It follows the adventures of Robinson Crusoe: a man who has been shipwrecked on an island for six years and is desperate to return home to his wife and children.

He has been shipwrecked on the island for the past six years, and desperately desires to return to his wife and children, whom he left back in England.

Allowed to develop away from the bonds of 17th Century life and possessing a talent for things mechanical, the ingenious Crusoe builds a breath-taking and altogether modern home high up in the trees to elude his enemies.

Santana is disgusted by Crusoe's respect for Friday, and makes a deal with his prisoners in order to obtain a treasure buried on the island.

After escaping the cannibals, he risks his life to save someone he once believed to be a savage, and sustains life-threatening injuries.

She disguises herself as a young man in order to serve as an assistant physician on an English merchant ship.

Other characters include James Crusoe (Sean Bean), Samuel Tuffley (Mark Dexter), Nathan West (Kieran Bew), Mary Crusoe (Emma Barnett), Captain Lynch (Jonathan Pienaar), Judy (Georgina Rylance), Will Atkins (Jeremy Crutchley), Cleric (James Middlemarch), Nolan Moore (Sean Michael), John Tuffley (Terence Harvey), Judge Jefferies (Joss Ackland), Fenwick (Bob Goody), and Captain Taylor (Danny Keogh).

The series format has been developed for television by British writer Stephen Gallagher with a writing staff that includes Andrew Rattenbury, Debbie Oates, Nick Fisher and James Moran.

[7] In early June filming moved to the North Yorkshire Moors using the backdrop of the Ryedale Folk Museum, in Hutton-le-Hole.

NBC ran a heavy promotion campaign during its screening of the Beijing Summer Olympic Games.

[15] Crusoe was initially promoted as a regular TV show but, after the first few episodes aired (with poor ratings), the network listed it as a "high-action, fast-paced, thirteen-part series."