Forbidden Planet (1956): The Banned Ending They Hid For Over 70 Years

Forbidden Planet is the grandfather of modern science fiction, a film where a crew of astronauts lands on an alien world and discovers that the most dangerous monster in the universe is hiding inside the human mind. But even after seven decades, this film is still hiding secrets. Did you know the original ending let everyone walk away alive, with no sacrifice and no monster from the subconscious? Or that the invisible creature has a hidden facial feature that reveals exactly who created it? Today, we're uncovering 16 hidden truths about Forbidden Planet 1956, including how this movie helped inspire the Star Trek and Star Wars universe. The movie ends with Dr. Morbius confronting the monster from his own subconscious, sacrificing himself so his daughter and the crew can escape. It is one of the most psychologically complex endings in 1950s science fiction. But the original version of this story had none of that. In 1952, writers Irving Block and Allen Adler wrote a treatment called “Fatal Planet”, and it was set on Mercury, not Altair IV. There was no ancient Krell civilization, no underground machine, and no monster from the id. The danger was just a native invisible ape-like creature living on Mercury. And in that version, the story ended more like a straight rescue adventure. The hero, John Grant, saves Dr. Morbius and his daughter with the help of a robot built by the doctor, and everyone escapes alive. Nobody has to die. Nobody has to confront their own darkest impulses. Cyril Hume later rewrote that rescue ending into something much darker, turning a normal space adventure into a tragedy about the monster inside man himself. The Id Monster's animation is one of the most striking visual effects in 1950s cinema, and it exists because Walt Disney lent MGM one of his best people. Joshua Meador was a veteran Disney effects animator who had worked on Snow White, Pinocchio, Fantasia, and Bambi. Disney personally presented the Forbidden Planet assignment to Meador as a creative challenge. Meador's technique was unlike anything that had been done before. Instead of traditional cel animation, he sketched each frame directly in black pencil on translucent vellum paper. Each drawing was photographed in high contrast so only the boldest lines survived, then reversed into photographic negative and tinted red. The result was a creature that seemed to exist between visibility and invisibility, its body outlined only by the energy of the force field and blaster beams striking it. The monster was considered so terrifying that in some U.S states, its image was actually edited out of the film to avoid frightening children. Forbidden Planet asked a question in 1956 that science fiction is still trying to answer: what happens when a civilization becomes powerful enough to make its darkest thoughts real? Seven decades later, that question feels more relevant than ever. If this video surprised you, let us know in the comments which fact caught you off guard. And if you want more hidden truths about the films that shaped science fiction, subscribe and hit the bell so you don't miss the next one.