Alien Earths (2009)

Astronomers discover wobbling stars with planets where the ice is hot and the rain is made of iron.

Director:

Dana Berry

Writers:

Dana Berry, Steven Reich

Stars:

Alan Boss, Sara Seager

Nominated for 1 Primetime Emmy.

Cast

Credited cast:
Alan Boss	...	Himself
Sara Seager	...	Herself

Storyline

Join leading astronomers on a visual journey beyond our solar system in search of planets like Earth. Using CGI animation, we'll explore bizarre worlds that stretch our imagination: planets with iron rain and hot ice, with diamonds everywhere, and endless oceans of gas. Planets with abnormal orbital patterns and planets with no pattern at all that drift alone in the Milky Way. Planets so strange we never could have predicted them before. Could life exist there?

---

Plot Keywords:

astronomer | stars | earth | search | astronomy | 

---

Taglines:

Planets so bizarre, we never could have imagined them

---

Genres:

Documentary

---

Details

Official Sites:

National Geographic [United States]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

23 August 2009 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Skyworks Digital

Technical Specs

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1 / (high definition)

User Reviews

A voyage to other worlds.

This is really a fantastic science documentary that explores other "Earth" like or sized worlds, but with very different, and often deadly, environments.

Imagine ice that is hot. Imagine a world where it rains liquid glass, or, if the world is hot enough, liquid aluminum or liquid iron!

Imagine a world tilted on its side so that it's perpetually sunset and sunrise, and one pole is broiling hot, while the other pole on the same world is near absolute zero because it's always in the shade.

Imagine a world where water is so condensed that it crushes to a form of ice with a perfect crystal lattice.

That's what this documentary is all about. Alien Earths provides both CGI and talking heads about worlds that our Earth might have turned out to be, and that actually exist somewhere out there in our own galaxy. And our top astronomers have only scratched the surface of the various kinds of planets that might be nearby in our own galaxy alone.

Incredible stuff. Grab a copy or rent it if you can if you're the least bit curious about planetary science or astronomy. A great watch.

Enjoy!