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V is a two-part 1983 NBC sci-fi miniseries, written and directed by Kenneth Johnson. It starred Jane Badler, Marc Singer, Faye Grant, Michael Durrell, Jenny Sullivan, Richard Herd, Peter Nelson, David Packer, Blair Tefkin, Diane Civita and Robert Englund. It was followed by a three-part 1984, V: The Final Battle, introducing Michael Ironside, and a TV series, V (sometimes referred to as V: The Series) during the 1984-1985 TV season. According to Johnson's website, a new made-for-TV movie is planned for 2007. *
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Premise
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Aliens, who appear human, arrive on Earth in a fleet of huge saucer-like motherships, which they park over all major cities. They have come from the fourth planet from the star Sirius, and they appear to be friendly, seeking the help of humans to obtain chemicals to aid their own world. In return, the Visitors promise to share their advanced technology with humanity. The governments of Earth accept, and the Visitors gain considerable influence with authorities.
However, strange things are soon noted. Scientists find themselves facing increasing media hostility, and government restrictions on their activities and movements. Others, particularly those keen on examining the Visitors more closely, disappear. Noted scientists confess to subversive activities; some exhibiting other unusual behavior, such as suddenly demonstrating an opposite hand preference to the one they are known to have.
TV cameraman Michael Donovan (Singer) sneaks aboard one of the Visitors' motherships and discovers that beneath their humanlike facade, the aliens are reptilian in nature, and carnivorous - preferring to eat live food, like rodents and birds. Donovan gets some of this on tape, but just as this exposé is about to air, the broadcast is interrupted by a Visitor announcement, suddenly making Donovan a fugitive, pursued by both the police and the Visitors.
As the miniseries progresses, the Visitors' agenda is revealed: they plan to steal all of the Earth's water and harvest the human race as food, leaving only a few as slaves and soldiers/cannon fodder for the Visitors' wars with other alien races. The scientists are persecuted - both to discredit them, the part of the human population most likely to discover the Visitors' secrets, and to distract the rest of the population with a scapegoat upon whom they could focus their fears.
Key human individuals are subjected to a special mind control process called "conversion", which turns them into the Visitors' pawns, leaving only subtle behavioral clues to this manipulation. Some other humans, on the other hand (including Mike Donovan's mother), willingly collaborate with the Visitors, seduced by their power.
A resistance movement is formed, determined to expose and oppose the Visitors as much as possible. The Los Angeles cell leader is Dr. Juliet (Julie) Parish. Donovan is later assimilated into the group. Soon, the members of the resistance strike their first blows against the Visitors. Meanwhile, there are dissidents among the Visitors (known as the Fifth Column), lead by Martin, who are opposed to their leader's plans and attempt to help the Resistance.
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Influences
Series creator Kenneth Johnson has said that the story was inspired by the 1935 novel It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis, but a quick check at the library will show that several scenes from the original TV pilot were lifted directly from the Bertolt Brecht play The Private Life of the Master Race. The opening half-hour of the movie, though not the outcome, resembles the introductory chapter of Arthur C. Clarke's 1953 novel Childhood's End. A short story entitled To Serve Man (later adapted into an episode of The Twilight Zone) had a similar theme of deceptively friendly aliens secretly cultivating humans for food.
In a commentary track on the DVD release of the first miniseries, Johnson reveals that V was originally intended as a straightforward political thriller, charting the rise of a fascist movement in the United States. NBC was interested in a sci-fi hit, to capitalize on the success of films such as the Star Wars trilogy.
The story remains a Nazi allegory, right down to the Swastika-like emblem used by the Visitors. Later, throughout the TV series, the Resistance Network's TV news bulletins report stories of erstwhile enemies uniting in common cause against the alien occupiers, such as black and white South Africans (the series was produced when South Africa was still under Apartheid). In addition, direct figure analogies are used, such as the senior Visitor scientist, Diana, who is a direct analogue of Dr. Josef Mengele.
The miniseries ran for 200 minutes and was successful enough to spawn a sequel, V: The Final Battle, which was meant to conclude the story, and a television series in 1984—1985 that revived it. Johnson left V during The Final Battle and went on to work on other science fiction shows, like Alien Nation. Perhaps as a result, the sequel and TV series had less of an emphasis on historical allegory and complex characters and their inter-relations, and was more action-oriented.
The cancellation of the TV series in the spring of 1985 appeared to have caught its producers by surprise, as the season ends with a cliffhanger. The TV series' single season was released on DVD in 2004. That same year, Kenneth Johnson announced plans to produce a sequel to the first V miniseries, but one that would disregard both The Final Battle and the subsequent weekly series. In October 2004, Kenneth Johnson made it known that NBC has decided it wants a remake of the original V miniseries, rather than a sequel. The possibility of a sequel of the original would remain open, but would be contingent on the success of the remake. This may have been reversed, however, as according to Kenneth Johnson's website a filmed version of the upcoming book V: The Second Generation will be released sometime in the future. A notable change is that the new filmed version is planned as a 3-hour TV movie rather than a new miniseries.
The concept of lizard-like aliens who appear human, and who plot to control humanity, is similar to some fringe theories — see Reptiloid.
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Characters
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Episode Guide (V: The Series)
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Trivia
In the original miniseries and The Final Battle, the Visitors' voices were given, among other post-processing, a pitch shift effect - to give them an otherworldly demeanor even though they looked (outwardly, at least) like normal human beings. This was dropped from the weekly series, evidently due to budgetary constraints. No explanation was ever given for the change; it was simply treated as if the Visitors never had unusual-sounding voices at all. However this did create a plot conflict, as in the miniseries, part of the plot involved simulating alien voices, but in the TV series aliens are easily mistaken for human. In certain dubbed versions, like the French, the Visitors had a deep bass voice, while in German, the pitch shift was maintained throughout the entire series.
In the UK the miniseries and its sequel were shown concurrently, across five nights on ITV opposite the BBC's coverage of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games, leading one critic to point out that the schedule presented a choice between "seeing a lot of people running and jumping in LA… or watching the Olympics".
An interesting aspect of the 1984-85 series which is never explained is the complete absence of any military or political authorities following the return of the Visitors. Although police are seen, as are Science Frontiers' own forces, at no point is any reference made to the military forces of any nation, or of the federal, state and civic governments of the United States and other nations (thus allowing businessmen like Nathan Bates to assume absolute power over parts of the country).
NBC initially refused to air the third episode of the TV series, "Breakout", as the network felt it was too violent for the intended family audience, even though the episode introduced the regular character, Kyle Bates. The next episode, "The Deception", was rewritten so that Kyle is introduced again. "Breakout" was finally aired in 1985 when NBC reran the series following its cancellation. As a result, viewers saw Kyle Bates introduced to the same Resistance fighters twice.
In 1989, Warner Bros. commissioned J. Michael Straczynski (who would later go on to create Babylon 5) to write a pilot screenplay for a proposed new series, tentatively titled V: The Next Chapter, that would have continued the V storyline. Picking up five years after the end of the NBC series, it would have followed the efforts of a new Resistance movement on a conquered Earth to make contact with the "Outsiders," the faction of the Visitors' own people who oppose their Leader, who had finally responded to a summons put out at the end of the original miniseries. The only character from the older V to appear in this script was Ham Tyler. After numerous drafts, the script, entitled "The Rebirth," was finally abandoned when the studio decided it would be too cost-prohibitive to produce.
Dominique Dunne was originally cast to play the role of Robin Maxwell, but was strangled and killed by her abusive ex-boyfriend John Thomas Sweeney after she refused to reconcile with him. One shot of her, from the rear, remains in the original mini-series.
Shots of mother ships over various foreign cities were paintings made before the model of the ship was finalized and built; as a result, the foreign mother ships appear different from one another, with different edge-on profiles.
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Books and comics
V spun off a series of original novels, including a novelization of the first two mini-series combined into one story. Unusually, most of the original novels that followed did not feature characters from the TV series, but rather focused on battles against the alien invaders in other parts of the world. While the series was on the air, new novels were published once a month by Pinnacle Paperbacks. In 1987-88, a new series of novels was published by Tor.
Prisoners and Pawns (Howard Weinstein) - March 1985 ISBN 0-523-42439-6
The Crivit Experiment (Allen L. Wold) - May 1985 ISBN 0-523-42466-3
The New England Resistance (Tim Sullivan) - June 1985 ISBN 0-523-42467-1
Death Tide (Ann C. Crispin) - July 1985 ISBN 0-523-42469-8
The Texas Run (George W. Proctor) - September 1985 ISBN 0-523-42470-1
Path to Conquest (Howard Weinstein) - September 1987 ISBN 0-8125-5725-5
To Conquer the Throne (Tim Sullivan) - November 1987 ISBN 0-8125-5727-1
Below the Threshold (Allen L. Wold) - March 1988 ISBN 0-8125-5732-8
Symphony of Terror (Somtow Sucharitkul) - May 1988 ISBN 0-8125-5482-5
The first three books were republished in 1994.
The first book novelises both the miniseries, but has subtle differences, including killing off several characters that do not die in the televised version. This includes Chris Farber, leading to confusion about his return in V: The Series.
Meanwhile, DC Comics published an 18-issue V comic book series in 1985-86, with stories set to be concurrent with the events of V: The Series. The editor of the comic reported at one point in the letter (fan mail) column that DC was working to acquire permission to continue the storyline of the television series should it not be renewed for a second season. In the end, either such permission was denied or DC decided not to pursue the matter further; the V comic ended without resolving any of the plot threads left dangling by the series' cliffhanger finale, though one of the comic's final storylines did lead directly into the events of the finale.
On his website, Kenneth Johnson announced recently that he will be publishing the novel: "V, The Second Generation" featuring original and new characters. The novel will go on sale in early 2007, and a filmed version is planned for an unspecified (and constantly delayed) time in the future.
Underground computer programmer David Menuhin has announced that he is producing an online V multi-media trivia game. Unfortunately, production has run into difficulties due to copyright issues, and as of August 2006, Menuhin has still not obtained express permission to use all the sounds and images from the series.
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