LOS ANGELES – When Covid-19 hit the news in early 2020, there was a surge of renewed interest in Contagion, a 2011 Hollywood movie about a respiratory virus sweeping the world and triggering chaos, panic-buying, quarantines and a rush to develop a vaccine.

And the writer of that seemingly prescient film, which became one of the most streamed movies in March 2020, has now created a television drama. Extrapolations envisions a similarly chaotic and bleak near future – this time triggered by climate change.