2001 History Channel: Arctic Tomb. A more tradional long-format documentary, made in the early days of the History Channel when it was still working to make a name for itself, it’s the first to feature historical re-enactments (the actor who plays Franklin seems perfectly to capture his mild-mannered, religiously sincere persona). Numerous Franklin experts of the day, among them the late Chauncey Loomis and Louie Kamookak, along with Ralph Lloyd-Jones add depth to the presentation.

The Franklin Expedition

Franklin’s lost expedition was a British voyage of Arctic exploration led by Captain Sir John Franklin that departed from England in 1845 aboard two ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, and was assigned to traverse the last unnavigated section of the Northwest Passage in the Canadian Arctic. The expedition met with disaster after both ships and their crews, a total of 129 officers and men, became icebound in Victoria Strait near King William Island, in what is today the Canadian territory of Nunavut. After being icebound for more than a year, Erebus and Terror were abandoned in April 1848, by which point Franklin and nearly two dozen others had died. The survivors, now led by Franklin’s deputy Francis Crozier and Erebus’ captain James Fitzjames, set out for the Canadian mainland and disappeared.