UFO (TV Series) - UFO Stories in Other Media

UFO Stories in Other Media

Stories set in the Gerry Anderson UFO series have appeared in various media:

• Two novelizations based upon the series were published in the UK and America.
• In the comics "Countdown" and "TV Action";
• In 1991 to 1999 Entropy Express in Brighton, South Australia published 7 issues of a periodical called Flightpath, containing 39 text stories set in the UFO scenario. These include a crossover with Bergerac, and a crossover with Predator.
• There was a hardback annual for the series featuring text stories. There were also hardback annuals for the Countdown and TV Action comics featuring comic strips.
• Much fan-fiction has been written in this series's scenario.
• An Italian-language board game of the race game type was published, called Distruggete Base Luna (= "Destroy Moonbase"), with up to 4 players, each representing an alien trying to penetrate Moonbase, and one player representing Straker in charge of Moonbase.
• In video games the retro science fiction "UFO: Enemy Unknown" is heavily inspired by this series. Aliens have attacked planet earth aiming to bio-harvest our organs. You play as the top secret Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, shooting down UFOs after sightings using Interceptors and transporting your men using the Skyranger (Skydiver reference) to investigate crash sites. The main poster race of the series, the Mutons, are bio-engineered humanoids controlled telepathically from the Alien homeworld by an unseen race. Later in the game it becomes clear that the Aliens can use telepathy to control your soldiers, also as in The Cat With Ten Lives. In the sequel "X-COM: Terror from the Deep" Aliens have built liveable environments in the sea forcing you to go on "scuba-diving" missions to find and destroy their main control centre as seen in the finale of Reflections in the Water. Interestingly, much like the series portrays Edward Straker's point of view you must play the role of making cold and analytic decisions to deal with the growing Alien threat, often resulting in permanently losing some of your team mates found in X-COM. Also, Aliens not killed during a crash landing or battle but captured go under autopsy to further your understanding on the Aliens' motives, the best example being Computer Affair.