Our Oceans is a five-part docuseries, narrated by Barack Obama, that takes an in-depth look at how earth’s oceans sustain life under water and on land. As Obama says in his narration, the oceans are “so vast, that they define the color of our planet.” The goal of the show is to follow the global ocean current, which circulates water through all of earth’s oceans over hundreds of years, to show aspects of life in even the remotest parts of those oceans. In addition, the show’s filmmakers will depict how climate change and human-created pollution affects aquatic life.
Opening Shot: A shot of a humpback whale about to give birth.
The Gist: The first episode of Our Oceans takes a look at the largest of the world’s oceans: the Pacific. Starting with the humpback mama, who swims towards Hawaiian shores to protect her calf while dodging male humpbacks trying to mate, we see how diverse life is from an ocean that feeds into the Gulf of California as well as provides a home to the Great Barrier Reef.
While following the global current we are given a look at the “ring of fire,” a series of volcanic islands that build and shape coastlines. We see an example of bioluminescence off the Southern California coast. We also get a look at spinner dolphins, who jump up to 10 feet out of the water and spin in order to make sure the rest of their pod stays with them. We also see sea lions chase tuna into rocky gullies in order to catch them for food and keep their prey away from sharks.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Our Oceans is similar to any number of nature shows on Netflix, including the Obama-produced-and-narrated Our Great National Parks.
Our Take: Our Oceans, as with most Netflix nature shows, has spectacular footage, and it tries to follow a format that creates a narrative. In this case, the show follows the global ocean current — the “conveyor belt”, as it’s called — and then jumps off where they have some spectacular footage of something. Then, at least in the case of the Pacific, it comes back to where it started.
The first episode doesn’t delve that deeply into climate change or pollution, but the second episode, on the Indian Ocean, does, showing species that have adapted to being surrounded by plastic and other garbage. At a certain point, the show’s producers need to acknowledge how life under the ocean’s surface is changing due to climate change and pollution, but it feels like the first episode wanted to emphasize the wonder of ocean life over anything else.
Obama’s narration can be dry at times, but there are times when he leans into some of the more lighthearted moments, usually revolving around mating rituals. He doesn’t exactly stir the soul like, say, David Attenborough does, but his soothing voice does match the soothing blue environs that are depicted in most of the series.
Sex and Skin: Like we said, there are mating rituals shown, but no actual mating.
Parting Shot: Scenes from the Indian Ocean episode, including scenes of sea life dodging or living inside man-made plastics.
Sleeper Star: The cinematography is fantastic on this series, and we loved how action-packed the camera movements following the spinner dolphins were.
Most Pilot-y Line: Nothing we could find, though like we mentioned above, Obama tends to go with his professorial voice in a lot of this show instead of his more “soaring orator” voice.
Our Call: STREAM IT. Our Oceans is a fascinating look at the environment that takes up the vast majority of our planet, the ecosystems that exist under the surface, and the manmade threats the oceans face.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.