Time of the Apes was cobbled together from bits and pieces of a 1974 Japanese TV series -- SF Drama: Saru no Gundan (SFドラマ 猿の軍団, "Army of Apes: A Sci-Fi Drama). The series ran for 26 episodes and did not meet with much enthusiasm, not even from its "home crowd" in Japan. In 1987, enter Sandy Frank: buyer, producer, and importer of all manner of Japanese crap cinema. Sandy purchases the 26 episodes, gets rid of all but 4 or 5 of them, and splices bits and pieces from these remaining episodes into a film. Kind of like a Frankenstein monster pieced together from garage sale leftovers. This film capitalized on the Planet of the Apes series. Though obviously (sometimes painfully) Japanese, the dubbed version gives the characters English names.