Theme: Other Planets

Other Planets refers to any other planet that is visited in the course of an SF film. The worlds of the Solar System are dealt with in more detail under Mars, Venus, The Moon and Journeys Inside the Solar System.

Visits to other planets were for many years (up until the 1950s) confined within the Solar System – the exception might be Flash Gordon’s Mongo. These were hardly scientific – most planets being represented with Earth-like atmosphere and inhabited or the unserious whimsies of Georges Melies where the Moon and Sun had faces.

Depictions of extra-solar planets began to enter in the Space Exploration films of the 1950s and in particular tv shows like Doctor Who (1963-89), Lost in Space (1965-8) and Star Trek (1966-9), which showed a widely inhabited galaxy beyond the Solar System – although in the majority of cases still inhabited by people that looked just like us, spoke English and lived on Earth-like planets. A large part of the reason for this being that creating non-human and exotic places was far more expensive than simply going on location in Bronson Canyon or the BBC Quarry.

The much more diverse galaxy started to come in in Star Wars (1977) and sequels, showing a galaxy of worlds and different environments – desert or ice worlds, forest moons, volcanic worlds. The new Star Trek series of the 1980s/90s created more exotic aliens with strange facial appliances. However, these were still all variants on humanoid aliens and earth-like planets for the most part.

Since this, not a huge amount is changed. There are plentiful films that depict well-inhabited galaxies. And a number of others that depict exotic worlds. However, with occasional exceptions, there are only a few works that have the imagination (or budget) to go for the truly exotic and different.