"The Mission" asks why extraterrestrials might have visited ancient Earth, proposing resource extraction as a primary motive—much like modern plans to mine the moon for helium-3. The episode highlights Sumerian clay tablets discovered in 19th-century Nineveh, which ancient astronaut theorists interpret as describing the Anunnaki, an alien race that supposedly came to Earth to mine gold. Author Zecharia Sitchin popularized this reading of Sumerian texts, though the episode also points to Egyptian depictions of hybrid creatures, crop circles, and crystal skulls as potential evidence of extraterrestrial experimentation, exploration, or conquest across multiple ancient cultures.
Mainstream scholars read these same Sumerian tablets very differently: the Anunnaki appear in Mesopotamian mythology as deities, not visitors from space, and the creation narratives reflect religious cosmology rather than historical encounters. Archaeologists attribute Sumerian advances—城grid cities, cuneiform writing, irrigation—to human ingenuity developing over centuries in the fertile region between the Tigris and Euphrates. Still, the episode raises a genuinely thought-provoking question: if humanity would mine other worlds for resources (as the helium-3 example suggests), why assume we're the first civilization capable of such ventures? That parallel between our space ambitions and the possibility of ancient resource extraction offers an intriguing lens, even if the interpretation of ancient texts remains the sticking point between ancient astronaut theorists and academic consensus.
Alamosa, Colorado (Snippy the horse mutilation site)
United States · Modern
UFO investigators and ancient astronaut theorists cite the 1967 mutilation of a horse named Snippy near Alamosa as early physical evidence of alien genetic harvesting operations, noting the surgical precision of the excisions, removal of organs and spinal fluid, and a formaldehyde-like odor. Conventional explanations include predation and natural decomposition, though law enforcement officers quoted in the episode reportedly ruled out predators, disease, and satanic cults.
Ancient gold mines of South Africa
South Africa · Hypothetical Extraterrestrial
Theorists claim that ancient gold mines in South Africa, some dating back 150,000 years, were operated by extraterrestrials using genetically engineered human slaves, consistent with Zulu legends of 'visitors from the stars' who came to excavate gold. Mainstream scientists acknowledge the mines' antiquity but attribute them to early human activity.
Ancient Sumerian ruins of Nineveh (clay tablet discoveries)
Iraq · Ancient Near Eastern
Theorists argue the Sumerian cuneiform tablets describe the Anunnaki, an alien race that came to Earth to mine gold and genetically engineered humans as a slave species called the Adamu. Mainstream archaeologists regard the tablets as mythological and religious texts belonging to one of the earliest known writing systems, with stories that parallel later Judeo-Christian narratives.
Easter Island / Rapa Nui
Chile · Polynesian (Rapa Nui)
Moai statues moved through anti-gravity or levitation technology
Great Pyramid of Cholula
Mexico · Aztec
Ancient astronaut theorists note that the Aztecs themselves did not believe the pyramid was built by ordinary humans but by a giant being associated with the planet Venus, suggesting an extraterrestrial or superhuman builder, and point to shared astronomical knowledge between the Aztecs and Egyptians despite being half a world apart. Mainstream archaeologists attribute the pyramid's construction to the Olmecs beginning around the third century BC, with subsequent additions by the Toltecs and Aztecs.
Lake Titicaca
Peru / Bolivia · Tiwanaku / Inca
Submerged temple ruins discovered beneath the lake
Teotihuacan
Mexico · Teotihuacan
Name means 'The place where men become gods' — literal alien ascension site
Tiwanaku / Tiahuanaco
Bolivia · Tiwanaku
Gateway of the Sun depicts a god holding alien technology