Plot Synopsis

Each monthly episode of EXPLORER goes deep into a story ripped from the pages of the current issue of "National Geographic" magazine. Over the course of more than 2,000 films in its original 25-year run, EXPLORER took viewers to more than 120 countries. Now, National Geographic Channel, in a multiplatform partnership with the National Geographic Society, has re-launched the documentary series in August 2015 with a premiere episode, "Warlords of Ivory," during which special investigative correspondent Bryan Christy, a veteran of wildlife trafficking wars, traces the path of destruction left in the wake of Africa's illegal ivory trade -- a path rife with misery, crime and terrorism that spreads like a dark stain across the map of the world. Christy employs new tools and technology to investigate the inner workings of the trade, and develops a powerful new weapon to fight it. Each monthly episode in 2016 continues to go deep into a story ripped from the pages of the current issue of National Geographic magazine. In the March episode, the escalating battle against ISIS has dominated world headlines in the wake of the November 2015 attacks in Paris. But for countries neighboring the Islamic State's Syrian base of operations, the threat has been ongoing for some time. Award-winning National Geographic writer Neil Shea embeds the front line of a brutal ground war with ISIS, to investigate why the Kurdish military in Iraq continues to hold the line against a brutal enemy while a coalition of Western countries wrestles with how best to respond to the growing global threat. And in June, Explorer ventures into Congo's Virunga National Park to take an intimate, compelling look at how Emmanuele de Merode, a Belgian prince and the fearless new warden there, is fighting poachers to save his park. Correspondent Justin Hall talks to de Merode about his enemies -- some of whom have attempted to assassinate him -- and also embeds with the poachers themselves, the notorious Mai Mai, who consider poaching critical to their survival.