‘V’ pours old foes into new skins for remake

By Kate O8217Hare, Comments 0
Published: November 1, 2009
Modified: October 31, 2009 at 12:14 pm

Back in 1983, NBC aired the two-part science-fiction miniseries "V.” In 1984, NBC followed with another hit miniseries, "V: The Final Battle.”

NO ARCHIVE V - ABC's " V" stars Logan Huffman as Tyler Evans, Laura Vandervoort as Lisa, Scott Wolf as Chad Decker, Elizabeth Mitchell as Erica Evans, Joel Gretsch as Father Jack, Morena Baccarin as Anna, Morris Chestnut as Ryan Nichols and Lourdes Benedicto as Valerie. ( ABC/BOB D'AMICO)

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Despite that title, the network forged on with "V: The Series” later in 1984, with most of the original cast. It was short-lived and bad.

Normally, this sort of a history would bode better for a miniseries remake than a series, but on the other hand, "Battlestar Galactica” was a hit pilot that turned into a flop series in the ’70s, only to be revived in this decade as a critically acclaimed miniseries and series.

So ABC and Warner Bros. Television developed a "V” remake, premiering at 7 p.m. Tuesday on ABC.

Morena Baccarin ("Firefly”) plays Anna, the enigmatic leader of aliens calling themselves the Visitors (or "Vs” for short), who hover gigantic spaceships over every major city in the world, scaring the pants off everybody. Anna then appears and offers a message of peace and advanced technology, just as long as the Vs get the slavish devotion of every human being on Earth.

Scott Wolf plays ambitious news anchor Chad Decker, who lands an exclusive interview with Anna, only to discover he’s expected to play ball and make the Vs look good, or else no chat. Unfortunately for journalistic ethics everywhere, Decker folds like a cheap suit.

But all may not be lost for this Anderson Cooper wannabe.

"In that moment, obviously he’s been put in a position where he’s got two very difficult choices to make,” Wolf says. "One is to be a real sucker, and the other is to potentially give up the best opportunity he’ll ever have.

"What Scott thought of Chad in that moment was that he’s actually smart enough to believe, or to know, that he’ll find a way to make it right, that this opportunity won’t come back again.”

If you haven’t seen the original "V,” stop reading right now, because anyone who has knows that the Visitors are only human on the surface, with a reptilian reality lurking within. But we’re not talking hulking crocodiles here; these lizards can hold their own with higher primates.

"I like how controlled and smart and calculating she is,” Baccarin says of Anna, "that she’s able to learn from humans and manipulate them and be who she thinks they want her to be, so she can get what she wants.

"I like the nuances of that.”