waste breaks down into ever tinier pieces, spreading right across the globe and posing direct health risks, including through bioamplification of toxic additives moving up the food chain. We explore the drastic changes it will take to deliver a sustainable future for our planet.
2021 • Environment