Dark Matters
Season 1
Delves into the most unusual research ever conducted, including attempts to crossbreed humans and apes, actual zombie investigations and head transplantation studies. Cutting-edge CGI recreations enable viewers to witness the pivotal moments when brilliant minds face controversy or ethical crossroads on the fringes of science.
Where to Watch Season 1
6 Episodes
- The Philadelphia Experiment, Ape-Man Army, Zapped to Death
E1The Philadelphia Experiment, Ape-Man Army, Zapped to DeathThe Philadelphia Experiment: In 1956 astronomer and UFOlogist Morris Jessup received an extraordinary letter. It claimed that during World War 2 the US Navy had experimented with invisibility and teleportation in a botched test on a destroyer, the USS Eldridge. Jessup's search for the truth will lead him to pay the ultimate price. APE-MAN ARMY: In the 1920s and 30s Soviet scientist Dr. Ilya Ivanov began a series of disturbing experiments to cross breed humans with apes. At first he tried to make female apes pregnant using humans as the fathers. His experiments grew so grotesque he was expelled from French Guinea in Africa when he attempted to make women pregnant using apes as the fathers. But his research continued in Russia. Did he succeed? ZAPPED TO DEATH: Thomas Edison was a great man, one of the inventors of the modern world. But even the greatest men make mistakes. Caught up in a commercial battle to supply America with electricity, Edison ran a disturbing publicity campaign against his bitter rival George Westinghouse. The campaign used Westinghouse technology to electrocute animals. Ultimately Edison's campaign went even further, leading to the invention of the electric chair. It was a battle Edison regretted for the rest of his life. - I Have Einstein's Brain, Unidentified Flying Nazis, Killer Thoughts
E2I Have Einstein's Brain, Unidentified Flying Nazis, Killer Thoughts"I Have Einstein's Brain" examines the case of Dr. Thomas Harvey who stole Albert Einstein's brain in order to discover the basis of genius. "Unidentified Flying Nazis" looks at the Kecksburg UFO incident and its possible connection with Nazi anti-gravity experimentation. "Killer Thoughts" examines the psychic arms race between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. during the Cold War. - Sexy Secret Agent, Full Body Transplant, Honey I Nuked the Planet
E3Sexy Secret Agent, Full Body Transplant, Honey I Nuked the PlanetSEXY SECRET AGENT: When talk show host John Nebel married ex-model Candy Jones he had no idea that she would reveal that she was a brainwashed CIA secret agent called Arlene Grant. She claims to have been the subject of mind control experiments in the late 50s and to have been sent on foreign missions where she was tortured. But was it true, or had Candy Jones developed a split personality during her troubled childhood? Truth or fantasy? FULL BODY TRANSPLANT: In 1971, in the culmination of a series of gruesome experiments, neurosurgeon Dr. Robert White successfully transplanted the head of one rhesus monkey onto the decapitated body of another. A devout Catholic, White believed the techniques could one day save human souls when their bodies gave out. But would it ever have worked? And would we tolerate today the level of unnecessary animal cruelty that he believed acceptable? HONEY I NUKED THE PLANET: In 1962 the United States exploded a 1.4 megaton H-Bomb in space Scientist James van Allen was asked to prove the test was safe but given just weeks to do it. President Kennedy went on to use Van Allen's name to prove the tests were not dangerous. The bomb created a radiation storm around the planet that took ten years to dissipate, blew out orbiting satellites and plunged parts of Oahu into darkness. They were fortunate it wasn't far worse. Van Allen kept his own council until the test was complete but then exploded labeling it shoddy and unsafe. - It's Alive!, Tripping with Uncle Sam, My Hand Is Killing Me
E4It's Alive!, Tripping with Uncle Sam, My Hand Is Killing MeIT'S ALIVE!: Could we restore the dead to life? At the beginning of the 19th century, Italian scientist Giovanni Aldini suspected that electricity could be the God given vital force of life. He began with frogs' legs…but he ended up attempting to resurrect a human corpse. This is the true story that inspired Mary Shelley to write the classic horror story Frankenstein. TRIPPING WITH UNCLE SAM: Could madness be infectious? In the late 90's journalist Hank Albarelli tied an epidemic of insanity in a small French town to the apparent suicide of a top US government scientist. Combining his own government sources with a detailed analysis of declassified files he concluded that the town of Pont Saint Esprit in Southern France had been used as a test bed for a mind control experiment and that the scientist had been murdered to prevent him blowing the story. MY HAND IS KILLING ME: Are you alone in your head or could there be another, darker personality hidden away in your mind? In 1908 a German woman's left hand began attacking her. She became the first recorded case of a new condition: Alien Hand Syndrome. Experiments later revealed that when the two hemispheres of the brain become separated a new, often irrational personality can appear alongside the patient's original one. But does this only happen when the brain is split in two, or could it exist in all of us? - 21 Grams, Missing Cosmonauts, Sound of Death
E521 Grams, Missing Cosmonauts, Sound of Death"21 Grams" looks at the work of Dr. Duncan MacDougall who weighed dying people in order to establish the existence of the soul. "Missing Cosmonauts" examines reports that several cosmonauts died on missions during the early days of space exploration. "Sound of Death" looks at the work of scientists who were experimenting with ultra-low-frequency sound and a sonic gun. - Radio Waves of Death, How to Make a Zombie, Jekyll vs. Hyde
E6Radio Waves of Death, How to Make a Zombie, Jekyll vs. HydeRADIO WAVES OF DEATH: Nikola Tesla was a genius with a plan to send electricity through the air. But as his behavior grew increasingly eccentric throughout his life, his financial backers abandoned him. Desperate to sell his ideas, he suggested that not only could his technology be the ultimate weapon of war, but that he had tested it. Was Tesla responsible for devastating a remote area of Siberia ninety years ago? HOW TO MAKE A ZOMBIE: Harvard scientist Wade Davis became obsessed with cracking the secrets of the Zombie. His journey led him to the island of Haiti where he tracked down a man with something few of us possess; his own death certificate. Digging down into the dark world of the voodoo sorcerer, Wade Davis believed he had uncovered the science that explained the zombie legend. But had he? JEKYLL VS. HYDE: You've probably never heard of Horace Wells, but he may have saved your life. In the 1840s Wells tried to invent anesthesia using laughing gas. But failure transformed him into an object of ridicule. Desperate to salvage his reputation, Wells experimented with a new drug, Chloroform. He had no idea of its addictive and hallucinogenic effects. In a drug-fueled madness he disfigured a woman with acid. He ended his own life without ever discovering that he had been acknowledged by his peers as the inventor of anesthesia.
