Abdução em Manhattan

At first glance, this is a simple documentary that may or may have not been exaggerated and has a solid foundation due to over a dozen witnesses.

It all gets weird when Carol Rainey , wife of Budd Hopkins, the wife of the main filmmaker that was platforming the original story gets all in her feelings, clearly jealous and starts questioning any and everything that would come their way. It didn't take her any reason or even logical thinking to question any of the claims, witnesses or setups, it was baseless hatred and jealousy from top to bottom. I would have much preferred to have someone who was truly neutral that would question everything and look deeper into it.

A fun watch nonetheless.

Thought I was about to experience an epic alien abduction story, right in the middle of NYC, with UFOs hovering over skyscrapers, mysterious lights flashing, and people disappearing into the sky. But nope, turns out it's just a long, drawn-out spat between two old ladies who can't stand each other. They bicker over the smallest things, throw insults like confetti, and somehow turn everything into a personal grudge match. If cranky seniors throwing shade and endless passive-aggressive banter are your thing, then dive in. But if you're here hoping for an encounter with extraterrestrial life, you're in the wrong place-no aliens here, just drama. Get outta here while you can.

This is not an investigative piece of documentary filmmaking. At most, there are presented 2 sides of a story that was thin on details even when new 25 years ago. Unfortunately, the only sane voice in the series - that of Carol Rainey - cannot be encouraged to speak more on the matter because she has died. The only voices left to speak to this are those of the alleged abductee and her son, whose face never appears on camera. There is no evidence provided by the filmmakers to support the assertion that the "Johnathon" that appears on camera is even the son of Linda, who is the main subject of the story.

The filmmakers missed every opportunity to support or refute the claims made by the participants in the series. Was there a city wide blackout in 1989 on the alleged date of the abduction? Are any of the alleged witnesses still alive? What are the opinions of Javier Pérez de Cuéllar (the former UN Sec-Gen who is named-checked throughout the series)? What happened to the alleged implant in Linda's nose? What are the well-known issues with hypnotic regression therapy? I don't know, because the filmmakers don't provide the simplest form of fact checking.

If you watch this, understand that the series is not an attempt at journalism. At least I hope that wasn't the intent of the filmmakers. What is presented is exactly what the title of this review states: an interesting subject with no legs on which to stand.

Simply put, I don't really remember seeing a worse ufo or mystery documentary.

• The show is spread into 3 parts for no reason since what you see or hear is extremely repetitive. The whole first part feels just like a trailer, and the following parts don't get much better. The show doesn't respect your time and just wastes it with repetition
• Many very basic questions that pop into your mind get unanswered and the show does very little to pursue them. Something like involved characters at least trying to explain what exact effort was done to explain some of the phenomena.

I feel it just wasted my time.

You can tell that some of these reviewers are young and don't even know who Budd Hopkins was. Also they don't realize that the woman doing the debunking was his other half. Budd Hopkins was a famous UFO Investigator of his time, talking this issue seriously and documenting cases because no one else was doing it back then. Problem is that most people in those times would think you are crazy if you even talked about it. The talk shows of that era (Oprah, Geraldo, Ricky, and many more) were all competing for ratings with the most controversial subjects they could find. When they started inviting Budd Hopkins on TV, it was more about ratings than a true concern for humanity in those days - and came across as mockery as the audience just laughed at his serious work. This Linda case got out of hand with Budd believing her every word and his objectivity was being over shadowed by basically getting hooked on her every call and whim. His other half who always filmed for him started to notice his bias and loss of objectivity in this particular case since it was so bizarre. She tried talking to him but by this time he would not entertain any discussion. So she started to piece together all the scientific evidence it was a hoax. The ending of this story is enlightening and I won't spoil it but some shocking evidence that wasn't brought out in the beginning shaped my own opinion whether this was a hoax or not.