Cooper's Treasure

Spaceflight historians and program veterans have serious problems with the fundamental premises of this show. They say there never was such a sensor on Mercury-9, there never was the slightest justification of putting such a sensor on it when airplanes could carry the sensor more effectively and cheaply, that Cooper only took a few dozen photos of the surface -- none at all over the Caribbean == that there was no way an astronaut looking out the window could accurately log latitude/longitude of anything he saw, and no way that Cooper could or would keep secret notes from the flight without NASA's knowledge. Otherwise, enjoy the show.

First and foremost, I think this show is paced and edited so badly - which is probably the producer's hand at work here. There should be a solid documentary underneath this, but the style they have gone for is just all wrong as they have tried to spin a series out of something that would be much better more shorter and concise. This type of editing coupled with fake suspense and an over dramatic musical score, makes me think I am watching an episode of Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA. Not a serious show about Treasure Hunting.

It really annoys me when a documentary devotes far too much time to what's coming up after the commercials and then a recap once the new section starts. It's just watering down of the content and I just wish they would get on with it! Also way too much is reiterated in various different scenes over and over and over again - I get the point and don't need to be re-fed stuff.

The scenes where he meets his father and just before he goes to meet him seem quite staged. I also think they've cut them to seem like they occur more than they actually did (the clue is in the clothing). There is so much here that is just being made unauthentic as the dad clearly loves and wants to help his son - but they have to spin an extra storyline out of this due to the format.

Saying all that with my hand on the fast forward button I am just about able to get a good enough show from this. The thing that keeps me watching is I find Darrell Miklos a charismatic and likable guy with a good enough story and who I want to succeed.

As it is so over-egged, if I do stop watching I will look for a book on the subject and then hopefully won't have to deal with the issues expressed.

It is yet another over-glorified, over-hyped reality TV show. What else would you expect from Discovery network?

As others have mentioned, you could easily condense the content into 1 or 2 episodes. There is so much repetition, that I feel like I'm being taken on an 'idiot ride' and I can't take any of it seriously. Especially the mapping from space, using such old technology to detect underwater objects from very far away, while traveling at high velocity.

Search for written documentation instead of this time-wasting trash and watch something else on NatGeo, for example.

I haven't seen enough substance to warrant a rating yet! Is this show going to continue? Will anything ever be found? The premise had some merit, but apparently neither Mikos nor any of his "experts" can read maps or understand any of Coopers research?!?! C'mon guys, Coop went to a lot of trouble to document a couple hundred sites, can't you honor him by finding at least one? If y'all write yourselves into a corner and can't figure a way out, let me know and I'll guide you to a couple of them.

I was initially intrigued by the premise of this show, but it quickly became apparent that all was not as it seemed. From the outset something is off about Darrell Miklos, at times he can be quite charismatic but at the same time he's unable to communicate normally with people, he's always trying to force the conversation with stuff like "remember that time me and Gordon Cooper were best friends?" It feels like he's trying to insert himself into Coopers life after the fact.

The problems just continue to get bigger when he explains how Cooper got his information, his explanation requires an astonishing level of technical ignorance to be accepted. They claim he used some camera device designed to detect nuclear installations that somehow managed to pick up underwater wrecks on a craft with less technology than a modern smartphone. At that time a craft moving at 7600 meters per second with the available optics could just about identify an object the size of a city block. Two years after this using better equipment Cooper was unable to take usable pictures or provide data on where the pictures were taken, despite having a 2nd crewman to help this time. These facts are from NASA's own log files from the mission.

If that wasn't problematic enough, Darrell Miklos's father is a known scam artist who cons people into handing over money to fund treasure hunts at which point he disappears with the money. Gordon Cooper himself was involved in several well documented scams and shady business dealings later in his life, he also told a lot of provable lies and fanciful stories.