In After Earth, one thousand years after cataclysmic events forced humanity’s escape from Earth, Nova Prime has become mankind’s new home. Legendary General Cypher Raige (played by Will Smith) returns from an extended tour of duty to his estranged family, ready to be a father to his 13-year-old son, Kitai (played by Jaden Smith). When an asteroid storm damages Cypher and Kitai’s craft, they crash-land on a now unfamiliar and dangerous Earth. As his father lies dying in the cockpit, Kitai must trek across the hostile terrain to recover their rescue beacon. His whole life, Kitai has wanted nothing more than to be a soldier like his father. Today, he gets his chance...
On July 6 of this year, Silver Screen Saucers published the world’s first in-depth article examining statements made June 23 on Coast to Coast AM by former CIA operative Chase Brandon concerning the Roswell incident of 1947. The story was picked up by the mainstream media two days later and has since become a major talking point within and beyond the UFO community. You can read our original article here. Brandon’s statements and the media’s response to them are also summarised in the opening 15 minutes of this recent Mysterious Universe podcast and in the latest episode of Open Minds’ Spacing Out...
On July 8, I was interviewed as a guest on The Conspiracy Show with Richard Syrett, along with Grant Cameron and Victor Viggiani. We discussed Brandon’s Roswell statements for around an hour and we each had chance to clarify our individual positions on why this former CIA man said what he said in the way that he said it. The interview begins at 55:07 here (NOTE: my grainy audio is cleaned up after the first commercial break).
On July 11, Silver Screen Saucers published an official statement by the CIA’s Office of Public Affairs denying Brandon’s Roswell claims. The CIA was responding to a written enquiry submitted by this author and co-signed by Dr Matthew Alford, Grant Cameron, and Victor Viggiani. Read the CIA’s response here.
The following night, on July 12, Chase Brandon again appeared on Coast to Coast AM, this time being interviewed by George Noory (his original host was John B. Wells). This new interview is every bit as fascinating (and frustrating) as the first. Grant Cameron of PresidentialUFO.comhas begun the task of transcribing the most salient points made by Brandon in this new interview and has already published a brief summary on his website.
You can listen to the new Chase Brandon interview in full right here (begins at 38:20)...
Of particular note in this interview, host George Noory asks Brandon if the CIA has ever used Hollywood – and specifically filmmaker Steven Spielberg – as a conduit for delivering to the public factual UFO information disguised as fiction. In this short audio clip(simply click ‘download the file’ to stream the audio) courtesy of Giuliano Marinkovic, Brandon’s uncharacteristically long pause before he essentially dodges the question speaks volumes.
On his website, Grant Cameron notes: “If Brandon is the new CIA Falcon every word he says should be studied very carefully.” I agree. And if you’re unfamiliar with the story of the Falcon, you can put that to rights over at PresidentialUFO.com.
For ongoing developments on the Chase Brandon-Roswell story and further analysis of his statements, watch this space.
A short Avengersspin-off film will be screened this Friday at the San Diego Comic-Con. Titled Item 47, the short will also appear on the Blu-ray/DVD for The Avengers when it is released on September 25 of this year. The premise for Item 47(July, 1947, anyone?) reads as follows: “Lizzy Caplan and Jesse Bradford star as a down-on-their-luck couple who find one of the discarded alien guns from the finale to The Avengers and proceed to make some incredibly bad decisions. Two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents (Maximiliano Hernandez, returning from Thor and The Avengers, and Lost’s Man in Black Titus Welliver, making his Marvel debut) are given the job of cleaning up the mess and stopping this modern Bonnie and Clyde (not coincidentally named Benny and Claire).” Yes, thank goodness the heroic Men in Black of S.H.I.E.L.D. are on call to snatch the matches from the babies’ hands. God forbid extraterrestrial technologies should ever be made available for utilization by the public. Please, officialdom, keep this stuff locked safely in your vault where it belongs!
TNT announced yesterday it has ordered a third season of Steven Spielberg’s alien invasion drama, Falling Skies.
TNT says its second series of Falling Skiesis currently averaging 5.9 million viewers and that “the series ranks as basic cable’s #1 summer drama with adults 18-49.” TNT has ordered 10 episodes for Falling Skies’ third season, which is slated to air in 2013.
This from the TNT press release:
“Falling Skies, which currently airs on TNT Sundays at 9 p.m. (ET/PT), chronicles the devastating aftermath of an alien attack that has left most of the world completely incapacitated. In the months since the initial invasion, the few remaining survivors have banded together outside major cities to begin the difficult task of fighting back. Each day is a test of survival as citizen soldiers work to protect the people in their care while also engaging in an insurgency campaign against the occupying alien force, whose nature and purpose remains a mystery.
In its debut season last summer, TNT’s Falling Skies topped the charts as basic cable’s #1 new series of 2011. This year, the show is off to a strong start, averaging 5.9 million viewers in Live + 7. It has also scored 2.7 million adults 18-49 (L+7) and ranks as basic cable’s #1 drama for the summer-to-date in that key demo. The show has brought in 3.1 million adults 25-54, ranking it behind TNT’s Dallas as basic cable’s #2 summer drama. On the international front, Falling Skies premiered in more than 115 global markets last year, achieving hit status in the United Kingdom, Australia and Latin America, among others. Last year’s launch of Falling Skies also ranked as the biggest series premiere ever for TNT networks in Spain, Germany and Austria.”
Fright-Rags keeps finding ways to drain my bank account and/or jack up my credit card bills. Though I've skipped out on several of their latest offerings (like their awesome ALIEN and DAWN OF THE DEAD limited editions), I find it impossible to miss out on the two designs that they are putting out this coming Friday. On FRIDAY THE 13TH, Fright-Rags is putting out two limited edition shirt designs based on "Friday the 13th Part IV: The Final Chapter." Check 'em out and start salivating folks!
The artwork is just beautiful, and as soon as I saw these shirts I knew that I must make them MINE! (Same thing happened when Fright-Rags put out their GI JASON and Tommy Jarvis shirts! I'm a sucker for the Voorhees!) Both designs are available on t-shirts and hoodies, and come in all sizes. (S - 5XL for the dudes and S - 2XL for the dudettes.) T-shirts are going for $25.95; hoodies are going for $45.95. This is a pre-order item that is only available from Friday, July 13th @ midnight (EST), until Sunday, July 15th @ 11:59 PM. Once your order is placed, it'll take up to four weeks for your shirt to get to you.
What's that? Yeah these shirts are pricy and yeah FOUR WEEKS is a long time. But you know what? When they arrive on your doorstep, you'll realize that they were well worth it! Plus, once you own either shirt (or both), you can act smug because not everyone will have been lucky enough to grab these shirts before they were gone! (Truth!)
So start rolling change or sell something on eBay (or whip out a credit card and drive yourself further into debt.... LIKE ME!) because you NEED to buy these awesome shirts! And speaking of "Friday the 13th," I'm STILL giving away all twelve films on DVD (plus a Kane Hodder autograph)! Enter before Friday ends! Details HERE!
After a tense wait, the CIA has finally stated its position on the explosive “Roswell Happened” comments made by their former Entertainment Liaison Officer Chase Brandon.Jennifer Youngblood of the Agency's Office of Public Affairs said that official historians have checked their files but “found nothing in the Agency’s holdings to corroborate Mr. Brandon’s specific claims.”
Brandon ignited an ongoing media furore following his appearance on Coast to Coast AM on June 23 of this year when he announced that he had seen evidence in a box marked ‘Roswell’ at the CIA’s Historical Intelligence Collection (HIC) which confirmed “100%” his belief that the government had recovered an extraterrestrial craft and its occupants near Roswell, New Mexico in July of 1947.
The CIA was responding by email to a detailed series of questions sent by a group of British and Canadian researchers: Robbie Graham, doctoral candidate at the University of Bristol and editor of silverscreensaucers.blogspot.com, Matthew Alford, Grant Cameron, and Victor Viggiani. The group’s email requested information about Brandon, specifically: his current relationship with the CIA; the possibility of researchers checking his claims; the vetting of his comments by the Publications Review Board, and whether his utterances disclosed classified information in any way.
Robbie Graham commented: “The CIA have done exactly what we expected they would do.They’ve refused to address our questions and they’ve brushed aside Brandon’s claims without directly calling him a liar.” He added:“It’s interesting that they say they actually checked their archives for the ‘Roswell box’ Brandon described -- that must have been a weird library trip.”
The purpose of Brandon's statements remains unclear, with some pointing to him promoting his new book, The Cryptos Conundrum, and others speculating it could be part of a more sophisticated UFO disinformation or disclosure strategy.
Youngblood also pointed the researchers towards the Agency's 1997 supposedly definitive account of its role in UFO studies, which appears on its website.
Independence Day producer Dean Devlin has revealed that a sequel to his and director Roland Emmerich’s iconic 1996 alien invasion movie is now in early stages of development: “I can tell you that Roland and I have been working together for the first time in 11 years and we’re very excited about the idea of doing it,” Devlin told The Hollywood Reporter, but stressed that bringing their concept to the big screen will certainly pose a challenge:
“Whether or not we can make this happen, if we can get all the pieces to come together, that’s gonna be challenging. But creatively, for the very first time since we did the original, I feel we have a worthy concept, a worthy path to go.”
Asked why the sequel has taken 16 years to get off the ground, Devlin said “we only wanted to do it when we had an idea and a concept that creatively felt like it honored the first one--that it felt like an organic sequel as opposed to ‘let's just go make some more money.’”
“I feel like we got it,” said Devlin, “I think it took a long time, but I feel like we finally got something that really feels like, ‘that's worth seeing as a sequel to Independence Day.’”
For now, though, the concept is strictly under wraps.
Meanwhile Devlin and Emmerich’s other alien-themed epic, Stargate (1994) may also yet spawn a movie sequel. Asked by THR what other title from his filmography he would most like to revisit, Devlin said: “Stargate has always had this empty hole. When we made the first one, we always intended on doing part two and three, and we were prevented for years. And our hope is that we can get another chance at Stargate and tell the entire story we wanted to tell.”
Dinosaurs Vs. Aliens teaser
A teaser trailer for the motion comic of Barry Sonnenfeld and Gran Morrison’s Dominion: Dinosaurs Vs. Aliens is now online at Yahoo Screen. Sonnenfeld (Men in Black 3) and Morrison (All-Star Superman) announced their collaboration last year, promising a graphic novel that would lead to a movie.
The graphic novel is yet to emerge, but the web-based motion comic will debut on July 23, while the movie itself – the first in a proposed trilogy – is unlikely to hit cinemas until the end of next year at the earliest. For now, though, check out the teaser, as well as interviews with the creators.
Starship Troopers reboot
Yes, a Starship Troopers reboot is in the works, and no, it won’t be as splatterifically violent as Paul Verhoeven’s 1997 alien carnage classic. In fact, by the sounds of it, it will be tame as a fuzzy lapdog by comparison. “The more expensive a film is, the harder it is now to make it that violent,” the film’s producer Toby Jaffe told Empire. Jaffe, who is also part of the team behind the upcoming Total Recall remake (again, the original was an ultra-violent Verhoeven project) added: “With [Total] Recall in particular, we made a conscious choice to keep it tonally closer to something like Minority Report. It gives the studio, and us as producers, the opportunity to reintroduce it in a new way.” Yes, in a way that is far more profitable. A PG-13 will likely gross twice as much as an ‘R’ rated movie.
Interestingly, and perhaps slightly worryingly, Jaffe also noted that: “Verhoeven made his movie a critique of fascism, whereas Heinlein [author of the source material] was writing from the perspective of someone who had served in World War II. Y' know, one man's fascism is another man’s patriotism...” Let’s hope that doesn’t signal a Battleship-style propaganda fest.
Storage 24
Check out this trailer for what looks like a shockingly amateurish UK alien flick currently in international cinemas. Doctor Who’s Noel Clarke plays Charlie, a bloke who finds himself trapped inside a warehouse with a carnivorous extraterrestrial. Must try harder, Britain...
Guardians of the Galaxy
Apparently, the appearance of the alien Thanos during the end credits of The Avengers was intended to signal not an Avengers sequel, but a spin-off into another (though not entirely unrelated) Marvel narrative: Guardians of the Galaxy. A well-regarded script has been penned by Nicole Perlman and is now eagerly awaiting a director. For more on this story, head on over to ComingSoon.net.
