À l'aube de notre histoire

Okay, so I watched this cause I'm an archaeology buff and I have to say I'm divided. On the one hand, this guy has a perfectly believable point which is that History as we know it is basically incomplete because we are missing large parts of time in our records due to war and cataclysm. That's a theory I can absolutely get behind. He essentially states that we have forgotten more ancient, advanced civilisations than we currently know. So in this theory Sumeria is not the oldest by far and human "civilised" history is actually several millenia older. Again I might be inclined to get behind that. He chalks up this amnesia to the ice age and willing ignorance from the academia. Having been in the academia myself I cam confirm that it can be stifling place full of people who are extremely reluctant to admit they might not hold the absolute, final truth so again far enough. But then it takes a turn into crazy Mulder conspiracy land. Not only is academia narrow-minded and humankind amnesiac, no. The truth is that all ancient civilisations are descended from a single super ancient, super advanced forgotten civilisation. And the evidence for this is that a bunch of them have kind of similar legends about their origins. So basically I sorta of agree with his premise but his conclusion is banana pants. He completely throws out the scientific method and he absolutely does cherry pick his legends and his facts. Being from one of the countries he visits and talks about I can confirm that the legends of my country he chose isn't even the most common one. This guy uses a very effective method to try and convince people which is he mixes up facts with the unknown and people's inherent desire for the mysterious to have meaning and then leads you down a very odd rabbit hole. I'm giving it 6 stars cause some of the things he says and presents are interesting enough that I'll read about them later on but also because he kinda goes down a cray cray path there. Oh and one star down because he talked to Joe Rogan.

This isn't a very well made show at all. It feels like something they made for a NatGeo show back in the 2000s but much less factual. The amount of slow-motion, pan-over drone shots of the worksite and Graham Hancock power-posing seem to outnumber the frames that actually meaningfully push the content forward.

Essentially the show continuously presents archaeological evidence that refutes the typical timeline of human history, which Hancock insists must be because of this advanced ancient civilization we've lost contact with. There's no evidence though of these mystical capabilities.

It genuinely feels like Graham Hancock is just showing up to various active archeological sites with a film crew, asking the workers questions, and then splicing out the parts of the interview that may further the ongoing narrative. I'm not convinced that the archaeologists presenting their findings are doing so in support of his theory, they're just having individual frames of content being mined out of interviews and interaction.

Why is this concerning? It's a film that has been made professionally enough to be called documentary even though it's not factual. Someone who doesn't really have a whole lot of attachment to the issue would probably entertain this as a factual documentary without looking too critically at it. And someone who is a genuine conspiracy theorist would allow this to feedback into their disbelief in genuine science anyway.

Could go on on, but I'll stop here.

If his motivation for making this film was merely asking questions about natural phenomenons & seemingly, forgotten landmarks, then this show has some defining moments. I do feel like he throws around a lot of dates, and treats thousands of years very loosely in his episodes, but his David Attenborough oration made this show more entertaining. The music & zoomed in angles made some moments a little overdramatic, which disconnected our thoughts from the story. Was the show thought provoking, yes, was is it entirely factually supported, no. This show has created many good questions & raised some interesting hypotheses. Why does a show like this create an apocalypse of his own, an a apocalypse of vitriol. His ideas are interesting, and this creates more investigations in to these suggestions. One thing we know, is those sites exist, and the monoliths and sites are old, so someone must have built them with more knowledge then clubs & loin clothes. This is indeed a thought provoking show, but remember, he is still throwing out ideas. If anything, this show has an entertainment value, but if this show doesn't provide accuracy to the ancient culture of forgotten history, then at least the show has shed some light on the current academic narrow mindedness of ancient history already has been answered. Whether you agreed with his viewpoint or not, we can see how this show has created interesting conversations & intriguing further study.

Having read both the scholarly papers for archaeological sites as well as Graham's books over the last few decades, they both seem to be at war with each other. While thought provoking, vivid, and beautifully filmed, this documentary falls short on what could have been a great response to "big archaeology" by Graham.

His theories are beginning to gain steam. However, I can't help but wonder how many of the individuals he interviews (including himself) are victims to selection bias. Some of his speculations brought forth in the episode (specifically the Sirius one) seem so far-fetched that it often feels like he's drawing conclusions from nothing. I was hoping this documentary would be more detailed. Unfortunately, it is very clear it was made for entertainment instead of data. I hope, if one is green-lit, a sophomore effort will be more detailed, both for our sake and for Graham's sake. I think it would benefit the masses and academia alike to consider non-mainstream ideas. My final thought-Archaeologists require massive funding for monumental projects- just food for thought on how money (and who owns it) can control a narrative. Graham's work here aims to poke holes in that narrative.

An old conspiracy theories believes he knows more than actual archaeologists and is so I'll researched that he can't even get basic dates for the sites he uses correctly. Netflix really just sunk their money into this oil spill of a ship for people to pretend they know what they're talking about.

How about making an actual documentary series with established real archaeologists who have actual credentials and experience instead of letting this wrinkled legume get off on his own ego and drag every pseudoscience loving freak with him. If you have an interest in history just do some research but don't take the steps back that watching this mess would take you.