In the yearly scramble to pick up pilots, renew old shows, and dispose of last season's weaker offerings, ABC is shorting 80s sci-fi favorite V.

The original 1983 miniseries featured a race of stealthy, guinea pig swallowing lizards from the stars taking over the world with fascist strategies reminiscent of the rise of Nazi Germany. The following year's TV series dumbed it down a bit and became a weekly battle between freedom fighters and creepy aliens.

You can catch the upfront trailer for V here. It looks a bit like ABC is being invaded by Independence Day -- though Independence Day looked like it was being invaded by the original V. Fortunately, these new invaders bring Firefly's Morena Baccarin (right) along for the trip as their spin doctor.

Hey 4400 fans! Co-creator and executive producer of that series, Scott Peters, is back at it again. This time he's gotten the official go ahead from ABC to bring the remake of the 1980's V mini-series to pilot. This means right from the beginning they're thinking more long-term in developing the overall storyline. With the original, we had a mini-series that proved so incredibly popular that it spawned a second mini-series, an ongoing series, and even a book and comic series. I know all of this because I own all of it.

Yes, even though (or maybe because) I was a very young boy when the V phenomenon first hit, it blew me away. I was haunted by the image of Diana unhinging her jaw and devouring that rodent. And the first peeling of human flees to reveal the green scales underneath was chilling to my pre-adolescent imagination. To this day, I think the concept is brilliantly strong, and the first two mini-series were very well executed. It'll be interesting to see how these creators bring the concept into the new millennium. Clearly the "surprise" reveal that the aliens aren't as benevolent as they purported to be is lost.