Right now there’s a documentary on the Sci Fi Channel called Mystery of the Crystal Skulls.
Obviously, it’s timed to coincide with the release of the new Indiana Jones movie that focuses on the mysterious and controversial crystal skulls. That movie has been mentioned a few times. Mostly, though, this has been a prime example of what passes for documentaries of strange and unusual things.
Some of what’s been presented is rehash of what is now ancient history and common knowledge–I remember a lot of it from Time-Life books back in the 80s. Much of that common knowledge has yet to be supported by more than hearsay and conjecture.
But here it gets presented without much counter. Definitely not enough to keep the average viewer questioning whether or not there actually was an ancient civilization of Atlantis.
There is music behind almost every bit of this documentary. Almost as if the filmmakers fear that any bits of silence will break the emotional flow of the viewer and let their more logical mind kick in, allowing them to realize just how outlandish a lot of these claims of “fact and science” are.
It wasn’t until early in the second hour of the documentary that they even brought up the fact that the Mitchell-Hedges skull (the one they talk about the most in the documentary) may not actually have been discovered in Mayan ruins. That’s kind of an important part of the investigation.
At least if you were planning on actually doing scientific investigation.
But that’s not at all what’s going on here.
What’s going on here is a presentation on myth, legend and wild speculation.
Most of that mess could be cleared up by some actual, honest, serious scientific inquiry. And it does look like some of that was done. Unfortunately for the filmmakers, the answers apparently didn’t fit with the story they wanted to tell.
So, instead, they fill the two-hours with so much pop-mystical-conspiracy-dross that even my head is spinning. Yes, these crystal skulls have been tied to just about every mythical bit of anything in the Western world, but it’s useless to just catalog and re-tell all of those connections. Pick one or two and stick with them.
Better yet, let’s just talk about the skulls themselves. Need more than that? Then let’s spend more time actually exploring the history of these things.
I don’t know why I always watch these things. I’m almost always disappointed. Mostly because I’ve been watching documentaries on these mysteries for so long, there’s very little new for me in anything produced in the past decade or so.
Here’s a rule of thumb for documentary makers out there: if you’re going to talk about an esoteric topic, do something new. Don’t throw together a hodge-podge of every hot topic you can think of. Focus. If you don’t cover everything (poorly) in one fell swoop, you’ll be able to make more (higher quality) documentaries about those topics later.
In other words, as much as I love Richard Hoagland, I don’t want to see him in a documentary about the crystal skulls–unless you’re focusing directly on the possible extra-terrestrial origins of the things.
(Also, right up front, one of Sci Fi’s own shows was misidentified… way to destroy any vestige of respectability right away!)
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