NPR

'Our Planet' Nature Documentary Addresses The 800-Pound Gorilla — Human Impact

The new Netflix series takes a hard look at the effects of our behavior on the natural world. Series producer Alastair Fothergill says that this is a different, more urgent type of show.
Gentoo penguins sit on an Antarctic iceberg in a scene from the new Netflix nature documentary series <em>Our Planet.</em>

Our Planet is the kind of nature show where every image could be a screen saver: sweeping, dramatic landscapes are full of colorful animals.

But among the high-definition scenes of lions on the hunt, there are some images you don't often see in these kinds of shows. Tropical reefs bleach into white bone-scapes; glaciers crumble into Arctic seas. In one particularly noteworthy sequence, confused walruses plummet off a cliff to their deaths — a phenomenon that the show links to climate change and the decline of the walrus' preferred habitat of sea ice.

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