Planet of the Apes (TV series)

The series begins with the June 14, 3085[1] crash of an Earth spaceship that encountered a time warp while approaching Alpha Centauri on August 19, 1980.[2] The spaceship is manned by three astronauts, one of whom has died in the crash. The other two astronauts, Colonel Alan Virdon and Major Peter J. Burke, are unconscious but are rescued by a human who carries them to an old bomb shelter. After the human opens a book containing historical text and pictures of Earth circa 2500, the two astronauts are convinced that they are indeed on a future Earth.

The crash is also witnessed by a young chimpanzee who tells his father, a village official who alerts the authorities. Ape councilor Zaius (an analog of the character from the original movie), notes that another such incident occurred ten years earlier. He orders the chief gorilla, Security Chief Urko, to find the humans and bring them back alive. Zaius wants to find out as much as he can about the humans before they are eventually killed. Zaius doesn't trust Urko to follow his orders and bring back any surviving humans, so he sends along his newly hired chimpanzee assistant, Galen.

Both Virdon and Burke go back to their ship to check the ship's chronometer. They are more than 1000 years in the future from when they left Earth. Virdon insists on retrieving the ship's flight log in the hopes that they will be able to analyze it and be able to return to their own time period, but while they are at the ship, they are captured, and the old man is subsequently killed by a group of apes.

Galen finds the human book that the old man had been carrying. He reads parts of the book and begins to doubt the history that he has been told: apes have always been dominant, and humans have always been inferior and subservient. When Galen finds out that Urko has arranged for the two astronauts to escape and be killed in the attempt, he stops the shooter and helps the humans escape. During the escape, a guard is killed, and Galen is found standing over him with a gun in his hand.

Galen discusses the book that he found with Zaius, who then accuses him of heresy. Galen is sentenced to death for his crime. Then Virdon and Burke find out about his sentence and rescue Galen. They are all then declared enemies of the state and become fugitives. The three fugitives thereafter wander around the territory that used to be the western United States having various encounters with apes, humans, and old human civilization ruins.

Back row: James Naughton and Roddy McDowall; front: Ron Harper (1974).

L-R: Wayne Foster, Zina Bethune and Ron Harper.

Ron Harper and Roddy McDowall.

• Roddy McDowall as Galen, a young chimpanzee that is sent by Zaius with Urko to ensure the safety of two humans that have survived a crash landing on Earth. McDowall previously played Cornelius and Caesar throughout the various movie versions.
• Ron Harper as Colonel Alan Virdon, the human commander of the crash-landed spaceship from 20th Century Earth.
• James Naughton as Major Peter J. Burke, a human astronaut that also survived the crash.
• Mark Lenard as Security Chief Urko, a violent gorilla and the series' main antagonist.
• Booth Colman as Councillor Zaius, the highest-ranking member of the High Council of Central City in the year 3085.
• John Hoyt as Barlow, a chimpanzee prefect of Kaymak who had introduced gladiatorial fights between the humans in "The Gladiators", and whose horse later competes against Urko's in "The Horse Race".
• Jacqueline Scott, as a chimpanzee farmer's daughter Zantes in "The Good Seeds", and as Kira, Galen's chimpanzee ex-fianceé and surgeon, in "The Surgeon".

Discussions for a Planet of the Apes television series were made by producer Arthur P. Jacobs as early as 1971. Because of the success of the movies, the idea of a television series was delayed until after the completion of Battle for the Planet of the Apes during the first half of 1973.[3] However, soon after the premiere of Battle, Jacobs died, and his production company APJAC Productions sold all Planet of the Apes rights and privileges to 20th Century Fox.[4] Subsequently, television rights for the first three Planet of the Apes movies were sold to CBS and broadcast successfully during September 1973. Based largely on high viewership of "movie-of-the-week" television broadcasts of the first few movies, CBS began to disfavor other contenders for a new science-fiction series, including Gene Roddenberry's Genesis II (1973) and favor proposals for a Planet of the Apes television series.[5] Fox and CBS then continued Jacob's plans of a series the next year.[6]

CBS ordered 14 episodes of Planet of the Apes to be produced. The series was filmed for the most part on location at what is now Malibu Creek State Park, with a budget of about $250,000 for each episode.[7] Originally scheduled to be broadcast during CBS's Tuesday night family hour,[8] the first regular episode of the series was broadcast on Friday, September 13, 1974 from 8:00-9:00 PM. The remainder of the series was broadcast during this same time slot until December 27, 1974, when its 14th and final broadcast was shown as a result of a premature cancellation of the series due to poor ratings.[9]

The series' main theme music was composed by Lalo Schifrin; Schifrin also scored three episodes of the series - "Escape From Tomorrow," "The Gladiators" and "The Good Seeds" (the latter, though not the premiere episode, was the first to be scored). Earle Hagen composed the scores for "The Legacy" and "Tomorrow's Tide," while Richard LaSalle wrote an original score for "The Trap." In addition, three episodes received partial scores - Hagen composed one for "The Surgeon," LaSalle composed "The Deception," and music supervisor Lionel Newman composed his only music for the series with "The Interrogation" (those last three, like the other episodes, were otherwise tracked with the music composed previously).

• "Episode One" (written by Rod Serling as pilot episode; radically different from what was broadcast).
• "Episode Two" (written by Rod Serling as follow-up to his version of the pilot).
• "Hostage" (written by Stephen Kandel).
• "A Fallen God" (written by Anthony Lawrence).
• "The Trek" (written by Jim Byrnes).
• "Freedom Road" (written by Arthur Rowe).
• "The Mine" (written by Paul Savage).
• "The Trial" (written by Edward J. Lakso).

The scripts for "Episode One", "Episode Two", "Hostage" and "A Fallen God" are available online at Hunter's Planet of the Apes Archive.[11] Details regarding "The Trek," "Freedom Road," "The Mine," and "The Trial" were provided in issue 12 of Simian Scrolls (a Planet of the Apes-based magazine), reprinted from the television series writer's bible.[12]

The series was broadcast in the U.S. from September 13 to December 20, 1974. The show was canceled after half a season because of poor ratings due at least partly to direct competition by NBC's Sanford and Son and Chico and the Man. Only thirteen of its fourteen episodes were broadcast; all 14 episodes were later included in the DVD box set. It was later shown in reruns on the Sci Fi Channel.

The series was broadcast in Britain by 13 of the 14 ITV companies from 13 October 1974 each Sunday, until 18 January 1975. Scottish Television (STV) never broadcast it during 1974/75, opting to broadcast Sale of the Century instead. The show was repeated in many regions from September 1975 until 1978, but was still not broadcast by STV. The series then received its first UK-wide transmissions on Channel 4 in 1994, and later the Sci Fi Channel. The television movie compilations have also been screened on Sky Movies, True Movies, True Entertainment (which also broadcast the show in original form) and Horror Channel.

During 2019, MeTV began broadcasting the series as part of its late Saturday Night "Red Eye Sci-Fi" block.

In 1980, several episodes of the series were edited into five made-for-television movies.

• Back to the Planet of the Apes ("Escape from Tomorrow" & "The Trap")[13]
• Forgotten City of the Planet of the Apes ("Gladiators" & "Legacy")
• Treachery and Greed on the Planet of the Apes ("Horse Race" & "The Tyrant")
• Life, Liberty and Pursuit on the Planet of the Apes ("The Surgeon" & "The Interrogation")
• Farewell to the Planet of the Apes ("Tomorrow's Tide" & "Up Above The World So High")

When the Planet of the Apes telefilms began syndication, ABC's owned and operated stations, who bought them for their afternoon movie programs (with titles such as The 4:30 Movie), asked Roddy McDowall to re-create his role of Galen in a series of new beginnings and endings specifically for these stations, billed as "The New Planet of the Apes". The introductions created originally by 20th Century Fox to begin each film were replaced by a now-aged Galen (McDowall) examining the events of the telefilms. The beginnings and endings revealed Virdon and Burke's final fates: "They found their computer in another city and disappeared into space as suddenly as they’d arrived". According to "TV Zone Special #17" (1995 issue) McDowall filmed these "two years after the demise of the first run episodes of the Planet of the Apes television series", which would be December 1976. The ABC openings and closings of these telefilms were neither broadcast by other stations nor included on any home media release.[14]

Most of the books and comics based on Planet of the Apes are based on the movies, not the television series. However, there are some titles that do involve the television show characters:

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Planet of the Apes (TV series).

• Planet of the Apes at IMDb
• Planet of the Apes at TV.com
• Kassidy's POTA Television Series Site - Galen's final TV appearance, Argentine comics, screencaps, collectibles, articles, photos, books, stories and more
• Stories From Chalo a POTA TV website
• Mez's UK site - an older POTA TV site
• Hunter's Planet of the Apes Archive – Extensive fan site with information on all original films and series, with full television scripts, comics and other relevant material
• Planet of the Apes Media Archive – Multi-media website
• Planet of the Apes: The Forbidden Zone – One of the oldest and most complete Planet of the Apes sites
• Back to the Planet of the Apes at IMDb
• Forgotten City of the Planet of the Apes at IMDb
• Treachery and Greed on the Planet of the Apes at IMDb
• Life, Liberty and Pursuit on the Planet of the Apes at IMDb
• Farewell to the Planet of the Apes at IMDb