‘Project Blue Book’: Inside the U.S. Government’s Top-Secret UFO Research
The X-Files revival may have flamed out after two less-than-vital seasons (the show’s tenth and eleventh), but genre fans won’t have to wait long to satiate their hunger for paranoid out-of-this-world mysteries. That’s because on Jan. 8, the History Channel premieres Project Blue Book, a 10-episode series (executive-produced by Robert Zemeckis) that follows Chris Carter’s “The Truth is Out There” playbook while also indulging in some The Americans-style Cold War espionage—all via a premise that’s “based on real events.”
That disclaimer requires some context, since Project Blue Book is a fictional affair whose individual cases are inspired by Dr. J. Allen Hynek’s 1950s investigations into UFOs on behalf of the U.S. Air Force. Melding documented reports with a more fanciful interconnected-conspiracy storyline that’s the stuff of (likely) fiction, its focus is Hynek, a professor of astrophysics with a gift for inventing experimental technology and a dogged desire to prove things factually, here played by The Wire and Game of Thrones alum Aidan Gillen.
Enticed by the government’s offer to look into reports of flying saucers and other strange aerial phenomena, he’s paired with the younger, brasher Captain Michael Quinn (Michael Malarky), a pragmatist who most certainly doesn’t believe in the existence of little green men flying about in spaceships. And even if he did, Quinn is determined to debunk claims about such sightings and close cases as quickly as possible, per the orders of his superiors, General James Harding (Neal McDonough) and General Hugh Valentine (Michael Harney).