All language subtitles for Ancient Aliens - S14E02 The Badlands Guardian

NARRATOR:
A mysterious formation...

carved out of the Earth...

gone unnoticed
for thousands of years.

HUGH NEWMAN:
It’s really, really striking

when you first see it.

It looks so much
like a human face.

NARRATOR:
Is it an ancient
megalithic structure

made to be seen from the sky?

TRAVIS TAYLOR:
The Badlands Guardian
looks artificial.

It doesn’t look like
a trick of nature.

NARRATOR:
And could it be

not only a link to mankind’s
extraterrestrial ancestors...

MARCIA MOORE:
So you have to ask yourself,

who were they emulating?

NARRATOR:
...but one that holds the key

to their return?

GEORGE HAAS:
We learned their codes

and their secret symbolism,

and what we’re seeing
probably holds...

a key to our legacy.

NARRATOR:
There is a doorway

in the universe.

Beyond it is
the promise of truth.

It demands
we question everything

we have ever been taught.

The evidence is all around us.

The future is
right before our eyes.

We are not alone.

We have never been alone.

NARRATOR:
Gravelbourg, Saskatchewan.

2005.

53-year-old grandmother
Lynn Hickox

is scanning
GPS driving directions

to a local museum
on satellite view

when something catches her eye:

a geographical feature that
bears a striking resemblance

to a human face.

It looks so much
like a man-made structure

that she posts the image
on a message board.

Almost overnight,
the image goes viral

and becomes known far and wide

as the "Badlands Guardian."

It is quite striking.
It is clearly a face.

The brow, the nose, the lips,
the chin are well formed.

The headdress a little less so,

but clearly could be seen
as feathers.

The Badlands Guardian appears
to be a huge geoglyph

near Alberta, Canada.

And to see it from Google Earth
or from satellite imagery,

you would think it was created
by people many, many years ago.

"Geo" means Earth,
and glyphs are symbols,

so "geoglyph" means
symbols on the Earth.

They can be geometric designs,
they can be...

animals, they can be faces.

Some of them are carved

into the ground,
like we find in Nazca.

And in some places
they’re built up,

mounds built up on the Earth.

The Badlands Guardian

is a bust, or a head
and shoulders presentation,

of a male indigenous person.

It is so striking,

because that is the indigenous
people of the area.

It doesn’t look like a Scotsman
wearing a kilt.

It doesn’t look like
an African warrior.

It looks like an indigenous,
uh, native to the area.

NARRATOR:
Is it possible that
the likeness of a human face

naturally formed in the Earth?

Many who have examined
the Badlands Guardian

suggest that, based on the
amount of detail it displays,

this is highly unlikely.

When the mainstream
scientific community

looks at the Badlands Guardian,

their first explanation is that
it was created by weathering,

uh, rain and water runoff.

But there’s just so much detail

that we’re seeing
in this formation

that it goes way beyond
anything nature could make.

It not only has
basic facial features,

it has secondary facial
features, such as the eyelid.

The only thing missing
from the Badlands Guardian

is an ear feature.

Now, the interesting thing
about that is,

the local government in Canada,

they had found
a gas deposit there,

right where the ear should be.

There might have been
an ear there at one time,

but now, because they put
an access road there

and they built this gas feature,
that was all erased.

Archaeologists are often
mistaken about ancient sites.

And what is actually a pyramid
that’s now, say,

covered in soil
and has a forest on it

can be mistaken
for just a natural hill.

This has happened in...
in South America, in China,

Archaeologists
are continually finding

that things
they think are natural

are actually artificial.

NARRATOR:
Some of the geoglyphs
found around the world

were formed simply by removing
the top layer of soil

to expose the lighter colored
dirt underneath.

But if the Badlands Guardian
is also a geoglyph,

creating it would have been
an enormous undertaking.

The massive concave formation
is almost half a mile long

and it is over 1,100 feet wide.

For comparison,

the Mount Rushmore National
Monument in South Dakota,

which was completed in 1941,

is approximately 80 feet tall

and 200 feet wide.

And while it is only
a fraction of the size

of the Badlands Guardian,

constructing it required
an enormous amount of work,

even with modern technology.

The carving
officially started in 1927,

and it was
considered complete in 1941.

My grandfather was
on the mountain

approximately from 1933 to 1941.

He was chief carver
on Mount Rushmore.

It took about 400 workers.

It took 14 years.

And when I think about
the amount of time and effort

that it took
for people in the ’30s

to create Mount Rushmore,

I can’t even begin to imagine

what the person or persons
had to do,

working on something the size
of the Badlands Guardian.

I-I can’t even wrap my head
around it.

How was it possible
that the people that carved this

thousands of years ago

were able to see
what they were doing

or know what they were doing?

They must have had assistance
by extraterrestrial beings.

GIORGIO TSOUKALOS: The Badlands
Guardian can only be

fully appreciated from the sky.

So you have to wonder why.

Well, then the answer is:

people on the ground wanted

to signal someone up in the sky.

NARRATOR:
For ancient astronaut theorists,

the Badlands Guardian
could offer

some of the most compelling
new evidence

that extraterrestrial
intervention occurred on Earth

in the distant past--

that is, if it really is
an artificial structure.

Boston, Massachusetts.

February 2019.

Aerospace engineer

and satellite imaging expert
Mark Carlotto

has spent countless hours
examining

the Badlands Guardian to see
if he can determine for certain

whether it is something
other than a natural formation.

CARLOTTO: The image
of the Badlands Guardian

is very striking
as this Native American figure,

and there are some properties
that are unusual.

So I did some analysis,

uh, using some imaging software

and the height map
of the feature.

We’ll start with an overview

of the Badlands Guardian
image here.

We see the figure in the middle
of the image here,

and notice
the surrounding landform’s

very similar in morphology.

So, now what we’ll do is
we’ll zoom up on the figure.

You can see it
a little bit more clearly,

the, um, this iconic face, so...

what can we do to bring out,
you know, some information?

Well, we ran a program
that extracts the height,

or elevation,
uh, from the figure.

And the way it’s depicted here
is... is: dark is low

and bright is high.

So now, after we’ve taken
the image and texture-mapped it

onto the elevation surface,
we can view it in 3D.

And, um, now
I’m moving around it

and viewing it like
we might see it in a drone.

And as you can see, when
you’re looking straight down

on the Badlands Guardian,

it’s, uh,
this uncanny resemblance

to a Native American.

But as we look off angle,

and as we look at it
from ground level,

simulated ground level,
you see the illusion disappears.

So clearly this feature,
if it was created,

was meant to be viewed
from above.

NARRATOR:
One important factor for Mark

is how information looks
when the lighting changes.

If the Badlands Guardian
still appears as a face

under different conditions,
it could strengthen the argument

that it’s
an artificial structure.

And as you can see, what we’ve
simulated here in these views

are noontime views,
so the Sun is at noon,

in the summer...

the spring or fall
and the winter.

Notice in the winter
the shadows are longer.

The Sun is lower in the sky.

And in all three, you definitely
get this impression of a face.

It implies
it’s very interesting,

and if it’s not,
uh, artificially created,

nature is having
a great joke on us.

TAYLOR:
To me, the Badlands Guardian
looks artificial.

It doesn’t look like
a trick of nature

and that I’m suffering
from apophenia.

All humans do have apophenia,

meaning they see patterns
where patterns are not.

That’s why we see Mickey Mouse
in the clouds and so on.

But this looks
too specifically like

some type of native person
with a headdress on.

Looking at this picture,

you can see the natural patterns
of erosion.

So it’s clear to me
from this picture

that this is
an artificial structure.

NARRATOR:
Did a grandmother
in Saskatchewan

accidentally discover
physical evidence

of extraterrestrial
intervention on Earth?

But if so,
how long has it been there?

Who built it?

And what does it mean?

Perhaps further clues
can be found

by examining other geoglyphs
that have been discovered

all over the world,

and the strange figures
they depict.

NARRATOR:
In 1820,

the prominent German
mathematician and physicist

Carl Friedrich Gauss

began to explore the possibility

that there are other intelligent
beings in our solar system.

He hypothesized
that alien life-forms

might be able to view
the surface of our planet

through the use
of superior technology,

and proposed
that we could attempt

to communicate with them

by creating large-scale shapes

and figures in the Earth...

what are known today
as geoglyphs.

CARLOTTO:
Gauss’ idea was simple,

that tracks of forests
be planted

in the shape of right triangles

so that at great distances,

patterns of triangles
would be visible from space.

He tried to come up with an idea
of how we could signal

our existence here down
on Earth,

and not just signal,

but to tell ’em that we
were intelligent.

So what he devised
was to create

this huge geoglyph in Siberia

showing the Pythagorean
triangle.

This is something
that you can only work out

if you have mathematical
knowledge.

So he wanted to convey
this knowledge

to these intelligences
outside of our own planet.

NARRATOR:
More than a century

after Gauss proposed creating
figures in the Earth

to communicate with
extraterrestrials,

pilots flying over southern Peru
in the 1930s discovered

hundreds of giant geoglyphs
etched into the desert soil:

the Nazca Lines.

As there is no record of when

or why the Nazca Lines
were formed--

or even who made them--

scholars can only guess as
to what purpose they served.

But is it possible
that these geoglyphs

were created by ancient people

who were doing exactly
what Carl Gauss proposed:

attempting to communicate

with beings looking down
on Earth from above?

This is a huge area

where these straight lines
stretch for many, many miles.

And then effigies
such as spiders

and birds and other animals
also carved into the landscape.

NARRATOR:
It wasn’t until the invention
of the airplane

that we were able to observe
the Nazca Lines

from the vantage point
they were designed for.

With the ability to see
the Earth from new heights,

more and more geoglyphs
were discovered.

And now,
with satellite imagery,

it has been revealed
that our ancestors

created similar formations
all over the world.

SAUNDERS:
They’ve been finding geoglyphs

in Asia, the Middle East,
Africa,

North America, South America,
Australia,

all over the world
they’re finding geoglyphs.

NEWMAN:
We have earthen geoglyphs

such as Serpent Mound in Ohio.

In England, at Glastonbury,
we have the Glastonbury Zodiac,

constellations carved
into the landscape.

We also have
the Blythe Intaglios

in the western part
of America.

So all the geoglyphs
all over the world

do suggest that the ancients
were using the Earth

as, like, a canvas,
but why would they do this?

Were they sending messages up

into the sky
for other beings to see?

POPE:
It might be a test of some sort,

uh, a code, a puzzle.

Something that
we would only recognize

when we had developed
powered flight and satellites.

Does it lead to a next step?

HENRY:
These massive geoglyphs,

they’re not art for art’s sake.

They did it for
a very specific purpose,

for a purpose
of communicating with

and interacting with
extraterrestrial beings.

NARRATOR:
Is it possible that an
extraterrestrial civilization

is monitoring us much like
Carl Gauss predicted?

One part of Gauss’s hypothesis

that now seems very plausible
is the idea

that extraterrestrials may have
the technology

to view details on the Earth’s
surface from great distances.

Could it be they are waiting
for the day

when we humans demonstrate
the ability to do the same?

That day may be closer
than we think,

as scientists are learning

how to view the surfaces
of faraway planets

through a process called
gravitational lensing.

A regular lens happens ’cause
you have a change

in index of refraction, which
changes the speed of light.

A gravitational lens literally
is curving space itself,

and light now travels
that curved path.

What it allows us to do
in exploring space

is it will allow us to observe

or look at things we wouldn’t
otherwise be able to see.

NARRATOR:
In 2019,

the Hubble Space Telescope used

a naturally occurring
gravitational lens,

a bend in space-time,

in order to capture the light

of a large galaxy cluster
in the Leo constellation

that was previously
too far away and dim to see.

While Hubble utilized
a gravitational lens

that already existed in space,

it is possible that one day we
may be able to create our own.

If there was an
extraterrestrial civilization

that had that technology
and was far enough along

to make a gravitational lens
that magnified,

that might allow them
to view things, for instance,

on Earth, that you couldn’t
with just a standard lens.

NARRATOR:
Is it possible

that extraterrestrials created
markers on Earth

that they were capable of seeing

from the far reaches of space?

And did our ancestors then
construct their own geoglyphs

in the hopes that the alien
visitors would return?

Perhaps a piece of the puzzle
can be revealed

by examining geoglyphs of
strange humanoid-type beings.

HENRY;
At Nazca, we see what appears

to be a humanoid figure wearing
a space suit.

At the Blythe Intaglio,
we see a very strange, tall,

spindly human being.

Then you have the Atacama Giant

who has these lines coming out
on the top of his head.

The Badlands Guardian
is unique among all

the geoglyphs we’ve found
around the world.

It’s the only one
that has a face.

DAVID CHILDRESS:
Most of the humanoid geoglyphs

are of a full figure who is
looking directly at the sky.

But the Badlands Guardian
is different.

He’s in profile;
it’s just his head.

TSOUKALOS:
It’s a Native American face

and Native Americans lived
in that area.

And Native American history
is filled

with stories of sky people
descending from above.

It’s maybe a signal, "Hey,

this is us down here.
Come and say hello."

NARRATOR:
Is it possible that the
geoglyphs of humanoid figures,

and also the Badlands Guardian,

illustrate actual
extraterrestrial visitors?

Perhaps further clues
can be found by examining

a nearby site that boasts
the greatest concentration

of rock art on the
North American Great Plains,

dating back
at least 9,000 years.

NARRATOR:
Writing-on-Stone
Provincial Park, Canada.

Here, less than
a hundred miles away

from the Badlands Guardian,
is an incredible record

of local Native American
traditions.

Thousands of ancient
petroglyphs,

images carved into stone,

depict every aspect of life

for the people who lived here
centuries ago.

There are ancient calendars,

depictions of animals, humans,

entire battle scenes,
and the Blackfoot gods,

who they also refer to
as "sky beings."

In various Native American
traditions,

we have different
spiritual beings located

on these sort of different
planes of existence.

And there’s a wonderful range

of stories in many, many
Native American groups that talk

about some of the adventures
and interactions

with these sky people
with the humans on Earth.

NARRATOR:
For the Blackfoot,

the most prominent
of these sky beings

is the one they credit
with their creation, Napi.

TSOUKALOS: The creator god of
the Blackfoot is called Napi,

and in this petroglyph
he can be seen,

what appears to be inside
of a disc.

And he’s very strange-looking
’cause he’s got four fingers,

he’s got sort of
an elongated skull.

HENRY:
The Blackfoot tell

a really interesting
creation myth about Napi.

They tell how he came to Earth
and created various animals

and-and other creatures.

And then one day
he decided to form

a living human being
out of clay.

And then he goes and leaves
the Blackfoot alone...

...but he promises
that he’s going to return.

NARRATOR:
The Blackfoot regard Napi

not as mythological,
but as a real being

who descended from the heavens.

So the Star People
in Native American traditions

are beings who came
from the cosmos

and taught the arts
of civilization,

agriculture, medicine,
healing,

and they brought maps
of the cosmos to Earth.

Throughout especially
the western part of America,

we find petroglyph or rock art

that portrays what appear
to be star beings.

People can look
at this art and say,

"That’s a depiction
of an extraterrestrial."

And this is one way that
the First Nations people

recorded their interactions
with the Star People.

NARRATOR:
Could this petroglyph of Napi

be a depiction of a being

that the ancient Blackfoot
encountered

coming down from the sky?

And might this provide
further evidence

that the local indigenous
populations

were visited by
extraterrestrials?

Ancient Astronaut theorists
say, yes,

and believe
the Badlands Guardian may reveal

how the ancients communicated

with these otherworldly
visitors.

HAAS:
Now, the headdress that he wears

is called a medicine hat, uh,
which--

it’s not a chief’s regalia
that you would see

with all the feathers going down
that a chief would wear.

What a medicine hat entails

is it incorporates
the tail feathers of an eagle.

And these are normally worn
by, uh, the medicine man.

YOUNG:
The medicine man--
this is a wisdom figure,

a combination of professor,
doctor and priest

all in one person.

The hat is what we tend to call
a headdress.

The shamanic, ceremonial leader
uses that

to make contact
with invisible dimensions,

often thought of
as upper worlds,

in which contact is made
with spirits, gods,

energy that is beyond
our understanding.

The fact that he’s wearing
a medicine hat

that acts as a antenna tells us
that this is a figure who was

in communication
with otherworldly beings,

maybe even the Star People.

NARRATOR:
If extraterrestrials
communicated

with the ancient
Blackfoot Indians,

is it possible
that they imparted the knowledge

and technology to construct
the Badlands Guardian?

Ancient astronaut theorists
suggest

that not only
did extraterrestrials

visit people living
in the Alberta Badlands

in the distant past,

but that they continue to visit
the region to this very day.

Certain areas of the world
are hotbeds of UFO activity.

And, in fact, Alberta, Canada,
is one of these hotbeds.

There’s constantly UFO sightings
in the day and night,

and there’s quite a few photos
and films that can be seen.

In 2009 alone, there were
over 150 reported sightings

of UFOs in Alberta.

One of the most famous
UFO sightings in that area

happened in 1967

when a person named Warren Smith
and two of his friends

were out walking in this area,

and in broad daylight,
they then saw

a silvery, disc-shaped UFO
hovering around the trees.

The witnesses took their photos,

and then, finally,
the UFO vanished.

HENRY:
Warren Smith’s photos

of this craft
as it was lifting into the sky

were analyzed by
the Photo Interpretation Center.

The experts there determined
that the photos were real

and that it matched
the description

of what he said he saw,

suggesting that this
was a genuine experience

and that these were, in fact,
genuine photos of a craft.

The area where Warren Smith
took the photos isn’t far

from where the Badlands Guardian
is located.

Does this suggest that aliens

have a continuing interest
in this area?

CHILDRESS:
With all of this UFO activity
in Alberta,

and it’s in the vicinity
of the Badlands Guardian,

you have to wonder
if this area isn’t some portal

or inter-dimensional spot

where UFOs are coming and going.

And you have to wonder
if it’s something to do

with the Badlands Guardian.

NARRATOR:
Does the Badlands Guardian

represent a medicine man

who communicated
with the Star People?

Or could it be depicting
a star being,

one who taught the indigenous
people of the region

a means of communicating
with extraterrestrials?

Ancient astronaut theorists
believe the answer can be found

only by forensically examining
the Badlands Guardian

and taking a closer look

at the shape
of the figure’s head.

NARRATOR:
Los Angeles, California.

February 2019.

Ancient astronaut theorist
Giorgio Tsoukalos is meeting up

with forensic 3-D artist
Marcia Moore.

-Marcia. Pleasure to meet you.
-Nice to meet you.

-How are you? Okay.
-Come on in.

Wow, look at this space.

NARRATOR:
Since learning
about the Badlands Guardian,

Marcia has been working

to reconstruct it digitally

to see what it would look like
as a three-dimensional head

and perhaps provide
further clues

as to who or what
it was modeled after.

-Pull up a chair.
-Great.

-And we’ll discuss
this guardian.
-Uh-huh.

So, you’ve taken this,

and clearly you’ve seen the face

and decided
to recreate the face.

-Absolutely.
-Okay.

And what did you come up with?

Well, the first step for me

is to just take a look
at the terrain.

I think, honestly, the whole
aerial view when you look at it,

there’s a whole storyboard
of information going on here.

But we’re focusing on this face
because this is very prominent.

So, you can tell

we’ve got a neck area
that’s rather extended.

Some feathers,

and then, also, this elongation

that’s forming
around this headdress.

TSOUKALOS:
Mm-hmm.

-All right, go on.
-From there, I created

a 3-D sculpture.

I’m starting
with just a normal-sized head.

So, I will overlay
the aerial view,

and I’m going to create layers.

And I’m actually just following
the terrain.

I’m creating this long neck,

and I’m creating
this elongated head.

And here we have it.
This is the sculpture.

Everything in 3-D is mirrored
on the other side,

-so as we turn this around...
-Right.

And this is what he would like
if that thing on the ground

-were a person.
-Absolutely.

TSOUKALOS:
Yeah, that’s pretty awesome.

MOORE:
You know, after the buildup
of the 3-D sculpture,

I made a digital piece
of artwork

that will flesh this entity out.

Mm-hmm.

TSOUKALOS:
That looks great.

You know,
I think it’s really cool

that you’ve kind of pointed out
the elongation of the skull.

This whole phenomenon

of elongated skulls
exists worldwide.

Not only do we have these shapes
in this geographic area,

but also, for example,
in South America,

in Peru, but also in Europe,

in the Hittite region,
present-day Turkey,

all with these long skulls.

NARRATOR:
Around the world,

ancient skulls have been found
that are thin,

long and misshapen.

In addition to the skulls,

there are many ancient
depictions of historical figures

with extra large,
elongated heads.

HENRY: What’s controversial
about the elongated skulls

is that their cranial capacity
is greater than a normal human.

So these may not be cases
of cranial deformation.

These could be examples

of a whole subspecies
of humanity.

TSOUKALOS:
Worldwide, we have these people

in depictions
wearing these long headdresses,

and sometimes
you even see pictures,

especially in ancient Egypt,

where you see the same figures
without the headdress,

and guess what?
They have elongated skulls.

So, you have to ask yourself,

why is there a, uh...

a figure coming out
of the terrain that has, to me,

seems like
an elongated shaped head.

TSOUKALOS:
The idea is

that Earth was visited
by extraterrestrials

a long time ago.

And one of my opinions is

that the elongated skull people
were the actual visitors,

and the skeletons
that are found today are some

of the few remnants

of the people that were here
a long time ago,

clearly people
that looked like us

except for that they had
an elongated skull.

So, that, to me, is fascinating.

Marcia, thank you so much
for sharing your work with me.

You’ve given me a lot
to think about, so thank you.

-Thank you.
-Appreciate it. All right,
take care. Bye-bye.

NARRATOR:
Does the three-dimensional
reconstruction

of the Badlands Guardian
point to the possibility

that it was not only built to be
seen by visitors from the sky,

but that it may even be
a representation

of an extraterrestrial?

Could this be the face
of the being

the Blackfoot people identify
as their creator god, Napi?

Perhaps the answers can be found

by examining
yet another geoglyph

that resembles a human face...

on Mars.

NARRATOR:
July 19, 1976.

A NASA spacecraft
named Viking 1 enters

into orbit above Mars.

Just six days later,

it takes a photograph
of the Red Planet

that is so extraordinary

it immediately seizes
the public imagination.

In the summer of 1976,

NASA announced that
they had found a face on Mars.

Now, NASA was the original group
of scientists

to label
the face on Mars a head--

it was actually in their file--

and they said that they had
found this formation on Mars

that looked like a face.

However, just a few days later,

they had
a second press conference,

and they said
that they had taken

a second image,
days later, and it--

they found that it was just
a trick of light and shadow

and there was nothing there.

NARRATOR:
Could it be that the image

of a giant face
on the Martian surface

is actually
an artificial structure,

a physical record that someone,

or something, has been there?

Perhaps a clue can be found
by comparing the Face on Mars

with the Badlands Guardian.

CARLOTTO:
So, the face
is about a mile wide

and about a mile
and two-thirds long.

The Face on Mars is larger
than the Badlands Guardian,

but the Badlands Guardian
is large enough

that you can still see it
in satellite imagery.

NARRATOR:
To determine if the face

was created by natural means,

imaging expert Mark Carlotto
conducted a scientific analysis

of the Martian structure.

All right, so,
in this overview,

we see the Face on Mars
in the middle.

One of the tests that was done

on the Face of Mars
was to assess

whether it was an artificial
or a natural object.

We applied a technique called
fractal, uh, analysis

to model
the background terrain locally.

We have a filter that basically
computes a little fractal model

as it moves over the image.

And we see,
if we go back and forth here

to the original image

and now the output
of the fractal model,

fractal filter, the face
has a very high response.

And this was a very, uh,

unexpected result,
uh, at the time.

And the fractal technique found

that it doesn’t
just look like a face

but it actually is,
statistically,

in terms of the structure,

different
from the surrounding landforms.

One criticism
of this formation is

that, in more recent images,

the impression of a face
is much less evident.

The structure appears
much more highly eroded.

But if it is an ancient feature,

you would expect erosion
would have taken its toll

over the course of time.

If we flip it back and forth,

there’s a very high degree
of correspondence

between the left
and the right side, making it

a highly bisymmetrical object.

Bisymmetry would imply
an artificial, uh, construction,

’cause nature would have
to conspire quite a bit

to create something that’s not
only face-like but bisymmetrical

and possessing all the detail
that the Face on Mars possesses.

The other interesting thing
about the Face on Mars

is that NASA has taken,
over the last 25, 30 years,

over 40 images
of the Face on Mars,

a formation that they say
they have no interest in.

NARRATOR:
If the Face on Mars is, in fact,

a fabricated structure,
who built it?

Does it have a connection
to the giant face

recently discovered in Canada

and perhaps other structures
around the globe

that were made to be seen
from the sky?

Curiously,

many who have examined
the Face on Mars have observed

that the area surrounding it
seems to point

to a connection
to one specific place on Earth,

Egypt.

HENRY:
Something extraordinary happened

when we started taking pictures
of the surface of Mars.

We saw what appeared to be
pyramids on the surface of Mars.

It’s mind-blowing,

because these match
the pyramids of ancient Egypt.

Is there a connection
between Mars and Egypt?

Well, indeed, there is.

The city of Cairo

was originally called
al-Qahirah, which meant

"City of Mars"
or "the Victorious."

The Egyptians referred
to the Sphinx

as Ra-Horakhty,

which means
"Place of the Horizon,"

which is the very same name
that they gave to Mars.

So there seems to be
a-a deep-embedded memory

in ancient Egypt of
a correspondence or a connection

between Egyptian civilization

and one
that might have been on Mars.

POPE:
If we are dealing with something

extraterrestrial in origin,

then the-the Egyptian connection

is very telling,

because many, many speculations

about the extraterrestrial links
with ancient Egypt.

NARRATOR:
But if there is a connection

between the Cydonia region
of Mars and ancient Egypt,

what is the significance?

Ancient astronaut theorists
suggest

further clues can be found

by taking a closer look
at the Badlands Guardian

and the famous ruler
it’s thought to depict.

CHILDRESS:
The Badlands Guardian

is very similar

to the statues of Akhenaten,

the renegade Egyptian pharaoh.

He and Nefertiti
and their children

all had elongated heads,

as we see all around the world

and is often associated
with extraterrestrials.

When you put an image of
the Egyptian pharaoh, Akhenaten,

beside the image
of the Badlands Guardian,

they’re virtually identical.

When you do the "A" to "B"
comparison,

they both have this long neck,
this very elongated face.

And Akhenaten, of course,

is the great mystic pharaoh
of ancient Egypt.

Ancient astronaut theorists
believe

that he might have
extraterrestrial connections.

Akhenaten claimed
that he was in contact

with a celestial disk
he referred to as the Aten.

In fact, he taught the Egyptians
to no longer worship

the whole pantheon
of over 360 deities

and to only worship the Aten.

And given the fact
that his mummy has disappeared

only adds to the mystery.

Is this, in fact,
a human being we’re looking at

or could this possibly be
a representation

of some other type of a being,

maybe an extraterrestrial, even?

NARRATOR:
If the Badlands Guardian

is a representation
not of a Native American

but of an extraterrestrial known
in Egypt as Akhenaten,

could it bring us closer
to solving a puzzle

whose pieces are scattered
all over the world

and even on other planets?

Ancient astronaut theorists
suggest

that a much more recent
discovery on Mars

provides yet another piece

that may finally complete
the puzzle.

NARRATOR:
Waterford, Virginia.

2017.

Cydonia Institute researcher
George Haas

is combing
through satellite images of Mars

when he spies
a discernible shape.

It appears to be
the image of another face.

Unlike the original
so-called Face on Mars

discovered in 1976,

this face appears in profile,

similar to that
of the Badlands Guardian.

HAAS:
So, in this area

called Utopia,

in a huge impact crater,

is the profile face

that has a beard, a mustache,

and he’s wearing a helmet
that has an avian headdress.

When the bearded profile on Mars

is compared
to the Badlands Guardian,

we see the same type of profile.

Both incorporate
avian iconography.

One has a headdress of feathers.

The other one
is wearing a headdress

that incorporates
an entire bird.

I think the culture
that produced these formations

on Mars had a direct
relationship to the human race.

NARRATOR:
Is an ancient story

being told through geoglyphs
that exist both on Earth

and on our closest
neighboring planet?

And, if so,

what happened to those
responsible for writing it?

CHILDRESS:
Perhaps civilization on Mars
was destroyed.

Or, perhaps,

civilization began on Mars

and then moved to Earth.

Earth was, in a sense, seeded
by a Martian civilization,

and that is why we have

similar structures on Mars
and on planet Earth.

COLLINS: So, with the discovery
of the Face on Mars,

is it possible

that it’s acting as a clue,

it’s telling us

that, somewhere here,
is evidence

of a lost civilization

that existed on the Red Planet

perhaps millions of years ago?

That’s a very tantalizing
possibility,

and it’s one that I know

that every scientist
going to Mars

wants to answer.

HAAS:
Maybe these geoglyphs

were all part
of some global memorial

that was built by some unknown
extraterrestrial culture

that, uh, has to do
with, uh, human origins

and is telling the story
of where we came from

and possibly where
we may be going.

HENRY: You have to ask,
is there something in common

between the people that
were making these geoglyphs,

and the answer is, is that
they all have similar stories

in these earthly civilizations.

They’re in contact
with star beings,

celestial beings
that came to Earth

and are assisting humanity.

They lived with us,
they interacted with us.

Then they left.

NARRATOR:
But is it possible

that not all of the
communications we’re receiving

from these otherworldly beings
are in the form of geoglyphs?

Could crop circles,
for instance,

be more recent examples

of a type
of extraterrestrial dialogue?

CARLOTTO: If you bring
crop circles into the mix,

there are some
very sophisticated crop circles

that also indicate, uh,
knowledge of fractal geometry.

There could be a message.

They might be communicating
with us,

and we might, perhaps,
want to communicate with them.

CHILDRESS:
It’s possible
that many of these geoglyphs,

much like crop circles
that appear every summer,

might give us clues to our past

and to our destiny.

TSOUKALOS:
The fact of the matter is

that we have geoglyphs
worldwide.

And with the improvement
of our technology,

who knows what else
we’ll discover

in the next five to ten years?

We are entering
a new era of discovery,

and I can’t wait to see
what tomorrow brings.

NARRATOR:
As we send more spacecrafts
to Mars,

will we continue
to uncover evidence

of an alien civilization

that could have lived there
centuries ago?

Ancient astronaut theorists
say yes

and believe
that the human race is getting

very close to the day
when it will unlock

what they believe
to be an alien code

and find a means
of direct communication,

a living link
between mankind’s past

and its extraterrestrial future.