The public debate over climate change and global warming has been referenced in popular movies and TV since at least the early 1970s.
Soylent Green
Crime thriller starring Charlton Heston about a dystopian future (2022) when global warming and the greenhouse effect has led to food shortages.
"In Search of..." The Coming Ice Age
A TV episode starring Leonard Nimoy asked the question of whether or not drastic weather changes in America's northern states mean that a new ice age is coming.
Warming Warning
An hour-long documentary aired in the United Kingdom and the United States highlights the effects of carbon emissions in the earth’s atmosphere.
Cheers
The number of TV shows in America at the time, featured a discussion on climate change, as did the season 9 episode of Cheers, “Crash of the Titans.”
HARRY: Well, Rebecca, I need to work up the figures, but everything seems to be in good shape. Except for that strange floor deformity.
REBECCA: What floor deformity?
HARRY: There seems to be a depression here. It’s almost as if this bar stool is sinking right into the Earth. I wonder what could cause that.
NORM: Uh, pardon me, pal. You’re standing between me and my cheese doodles.
CLIFF: You know, uh, I don’t think that a ground surface irregularity of this nature is so strange. I mean, after all, the entire east coast is sinking. We all know that. I mean, due to global warming, the polar ice caps are melting and, hey, we’re gonna be all underwater anyway.
Batman Returns
The American President
President Shepherd: Tomorrow morning, the White House is sending a bill to Congress for its consideration. It’s White House Resolution 455, an energy bill requiring a 25% reduction in the use of fossil fuels in the next 10 years. It is by far the most aggressive step ever taken to reduce the effects of global warming.
Frasier
Daphne: Oh, it is beautiful, and in the middle of such a terrible winter. Oh, I love nature's little aberrations: warm days in winter, four leaf clovers, Australians...
Frasier: Yes, it is glorious. It defies you not to take a moment to acknowledge the power that created it.
Martin: [out the window] Thank you, global warming!
South Park
Citizens of South Park: “Here it comes!” “Global Warming!” “We didn’t listen!”
The West Wing
Sam Seaborn: Is global warming a real environmental condition or merely a temporary anomaly? Is it a global threat or the exaggerated claim of alarmists? The time for such debate is over. As of today, it shall be the unequivocal position of the United States government that global warming constitutes a clear and present danger to the health and future well-being of this planet and all its inhabitants. Did somebody get that?
The Day After Tomorrow
The film depicts catastrophic climatic effects following the disruption of the North Atlantic Ocean circulation, in which a series of extreme weather events usher in climate change and lead to a new ice age.
Boston Legal
When Crane, Poole, and Schmidt are sued for misrepresenting their efforts to “go green,” the firm’s attorney notes that the climate debate is not as simple as the green activists suggest.
An Inconvenient Truth
A 2006 American documentary film directed by Davis Guggenheim about former Vice President of the United States Al Gore's campaign to educate people about global warming.
The Day the Earth Stood Still
A remake of a 1951 sci-fi classic about an alien who comes to Earth with the intent to eradicate all humans to save it from climate change.
Snowpiercer
A sci-fi film in which scientists attempted to reverse global warming with an experiment injecting chemicals into the atmosphere, but the experiment caused the earth to freeze over and the last humans on earth live on a train traveling around the world.
"First the weather changed. The deniers knew why, but they still doomed us with their lies. War made the Earth even hotter. Her ice melted, and all her species crashed."
Before the Flood
Before the flood is a 2019 National Geographic Documentary about Climate change.
“We’ve known about this for decades. For over half a century, top scientists have been warning us.”
Greys Anatomy
In season 18, in an episode “Hotter than hell,” the Pacific Northwest experiences a heat dome.
"When the body's exposed to rising temperatures, it has the ability to cool itself down. We sweat, our blood vessels dilate, and our heart rate increases,” - Meredith Grey
Don’t Look Up
Don’t look up is a 2021 Netflix comedy that satirizes society’s response to climate change and the lack of global action by using an earth-destroying comet as an allegory for climate change.
Abbott Elementary
“I’m here to talk to you about making a change”
“I don’t believe in climate change’
“That’s alarming, but not what I’m here to talk to you about.” - Janine Teagues
