Project Blue Book

Season One and Two DVD boxset review written from France, so do apologize any typo.To everyone:If you are interested by the UFO subject, UFO investigations and its history, this TV show is a must have seen!Produced by Robert Zemeckis, David O'Leary and Sean Jablonski, Project Blue book depicts the work of Josef Allen Hynek for the US Air Force in the idea to explain the unexplainable about the UFO sightings.Even if the story of Dr. Hynek has been heavily modified for mysterious reasons unknown to me, this TV series remains nevertheless particularly interesting and enjoyable.Aidan Gillen plays Dr J. Allen Hynek, the smart guy! A university professor skeptical about UFOs, he changes his mind when he sees more and more cases, some he can explain from natural phenomenon or even hoax, some he cover up because he has to follow orders coming from the top. Aidan Gillen is really good, the only minor reproach that one can make is that it does not carry the famous goatee of Dr. Hynek! But otherwise that's a real pleasure to watch him.Michael Malarkey plays Captain Michael Quinn, the tough guy! He is the US Air Force officer that needs to close all the opened cases, with the help of Dr. Hynek when he joins him! This British/American actor perfectly personifies this officer. Sometimes solid as a rock, sometimes more vulnerable when he fell in love with a girl.If the two leading casts are men, please do not forget the girls!Laura Mennell as Mimi Hynek, the sweet lady! She stays at home but do much more things than we can expected about a wife at home at this time! She has a true pro-active position, and finally helping her husband for discovering the truth about the UFO, and who is behind some cases.Ksenia Solo as Susie Miller, the tough lady! She plays several characters because she is just not exactly as we could think about her in the first place. She adds to the already complex storyline a wider aspect of the Cold war and true paranoia at its paramount in these times. People built fallout shelters in their gardens!Then you have the bad guys, and they are really so good to be so bad!Michael Harney as General Hugh Valentine, a top officer that wants no trouble and keep the situation under control at any cost. As usual with this fine actor, he plays so well that's a real pleasure to see him on screen.Neal McDonough as General James Harding, another top officer that also wants no trouble but do the job, go on the field, clean up and/or cover up any situations, including the Roswell incident in the first and second places. Neal McDonough really seems to enjoy playing this military role who behaves above all others including the Secretary of Defense, taking no orders just giving them!All episodes are really interesting. The production is very good. Acting is at its best. Visual special effects are very good for a TV show and by some aspects could be frankly a motion picture. The editing is super fluid, not too fast, not too slow, a real pleasure. For instance, you are in a Washington hotel room with Dr. Hynek and Captain Quinn, then the camera pans quickly and we are in a cab, no dead time.So sorry to learn that the so desired third season will not be produced thanks to the intelligence of the History channel that cancelled this fine TV show!I only hope another TV channel, Amazon or Netflix, will have the good idea to produce the third season.To Marta in person who complains about picture quality of the DVD:May I suggest to you to change your computer graphic card or update the drivers of your current graphic card or buy a DVD/Bluray player connected directly to your televsion!I post today several captures of the 1080p video as sent to my Sony 4K 3D QLED 65" from this DVD, and as you can see the picture is as clear as possible from a 480p source without any visual artefacts.The source is great for a DVD!But I recognize the total lack of bonuses, which I miss immensely!

If you're a nit-picker about detail accuracy, then don't bother. But if you've been waiting for decades (like I have) for the real story that reflects what happened - just after Roswell - then you will certainly enjoy this.Of course there is some disinformation, but each episode is "based on actual events." Likewise the series employs some Hollywood-style story filler, but the cinematography should have won awards. Nothing I've ever seen produced to date details what our military was faced with when confronted with a massive increase of UFO sightings at the volatile beginning of the Cold War. It became increasingly clear that the skies above many of our most sensitive military facilities were suddenly, and boldly, being penetrated with craft doing impossible things.The very fact that all of this was allowed to be shown on mainstream television underscores the surprising changes that many feel will eventually lead to official Disclosure that we are - in fact - not alone.So it is understandable, given its highly sensitive nature, that the details (names, location of events, etc) have been purposely altered so that it can't be considered a documentary. Top military officials dealing with the phenomenon mention "controlling the narrative" from the get-go, so that the “public can sleep better at night."There are a lot of details that will get lost on you if you aren't schooled in this arcane subject - like younger-aged kids watching Family Guy, where incredibly-disgusting (but hilarious) sexual inferences are casually tossed back & forth on prime time television - just beyond the grasp (thank God!) of those not quite acquainted with puberty and the sudden interest of sex that comes along with that.I already knew that one of the reasons the military ordered our pilots to stop shooting at UFO's was that in many cases the shells we tried to unleash on them during a chase were re-directed exactly 180 degrees and right back INTO the very gun barrels from which they originated! In other words we were shooting down our own planes with bullets from our very own guns! This you will see in detail in the very first episode, where Hynek inspects the damage to the wings directly behind each gun mount. Watch carefully when they "replay" the event. You will hear the rat-a-tat-tat of bullets (not some sort of beam) as they hit the plane. Notice the jagged edges where they impacted - not molten metal from high powered laser beams. They give no explanation, but this will not be lost on many who have studied the history of UFO’s well, as I have.When I saw this, I understood immediately that this was the story I'd been waiting for. Finally! And that hidden in plain sight were a lot of answers - IF you knew the questions! I've found numerous other examples of this, throughout both Seasons 1 & 2, that mean a lot to people who study the phenomenon. So, get busy and watch this. Some of you will detect the disinformation and inaccurate details - which, to me, don't make a bit of difference. I know where to look and have found the details. I just want people to understand that it is about the STORY this time and NOT the details. This is the first time that people watching mainstream television can peer behind the dark cloak of how our government HAD to respond to these events so that the public would not be so alarmed to the point of panic. What happened at Roswell is the subject of much speculation, and fueled the cover-up that has been on-going ever since. Not until the US Navy recently declassified 3 gun camera videos showing (and admitting to) UFO's, has the public been shown at least the possibility that high strangeness is ever-present in our skies.The rarity of the official declaration of "UFO" was because anyone who claimed such - especially the government military - that it was dismissed with extreme prejudice: through denial & ridicule - and sometimes things even worse. And until recently, no one watching television would ever see what actually happened and how the most power military on Earth could do little about it. Trust me: we DO sleep better at night because of non-disclosure. This world is FAR from ready for the real truth. We are babes - and sloooowly need to become acclimated to the unthinkable terrors - and soul-opening, jaw-dropping and incredible wonders of what has been here - possibly longer the we, ourselves!

not such a good buy

Excellent recreation of the Fifties visits by UFOs (or were they) to a mostly rural America. For those of us who lived those times this feels spot-on, with creepy landings, crazy theories to cover up the real deal, recreations of Air Force bases, Roswell, on and on. We binged this.

The series is loosely based on the actual character of Dr. J. Allen Hynek and the actual government program of the same name. Hynek is played by Aiden Gillen, of Game of Thrones prominence. The rest of the cast are not household names, but the acting, directing, writing, cinematography and effects are grade-A. The series gets a bit uneven in the second season, probably the producers and crew sensed the axe coming.The series gives a good sense of the fraught relationship between the US military and scientists in the early days of the UFO phenomenon. Spiced up with a steamy subplot of a red-hot Russian spy, living in deep cover next door to Hynek! Highly recommended. (And once you see it, you might get interested in the excellent book "UFO: The Inside Story of the US Governments Search for Alien Life Here -- And Out There" by Garrett Graff.)

Although I watched this show on the History channel, I had to pick up the BR when I saw it was available.If you love shows about UFOs, spies or the fifties, you'll love this show. Sure, maybe it's not as good as "The X-Files". And, sure, it plays fast and loose with the life of the real Dr. Hynek. But, it's a TV show, if you want the real history, read a book.I knocked off a star because all ten episodes are on one disk. The image is still great. But there are no extras. And no 5.1 mix. Also, the bits detail the real cases that appeared during the closing credits are nowhere to be found on these versions.