Something Is out There (1988)

Something Is Out There is an expensive (and expansive) sci-fi TV movie in the tradition of the miniseries V and the theatrical picture The Hidden (1988). LA cop Joe Cortese finds himself with an unlikely partner--gorgeous extraterrestrial Maryam D'Abo. Both Earthling and alien are on the hunt for an evil entity called a "xenomorph," which has escaped from D'Abo's spaceship. The xenomorph has the capacity to take over the bodies of humans and to assume any shape (Alien meets The Thing). The creature design is courtesy of makeup maestro Rick Baker, while the special effects are cooked up by Star Wars' John Dykstra. Still, the one element of Something Is Out There that sticks in the memory is also the simplest: Maryam D'Abo is attracted to Joe Cortese because she thinks his hands are beautiful. Too insubstantial to be stretched out over four hours (and two consecutive evenings),it nonetheless resulted in a TV series, which lasted from October to December of 1988. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi