Victor Danell’s Watch The Skies (also known as UFO Sweden) is a sci-fi drama that begins with a daughter’s impossible dream of finding her missing father, and it gradually evolves into a heartwarming tale of found families and friendships. Denise, a teenager growing up in Sweden during the 90s, was pretty much a tech genius. She could easily hack into pretty much anything. And these little thrills were her only source of joy. Denise grew up in foster homes after her father, a UFO hunter, went missing one night in 1988. She despised her father and everything he stood for, and she was convinced that he’d always been chasing a mirage. But her opinion changed drastically after her father’s red Saab landed on a barn in the neighborhood. The farmer claimed that the car fell from the sky, and naturally no one believed him, and it was concluded that he was heavily drunk. But Denise was sure that it was her father’s car, so how did it end up at the farm?
Spoiler Alert
What did the data from the SMHI reveal?
After figuring out that her father’s hypothesis might have been true, Denise approached UFO Sweden. It was a club formed by space enthusiasts, and her father used to be a member. Denise stated that according to her father, there was a connection between UFO sightings and erratic weather conditions. And the night the red Saab was said to have fallen out of the sky, the papers had reported it would rain heavily, but it didn’t rain at all; along with this, the unexplainable power cut added to the mystery. She added that she went to the barn to check the car, and while the number plate was gone, her father’s cassette tape was still there, which led her to the conclusion that it was indeed her father’s car. The group initially dismissed her theory; they believed a similar cassette tape could’ve been bought, and moreover, there was no evidence to prove her theory, and without facts, they refused to proceed. Denise showed Uno’s theory and equation, according to which he’d predicted where UFOs could be spotted. But Lennart strongly believed Uno was not on the right track. He’d had a major falling out with Uno—in an attempt to help Uno by providing him confidential data, Lennart had ended up losing his job at the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute. He despised Uno because he had always proved to be selfish, and he never really thanked the people around him who had put their jobs and lives on the line for him. But the young members of the team were interested in giving Denise’s theory a chance. They voted in favor of further investigation. During their search for answers, they stumbled upon an SMHI weather station. Denise believed that the data the institute had gathered could help them find answers, but the group refused to break the law. Denise decided to break into the station and collect the data. The research manager, Kicki, showed up at the spot after a while, and Lennart grew all the more suspicious of SMHI. He wondered if they were using Uno’s equation to track UFOs, but of course, Kicki dismissed his theory. Lennart and the group helped Denise escape with the data. And on their way out of the spot, the sky suddenly turned red, and they spotted what seemed to be a UFO.
The data went on to reveal that Kicki had been studying anomalies in gravity since 25th November, 1988, the day Uno disappeared. Denise was all the more convinced that the SMHI knew that there was a connection with her father’s disappearance and his UFO research. Gunnar, the eldest member of UFO Sweden, was completely against Denise’s decision to dig deeper, but the rest of the group were equally curious. They once again voted in favor of Denise, and this time Lennart supported her.
Was there an UFO underwater?
Denise was confident that if they searched thoroughly enough, they would come across the UFO near the area where they last spotted it. But the equipment they had was inadequate for the mission, resulting in Denise’s frustration. She stated that if she could hack into the SMHI network, she could triangulate the impact site. But Lennart refused to let her do it, and Denise lost her temper. Lennart was not ready to put their organization at risk, while Denise didn’t really care about the team. Just when Denise lost all hope, Tomi showed up. They had developed an unlikely friendship—Tomi was the one who’d found Denise at Uno’s study after he disappeared, and she’d been supporting her since she was a little child. She wanted Denise to live a normal life, and she was afraid that she would fall into the same trap that her father did. She’d lately started to suspect that Denise was working with the UFO Sweden, but she needed to find evidence. After the power outage at the SMHI station, Tomi spoke to Kicki and offered to help her find the stolen data. But every time Tomi thought she was close to catching UFO Sweden red-handed, she missed the chance. Kicki had granted Tomi access to her network in the hopes of finding the silver foil hats. She ended up seeking Denise’s help to crack the case, and the minute Denise got access to SMHI’s data, she faxed herself all the information she needed.
By the time Tomi figured out what had gone down, Denise had left. After going through the data, she’d come to the conclusion that the UFO was underwater. The association, except Gunnar, who refused to be a part of it, used a strong magnet to detect the presence of the UFO. The minute they noticed ripples in the lake water, they knew they were close to finding the truth. They pulled and pulled even though the weight of the object made it a very challenging task. While Lennart and the rest wondered if they must reconsider, Denise was insistent that they keep on going. They’d put their lives at risk to prove Denise/Uno’s theory only to find an airplane underwater. Denise refused to believe that it was all a big mistake. In a moment of frustration, Denise revealed that she had gathered the data by hacking the SMHI data, and Lennart was disappointed in her. Denise added that she couldn’t have made progress using their amateur methods, and she did what she thought was for the best. Lennart refused to continue working with her. She lacked the team spirit that the association was all about. She wanted their help, but she didn’t really value them. Lennart expressed that he cared about the association because at the end of the day they were all great friends. Denise scoffed at the remark and added they were just a bunch of freaks. This offended the team, and they immediately left.
How did Denise fix her relationship with Lennart?
Tomi managed to track down Denise while she was staring at the broken plane in complete disappointment. She arrested Denise, and they were on their way to the police station. Denise watched the plane being taken away, and she noticed the number on it (DK-2342), and she was reminded that this was the same plane that had gone missing over the Baltic Sea. She asked Tomi to stop the car, but she refused to listen. Denise was desperate, and she ended up crashing the car. She made it out of the accident alive, and she noticed that Tomi was also breathing and help was on the way. Denise immediately went back to meet UFO Sweden at their office, and she tried to explain that the plane ending up at the lake just like her father’s car that landed from the sky could not be a coincidence. She believed that they were very close to solving the mystery, and perhaps all they needed to do was ask for Kicki’s help since she too was equally invested in UFOs. While Gunnar made sure no one sided with Denise, to his surprise, Lennart offered to help her. Since the rest of the team was not willing to take the risk, or at least they were afraid of offending Gunnar, Lennart decided to assist Denise. She had apologized for the past remarks, and she added that it was impossible for her to do it all alone and she needed their help. Lennart didn’t lose faith in Denise; he surrendered his ‘UFO Sweden’ pin and walked out of the office with Denise.
Why did Denise choose Lennart over her father?
They managed to sneak into the SMHI office, and Denise finally spoke to Kicki. She showed her Uno’s equation and hoped that they could solve it together. Kicki didn’t mind doing it together as long as they could find answers. And they finally did—through the equation, they deduced that the gravitational deviations were on an Einstein-Rosen bridge, also known as a wormhole. According to Lennart and Kicki, the plane and the car ended up in strange places because of the wormhole, and they believed Uno was not in the car because he’d possibly stepped out of the car to be with the ones who’d created the wormhole to make time travel a possibility. Denise was hellbent on finding the next wormhole. Meanwhile, Gunnar, out of spite, had contacted the local police station and warned them that UFO Sweden would blow down the SMHI building. Since the rest of the team ultimately decided to stand by Lennart and Denise, he thought that they deserved to be punished. The cops got hold of Lennart and Denise, but their friends came to help them. They drove the same red Saab that Gunnar got from the police dumping ground just to prove Denise wrong. At the time, she thought it was a mistake because she was confident that the car she’d seen at the barn was her father’s. But Gunner had ownership proof suggesting that it was Uno’s car. Denise and Lennart managed to get in the car, and they tried to drive away from the cops. But the chase continued, and they ended up at the top floor of a multistory carpark.
After learning about the wormhole, Lennart figured that if the red Saab was meant to end up in the barn, it was impossible for them to crash even if they drove the car off the building. It was a mad idea, but it was the only way to prove the hypothesis. They figured putting their lives on the line one last time to find out the truth was better than surrendering to the cops and never finding out what lies on the other side. So, Denise and Lennart together decided to drive the car off the building. Even though it was scary, their theory was proved right. The car didn’t crash; instead, they went into a wormhole, and they ended up in the barn, and it was snowing heavily. It looked like an alternate reality that was almost coming to a crash, and Denise knew she had to find her father before the wormhole closed. After walking in the storm for a while, she noticed her father in the distance. She called out to him, and he couldn’t believe that she had made it on the other side. He asked her to come along to explore the universe with him. When Denise hesitated, her father told her to quickly decide since ‘they’ were waiting for him and he needed to go before the wormhole closed. Denise chose to walk away from her father.
After everything she’d been through, Denise realized that her father had never prioritized her. He was more concerned about being with ‘them’ than going home with his daughter. Even though they were tied by blood, Denise didn’t feel any emotional connection with him. Instead, she felt the desperate need to head back and find Lennart, who was bleeding from his leg after a shard of glass accidentally pierced it.
In Watch The Skies’ ending, Denise chose Lennart because, unlike her father, he was there for her. He believed her and firmly stood by her when things got complicated. He was her family and she knew it was her responsibility to protect him. She ran back to him, and they tried to make it to the barn, but the wormhole started to close rapidly. They gave up, and they embraced the once-in-a-lifetime experience. When they woke up, they found themselves in the year 1998 (two years into the future), on a film set. Karl, the field inspector of UFO Sweden, received a call confirming that Denise and Lennart were finally found.
Who helped them return home?
In what seemed to Denise and Lennart like only a few moments, two years had passed, but thankfully they were reunited with their found family. The red Saab was destroyed at Lennart’s scrapyard, and Tomi finally seemed to have forgiven Denise after witnessing the red Saab disappear after falling from the building with her own eyes. Lennart handed Denise mail he’d found in the UFO Sweden mailbox. Denise seemed quite secretive about it. Lennart wondered if what she was hiding could explain how they managed to make it to their hometown in 1998 despite the infinite places and timelines they could have ended up in. Denise hinted that they got help, but they refused to reveal the entire secret. The ending suggests that perhaps it was the aliens that her father had become a part of who helped them go back to their hometown safely since they were pretty much lost. Maybe Denise found a way to stay in touch with her father or his new friends so that they could learn more about the universe and time travel. The possibilities remain infinite!
