‘Our Planet’: Netflix Warns Viewers to Skip Graphic Scenes

Netflix is warning animal lovers that its new documentary Our Planet may not be for them thanks to a number of graphic scenes.

The streaming giant issued a warning regarding what scenes fans may want to avoid after the David Attenborough-narrated nature documentary left some viewers, who thought they were tuning into a serene documentary, “traumatized” thanks to the number of heartbreaking scenes included.

“As you make your way through Our Planet, here are some moments animal lovers may want to skip,” the tweet read, going on to list the exact moments of each episode that viewers may find disturbing.

Backlash against the documentary was first sparked after viewers watching the documentary’s second episode, “Frozen Worlds,” watched as walruses affected by climate change and melting ice forced themselves onto a crowded island. Some of the group ventured up 80 meter cliffs, but the descent back to the water below was treacherous due to their poor eyesight out of water, and many of the walruses fell hundreds of feet to their deaths.

“What we think is going on is that the ones at the top can probably hear the ones in the water, and they can sense that there is water below. They teeter on the edge, and they just can’t work out how to get down there,” Our Planet producer Sophie Lanfear told The New York Times of the scene. “A small group of maybe six or seven would make it down safely, and we’d all celebrate. But the vast majority do not. They basically walk themselves off the cliff.”

But the walrus scene is just one of many that have left viewers traumatized thanks to the nature of the documentary, whose main focus is to show viewers how humans have negatively impacted the planet and what they can do to help it.

Some of the other traumatizing moments include killer whales hunting a penguin, jaguars killing an alligator, and a baby flamingo being abandoned by its pat after its legs become solidified in salt deposits.

“All you can do there is watch tragedy,” Attenborough, who narrated each of the grisly and heartbreaking scenes, told I News when addressing the backlash. “But tragedy is part of life and you have to show it. You can’t have sunshine throughout your life. To have done anything else would only have made matters worse and distort the truth.”

Our Planet is available for streaming on Netflix.