The summer blockbuster is back with "Twisters," a loose sequel cum spiritual successor to 1996's megahit "Twister." This film has more action, more special effects wizardry and, yes, more of the eponymous whirlwinds wreaking havoc. But for a movie premised on cinematic excess, there's an absence in "Twisters" as well. Despite its focus on catastrophic weather, the film elides any mention of climate change and its real-world contributions to the meteorological bedlam onscreen. That is by design. "I wanted to make sure that we are never creating a feeling that we're preaching a message," the director, Lee Isaac Chung, said to CNN.Â
Chung's omission has raised questions from critics and viewers wondering how a film about extreme weather works without addressing an underlying factor. Others have celebrated the movie's embrace of straightforward storytelling over broader moralizing.Â
'Safe and sanitized' Rather than focus on climate change, "Twisters" "proposes a "different idea: Don't sweat it. Science has got this," said Slate. The "geoengineering solutions" designed to combat tornadoes in the film are "especially attractive because they don't require any change."Â
"Twisters" offers viewers a "safe and sanitized way to experience a natural disaster: as a fantasy," The New York Times said. And while climate change may not be mentioned, "Twisters" is "much more accurate" scientifically than its predecessor, former National Severe Storms Laboratory meteorologist Sean Waugh said at Nature.
'Studio caution during polarized times' "Twisters" seems like it would have been "well positioned to explore the realities" of the complicated "relationship between climate change and tornadoes," The Verge said. By pointedly not addressing "factors like limited data collection methods," which "still make it difficult for researchers to establish concrete connections" between climate change and tornadoes, "Twisters" misses an opportunity to be a "thoughtful [evolution] of a franchise." Instead, it makes the whole project "seem even sillier than it already does." To not mention this at all is a "reflection of studio caution during polarized times when looking for a summer movie hit," added The Verge.
"It's not 'preaching' to acknowledge the world we all live in," said climate journalist Anna Jane Joyner on X. "Ignoring it sends a clear message too." |