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New York

The new series' New York Mothership

The Mothership is the primary vessel of the Visitors used in their mission to Earth in both the original and new series. In both series, they are massive facilities devoted to several tasks, housing thousands of Visitors while hovering over major cities around the world, mainly the capitals of different states. Its recently been revealed the mothership above is only one class of ship and that there are other classes of motherships.

History[]

The Motherships are much older than they look, and in Uneasy Lies the Head, Diana said she installed an escape pod into the ship, meaning the ship is older than Anna and was owned by Diana.

The Visitors sent 29 Motherships to Earth in the final stages of their plan for Earth. When they arrived, earthquakes were caused by the vessels and onboard electrical guidance systems failed when fighter jets were sent to intercept them. The ships addressed the cities they had arrived in when their broadcast displays opened up and Anna, the Visitor High Commander, stated her people had come in need of water and valuable minerals in exchange for advanced technology. Anna was stationed upon the New York Mothership, the 'command center' of the Motherships, although she addressed all cities in their local languages.

Mothership

The hangar/landing bay of the Motherships

The Motherships were opened to tourists from Earth. After three weeks of the Visitors' presence, Anna held an interview with Chad Decker aboard the New York Mothership. That night, a shuttle was sent down to the site of a resistance meeting the Visitors had forcibly ended, and a squad exited the craft to clear the crime scene. When Erica Evans saw the scene, she attempted to call 911 and was redirected to a Mothership, unknown to her, although the line was tapped by the authorities at the time. The Mothership broadcast screens were later used when Anna thanked Japan and Mexico for opening diplomatic relations with them.

Overview[]

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Memory Chamber

The new series had a different design of ship. Instead of a nearly radially symmetrical disc, the new version is somewhat saddle-shaped, with a flat bottom, arched down, front-to-back, and arched up left-to-right. This front-to-back arch is noticeable from the large open space within the craft, resembling the interior of a ring world. The vessel's aesthetics lend it a reptillian appearence, resembling that of a cobra's head. It also seems to incorporate various organic design cues. From exterior shots external structures can be seen on the hull that are reminiscent of eyes, a mouth and gills. This version had numerous upgrades from the old one. Instead of tens of hanger bays located inside the ship, the ships feature one main and two secondary circular landing bays on the bottom hull that protrudes inside. These bays are completely open to Earth, but have the ability to close themselves (necessary for travel in space and for the broadcast screens). The Motherships also have the ability to transform the bottom of the ship into an enormous broadcast display.

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Anna's Chambers

The ships feature advanced integrated technologies, such as holographics, as an alternative to contemporary monitors. The ships have also been shown to be able to manipulate gravity, described as necessary for propulsion and almost certainly used to maintain their motionless hover. Motherships also appear to have formidable electronic countermeasures; when the Visitors first arrived, modern-day Human combat aircraft scrambled to intercept them experienced electronics failures so severe that they lost control and crashed without ever being fired on. The newer version also has a city like area within the ships. Twenty-nine ships were sent in the new series. In Unholy Alliance there is a map on a computer with cities, some with motherships like Seoul, Lima, Tehran, Buenos Aires, Berlin, Jakarta... Probably it can be the 29 cities with V´s motherships. Larger vessels, that may or may not be warships, have been sighted en route to Earth.  

Known Motherships[]

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The Atrium

The locations of 29 out of 29 motherships have been identified on the show:

  • Ankara, Turkey
  • Bangkok, Thailand
  • Barcelona, Spain
  • Beijing, China (over the Tiananmen)
  • Berlin, Germany
  • Buenos Aires, Argentina
  • Cairo, Egypt (above the Great Pyramid of Giza)
  • Delhi, India
  • Florence, Italy (above the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore)
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    Landing platform in hangars of a V Mothership.

  • Hong Kong, China (over the Finance Centre Tower)
  • Johannesburg, South Africa
  • Lagos, Nigeria
  • Lima, Peru
  • London, United Kingdom (near the Palace of Westminster)
  • Los Angeles, CA (over the U.S. Bank Tower)
  • Madrid, Spain (near Puerta del Sol ).
  • Mexico City, Mexico (over Constitution Square)
  • Moscow, Russia (over Red Square)
  • New York, NY (over Manhattan, usually above Central Park) - more or less the "command" mothership, where the Visitor Queen Anna is headquartered (presumably, to be close to the United Nations for diplomatic appearances with Earth's leaders), though Anna regularly has hologram-projected conferences with the captains of the other 28 ships simultaneously.
  • Nairobi, Kenya
  • Paris, France (near the Eiffel Tower)
  • Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (near the Christ the Redeemer statue)
  • Rome, Italy (over the Coliseum)
  • Santiago, Chile
  • Singapore, Singapore (near Marina Bay Sands)
  • Shanghai, China (near the Oriental Pearl Tower)
  • Sydney, Australia (near the Syndey Opera House)
  • Tokyo, Japan
  • Vancouver, Canada (in Birth Pangs, a map is seen with the 29 breeding partners for Lisa, the locations of some faces can be made out over cities such as Lima, Vancouver, Buenos aires, Santiago and Lagos)


However, a map seen during Unholy Alliance also places motherships above

  • Tehran, Iran
  • Baghdad, Iraq
  • Karachi, Pakistan

Though this map could have been showing fifth column cells around the world.

Trivia[]

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1983-85 Mothership

Behind the Scenes[]

It is likely that the interior of the Mothership in the 2009 series was inspired by 1970's NASA-commissioned art by Don Davis, Rick Guidice and others, depicting 'Stanford Torus' colony designs. Such art inspired the look of other fictional space colonies found in countless other sci-fi series within a wide range of media, like the classic anime Mobile Suit Gundam and the video game Mass Effect, just to name a few.

Gallery[]

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