V (1983 Miniseries) - Influences

Influences

Aside from It Can't Happen Here, several scenes from the original TV pilot resemble the Bertolt Brecht play The Private Life of the Master Race. A short story by Damon Knight entitled To Serve Man (later adapted into an episode of The Twilight Zone) had a similar theme suggesting that deceptively friendly aliens were secretly cultivating humans as food. The introduction, featuring large 'mother ships' over major Earth cities, is nearly identical to Arthur C. Clarke's novel Childhood's End.

The story became a Nazi allegory, right down to the Swastika-like emblem used by the Visitors and their SS-like uniforms. There is a youth auxiliary movement called the "Friends of the Visitors" with obvious similarities to the Hitler Youth, and Visitor broadcasts mimic Nazi-era propaganda. The show's portrayal of human interaction with the Visitors bears a striking resemblance to stories from Occupied Europe during World War II with some citizens choosing collaboration and others choosing to join underground resistance movements.

Where the Nazis persecuted primarily Jews, the Visitors were instead depicted to persecute scientists, their families, and anyone associating with them. They also distribute propaganda in an effort to hide their true identity. Some of the main characters in the initial series were from a Jewish family and the grandfather, a Holocaust survivor, frequently commented on the events of the past again unfolding. Once they are in a position to do so, the Visitors later declare martial law to control the scientists (and resistance fighters) as well.