History Trivia / TheWarOfTheWorlds

!![[Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds The novel]]:
* AscendedFanon: Most info on Martian technology, such as their power plants and motors come from a document titled ''[[http://web.archive.org/20010501001141/www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Galaxy/3773/waroftheworlds/martians/tech.html A Report on Martian Technology]],'' written long afterwards(1999-ish). It purports that the martians have portable nuclear reactors and artificial muscles utilizing room-temperature superconductors, and the green exhaust their walkers occasionally release is an easily-plasmatized gas they use to generate electricity. Flying Machine hulls are also apparently plated in [[Literature/TheFirstMenInTheMoon Cavorite]].
* ReferencedBy: The Mars People from ''VideoGame/MetalSlug'' are lifted wholesale from the book's description of martians, minus the huge, "V" shaped mouth and VaderBreath (ie, sapent, land-lubbing octopi with giant robots).
* ScienceMarchesOn:
** At the very least, there's no Martian civilization invading Earth, and much of the speculation about how the Martians' technology and biology works is based on outdated science. Wells does future-proof the story to some extent, though, by constantly stating that the characters' scientific speculation is just that, and they could be entirely wrong.
** In some ways that makes our technological advancement over the last 100 years or so quite scary. These machines were pretty much the most deadly things that the author could think up, and yet put them against modern weapons and they would be obliterated in seconds.
** The Martians' main advantage is that their weapon is point-and-shoot accurate, whereas artillery of the day required that the target be 'bracketed' in order to reliably place fire on the target. So the artillery would open up with their initial shots to try and find the range, and the Martian Heat-Ray would immediately and accurately destroy them. The ''Thunder Child'' was so effective because it closed to point-blank range before opening fire.
*** Also because it was by no means clear to the Martians that this iron ship was anything to do with the humans, or had any aggressive intent.
** The Martians are described lacking a true digestive system, instead draining blood from other creatures and replacing their own with it, thus gaining the necessary nutrients. Needless to say, the understanding of blood transfusions hadn't developed very far when the book was written. And there's also the issue of NoBiochemicalBarriers, although they ''did'' all die from interaction with Earth's ecosystem...
** Modern science would agree that extraterrestrials with no familiarity with Earth's biosphere would indeed have little or no resistance to Terran microbes. But neither would we against microbes they would invariably bring with them. So the Martian's succumbing to the diseases of our planet would be grimly counterbalanced by scores of humans dying from "martian smallpox," possibly resulting in MutuallyAssuredDestruction. (This is handwaved in some cases where it's stated the Martians wiped out anything resembling disease years ago, bringing nothing with them to Earth).
*** The book flat-out states that there are no bacteria on Mars at all. The reason the martians didn't consider the possibility of catching Earth diseases is because they had no idea such things existed in the first place. This is, of course, a rather extreme case of science marching on.
* TechnologyMarchesOn: The awe that the humans experience upon seeing the Martian flying machine is somewhat dated, especially considering that human flight would be achieved ''within the next 5 years''. In contrast, every other piece of technology the Martians use has aged surprisingly well, as walking machines and directed energy weapons, though beginning to appear in real life, have yet to become subject to the industrial precision and mass-production shown in the novel. One big exception is their defenses, or lack thereof; while they move fast enough to be hard targets for British artillery, any shell that actually connects will destroy one.
** The scene where the protagonist describes the Martians' aluminium refining technology. A modern reader may think "So what? Big deal". At the time the book was written, however, aluminium was extremely difficult and expensive to mass-produce, it was even considered to be a precious metal with a higher value than gold, so being able to mass-produce it was used as proof of the Martians' technological mastery.
** Even then, today mass production of aluminium isn't exactly cheap or easy, at least not compared to something like iron. It's cheap today in large part because we recycle it far more than we do other metals.
* TropeNamer;
** MillionToOneChance
** TripodTerror
* TheWikiRule: [[https://waroftheworlds.fandom.com/wiki/War_Of_The_Worlds_Wiki War of the Worlds Wiki.]] It has info from all four video games, ''The Crystal Egg,'' the 1953, 2005, and neo-B movies, ''Goliath,'' the Dark Horse graphic novel, and the crossover with ''ComicBook/SuperMan.''

!![[Radio/TheWarOfTheWorlds The 1938 radio program]]:
* ThrowItIn: As to be expected in a live broadcast, several actors (inlcuding Welles) flubbed lines on the air, but it actually [[NarmCharm added to the realism]] of the show.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Before deciding on the H.G. Wells novel, Creator/OrsonWelles considered using ''[[Literature/TheLostWorld1912 The Lost World]]'' or ''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Purple_Cloud The Purple Cloud]]'' as the story to be adapted in a fake news bulletin format.
* The mass panic associated with the radio broadcast? [[http://books.google.ca/books?id=GeWm-zM3NEoC&lpg=PP1&dq=Little+Green+Men,+Meowing+Nuns+and+Head-Hunting+Panics:&pg=PA219&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false Not as massive as we've been led to believe]], but [[https://books.google.com/books/about/Broadcast_Hysteria.html?id=pGMGCAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false not entirely faked or over-reported, either]]. Most people would have reacted as most probably would today: call the police or friends and find out. CBS got an unusually high volume of calls, as did police and fire stations, so people were trying to verify one way or the other. Caches of letters to CBS, Welles and the FCC have been found, from people who had believed it -- many congratulating Welles for a job well done. The listening audience size was six million, and it's estimated that about a million of those, however briefly, believed the program. (Because it was Halloween, some stupid things were bound to happen anyway; a lot of extreme reactions came from people who hadn't heard the show, but heard ''of'' a "Martian invasion", or a "deadly meteor crash, from friends or neighbors; and others who thought it was real simply tuned in late, heard "invasion" and "poison gas", and thought "Nazis".)
** Another thing most people would have done, that people would do today, is: change the station, because such a world shattering event as an alien invasion wouldn't be covered by only CBS, and when they heard regular broadcasts from other stations they'd realise it's a play.
* The idea that a lot of the panic came from people who'd switched over late from ''The Chase & Sanborn Hour'' on NBC is based on the idea that ''Chase & Sanborn'' was "lowbrow" comedy with Creator/EdgarBergen and Charlie [=McCarthy=], so researchers assumed that anyone who believed in a Martian invasion must be [[ThisLoserIsYou either stupid or, at the very least, incredibly naive]]. Letters and telegrams revealed listeners who'd had CBS on as background noise; others were fans of ''Mercury Theatre'' who had tuned in late or didn't hear the first couple of minutes and thought ''Mercury Theatre'' was being interrupted.[[note]]The fact that ''Mercury Theatre'' had just had a time-slot change, plus an erroneous newspaper listing that Welles and co. were doing "The Pickwick Papers" that night, didn't help.[[/note]] Still others were listening on faraway static-ridden stations and could only hear parts of what happened. Many heard "invasion" without the "Martians" which would have told them it was a play. Others heard "meteor crash" and thought it was a natural disaster. Brad Schwartz in his book ''Broadcast Hysteria'' writes:
--> Above all, what late listeners heard and understood were the references to real organizations and figures of authority. Their ears pricked up at the mentions of the governor of New Jersey, the Red Cross, the vice president of CBS, and Princeton University. This, more than perhaps anything else, made the broadcast seem real to those that it deceived.
* Welles was deeply involved in producing a theatrical play at the time and was only peripherally involved with the preparation for ''War of the Worlds''; but he emphasized that it must be as realistic as possible because the story was an old classic and he feared listeners would be bored and tune out. Many did recognize the old tale: children, who wrote Welles enthusiastic fan letters.

!![[Film/TheWarOfTheWorlds The 1953 Film]]:

!![[Film/WarOfTheWorlds The 2005 Film]]:

* [[Trivia/WarOfTheWorlds See here]]

* AFIS100Years100HeroesAndVillains:
** #27 Villain, Martians
* HeyItsThatSound: The sound effect of the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUY1KYEABz0 green disintegrator rays]] would later be reused for the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34FsrucOOBY photon torpedoes firing]] in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries''.
* ReferencedBy: Someone on the writing staff for ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'' really loved this movie, as references to it frequently pop up. In "Germs," he and Gir watch a parody of the film which turns Zim into a germaphobe. A cut scene from "Door To Door" has Zim showing a VR simulation of an alien invasion with space ships not unlike the ones in this film.[[note]]Due to the show's close proximity to 9/11, the scene was deemed too visually similar to the fallout from the attacks, forcing the crew to reanimate it into something slightly tamer (the original version was aired once due to a mix up of the master tapes, however).[[/note]]
* ScienceMarchesOn:
** While preparing to make the movie, producer George Pal talked to military representatives who let him know in no uncertain terms the tripods of the original novel would be cut to pieces by modern weaponry before their drivers would suffer so much as a sniffle. Hence the movie Martians came equipped with nuke-proof force fields.
** The 1953 movie opens with the narrator explaining why none of the solar system's ''other'' planets were suitable for invasion, and getting most of his information completely wrong. Which is kind of a shame, because the shot of erupting volcanoes on Jupiter is pretty well done for the time.
** The movie opens with Chesley Bonestelle paintings of the other planets of the Solar System ''except'' for Venus. In 1953, the nature of what lay beneath that world's clouds was unknown – deserts, swamps, and global seas of carbonated water or petroleum were all considered possibilities. Ironically, the grossly inaccurate description of Jupiter is far more telling of Venus' surface conditions, and Venus was the ''first'' planet examined by a probe, in 1962.
* TechnologyMarchesOn: Back in the source novel the alien war machines were vulnerable to artillery fire and a torpedo ram, which were the most powerful weapons available at the time. In this film the aliens can survive an atom bomb blast, because otherwise they would be defeated very quickly. Reportedly, George Pal asked a Pentagon representative how contemporary armed forces would do against the Martians from the novel. He replied in no uncertain terms it would be a CurbStompBattle in favor of humanity.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Ray Harryhausen apparently always wanted to take on the story, but never got the chance to do so.

* TechnologyMarchesOn: Back in the source novel the alien war machines were vulnerable to artillery fire and a torpedo ram, which were the most powerful weapons available at the time. In this film the aliens can survive an atom bomb blast, because otherwise they would be defeated very quickly. Reportedly, George Pal asked a Pentagon representative how contemporary armed forces would do against the Martians from the novel. He replied in no uncertain terms it would be a CurbStompBattle for humanity.

* The idea that a lot of the panic came from people who'd switched over late from ''The Chase & Sanborn Hour'' on NBC is based on the idea that ''Chase & Sanborn'' was "lowbrow" comedy with Creator/EdgarBergen and Charlie [=McCarthy=], so researchers assumed that anyone who believed in a Martian invasion must be [[ThisLoserIsYou dumb or naive]]. Letters and telegrams revealed listeners who'd had CBS on as background noise; others were fans of ''Mercury Theatre'' who had tuned in late or didn't hear the first couple of minutes and thought ''Mercury Theatre'' was being interrupted.[[note]]The fact that ''Mercury Theatre'' had just had a time-slot change, plus an erroneous newspaper listing that Welles and co. were doing "The Pickwick Papers" that night, didn't help.[[/note]] Still others were listening on faraway static-ridden stations and could only hear parts of what happened. Many heard "invasion" without the "Martians" which would have told them it was a play. Others heard "meteor crash" and thought it was a natural disaster. Brad Schwartz in his book ''Broadcast Hysteria'' writes:

!![[Film/WarOfTheWorlds The 2005 Film]] and [[Series/WarOfTheWorlds 1988 TV series]]:
* [[Trivia/WarOfTheWorlds See here]]

* ReferencedBy: In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim,'' Zim watches a pardy of the movie and becomes a germaphobe because HE'S an alien invader on Earth. While he does get an infection, it's concentrated into a single, huge boil by his BizarreAlienBiology.

* AscendedFanon: Most info on Martian technology, such as their power plants and motors come from a document titled ''A Report on Martian Technology,'' written long afterwards. It purports that the martians have portable nuclear reactors and artificial muscles utilizing room-temperature superconductors, and the green exhaust their walkers occasionally release is an easily-plasmatized gas they use to generate electricity. Flying Machine hulls are also apparently plated in [[Literature/TheFirstMenInTheMoon Cavorite]].

* AscendedFanon: Most info on Martian technology, such as their power plants and motors come from a document titled ''A Report on Martian Technology,'' written long afterwards. It purports that the martians have portable nuclear reactors and artificial muscles utilizing room-temperature superconductors, and the green exhaust their walkers occasionally release is an easily-plasmatized gas they use to generate electricity.

* AscendedFanon: Most info on Martian technology, such as their power plants and motors come from a document titled ''A Report on Martian Technology,'' written long afterwards. It purports that the martians have portable nuclear reactors and artificial muscles utilizing room-temperature superconductors, and the green exhaust their walkers occasionally release is an easily-plasmstized gas they use to generate electricity.

* AscendedFanon: Most info on Martian technology, such as their power plants and motors come from a document titled ''A Report on Martian Technology,'' written long afterwards (~2009!). It purports that the martians have portable nuclear reactors and artificial muscles utilizing room-temperature superconductors, and the green exhaust their walkers occasionally release is an easily-plasmstized gas they use to generate electricity.

* TheWikiRule: [[https://waroftheworlds.fandom.com/wiki/War_Of_The_Worlds_Wiki War of the Worlds Wiki.]] It has info from all four video games, the 1953, 2005, and neo-B movies, the Dark Horse graphic novel, and the crossover with ''ComicBook/SuperMan.''

* TheWikiRule: [[https://waroftheworlds.fandom.com/wiki/War_Of_The_Worlds_Wiki War of the Worlds Wiki.]]

* ReferencedBy: In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim,'' Zim watches the movie and becomes a germaphobe because HE'S an alien invader on Earth. While he does get an infection, it's concentrated into a single, huge boil by his BizarreAlienBiology.

* ReferencedBy: The Mars People from ''VideoGame/MetalSlug'' are lifted wholesale from the book's description of martians, minus the huge, "V" shaped mouth and VaderBreath (ie, sapent, land-lubbing octopi).

* ReferencedBy: The Mars People from ''VideoGame/MetalSlug'' are lifted wholesale from the book's description of martians, minus the huge, "V" shaped mouth and VaderBreath.

* ReferencedBy: In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim,'' Zim watches the movie and becomes a germaphobe because HE'S an alien invader on Earth. While he does get an infection, it's concentrated into a single, huge boil by his BizarreAlienBiogy.

* TechnologyMarchesOn: The awe that the humans experience upon seeing the Martian flying machine is somewhat dated, especially considering that human flight would be achieved ''within the next 5 years''. In contrast, every other piece of technology the Martians use has aged surprisingly well, as walking machines and directed energy weapons, though beginning to appear in real life, have yet to become subject to the industrial precision and mass-production shown in the novel.

* ScienceMarchesOn: At the very least, there's no Martian civilization invading Earth, and much of the speculation about how the Martians' technology and biology works is based on outdated science. Wells does future-proof the story to some extent, though, by constantly stating that the characters' scientific speculation is just that, and they could be entirely wrong.

* ScienceMarchesOn: While preparing to make the movie, producer George Pal talked to military representatives who let him know in no uncertain terms the tripods of the original novel would be cut to pieces by modern weaponry before their drivers would suffer so much as a sniffle. Hence the movie Martians came equipped with nuke-proof force fields.

* Welles was deeply involved in producing a theatrical play at the time and was only peripherally involved with the preparation for ''War of the Worlds''; but he emphasized that it must be as realistic as possible because the story was an old classic and he feared listeners would be bored and tune out. Many did recognize the old tale: children, who [[CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming wrote Welles enthusiastic fan letters]].