Documentary dives deep into dinos

Maybe the key to what went wrong with “Dinosaur Planet,” the four-episode documentary that begins Sunday on the Discovery Channel, lies not so much with the prehistoric creatures who ruled the world but with the very modern academic who finds them fascinating.

Scott Sampson, the University of Utah professor who is the host, fell in love with paleontology at age 5, and his childhood curiosity bloomed into a lifelong passion.

Intellectual passion is a wonderful thing, but it’s devilishly difficult to convey, as anyone knows who has ever been cornered at a party by someone on fire to talk about the latest development in his or her line of work.

Except for the true dino-aficionados -- and there are lots of them -- viewers are likely to find much of “Dinosaur Planet” plodding and burdened with too many details and too much straining to differentiate among different kinds of dinosaurs.

The goal appears to be to leave us in wonder and awe at these creatures that once roamed the Earth. Instead, the impression is that dinosaurs lived mundane lives of moving, hunting, foraging and mating -- like modern beasts, just on a grander scale.

Any dinosaur project, of course, exists in the shadow of the Steven Spielberg movies, and “Dinosaur Planet” makes its bows right off, noting that the real Velociraptor was smaller than the “Jurassic Park” one. Fair enough.

But the documentary makers could have taken a lesson from the iconoclastic professor in “Jurassic Park” played by Jeff Goldblum.

“Dinosaur Planet” needed a doubter to ask the Goldblumian questions: Yes, this is accurate but is it interesting? Can we summarize? Does having the budget to do this mean we should, particularly at this length and languid pace?

To be sure, “Dinosaur Planet” has its moments. The animation, particularly of the background, is detailed and realistic. The up-close looks at the dinosaurs, their thick skulls and lizard-like limbs, are vivid. Their raspy, throaty roars are menacing. One scene in which the young dinos run for their lives to escape their carnivorous elders is a true heart-pumper.

Even so, in “Dinosaur Planet,” the creatures are heavily humanized and given cute names, emotions and interior lives. Narration by actor Christian Slater is breezy and pushes the dinos-as-people metaphor. A dino is doing some pre-mating behavior: “He’s got smooth moves and a good line [but] it’s not working.”

A pack of dinos is bent on stealing eggs: “The intruders aren’t looking for a kill, just to pull off a heist.” Dinos face challenges in the desert: “Here even the toughest dinosaurs struggle to eke out a living.”

Each of four episodes -- two on Sunday, two on Tuesday -- is set in a different place with a different breed: A Velociraptor in the Gobi Desert, a Daspletosaurus in North America, a Saltasaurus in Southern America, and a Pyroraptor in Europe.

Sampson, his delight apparent, appears occasionally for explication. In Episode 3he notes that even tall dinosaurs were able to lay eggs without breaking them.

Maybe they had an egg chute or maybe they just squatted down, he suggests, adding quickly that nobody knows for sure.

“Something as simple as laying an egg still mystifies us,” says Sampson.

“Dinosaur Planet” could have used someone to say, “No, professor, it doesn’t.” Goldblum’s character would have said it.

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‘Dinosaur Planet’

Where: Discovery Channel.

When: 8-10 p.m. Sunday and Tuesday

Narrator...Christian Slater

Host...Scott Sampson

Executive producers, Tomi Landis, Pierre de Lespinois and Frances LoCascio.