Joshua Jackson Encounters UFO

From sci-fi lab rat crime fighting to Alien fighting, Variety says Joshua Jackson (TV’s Fringe) is going to star in the movie version of UFO based on the ’70s British series of the same title created by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson. VFX master Matthew Gratzner (Superman Returns, Iron Man) will make his directorial debut. Jackson will play the character Col. Paul Foster who was played by the late Michael Billington in the original series…

I’ve never watched the series UFO, they didn’t play the re-runs of the show where I grew up but judging from the 2 videos below, it looks like the British tried to copy Star Trek. But the hottie with the purple hair implies that I may have been missing out.
The report says that the series became a cult hit but IMDb only states that it lasted for just one season which didn’t surprise me because the success of a British show is not determined by how many years it can remain on TV. Ricky Gervais‘ The Office and John Cleese‘s Fawlty Towers ran for only 2 seasons respectively but they became classic.

The series UFO is about “Earth in the 1980s, being threatened by an alien race who kidnap and kill humans and use them for body parts. A highly secret military organization is set up in the hope of defending the Earth from this alien threat. This organization is named SHADO (Supreme Headquarters Alien Defence Organization) and operates from a secret location beneath a film studio. They also operate a fleet of submarines and have a base on the moon as well as an early warning satellite that detects inbound UFOs. UFOs can be destroyed in space by Interceptors which are launched from Moonbase. If one gets through it can be attacked in the Earth’s atmosphere by a high altitude aircraft launched from one of the submarines. If a UFO also avoids this and manages to land it can be tracked and destroyed by a number of Mobiles (armored vehicles) which are deployed throughout the world.”