Hopeless "alien invasion" TV series...

[DarKush]

I don't think it's the premise, but the execution which dooms alien invasion series. There was another one, The First Wave, that came out on Sci-Fi channel a few years ago.

With Threshold, the cast was good, but it was too vanilla. It needed a gritter, harder edge to it. Invasion did move too slow. Surface felt hokey to me. I did enjoy Dark Skies though I wasn't a faithful viewer and I also enjoyed War of the Worlds. With V, the series never matched up to the two miniseries, particularly the first.

I agree with the english that a lot of these shows probably could've worked in a limited format better than a multiple seasons series.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

War of the Worlds - I loved this show as a kid. The special effects were campy at times but the stories always gripped me. Bought season one last year and watched it straight thru in about two weeks. I don't remember season two but it was apparently pretty bad.

Oh boy, do you ever remember correctly. WOTW Season 2 was a total weird fest. What the hell were they thinking, anyway?

 

[Tom]

You can include Earth Final Conflict, that lasted 5 seasons

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Threshold, hmmm. The premise had potential and I did like the cast. Hard to know how that one could have turned out.

I got the impression Threshold would probably continue the way it was. Interesting premise. Mostly stand-alone, but a slowly building plot. The stakes would continue to get higher. But, in spite of all that, the writing wouldn't be quite up to par to sell the series and it would never stand out from other shows.

 

[Anthony Sabre]

War of the Worlds - I loved this show as a kid. The special effects were campy at times but the stories always gripped me. Bought season one last year and watched it straight thru in about two weeks. I don't remember season two but it was apparently pretty bad.

Oh boy, do you ever remember correctly. WOTW Season 2 was a total weird fest. What the hell were they thinking, anyway?

I wish I could remember! But from the posts I've read on other boards, it was horribly done. Basically a reboot, right in the middle of a series.

 

[archeryguy1701]

Surface was originally described as an alien invasion series in the early press materials, although I'm not sure of whether those plans were changed in reaction to the cancellation notice or whether they had already been changed prior to that.

I would imagine the plans were changed pretty early. If I remember correctly, it was on the same channel as Invasion, and an alien invasion plot just doesn't seem like the sort of story that ABC would double up on.

 

[Anthony Sabre]

You can include Earth Final Conflict, that lasted 5 seasons

I came across that one while searching for First Wave. I'll probably check out both, though FW doesn't seem to be on DVD yet.

 

[Out Of My Vulcan Mind]

Surface was originally described as an alien invasion series in the early press materials, although I'm not sure of whether those plans were changed in reaction to the cancellation notice or whether they had already been changed prior to that.

I would imagine the plans were changed pretty early. If I remember correctly, it was on the same channel as Invasion, and an alien invasion plot just doesn't seem like the sort of story that ABC would double up on.

Surface was on NBC, while Invasion was on ABC and Threshold was on CBS.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Surface was originally described as an alien invasion series in the early press materials, although I'm not sure of whether those plans were changed in reaction to the cancellation notice or whether they had already been changed prior to that.

I would imagine the plans were changed pretty early. If I remember correctly, it was on the same channel as Invasion, and an alien invasion plot just doesn't seem like the sort of story that ABC would double up on.

Surface was on NBC, while Invasion was on ABC and Threshold was on CBS.

Which in itself was weird. Surface was a CBS show, Invasion maybe ABC but more like NBC and Threshold was definitely Fox. No wonder they all flopped!

 

[Mr. Adventure]

^^ Hmm, interesting, Invasion definitely feels CBS to me.

 

[Out Of My Vulcan Mind]

It was felt that Threshold might work on CBS because it could follow something of a procedural format, rather than a heavily serialized one. That was certainly the approach taken in the earlier episodes, but most of them were dull as dishwater. They tried to juice up the series towards the end, but it was too late.