It was serialized in Tokuma Shoten's Monthly Shōnen Captain between 1985 and 1996, with its chapters collected in 13 tankōbon volumes.
Portions of the manga was adapted into a 45-minute original video animation directed by Kimio Yabuki which aired in 1988.
The manga's title is a parody on Swiss Family Robinson, in addition to referencing the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, which was stationed in Japan at the time of the manga's creation, which in turn was named after Georgia congressman Carl Vinson.
It has received generally favorable reviews praising its emotional core and underlying themes, but critiquing its lack of substantiative development for its cast.
In the year 4001, an interstellar acting troupe of six aliens are trying to fly to their next performance, as they are doing so, they accidentally crash into another spaceship over the planet Anika and lead to the death of a human couple.
[7] Transitioning between spring, summer, autumn, and winter, it highlights on the deep bonds that the alien acting troupe has grown over the years and the genuine care they feel for Corona.
[2] When someone comes to pick up Corona, her adoptive mother struggles to decide between whether to do what is best for her child and her urge not to return her to her rightful family.
[2] It is eventually revealed that the craft sent to pick her up was not from her home planet, but an alien, Pona, who was looking for lost children to raise on her own.
[2][3] The "Carlvinson" portion of the title likely refers to the USS Carl Vinson, which was active in the Sea of Japan between the 1980s and 1990s.
[3][2] Asari, a fan of the science fiction genre, inserted in-group references to contemporary films and other related forms of media.
Rescued as a baby, as her parents protected her as their spaceship crashed and died doing so, the story skips ahead to when she is 5 years old.
[6] An alien consisting of a huge oval shaped head and a singular eye with thin limbs.
They bear characters resembling kanji on their forehead that serve to differentiate between each of them, and all are modelled after film directors.
[6] Jun, modelled after Junkichi Oki, a film director, is a hopeless romantic and has a crush on Parker.
[6] Jisso, who has the habit of placing objects to obscure parts of his face, and is modelled after Akio Jissoji.
[9] A mysterious humanoid woman alien with long dark hair who shows up for the purpose of becoming the town's kindergarten teacher.
[4] Jason Huff writing in The Anime Review described the style as simplistic but effective, and praised its emotional core and underlying themes.
[5] Sean O'Mara writing for ZIMMERIT described Space Family Carlvinson as "charming if forgettable", stating that it "holds up better than it has any right to and [it is] easy to recommend".