In the Syfy series Resident Alien, Harry Vanderspeigle, or the extraterrestrial in the Harry human suit, to be specific, has been trying to get back to his home world after completing a mission to kill everyone on earth. But in the newest episode, “Welcome Aliens,” he has a close encounter with humans in alien suits — as well as one “high-haired gentleman” — at a UFO convention in Dulce, New Mexico. The penultimate episode of the season occurs as Harry (Alan Tudyk) and Asta (Sara Tomko) head to the con to find an abductee embedded with an alien chip, which he can use to fix his humanity-ending weapon. And along with cosplayers and experiencers, he meets Giorgio A. Tsoukalos, the researcher best known from History Channel’s Ancient Aliens and the “I’m not saying it was aliens…but it was aliens” meme (which is not what he actually said). Tsoukalos first appears on stage during an Ancient Aliens presentation, where he says human ancestors had teachers, and our knowledge came from beings from the stars. Apparently, he’s right on the mark because Harry says he likes this high-haired gentleman, and it’s about time aliens received a little credit. But when Harry hides in Tsoukalos’ green room — to avoid the Alien Tracker (Terry O’Quinn from Lost) — the researcher goes deep with his theories. This is intentional, says show creator and Executive Producer Chris Sheridan, who shared in a recent interview that he has, “spent many years going down a lot of different rabbit holes” in the paranormal and alien genres. Sheridan said the appearance, which he calls a “great get,” came about due to a connection with Ancient Aliens producer Kim Sheerin via production company Amblin Television. Sheridan says he originally had an idea of how he wanted Tsoukalos’ interaction with Harry to go and wrote some material that was more about aliens in particular. “[But] he’s a little bit more about being ancient monuments. That’s more of his background, so I tailored it a little bit to fit more of really who he is … I was basically working with him to try to get the depiction of him as accurate as possible.” The result is Tsoukalos talking about the nearly identical masonry of Delphi and Sacsayhuaman as “navels of the world where deities descended from the sky and imparted knowledge to the local population,” with Harry obliviously replying that he should be on television. But the fictional version of Tsoukalos likewise says he has no problem hiding aliens, if indeed Harry is one. So is he onto Tudyk’s character? Apparently, even when Resident Alien is not saying it was aliens, it’s aliens.
