Name a movie/TV show that reshaped the public perception of something

This one is easy.

Jaws.

Damn, Jaws was a big one for sure. I'm definitely old enough to remember the public's perception when it was first released

Breaking Bad broke the stigma of smoking meth.

Roots
The Day After
Platoon

quote:

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Sideways and Merlot is the biggest that comes to mind

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Not to mention Pinot. I’d never even heard of Pinot, now it’s everywhere.

Crime shows like Forensic Files and CSI has actually hurt the judicial system. LINK

The Travolta Trifecta:

Saturday Night Fever: Disco
Urban Cowboy: Country Music
Grease: 40 year old high school students

GOT: Made people realize epic fantasy may not just be for nerds
The Dark Knight: Made people realize superhero movies may not just be for nerds

The movie JFK literally caused congressional action on the asssassination records release

The Matrix really shaped public perception on technology and philosophy, especially the concept of the "red pill" verses "blue pill".

Friday the 13th made people afraid to send their kids to summer camp

"It" is almost single-handedly responsible for making the majority of the population afraid of clowns.

"Dracula" transitioned the public's perception of vampires from being hideous monsters to sex symbols.

South Park coined the phrase "The Chewbacca Defense" for when attorneys use unrelated facts and non-sequiters to purposefully confuse a jury.

"Saturday Night Fever" and "Urban Cowboy" both spawned huge and influential fashion trends.

"Smokey and the Bandit" and "The Dukes of Hazard" were largely responsible for bringing "southern" culture to the rest of the country.

"My Brother, Where art Thou" is largely responsible for bringing back the folk/americana music genre into the mainstream and being the well-spring for eventually re-popularizing a lot of "old-timey" fashions. Basically, the modern hipster chic can largely be traced back to this movie.

"Dragon Ball Z", while not the first Anime to hit American audiences, largely served as the biggest force for making anime "cool" to watch by kids in the 90's. "Dragon Ball Z: Abridged" then maintained the show's popularity long after it had gone off the air, making it popular again enough to export English dubs of new seasons to the U.S. That internet satire series pretty much resurrected a show that had run its course over a decade before in the U.S.

Star Trek was tremendously influential on scientists and future writers and inventors who sought to make the world more like the Galaxy from Star Trek. Many inventors have credited Star Trek to being the inspiration for their products and even tried to make their design look similar to what devices looked like on the show.

I can't tell you how many teens tried to model their high school experiences after Jon Hughes movies.

"The Graduate" popularized the concept of the "mild" even if not in those terms. "American Pie" popularized that term 30 years later.