By the 1990s, Alien Invasion movies had gone fully

mainstream. Thanks to filmmakers like Spielberg and James Cameron in the 80s, what was once a

dark, menacing sub-jummerer had become popcorn fun for the whole family. In 1996, two Alien Invasion

films were released months apart with hugely varying levels of success. Both owed a debt to the

Alien Invasion horror movies of the 1950s, but also the star-studded disaster films of the 1970s.

While one of these films was a huge commercial flop, the other became the biggest grossing film

of the year and ushered in a new era of CGI-centric sci-fi action movies.

Join me as we continue exploring the evolution of Alien horror and we discuss Mars attacks and

Independence Day. Welcome back to the evolution of horror. My name is Mike Munter and as ever I

am your host. If you're tuning in for the first time, then welcome. In this podcast, we explore and

dissect the history and the evolution of the horror genre by looking at a particular sub-jummerer's

one series at a time. We are currently in the middle of our seventh series exploring the evolution

of Alien, sci-fi and cosmic horror and this is part 20. This week's episode is sponsored by

$20 Patreon subscriber Richard Picard and in this week's episode, as that intro suggested,

we're going to be looking at two slightly more family-friendly classics from 1996. That's

Roland Emmerich's Independence Day and Tim Burton's Mars Attacks. Both of these discussions will

be spoilerific so give both movies a watch before listening to our discussion. Let's get straight

into it, joining me to discuss these films I've got a brand new guest. I've been a big fan of

his work for a very long time. He is a producer, presenter and all-round content creator. Welcome to

the podcast. Gav Murphy. Hello, Gav. Hello, mate. Thank you so much for having me on. I was just

saying that before we started. You've had so many of my actual friends on. I feel like I

listen to this podcast a lot, but yeah, it's good, man. Oh, thank you very much. Well, just tell

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