Since pretty much everyone wants to drive a Tesla, you might as well know about the life and death of the guy Elon Musk’s car company is named after. Science Channel has ordered new series “Deadly Intelligence,” TheWrap has learned exclusively, which will tell you all abut Nikola Tesla and other geniuses who have suffered bizarre, shady deaths.
We’ve also got your first-look video from the upcoming series’ debut, which is posted above.
The premiere episode of “Deadly Intelligence” looks to uncover the death of Frank Olson (pictured above), a CIA employed biological warfare scientist, who died after falling out of the window of a New York City hotel in 1953. The official story is that he jumped, but his family believes he was murdered. One of the theories explored is that Olson, who witnessed brutal interrogations using biological agents he helped develop, may have developed misgivings about his work, leading the CIA to eliminate one of their own.
Each of the eight, hour-long episodes will follow experts as they attempt to unravel the cold-case mysterious deaths of cutting-edge scientists, each caught in a web of intrigue before their lives were cut short. Basically, did each of the subjects simply know too much?
“It’s said that knowledge is power, but in these compelling stories, knowledge is also tightly intertwined with mystery, conspiracy and perhaps even murder,” said Caroline Perez, vice president of Development and Production, Science Channel. “Innovative scientists have always run the risk of creating or discovering something so dangerous — or valuable — that others would kill for it.”
Other mysteries explored this season include Tesla, the father of the “Death Ray” who was found dead in a New York hotel room at the height of WWII; engineer Gerald Bull, who was gunned down outside of his Brussels apartment after his research in cutting-edge artillery made him a target among powerful associates; Jack Parsons, the Jet Propulsion Lab co-founder who had powerful enemies and has been suspected of espionage, and was killed in a suspicious lab explosion which may have been than a chemical mishap; American researcher Shane Todd whose 2012 death in Singapore was ruled a suicide, but the work he was doing on a futuristic semi-conductor may have been what really cost him his life.
“Deadly Intelligence” is produced for Science Channel by Beyond Productions. For Beyond Productions, Martyn Ives is executive producer and Nick Long is series producer. For Science Channel, Lindsey Foster Blumberg is supervising producer.
Science Channel’s “Deadly Intelligence” premieres on Sunday, April 8 at 10 p.m. ET/PT.