He expressed exasperation that it took Al Gore to finally get the message across. "We really did a shitty job of communicating, and part of that is educating ourselves as a scientific community in how to communicate, part of it is educating the media on how to listen to scientists."
It's a lofty goal, and he understand that ReGenesis is not the complete answer. But he hopes by making the fictional characters use the same "uncertain" phrases as real-life scientists, like "the data suggests," or "my hypothesis is" instead of "I know," viewers will start to understand the language of science.
"They always get it right on TV," he continued, contrasting TV fiction to real life, where "the policemen come and give their testimony and there's a little bit of uncertainty and 'whoa, why can't you get it right?'"
Actor Outerbridge thinks accuracy is not just a positive choice for science, but for drama. "Reality gives credibility to your story and your characters," he said at the forum. He believes the ReGenesis writers are forced to think about drama differently, to search for what's interesting in the four hours or four days before test results come in, resulting in a more satisfying story.
"A lot of television writing is formulaic, and it's so easy to fall back into the trite stories that you know people will watch, you know people will like," Edwards said in our interview. "This is a much greater challenge, but it's a much nobler challenge."
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