Ep 1. The Bodies Left Behind

Life After People: The Series is a documentary-style television show that explores what would happen to Earth if all human beings disappeared suddenly. The first season of the show was premiered on History Channel in 2009 with a total of ten episodes.

The first episode of the series is titled "The Bodies Left Behind," which depicts what would happen to human remains after human beings vanish mysteriously. The episode begins with a narration that highlights the magnitude of human beings' presence and its impact on the planet. The narrator goes on to ask a crucial question, "What would happen to our bodies if we disappeared from the face of the Earth?"

The first segment of the episode takes the viewers to the bustling streets of New York City, where over eight million people live. It showcases how in just a few days, buildings and infrastructures, such as bridges and roads, would start to deteriorate as nature takes over. The show's experts explain that when humans vanish, the most significant immediate impact would be the absence of maintenance work, which is essential in keeping cities functional.

The narrator explains that as time passes, the Earth would become a world without humans, leaving our bodies to decay and decompose in various stages. The show then switches to a simulation that explores what would happen in the next few hours after humans vanish.

The simulation depicts a scenario where thousands of bodies are left behind in hospitals, nursing homes, and even on the streets. Over time, these bodies would start to decay and turn into bones, and nature would take over, burying them under various types of organic materials. The episode highlights how, throughout history, natural phenomena like floods and earthquakes have buried bodies, and over time, they turn into fossils.

The show explores how wildlife that feasts on carrion would start to emerge from forests and mountains in search of food. Large carnivores, such as bears and cougars, would venture into towns in search of prey. Bodies left behind in homes and offices would become a breeding ground for pests like rodents and insects.

In another simulation, the show explores what would happen to bodies left in cars on the busy highways and intersections. Animals would start to feed on the flesh, and natural phenomena like wind and rain would gradually disperse the remains.

The episode also explores how, over time, our clothing would disintegrate, becoming part of the soil, and would eventually disappear. The same would happen to inorganic materials like cars, plastic, and metal.

The show's experts explain the difference in the decay rate of human body parts. For instance, hair and nails would take longer to decompose than skin and flesh, which break down faster. The show also details how tooth enamel is the hardest element in the human body and takes the longest to break down.

In the final parts of the episode, the show explores how our genetic code, our DNA, would remain for a long time, frozen in time like a time capsule that future generations could evaluate to learn more about us.

The episode concludes with a haunting message that the only remnants of human existence would be what we leave behind – the products we made and the stories that accompany them.

In conclusion, "The Bodies Left Behind" is an eye-opening episode that showcases the sheer impact of humans' presence on the planet. It explores what would happen to our bodies after we vanish, highlighting the role of nature in returning everything to its original form. It’s a relatively dark episode of Life After People: The Series but is a thought-provoking meditation on what we leave behind.