The three major educational sectors in which learning occurs are often taken to be the formal education sector (schools, colleges, universities and so on), the workplace, and the free-choice learning sector (Falk, 2002). This review is concerned with science on television, understood as a significant component of the free-choice learning sector. It looks at the ways that science and scientists are depicted on television, and at what is known about the ways that science is learned from watching television. At some points the analysis will extend more broadly, examining television in conjunction with other science communication agents, including the print media, the internet, dialogue with others, and the classroom. Here, the author argues that television functions as a storyteller and as a provider of a significant and highly accessible public space for the presentation and exchange of ideas. The author's arguments are framed first, by the view that television is best at telling stories through pictures. Second, since learning is a form of enculturation, the author suggests that attention must be paid to the key factors that shape culture. Third, television and other mass media, in their role as public fora, play a crucial role in public discourse on new science and local, community-based science issues with which citizens must engage. Therefore, it is also necessary to look at the ways in which citizen thinking is represented and modelled on television. (Contains 1 table.)