Frozen Planet – Review of episode one of David Attenborough’s new BBC series

It took the BBC only eight minutes to get to the polar bear sex in ‘Frozen Planet’, and with that and the sultry tones of David Attenborough we knew we were in for yet another nature documentary to remember.

With just one epic trailer the Beeb grabbed everyone’s attention and last night we got our first taste of what’s to come from the follow-up to 2009’s ‘Life’.

It wasn’t the polar porno that stood out in this first episode though, it was the incredible violence of the world being filmed.

It opened with a lone polar bear as he searches for a mate, finds her, protects her and is left alone again bearing the scars of his relationship, the vivid red stains blotting his white fur.

[Gallery: Frozen Planet - The best pics]

It set the tone for the rest of the episode, which saw a young bison being separated from its herd only for a fellow bison to run head-first into its backside, sending it crashing to the ground before the pursuing pack of wolves finished the job.

Most terrifying of all were the killer whales who stalked a young seal. They systematically broke the sheet of ice on which it lay terrified and then knocked the poor sod into the water.

The evil whales even toyed with him before one of the saddest sights a nature doc has every produced, the seal slowly sliding backwards into the sea. There was no whale in sight but you knew what was happening below the surface.

It wasn’t all traumatic however, the scene in which a seal chases a penguin around was probably the funniest thing to come out of the BBC in years, definitely funnier than some of their recent sitcoms. All it lacked was the Benny Hill theme.

In just one hour the BBC showed us that they’d struck gold again and that Attenborough still has the crucial, golden touch. The rest of the series can’t come soon enough.