As Election Day nears, CBS’s procedural drama "FBI: Most Wanted" took on the issue of hydraulic fracturing (AKA fracking) and CO2 pipelines, but even though the ecoterrorists were the bad guys, the vibe was sympathetic to their cause if not their violent methods of protest.
The episode, “White Buffalo,” starts with two young friends, Trevor (Bubba Weiler) and Emma (Eddy Grace), destroying art in a museum as Emma shouts, “The temperature of the earth is increasing day by day by day!” A scuffle ensues with a security guard and Trevor accidentally shoots another guard dead with the first guard’s gun.
The two escape and the FBI team learns they’re part of an environmentalist group called Global Climate Front. Further investigation leads Remy (Dylan McDermott) and Nina (Shantel VanSanten) to discover Emma is an oil heiress. They deduce Emma must likely be “trying to repay some karmic debt.”
Meanwhile, an accomplice arrives to assist Trevor and Emma, and the FBI team interview a leader of the Global Climate Front:
When the trio arrives at Tori’s (Ellen Tamaki) farmhouse, Tori claims fracking poisoned her water, gave her a thyroid problem, killed her mother, and made her entire town sick:
Trevor explains that Henstep is building a CO2 pipeline. “It's supposedly a good thing,” he says, “but the reason it's taken so long is this stuff is totally dangerous and bad for the environment.”
There are very strict safety standards for CO2 pipelines, which provide invaluable benefits: cleaner air, enhanced economic development, job creation, support of domestic energy production, and many more . Of course, the writers didn’t mention any of that.
Related: Sudden Change: Harris Drops Previous Plan To Ban Plastic Straws
The FBI team reviews an aerial photo of Tori’s farm and notes it’s on Marcellus Shale, leading Remy to remark, “That land’s been fracked within an inch of its life.” The terrorist trio hijacks a Henstep tanker after Trevor kills the driver and they wreak a ton of havoc as they try to escape.
They release the truck’s 6,000 gallons of carbon dioxide outside an apple orchard filled with families, which depletes oxygen making it difficult to breathe. As the FBI works to shut down the gas and save the affected victims, Remy confronts a higher-up at Henstep. He’s painted as a heartless, money-hungry man, though he makes several valid points:
As Emma and Trevor hide out in a barn (Tori got left behind at the apple orchard), the two “pledge allegiance to the planet and to the destruction of companies who rape and murder her”:
Trevor discovers Henstep is illegally fracking with CO2. Which doesn’t really make any sense, but okay. He sets fire to the pipeline as the FBI team arrives, and a dramatic plea is made to Emma to surrender so she can stay alive to help fight for the planet. Emma proclaims, “The earth is doomed,” but eventually surrenders:
We can read between the lines, "FBI: Most Wanted." We see your not-so-hidden anti-fracking agenda. We’re supposed to believe the fracking claims that have been debunked and feel sad this girl was driven to extremes because of the “evil” she had to live with as an oil heiress.
We’re not buying it, and neither are the viewers who are educated enough to understand the many benefits of fracking, including increasing America’s energy independence, creating jobs, lowering energy costs, and boosting local economies, just to name a few.
If Hollywood resorts to lies and omitting facts to promote their agenda, it becomes pretty obvious they’re on the wrong side of the debate.
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