specials, The Giant Claw (2002) and Land of Giants (2003), starred wildlife presenter Nigel Marven as a "time-travelling zoologist", traveling back in time and interacting with various dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals. Reception Walking with Dinosaurs was broadcast to record audiences and is sometimes considered the biggest science documentary series ever created. With 15 million viewers viewing the first episode on 4 October 1999 and another 3.91 million viewing it on its repeat the Sunday afterwards, Walking with Dinosaurs is by far the most watched science programme in British television history. By late 2000, 200 million people worldwide had seen the Walking with Dinosaurs. By 2005 the number had increased to almost 400 million and by 2009 it was around 700 million; unprecedented numbers for a palaeontology programme. In the BFI TV 100, a list compiled by the British Film Institute in 2000 of the greatest British TV programmes of all time and of any genre, Walking with Dinosaurs was placed 72nd. Reviews Walking with Dinosaurs was released to critical acclaim. Most scientists applauded Walking with Dinosaurs for its use of scientific research and for its portrayal of dinosaurs as animals and not movie monsters. Some reviews were dismissives and contemptuous. Walking with Dinosaurs was praised in The Guardian, The Observer, The Independent and in The Independent on Sunday. Negative reviews were mostly founded on the series in some cases appearing to present speculation as fact. Nancy Banks-Smith in her review of Walking with Dinosaurs also worried that the success of the series would lead to the BBC exploiting its appeal to younger viewers and launching merchandise, writing that "I begin to think that the whole thing is geared to selling chocolate dinosaur eggs to five-year-olds". Online reviewers were largely positive. Common Sense Media praised the program, giving it five stars out of five and saying that, "Somebody had a great idea, which was to make a documentary series about dinosaurs, but with a twist. The ageing Ornithocheirus on a desperate final flight to his mating grounds, the sauropod hatchlings struggling for survival in the late Jurassic, the migrating herds and the undersea life of 150 million years ago would all seem as real as a nature program about polar bears or snow monkeys." Walking with Dinosaurs was also praised by IGN, which referred to it as a fascinating documentary with excellent narratives, video quality and audio quality. The score