New Netflix nature documentary series “Our Planet” has been basking in critical acclaim, yet the eight-episode series is also creating controversy due to a brutal scene documenting walruses falling to their deaths while attempting to navigate precarious rocky cliffs.
“Our Planet”, narrated by David Attenborough, documents the ongoing affects of climate change on the world’s wildlife, and this brutal scene has proven particularly distressing for viewers.
The scene follows walruses in Russia who are returning to the sea but become confused due to an icy habitat that no longer exists, as ice packs have receded dramatically in recent years. As a result, some walruses attempt to make their way back to the ocean by going over the rocky cliff face.
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Sadly, not every walrus makes it; more than 700 casualties were washed up along the shores in 2017.
Watching walruses fall to their deaths proved to be a harrowing experience for viewers, who took to social media to share their horror and heartbreak.
Meanwhile, a Canadian scientist has come forward to claim the walruses that died did so while fleeing a polar bear attack, not because of receding ice.
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According to University of Victoria zoologist Dr. Susan Crockford, it’s hungry polar bears, not receding ice that led to the animals’ deaths. Describing the scene as “contrived nonsense,” Crockford told the Telegraph, “This powerful story is fiction and emotional manipulation at its worst. The walruses shown in this Netflix film were almost certainly driven over the cliff by polar bears during a well-publicized incident in 2017, not because they were confused by a combination of shrinking ice cover and their own poor eyesight.”
Netflix, however, is standing by the filmmakers’ depiction, telling TMZ that it’s “a documented fact” that walruses are gathering on land because there’s less ice available, “which leaves them in unfamiliar, dangerous territory.”
In addition, Netflix tells TMZ that the filmmakers “worked with a seasoned Russian biologist who’s worked on that stretch of coastline — and with those walruses — for 35 years,” and that the disturbing scene will remain in the series.
