From "Don't Look Up" to COP29: A Real-Life Satire on Climate Inaction

The outcome of COP29 bears an unsettling resemblance to the 2021 satirical science fiction film "Don't Look Up," starring Leonardo DiCaprio.

- GSM Shamsuzzoha (Nasim)

The film satirizes government inaction in the face of an existential threat, much like the current global response to climate change. It also critiques the corrosive role of media, social media, and corporate interests in distorting public perception of critical issues.

In the movie, two astronomers, Dr. Randall Mindy and Kate Dibiasky, discover a planet-killing comet on a collision course with Earth. When they alert the U.S. government and the public, their warnings are dismissed, mocked, and politicized. The administration, motivated by short-term political gain and corporate agendas, downplays the crisis. A social media-driven disinformation campaign ensues, where citizens are urged to “Don’t Look Up,” even as the comet becomes visible in the sky. Meanwhile, the scientists urge people to “Just Look Up” and take action, but their calls are drowned in a sea of memes, apathy, and partisan noise. In the end, the comet strikes Earth—with a severe catastrophic consequences.

This fictional story uncomfortably mirrors the current global approach to climate change. Despite clear scientific consensus and visible signs of planetary distress, political inertia and media trivialization continue to stall meaningful action. COP29, instead of being a breakthrough moment, largely echoed this same paralysis—rhetoric over responsibility, optics over outcomes.

The outcome of COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, resonates with chilling familiarity against the backdrop of Adam McKay’s 2021 satirical masterpiece, “Don’t Look Up”. The film’s central narrative —scientists discovering an existential threat (a planet-killing comet), only to be met with political indifference, media trivialization, corporate co-option, and public apathy — serves not merely as allegory but as a near-documentary reflection of the global response to the climate crisis, crystallized in the failures of the “Finance COP.”

COP29: A “Don’t Look Up” Scenario Played Out in Real Time