Trivia: John Carpenter has said that the movie was meant to be silly and tongue-in-cheek, with a purposely ludicrous premise. He'd even come onto set every day and exclaim that the movie was "The biggest piece of s**t I've ever made!" He was reportedly incredibly annoyed that critics and audiences took it seriously, even remarking "It's called 'Ghosts Of Mars' for Christ's sake! Why would people take this movie seriously?" He's since said that he should have added more humor to clarify the the tone.
Trivia: Reportedly, the film was originally going to be titled "Escape from Mars," and was going to be a sequel to "Escape from New York" and "Escape from LA," with Kurt Russell reprising his role as Snake Pliskin. However, after "Escape from LA" bombed at the box office, the script was reworked, and Snake was rewritten into the character "Desolation" Williams.