Hello, and welcome to the Rojas Report, our special interviewers, exclusive content
just for our subscribers, and hopefully we'll have We've got a couple of people
joining live, but hopefully we'll have a few. I did put this together
kind of last minute, but we've got a great show here. We've got
Anthony Lepey and am I saying that correctly? You nailed it. I think
I asked you that last time too. But you are the showrunner and executive
producer for Unidentified and congratulations on launching the second season. Thank you, thank
you. It was not easy getting that on the air in the time of
COVID, I'll tell you that. Oh right, And from what I understand,
you had to even make the season a little shorter. Yeah, unfortunately
we had. We were planning on two more episodes, but it just we
had all a bunch of shoots set up for March that we had to shut
down, and we decided not to try to, you know, stretch material
or you know, kind of make something out of nothing. So we fortunately
the network was was okay with us just delivering the eight mm hmm. Well
I want to get into to begin with. I was able to interview Chris
Mellen, which was great. I saw that. That was really interesting.
Yeah, thank you. I was really excited to be able to do that.
I over all these years, I haven't been able to talk to him
personally. Oh oh, Brittain interview. So that was my first one,
and I kind of froze up a bit because I finished my questions and I
was like, uh, and I had I could have asked so much more,
but oh well, I was able to get though a good story out
of it. For Den of Geek regarding how much Unidentified the television show was
able to help with getting the Senate Intelligence Committee to ask for these UFO reports
from military agencies, and he said quite a bit. I mean, is
that surprising to you? No, but it's it's not surprising because you know,
I've been I've been on the inside of it for the last two years.
I've never been involved in something like this though, where I'm both following
a group of people who are investigating something and then actually the product of you
know, what I captured also had an effect on the stories. You know
what I mean. It's kind of a circular, kind of meta, weird
thing that you know, I've never done a show like that that's had such
a tangible effect on both public opinion and you know, actual things on Capitol
Hill and in Pentagon. It's so it's it's surreal, honestly actually to tell
you the truth, because I saw it happening. You know, Chris had
been working on this, you know, behind this scene stuff for years,
going back to the first season. You see a little bit of that happening
in the first season. You know, there's a whole process by which we
interviewed Lieutenant Ryan Graves. Right, We took a video of that. We
did about a ten minute piece of that interview, and Alizondo showed that to
Melon in Washington, DC. And then he actually took a tablet with that
video on it and met with members of Congress and showed that And so that's
all. People might not remember that. It's a short scene in season one,
but so yeah, our invest our show has been has been part of
this whole ongoing story in a very interesting way. Right, I mean,
as an investigative journalist, which is your background, you've covered a lot of
Typically, you know, as investigative journalists, you cover topics that you feel
need some more attention. And what has happened here is kind of the ultimate
goal, which is to really make some change. And it's it's kind of
odd that, you know, UFOs is the thing that you're you're exactly you
would have told me five years ago this was going to be the show that
sort of had the most kind of effect on both public opinion and actual lawmakers.
I would have I said, you were crazy. But but that's what's
been so exciting about it. It's just such a it's such an amazingly fascinating,
endless mystery, and it just keeps getting more interesting. Honestly by the
week. It blows my mind everything that's that happens every almost every week now
on this ongoing story. It's really a live story. Right. So yesterday,
I think Marco Rubio made some comments or the day before about and he
didn't back down. He was like, yeah, this is a big deal,
you know, yeah, and it's been going on for years, you
know, basically confirming exactly what you know Alessander and Mellen Ben saying, I
mean, it's the other really fascinating part about this story, right as an
investigative journalist is you know, I have these characters who you know, they
really do have one foot in the government, right, they have clearances,
They are actively meeting with these people who are making these decisions. So and
they are still very serious about their non disclosure agreements and they're in maintaining their
clearances. So you know, they can't say everything they know, right,
and they can't even allude to the things that they've actually seen in a lot
of ways. So it's a very interesting story because they are not you know,
I always say to people, you have to remember, these guys are
not whistleblowers. They consider themselves sort of still performing the duties that they were
when they were in the government. They just, you know, couldn't they
hit a wall inside while they were in government and now are kind of you
know, coming out from the outside. But they are still very much and
you can read that you know, both ways, right you can. I
think it still is a very legitimate question to ask, and I don't I
take no offense. And we explore this question as well as we did in
the first season, asking the hard question of well, can what they say
be trusted? Are they still acting as intelligence officers? That is a completely
valid question to ask, and you'll see in season two we asked that question,
just in the same way we asked in season one, because I think
it's it's irresponsible, not that, uh, to ask that question journalistic.
I have my own opinions, but I don't I don't those are you know,
they don't count really, you know. I we try, we're trying
to, you know, be as transparent and journalistically sound as you can.
But I do think those are legitimate. But I don't think I don't think
it's disingenuous to ask those questions. But I think you can. You can
look at what these guys have said and how they act, and people can
judge for themselves. And and this, I think, the whole cycle of
Pentagon statements and revisions and it's just fascinating. I still don't really understand what's
going on there. But remember in season one, this is what's interesting,
and people there's like parts of season one that I feel like people don't remember.
Uh maybe they have. They're in the in you know, in the
last episode, but and they are short scenes. But remember in season one,
Elizondo says there's an ongoing effort that's and he meets with two guys and
a third guy. If you remember in a hotel that we got from a
distance and we hid their identities. But you know, he called it and
said that there was an ongoing effort, didn't and I you know, we
we were able to check that out and it appeared to be legitimate. That's
why we reported it. You know, I know some of the names of
those individuals. I was able to see some correspondence and things that proved to
me that that seemed appeared to be true, and that's why we included in
the show. So actually that you know, that's actually not new. We
we somewhat broke that story in season one. So the fact that now with
the Senate Intelligence Committee calling for this multi agency task force and and you know,
revealing that there is an ongoing effort, it's something that actually, you
know, we taught Alessandro has been consistently saying, you know, so that's
just it's fascinating. But I'm not saying I'm not trying to say take credit,
but it isn't there. These are elements that these guys have basically been
working on ever since we were left, you know, in twenty seventeen.
I think you can take credit because I mean, you're doing investigative journalism with
the show and what's interesting and I'm interested to hear what this experience was like.
During the first season, I things such as Alessando's saying, this is
an ongoing project, you know, the a hip and its affiliation or what
it was purpose to do and his affiliation with it, all of these were
in question. I mean, everything's pretty much been resolved and it's come out
that your show was accurate. Alessando was accurate. It's only even recent,
you know, just before the second season aired that the d admitted, essentially
right before the Senate request was revealed, that this was an ongoing effort with
a task force and multiple agencies involved, just like you reflected in the show,
Like you said, was were you nervous about kind of these what was
coming out with the D O D and everybody kind of Oh definitely, I
mean you might want to step into your mic a little bit more. On
one hundred people are noting that. Yeah, you're a little low for me
too. Thank you Stacy for pointing that out. Yeah. No, I
mean that was, like, you know, from as a producer and a
journalist, when that what's her name, Susan grow statement came out, that
was like I was like, what, Yeah, that was pretty that was
a shock to the system, and uh, you know, it's still confusing
exactly what's going on there. I mean, Lous explained, I mean I
don't think he really fully understands what what the you know, what was actually
going on behind the scenes there. That is some you know, byzantine deep
state stuff that you know. Obviously I'm not privy too, and I'm not
even sure he understands at this point what the game that was being played there
or whether it was a game, whether it was just you know, people
not being in the need to know, you know, so, but it
was, yeah, it was definitely you know, we were just gearing up
to start the new season and it was just like, what that's a twist.
How do we incorporate that? So we just kind of took a wait
and see and let let it play out. And you know, we try,
as you see in the show, we try not we don't go too
much because in some ways this is a popular show, right, it's a
show for a mass audience, So it's not about the Louelsondo story and his
trials and tribulations. So we just we kind of work took it as a
wait and see situation and then saw you know, as the succeeding statements came
out, it kind of you know, resolved itself, at least to somebody.
I mean, there's still lots of mystery and murkiness. I mean,
if you're an investigative reporter, you know, people like Greenwald and McMillan and
m J. Bannis in particular, those guys have been doing some great reporting
all around this that has definitely informed us, but that that wasn't the focus,
like what a tip. You know, our show is not about a
tip and what a tip was and what Bass was and what Bigelow did and
those are all fascinating stories, but that's the network, you know, fundamentally
want to focus on, you know, what happened in the past. They
wanted to focus you know, being a popular show for a mass audience,
they really wanted to focus on stories, on engaging evidence and stories. And
that's what we did and that's what we do. Know kind of segue to
talk about this season, you know, I think that's the exciting part about
this season is there's just as you saw in episode one, there are four
news stories. Every episode has three to four, sometimes five. Never before
heard stories. So it's just I think it's the entertainment value of this season.
We were able to really up the production value, which I'm very proud
of from the producer's point of view. But it's just fascinating. You're just
gonna we spent a lot of time vetting those stories. You know, these
most of these stories came from people emailing us. You know, we had
to call it action at the end of the episodes last year. Some of
them came through connections to Alesondo and other people contacting TPSA and some of our
other sources, but that majority of the cases came through this email system that
I spent most of last summer reading through these emails and then vet and then
sort of wittle the people down and then vetting them and talking to them,
and you know, sometimes people didn't want to talk and we got them to
talk. Sometimes you'll see some people wanted to remain anonymous. So but it's
fascinating. I mean, the trove of stories that came in were absolutely amazing,
and we really try to focus on a diverse range of kinds of stories,
of locations of different branches. We have people who have intelligence, we
have an army we have Navy, Air Force, you know, we have
everyone involved. And but anyway, that's that's the most exciting thing that I
hope viewers appreciate and are entertained by, because you know, this is a
TV show. We're trying to make something entertaining. What I think was exciting
too, hopefully and let me know if people can hopefully hear me better if
there's still an audio level. But another thing exciting part of this that Chris
Mellan had talked about along the lines of just what you were saying, is
that these cases that you're now presenting are actually part of this strategy to get
information out of the government in that some of these cases that you're covering demonstrate
there were investigations done by these different agencies that should be coming out in these
reports that the Senate has asked about. In particular, he talked about a
nor AD case that will be coming up. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
no. Some of them were yeah, very high level, you know
NORRAD command and stories of you know, i'd never heard the light of day.
Some of them are like if you saw in the first episode where you
have instances after action reports being you know, issued or film being confiscated and
classified and you know, we've tried in vain to do floyas on some of
those. And yeah, I mean most of these cases included some sort of
action after action report, in particular the the you know, the ones involving
pilots. There's a very interesting case coming up that launched a larger Dad investigation
that will be in a later episode that we you know, we haven't been
able to find out much about as well. There's a lot of things that
we've a lot of stories that we've you know, just kind of this show
in some ways is like the tip of the iceberg. We're getting the first
hand accounts and like like a lot of these UFO stories, right, it
just takes years, right for the multi layered pieces of information to kind of
leak out and other people to come forward, Right, So this is almost
like a new wave of witnesses that hopefully will spur further investigations. Mm hmm.
Now you talked about the second season being kind of I think you called
it more professional, which I I think it's I agree. I love that
the first episode, I think it feels kind of like you've got your own
thing. Now, you've got your own professional, credible way in which to
demonstrate, to show this information and interview these guys and have your own space
to present it. That's unique, it's edgy, it's professional. So it's
really exciting going forward. And I've heard a lot of great feedback as the
feedbacks been pretty good on your end. Thanks, Yeah, I mean I
think, I mean, I think the first season was professional. Is just
the production value and that we you know, really tried to bring these sightings
alive with you know, as you see the dramatic recreations where we were using
a lot of real military hardware to shoot with, which was really fun just
as a director. And then we have a lot more visual effects where we're
taking their accounts and we were really working with these guys to like tell us,
you know, how big, where was it? What did it look
like? So we worked very hard to try to really illustrate, uh,
visually what they were talking about, you know, and terms both everything down
to the size, the shape, the way the lights moved in some cases,
you know, the way they described the noises it made. The I'll
give you a hint actually about tonight's episode is really cool. It's one of
my favorite. It's really that it's and it's very app that you You've got
to talk to Chris Mellan this week because, uh, tonight's episode is really
his mission. M hm. He is on a mission to investigate the great,
you know, giant Triangle mystery, which is something that is it's like
kind of his personal I don't know if a lot of people know, but
he's personally fascinated by trying. I didn't know that that's interesting. Yes,
so we and we have two never before heard stories from incredibly incredible witnesses from
the Gulf War era, in the Gulf War feeding and that. You know,
what's so interesting about the triangle mystery is it's clearly connected. You know,
some people are clearly seeing some sort of military craft, right, there's
definitely enough evidence, you know, in terms of where they're seeing things and
what the craft we're doing. But then there's just so many other accounts that
don't add up to anyway. It's fascinating. I think people are really there's
a lot of story. We have a lot. We have a new witness.
He goes to Utah and meets with a former intelligence officer who just had
a very recent incident. Even have some photos of it, But it's what's
exciting about tonight's episode. And I think the other thing that I'm excited about
this season is even though this show is not about Melon and Alessandro, right,
it's not a biography of them, we really try to focus on the
witness stories and and you know what they're seeing and try to examine that you
do. As you watch this season, you will get to know these guys
a lot better, and you'll start to hear them speaking in ways that they
didn't speak in the first season. So tonight is a great example. I'm
not going to give too much away, but tonight is a very good example
of you're going to hear Chris Mellan speak in ways that I don't think anyone
got held him speak. Wow, that's interesting. I'm want to interview David
Marler next week. Is a good friend of mine, one of my favorite
researchers. I don't help you in the episode, Yes, he figures prominently.
Melon goes and meets with him and they have a fascinating conversation. He's
just He's got one of the most incredible tropes of research I think I've ever
seen on any topic. Fascinating guy, really smart, guy and was incredibly
generous with his time and his research, and it's a great meeting of the
mind. You'll see they had a really so it's a really interesting it's really
exciting to hear also that you have a new triangle cases because of course Dave
David follows him closely, and anybody who follows him, you know, knows
a lot about the big cases. So and that's one other thing that's great
about the show is that you're presenting new cases that are credible military cases that
no one's ever heard before. Yeah. Yeah, this one is technically a
civilian, but he's he's former military intelligence. So even even in our civilian
cases. We have another instance like that in another hot spot, uh where
we go to North Carolina, you know, where there's been a lot of
sightings, and we have a former marine, a very high level well not
high level, but a real badass marine commando ricon guy who had a siding
off the Carolina coast that just you know, he just cannot explain and I
didn't terrify him. He was pretty freaked out. Yeah, And you know,
and this is a guy who was a marine reconnaissance you know, going
behind front lines. You know, up in the mountains Afghanistan. Kind of
a dude, so not easily scared guy. The other thing that I'm really
excited about is the we have a whole episode with Never for Her. Civilian
UH airline pilots include active, active pilots and some recently retired guys, very
very experienced flying. You know, I think we don't mention the airlines,
but for to say, major legacy airlines in the United States and they have
that is just incredibly captivating because it really brings home these guys were super freaked
out. You know, there is they have two hundred souls right that they're
responsible for, and there's these things that they're seeing and in one case what
I think one of the most dramatic accounts that we have something that comes very
close to an air So I'm excited for the response to that episode as well.
I think people are going to be surprised because we've been so focused on
military kind of we switch it up and we've got these just really great guys
too. These you know, pilots are just you know, you got to
there's something about the bearing of a pilot. They're all you know, I
think they were all ex military, if not most of the guys, uh,
you know, and these guys take their jobs. These guys, you
know, every time they go to work, right, they have two hundred
people's lives in their moments, right, think about that responsibility. Right.
So this these were like serious life, life altering experiences for them that you
know, like the same way these military pilots that you know, they can't
shake. That's what it you you find in this season, you know,
Ah, there's a lot more there's a lot more emotional things that happened where
people are you know, really are like really kind of had had life changing
moments, whereas I think you know when you uh, you know, Commander
Favor and even Graves, those guys are fascinated, you know, and I
think it definitely kind of has changed their worldview a little bit. But they're
they're very you know, they're you know, there's they're cool cats, right,
Like Fraver it's just like I want to fly that thing, right,
I remember to me And Graves is just he's like a real intellectual. Actually
he's just kind of perplexed. But there's other people that you'll meet, you
know who you who, they really changes their world view and in an emotional
way. So I'm excited about that part of the storytelling. Ye just want
to He'll make those point of view. I'm really just the story. Yeah,
that's really interesting. Are there other I guess I was gonna say surprises,
but I guess revelations that you're really excited about this season? You know,
I don't want to give too much away, and I had off off
the you know, yeah, I think I think I'd rather just let it,
let it play out. I mean, there's a lot of things just
there's a lot of things that happened. You know, we go down to
South America, lots of interesting things happen down there with Blue and we meet
some very interesting people, and uh, you know, there's just yeah,
there's just a lot of stories. I don't and I think it's it's really
about building this big pattern, you know that when you watch it all together,
it's just like there's just the patterns that emerge are fascinating. That's Yeah.
One of the the most negative comment that I heard I have heard from
people is a repetition of the Knimics material. Yeah. I didn't really have
a problem with it, because I know you have to remind the audience,
and not all the audiences live with the UFO stuff or pay attention to it
as much as those like myself and those I've heard feedback from. It was
that something that people just saw in the first episode and won't see as much
going forward. Well, you know, here's the tricky thing. You know,
your audience is just a real subset, right, Yeah, you know
the nimics incident inside and out. Probably every single person listening right, like
me, knows that incident inside and out, But for the vast majority of
viewers, it's it's new information or its information they have only seen a headline
about. So yeah, I mean it was something that the network, you
know, we tried to I tried to streamline the storytelling more this season,
to to have a little less you know, there's definitely a style on the
History Channel that that tries to hold your hand a lot as you move through,
right. You know, I'm definitely come from more of a filmmaking you
know, just kind of let people, you know, put the two and
two together themselves. But there is something effective to it because it does it.
There is you know, some satisfying neuro connections that are made and you
help you know, you have to not everyone knows this stuff, you know,
and it can be confusing. So you can't just say like in two
thousand and four, right, right, have to say like in two thousand
and four in the US or pilots from the USS mimic, so I'll pick
back and it did this and this and this. You just unfortunately you have
to kind of yeah, there has to be a minimum amount of context when
you're trying to put it into the whole thing. So it's definitely something that
we really tinkered with, and it's tricky, you know. It's it's how
do you draw connections and create and talk about patterns without being repebited. That's
definitely it was a major kind of editorial conversation that we've got to put that
So, but I hope you know. What I think is cool about this
season is because there's so many new stories. We're constantly moving forward, you
know, and there's just new new information and new information and new information.
So you know, like that's what that's why it's that's in particular why the
network wanted to air tonight's episode as a second episode, because it's it's you
know, it's nothing to do with for the minutes. It's all about this
whole other as you know, universe of trying the sightings and theories and counter
theories, right, so that's its whole. It's like it's whole you know,
cottage industry. Mh. So yeah, but it's a good point.
It's a fair point, definitely. Well I get it though, because I
when I write articles or when I do my podcast or interviews, every time
a case comes up, I do my best to encapsulate the gist of that
case. So it's something I try to do and I know viewers and listeners
appreciate because, like you said, not everybody's up to speed, and a
lot of times we've got someone brand new, right, and so they need
that background. Another important point about this season, which is different from last
season, which made it a little trickier as a filmmaker, is they wanted
these episodes. Technically, this season is not a serialized so each episode needs
to they the direction we thought was each episode needs to stand on its own,
So they're just watching this on a replay later, you know, in
two thousand and one or something that you wouldn't have to have seen the second
episode the first episode for the second episode to make sense. So they're they're
more they're more self enclosed in that way. So, uh, that made
it a little different, that makes sense. Speaking of triangles, one of
the things that really strikes me about those, and I'm wondering if you have
the same sense when you began investigating it to prepare for the episode, is
that they're these sightings seem much more bold like off. In other sightings,
the objects are at a distance or they zip off very quickly, whereas with
triangle sightings, they're right above the road, they're right above the witness.
They hang out for a period of time, sometimes long periods of times before
they float off, sometimes lingerally, you know, slow, before they take
off very fast. That's what yeah, yeah, I mean, that's one
of the major points. Actually. The other interesting theme actually actually about this
season is there's there are more voices from TTSA are going to get involved.
So without getting too much away, and what they say in tonight's episode,
you're going to hear from some of the other players in TTSA and they're in
one of them speaks very much to that exact part of the phenomenon. What
the if this was a military craft, why is it lingering floating really low
over a house a civilian area, and why is that repeating account? That's
huge part of the story that is perplexing and fascinating. Speaking of you know,
these discussions, like we had this kind of analysis and discussion in the
first episode. One of the things that this show does well, also compared
to other reality television shows, is that it doesn't feel scripted, even though
obviously you have them positioned in a location that film's really good. But they're
like other shows, including sister shows on History Channel that I won't name,
you know, feel very very scripted. You could tell their they may be
even repeating something they already said, but it just feels scripted. You don't
really get that in Unidentified. How do you get around that? You know?
Thanks, I really appreciate that, because, well, first off,
I'm not a reality I've never done a reality show, so I wouldn't even
really know how to do it. But I also wanted to make sure it
never felt like we were doing it even though we weren't doing And sometimes I'll
be honest, it's hard because you know, Eleisondo in particular, is you
know he also he can be very formal sometimes in the way he speaks.
So we definitely, you know, just to you know, try to like
when they're having their discussions, really tried to just say, hey, guys,
just pretend like we're not here, like there's a that's actually when tonight's
episode has a really good example of that, where we get the team,
the larger team together to talk about the triangle phenomenon, and I think people
are going to be and we really are just you know, all we're saying
is triangles go. You know, we're not trying to say, okay,
can you set this up? And can you Yeah? I mean and also
these you can't tell Chris Melan or Lou Alesando what to say, right,
that's not something that you know, you're really able to do. These guys
don't take direction, you know. So, but thank you. I appreciate
it, because yeah, we really tried not to. You know, we
tried to make this show really as organic as as possible. Obviously there is
a you know, an artifice of of you know, for instance, I
don't think Lou would have been going to South America if we did not decide
to go there. But in going there, in organically a bunch of things
happen because of his connections to some of the military uh personnel them that is
completely organic. You know, that wasn't tried as we'll see. Uh.
So you know there's you know, it's still a television show. You know,
he's still going out and just you know, the resources we have,
they it wasn't you know, I don't know if they really have the resources
for for for us to be all the event. You know, we're sort
of you know, our production is able to go places. Let's say that
that they who wouldn't necessarily be able to go to it on a daily basis,
right, So that's also that you know, I think the benefit for
everyone is that we're able to you know, support this effort in a way
and to get more. I mean, really all what this show is all
about is just getting stories out there and finding credible stories and vetting them as
much as we can and letting people decide for themselves. And you know,
the other part of this season, which some some of your viewers and others
may get annoyed with, is we we even more so are you offering countervailing
theories and evidence? And I think last season we didn't have as many voices
that were offering countervailing technical explanations for things. It was, you know,
sometimes it was more like Chris, I mean, Lou and Steve Justice sort
of devil's advocating, you know, gaming it out right, whereas now we
have guys like Bill Scott, you know, who's a former Air Force test
engineer who had a lot of experience in black projects, who was an aviation
group editor for years, you know, people like that, and other even
and uh, people who are sort of skeptics, like Clark in the UK
I believe he was in episode one was so you know all about him,
right, He's definitely a skeptic. So we're really offering those voices as well
because I think it's important to hear those those voices, and because and then
also just from a storytelling point of view, it's you know, I enjoy
hearing these uh, these countervailing points. It makes it just more interesting,
you know. That's what That's what I think most not to critique other shows,
you know, but that's always kind of the problem with the UFO shows
in the past is they always are trying to you just can't really believe what
you're seeing because it's so clearly trying to push you in a particular direction,
right, Yeah, that's what I loved about the first episode. And and
it also, you know, you're putting out all the information, you have
experts who are all looking at that information, and then some of the things,
like David Clark, honestly, you know, some of his comments really
seem kind of out there. You know, they don't fit along the lines
of what some of the experts are saying. And they're more experts on some
subjects than he is. So I think it's really fair to really encapsulate the
information. And what's really interesting about the show too, is that the witnesses
also become experts because they are experts, they're pilots, h yeah, and
so they're input. You usually don't see that. Usually a witness is a
talking head as opposed to kind of jumping in and joining in on the analysis.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean that's what's so. I mean,
who knows more about what is flying in the air than you know,
these these guys. I mean, there's a there's guys who uh coming up
really fascinating story from a from the FAA contractor who has a really interesting uh
visual on craft from a very remote location. And but like, for instance,
his experience, I don't even know if we even talked about this in
the show, but like he had been trained as a anti ballistic missile uh
you know operator, so he was you know, well, what he's studying
the profiles of craft, right, like every single known aircraft. He has
to know the profile on the characteristic side. Right, These these people are
and that's fundamentally the DNA of our show, Right, we're finding these people
who have been I think we even when I think about it and I say
it's out loud, we probably underplay that. We probably should if we have
more time on these shows, really get into the amount of training and what
it goes into each of these you know, these people's roles and how much
they really understand aircraft and things like that, and how train how much training
goes into every one of their their you know, uh positions. Because I
think that then that's why I think that's why our show had the impact it
had and is having, because these people they're not you know, a military
person isn't necessarily a better person, right or more honest than anyone else's,
but they are trained in what is flying and what enemy looks like the want
of you know, in physics and things like that. I mean Ryan Braves,
you know, had a degree in aeronautical you know, physical aviation,
things like that. So these are these are really highly trained people. They
are as you said, they're experts, right, And it comes across in
that they speak the same language, you know, being in the military and
having that experience Chris Elizondo along with the military witnesses, uh and the engineer,
the aerospace engineer, uh, not just Steve Justice, but the other
guy who with from Air and Space magazine. I think he's from Uh.
They speak the same language, and so they kind of are typically on the
same page about things and explaining it similarly, which I think then adds to
you know, people backing up what they're saying as far as their expertise,
especially when they're kind of digesting and mulling over maybe things that David Clark is
saying. You know, they're putting their take on it. And so I
think that comes across said these guys, you know, they know what they're
talking about. Yeah. One of the interesting things that happened last season.
You got a hold of me and you said, there's something that's going to
happen in this episode that looks scripted, but it wasn't at all. And
I think it was the Guadaloupe Island Show, and I watched it and I
didn't see anything that felt scripted. And I don't know that I've asked you,
what was it that you felt might have come a crod scripted. I
don't think it did. I guess it was the scripted. He just like
basically to recap it so you know, people know what we're talking about.
In episode three, season one, we go down. You know, we
kind of followed the trail where Kevin Day, the radar operator and the Princeton
said the craft that we don't know necessarily if there were tic TACs or not,
but the craft, the multiple craft that he was tracking on the each
just radar, we're all flying in a particular direction and then would disappear off
their radar down near Wadalu Bay Island, which is a small island off the
Baja Coast, right outside of the the Navy's exercise area. So we decided,
just like, heck, let's go down. There's a really big risk
honestly from a production point of view, because it costs a lot of money
to charter. We chartered a whole big boat, right, And it's very
complicated to go to Guadalca Island because it's a nature preserve and you can't land
on the island and there's like a fishing collective there and it's it's a great
white shark breeding ground. So it was very complicated in shooting overseas, as
always complicated. Shooting in Mexico's complicated, right, So long story short,
we go down there and we hired a great local producer and he basically starts
just doing some pre research and starts talking to all these fishermen from the fishing
collective that basically splits their time you to have like some kind of small shacks
on Guadalupe and they're the only people that are allowed to kind of be there
other than the Mexican Navy. So we go down there and basically like ten
of these guys all start talking about seeing basically tictacked like craft and then seeing
flying up in and out of the water, going back like decades. And
then we find a spotter of a tuna spotter who flies a small plane who
had a sighting of a thing that sounds moved and it was so eerie the
way he described it zigzagging in the air, and then when he flashed his
lights at it, you know, which is like the kind of aviation thing
to say hello, right, it flew right at him past his nose,
which is exactly what Fraber said the tic Tac did at the end right of
their little interaction, it kind of zipped off the kind of, you know,
very kind of freaky way for them because it came so close and it
went so fast. So and then you and then we go to the island,
and not only we found more fishermen there on the island, but we
found this legendary great quite shark researcher who himself had a psych and that I
just I couldn't when they got back with that footage, I just was like,
I just couldn't believe it from you know, from I honestly, I'm
actually surprised more people that showed that episode, even actually it was our highest
graded episode actually, but it didn't get a lot of like people don't still
talk about it, you know what I mean. And I'm surprised that that's
not part of the narrative more. And I don't know whether people that they're
because they're discounting them because they were just kind of local fishermen and they weren't
experts. But honestly, people like local fishermen, like people like farmers and
fishermen who are out in nature and are like know the skies and conditions and
they know the difference between biolumin f and not. Right. Those are people
that are experts to in their environment. Right. So when they were telling
these stories, it was that blew my mind. Honestly, that was one
of the things that really started to push me in a direction of like,
Wow, this is good something that was unexplained. That's what I thought it
might be. And when I watched the show, I think even Stacy who's
in she runs the Arizona moufon or chapter, and I was watching with her
and other friends who do UFO research, so I think that we were all
like, yeah, that's what happens. But I asked a ram too,
just to kind of get a sense, and just like you said, which
is good, you know, nobody I didn't. Nobody had said, oh,
how did all those people witness it? Down there? Everybody would kind
of accepted it was like, wow, you know, they're having lots of
sightings down there. Yeah, Yeah, it's fascinating. Yeah, which is
really good, which is interesting. And of course Kevin Dayan has gotten together
a group and some scientists and they're going to go down there and do an
expedition. Is that actually happening. Are they going to get down I don't
know. I know that it's going to take a lot of money and I'm
not sure if they've raised it all, but they're planning on it, and
at least the last I've heard from Kevin days very positive about it happening.
That's good, mm hmm. Yeah. It's not easy to do anything these
days. It was definitely difficult to finish the show. As people will see.
We had to you know, kind of the last ten percent of the
show. We had to do with Spike and and do some things like that.
Ah, so ye'll see more of that. What about your colleagues,
I mean, being an investigative journalist, they probably especially with second season or
first season, where maybe uh, you know, oh this is interesting,
but I mean they really have to be shocked that, you know, what
you've done is is literally some of the cases you've talked about and shared with
the public or have now made it into you know, the Senate Intelligence Committee
and briefings to the senators. Yeah, I mean definitely. When I began,
before we went the first season went on the air, a lot of
my friends thought I'd gone crazy. We're like, what are you doing?
Are you sure do you want to do that? And I was like,
I don't know, man, I just I can't not follow this story.
It's so interesting. You know, if I just got to I got to
stick to my guns. I got to do it the right way. But
how could you turn away from having access, you know, a front seat
to this narrative and being able to roll around with Chris and Lou for the
last two years has been you know, how could you not from a journalistic
point of view, you know, I would be crazy. So I think
a lot of people, definitely, a lot of my friends were like,
oh, okay, now I see why are you so interested in this out
it? Because it seems a lot bigger than uh, you know that they
thought, mm hmmm. So a couple of comments real quick from that are
in here Acupunk is saying, and I'm not sure necessarily what he's asking,
but maybe you'll get super cuts of foreign surveillance teams chasing Lou and Chris.
Question mark, So I think, yes, I think I might have given
given a little tip away on another podcast that I did, But there is
there. We do have a instance where we're being trailed by some very seems
to be clearly foreign intelligence. Interesting, but of course, when you have
someone of Chris and Lou's stature, given their backgrounds, they probably get that.
Yeah, exactly, this this was This was interesting in the context because
I'll give you a hint. Okay, they were appeared to be intelligence officer
or agents of some sort or security agents. That's some sort of agents of
a foreign government, but not of the country we were in. Oh wow,
that's very strange. Yes, Oh, I can't wait for that.
How long are we gonna have to wait for that? Is that late in
the season. I got to look up one episode, the fourth episode.
Oh cool, so we don't have to wait too long. Awesome. So
another comment, the Unidentified series has legitimized the subject where other shows just couldn't
do that. It has made a huge difference to both seasoned upologists and the
newbies out there. Great job, and this is from Stacy, my friend
at Phoenix. Thank you and then nice to finally have reliable sources. And
I think that that is something that people don't get and when it comes to
journalism is the importance of expertise these and credible sources. And I think a
lot of people in this community, the UFO research community don't always get that
either, But it seems to be something that is definitely should be for every
journalist, but it's something certainly paramount to you producing the show. Yeah,
yeah, I think so. I mean, I think and that's why these
military people are so interesting because they really do even if they're not in the
service anymore, they really have a lot to lose because of the straight laceness
of the military. So their reputations and their names are really, you know,
paramount in the legacy of their careers. So for them to come out
and be an outlier and talk about something that's kind of weird and cooky in
military culture is just you really have to that has to come into play when
you look at their credibility that they're willing to come out and say this stuff.
That's the big theme right at this season as you see all these guys,
you're telling stories that they've held some of them thirty forty years, some
of them with much more recent but these are all stories that they haven't told
anyone publicly, and we're a lot of them were very nervous, you'll see.
That's why we try to show some of the stuff where you see guys
that are kind of behind the scenes when they come in and sit down and
you know, this is like some of them are pretty freaked out about their
ramipications. I'm still in touch with a lot all they're all emailing me,
you know, like when is it going to air? I went to wait
till, you know, to know when I should turn off my phone because
I'm going to get you know, basic az by my whole you know unit.
So they're they're they're nervous, they're very Some of these guys are very
nervous about the show, their participation in the show, and what how they're
colleagues. You know, it's going to come out of the blue, like
look, there's you know, sergeant whatever or lieutenant or leaving lieutenant command or
whatever, uh saying something and then they're going to get blasted. And so
I give them a lot of credit, you know, and yeah, I
appreciate it because it's you know, that's what that's what made our show possible,
is their bravery really and coming quote yeah, and I mean a lot
of people feel like, you know, there's a there's a suppression of this
information, like these military guys are told not to share this information. But
in my experience, it's more along the lines of what you're talking about.
They're they're just they don't want to share information and they're kind of self editing
themselves because of the ridicule and that, you know, they don't want to
be a subject of this sort of attention. Yeah. By by a couple
instances, there were guys who said they were forced to sign an NBA,
but vast majority of this is just yeah, just wanting to keep it quiet.
We have a story coming up that's really interesting, one of the most
dramatic stories where we and then we have the second witness who also went to
sit from a different dvantage point and we call him and this is really the
kind of emotional interesting The most psychological and emotional twists in terms of these were
basically, they both were they were in a National Guard unit. They both
had the same incident happened to them. They both went out and talked to
tolder unit that day, right, and they both got totally ridiculed. And
the second guy not our main source, but the second guy kind of turned
on the other guy and was like, oh, yeah, we were just
joking at the time and kind of hung him out to drop. So when
we called him to corroborate, he was like, yeah, you know,
I feel bad because all those years that I kind of left my partner out
to drive because I couldn't handle they were all and I couldn't handle the ridicule.
But here's what happened. And he tells us this is totally independently from
the other guy, tells us his story from this different vantage point, totally
I mean, slight differences and you know, kind of subjective experience, but
tells the same story of the same seeing the same craft, right and and
and says, you know, look, I feel bad. I feel bad
that I let him. I hung him out to dry. All these years,
I've always felt bad about that because apparently it was like a big deal.
It really affected them. And you know, again, that's what's so
people. You know, one I'd say one of the negative things about the
military if you learn about military culture, and I don't want to speak too
much because someone has never served, but having been to a rock and other
than have been embedded and know people that you have obviously, so you know,
there definitely is a culture of hazing, right, Like you know,
I've played a lot of sports. You know it's similar, right. Yeah.
Uh, there's definitely a macho hazing and I don't think that's going to
be splash or controversial to say the culture of hazing that that can be pretty
intense in the more things. So and there's a there's a culture of conformity,
right so uh yeah, that's what we get. So hopefully you're going
to learn more about that see it in the first champ. And I guess
my last question because we're kind of gone about an hour here is I know
there are a lot of people in the woodworks who are interested in this topic
but afraid to share their interests, not just high level officials but also uh,
celebrities. You know, you could share names if you want or not.
But have you heard, you know, from some high level officials or
celebrities saying, hey, WHOA I wish not really, I mean we definitely
heard. I mean, for every story that you see on the show.
There's about ten more right people who contact them right and some of those stories
are super compelling, but for whatever reason, like they didn't want to come
on, or sometimes it's like just a little bit too secondhand of like I
saw a video, like we had a story. I don't want to say
too much about it, but a very uh interesting person or with a very
high level position within Air Force and NASA telescort. But it was, you
know, it was secondhand. It was like I saw a video or something,
so we didn't you know, I didn't have the videos. It's like,
can we really make that into a story. It just seems something something
you know, kind of secondhand. It just it just wasn't enough there and
in the prout. So but there's a lot more and we're still asking.
We're going to put up coming up in the new episodes build the call to
action is going to be up there at the email that uh you know is
a shoot. I only know that email address is live. And we were
still you know, people are still coming in. We've gotten some of the
stories that you see in this episode. I mean, in the season we're
late breaking that just came in you'll see because they're you know, you can
tell by the ones that are on Skype, right, those are all post
COVID stories that that guys coming forward to Lou, And people are coming forward
to Lou all the time. Every week he's forwarding something from someone coming to
him. So you'll see a couple of those stories that came in in the
last couple of months that were just you know, they're too good that we
had awesome. That's so exciting, So excited to watch the show in just
a few hours now, episode two. But thank you so much for coming
on and sharing this information. These are some really exciting times and the show
is right in the middle of it, kind of steam rolling all this information
through. Yeah, well, so are you all? You know, you're
definitely doing a great job with all you're reporting. Really, I really love
reading your articles, and again I appreciate all the support and a big shout
out to all your supporters as well. I think you're one of the best
guys. I've said this before on this topic, and that's great that you
have more supporters and keep out the great work. Well. Thank you,
thank you very much, and of course the feelings mutual. You could hear
kicking some butt over there, so thanks so much for that. All right,
thanks man, and yeah, let's touch space. Like you know,
I want to hear more, you know, if you want to do a
kind of into season wrap up or something, I'd love to chat with you.
Okay, get more feedback from you and your viewers, definitely great,
then we'll make that happen. Excellent, all right, bye everybody, all
right, Tia, thank you, and yeah bye to my listeners. I
know I had talked about getting Luelasando on and I will be able to do
that soon. We're working on it. But lots of more exciting people,
including we'll be talking to Dave Marler, so you'll be watching him hopefully in
a few hours on the show, and we'll talk to him about the show
next week. We'll do, in fact, probably a couple of interviews with
him, because he's a good buddy with a lot of great information that would
be great to hear. I'd love to I'm going to tune in because i'd
love to hear what Marlar thinks about the show. Obviously he hasn't seen it,
so i'd love to hear his reactions to how we He's excited, he's
really excited about it, and he loved meeting Chris Mellon. Who wouldn't so
yeah, it's going to be good. Excell all right, thanks man,
bye everybody,