Culture and science
Movies, series and documentaries, from Close Encounters to Skinwalker Ranch on TV. 178 events, newest first.
Media19 May 2002
Fox aired The Truth, the two-hour finale of The X-Files, ending its nine-season original run. Creator Chris Carter said it would close some storylines but not answer every question about the government-conspiracy plot. The series later returned in 2016.
Photo: David Shankbone, CC BY 3.0
Media25 Jan 2002
Screen Gems released a thriller starring Richard Gere loosely adapted from John Keel's 1975 book about strange sightings around Point Pleasant, West Virginia. It renewed public interest in the Mothman reports and the 1967 Silver Bridge collapse.
Photo: Jacket design by Peter Parnell, Public domain
WhistleblowersAug 2000
Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper's memoir Leap of Faith, written with Bruce Henderson, says that in 1957 at Edwards AFB camera crew filmed a saucer-shaped craft landing, and that the film was sent to the Pentagon on orders and never heard of again. No official record of it has been confirmed.
Photo: NASA, Public domain
Media6 Oct 1999
The WB premiered Roswell, a teen drama based on Melinda Metz's Roswell High novels in which a small-town high schooler learns that a classmate is an alien tied to the alleged 1947 crash in Roswell, New Mexico.
Photo: 20th Television, Public domain
Media28 Dec 1998
Fox, which aired 'Alien Autopsy: Fact or Fiction?' in 1995, broadcast 'World's Greatest Hoaxes: Secrets Finally Revealed,' hosted by Lance Henriksen. The special presented the autopsy footage as staged and was made by the same executive producer, Robert Kiviat.
Media19 Jun 1998
20th Century Fox released the first X-Files feature film, which carried the TV series' story of a government cover-up of alien activity to a theatrical audience between the show's fifth and sixth seasons. It grossed about $189 million worldwide.
Photo: Fox Broadcasting Company, Public domain
Media20 Jan 1998
UPN aired the mock documentary Alien Abduction: Incident in Lake County, a TV remake of Dean Alioto's 1989 McPherson Tape. Many viewers took it as real and some local papers ran notices that it was fiction, while some UFO researchers, including Stanton Friedman, argued it reflected a real tape.
MediaOct 1997
Earth: Final Conflict, developed from concepts left by Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, began in U.S. first-run syndication. The series imagined aliens arriving openly on Earth and a human resistance that suspects their motives.
Photo: Beth Madison, CC BY 2.0
Media14 Sep 1997
Gillian Anderson won the Primetime Emmy for outstanding lead actress in a drama series for playing FBI agent Dana Scully on The X-Files.
Photo: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0
Media13 Aug 1997
Comedy Central premiered South Park with 'Cartman Gets an Anal Probe,' in which aliens probe Cartman and abduct a younger child. The crude pilot lampooned familiar abduction tropes and launched a long-running series.
Photo: Comedy Central, Public domain
Media27 Jul 1997
Showtime premiered Stargate SG-1, a series sequel to the 1994 film starring Richard Dean Anderson as an officer leading teams through an alien gateway. It ran ten seasons, moving to the Sci-Fi Channel for the last five.
Photo: Falashad, CC BY 2.0
Media11 Jul 1997
Warner Bros. released Contact, Robert Zemeckis's adaptation of Carl Sagan's novel, starring Jodie Foster as a radio astronomer who detects a signal from the star Vega. It framed alien contact through radio searches rather than saucers.
Photo: NASA, Public domain
Media24 Mar 1997
At the 69th Academy Awards, Independence Day won the Oscar for visual effects, credited to Volker Engel, Douglas Smith, Clay Pinney and Joseph Viskocil. It was the film's only win from two nominations.
Media13 Dec 1996
Warner Bros. released Tim Burton's Mars Attacks!, a satirical alien-invasion comedy adapted from a 1962 Topps trading card series. It opened in Los Angeles and New York months after Independence Day revived big-screen saucer invasions.
Photo: Chester from Toronto, Canada, CC BY 2.0
Media21 Sep 1996
NBC premiered Dark Skies, a drama in which a young couple in 1960s Washington uncovers Majestic-12, a secret agency fighting an alien presence. Critics compared it to The X-Files; it ran one season.
Photo: Universal Television, Public domain
Media2 Jul 1996
20th Century Fox released Independence Day, an alien-invasion blockbuster. It set records as the fastest film to $100 million and grossed over $300 million in the U.S. and about $817 million worldwide.
Photo: 20th Century Studios, Public domain
Close encounters27 Feb 1996
The PBS science series NOVA examined alien abduction accounts, giving time to Budd Hopkins, John Mack and abductees, then weighing them against sleep paralysis, suggestibility and false-memory research presented by Carl Sagan, Elizabeth Loftus and other skeptics.
Photo: PBS, Public domain
Media9 Jan 1996
NBC premiered 3rd Rock from the Sun, a sitcom about extraterrestrials posing as a human family in Ohio to study people. The series ran until 2001 and won eight Emmys, part of the mid-1990s wave of alien-themed entertainment.
Photo: The Carsey-Werner Company, Public domain
Government1996
Through 1996, MP Martin Redmond put a run of written questions to ministers on UFOs and the 1980 Rendlesham Forest case. Answers recorded in Hansard said the MoD looked at reports only for defence significance and that John Major's government had no plans to fund research.
Media28 Aug 1995
Fox broadcast a special built around Ray Santilli's black-and-white film said to show a 1947 alien autopsy, hosted by Jonathan Frakes. In 2006 Santilli admitted the film was a staged recreation, while still claiming it was based on genuine footage he had seen; no such footage has been produced.
Media21 Jan 1995
At the 52nd Golden Globe Awards, The X-Files won best television series, drama, over ER, NYPD Blue, Chicago Hope and Picket Fences. It won the category again in 1997 and 1998, marking the show's move from cult hit to mainstream success.
Photo: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0
Media28 Oct 1994
MGM released Roland Emmerich's Stargate, starring Kurt Russell and James Spader, which builds on the ancient-astronaut idea that an alien posed as an Egyptian god. It launched a long-running TV and film franchise.
Photo: Georges Biard, CC BY-SA 3.0
Media1 Oct 1994
TNT aired a two-hour live special, 'The UFO Cover-Up? Live From Area 51', with Larry King broadcasting a few miles from the base. A preview listed guests including Carl Sagan, Barry Goldwater and William Shatner, with debunkers alongside believers.
Photo: Simon Johansson, Public domain
MediaJul 1994
Showtime aired Roswell, a TV film directed by Jeremy Kagan with Kyle MacLachlan as an Air Force intelligence officer revisiting the 1947 events and Martin Sheen in support. It dramatized claims that a flying saucer was recovered and the story covered up.
Photo: Roswell Daily Record, Public domain
Media10 Sep 1993
Fox premiered Chris Carter's drama The X-Files, in which a skeptic and a believer investigate unexplained phenomena. It ran to 2002, and its 1996 Peabody citation said it prompted viewers to discuss unexplained phenomena and the motives of government officials.
Photo: Marcin Wichary from San Francisco, U.S.A., CC BY 2.0
