"Hellier" - recommended documentary series

[Wombaticus Rex]

I generally watch television with an eye towards turning it off - just looking for an excuse to walk away. This one stymied me.

Part of that is just the classic Zegarnik effect mechanics of narrative storytelling, the drip-drop of tantalizing facts and questions. However, most of it was the quality of the production and the quality of the investigators. The series is essentially an update on the Hopkinsville encounter that quickly expands into a tour of Tau Allan Greenfield's work and the life of John Keel. This encompasses cryptids, UFOlogy, synchronicity and the occult. To the extent there are boundaries separating those fields, right? It's earnest and the sensationalizing is mercifully minimal.

The investigators use interesting methods, often consider the possibility they're being hoaxed, and they're mighty darn polite to all the subjects they encounter -- they're so endearing, really, you'd be insane to trust them, and I don't. But I still highly recommend it to everyone here.

I also have that old timey feeling that all of this bullshit is about to start reaching into my daily life again now that I'm engaging with it again. I almost welcome it. It's encouraging to remember that, beneath the accretions of bullshit and hoax, there is a genuine phenomenon to contend with.

[Wombaticus Rex]

At the end of it, there's a remarkable moment where the lead investigator is asked about the mysterious emails that got him involved - a David Christie, who apparently never existed in Hellier, Kentucky, and the obvious pseudonym "Terry Wriste." The latter moniker is the principal tie to Alan Greenfield's work, appearing in the first appendix to Secret Cipher of the UFOnauts. It's an interview where he tells some shaggy dog stories about raiding caves and shooting aliens and such, which was very much the hot fad in UFOlogy circles back in 1994 when Greenfield's book was first published. This dovetails into the online fanfic "Branton" mythos and of course the tall tales of one Bob Lazar.

Anyways.

The lead investigator gets asked what he would say to either of those mystery men if they were watching. He says he'd love to hear from them, and he feels like "there may be other places we should go." Now, what else would a seeker say?

Yet I can't escape the notion that this is exactly the kind of eager mark that men like Peter Levenda and Richard Doty and Tom Bearden thrive on, seek out, recruit for. This is the raw material that you need in order to make your myths, these are the evangelists who will do the heavy lifting for you.

I'm hardly a skeptic on the subject of synchronicity, having lived through dozens of doozies, but some of the early spooky synchs in Hellier involving the correspondence with "Terry Wriste" (through email, of course) would be trivial to intel operatives. The team visits an obscure "alien base" cave in the North Carolina boonies, and upon returning, get their first message from T. Wriste, asking "why did you stop when you were so close?"

Monitoring the comings and goings of a target is the basic job description when you're working on Doty's side of the wall. If you're on the radar, every single thing you do is on the radar. (More than that, of course, it's hard to miss that the only connection between that email message and their recent trip was their own inferences. They claim that there were some GPS coordinates included but this can't be verified since they won't share them -- perhaps it's buried somewhere on their website.)

So, inconclusive, vague, more tantalizing than illuminating...all in all, a pretty fitting documentary given the subject. I still recommend it.

[RocketMan]

Sounds amazing! Thanks for the heads up, getting it now.

[liminalOyster]

Watching S1E1 now. Good vibes so far. Thanks for tip.

[Wombaticus Rex]

Fairly certain none of this email from Greenfield made cut for the documentary, but it's interesting at least. The most likely explanation is that there is nobody behind the pseudonym at all and it's just more metafiction wank. Probably used as an open handle now.

Terry was a friend of mine for many years. By the same token, I haven’t heard from him since the middle 1990s. “Terry” was a pseudonym he came up with which he no longer uses, AFAIK. I advise far more caution due to cave ins, mine gases etc. Such locations are for real experts, and there are safer ways to make contact. I hope your friend stayed out of the mine. Ky has had “little men” stuff since at least the 1950s. The best approach is one of detachment. If theft is involved, lock up good, but one should cultivate not being afraid – fear intensifies their “power” – indifference dis-empowers them. See my book SECRET CIPHER OF THE UFONAUTS, “Law of the Battle of Conquest” chapter.

Just stay out of mines and caves. Dangerous – on-site investigation is best confined to the household being allegedly victimized. Treat it like an apparition case or a poltergeist case – the overlap between such cases is greater than most conventional ufologists usually think. They are in fact differing perceptions of the same thing, IMHO.

If you have further questions, write me.

Cordially,
Allen

2nd Communique:

Well, I never underestimate some people’s desire to get attention or just accomplish a good hoax, but, still, it does sound like a case at least worth taking seriously. I have been quite frustrated by the gradual move from serious paranormal field investigations and, for that matter, scholarly research to t.v. style ghost hunting.

[Wriste] is much younger than me – I’d guess he’s pushing 50. But he isn’t a “man of mystery” per se. UFOs were an occasional side interest to him when I knew him. I sat him down for three interviews in the early 1990s – two have been published and relate to UFOlogy. The other, from our common political radical days, which, imo, where his hear is, and was of no interest to UFOlogists and a bit hot to handle as political rhetoric. I do know his “street name”: but, like everybody I knew in that era, we all had noms de guerre, and our code of honor was never to associate our ‘real’ names with our nom de guerre, which I have continued to honor, though most of us have long since ceased to be street activists.

I’d be inclined to think [the Terry Wriste you’re speaking to] is more of a “man in black” than the Terry I know.

On one of my visits [to Brown Mountain]- frankly I don’t remember which one – this nicely dressed local guy (supposedly) came to my motel room for no apparent reason other than to ‘warn’ me that Lael was ‘a local moonshiner’. At the time it seemed very normal if a bit unexpected. He identified himself, but his name disappeared from my memory. It was probably my poking around in a rural area that brought him to me, to uphold local pride or whatever – but who knows? Maybe he was a “man in black” — a thought that didn’t strike me until years later. He knew where I was, what I was there for and wanted to in some fashion discredit the local contactee. The primary phenomenon – the Brown Mountain Lights – is real, whatever that may mean.

[cptmarginal]

This series is probably something I should check out. I currently live not far from Serpent Mound, have long ago visited the site between Ohio and West Virginia that Keel wrote about, and have family roots in Kentucky (near Cave City - not near Hellier.)

-

I've just been reading Gordon White's Star.Ships once again (and planning on starting it over from the beginning) and these parts from the end struck me as relevant:

And so there is an element of ‘burying the lead’ here because there are some compelling data to be extracted from these stories once one lets go of one’s preferred interpretation. For instance, when the asura, King Salva, attacked Krishna’s city of Dwarka, his vimana was observed to split apart, bounce along the surface of the ocean, and reabsorb its various split parts back into a whole, all while Krishna was firing projectiles at him from the city. Viewed dispassionately, this is remarkably reminiscent of Norway’s ‘Hessdalen Lights’; an aerial phenomenon observed with surprising regularity. They also appear to behave as if consciously controlled and regularly split apart from each other before reforming, often moving around or through the mountains around the Hessdalen valley at tremendous speeds. The story of King Salva and the Hessdalen Lights offers some compelling parallels to the 9th century Lyon story of Magonia that gave Jacques Vallée the title to his masterwork, Passport to Magonia. Bishop Agobard of Lyon observed a sky battle between competing wizards from the cloud realm of Magonia. Several occupants of one of the downed craft were even captured and kept for days. There is nothing in the good bishop’s account that suggests these ‘wizards’ had descended from the clouds to teach us about genetics or quantum computing. Mostly it is just complaints about the damage the Magonians caused to the local crops.

What this suggests is that there is a continuity of observation that can be used to calibrate ancient anomalous encounters that all-too-many of us hastily throw onto the ‘proof of aliens’ bonfire. To say these beings ‘aren’t’ aliens is not to rob the myths of their potency. This very book rests on the proven hypothesis that local mythology can be a container for recognisable astronomical, climatic and consciousness-based experiences.

...

Using a wider model accounts for the capricious nature or presentation of these phenomena. If they are our ‘teachers’ then they are crack-addicted relief teachers who only show up to steal the lightbulbs from the faculty lounge. The universe owes us nothing and it is only our deep-seated psychological need for structure that attributes such nobility to the motives of phenomena that have never demonstrated a coherent awareness of human morality, whatever and however useful that may be. Caveat emptor.

Contentious, supremely personal and near-impossible to draw quantifiable conclusions from, the contemporary magical experience nevertheless seems a legitimate source of counter-checking for the wider hypothesis. It is not so much the content of contemporary magical experience – that overused phrase, ‘personal gnosis’ – so much as it is its context. Recall, for instance, the experience of the reception of The Book of the Law from the previous chapter.

Contemporary magical experience can be marshalled to countercheck the hypothesis not in terms of ‘the spirits told me this is what happened’ (for they are ever-unreliable narrators) but in the wider synchronicitous context in which it occurs: what kind of ‘nonhuman logic’ was discerned in its aftereffects?

[DrEvil]

^^Here's the homepage(s) of the currently ongoing research project on the Hessdalen lights by the Østfold university college:

http://hessdalen.hiof.no/station/
http://www.hessdalen.org/index_e.shtml

Their english is dodgy and the livecams need Flash installed. The pictures in the sidebar also have short videos of the lights, starting in 2017. The older stuff is just pictures.

[Wombaticus Rex]

That's certainly resonant -- the North Carolina mountain in question is also host to some remarkable light phenomena: Brown Mountain Lights, which yours truly has actually witnessed, albeit on hella drugs.

It is not so much the content of contemporary magical experience – that overused phrase, ‘personal gnosis’ – so much as it is its context. Recall, for instance, the experience of the reception of The Book of the Law from the previous chapter.

Indeed, Liber AL vel Legis is the beating heart of Greenfield's Cipher. And "the context" is precisely what our plucky team of protagonists willingly immerse themselves in. There's a lot of thoughtful reflections on synchronicity, heavily influenced by Vallee, a sign of good sense and good taste. There's also a lot of unambiguous precognitive hits throughout the narrative here that get woven into the spooky mythos rather than acknowledged as regular-ass human psychic functioning. Kind of fascinating that Ultraterrestrial goblins inhabiting a nationwide network of underground tunnels and abandoned mines is an easier thesis to float than the straight-faced assertion that ESP exists.

Still, that's probably good strategy on their part. My sense is they're basically crowdfunding much of this and they are full-time "paranormal beat" media personalities, which much be fucking exhausting. I am certain the bulk of their audience wants cryptids more than they want psychic protocols -- people want answers, not homework.

Thanks for the heads-up on Gordon's book.

[cptmarginal]

2012 thread started by the guy who wrote that wacky Rigorous Intuition book for TrineDay: The Brown Mountain Lights

Indeed, Liber AL vel Legis is the beating heart of Greenfield's Cipher. And "the context" is precisely what our plucky team of protagonists willingly immerse themselves in. There's a lot of thoughtful reflections on synchronicity, heavily influenced by Vallee, a sign of good sense and good taste. There's also a lot of unambiguous precognitive hits throughout the narrative here that get woven into the spooky mythos rather than acknowledged as regular-ass human psychic functioning. Kind of fascinating that Ultraterrestrial goblins inhabiting a nationwide network of underground tunnels and abandoned mines is an easier thesis to float than the straight-faced assertion that ESP exists.

Still, that's probably good strategy on their part. My sense is they're basically crowdfunding much of this and they are full-time "paranormal beat" media personalities, which much be fucking exhausting. I am certain the bulk of their audience wants cryptids more than they want psychic protocols -- people want answers, not homework.

The brand new season 2 is twice as long and on Amazon Prime right now, as a temporary exclusive...

I've watched the first episode of season one so far and found it compelling and thought-provoking, though there were a few fast-forward moments early on. The initial email from T. Wriste has me on the hook for the next four episodes. It is bizarre for me to see images from Greenfield's book being shown onscreen and to remember reading a PDF of it a decade ago (shared on your website, I think.)

It's a bit odd but these ideas prompt me to go in a completely different direction, and to re-watch the Thai film "Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives". I don't think many people who saw that when it was released (or maybe were bored to tears by it, as with any acclaimed Apichatpong Weerasethakul film) would notice how many details of the primary plot-line were not just a case of the director being weird.

A man who experiences past-life recall while meditating. Non-human creatures with indistinct features and glowing eyes lurk in the jungle. The man experiences the process of dying and reincarnating, which necessitates a night journey with his family into a pitch-black mysterious womb-like cave inhabited by said creatures.

[Wombaticus Rex]

As I was ranting elsewhere: One of the most inspirational points to take from the "Hellier" nexus is 1) "synchromysticism" may yet evolve from online wank to useful real world protocols, and 2) we could be expanding our data points at scale at sites around the world with small teams.

I'd love to see the show evolve into a much more explicit gateway drug for Keel's work, rather than reality TV for paranormal convention fandom. And you know, there really is a Mothman "fandom," which has always struck me as rather perverse -- but far less so than fetishizing the howling void of UFO/UAP phenomena as cute Little Green Men merch and grey alien throw pillows.

The wind-down in the final episode features a long phone call with another researcher about the dangers of letting all this into your daily life too much, but despite dropping John's name every 10 minutes, there is remarkably little explication about his life and his work.

Now, granted, The Eighth Tower is going to be a little tricky to spoon-feed people whose main learning modality is online videos and Vox explainer infographics. But they should try.

Besides, the Keel tome that really comes to mind is Our Haunted Planet.

[cptmarginal]

Hopkinsville is expecting 200,000 eclipse chasers

Aug. 3, 2017 - by Jeffrey Lee Puckett

HOPKINSVILLE, Ky.— Edgar Cayce has been dead since 1945 but still has a say about what goes on in the small Kentucky town he once called home.

The man known as The Sleeping Prophet was a celebrated mystic who trafficked in prophecy, healing and reincarnation. And as the world turns its attention on Hopkinsville for the Aug. 21 solar eclipse, Cayce has a piece of the action.

A farm just outside of Hopkinsville will offer the ideal spot to witness the full totality of the eclipse for a spectacularly dark 2 minutes and 41.2 seconds. And Cayce believed that this eclipse will be enormously significant: It will usher in the Age of Aquarius, a time when peace and love will rule.

"I think that's pretty special for our town to usher in a new age of love," said Janet Bravard, director of exhibits and programs at Hopkinsville's Pennyroyal Area Museum.

"Of course, it'll take all of us to make it right. ... I think our town has gotten all the hospitality it can conjure up to prepare for it."

There's no time like the present to start because love – along with patience and kindness – will come in handy when eclipse chasers from 38 states and 16 countries descend upon Hopkinsville.

As many as 200,000 tourists, scientists and eclipse junkies are expected to swamp the quiet town of 33,000, many of them arriving early for camping and a music festival. Roads will be clogged, schools will be closed.

Hopkinsville Mayor Carter Hendricks said the town is ready for its moment in the sun, so to speak, although he's quick to point out that no one really knows what that means in such extraordinary circumstances.

"We're encouraging our residents to really embrace this opportunity," Hendricks said. "We know that it's going to create a little more hassle over that weekend, but when it's all said and done it's going to be worth it because it's giving us a chance to showcase ... all of the region for a worldwide audience."

For some perspective, Hopkinsville's biggest annual tourism event in years past was the Little River Days Festival, which drew 15,000 at its peak.

But 100,000 or more tourists, many of them spread across the city's modest 31 square miles? That, said Hendricks, is unknown territory.

"We're all being told to get our groceries, gas, and everything else before it starts, to treat it like a snowstorm," said Nancy Stalls. "I'm looking forward to it for the notoriety but the crowds of people, if they come, will be overwhelming."

...

The town was alerted a decade ago to the potential impact of the eclipse, which is the first total eclipse in 99 years to travel the width of North America.

Astronomers determined that Hopkinsville would be dark for 2 minutes and 41.2 seconds, one of the longer durations, and that nearby Orchardale Shepherd Farm would offer the spot where the moon will achieve maximum coverage.

That combination is catnip for scientists, eclipse aficionados and the merely curious.

Preparation began in earnest five years ago, Hendricks said, after an eclipse expert addressed a forum at Hopkinsville Community College. He showed photos where tens of thousands of people had gathered even in remote locations.

"That's where for the first time I really began to understand the magnitude of what we were talking about," Hendricks said. "I think we were all looking at it with a healthy degree of skepticism but when he shared those photos ... it really struck me that this was going to be something significant."

[cptmarginal]

I'd love to see the show evolve into a much more explicit gateway drug for Keel's work, rather than reality TV for paranormal convention fandom. And you know, there really is a Mothman "fandom," which has always struck me as rather perverse -- but far less so than fetishizing the howling void of UFO/UAP phenomena as cute Little Green Men merch and grey alien throw pillows.

Whoa, I did not notice this detail before making that last post about the solar eclipse...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/mor ... farm-town/

Kelly, it turns out, had quite the tale buried in its past, an incident that crop circle conspirators and UFO-chasers call the “Kelly-Hopkinsville encounter.” It involved farmers, space creatures and an hours-long shootout so intense that legend says the farmhouse and barn where it took place was left peppered with bullet holes.

So Smithey’s group, Kelly Community Organization, turned the “Kelly-Hopkinsville encounter” into the Kelly “Little Green Men” Days Festival, a celebration with aliens and flying saucers that coincides every year on the shootout’s anniversary: Aug. 21, 1955.

This year, the 62nd anniversary falls on a day already marked for darkness — the total solar eclipse.

The town once tormented by tales of an alien invasion sits within the eclipse’s path of totality. At about 1:20 p.m., Kelly will be shrouded in black.

“Some people are afraid the aliens are coming back,” said Smithey, Kelly’s “Little Green Men” Days Festival chairwoman. “We call the whole thing cosmic coincidence.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_C._L ... e_(E.C.C.O.)

There exists a Cosmic Coincidence Control Center (CCCC) with a Galactic substation called Galactic Coincidence Control (GCC). Within GCC is the Solar System Control Unit (SSCU), within which is the Earth Coincidence Control Office (ECCO). [...] Remember the motto passed to us (from G.C.C. via S.S.C.U.): "Cosmic Love is absolutely Ruthless and Highly Indifferent: it teaches its lessons whether you like/dislike them or not."

[Wombaticus Rex]

A pity it's too late to edit the OP -- they repeatedly show hypnotic inductions and even do an evocation of pan in the S2 season finale. Definitely keep the mute button handy, or have fun taking risks.

S2 does little to dispel the notion these people are either reckless or malicious, but I'm still glad I watched it. It's at least more polyglot and informative than any of the other pop occultism product I've seen this decade, and they're not insufferable pricks like Satanists are.

[Agent Orange Cooper]

I finished up the first season of this and was shocked at how little substance it actually contains. The initial email about the goblins was compelling but after that it just becomes an exercise in narcissism. Boring conversations lead to self-fulfilling prophecies, or more often unfulfilled. Literally nothing interesting happens, let alone anything paranormal, yet we are expected to think these people are like, scouring the dizzying heights of the mystery in the wake of Keel.

Someone tell me, does anything actually happen in season 2? I have a kind of professional obligation to watch this, otherwise I wouldn't bother continuing.

[Wombaticus Rex]

I finished up the first season of this and was shocked at how little substance it actually contains. The initial email about the goblins was compelling but after that it just becomes an exercise in narcissism.

Ah, so you agree it's a remarkably accurate depiction of the field.

Someone tell me, does anything actually happen in season 2? I have a kind of professional obligation to watch this, otherwise I wouldn't bother continuing.

Skip to S2E7 - "The Trickster." It's basically an interview in a hotel room with Allan Greenfield, who may not be the architect of all this -- although someone very clearly games them with a Sapphire Star prank in the aftermath -- but his work is certainly the source material.

They conclude the season by doing an evocation of Pan in a cave, then announcing they've re-re-re-cracked the Cipher with some information that may lead to the mysterious Terry Wriste. But certainly won't.

It's a reality TV show, a genre forged upon the crudest possible applications of the Zeigarnik effect. It's like the classic sci-fi soap opera trash show LOST -- there will never be answers, only more mysteries. The point is keeping the viewer engaged. I expect Hellier to evolve just like "The Curse of Oak Island," a treasure-hunting Templar mystery show that has somehow squeezed seven seasons out of an absolute nothingburger.

The show, then, is not about solving mysteries but about getting more seasons. This is nothing new or unique. What is interesting about Hellier is the content and how it is treated. This is an attempt at explicating occult currents familiar to RI to the general public, or at least the 'ghost hunters' / UFO conference fandom general public.

The lead characters continually profess to be novices and it continually rings false. They readily & often admit to being manipulated, but seem more curious than concerned. What is being created here is a mythic complex, no different than the project Tom DeLonge is engaged with through his To The Stars Academy work -- which is being facilitated by spook nerd Peter Levenda, who is Suspect No. 1 here in Hellier, too. I suspect Levenda will see more long-term success from this smaller, lower-budget initiative. I am certainly seeing a huge tide of correspondence from weirdos old and new regarding the content, which is why I, too, remain professionally obligated to keep watching.

Like an asshole, like an idiot.