Original subtitles

NARRATOR: Elusive ape-men stalking remote forests.

Reptilian humanoids lurking in the shadows.

And mysterious cryptids vanishing without a trace.

For nearly two decades, Ancient Alienshas traveled

the globe exploring towering megalithic structures,

mysterious artifacts,

and stories of otherworldly beings,

in a quest for evidence that might

reveal the truth of our extraterrestrial origins.

People have been reporting strange encounters

with very bizarre creatures for decades.

NARRATOR: Now, we take a look back

through the Ancient Aliensarchives

to the show's very origins,

to examine the evidence that we are not alone.

We have never been alone.

♪

It's fascinating that there are stories

from all over the world of what we call cryptids.

And these strange creatures are unlike anything else

in the animal kingdom, and we have reports

that they even have supernatural abilities.

Right, and often, these cryptids, for example,

in ancient times, are referred to as hybrid beings,

like the Minotaur in ancient Greece, half-human, half-bull.

And according to legend,

this being was allegedly created inside of a container.

- That to me speaks of genetic experimentation. - WILLIAM HENRY: Yeah.

And these stories aren't just isolated to the ancient world.

Cryptids have been recorded right up through to

the present day. We featured these strange creatures

in a 2011 episode called "Aliens and Monsters."

NARRATOR: Surfside Beach. Montauk, New York.

On July 13, 2008, a 26-year-old woman

and three of her friends

discovered the carcass of a strange-looking creature

that had washed onto the shore.

It actually, uh, looked like a hybrid creature

that had the claws of a raccoon and possibly the beak of a bird

and the body, perhaps, of a dog.

A very unusual creature.

A photograph was taken and circulated.

It started popping up all over the Internet. It went viral.

The people couldn't identify the animal

because it didn't look like anything.

It looked like a mixture of different animals.

NICK REDFERN: And because it looked so strange,

you know, it's provoked a lot of theories.

Is it just an unknown animal?

Could it be some sort of a hybrid-type creature?

Something, you know, that had been

genetically tinkered with in a lab.

NARRATOR: Some believe the mysterious creature

is a hybrid beast, perhaps created

at a nearby government testing facility,

the Plum Island Animal Disease Center.

Cryptozoologist Loren Coleman

labels the creature the Montauk Monster.

This is a replica of the Montauk Monster.

One of the things that we noticed about this creature

was these strange features around its mouth.

It looked like a beak, it actually looked like.

Uh, we didn't know what was going on here. Was it a griffin?

Was it a creature? Was it a giant turtle?

But indeed, that was decaying flesh

that had come away from the skull.

Other features were the strange-looking feet

and the body indeed, because the picture had no scale in it,

we thought looked enormous.

But on the body, these white objects here really define

the size of flies on the creature,

which then determined the scale of this creature was very small.

RUEHL: Unfortunately, someone grabbed the carcass

and supposedly took it to his front yard,

and then it ultimately vanished.

So, the only evidence we have of-of this creature

is the photo.

NARRATOR: But while some researchers theorized that the so-called

Montauk Monster was the product of modern science...

...ancient astronaut theorists believe the animal could be part

of a long line of genetically modified creatures

that have appeared throughout human history.

If the Montauk Monster is, in fact, a reality,

then that could mean that, if we are able today

to create some very bizarre creatures

behind closed doors in labs all around the world,

it is possible that our ancestors,

especially the extraterrestrial ancestors,

had the same capability.

Because in ancient texts,

we have numerous references to monsters--

bizarre beings that have been described in great detail.

NARRATOR: Ancient Greek artifacts

depict terrifying beasts such as the gorgon...

[hissing]

...the Hydra...

[screeching]

...and the ferocious Cerberus.

[growling]

And in Homer's epic poem the Iliad,

the Greek author describes a battle in which the hero

Bellerophon slays a monster called the chimera.

JASON MARTELL: The chimera was a dreaded beast that wreaked havoc

and terrorized the people of Asia Minor.

Homer described the chimera as an immortal beast

with a lion-like head, a snake tail,

and a third goat head in the middle that snorted bright fire.

LINDA MacDONALD GLENN: The notion of chimeras and hybrids is one that has been

part of the human psyche for millennium.

I mean, when you think about things such as the Minotaur,

Pegasus, Anubis,

this is something that either we have imagined

or had been created at one time.

NARRATOR: But did mythic monsters merely spring

from the imagination of our ancestors?

Or might they have actually existed?

Ancient alien theorists believe in their existence,

and that evidence can be found in the relics of the past.

To suggest that all of these creatures were nothing else

but fantasy, in my opinion, doesn't really hold water

because our ancestors weren't stupid.

They depicted what they saw.

We find these mixed hybrid beings all throughout Egypt,

as sphinxes, as griffins, as bizarre creatures that,

according to the ancient Egyptian texts, they did exist.

They were not a fantasy of our ancestors' imagination.

ERICH VON DÄNIKEN: Just imagine there is a mother spaceship traveling

in the universe for centuries and centuries.

Then they find a solar system with a planet

with the possibility of life, like the Earth.

And they observe on the Nile, a crocodile, a living creature,

which obviously, is resistant to the heat.

They observe a lion, with his power, his muscles.

And now, they start to think,

we could use a mixture of this creature on another planet.

And now, by genetical design,

they start to create mixed creatures.

Some of these mixed creatures did exist in the past.

JONATHAN YOUNG: The griffin was a mythological creature that had

the body of a lion with the head and wings of an eagle.

Now, the lion is the king of beasts.

The eagle is the king of birds.

So, the griffin was the king of all creatures.

PHILIP COPPENS: The creature is somehow two creatures put together in a way

that defies normal sense, defies normal explanation.

So the question then is how does that happen?

NARRATOR: By the mid-19th century,

scientists began to look at fossil records around the planet

to study how organisms changed over time.

Naturalist Charles Darwin theorized

that all life forms share a common origin

and have evolved over the centuries

through a process called natural selection.

Might the hybrid monsters of ancient religion and myth

really have been the result of evolution?

Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection is a mechanism

by which life forms can change from one into another.

It relies on the principle that organisms

that have certain traits, which are mutations,

may be advantageous in the struggle for existence,

in the struggle for reproduction.

And those traits are the ones that will be perpetuated

over time, over many, many generations.

Certain different species can breed

if they are genetically close,

like the, like the donkey and the horse.

Like the wolf and the dog.

However, cats and dogs will not mate

because, first of all, they're not...

they-they don't have the biochemical signatures

to mate with each other, and plus, their genes

are so different that the chromosomes

just won't line up properly to reproduce.

It's impossible.

NARRATOR: But if Darwin's theories on evolution and natural selection

cannot explain the origins of ancient beasts and monsters,

then where might they have come from?

Perhaps the answer cannot be found on Earth,

but in a place much farther away.

NARRATOR: Southern Pakistan.

In the middle of the Indus River Valley

lie the ruins of Mohenjo Daro.

This ancient city, whose name means "mound of the dead,"

was one of the largest urban settlements

in the world in 2600 BC.

The ancient city of Mohenjo Daro

had what appeared to be streets that were laid out

parallel and perpendicular to each other like a modern city.

Uh, the homes actually had their own toilets,

and they had a very sophisticated sewer system.

So, it looks like a very advanced city.

NARRATOR: Ancient astronaut theorists have long thought

this site was also the epicenter of a nuclear explosion

that occurred more than 4,000 years ago.

RUEHL: Skeletons were found in dead positions

as though there's an instantaneous death.

And some of those skeletons, as measured by Soviet scientists,

had 50 times the normal radioactivity.

They found pottery that had been fused.

Then walls were heated to such an extent

they became vitrified, or glass-like,

suggesting some sort of ancient nuclear weapon involved.

NARRATOR: According to the Mahabharata--

the ancient holy text of the Hindus--

white-hot smoke rose in infinite brilliance

and reduced the city to ashes.

Horses were burned by the thousands,

and corpses were vaporized by intense heat.

And afterwards, a big silence came over the entire land,

and people started to have boils on their skin.

Their hair started to fall out, and their nails.

There's only one thing that causes this.

And that is radiation poisoning. It's radiation fallout.

So, the question then becomes, when events happen

in a place where there is extreme radiation,

what impact does that have on human life

or on other life present there?

Could it explain, for example, why creatures were born

with more than one arm or more than one leg,

which then somehow became deified because,

even to this day, we know that, in civilizations where

anomalous human beings are born,

somehow the touch of God is seen to be part of this creation.

NARRATOR: According to the ancient Hindu texts,

after the carnage at Mohenjo Daro,

a fearsome flying monster appeared in the sky.

It was called Garuda.

In the Mahabharata, the Garuda is a massive

bird-like creature. It has a red face, red wings, talon.

It's so huge, it would block out the sun.

Uh, there are stories that it would let a certain god,

Vishnu, ride on him on occasion.

Each and every time he would show up descending from the sky,

he would create hurricane winds.

And upon his descent, the Earth would shake,

dust would fly up in the air,

and everyone in the vicinity would be absolutely terrified.

Now, here we have a carving of Garuda,

and if we look at the top,

yes, they look like feathers, but at the same time,

they could be interpreted as big gigantic flames.

CHILDRESS: According to Hindu mythology, Garuda is born

out of this cosmic event,

this war and destruction

that happens at the end of every age.

COPPENS: Could this have been somehow connected to exposures

or to radiation, being born within a zone of high radiation?

We cannot know the answer, but we do know

that, within India, within Pakistan, there are

known zones of higher radiation than there are normal.

The logic dictates that, somehow,

genetic abominations will have been born within those places.

NARRATOR: If Mohenjo Daro was, in fact,

the site of an ancient nuclear attack,

could it be possible that Garuda was a mutant beast

created as a byproduct of intense radioactivity?

We tend to have a science fiction view

of what mutation is.

We think of mutations being caused by radiation,

and they cause outlandish features,

and-and gigantic-sized insects and so forth,

but in fact, mutations happen all the time.

There's no recorded evidence

of-of any radiation causing a mutation,

uh, which changes some species into a different species.

Most of the radiation mutations are lethal.

NARRATOR: But if, as modern scientists believe,

Garuda was not likely the result of genetic mutation,

then what could explain its existence?

To the east of India, near the village of Wucheng,

in the Sichuan province of China,

similar tales of flying beasts have also been found

in ancient texts.

In the 4th century, historian Chang Qu reported the discovery

of what were then called "dragon bones."

A question occurs as to whether dragons

might actually have been actual dinosaurs that had wings.

I should point out that

the wings would've been lost to the fossil record.

We're just recently talking about dinosaurs

having feathers and having evolved into birds.

Well, it's possible that some dinosaurs actually

did have wings and could be described as dragons.

NARRATOR: But while most mainstream scientists believe

the remains found were most likely dinosaur fossils,

like those of the flying pterosaur,

ancient astronaut theorists have another,

more provocative explanation.

Now, a creature which somehow is able to spit fire

obviously is not any place in the animal kingdom of today.

So, what we have here is either an invention,

which did indeed spit fire,

in which case we're not confronting a creature here,

but somehow a creation.

Something which was either engineered by mankind

or which was engineered by extraterrestrials.

NARRATOR: While accounts of strange creatures

commonly referred to as cryptids

are not scientifically validated,

is it possible that some of them truly exist?

And if so, might these beings have an otherworldly connection?

Perhaps further evidence can be found

by exploring accounts of an aquatic beast

said to reside in the deep waters of Loch Ness.

We have so many stories

that describe cryptids inhabiting bodies of water,

whether oceans, lakes,

- even rivers. - CHILDRESS: Right.

We have stories of the kraken

and the Hydra and the Leviathan.

And in modern times,

we have stories of the Loch Ness Monster,

this long-necked creature that

hundreds of people have claimed to have seen

and even photographed.

Yeah, and there really is no better

hiding place than deep underwater.

And we keep making these new discoveries

of species in our oceans, so

who knows what else might be lurking down there.

NARRATOR: In March 2010,

a panel of 41 international experts

concluded that the impact of an asteroid

that smashed into Earth

at Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula 65 million years ago,

probably triggered the global climate change that resulted

in the mass extinction of the Earth's dinosaurs.

But is there also evidence

that some dinosaur species survived?

And if so, might they also have evolved?

Paleontologists tell us that, "Oh, these things have been

extinct for-for 65 million years," yet, they still crop up.

And they appear to be prehistoric animals,

dinosaurs, literally, that have survived right down to today,

much like the coelacanth

and, uh, alligators and sharks

and turtles also have survived

from those same prehistoric times.

I believe that ancient, prehistoric monsters

are still living in remote areas of the world,

either in oceans and lakes or jungle areas today.

NARRATOR: In the Highlands of Scotland,

the legend of the Loch Ness Monster

has long been part of Celtic and Norse folklore.

Recorded accounts of sightings can be traced to the year 565,

to the Irish monk Saint Columba,

a powerful leader who founded monasteries

in both Ireland and Scotland.

During his travels, Columba is said to have encountered locals

burying a man near the shores of the now fabled Loch Ness.

MARTELL: They explained to Father Columba that the man who had died had

been swimming in the lake and was attacked by the water beast.

Upon hearing this, Father Columba sent his own

follower into the lake.

When the beast came after this man,

Father Columba made the sign of a cross

and commanded the beast not to harm the man.

The beast fled and was never seen harming another man again.

REDFERN: A lot of people don't realize how big Loch Ness is.

It's 23 miles long, a mile wide,

and at its deepest point, about 800 feet,

and the water is very, very dark and dense,

and so, it is the prime location where, conceivably,

if they didn't need to surface that often,

they would sort of bypass detection.

When we're confronted with the Loch Ness Monster

or any kind of anomalous creature,

the question really is where does it come from?

Is it a remnant of the dinosaur age?

Or is it something which is out of this world?

We know that, for example, Saint Columba definitely felt

that lake was sacred and that there was something present

there which had a religious connotation,

which is why he went to that place to begin with.

The intriguing thing is that there actually have been

a significant number of UFO sightings

over the loch itself of strange, brightly lit objects

hovering over the water late at night,

which clearly aren't helicopters or aircraft

or meteorites or anything like that at all.

So, in other words, Loch Ness is a weird and spooky place.

NARRATOR: Could the so-called sea monsters of Loch Ness

possibly be descendants of ancient dinosaurs?

Or might it be of another perhaps extraterrestrial origin?

And if so, what might this say about other mythical sea beasts

like the seven-headed Sumerian sea monster the Leviathan?

The Leviathan is sometimes described as a serpent

or a crocodile or a dragon, but it lurks.

It is the gatekeeper to a portal to Hell,

and this gateway to Hell is apparently deep in the ocean,

and the Leviathan is there, forever lurking.

NARRATOR: In Greek myths, the Hydra was described

as an ancient sea serpent with many heads.

It was said to be a descendant of the Earth goddess Gaia.

Hercules was sent to kill the Hydra.

But it was terribly difficult.

He would slice off the head and two heads would form.

He had to ask help from his nephew,

and his nephew had a brilliant idea.

Bring a torch. Fire might keep the heads from forming.

So, Hercules would bash off one of the heads,

and his-his nephew would essentially cauterize

the neck so that another one wouldn't form.

And in this way, the Hydra was finally defeated.

COPPENS: In the case of a Hydra, we have something

which has several heads, which is once again a category

of a creature which you would expect not to see.

So, we're either confronted here with something

which was genetically engineered or which genetically went wrong.

But clearly, it was of such importance

that it was adhered to in mythology where it attained

a status over the years, over the centuries

up until this moment in time.

NARRATOR: According to Scandinavian legend,

the kraken are legendary sea monsters of gargantuan size

and are said to have roamed the seas

off the coasts of Norway and Iceland.

This fearsome beast was infamous

for its attacks on sailing ships.

YOUNG: The danger was not only being attacked by the kraken.

They would come up to the surface

and were enormous, the size of small islands,

so you could, you could have a collision with a-a kraken

that wasn't even, uh, out to attack you.

Another great danger was that, if it submerged suddenly,

it formed such a great whirlpool that it could pull a ship under.

NARRATOR: Could such legendary sea monsters have actually existed?

Might they have escaped extinction

in the safety of cold, deep waters?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and they suggest that, in addition to oceans and lakes,

there is evidence that many cryptids

find refuge in the world's densest forests

and highest mountains.

You can't really talk about cryptids

without mentioning Bigfoot.

And I spent a lot of time with Bigfoot hunters

back in 2014 for my show In Search of Aliens,

and I'll tell you, those people were convinced

that they did encounter this creature.

You know, what's intriguing is that people that report

witnessing Bigfoot often see him

right after a UFO sighting, or even at the exact same time.

Right, and there are reports of Bigfoot

disappearing in a sudden flash of light.

So, you know, you have to wonder,

is there an extraterrestrial connection?

NARRATOR: Mount Everest. November 9, 1951.

On the Menlung Glacier at an altitude of 18,000 feet,

British explorers Eric Shipton and Michael Ward

came across a mile-long trail of unusual footprints.

Not expecting to find humans

in this remote corner of the mountain,

the climbers examined the prints to determine what made them.

To their surprise, the footprints

were in the shape of a large, human-like foot,

one roughly twice the normal size.

MELDRUM: The footprints suggest that,

in fact, we're dealing with a large primate.

One that shares with us the-- not only the habit

of walking on two legs, but has some superficial resemblance

in its foot to our footprints.

Uh, only much larger scale,

but differ from the other great apes

in the lack of a divergent big toe,

suggesting they're adapted

to a wholly terrestrial environment,

living on the ground.

NARRATOR: Photographs brought back from the expedition

launched a media sensation,

and marked the beginning of the Bigfoot phenomena.

But where do these giant footprints come from?

Could they be a hoax?

Or is there some mysterious unknown creature

living in the remote wilderness?

According to the histories and myths of the Himalayan region,

one such ape-like creature is the Yeti,

more commonly known as the Abominable Snowman.

MELDRUM: The, uh, notorious Himalayan Yeti,

it's often described as being less than six feet in height,

much more aggressive when encountered.

[growling]

All of these sightings really make for

a creature which seems to be hiding from us.

There's a creature which is hiding in plain sight.

And obviously, the direct evidence comes in the form

of its footprints, hence why it's quite often

referred to as Bigfoot.

REDFERN: People often ask why don't we catch Bigfoot?

Bigfoot could be some sort of supernatural creature,

like a-a phantom, you know.

If Bigfoot is, however, a flesh and blood animal,

then I would have to say their numbers

would have to be few and far between.

NARRATOR: Since the Mount Everest discovery,

there have been numerous sightings

of large ape-like creatures on every continent,

many clustered in the Pacific Northwest area

of the United States,

including Mount Shasta in Northern California.

In 1979, I was up on the side of Mount Shasta on the foothills,

uh, trying to get to the base of the mountain.

It was so dense and so tough.

As we're standing there, we heard this crashing sound.

[foliage crunching]

Simultaneously, we smelled this awful smell.

I mean, it was foul.

But what was horrifying was, whatever it was,

was coming at us through this impenetrable hedge.

And then, we heard the most blood-curdling combination

of an elephant, uh, trumpeting, a lion roaring.

[roaring]

And it was so loud,

it bounced off the foothills two miles away.

That was probably the most terrified

I've ever been in my life, and-and the next thing I knew,

we were headed down the mountain almost skidding off corners.

LINDA MOULTON HOWE: I had heard from sheriffs

about a rancher in Montana who had gone out to go hunting.

Comes around a ridge, has an eight-foot-tall,

reddish-brown, primate-looking,

long-haired creature standing right in front of him.

Picks up a thirty-aught-six and just fires.

And the creature disappeared in a flash of light.

If the Sasquatch, when a bullet is shot at it,

disappears in a flash of light,

then what in the world are we dealing with?

And what do they want?

NARRATOR: Why is the creature known as Bigfoot

so difficult to capture or kill?

Could it be, as ancient astronaut theorists contend,

that the creature's ghost-like abilities

are the result of its otherworldly origin?

CHILDRESS: Many Sasquatch researchers

have noted that there's a connection between

UFO activity and Bigfoot activity.

In fact, Bigfoot has been seen coming out

of some UFO flying saucer craft.

You have to wonder if somehow Bigfoot himself

isn't some kind of extraterrestrial.

MARTELL: Many of the North American Indian tribes

have legends and mythological tales about these Sasquatch.

The Anasazi and various other Indian cultures

look at these as a ghost creature.

Something that-- it's impossible to capture.

Close to impossible to see.

But they do know that they exist.

NARRATOR: Although mainstream scientists consider the mysterious beast

as no more than a modern-day myth,

the number of Bigfoot sightings reported and photographed

continues to steadily increase.

COPPENS: Specifically what you get is obviously big feet,

you get a hairy creature.

You get a very specific smell, very harsh smell,

and it is also said that the sound

which Bigfoot makes is kind of whistling.

[high-pitched whistle]

So, all of these components really make for a typical

Bigfoot sighting, and they are concise across the board.

MELDRUM: They seem to be very elusive, very retiring and retreating.

Aggressive behaviors are very rarely reported.

The witness sees the creature,

and, uh, both go in opposite directions

with no interaction whatsoever.

They range in size from perhaps six feet to ten feet tall.

Coloration, the most common description

is of a dark brown fur.

Their names vary from location,

uh, but you have, of course, in America, Bigfoot,

otherwise known as Sasquatch in the Pacific Northwest.

Down in Florida, he's known as the skunk ape.

Down in Australia, we have the Yowie.

NARRATOR: But if a Bigfoot creature really does exist,

how has it remained so elusive?

Researchers point out that accounts of giant,

human-like beasts date back thousands of years.

Throughout ancient history, we have a number

of legends about giants, about wild men,

about hairy beasts that live at the edge of civilization.

These were humans, you know, people

who were, however, wild. They were hairy.

They didn't wear clothes. They lived in the woods.

And yet, in other ways, they had special powers.

NARRATOR: Is it possible that the supernatural creatures

of Native American myths are in fact descriptions

of encounters with Bigfoot in the remote past?

And are such creatures extraterrestrial in nature?

Ancient astronaut theorists believe the answers can be found

in numerous ancient texts.

COPPENS: In the Book of Enoch, we have a category called

the Nephilim, or the watchers,

people who are said to come down from Heaven to Earth

and basically lived ever after amongst us.

Now, the Bible gives some very little discussion as to really

what they looked like, except the fact

that they were giants, that they were big,

and clearly, they are deemed to be less worthy.

And I think this is of interest because, when you start

looking on the Bigfoot, you really are confronted

with a creature which even we today would classify more

as a animal rather than as a human being.

TSOUKALOS: What they witnessed had absolutely nothing to do

with the divine or with the spiritual because

those gods were not gods at all.

They were misinterpreted flesh and blood extraterrestrials.

[growling]

NARRATOR: Might Bigfoot and the Himalayan Yeti

really be creatures of alien origin,

as some ancient astronaut theorists contend?

Perhaps further evidence can be found in ancient tales

of giant beings with supernatural powers.

You know, we often think of Bigfoot as a modern phenomenon,

but there's actually reports of a Bigfoot-like creature

in the Sumerian text called the Epic of Gilgamesh,

which is the oldest story ever written.

Yeah, and that text goes back about 5,000 years ago.

And in it, there is a character named Enkidu

who is this wild, hairy beast of giant proportions.

Yeah, it's really amazing to think that the creature

we call Bigfoot has been hiding out in the wilderness

since the time of the Sumerians.

And you have to wonder,

maybe the reason why it's so elusive

is because it really is of otherworldly origin.

NARRATOR: Iraq.

Site of ancient Mesopotamia and the cradle of civilization.

In the remains of the ancient city of Nineveh,

Sumerian tablets dating back to as early as

1800 BC tell the story of King Gilgamesh.

In this epic poem, Gilgamesh has a companion named Enkidu...

...who is described as a hairy wild man

living outside human society.

What is fascinating about the Epic of Gilgamesh

is the fact that it relates to us a story of Enkidu

who allegedly was a giant.

It is possible that Enkidu,

this wild hairy beast, this giant,

could have been of extraterrestrial origin.

Because that is what the ancient Sumerian texts are saying.

Enkidu is described in the-the Epic of Gilgameshas being

a hairy man-like monster with great strength,

and when you read that story,

you have to think that Enkidu

is some kind of a Bigfoot, Sasquatch.

This is the actual first fashioned being by the gods,

where they put their genetic marker on it

to make a new being that would be their slave.

And they called this being the Enkidu.

NARRATOR: Is it possible, as ancient astronaut theorists suggest,

that the Epic of Gilgamesh

actually describes a hominid creature

created by extraterrestrial beings?

Sumerian texts also describe ancient sky gods

who came to Earth, called the Anunnaki.

MARTELL: The ancient astronaut theory explains how these gods

were probably extraterrestrials...

...and put their genetic marker on this beast.

But that beast would still exist

and probably went on its own evolutionary path

to be the Bigfoot and the Sasquatch that we have today.

NARRATOR: Do ancient accounts of such human-like beasts

provide further evidence that this otherworldly being

may have really existed throughout our history?

All cultures across the world, whether it's South America,

Native American Indians, Europe, Russia, China, Tibet, Australia,

all these nations have legends and tales

of giant, hairy, wild men.

Now, you know, people say,

"Well, legends are just legends."

But when you have cultures and countries separated by oceans

all talking about very similar things,

to me, this does suggest that, in times past, these things

were very, very prevalent and widespread across the world.

NARRATOR: Legends of giants were common in the ancient world.

But similar stories emerged much later

with Viking explorer Leif Ericson,

who in the 10th century AD

wrote of "horrible, ugly, hairy creatures with dark eyes."

Leif Ericson was familiar with the different types

of tribes of Indigenous people.

Now, he spoke very specifically about these

large, hairy creatures with dark eyes,

and a very specific scent that they had.

It stood out from all the other cultures that

they interacted with on their travels into the New World.

Could these have been the Sasquatch

or Yeti that we speak of today? Very possibly.

NARRATOR: But could all these similar accounts

found throughout history and around the world

be proof that Bigfoot is more than just myth?

And is there any evidence that its origins

lie not on Earth, but in the stars?

REDFERN: There are a number of cases on record

where Bigfoot has been seen in the same precise timeframe

as UFO activities being reported.

For example, there was a-a big wave

of UFO activity in Pennsylvania in the early 1970s,

and people were actually reporting these large, shadowy,

lumbering ape-like creatures walking out of the woods.

In Texas, there's a road known locally as Ghost Light Road.

And it's called Ghost Light Road because people

see these weird balls of light flying through the woods.

Coincidentally, people also have reported

huge numbers of Bigfoot sight reports

in these very same woods.

[growling]

Bigfoot are intelligent.

They're very, very secretive and very, very hidden.

They're able to skirt around civilization.

Perhaps they do have some sort of extra abilities

that allow them to do this and if so,

where did those abilities come from?

We can't factor out that, possibly,

Bigfoot are somehow an extraterrestrial species.

HOWE: Back in 1980,

I had been investigating a lot of animal mutilations,

and I get a letter from a man up in Snohomish, Washington,

famous for the Sasquatch or Bigfoot sightings...

...who said, "I was out at my father's place...

"...and I hear a sound in the trees as if wind has come in.

With the trees starting to move, comes this silver disc."

And then he sees a beam that comes down to the ground.

In the beam, is a tall, shaggy,

primate-looking-- he said it looked like a gorilla--

comes down to the bottom,

and the tall creature walks by as if he doesn't exist.

The next thing, animal mutilations

are reported within a few days.

[flies buzzing]

NARRATOR: If Bigfoot creatures are aligned

with extraterrestrial beings

as ancient astronaut theorists believe,

what might be the purpose of their presence on this planet?

And might the worldwide sightings

be part of a clandestine program that has been going on

for thousands of years?

Bigfoot could've been brought here,

you know, to sort of, "Let's put it in

alongside the Natives and see what happens."

There are stories of the star people coming down and releasing

these Bigfoot-type creatures into the wilderness.

Of course, you have to wonder what prompted those stories.

And that's why there are researchers out there who do

believe that Bigfoot is, if you like,

an animal born on another world.

One idea is that these are entities that have been

dropped down here as part of a research project.

Another idea is that the Bigfoot creatures perhaps

were criminals or some other type of undesirable from

an alien planet that have been left on our world.

NARRATOR: If extraterrestrials did create a race of Bigfoot creatures

thousands of years in the past,

as ancient astronaut theorists believe...

...might they have had a reason for keeping them hidden from us?

Perhaps further clues can be uncovered

by examining another elusive and even more sinister

cryptid race known as the Reptilians.

One group of cryptids that are reported a lot

in modern times are the Reptilians.

But they're usually not thought of as monsters,

they're thought of as an intelligent alien species,

like the Nordics or the Greys.

Dozens of alleged alien abductees

have reported encountering Reptilians.

Yeah, and in fact, in ancient India,

in the Vedic texts, they describe beings like that

called the Nagas.

But that is not the only culture

that talks about these creatures.

Right, and there are some reports

that the Reptilians are able to disguise themselves as humans.

We talked about all this in a 2014 episode

called the "Reptilians."

NARRATOR: Bishopville, South Carolina.

June 1988. 2:00 a.m.

17-year-old Christopher Davis

had pulled over on a deserted road

near Scape Ore Swamp to fix a flat tire.

Just as he finished, he heard a noise behind him.

He saw a strange, seven-foot-tall creature

with red glowing eyes running towards him.

Davis started to drive away, but the creature caught up with him

and jumped on the roof of the car.

Swerving hard to throw the creature off,

he saw it had three fingers and green skin.

Finally, it fell from the car, and Davis sped away.

JOHN RHODES: And he ended up getting out of where he was,

and he went immediately home.

He was so upset that his parents called the police department.

Sheriff Liston Truesdale actually went out there

and interviewed him.

He asked him to take a lie detector test,

and this young boy passed the lie detector test

with flying colors.

NARRATOR: What Christopher Davis told the detective he saw

was a Lizard Man.

REDFERN: And what's interesting is that the police

took the story very, very seriously.

Although Christopher Davis's sighting of the Lizard Man

was certainly the most famous and infamous one,

it's not the only one.

They tracked down a number of other witnesses

who both previously and after had seen the Lizard Man.

NARRATOR: In the spring of 1988,

a crop duster named Frank Mitchell

reported seeing what he said was a Lizard Man

cross his grassy runway one morning

as he was about to take off.

And two years later, in 1990,

Bertha Blythers and her five children claimed

they nearly hit a lizard-like man

while driving near the same swamp.

[snorting]

Could these incidents all be related?

Is it merely coincidence

that three separate people on three separate occasions

reported seeing a Lizard Man near the Scape Ore Swamp?

Could there possibly be another species of life

down here, something we're not aware of,

and-and they're interacting with people?

NARRATOR: Further sightings of a so-called Lizard Man

have been reported not only in this area,

but also in Tennessee, Illinois, and Austria.

In fact, alleged encounters with these creatures

have become so widespread,

they are now collectively known by one name:

the Reptilians.

But could accounts of the Reptilians

be more than just the product of overactive imaginations?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and as evidence, they point to the legends of serpent gods

that can be found throughout the world.

MARTELL: In South America, Quetzalcoatl,

Kukulcan, they're always referenced as serpent gods.

Even in Japan or ancient China, we have these

dragon emperors and dragon gods.

It's very possible that there was a time

in the past that ancient man was interacting with what appear

to be living serpent beings, a lost reptilian race.

TSOUKALOS: We can find these stories of serpent gods

all around the world.

I don't mean just, you know, particular geographic regions,

but on every continent, on virtually every ancient culture.

You have them in India.

You have them in China.

In Greece, in England,

in South and North America, in Africa.

I mean, it doesn't matter where you go in the world,

there are these direct references

to these serpent-like beings that descended from the sky.

So, to me, this is not a figment of the imagination.

And certainly, not coincidence.

NARRATOR: In addition to myths and legends passed down

through oral history,

early written texts also speak of serpent beings

that were once present on Earth.

TZADOK: The Bible speaks of a reptilian race, the seraphim,

we read about them in the Book of Isaiah.

Some will interpret them as being the fiery ones,

but the correct understanding is reptilian.

There has always been knowledge of the Reptilians.

Some are good, others bad.

MAGLIOCCO: Religious texts tell of reptilian beings

whose existence is inexorably linked

to that of the Earth and humankind.

So, for example, in the Bible,

the Book of Genesis has a story about a serpent

who tempts Eve, the first woman, by offering her

the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge.

Eve falls for the snake's blandishments,

and she eats of that apple and forever changes human history,

causing Adam and Eve to be expelled

from the Garden of Eden,

and causing the serpent, too, to be punished,

in that he is doomed to slither upon the ground

as a punishment for his disobeying God's will.

TZADOK: It is understood, in ancient legend,

that, prior to God punishing the serpent,

the serpent was completely humanoid in character.

And that this serpent, this nachash, was only one

of a race of reptilian beings who served God.

HENRY: When you hear that story from a modern perspective,

it sounds an awful lot like what people describe

as the Reptilians,

lizard-like beings,

or beings with the faces or visage of a viper.

NARRATOR: But if the serpent in the Garden of Eden

really was a reptilian alien,

as ancient astronaut theorists suggest,

could there be similar stories recorded

in the ancient texts of other cultures as well?

In the Quran, there's a fascinating category

of creatures known as the-the jinn.

The jinn are ancient.

They were here before humans.

They're a category unto themselves, not unlike angels.

And at one point, Iblis, the leader of the jinn

offended God, crossed him, was rebellious and was cursed

like the serpents in the Garden of Eden

and became Earthbound,

trapped on Earth for eternity, and they are here with us.

MAGLIOCCO: Throughout the Mediterranean and the Near East,

there is a very strong belief linking snakes,

skinks, lizards, and other reptiles

to supernatural or magical creatures,

and in some cases, to the souls of ancestors.

So, it can be considered bad luck

to kill one of these beings if you find it in the home

because it might be a jinn

or another kind of supernatural creature that is visiting you.

NARRATOR: The jinn. Kukulkan.

The serpent in the Garden of Eden.

Could all of these stories about otherworldly

serpent-beings able to influence humanity be based on fact?

And if they have been part of human history

for thousands of years, where do they come from?

Some ancient astronaut theorists believe the answer can be found

by looking back not thousands of years, but millions.

NARRATOR: Ottawa, Ontario. 1982.

At the national museum of Canada,

paleontologist and curator of vertebrate fossils Dale Russell

publishes a thought experiment

based on the trend toward larger brain sizes

and the upright posture of dinosaurs.

He proposes a theory about what one species

of dinosaur would've evolved into

if it had survived the mass extinction 65 million years ago.

RHODES: What he did is take the dinosaur known as Troodon,

and they noticed the morphological changes

in the skeletal structure of the dinosaur.

And based on over time where it was going,

they extrapolated it out further.

And strangely enough, or wonderfully enough,

they actually came up with a model that resembled

a humanoid reptilian being,

which actually matched that of the reports that we were

hearing now as well as reports from ancient history.

So, for me, this was one of the most compelling pieces

of information where science actually says, "It is possible."

RUEHL: If the dinos hadn't died out,

this would've become what he called the Dinosauroid,

an upright, standing, semi-humanoid,

semi-reptilian entity, what we might call a reptoid.

He thought it might stand four to five feet high,

weigh about 90 pounds, and have a fairly advanced brain.

Now, did this entity ever come into existence?

REDFERN: What if some of the dinosaurs didn't become extinct?

What if they managed to survive the global extinction,

or presumed extinction, 65 million years ago,

and over time, some of them developed

through natural selection and they grew smaller,

they became more intelligent,

they became more adept and adaptive

and-and took on a-a humanoid form.

We necessarily shouldn't think

that the Reptilians are extraterrestrials.

Perhaps, in some strange way, they're our forefathers,

albeit from millions and millions of years in the past.

NARRATOR: If the Reptilians do exist,

could they be the descendants of dinosaurs

that walked the Earth millions of years ago?

Our concept of dinosaurs is changing

all the time, of course.

And nowadays, we're making

so many new discoveries every year,

that we're reinterpreting them in many ways.

Certainly, if you looked 20, 30 years, uh, back,

there were so many things that have been found,

and so many other things we know now.

Uh, particularly, I think it's been very important

that nowadays, it's completely,

uh, very well-accepted the idea

that dinosaurs are not extinct.

That dinosaurs essentially evolved into birds,

and that, um, they're alive today.

And now that we know that not all the dinosaurs died out,

and as a matter of fact, some survived to become birds--

warm-blooded birds, mind you-- from a dinosaur,

which is considered reptile and cold-blooded...

...we're recognizing that, even if these are birds now,

we didn't recognize them now as being

part of the dinosaur family.

What could these other pockets

that have survived the devastation

65 million years ago--

could they have evolved parallel to mankind

in-in hidden cavern systems, and could they be actually

the beings that we think are extraterrestrial,

but are actually our terrestrial neighbors?

Paleontologists generally argue that the dinosaurs

died out totally 65 million years ago.

I think it's certainly within the realm of feasibility

that some found an ecological niche to survive in

and may even exist today.

And I point out that while we hear UFO abductees

talking about little Greys and tall humanoids,

a minority of them do report encounters

with what we would call reptoids.

So, it's possible

that on some planet, if not Earth,

somewhere else, they evolved from dinosaurs.

To find another place in the universe

that was so rich with resources

and so capable of supporting life

was probably a very exciting discovery

for extraterrestrial visitors to Earth in our prehistory.

In their eyes, this could have been the place

they could colonize, or perhaps

act as a working environment

for experiments they were doing with new species

they were trying to engineer.

Maybe they manipulated dinosaur DNA

to favor certain mutations.

By playing with certain mutations

in the genes of dinosaurs,

highly advanced extraterrestrials,

through genetic modification,

may have been able to alter the course of dinosaur evolution

to favor the rise of mammals.

NARRATOR: Is it possible celestial travelers

manipulated the DNA of reptiles and mammals on Earth,

as ancient astronaut theorists believe?

And could one of their experiments have resulted

in a reptilian-human hybrid species?

It's very possible that the reptilian agenda

extends well into our history.

We really don't know the full record of dinosaurs

on our planet,

since dinosaurs were here for millions of years.

Many of these references to a current reptilian race

or an ancient serpent race

that was worshiped by various cultures

could be an offshoot, a genetic variation of dinosaurs

that naturally evolved here on Earth.

NARRATOR: Could Earth really be home to human-like reptiles

that are an evolutionary offshoot of dinosaurs?

Some researchers suggest

there might be an even more profound explanation

behind the so-called Reptilians...

...one that may be revealed

by exploring encounters with strange entities

at a mysterious site in the American Southwest

known as Skinwalker Ranch.

If you're looking for evidence of cryptids,

look no further than Skinwalker Ranch in Utah.

I mean, that place is famous for modern UFO activity.

However, people have been reporting strange encounters

with very bizarre creatures for decades.

Right. And our own Dr. Travis Taylor

has been investigating the bizarre phenomena there

since 2019.

And William, you had a chance to visit the ranch

- recently yourself. - I did.

It is a powerfully strange place.

And one of the theories about why

there is so much anomalous activity there is because

it's thought to be the location of an interdimensional portal.

NARRATOR: Uintah County, Utah.

Nestled in a deep valley,

surrounded by some of the highest mountain peaks

in North America,

is an infamous 512-acre patch of land

known as Skinwalker Ranch.

The native Utes warn of a dark presence

that exists in this area...

...where strange sightings in the sky,

encounters with terrifying creatures,

animal mutilations

and numerous other paranormal activities

have been reported for centuries.

Skinwalker Ranch has become this nexus of activity

where people are reporting strange things.

It's in an area in Utah that's very much like a desert terrain.

And what's there now is high desert prairie kind of area.

Now, what it actually is and what's going on there

is a whole other question.

JEREMY CORBELL: It's a very unique place in the world

where the phenomenon expresses itself

in dramatic form.

It's also the most scientifically studied

UFO or paranormal hot spot in history.

NARRATOR: Native American legends say that there has been

an otherworldly presence at Skinwalker Ranch

for as long as humans have existed in the area,

which, according to archaeological evidence,

is at least 10,000 years.

And the very first European settlers

to pass through this land in the late 1700s

had their own bizarre experiences,

which they recorded in their journals.

The first Europeans to cross the Uinta Basin,

the, uh, Franciscan monks,

reported seeing things over their campfires at night,

really weird objects that we would call UFOs.

The Native Americans, the Indigenous tribes

who have been there, have had these experiences

for generations.

It has, for as long as humans have lived there,

it has been the site of paranormal activity,

strange things in the sky, UFOs.

There are so many stories about Skinwalker Ranch

that range from cattle mutilations going on,

there are stories that if you dig on the property,

you'll get sick.

Even strange stories

of cloaked beasts running out of the woods.

You've seen UFOs,

they have seen different creatures,

they have seen weird things happening up in the sky.

So, you have all these different phenomena

that happen on that ranch, so some have referred to it

as a veritable Disneyland of the Paranormal.

NARRATOR: The most notorious of the paranormal phenomena

associated with Skinwalker Ranch

is the creature for which the property is named.

The association of the skinwalker

with this mysterious plot of land

can be traced back to the mid-19th century.

In January of 1864,

land disputes between Navajos,

Utes and the United States military in Utah and Arizona

reached a fateful tipping point.

After decades of conflict,

the military removed the Navajo people from the area,

forcing them to make what became known

as the Long Walk to New Mexico.

The Navajos blamed the Utes for helping the military.

And so, they cursed the land that the Utes lived on up there.

And it must have been a pretty strong curse

because, even today,

there are really interesting things that happen up there.

NARRATOR: Cursing the land, the Navajo witch doctors

attempted to conjure an entity called

a "yee naaldlooshii," or "skinwalker."

The skinwalkers, they're sort of typically

six to seven feet tall,

very dangerous.

It's described as being wolflike but walking on two limbs.

So, inevitably, it sort of provokes imagery of a werewolf.

[growling]

DOVER: The subject of skinwalkers is as serious as a heart attack.

This is not something to trifle with.

Even talking about them puts me in some danger.

The skinwalker is somebody who is evil.

They want to control people, communities, regions,

and have that power over people, and they do this by fear.

JIM MORSE: The Utes, to this day, are very respectful,

they're very mindful.

Matter of fact, they stay at an arm's length,

um, from the Skinwalker Ranch.

Uh, they firmly believe

that this ground is cursed,

and that not only the Uinta Basin

but this concentration of this phenomenon,

this host, is on the Skinwalker Ranch.

NARRATOR: Could a monster known as the skinwalker

really stalk the grounds of Skinwalker Ranch?

And if so, was it conjured up by Navajo witch doctors?

Or is it connected to the paranormal

and perhaps otherworldly activity

that has been reported on the property for centuries?

Investigative journalist George Knapp

was one of the first reporters to expose the strange stories

at Skinwalker Ranch back in the mid-1990s,

when he conducted extensive interviews with the Shermans,

the family of ranchers that owned the property.

This guy shows up one day

while the ranching family is still there.

He's built like Grizzly Adams, big burly guy with a beard.

He said he'd been drawn to the property.

And he talks to the rancher and says,

"I just need to meditate for a couple of minutes.

"I'm drawn here, I need to do this.

Can you let me on the property?"

The rancher kind of bemusedly says, "Okay, come on in."

He lets the guy in, the rancher and his son

escort him to the middle homestead

and the rancher and his son are watching the guy

and just kind of chuckling to themselves.

They hear this thing in the brush,

and then they look over and there's something moving.

And then it comes out of the brush,

right up to where this guy is...

[screaming]

...and it looked like the creature in Predator

with the camouflage, the opaque camouflage,

the invisibility technology.

This thing comes right up to this guy and roars.

[roaring]

Scares the hell out of this guy, who opens his eyes,

flies back, lands on his back.

The rancher and his son go rushing over to him.

He's petrified, grabbing them, won't let go.

They escort him off the property and he swears, "It's the devil,

it's Satan, you're gonna burn for this kind of stuff."

NARRATOR: Is it possible that the terrifying creature

witnessed by both the ranchers and their mysterious visitor

was what the Navajo call a skinwalker?

Was it a being from another world?

Even another dimension?

Such stories have inspired countless curiosity seekers

to make pilgrimages to the ranch.

But for those who have lived and worked there,

like current ranch superintendent Tom Winterton,

Skinwalker Ranch is not a place to be taken lightly.

I had been warned not to dig on this ranch,

which I thought was absolutely ridiculous.

It's just, it's a ranch, for crying out loud.

That's what you do, you dig fence holes, you dig ditches.

And so, I paid zero attention to it.

And whether it's related or not,

I ended up getting this severe head injury

that causes my head to swell up.

I had fluid that separated the fatty tissue from my skull.

And to this day, my doctors still haven't

come up with an explanation of what happened.

What they did say was that what happened to me

just was not medically possible.

But I'd be lying if I didn't say that there are things

that have happened here that have shaken me to my core.

When we patrol the-the perimeter of the place,

both on foot and with our vehicles,

um, we are heavily armed.

And that's not necessarily

because we're looking to hurt anybody,

it's more of we don't know what we're dealing with,

and it's a dangerous place...

- Morning. - Hey, Kaleb. How you doing, man?

ARNOLD: ...between the natural things that are here

and then, also, the unknown.

NARRATOR: What could possibly explain so many incredible encounters

being reported on a single 512-acre stretch of land...

...and by multiple groups of people

over a span of hundreds of years?

Do the many accounts of UFOs

point to an extraterrestrial connection?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by more closely examining the stories of the skinwalker

and its connection to a supernatural creature

thought to have vanished from the Earth long ago.

NARRATOR: Fort Duchesne, Utah.

1968.

17-year-old Larry Cesspooch is with his friends,

driving along an infamous stretch of road

near Skinwalker Ranch.

As they approach a spot known as Dead Man's Curve,

named for the high number of car crashes

that have occurred there,

they spot a bright object in the sky.

We were driving around, with a bunch of us,

and we come around Dead Man's Curve

and, uh, the driver looked in his rearview mirror

and said, "Oh, what the heck is that?"

It was a fireball,

and that fireball was coming up behind us.

And so, we told him to go faster.

And this thing just flew over our head.

When I had told my mother, she had talked about

a similar incident when she was younger.

And other tribal members have seen that fireball.

NARRATOR: Other reports indicate that the local residents

have been regularly witnessing similar strange events

both in and around Skinwalker Ranch for decades.

The various accounts describe flashing lights,

floating orbs and UFOs.

ARNOLD: In this entire area,

there have been hundreds of reports of UFOs,

you know, multiple people seeing the same ones.

This particular part of the area has kind of gotten the nickname

of "UFO Alley" because of the number

of those sightings that have been reported.

JOHN ALEXANDER: We did see tears, we had openings in the sky, voices,

craft coming through, orbs.

Is that E.T.? Um, hard to say.

Reality of the events is absolute.

ERIK BARD: I have personally watched

as portions of the mesa,

as large as 500 to 600 feet, appeared to glow.

We may be looking at a terrestrial light source,

or we may be looking at something far more interesting.

NARRATOR: In the 1990s,

the owners of Skinwalker Ranch

also witnessed strange orbs in the sky.

When they relayed their experiences

to George Knapp, he found that the UFOs

were tied to the other paranormal activity

taking place on the property.

They start hearing heavy footsteps

outside their bedroom window at night.

Then they start seeing these dark humanoid shapes

in the windows at night.

[floorboards creaking]

Then they start hearing the footsteps inside the house.

Then they wake up at night,

and there's the thing at the bottom of their bed.

They would go out at night, they walk around,

they start hearing disembodied voices

in the sky above their heads...

[whispering voices]

...speaking some strange language,

almost like mocking them.

They start seeing little orbs floating around,

seemingly intelligently controlled,

floating around in the trees.

NARRATOR: Is it possible that reports of floating orbs,

poltergeist activity

and the creature known as the skinwalker

are not separate phenomena?

Might they be better understood

by considering them all together?

Another story told to George Knapp by the Shermans

may reveal yet another aspect to the Skinwalker Ranch mystery.

KNAPP: The first day there on the property,

they see an animal of some sort over on the brush line,

and it starts coming toward them.

They then realized, "That's a wolf."

It's huge.

The back of the wolf came up to the middle of his chest.

[growls]

They petted this thing, it was a real physical creature.

Uh, now, the calves are in the corral,

they're all backed up against one side,

scared of this wolf, except one calf

makes the mistake of sticking its snout out

between the bars of the corral.

The wolf sees it...

...leaps in the air like 20 feet,

chomps down on the head of this calf,

and it's trying to drag it out of the corral.

The son grabs a .357 out of the truck

and brings it over, Dad pops a shot into this wolf.

No yelp, no blood, no anything.

Shoots it a second and third time.

Now this is the fourth shot they've put into this wolf,

and then a fifth shot goes right into the chest.

A chunk of flesh and fur comes popping off the side

and falls on the ground.

And this wolf just casually turns around

and starts walking away, he's had enough.

Five shots in this thing and didn't kill it.

NARRATOR: The Shermans say they pursued the wolf into the brush,

following its tracks on the wet ground.

KNAPP: They get to a clearing beyond the brush, a muddy area.

The tracks go all the way out

into the middle of the muddy field and stop.

It's gone.

It's as if it had been sucked up into the sky.

NARRATOR: Later, when the Shermans told this story

to a group of scientists

that had come to investigate the ranch,

they were shown a series of photographs and asked

if any of them resembled the animal they encountered.

KNAPP: They have a lineup of different types of wolves

to ask each of the family members,

"Show us what this looked like,"

and the one that they all identified

is what's known as a dire wolf.

Dire wolf, of course, has been extinct for 10,000 years.

NARRATOR: If a dire wolf is, in fact, what the Shermans witnessed,

could it present another clue

as to what is happening at Skinwalker Ranch?

Many ancient astronaut theorists believe the answer is simple.

According to them, the ranch most likely contains

some kind of interdimensional portal,

one that would allow not only travel

from one dimension to another

but to various points in time and space.

And they also suggest that this otherworldly connection

could account for the various cryptid life-forms

such as the Loch Ness Monster,

Bigfoot, reptilian beings

and other elusive entities

that regularly appear and disappear from our reality.

A lot of times, when we imagine alien life-forms,

we think of them as looking a lot like us.

I mean, not exactly like us, but as an upright humanoid form.

Then again, they may look nothing like us.

Their planet's atmosphere could be different than ours,

the geology, the gravitational forces.

Yeah, and if you take into consideration all the cryptids

that have been reported since ancient times,

it's quite possible that some of them

were of extraterrestrial origin.

In fact, we covered this in a 2015 episode

called "Alien Evolution."

NARRATOR: West Virginia. September 1952.

Multiple witnesses report seeing a strange ball of light

shooting across the night sky

and landing in a nearby wooded area.

Those who investigate the crash site

describe seeing a ten-foot-tall birdlike creature

with glowing red eyes.

REDFERN: It was this huge, humanoid-type figure

anywhere from about ten feet to 12 feet high.

Had these fiery, blazing eyes and was emitting

these sparks and flashes of light.

It was described as having a cowl-like head,

not unlike an ace of spades card in a deck of cards.

The entire group was unanimous in their belief

that the object or the creature was utterly real...

...that it was connected with the overflight

of the strange light,

and it was also connected

with this red pulsating light that they saw.

NARRATOR: Curiously, Native American mythology

also describes a similar half-bird, half-human creature

that shared the planet with mankind thousands of years ago.

YOUNG: The Apache had a demonic figure in their mythology,

the giant Owl-Man,

who could petrify you through its gaze.

It was truly a terrifying presence

that could come at any time,

and particularly in the night sky when owls fly.

TOK THOMPSON: This is a pretty common theme

in a lot of Native American mythology,

that there was a time in the past

when the Earth was overrun

by pretty scary monsters of various forms.

And the Big Owl, or the Owl-Man,

is one of these sort of, uh, representatives.

NARRATOR: Might the stories of Owl-Men

and other strange creatures describe beings

that the Native Americans actually encountered?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and point to similar creation myths

from across the world

of gods that resemble not just anthropomorphic birds...

...but also reptiles...

...insects and sea creatures.

TSOUKALOS: All around the world,

we have figurines and carvings

and paintings, rock paintings,

of these very bizarre creatures

that can be found not only on every continent

but, once you compare them, they're also incredibly similar.

So, one has to wonder if these figurines

and these statues of these different depictions

of what they referred to as the gods,

if they're actually rooted in some type of reality.

NARRATOR: Did our ancestors really encounter

these intelligent life-forms thousands of years ago?

And if so, just what were they?

Cambridge, Massachusetts.

February 2013.

Analyzing data gathered by NASA's Kepler space telescope,

astronomers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center

for Astrophysics announce that six percent

of all red dwarf stars have habitable, Earthlike planets.

Because red dwarf stars burn much longer than our Sun,

the discovery raises the possibility

that life on these planets could be much older,

and much different than life on Earth.

The environment plays a-a really pivotal role

in sort of the direction, um, that organisms evolve.

And so, you can imagine that evolution played out

on a different planet

might follow the same types of rules

but have completely different end products,

so it'd look completely different.

PETER WARD: Just go to any other star with planets around it.

Intelligence is going to happen because of crises,

it's going to happen because

you can only survive with that intelligence.

But it could be from a reptile.

That we were reptile-equivalent.

It could be from a quadruped.

It might be from a mollusk-like creature.

The cause is probably going to be the same.

The end result, anatomically, totally different.

HENRY: There could be a myriad of different forms

that intelligent life takes throughout the cosmos.

When we look to the earthly record

of otherworldly beings that have visited Earth...

...they exhibit different characteristics.

They have bird heads, dog heads,

reptilian-type forms.

It's possible that these are the forms

that these beings take on their home planet,

and they might even coexist

with beings that are even different from them.

I think it's unscientific to flat-out say

that any and all cryptids are nonexistent,

because they said the same thing about the coelacanth.

"Extinct. Does not exist."

And then they found the coelacanth again.

Just because you take a spoon out of the ocean with water

and there is no shark in the spoon,

doesn't mean there is no sharks in the water.

Well, right, and the-the oceans are so vast and deep.

I mean, that is really the unexplored territory

- on our planet. - Absolutely.

And, you know, we're only just beginning to discover,

you know, all the creatures and cryptids all over the world.

Well, and then, you multiply that by the possibility

that there's beings perhaps that are beyond the physical.

Light beings, for example, or beings

living in a different density or a different frequency

that are still intelligent life.

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