Last month we gave you a precursory heads up about Steven Spielberg’s upcoming Netflix Documentary, “Encounters.”  Today we are excited to share the first trailer for the 4-part series which premiers on September 27th.  (We are counting the days!)

Explosive new revelations from military whistleblowers of alien encounters, UFOs, and clandestine Pentagon programs, as well as coverage from major news sources, have breathed a fresh urgency into a topic that, for decades, we’ve relegated to the realm of conspiracy.

Credit: cfhdesign / Adobe Stock

“ENCOUNTERS,” directed by Yon Motskin (Generation Hustle) and executive produced by Amblin Television, Emmy-winning Boardwalk Pictures and Vice Studios, is a landmark four-part series that travels the globe to explore four extraordinary true stories of encounters with otherworldly phenomena. Each cinematic and deeply-researched episode tells a single story: strange lights in the sky over small-town Texas; submersible space crafts haunting a coastal Welsh village; an alien encounter with schoolchildren in Zimbabwe; non-human intelligence reportedly interfering with a nuclear power plant in Japan.

As told from the perspective of firsthand experiencers – in the places where the sightings occurred – and guided by cutting-edge scientists and military personnel, the series goes beyond the science to highlight the profoundly human impact of these encounters on lives, families, and communities. A timely and timeless cosmic detective story, what will be revealed from this puzzle of seemingly unrelated encounters across different places, times, and cultures is a set of uncanny similarities, and one astonishing truth: extraterrestrial encounters are global, awe-inspiring, and unlike anything we’ve ever imagined.

The series will interview:

• Dr. Kevin Knuth, astrophysicist and former NASA research scientist
• David Clarke, journalist
• Tony Cowan, former RAF officer
• Eric MacLeish, attorney
• Matthew Roberts, naval intelligence cryptologist
• Sara Vanden Berge, managing editor, Stephenville Empire-Tribune
• Lee Roy Gaitan, a constable in Erath County, Texas
• Robert Powell, nanotechnology engineer and co-founder of the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies

The series includes four different but eerily similar stories about encounters with alien life-forms and otherworldly phenomena on Earth.

Episode 1, “Messengers”

In early 2008, residents in and around the small central Texas town of Stephenville experienced something unexplainable: UFO sightings, reported by hundreds of people, including local business leaders and law enforcement. Trucking company owner Steve Allen described blinding lights and a feeling of great peace. Pat Leatherwood, a bank chairman, saw a “flying Dorito.” Constable Lee Roy Gaitan and his son watched an orb appear in the sky and then suddenly zoom away. According to one former military analyst, the Stephenville event and surrounding data prove we should no longer be asking, “Are UFOs real?” but rather, “What’s your version of reality?”

Episode 2, “The Broad Haven Triangle”

In 1977, the Cold War was raging, Close Encounters of the Third Kind was in theaters, and a group of boys spotted a cigar-shaped spacecraft rising from the trees beyond their playground. Suddenly, the area surrounding the Welsh coastal town of Broad Haven was gripped by over 450 reports of UFO and alien encounters — the largest mass sighting in UK history. As investigators and media dug into the sightings, they realized many bore a close resemblance to tales from Welsh and Celtic folklore, in which faeries are known as tricksters with sinister intent. So, were the otherworldly visitors in Broad Haven a new phenomenon, or had they been there all along, hiding in the sea?

Episode 3, “Lights Over Fukushima”

In 2011, the chief monk of Enmyoin Temple off the coast of Japan walked out onto the temple’s plaza and saw what he describes as an undeniable UFO. Just afterward, an earthquake hit, sparking the massive tsunami that set off the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster. During that event, many residents saw mysterious balls of light over the reactors in the wake of their meltdown — many believe they indicated the presence of alien life-forms. 

Episode 4, “Believers”

It was a bright and sunny day in Ruwa, Zimbabwe, when 62 young students at Ariel School saw spaceships and strange humanoid figures in their playground. The 1994 encounter — considered by many to be the most significant of the 20th century — profoundly changed the lives of the children, the headmistress, and even the preeminent Harvard psychiatrist who came to investigate what they’d seen. The story raised some important questions in the search for truth: Are kids reliable witnesses?Why isn’t eyewitness testimony in UFO cases enough evidence, when it is in many other situations? And finally, how can we bring empathy to credible witnesses, even as so many of us still struggle to embrace their truth?