Curiosity Stream's GIANTS Premieres May 18th!

Maria chats with explorer, field biologist and conservationist DAN O'NEILL about GIANTS,
Curiosity Stream's original 5-part series premiering May 18th!

Dan travels from Africa to South America and Australia in search of giant species while hopefully
finding out their evolutionary secrets.

The 5-part series includes Elephants, Lions, Sharks, Anacondas and Saltwater Crocodiles!

GIANTS Premieres May 18th on Curiosity Stream.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
It's Maria's MutS and Stuff. Whata great idea on iHeart Radio. Welcome
to Maria's MutS and Stuff with metoday. I'm very excited. He is
an explorer, he's a field biologist, he's a conservationist, and he's the
host of Giants. It's Dan O'Neill. See that was the proper introduction.

(00:28):
Thank you very much for having me. Absolutely so. Giants it's a five
part series that's coming out May eighteenthon Curiosity Stream. And first of all,
tell me how did this all?How did it all begin? Like,
how did you get connected with doingthis for your Curiosity Stream? Did
they approach you? You approach them? Explain the whole process to me.

(00:53):
Well, so I'm in a researchbroologist for about ten years um and that
sort of conditioned into the film.Was doing some digital projects and mostly most
of my work is expeditions. UM. And then hilariously, it was actually
quite an interesting meat cute for thecompany that created the series for Curiosity Stream.
Off Defense. I was presenting anaward at the British Documentary Awards,

(01:17):
the Award for Natural History Film,and it went to my octopus teacher.
If you've seen it, the incredibleOscar winning film about a man's relationship with
an octopus, and I gave itto Andrew Zicking, who then collective the
award came and met me and himand I got to talking over a glass

(01:38):
of why outside the award and thatwas sort of the beginning of the relationship
that created me joining Giants. Wow. That's amazing. That's that's I mean,
that's almost it's like a Hollywood story, you know what I mean,
Like it's just one of those itis, but it's like one of those
random things that happened, but likemeant to be. That's so cool.
Absolutely, I mean he was like, I like, you, Dan,

(02:00):
We'll we'll stay in touch. I'llbe in touch, and you know people
say that and you're like, ohall right, and then he absolutely he
texted me, Wow, that's thecoolest. I love it. That Wow.
So okay. So that's that's likea very very cool, amazing beginning.
So then was Giants your idea orhis idea or both? So it

(02:21):
was an amalgamation of a lot ofpeople's ideas and then the sort of creation
of it and the and the decidingof which prehistoric animals to look at,
which modern day counterparts to look atwas all the incredible team at Curiosity Stream
and collaborated with Off the Fence.I was some small interductions from me.
Okay, wow, that's really coolthough. I mean, you know,

(02:42):
it's just it's amazing to me howthings just happened to be. But it's
just one of those things. It'sjust it's just meant to be, you
know. So yeah, I meanit was every kid's dreams. Yes,
I mean Giants. It's a it'sa series about um prehistoric animals, the
biggest prehistoric animals that have ever lived, and then going on an expedition SIRK
and navigating the world to find theirmodern day giant counterpart. And when I

(03:04):
was a kid, my first dreambefore becoming a biologist, to be a
paleontologist. Oh, it's like achildhood dream come true. It's true.
Well, you know they always saydo what you love and love what you
do, and it's really really truefor you in so many ways. And
I was going to say, becauseI watched two of the episodes and uh,
you could see that you being partof it, like you're the real

(03:28):
deal and you're you're really like enjoyingit. So much, thanks so much.
I honestly was. It was thebest adventure of my life. I'm
sure. I'm so sure. Okay, So I don't want to tell I
don't want to give everything away becauseI want my audience to watch the series.
But just so they know the fivepart series, it's elephants, lions,

(03:50):
sharks, anacondas, and crocodiles.So hair raising moment with everything single
one. Yes, Okay, SoI'll tell you I watched elephants. I
really love elephants. I watched elephants, and I watched sharks and sharks.
Let's talk a little bit about sharks. Because you were out on the water

(04:13):
often when you were a child,you said, correct, yeah, so
yeah. My dad was a physicistand never really had the opportunity to leave
a very small office. There wasnever really big adventures. But my parents
are quite a lot older than everybodyelse's and my dad eventually decided he wanted

(04:34):
to go on a big adventure andhe took me and my brother sailing one
of history and we got to experienceso many incredible locations. So I've had
a couple of little encounters with sharksoff the side of boats, but nothing
quite like what we did us forNeptune Islands for giants. Oh my goodness.
And I have to tell you whenyou went into the cage and you

(04:57):
went out, I was like,Okay, he's brave. I mean,
it's interesting. So people will tellyou that those sharks are you know,
great white sharks aren't out to getyou, but in that particular time of
year, in that particular location,they absolutely would have been. It was
popping season and all the seals throughoutthere learning to swim, which is a
time for great whites, and sothe people we were at so we were

(05:18):
like, we would never get inthis water without being completely protected. And
you, I mean, I won'tgive too much away, but you see
something that happens when we're in therethat really lets you know that's probably true.
Yes, well it's true, andthat's why well, yeah, that's
why I don't want to give itaway too, but that's why when I
saw that, I'm like, oh, he is really brave. That's great

(05:39):
that you did that. Okay,well I will watch that too. So
of the five of this series,and I know you're going to tell me
no, but do you have afavorite? You're right time. I'm going
to say everything one of those things. So it's so hard to say because
I know every episode, and it'sjust one thing I really loved about doing

(06:00):
this project was every episode we weregoing into it blind. You know,
we didn't know exactly how we weregoing to find this pieces where we were
going to find it, and soeach each mission is completely different from another
one, and you really feel thatwhen you watched the episode, and I
felt it, you know, whilesearching these animals and studied them on location.
But I would I think Elephants wasthe first one we did right,

(06:24):
and I've never seen an African bullelephant in the wild before, and I
definitely hadn't seen, you know,one of the last twenty to thirty super
tuskers left in the world, theelephants with these giant, great, big
tusks, And when seeing one ofthose, yeah, that was absolutely I
mean it was I think that wasa life changing experience. It would be

(06:45):
for anybody seeing an animal. I'msure. I'm sure I had to be,
like, it takes your breath away. I mean I felt that watching
you watch see that, you knowwhat I mean, I was like,
oh my god, you're just it'sbreathtaking because they're so ginormous, like it's
hard to imagine it. And youdo a very great job of explaining the
enormity of their size, because Imean, for those of us who see
it in a textbook or something,you know, but you actually have the

(07:10):
way you were describing it, I'msure it's life changing. Yeah, and
then yeah, and then bringing theirextinct counterparts back to that and seeing that
afterwards, just how big these animalsused to be, right, I mean,
it's incredible that the what I mean, the one episode that I think
is where you really feel that isthe Anacondas, because lots of my work

(07:31):
has been in South America and I'veseen anacondas a few times, but I
mean the ones that we were lookingfor are truly massive. But the Titanabo
are the biggest snake that ever existed. They only know about it from finding
spinal vertebrae of this snake. Thatit was a fifty foot long giant snake
that squeezed and soiled animals as bigas dinosaurs. And when you think that

(07:55):
those creatures used to live, Imean, it's just that's kind of a
whole world of magic. Yeah,it's basically the back from Harry Potter right
where I was gonna say, it'slike it's it's like beyond our brains because
you're like, oh, it's likea cartoon or you know, like a
science fiction movie. It doesn't feellike it could be possible. But it
was. Yeah, completely absolutely terrifying, very very cool, very cool.

(08:20):
So about how long did each episodetake to shoot it and get all your
information? I mean, I'm sureit differed for all of them. Um,
I mean, like when did youstart shooting everything? So we started
shooting last year in a sort ofthe beginning of summer time, okay,
and the we'd we'd go on monthlong shoots to do two episodes. So

(08:43):
we were in Australia for just forjust a little bit over a month,
um, and then in Africa fora month and traveling through Botswana, Kenya
and South Africa, and then wewent over for a couple of weeks in
Brazil right at the end with niceto end in Brazil as well, play
somewhere familiar with Right, I'm justgonna say it, since you're so familiar,
that's so that's that's excellent. Imean, it's probably kind of an

(09:05):
obvious thing that these ginormous creatures roamthe earth and due to mankind, due
to nature, they're not with usanymore or they right, species have become
smaller, which is interesting because becausehumans have done the opposite. I think

(09:26):
when you think back and said we'veI feel like humans have gotten larger over
the years. But the animal world, right, No, seriously, I
mean you think of going to thetheater and the seats, you know,
for a theater that was built onehundred years ago, and the seats are
much smaller. Yeah, yeah,but that's another whole thing. But so
yeah, human wise, I meanthat's larging to do with you know,

(09:48):
nutrition and things. Yeah, thatreally has stunted people's good. But animals
wise, I mean people think thatthat we've lost size in the animal kingdom.
But the biggest animal that's ever livedon the planet is still alive today.
That the blue whales. That's thebiggest animal that has ever existed anywhere
on the planet. But I thinkit is a really interesting conversation about it
because we're currently you know, therehave been five major mass extinctions in the

(10:11):
past, and we're currently going throughthe sixth mass extinction. Is the first
time an extinction has been caused byjust one species, and that's us.
But it's also this incredible zone thatwe're entering where just one species is capable
of saving the planet as well.You know, that's a lot of potential
damage, but a lot of responsibility. And I think it's really interesting looking

(10:31):
back at these species because you cansee through through geological time what's happened,
and a lot of those changes isrelated to climate change. You know,
the edibility of food and prey itemschanges, and these very big animals that
need large amounts of grass tweaks interms of the elephants, and huge prey
items to eat in terms of lionsor the crop or the other predators.

(10:54):
We're looking at that in real timenow. So the decisions that we make
will impact the world, and it'sinteresting being able to do it in such
an entertaining way, to showcase itin a way that I think we'll inspire
people. I think so too.No, I think so too, because
you're right, I mean, wecaused it, but we can fix it.
And it's really very important, youknow, for generations and for us,

(11:16):
but for generations to come as well. Absolutely, Yeah, I think
it's another thing as well, Like, it's great looking back at the fossil
record because we see all these animalsalive today, but some ninety nine point
nine percent of species that have everexisted are are gone, are gone,
and there's this tiny fraction alive todayand that's completely natural, but it is.

(11:37):
Yeah, it's very cool just howsimilar these animals are, Like the
crocodiles. The largest crocodile that's everexisted, Sarcasucus, is barely different at
all from any crocodile alive today.Very similar for the snake in terms of
their body formation, only the sidesis different. So it's really cool how
evolution kind of keeps these traits rightright, right, No, it is.

(11:58):
It's fascinating. I mean it's fascinating. It's fascinating for a civilian like
me and for the audience because thisisn't our expertise like it is for you,
but it's I'm sure it's far morefascinating for you because you actually get
it, if that makes sense.Yeah, I mean what I love most.
I think a lot of the timepeople are afraid to show that they're

(12:22):
learning, and for me, Ihope that you can see it camera a
lot of this new experiences for me. You know, I'd never been up
close to a wild elephant before oreven seen an African line in the wild,
So I was a kid in acandy store, honestly, I mean
it was it was absolutely amazing.Oh. Most of my work, I've
i said, has been in catsin completely different parts of the world.
So seeing them that was yeah.Oh no, you could definitely your excitement

(12:46):
definitely came through loud and clear andsincerely. It wasn't like you were acting,
you know what I mean, Likeit was sincere. You could tell
that you were really excited and justlike, oh my goodness. Yeah.
Yeah, a lot of that comesas well. I mean, like one
thing that I yeah, I'm notsure if you know about this, but
it's the first time an LGBT personsfronted a nature documentary anywhere on any platform,

(13:11):
from major network, from major network. So I think for me,
there was I had this feeling ofwhen I was a kid that there wasn't
that possible for me to do itbecause there wasn't anyone out there. There
was a bit like me, Ithink there's something I really feel when I'm
there because it's just so it's sospecial for me to be able to be
living that dream that I think issomething a lot of young Quick kids want

(13:35):
but haven't necessarily thought were possible forthem. So I'm really happy to be
able to show that. And Ithink there's I think there's a slight comedy
and a difference about LGBT people oncamera, and I think I watch it
back and I'm like, yeah,I can definitely see it right right right,
No, it's excellent. I'm sohappy that you did this series.
So now I know this isn't evenout yet, and I don't mean to

(13:56):
say is there more, but Iwill assume there will be more sins of
this of the series we are hoping, so I mean, I can't wait
to people to watch it, butI mean we're talking about it. There's
so many more animals, for somany places to go, and yeah,
we have everything cross that we willbe able to go out in these adventures

(14:18):
again and bring more of these incredibleanimals back to life. Yeah for sure.
And oh and I also want toask you too, because let's talk
to the audience about this um andI saw it an elephants. The technology
with the camera that you had thateven the people who you were showing it
to who are like are at thesanctuary, like that they can approximate a

(14:39):
height or a weight, but withthis camera that you had, it was
able to Like I thought that wasreally cool and you can explain it technically
much better than me. Yeah,I mean so like job Slash and Daniel
there the rangers from Big Life whowere who I basically studied it looking after,
but also studying the elephants that webrought along a camera, so it's

(15:01):
really simple set up. It's aDSLR camera, which meant a lot of
people have just to take photographs,and then connected this bar at the bottom
with two laser pens at a fixedwidth, and we were able to use
an equation developed by scientists to takea boat of an elephant to get its
side on and use those two laserdots as a scale to estimate a number

(15:24):
of different things about the elephant,which is really really cool being able to
bring that to those people And anotherthing that I love about wildlife documentaries when
they worked properly bringing stuff to youknow, local communities and being able to
work with them. So that's likesomething that we can bring along that's a
bit tacky, like a a cameratack can then help the communities and leave
something lasting. Is really really cooland ipose on that actually one thing we

(15:48):
should mention so off the fence theteam. When we got back, we
created a fundraiser because we spoke toan amazing woman called Maria who had lost
the use of her legs because she'dhad a run in with an elephant right
right, who crushed sex. Andone of the things I'm most proud of
about the whole series is that weraised money for Maria. Oh wow,

(16:15):
we did, and now she's havingall of the afterca and the surgery so
that she can walk again. Ohthat's amazing. That's and it's just so
cool. And that was completely runby off and that that's just such a
testament to what a great company ofthe Vents are that they took so much
time and energy and also part fundedit themselves. So yeah, I'm really

(16:36):
proud to work with them. OhI love hearing mad because Yeah, I
was touched by her because she hada fear even though she appreciated the elephants
and she kind of she lived amongstthem, and yeah, oh that's Oh,
that's so great. That must makeit makes me feel so good.
I'm sure how that makes you feel. Oh that's wonderful. Imagine how she
feels. Imagine getting that news.Yeah, yeah, oh my god,

(16:59):
that's great. Love this, thisis Dan. I love talking to you.
I swear this is so cool.So okay, all right, So
it's Giants and it's on Curiosity Streamand it is debuting on premiering on May
eighteenth, So that's pretty exciting.I cannot wait. I know, I
know, well, I can't waitto watch more of this, and I

(17:19):
really do appreciate you talking to meabout it, and good luck, I
will. I would love to talkto you because I know there will be
more coming out when you do thoseand good luck with this. Is there
going to be a big premiere partyor a big premiere screening of it?
That may well be. Yeah,No, we're all so exposing. Can't
wait first come out. Yeah,and to get out more bunches. Thanks

(17:41):
so much. It's great looking toyou too, Thanks so much, Dan
O'Neill. Giants premiering May eighteenth onCuriosity Stream. Keep having a great time
and keep doing all this wonderful workthat you're doing, because you're educating the
world and we need you. Wereally do. Thank you so much.
Has never been a greator operator,and this seal later for the Gator