A dominant way of thinking about orcas in society is that they are cruel, monstrous and wild the film challenges this way of thinking by portraying orcas as kind, intelligent and caring creatures throughout the documentary. For example, when the film first starts we can see that when capturers had surrounded the “killer whales”, and the calves are taken away. We can observe through archival footage that all the orcas were willing to beach themselves just to stay with newborn calves and through scientific interviews, showing that even when the calves were taken away, the pod would still return to the area and even try to send long-range sonar messages through the ocean. This points to the fact that orcas are extremely caring of their own and …show more content…
The dominant way of thinking is that the orcas are caring intelligent creatures that have been traumatized into acting the way the media covers. Another example challenging the dominant view that orcas are dangerous and cruel creatures occurs throughout the documentary, Blackfish challenges the dominant way of thinking by interviews with former SeaWorld trainers and a number of archived footage. For example, when the former SeaWorld trainers were interviewed and asked about the behaviour of orcas they described how the Orcas were gentle caring giants as they reminisced over the footage showing the interactions they shared with orcas through archival footage and sharing the experience they shared with the orcas within the film. These interactions show one of the trainers first time actually in the water with an orca and in the film, she is beyond nervous but as soon as she heads into that water all the butterflies disappear as the orca jumps around and listens to her signals with a heartbeat. This is further solidified when we see another trainer below the ground at a viewing