Return of the UFOs.

I'm starting to get a sense that it's time for the UFOs to come back. They have a cultural moment every twenty to twenty-five years, and I think they're due. 

Why do I think so? Oh, they radioed me through my tinfoil hat. You should get one. It blocks the CIA but lets in the aliens alerts. Kind of a police radio for ETs. 

No, it's actually a couple of real things. For one, in the last twelve months I've had assignments for various books centering on space creatures, either nonfiction (such as, about Roswell or Area 51) or fiction (aliens-among-us stuff). Book publishers have their faults -- their many, many, many faults -- but they often are right up front with this stuff. Our cultural vampire phase and zombie phase came out of book series; the apocalypse phase too, and whenever we're in a mood for swashbuckling or historical drama you can bet it started on the bookshelves and went into movies and TV after. And I am seeing a ton of BEMs and LGMs and ETs and UFOs (or UAPs, as the navy calls them now) coming down the cultural chute. 

Don't count me among
the Little Green Men.

Usually there is a real-world prompt that gets things moving. I think the main one now is the Webb Space Telescope, which is getting people who like space stuff excited enough for it to spill over to the rest of us. Less so the talk of Mars missions and new missions to the moon. They are boosted by nationalism again with China and Europe and the US and others wanting a taste of space glory -- and nationalism is the only thing that got humans into space and on the moon, by the way -- but those goals keep being pushed off and seem less concrete. Webb goes live in July and we expect some amazing things.

Culturally, this means more X-Files type shows, maybe some ALFs or Mork and Mindys or My Favorite Martians, although undoubtedly the darker, grittier, versions. Our fictional aliens have been with us for decades, but I predict a strong resurgence of alien-themed cultural artifacts. I think a lot of it died down because the ubiquity of personal cameras in phones meant far fewer UFO sightings for a while, because tales of things that happened would have inevitably meant lots of pictures from various people. However, they're coming back. 

Here's where I would say "Keep watching the skies." Honestly, though, I am not convinced that there's ever going to be a useful workaround to the universal speed limit of light speed, so I think it's very unlikely we'll ever be visited by aliens. So instead I'll say "Keep watching the TV." That's where you'll see most of our visitors from outer space.  

And don't bother with the tinfoil hat. That was a joke. Tinfoil underwear, however, is very useful for stopping the FBI's omega rays that sap one's essence.