I’m embarrassed to admit that “Free Willy” was my favorite movie when it first came out (back when I was an enviro-freak.) So I found this interesting:

Keiko, the killer whale made famous by the “Free Willy” movies, has died in Norwegian coastal waters where he remained after millions of dollars and a decade of work failed to coax him back to the open sea, his caretakers said early Saturday…. The project — to reintegrate Keiko with a pod of wild killer whales — cost more than $20 million and stirred interest and ire worldwide.

Apparently orcas are smart enough to know that living “close to nature” isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. $20 million and all the environmentalists in the world couldn’t convince Keiko to leave human civilization. If only the environmentalists were so smart…