THIS PAST DECEMBER, as my mailbox. overflowed with screener DVDs of prestige films and television shows designed to capture my vote for the Writers Guild of America Awards, I did what any respectable resident of cozy season would do: I pressed play on Partner Track, a playful romantic comedy series that the Netflix algorithm had been trying to convince me to watch for months.
The trailer promised beautiful clothes, pretty people, and humor as Ingrid Yun, played by Arden Cho, brings viewers into the world of a Korean American woman trying to make junior partner at a top-flight (and nearly all-white) law firm while balancing the flirtations of an earnest philanthropic millionaire and a cheeky senior associate who is also a rival. The show delivered on the trailer's promise. But it also delivered something else-a stealth climate change plotline.
In her attempt to make partner, Yun works hard to close a deal wherein a large oil company, the ironically named Sun Corp, seeks to buy a smaller, family-run firm called Min Enterprises. But in a twist that's absent from the book on which the series is based, Sun Corp ultimately has one goal in mind: gutting Min's clean energy division.
That surprised me.
Years of working as an environmental reporter have given me what 1 jokingly call climate goggles. When I go outside, I see traces of climate change everywhere, like delicate tracks through a forest. But it's still very rare to see climate plotlines on my television.
"We always said that the goal of this show is to be a fun, frothy rom-com," says Georgia Lee, Partner Track's showrunner. "But if we're able to sneak in some commentary about stuff like structural racism and sexism, then we would be happy to do that. And if we can give a message about clean energy and the environment, so much the better."
Denne historien er fra July/August 2023-utgaven av Mother Jones.
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Denne historien er fra July/August 2023-utgaven av Mother Jones.
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In the Name of the Mother - How Shyamala Gopalan Harris raised a presidential contender
Shyamala Gopalan Harris did not believe in coddling. Pay her daughters, Kamala and Maya, an allowance for doing chores? “If you do the dishes, you should get two dollars,” scoffed the woman who this past summer, almost two decades after we spoke, would launch a million coconut memes. “You ate from the damn dishes!” Reward the future vice president of the United States—and possible future president—for good grades? Ridiculous. “What does that tell you?” her mother chided. “It says, ‘You know, I really thought you were stupid. Oh, you surprised Mommy!’ No.”
Kill the Messenger - The anti-disinformation field is retreating under attack.
A few months ago, a man crawling along a rooftop in Pennsylvania tried to murder Donald Trump at a campaign rally. Hours later, press releases started to circulate, from analysts, think tanks, politicians, and pundits, all offering to cut through the swell of confusion and misinformation.
Food + Health / Global Warning - Why Project 2025 is an environmental catastrophe in the making
When President Joe Biden took office, Democrats held a slim majority in the House of Representatives and a single-vote edge in the Senate. Despite the monumental odds, he has presided over the most productive presidential term for climate action in American history. Under Biden’s direction, the federal government took up the arduous task of incorporating climate considerations into scores of administrative operations and procedures. The epa cracked down on superpollutants and issued stricter emissions regulations for passenger vehicles. The Inflation Reduction Act, the biggest climate spending bill Congress has ever passed, brings the nation closer to its goal of slashing carbon emissions in half by 2030.
Trumpnesia - To get a second chance, Trump needs voters to forget his disastrous presidency.
One of the most oft-quoted sentences ever penned by a philosopher is George Santayana’s observation that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” In 2024, this aphorism is practically a campaign slogan. Donald Trump, seeking to become the first former president since Grover Cleveland to return to the White House after being voted out of the job, has waged war on remembrance. In fact, he’s depending on tens of millions of voters forgetting the recent past. This election is an experiment in how powerful a memory hole can be.
WHEN IN DROUGHT
This obscure yet adaptable grain could be a healthy staple for a warming planet.
BAD HABITS
A spate of recent horror movies recycle tired tropes about nuns-and reveal society's ongoing discomfort with independent women.
Taking the Fifth For a glimpse of the Supreme Court after a second Trump term, look at the radical circuit court that's already driving America to the right.
Imagine obamacare is dead and millions of Americans have lost health coverage.
THE ARCHITECT
TRUMP WANTS TO BE KING. RUSS VOUGHT HAS A PLAN TO MAKE IT HAPPEN.
Losing Faith
As an evangelical leader, I enticed lawmakers and federal judges to adopt a conservative Christian agenda. Donald Trump’s rise proved how wrong I was.
GOD'S COUNTRY
These Christian nationalists have a plan to take over Americafrom small towns to the highest court in the land.
