This has been bugging me for the longest time ... and I am new here so don't mind me if this question has been beat to death but does anyone know why they made the aliens look diferent in the tv series compared to the great 1953 motion picture?
shareWell, personally, I thought the aliens in the film looked rather weak, so the redesign for the series is an upgrade. They look stronger (which, I think gives even more irony to their fall from bacteria), and they have more of a bear-like bulk, which is reminicent of how the Martians are described in the novel.
But to answer your question: no one really knows for certain. I have a theory about the differences that ties into how no one remembers the real invasion, but the more bare-root theory, and others seem to follow this, is that it was simply done as an idea on how to improve the original design. Unlike the brilliantly done war machines, I don't think many would argue over the aliens looking rather lacklustre. And given some of things the aliens would be doing, I think the alteration worked better.
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Formless, faithless, and free.
Well, they really needed to be remade in order to be effective on 1988 television. Anyhow, as far as story continuity is concerned, I have always wondered if the martians didn't actually mutate while in those storage containers. I suppose it is possible. Perhaps had the rest of them arrived, they would look just like the ones from the 1953 film. Seeing that the show never continued to this point, we can certainly accept this as one of many possibilities. In all honesty, I think it was just a makeup upgrade that is really supposed to be unnoticed, kind of like the new Klingon makeup the suddenly appeared in Star Trek the Motion Picture! Just pretend like the martians always looked like this.
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