Alien stories have a way of revealing the viewer before they reveal the creature.

With Steven Spielberg returning to alien sci-fi in Disclosure Day this week, some old questions are floating back into the conversation. What would it mean if we were not alone? Would it stir our wonder, rattle our faith, or simply give us another reason to believe what we already believed?

That’s part of the genre’s strange power. The same light in the sky can feel like a miracle, a warning, or even a mystery waiting to be solved. Because long before the alien arrives, the viewer has already brought something into the room.

Sci-fi is always reaching past the edge of what we can explain. It asks what might be out there, but it also has a way of exposing what is already in us — the fear, the hope, the suspicion. The longing to know we are not alone, and the deeper longing to know whether anyone is watching over us.

A Christian worldview doesn’t make those questions smaller. It actually gives them weight. It reminds us that discernment isn’t the same as suspicion, and wonder isn’t the same as naivety.

When a story steps into the unknown, the question isn’t only what the filmmaker wants us to see. It’s what we brought with us when we started watching.

M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs follows Graham Hess, a former pastor trying to raise his family after the death of his wife. When crop circles appear in his fields, and strange reports spread across the world, the threat feels both personal and impossible to understand. The film endures because its alien invasion is never just about aliens. It’s about grief, providence, and whether the pieces of a broken life can still point toward meaning.

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Brian Duffield’s No One Will Save You begins with a familiar nightmare. A young woman is alone in her house when she realizes something is inside. Kaitlyn Dever plays Brynn, an outcast carrying a past her town refuses to forget. As the alien threat closes in, the film becomes less about escape than exposure. What first looks like a survival story slowly becomes a reckoning with guilt, isolation, and the need to be forgiven.

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In No One Will Save You, Brynn lives alone, keeps to herself, and moves through town like someone who knows she isn't welcome there. Her past is revealed slowly, but the people around her no longer seem to need the pieces. They have their conclusion — she is guilty, marked, and not worthy of redemption.

Brian Duffield's film becomes more interesting than a simple invasion story. Duffield, who has been described as a former missionary kid, has been open to religious readings of the movie without turning it into one clean allegory. The aliens don’t arrive with an obvious meaning attached to them, but they force a deeper question: what does it mean to be seen clearly?

For most of the film, Brynn is trapped between the town's judgment and her own shame. The invasion breaks that closed loop in a way that’s terrifying and strangely personal. By the end, the movie leaves viewers in an uncomfortable place — has Brynn been saved, accepted, or simply understood by the only beings willing to look at her without the town's old verdict?

That's where the film becomes a test of perception. Some viewers may see trauma. Others may feel the pull of judgment, forgiveness, or spiritual deception. The movie doesn't settle the question for us. It lets our assumptions start speaking.

For a faith-shaped audience, that ambiguity matters. The question isn't whether every alien image needs to be solved like a puzzle. It's whether the kind of acceptance Brynn receives can actually make her whole. No One Will Save You lingers because it understands that being seen is powerful, but being seen isn't always the same thing as being saved.

The results are in, and it’s a tie! 50% of you voted for New voices getting a shot and Original ideas breaking through in last week’s poll: What excites you most about YouTube-born filmmaking?

UFOs and God is a 90-minute documentary exploring the modern UFO conversation and what it means for Christians trying to think faithfully about the unexplained.

It's a timely project for a moment when alien stories are moving between entertainment, news, and belief. The film brings together scientists, theologians, researchers, and others to ask what happens when the unknown begins to shape how people see God, Scripture, and the unseen world.

That's what makes the project worth watching. It doesn't appear to dismiss the conversation outright or chase it uncritically. It steps into the tension, which is often where discernment has to start.

The project was previewed at the National Religious Broadcasters convention earlier this year, and the completed film is preparing for a wider release this fall. For now, supporting it means helping more people know it exists.

_{*Plumb News is not affiliated with "UFOs and God" and does not receive compensation for featuring it. We’re just highlighting it because we believe projects like this deserve support.}

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” – Romans 12:2 (ESV)

Most of us like to think we see clearly. We notice the clues. We understand the pattern. We know what kind of story we're watching before it's finished unfolding.

But Scripture gives us a more humble starting point. Our minds are always being shaped by something, whether it's fear, culture, or even our past wounds. Left alone, we don't simply become more objective. We become more practiced at seeing what we already expect to find.

That's why renewal matters. God doesn't call us to live suspicious of every mystery or naïve about every beautiful thing. He invites us to become people who can test, discern, and recognize what's good.

A renewed mind doesn't see less. It sees more truthfully.

Until next time,

THE PLUMB NEWS TEAM