La Planète des Singes

The television series of The Planet Of The Apes is not as good as the films, but is still worth a watch.It lacks the originality of the films. The series is set 893 years before the original film and it seems that in this time humans can talk, this means that over the next 893 years humans lose the power of speech and become more wild. One thing i did notice, though, is that dogs are alive...Now this is impossible considering the movie fact that dogs(along with cats) died out, thus opening up the way for apes to become pets, and eventually servants, and soon became intelligent like humans.This series of Planet Of The Apes was released on video in two limited edition box sets in Australia. I now own all five films and all thirteen episodes on video.I am now eagerly awaiting the release of Return To The Planet Of The Apes (the animated series) on video. I am also looking for the Behind The Scenes Video about the films.

I have just finished watching the Planet of the Apes Tv series, which I decided to do since I happen to be a great fun of the original movie.

Watching it definetly did not let me down, as I was always interested to follow the adventurers in the endless trouble they got into all the time and good job was made to make sure viewers would be interested throughout.

The only downfall was that the original idea of the astronauts to escape and find some computer from the old days an establish what really happened was abandoned, therefore downgrading the plot.

7/10

PLANET OF THE APES was a show that stressed dialouge over brawn; Talk over heft and firepower. The tv show was big on words and had some good art direction yet alas, only lasted 14 episodes. The series featured creative people who worked on STAR TREK and had a quality to it seen prominently in the episode about the prison fishermen. The show at times had a flair of genius in production values and props. PLANET OF THE APES was a genre show in a era before big syndicated sci fi had found a market (except SPACE 1999). The series as a whole was not bad but it was not all it could have been either. There were questions raised in the films left unexplored that could have been delved into by the series. I recommend the DVD set to serious fans.

I loved watching this show on Friday night as a teenager. It lacked the action of the feature films, but was nonetheless interesting fare. Ron Harper and James Naughton had good on-screen chemistry with always-great Roddy McDowell. This show could have had a good run with a better time slot and run later in the night so more violence could be featured. This was a great cast that should have been given more than 14 episodes to show their stuff.

The Planet of the Apes TV series is often unfairly criticised (as are the four film sequels) for falling far short of the epoch-making original movie.

However, there is much to be enjoyed for PotA devotees and the less committed alike. The three leading characters of Galen, Virdon and Burke are all instantly likeable and well acted, Mark Lenard is superb as their pursuer Urko, who is second as a Gorilla commander only to James Gregory's peerless performance as Ursus in "Beneath") and Booth Colman evokes Maurice Evans as Zauis (although this Zauis cannot be the same ape as played by Evans in the first two films). Many fine and memorable guest roles throughout and interesting - if slightly repetitive - storylines add up to a satisfying series.

The only downside is the somewhat corny dialogue - especially certain lines spoken by Burke - which rob a number of scenes of their effectiveness.