Aliens in the Outfield is the most popular show in Bluff City, created by Bluff City Studios. There was a delay in the completion of the pilot episode due to the writers' strike. It airs on the local TV Guide channel at 9pm.
The show is a hour-long dramedy/mockumentary, with production elements similar to Sports Night or The Office. As the show is set during the 2008 recession, it features anxieties over the potential future, while the aliens are shown not understanding why we "put up with" large corporations and foreclosures.
The premise of the show is that aliens land in America and meet Frankie Bianchi, a minor league player/manager, who protects them by recruiting them into his baseball team, the Bluff City Blackjacks (and also the travel documentary the baseball team must film as part of a funding deal). This serves the aliens well, as this enables them to travel across America to gather footage for their real mission: proving that the Earth should not be destroyed.
Although the way, the aliens must avoid being discovered by a major league scout who is also a former UFO expert and compete with their rivals in both baseball and their alien mission: the Bloomington Blooms. Both groups of aliens report up to The Station Manager, a shadowy figure who speaks in low rumbles.
The show has a running gag of "alien swears":
- Chez = fuck
- Fuck = shit
Opening Credits
A baseball bat hitting a ball, followed by a montage of the aliens antiquing interspersed with shots of them playing baseball as the theme song plays.
Sets
- Frankie Bianchi's house
- Frankie's office (in his unfinished basement, which he stopped working on when his career in the major leagues stopped, and features a pool table and easy chair, no carpet, concrete)
- The video editing desk in the half-finished basement
- The Blackjacks' traveling documentary production van
- The Blackjacks team bus
- The baseball stadium
- The concession stand
- The pitcher’s mound/field
- The dugout
- The alien's hidden spaceship (in bottom level of parking garage of the stadium, covered by tarp)
- The locker room
- The small room set up for Keith Carberry inside of his locker
- The Chez Chez Motel Apartments
- The alien's hotel room
- Chez's front desk