History Film / TheGreatMartianWar19131917

** At the end of the film, Hart suggests that Victicite is this--a tremendously useful, adaptive, self-replicating and [[ItCanThink sentient living metal]] that any species can use to make vast increases in technology and the population it can support, thereby encouraging its users to spread it further across the galaxy in wars of conquest.

** At the end of the film, Hart suggests that Victicite is this--a tremendously useful, adaptive, self-replicating and [[ItCanThink sentient living metal]] that any species can use make vast increases in technology and the population it can support, thereby encouraging its users to spread it further across the galaxy in wars of conquest.

* BaitAndSwitch: A massive mine is detonated to knock out a Heron, and a specially trained unit is supposed to rush across No Mans Land to recover it before the Iron Spiders can get there. They succeed at the first goal, even capturing a couple of Martians, only for seven Spiders to swarm them...and then raise their Ribbons of Death in the air in surrender. The human soldiers aren't familiar with drone warfare and don't realise at the time that the captured Martians were controlling them, and apparently are too stunned by the explosion to consider fighting to the death.

** Because the Martians haven't invaded the United States, President UsefulNotes/WoodrowWilson sends aid but refuses to declare war, even using the Presidential veto to stop an American volunteer force. When the Martians launch attacks on American shipping, he's forced to resign and UsefulNotes/TheodoreRoosevelt is brought back into office.

* TheEndOrIsIt: When the Martian Code is translated, it's revealed that the Martians were once invaded by an alien force that used the same living metal that the Martians became dependent on, and now the same thing is happening all over again with humanity.

''The Great Martian War 1913–1917'' is a 2013 MadeForTVMovie that presents an alternate version of ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds'' InTheStyleOf a [[{{mockumentary}} documentary]] from Creator/TheHistoryChannel.

->''HIS MAJESTY THE EMPEROR, IN THE NAME OF GOD, THE FATHERLAND, AND THE GERMAN PEOPLE, BEG FOR THE ASSISTANCE OF HIS BROTHER NATIONS. GERMANY IS UNDER ATTACK FROM ASSAILANTS NOT OF THIS WORLD.''

* HumanResources: Surprisingly averted; everyone assumes the robotic Lice that swarm out into No Mans Land every night are harvesting the dead. Turns out they're harvesting the metal from the shrapnel, barbed wire, unexploded shells and weaponry--all of which is reproposed for the Martian war machine. The corpses of the Vanished were [[NotEnoughToBury disintegrated under this harvesting and the remains churned into the mud]].

** The Martian pilot of the Westminster Hero is saved from being lynched by outraged citizens by mounted police. It then dies of a disease it picked up from their horses.

** [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glanders Glanders]] is used as a weapon of biological warfare, which the Germans did in World War One. It causes a [[UsefulNotes/TheSpanishFlu massive pandemic that kills millions of humans.]]

** World War One never happens because the Martians invade first. However because they strike the German Empire first instead of Britain, events have an uncanny similarity to the Great War because the Martians are coming from that direction.

''The Great Martian War 1913–1917'' is a 2013 {{mockumentary}} that presents an alternate version of ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds'' InTheStyleOf a film from Creator/TheHistoryChannel.

* AdaptationalBadass: The Martian fighting machines are protected by energy shields, making them impervious to the artillery shells that brought down one of them in the original novel. They also command a swarm of smaller {{attack drones}}.

* SpiderTank:
** The giant Herons are armed with slow-firing but powerful energy cannon, and protected by clouds of DeadlyGas and a forcefield generated by [[OurDarkMatterIsMysterious dark energy particles]]. Their role is to create mass destruction, driving the humans out into the open so the Iron Spiders can kill them.

* StarfishLanguage: The so-called Martian Code.
* TheSwarm: Lice are robotic harvesters that swarm out into No Mans Land (and presumably everywhere else the Martians have conquered) in their thousands to harvest metal.

* TotalPartyKill: The Big Push is launched in Spring of 1915 even though Allied Command knows the Martians have brought up massive reinforcements. Three million men are sent over the top and are never seen again, not even as wounded.

''The Great Martian War 1913–1917'' is a 2013 {{mockumentary}} that presents an alternate version of ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds'' InTheStyleOf a [[Creator/TheHistoryChannel History Channel]] war documentary.

''The Great Martian War 1913–1917'' is a 2013 {{mockumentary}} that presents an AlternateHistory of ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds'' InTheStyleOf a [[Creator/TheHistoryChannel History Channel]] war documentary.

* SendInTheSearchParty: An [[CraterPower eight-mile wide impact crater]] in the Bohemian Forest is the result of the first Martian vessel landing. The Kaiser UsefulNotes/WilhelmII is [[NotMeThisTime promptly accused of testing a superweapon]], so he sends a military expedition to find out what happened. None of them return, and within days the Martians are laying waste to Imperial Germany.

* NotMeThisTime: An [[CraterPower eight-mile wide impact crater]] in the Bohemian Forest is the result of the first Martian vessel landing. The Kaiser UsefulNotes/WilhelmII is promptly accused of testing a superweapon, so he sends a military expedition to find out what happened. None of them return, and within days the Martians are laying waste to Imperial Germany.

* GodzillaThreshold: Faced with the impending collapse of Allied forces, Allied Command use biological warfare regardless of the risk. The battle along costs two million soldiers, and the disease mutates into The Martian Flu, an airborne pandemic that kills another 100 million.

* PuppeteerParasite:
-->'''Lawrence Hart:''' Victicite has long been recognized as a form of life in its own right. So ask yourself this: What is a form of life that takes possession of another species, that modifies its host behaviour to dispense itself in even greater numbers? What else if not a parasite? But that is precisely what Victicite is.

* TheSwarm: 'Lice', robotic harvesters that swarm out into No Mans Land (and presumably everywhere else the Martians have conquered) in their thousands to harvest metal.

* CassandraTruth: The Westminister Heron may not have been launching a one-man attack on London, but trying to pass on a warning about victicite. Unfortunately the pilot died and his message was untranslated for a hundred years until the Martian Code was broken.

-->'''Lawrence Hart:''' Victicite has long been recognized as a form of life in its own right. So ask yourself this: What is a form of life that takes possession of another species, that modifies its host behaviour to dispense itself in even greater numbers? What else if not a parasite? But that is precisely what victicite is.

** At the end of the film, Hart suggests that victicite is this--a tremendously useful, adaptive, self-replicating and [[ItCanThink sentient living metal]] that any species can use make vast increases in technology and the population it can support, thereby encouraging its users to spread it further across the galaxy in wars of conquest.

* SyntheticPlague: A captured Martian dies of glanders, an animal disease caught from the horses of its mounted police escort. Scientists rush to weaponize it into a plague that will kill Martians.
* TotalPartyKill: The Big Push is launched in Spring of 1915 even though Allied Command knows the Martians have brought up massive reinforcements. ''Three million men'' are sent over the top and are never seen again, not even as wounded.