Season 10's premiere episode argues that advanced civilizations may have inhabited Earth thousands of years before mainstream timelines suggest, pointing to megalithic monuments, unexplained underground structures, and anomalous artifacts as potential evidence. While the episode description references enormous manmade caves and underwater discoveries, the transcript focuses extensively on crop circles as possible extraterrestrial communication. Ancient astronaut theorist Giorgio Tsoukalos interprets these formations as "messages from elsewhere...of extraterrestrial origin," while investigative reporter Linda Moulton Howe highlights cases like the 2015 Turin, Italy formation that appeared near an airport without detection. The episode notes over 10,000 crop formations have been documented across 50 countries since the 1960s, with researchers emphasizing the absence of footprints or broken stalks in many cases and the sudden explosion of complex designs worldwide after 1990.
The mainstream explanation centers on the 1991 confession by Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, two English retirees who demonstrated how they created crop circles using simple boards and strings, effectively claiming responsibility for sparking the phenomenon. Conventional researchers attribute the vast majority of formations to human hoaxers using increasingly sophisticated techniques. For curious viewers, the episode offers compelling questions about specific cases like the 1966 Tully, Australia event—where a farmer reportedly witnessed a disk-shaped craft before discovering a circular impression—and formations appearing in high-security areas without apparent human access. The tension between documented hoaxes and genuinely puzzling cases provides the central intrigue.
Arecibo Observatory
United States (Puerto Rico) · Modern
The episode presents the 1974 Arecibo transmission of binary-encoded information about Earth into deep space as the initiating event to which the Chilbolton crop formation was allegedly a reply, framing the observatory as the origin point of humanity's first deliberate attempt at extraterrestrial communication. Mainstream history records this as a symbolic demonstration of radio telescope capability rather than a genuine attempt to contact a specific civilization.
Çatalhöyük
Turkey · Neolithic Anatolian
One of the world's first cities (c. 7500 BC) with no streets — houses entered through rooftop holes like alien craft hatches
Gobekli Tepe
Turkey · Pre-Pottery Neolithic
Built 12,000 years ago — 6,500 years before Stonehenge, 5,000 years before the first known civilization
Jericho
Palestinian Territories · Neolithic / Canaanite
One of the world's oldest cities — settled c. 9000 BC, suggesting alien-assisted civilization jump
Nabta Playa
Egypt · Prehistoric Nubian
Stone circle predates Stonehenge by 1,000 years
Staffordshire crop circle sites
United Kingdom · Modern
Theorists cite 17th-century accounts by scientist Dr. Robert Plot of crop circles appearing on his land in Staffordshire as evidence that the phenomenon predates any modern hoaxer activity. These historical records, including drawn diagrams, are presented as proof of a long-standing and potentially non-human phenomenon.
Tully, Queensland crop circle site
Australia · Modern
Theorists point to the 1966 Tully incident as one of the earliest documented crop circle events, where a farmer reportedly witnessed a disk-shaped craft rising from marshy ground and leaving a circular impression. The account is treated as foundational evidence for a non-human origin of the phenomenon.
“In the Dead Sea Scrolls”