Introduction
The series begins with the crash of an Earth spaceship that encountered a time warp while approaching Alpha Centauri on August 19, 1980. The date on the ship's chronometer is given as March 21, 3085 but we are told that it could have simply stopped at that point while the ship was still travelling. It could therefore be many thousands of years into the future. The spaceship is manned by three astronauts from ANSA, one of whom has died in the crash. The other two astronauts are unconscious but are rescued by a human who carries them to an old bomb shelter. After the human opens a book containing historical text and pictures of Earth circa 2500, the two astronauts are convinced that they are indeed on a future Earth.
The crash is also witnessed by a young chimpanzee who tells his father, a village official who alerts the authorities. Ape counselor Zaius (an analog of the Dr. Zaius character from the original movie), notes that another such incident occurred ten years earlier. He orders the head gorilla, General Urko (Mark Lenard), to find the humans and bring them back alive. Zaius wants to find out as much as he can about the humans before they are eventually killed. Zaius doesn't trust General Urko to follow his orders and bring back any surviving humans, so he sends along his newly hired chimpanzee assistant, Galen (Roddy McDowall, who played Cornelius and Caesar in most of the film versions).
The two astronauts, Colonel Alan Virdon (Ron Harper) and Major Peter J. Burke (James Naughton), go back to their ship to check the ship's chronometer. They are more than 1000 years in the future from when they left Earth. Virdon insists on retrieving the ship's flight log in the hopes that they will be able to analyze it and be able to return to their own time period, but while they are at the ship, they are captured, and the old man is subsequently killed by a group of apes.
Galen finds the human book that the old man had been carrying. He reads parts of the book and begins to doubt the history that he has been told: apes have always been dominant, and humans have always been inferior and subservient. When Galen finds out that Urko has arranged for the two astronauts to escape and be killed in the attempt, he stops the shooter and helps the humans escape.
Galen discusses the book that he found with Zaius, who then accuses him of heresy. Galen is sentenced to death for his crime. The two astronauts find out about his sentence and rescue Galen. They are all then declared enemies of the state and become fugitives. The three fugitives wander around the territory that used to be the western United States having various encounters with apes, humans, and old human civilization ruins.
Read more about this topic: Planet Of The Apes (TV Series)
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