Skip to main content

Secrets of the Neanderthals - a review

 


Secrets of the Neanderthals is a Netflix documentary about our ancestors. It challenges your preconceptions about this ancient human species and introduces you to a different world.

Kindness and caring

The documentary is fascinating and introduces a new perspective about the Neanderthals. To this day, the word Neanderthal is used as offensive; it means that someone is not intelligent. Well, this documentary makes that assumption go away.

Various evidence left behind by these humans shows that they weren’t simply brutes with no complex cognitive activity. In fact, they seemed to be caring to each other. They took care of their elders and sick or hurt members of the group. This is probably one of the most significant evidence of an organized civilization. 

They even take care of their dead. The evidence shows that they have rituals to bury their loved ones who have died, which shows their ability to think about themselves and their place in the world.

It raises questions

Due to time action, it is impossible to have straight answers to all the questions, but the documentary makes us rethink the way we see this extinct human species and ourselves as well.

Secrets of the Neanderthals is an introspection about humanity and what really makes us human. I liked it very much, and I recommend watching it.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Gangsta Granny – Hilarious and Surprisingly Moving

  I have a ten-year-old daughter, and one thing we like to do is read the same books so we can talk about them afterward. Gangsta Granny was a birthday gift for her, and she read it so quickly that it immediately made me curious. When a child finishes a book that fast, you know something is working. When I finally read it myself, I was pleasantly surprised — and completely charmed. A Story That Is Funny and Moving At first glance, Gangsta Granny is a crazy, over-the-top, and very funny story. David Walliams clearly knows how to make children laugh, using absurd situations, exaggerated characters, and a fast-moving plot that keeps young readers hooked. But beneath the humour, the book is also sweet, touching, and emotionally rich. What starts as a wild adventure slowly reveals a story about family, loneliness, empathy, and learning to truly see the people around us. This balance reminded me of Roald Dahl’s books , where outrageous humour and emotional depth coexist effortles...

The Handmaid’s Tale – From Brilliant to Frustrating

  When The Handmaid’s Tale first aired, it felt sharp, terrifying, and painfully necessary. I wrote about the first season as a dark and brilliant adaptation, one that used restraint, symbolism, and dread to tell its story. Now that I've finished the third season, my opinion has shifted — not wholly, but noticeably. The show is still good . Sometimes very good. But it also became frustrating, uneven, and less powerful than it could have been. June Osborne: From Survivor to Exhaustion Let’s talk about June (Elisabeth Moss, Mad Men ). I understand the idea behind her arc. She was meant to evolve — to become more confident, more assertive, more dangerous. A woman shaped by trauma who stops surviving and starts fighting back. On paper, it makes sense. On screen, however, it often doesn’t work. June becomes reckless to the point of irresponsibility. She repeatedly puts others in danger without seeming to fully care about who might be caught in the crossfire. Her actions feel impuls...

Breaking Bad: When Desperation Redefines Morality

  Breaking Bad is often praised as one of the greatest television series ever made—and I definitely agree. Beneath its gripping plot and intense character arcs lies a deeply unsettling exploration of morality, identity, and the human capacity for self-justification. At its core, the show asks a haunting question: what happens when an ordinary person is pushed past their limits—and keeps going? Walter White: From Victim to Architect of Chaos Walter White (Bryan Cranston) begins as a man we instinctively sympathize with—a struggling high school chemistry teacher facing a terminal illness. His initial decision to cook methamphetamine is framed as an act of desperation, even sacrifice. He wants to provide for his family after his death. But that justification doesn’t hold for long. As the series progresses, Walter’s transformation becomes less about survival and more about control, pride, and power. The tragedy is not just that he becomes a criminal, but that he chooses to contin...