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The War of the Worlds (1898) is a science fiction novel by H. G. Wells. It describes the experiences of a character who travels through London as the Earth is invaded by Martians. It is said to be the first story that details a conflict between mankind and an alien race.

Following its publication, The War of the Worlds rapidly entered popular culture. Through the 20th and 21st centuries, the novel has been adapted into a number of different mediums, including radio, television and film. These have been produced with varying degrees of faithfulness towards the original text, with many of the more famous adaptations, such as Orson Welles' 1938 radio adaptation and the 2005 film directed by Steven Spielberg, choosing to set the events in a contemporary setting. In addition, many adaptations, including both of the above, have relocated the plot from its original setting of England in favour of the United States.

Film

• 1953: The War of the Worlds (1953 film), produced by George Pál and directed by Byron Haskin, for Paramount Pictures
• 1981: The War of the Worlds: Next Century, a Polish film by Piotr Szulkin
• 1996: Independence Day, directed by Roland Emmerich, for 20th Century Fox -- While modernized and not officially billed as an adaptation, the film very closely follows the primary storyline of the novel and Byron Haskin's 1953 adaptation, including the aliens' vulnerability to a (computer) virus née bacteria.
• 2005: H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds (2005 film), directed by Timothy Hines, for Pendragon Pictures
• 2005: H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds (2005 film), directed by David Michael Latt (titled Invasion internationally), for The Asylum
  • 2008: War of the Worlds 2: The Next Wave, sequel to the Asylum's film, directed by C. Thomas Howell
• 2005: War of the Worlds (2005 film), directed by Steven Spielberg, for Paramount Pictures

Also

• The Night That Panicked America, a film that follows Orson Welles' radio broadcast based on Wells' novel.

• Scary Movie 4, a spoof of Steven Spielberg's film version.

Television

• 1988: War of the Worlds (TV series)
• 2001: Justice League animated TV series adapts the main events and visuals of the novel for the three part story Secret Origins. Aliens, after destroying Mars, attack Earth via tripods and a team of superheroes, including Superman, attempt to stop them.

Radio

• 1938: The War of the Worlds (radio), the Orson Welles' 1938 radio adaptation
• 1944: War Of The Worlds radio broadcast, Santiago
• 1949: War Of The Worlds radio broadcast, Radio Quito, Quito, Ecuador
• 1950: The War of the Worlds, BBC radio dramatisation
• 1955: The Lux Radio Theater: War of the Worlds, adaptation of the 1953 Film.
• 1967: The War of the Worlds, BBC radio dramatisation
• 1968: The War of the Worlds (radio 1968), WKBW radio adaptation
• 1988: The War of the Worlds (radio 1988), an NPR 50th Anniversary radio adaptation

Musical

• 1978: Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds, by Jeff Wayne

Game

• 1979; 1982: The War of the Worlds (arcade game), an arcade game published by Cinematronics, and its re-released color verson
• 1980: The War Of The Worlds, a war board game designed by Allen D. Eldridge and published by Task Force Games
• 1984: The War of the Worlds (1984 computer game), a home computer game

• 1998: Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds, computer game
• 2009: Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds Slots, online casino slots game

Comic books

• 1973-1976: Amazing Adventures #18-39 featured Killraven, a 21^st century freedom fighter against a second Martian invasion.
• 2002–2003: Volume II of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, a limited series comic book written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Kevin O'Neill
• 2006: H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds (comic), graphic novel

Other

• 1994: War of the Worlds: Invasion from Mars, an Audio Theatre adaption by L.A. Theatre Works, casting Star Trek cast members like Leonard Nimoy, Gates McFadden, Brent Spiner and directed by John DeLancie.^[1]
• 2004–2005: H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds, a site specific theatre adaptation by Canadian playwright Ian Case staged in and around Craigdarroch Castle in Victoria, BC.
• 2005: The Art of H. G. Wells by Ricardo Garijo, the third in the series of trading cards, released^[2]
• 2008: Solar Pons's War of the Worlds, an online web serial set in the world of Solar Pons, combining elements of the original novel, the 1938 radio adaptation, and the Wells short-story The Crystal Egg.^[3]

1938 radio adaption by Orson Welles

The 1938 radio broadcast caused public outcry against the episode, as many listeners believed that an actual Martian invasion was in progress,^[4] a notable example of mass hysteria.

Wells later met Orson Welles while driving through San Antonio, Texas, after stopping to ask directions and by coincidence happening upon the actor. They spent the day together, and later discussed the famous broadcast in a radio interview at Radio KTSA.^[5]

Unreleased adaptations

After World War II, Ray Harryhausen shot a scene of a dying alien falling out of a Martian war machine, test footage for an abandoned project to adapt the story using Wells' original "octopus" concept for the Martians. A video of the footage can be found here.^[6]

Here Harryhausen talks about his proposed adaptation:

"Yes, originally, after Mighty Joe [Young] I made a lot of sketches for War of the Worlds. I wanted to keep it in the period that H.G. Wells wrote it, of the Victorian period, and I made eight big drawings, some of which are published - in the book and it would have been an interesting picture, if it was made years ago. But since then so many pictures of that nature have been made that it wouldn't be quite unique as it would have been."^[7]

Sequels by other authors

• Within six weeks of the novel's original 1897 magazine serialisation, The Boston Post began running a sequel, Edison's Conquest of Mars by Garrett P. Serviss, about an Earth counter-attack against the Martians, led by Thomas Edison. Though this is actually a sequel to 'Fighters from Mars', a revised and un-authorised re-print, they both were first printed in the Boston Post in 1898.^[8]

• In 1962, Soviet author Lazar Lagin published a political pamphlet named "Major Well Andyou" ("Майор Велл Эндъю"), a pun on "Well, and you?", which relates the story of a major in the British Army who collaborates with the Martian invaders. A condemnation of imperialism and capitalism, the story was dominated by Soviet analysis of political issues contemporary to the 1950s and 1960s.

• The Second War of the Worlds, by George H. Smith concerned the Martians trying to invade an alternate, less-technologically advanced Earth. Helping these people are an unnamed English detective, and his companion, a doctor, from 'our' world. (It is quite obvious from clues in the story that these are actually Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson.)

• In the 1970s, Marvel Comics had a character named Killraven Warrior of the Worlds who (in an alternative timeline) fought H. G. Wells' Martians after their second invasion of Earth in 2001. He first appeared in Amazing Adventures volume 2 #18.

• Manly and Wade Wellman wrote Sherlock Holmes' War of the Worlds (1975) which describes Sherlock Holmes's adventures during the Martian occupation of London, turned the Martians into simple vampires, who suck and ingest human blood.

• In the The Space Machine Christopher Priest presents both a sequel and prequel to The War of the Worlds (due to time travel elements), which also integrates the events of the The Time Machine.

• In the novel W. G. Grace's Last Case (1984) by Willie Rushton, W. G. Grace and Doctor Watson avert a second Martian invasion by attacking the Martian fleet on the far side of the moon with "bombs" containing influenza germs.

• The comic book Scarlet Traces (2002) begins a decade later with Great Britain utilising the Martians' technology, and ironic to the allegory of Wells' novel, have become more powerful because of it. Eventually, this leads up to a counter-invasion aimed for Mars in its own sequel, Scarlet Traces: The Great Game (2006).

• Science fiction author Eric Brown wrote a short story, "Ulla, Ulla" (2002) about an expedition to Mars, finding the truth behind H.G. Wells' novel.

• A number of people have written contemporaneously set stories that describe the same invasion from the perspectives of locations other than Britain. Notable stories of this type are:
  • "Night of the Cooters" by Howard Waldrop, in which a Martian war machine lands in Texas.
  • "Foreign Devils" by Walter Jon Williams, set in China.
  • War of the Worlds: Global Dispatches, edited by Kevin J. Anderson, an anthology of such stories (ISBN 0-553-10353-9).
  • "War of the Worlds : New Millennium" (2005) by Douglas Niles in which the invasion is set in 2005 and focuses mainly on the American fightback. (ISBN 0-765-35000-9) Tor Books

• In the short story Mastery of Vesania, Hayden Lee uses his appropriation to present the invasion from the perspective of the Martian invaders, also providing the link between the different nature of the two invasions presented in the book and the 2005 movie (arriving from space and rising from the ground).

References