BBC Dumbs Down "Frozen Planet" For U.S. Audience

The British Broadcasting Corporation is out with the followup to its fabulous Planet Earth series, this one entitled Frozen Planet, a seven-part series about Earth's polar regions. Only U.S. viewers will only see six parts, because the seventh one deals with climate change and the Beeb thought it wouldn't sell well in the climate-denialist U.S.A. A corporation spokeswoman told the UK Telegraph that Discovery, which airs the BBC shows in the United States, only had slots for six episodes, so the conclusion--featuring one-time climate skeptic David Attenborough--will be relegated to an "optional extra."

On Thin Ice (Programme Seven) features David Attenborough in vision as it is his authored show. It would be impossible to do a presenter-less version. Only those countries that accept David as a presenter. . . could be expected to take episode seven as it stands.

 In other news: The International Energy Agency, in its 2011 World Energy Outlook, warns that delaying serious action on climate change for as little as five years could put us on track to temperature increases of 11 degrees F.--in which case lovely video images of polar bears and penguins will be all we'll have to look at.

--Paul Rauber

--Photo: BBC