Red Planet (miniseries)
Encyclopedia
Red Planet was a 1994 animated
miniseries
created by Gunther-Wahl Productions. It was adapted from the Robert A. Heinlein
novel
of the same name, with the teleplay
written by Julia Lewald.
. Along with the harsh climate and severe weather, there are many dangerous creatures living on New Aries, such as the three-headed Hounds, the swift and voracious Water Seekers, and the misunderstood Locals, creatures so rare and dangerous they border on urban legend.
Jim has recently acquired a new pet, a "roundhead" called Willis (voiced by Pat Fraley
) with the parrot
-like ability to mimic human speech and record conversations. Willis is small, furry, and playful, can survive both on the surface of New Aries and the Earth
-like atmosphere
of the colony, and has some sort of connection with the Locals on an almost empathic level.
As Jim and P.J. are about to be sent off to a boarding school, their mother (voiced by Marcia Mitzman Gaven
), the colony's medical officer, discovers a substance deep within the mines that is killing the miners. The school's headmaster and the colony leader - a company man from the Beta Earth Mining Company - learn of Jim Marlowe's new pet, and plot to steal him for medical experiment in order to generate a serum to protect the miners, and thus, keep the company in the black. Willis records this entire conversation, which prompts Jim, Willis, and P.J. to escape into the desert. With their life-support running low, they are forced to take shelter in a carnivorous plant, using the process of photosynthesis
so the plant will generate oxygen and keep them alive.
Running from New Aries' many dangerous life-forms, they are eventually found by the Locals. They are enraged by the attempted capture of the tiny Willis. In the end, only Jim and Willis' friendship save the colony world from destruction by the angered natives, who reveal themselves to be an intelligent, highly-advanced subterranean race.
Willis then tells Jim that it is time for him to go. He is finished being a child, and must become an adult via metamorphosis
. One of the colony's doctors correctly assumed that Willis was not a separate species from the Locals, but rather a Local in its infant form. Jim says that he will wait for Willis to finish changing, but Willis states that this will take a long, long time. He and Jim will probably never see one another again.
Many decades later, New Aries has been terraformed into a green, Earth-like world, with humans and Locals living side by side in peace. Willis, now a full-grown Local, has befriended Jim's young granddaughter, and spends time with her wandering the grass-covered hills and telling her stories of the adventures he and her grandfather had together.
programming, said that Red Planet received the adaptation because it has many "characters that kids can relate to."
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
miniseries
Miniseries
A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...
created by Gunther-Wahl Productions. It was adapted from the Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...
novel
Red Planet (novel)
Red Planet is a 1949 science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein about students at boarding school on the planet Mars. It represents the first appearance of Heinlein's idealized Martian elder race...
of the same name, with the teleplay
Teleplay
A teleplay is a television play, a comedy or drama written or adapted for television. The term surfaced during the 1950s with wide usage to distinguish a television plays from stage plays for the theater and screenplays written for films...
written by Julia Lewald.
Plot summary
Jim Marlowe (voiced by Benny Grant), Jr., and his little sister, Phillis Jane "P.J." Marlowe (voiced by Haven Hartman), are teens growing up on the distant mining world of New Aries. Life on New Aries is difficult, with its surface being a red-colored desertDesert
A desert is a landscape or region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation, less than enough to support growth of most plants. Most deserts have an average annual precipitation of less than...
. Along with the harsh climate and severe weather, there are many dangerous creatures living on New Aries, such as the three-headed Hounds, the swift and voracious Water Seekers, and the misunderstood Locals, creatures so rare and dangerous they border on urban legend.
Jim has recently acquired a new pet, a "roundhead" called Willis (voiced by Pat Fraley
Pat Fraley
Patrick "Pat" Fraley is an American voice actor, who is best known as the voice of Krang, Casey Jones and numerous other characters from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles...
) with the parrot
Parrot
Parrots, also known as psittacines , are birds of the roughly 372 species in 86 genera that make up the order Psittaciformes, found in most tropical and subtropical regions. The order is subdivided into three families: the Psittacidae , the Cacatuidae and the Strigopidae...
-like ability to mimic human speech and record conversations. Willis is small, furry, and playful, can survive both on the surface of New Aries and the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
-like atmosphere
Atmosphere
An atmosphere is a layer of gases that may surround a material body of sufficient mass, and that is held in place by the gravity of the body. An atmosphere may be retained for a longer duration, if the gravity is high and the atmosphere's temperature is low...
of the colony, and has some sort of connection with the Locals on an almost empathic level.
As Jim and P.J. are about to be sent off to a boarding school, their mother (voiced by Marcia Mitzman Gaven
Marcia Mitzman Gaven
Marcia Mitzman Gaven is an award-winning American actress from New York. Since studying at the High School of Performing Arts and the State University of New York at Purchase, she has appeared in many musicals during her career singing in both mezzo-soprano and soprano roles...
), the colony's medical officer, discovers a substance deep within the mines that is killing the miners. The school's headmaster and the colony leader - a company man from the Beta Earth Mining Company - learn of Jim Marlowe's new pet, and plot to steal him for medical experiment in order to generate a serum to protect the miners, and thus, keep the company in the black. Willis records this entire conversation, which prompts Jim, Willis, and P.J. to escape into the desert. With their life-support running low, they are forced to take shelter in a carnivorous plant, using the process of photosynthesis
Photosynthesis
Photosynthesis is a chemical process that converts carbon dioxide into organic compounds, especially sugars, using the energy from sunlight. Photosynthesis occurs in plants, algae, and many species of bacteria, but not in archaea. Photosynthetic organisms are called photoautotrophs, since they can...
so the plant will generate oxygen and keep them alive.
Running from New Aries' many dangerous life-forms, they are eventually found by the Locals. They are enraged by the attempted capture of the tiny Willis. In the end, only Jim and Willis' friendship save the colony world from destruction by the angered natives, who reveal themselves to be an intelligent, highly-advanced subterranean race.
Willis then tells Jim that it is time for him to go. He is finished being a child, and must become an adult via metamorphosis
Metamorphosis
Metamorphosis is a biological process by which an animal physically develops after birth or hatching, involving a conspicuous and relatively abrupt change in the animal's body structure through cell growth and differentiation...
. One of the colony's doctors correctly assumed that Willis was not a separate species from the Locals, but rather a Local in its infant form. Jim says that he will wait for Willis to finish changing, but Willis states that this will take a long, long time. He and Jim will probably never see one another again.
Many decades later, New Aries has been terraformed into a green, Earth-like world, with humans and Locals living side by side in peace. Willis, now a full-grown Local, has befriended Jim's young granddaughter, and spends time with her wandering the grass-covered hills and telling her stories of the adventures he and her grandfather had together.
Differences from novel
- The story takes place on the fictitious planet of New Aries instead of MarsMarsMars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance...
. It (supposedly) has a higher gravity than Mars, making it somewhere closer to Earth's. - Jim's little sister, P.J. is the main supporting character. In the novel, this role was filled by his classmate, Frank Sutton.
- The main conflict in the novel was the colony leader's prevention of the annual migration to avoid the harsh winter conditions so as to save money. In the miniseries, it was the poison in the mines that was slowly killing the miners.
- In the novel, Willis is confiscated by the school's headmaster since it is against the rules to have pets. He is then taken from the headmaster by the colony leader, Beecher, in order to sell him to the London ZooLondon ZooLondon Zoo is the world's oldest scientific zoo. It was opened in London on 27 April 1828, and was originally intended to be used as a collection for scientific study. It was eventually opened to the public in 1847...
for a hefty sum. In the miniseries, both the headmaster and the colony leader are in on a plot to steal Willis and study his alien physiology to find an antidote to the poison in the mines.
Intent
Karen Barnes, who acted as the vice president of Fox KidsFox Kids
Fox Kids was the Fox Broadcasting Company's American children's programming division and brand name from September 8, 1990 until September 7, 2002. It was owned by Fox Television Entertainment airing programming on Monday–Friday afternoons and Saturday mornings.Depending on the show, the...
programming, said that Red Planet received the adaptation because it has many "characters that kids can relate to."