In the original novel, the story was situated in Victorian England, which was the technological superpower of that age. It made the alien invasion that more dramatic, since the Martians were able to defeat the strongest country in the world with relative ease. Also, author H. Wells was from England, so he wrote about the country he lived in, purposely situating the action in places and locations that were known by his family and friends. The movie, however, is a US production made with an American cast and crew, and therefore it is primarily geared towards the US.
Setting the film in the States would make it more relevant to that audience. Also, in this setting, the US effectively takes the place of England as the modern superpower that gets easily defeated by an alien attack force. Probably because they weren't switched on at the time. An EMP (electromagnetic pulse) causes an overload of electrical systems through which electricity is flowing at the same moment. Consequently, switched-off devices will be less affected or possibly unaffected.
In the case of military vehicles, EMP doesn't affect diesel engines (for loosely similar reasons that it doesn't affect firearm rounds), and it's likely that they were braced against electromagnetic disruption anyway. If they were affected, the military would have had plenty of time to fix the problem with their vehicles just as the van was.
However, digital/computer memory systems (besides optical media) can be damaged, blanked, scrambled or reset to factory defaults from the interference of strong/nearby magnetic forces (whether fixed or fluctuating); so in regards to the camcorder and cellphones (even various kinds of walkie-talkie/CB/HAM units), it is definitely possible that the filmmakers ignored factual accuracy in favor of (suspense-invoking) artistic license. Also, strong/nearby electric forces (whether fixed or fluctuating) can cause batteries to be damaged or discharged, along with photovoltaics and piezoelectrics.
Lifeforms can be affected in certain contexts too, as a matter of electrophysiology in general but especially in the context of needful magnetoreception (of Earth's magnetic field). Ultimately, the level of destruction or disruption depends upon the fields strengths (volts per meter, and teslas) of the pulse (the strength values being strongest at the spatial center of an event and weaker at distance), along with frequencies/bands of the signals and noise, as well as the amount of shielding in/around electric or magnetic devices located within the path/range of the pulse. For instance, a nuclear EMP is much stronger and spans more electromagnetic bands than a man-made, non-nuclear EMP, since the nuclear radiation (much like solar radiation) itself can actually cause material to heat up (melting, evaporating, decomposing or changing state in other ways). If you'll notice, all the cars have stalled on the highway in such a manner that created a handy little pathway for Ray to drive steadily without stopping, taking sharp curves or being forced onto the median. It's not totally unbelievable that most people, if their car suddenly lost power while driving on a freeway, would choose to pull off the road. And most of the cars probably had enough momentum left after the engines lost power to get to the shoulder.
The van was being worked on by a mechanic, and Ray had told him the problem with the van was the solenoid, the mechanic replaced it with a new one which should not have been affected by an EMP since it had no electricity going through it. There is a basement sequence in the movie because much of the novel took place in basements. The main character in the book spends time first with a sniveling, drunken cleric who makes a lot of noise and endangers them. Later he spends time in a basement with an artilleryman who is something of a survivalist.
These characters are combined into the character Ogilvy —in screenwriting terms, Ogilvy is often referred to as a 'composite' character. In a disaster/action movie, a relaxed pace is often used for explanation, speculation and plot/character development, things that are hard to establish during action sequences. Also, it is necessary to prevent the story from becoming a blurred succession of events steadily increasing in intensity by which the audience gets emotionally exhausted.
This sequence allows us to discover exactly what Ray will do to survive and, more importantly, to protect his daughter from both the invaders and a dangerous person like Ogilvy. If looked at closely enough, it's clear that there actually are a few bodies still on the plane. Why there are so few is not clear.
The tripods/aliens may have already harvested them. Another explanation is that the plane's roof, which is clearly missing, had blown off at high altitude and most of the passengers simply flew out of the aircraft (especially if their safety belts weren't fastened). A third explanation is that, if hit by a heat ray, many of the passengers may have just been incinerated. On several occasions, the ray is shown to incinerate biological matter while simply passing through or pushing aside inanimate objects, like the cars we see in the initial attack in Ray's town. One theory is that they came down with the lightning as the tripods did. Another theory is some kind of cloaking device the aliens had invented.
The tripods could have been buried quite deep, there are very few places on Earth where we have an intimate knowledge of what lies even half a mile under the surface. The tripod 'heads' were also relatively small, the were probably buried in some kind of capsule that had buried itself with the legs curled inside. Another possibility is that the tripods were not buried very deep at all but were miniaturized even to a microscopic scale and not restored to their full size until the strange lightning hit.
They must have been killed by the aliens. As seen in the book, along with heat rays, the aliens also used a kind of black smoke that caused people to suffocate. In both the book and the film we also see the aliens taking people and killing them, which would suggest that this was how they disposed of the bodies. You could assume that these people were victims of this. However, you are left to your imagination, much the same as Ray is. In a practical sense, the bodies are shown dead this way to heighten the tension of the story: we don't know how they died and the filmmakers can let us imagine some horrific way in which they may have been killed.
According to Ogilvy, the Martians were drinking human blood. Certainly a possibility, but another suggestion is that they were using human blood as fertilizer for the 'red weed' that they were planting, a sort of terraforming, if you will. In the original book, the unnamed protagonist does manage to observe the Martians killing a man, and speculates that their way of nourishing themselves involved injecting blood from other life forms into their own veins. This possibility seems to be alluded to in the film, where people are lifted out of cages and pulled into the machine where they are presumably consumed. Perhaps he knew he could have handled it without weapons. Looking at the scene at the docks when his car is overrun by the crowd, he seemed to be able to handle himself pretty well there. It was only because he was out-numbered that he was overcome.
He could have taken Ogilvy's shotgun, but he only had one round and the whole reason he was going to kill Ogilvy was because he was making too much noise. So firing a gun wouldn't make much sense. Also there was only one round for the gun, so what if Ray had missed? Also, Ray probably didn't want Rachel to panic any more than she already was. Even with her hands covering her ears, she would have heard a gunshot. Ray wanted to avoid that. The reason the Army guy held on to Ray, and encouraged others to do so, when he was being sucked up inside the opening (when no one had gone to the other victim's aid) is that he saw Ray had hand grenades, and could do some damage.
An alternative theory is that no one anticipated the first guy being taken. The unfortunate fellow was just pulled into the sphincter before anyone could react.
When Ray's foot was grabbed, people now understood what was happening and decided to react. There's no evidence the soldier actually saw the grenades; he saw the pins later, though, and realized what happened. They knew what was going to happen to Ray and then all decided that although they don't know each other, the only way they can survive this is if they stick together and take down the aliens as one force rather than several gangs trying to conquer the aliens by themselves. They are sticking together as the more people that stay alive, the more chance they have of surviving. The army man also has a sense of authority over the civilians so the civilians feel they should help the army guy. Also, one man can be seen trying (and failing) to grab the man who gets sucked in before Ray. In another theory could be that they realize that Ray had a daughter with him and the idea of a child seeing their parent killed encouraged them to help save the father.
Ray and Rachel make it to Boston together on foot. Boston is covered with the red weeds, some living, some dying. The Martians seem to have been stopped, but no one knows why. They witness a tripod come crashing to the ground after being attacked by a nearby Army detachment and a door opening up to reveal a flood of red liquid followed by a dying Martian. Ray and Rachel make their way to Mary Ann's house where they are reunited with Robbie.
War Of The Worlds Plane Crash Scene Graphic Photos
In the final scene, the camera pans over the destroyed city, focusing on a tree bud, then a water droplet, and finally the multitude of microscopic organisms living in it. The narrator says in a voiceover: From the moment the invaders arrived and breathed our air, ate and drank, they were doomed. They were undone, destroyed, after all man's weapons and devices had failed, by the tiniest creatures that God, in His wisdom, put upon this earth. By the toll of a billion deaths, man had earned his immunity, his right to survive among this planet's infinite organisms, and that right is housed against all challenges.for neither do men live nor die in vain.
It's unknown. Spring to my step song download. Again it was a first person point of view.
We don't know any more than Ray knows and we don't see Robbie after he runs over the ridge. Maybe he hid; maybe he made it to Boston with the military unit that Ray encountered there. Many people are seen running down the hill after the explosion. Maybe Robbie survived the way they survived. It could be homage to the original book.
In it, the narrator learns that the town where his wife was hiding with family has been completely destroyed. When he finally makes it there at the end, he finds that several blocks of houses have been spared from destruction, and his wife and her family are alive and well at their house. Maybe Robbie joined the army and the surviving troops took him with them when they retreated.
He also could have been evacuated with the other survivors. The grandparents had on clean fresh clothes because they still had some in the house.
It didn't look like it took all that long for the aliens to start getting sick, and dying. It was probably less than a week. You don't go totally primitive in that length of time if your house is even partially intact. That part of America hadn't been attacked as badly as the other parts so their district may not have been attacked yet therefore they were clean and tidy as they didn't have to run away.
A large part of Boston, Massachusetts, is on reclaimed or artificially created land. It is possible that there were no buried alien war machines near Boston so the city had not suffered as much during the attack. Surprisingly, the concept is quite sound; assuming the shields were some form of electromagnetic shell, they would implement a premature detonation of any weapon entering its range but allow anything else to pass through; the spikes on the tripod legs and head are indeed suggestive of Electric Reactive Armour, an experimental countermeasure against anti-tank weapons. If the tripods were able to generate a large enough charge, an aura of plasma, similar to the one seen in the film would result.
Another explanation is that they turned off the shields temporarily when they picked up humans, otherwise it would negate the bird-scene at the end, which indicated that the shields were offline. It's perfectly believable that the aliens, having become seriously ill because of Earth-born disease, simply didn't have the mental capacity anymore to keep the defenses of the vehicles operating properly. The aliens were dying.
They essentially had the flu, or some kind of virus they had ingested. Think about driving a car. Now picture driving it with a temperature of 105, while coughing and vomiting or suffering other symptoms of sickness like a headache or impaired vision. The only way to explain the shields being down is that the operator has already died, passed out, or doesn't have the strength or mental capacity to turn them on—if you're sick and not thinking straight, it's very easy to forget even habitual procedures. Another theory is that the tripods were bio-mechanical.
The appendages looked like they may have been organic and the anus-looking thing that was pulling in Ray looked very organic. So maybe the virus/bacteria that killed the aliens had a similar effect on their equipment. It is not made clear why the aliens chose to attack at the time they did, even though it is suggested that their tripods have been buried deep in the Earth for millennia. Possible explanations include: (1) the aliens used humans as a kind of 'fertilizer' once they started their invasion, (2) they may have 'seeded' several, or even many, planets with the tripods many years ago. (Ogilvy's estimate of 'a million years' has no real support as the tripods could have been planted here as few as 10,000 years ago) and waited until they needed a planet, (3) the tripods have been put into place by an unmanned fleet that is sent out into the universe and automatically searches for useful planets; it just took the aliens that long to come after.
There is no evidence that they did not get those diseases when they left their tripods. Most bacteria or viruses have an incubation period before the host becomes symptomatic. Just because they did not become immediately ill upon leaving their tripods does not mean that they were not exposed. Also, there's a brief moment in the basement when we see the actual aliens where one of them drinks from a leaking pipe. If a human drinks contaminated water, it takes a while before they start to become sick. The aliens were obviously a biological life form like us, but with superior technology. Even if the aliens found out about bacteria way back when they buried the machines in the first place, bacteria are evolving all the time.
The bacteria they may or may not have known about way back then could be very different from the bacteria present today. Even if they had vaccines against known bacteria, there would be new strains against which they would not be protected. A similar idea is explored in the 1983-84 TV miniseries 'V': essentially a big-budget version of War of the Worlds, aliens called 'Visitors' come to Earth to plunder our resources, chiefly our water and subjugate the human race for food.
They claim to have been monitoring our world and communications for years and also claim they've been inoculated against all Earth-bound diseases. However, the human resistance movement eventually discovers that a new strain of bacteria can kill the Visitors. The organism, like any bacteria, can multiply rapidly so the resistance releases it into our atmosphere, making Earth uninhabitable to the invaders. They were watching us with telescopes, not microscopes.
According to David Koepp, his intention was that the tripods were sent down in capsules as a contingency, ahead of a potential invasion force, although this is not made clear in the film itself. An important theme in the novel (and partly the movie as well) is the separation between evolution and technology. The aliens are so arrogant and overdependent on their technological superiority that they never consider their evolutionary inferiority, i.e.
They are well prepared for full frontal attacks, but defenseless against the tiniest form of attack possible.
What always bothered me was the son. Specifically, that big moment between him and the dad. I get that there is a bit of social commentary in the film. Spielberg wants to comment on how young men get geared up to retaliate and become little more than military pun cushions.
But it just doesn't make sense in the context of the film. From what we have seen, the father is a man-child. He's barely there. He's more of a friend to his children than a parent.And then all the sudden you have this moment where the son tells the dad that he needs to let go. He tells the dad that he needs to be able to go out and be his own man. What has there been for him to rebel against? Not only has the dad not demonstrated 'helicopter' mentality, but the movie provides evidence to the contrary!I don't know.
There's a lot to like with War of the Worlds, but the relationships between the characters bothers me a little bit. And the son should have died. What a cop-out to bring him back. Boo, stupid son!. I remember first seeing Signs in theaters.
It was great. Baby monitor static/feedback/whatever still sort of creeps me out to this day.The best part, was that very near the end of the movie (before the dreaded 'twist'), the picture went out. All that was left was the sound. I think, coincidentally, it happened when they were in the basement(?) and the lights went out in the actual film, so it took a while before we knew there was something wrong.We got our money back, and free tickets as well. I sort of wish I had never rewatched to see the actual ending.War of the Worlds is fun too, but again, the ending. I do judge them on their own merits.
Signs was excellent. It was not just a solid piece of Science Fiction it was excellent Science Fiction.War of the Worlds was atrocious. There are some great moments in the movie, the walker coming out the ground and the walker attacking the ferry, and the plane crash at the house.Everything else was horrible. All the stuff with Cruise and his kids was just dumb. The Tim Robbin's scene went on forever and was equally dumb.
I can't stand Tom Cruise, he is just the Big Mac of actors to me. Thing is though, Cruise and the kids are not the worst part of War of the Worlds. Spielberg was.Spielberg just can't do that material. He can't show the total destruction and misery that would be society during and after that. Big and small he can't do it. Big he has the stupid happy reunion scene at the end. When they were all trapped in the belly of the walker being liquefied into fertilizer he had to put a big save scene.
$704 millionWar of the Worlds is a 2005 American directed by and written by and, loosely based on the. It stars, and, with narration. In the film, an American dock worker is forced to look after his children, from whom he lives separately, as he struggles to protect them and reunite them with their mother when the Earth and devastate cities with towering.The film was shot in 73 days, using five different sound stages as well as locations in,.
The film was surrounded by a secrecy campaign so few details would be leaked before its release. Tie-in promotions were made with several companies, including.
The film was released in the United States on June 29 and in United Kingdom on July 1. War of the Worlds was a box office success, and became 2005's fourth most successful film both domestically, with $234 million in North America, and $591 million overall. At the time of release, it was the highest-grossing film starring.
Plot Synopsis.WARNING: SpoilersRay Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is a divorced union container crane operator with few skills as a father. Ray's ex-wife (Miranda Otto) drops off their rebelious but coming of age teenage son Robbie (Justin Chatwin), and meek 10-year old daughter Rachel (Dakota Fanning) for a weekend visit with their father in New Jersey. (Filmed in Bayonne in the shadow of the worlds longest arch bridge.) Ray is a self-absorbed individual who feels imposed upon by having to baby sit his own children. Then something happens that will change their entire lives. An unusual and violent lightning storm hits the town. In the intersection down the street, Ray sees a huge three-legged war machine rise from beneath the street.
The machine begins to fire and incinerate everything and everybody. The Martians have begun the war by attacking Earth with only one goal in mind, destroying everything in sight.
Ray becomes a real father when he decides to protect his children and take them to their mother house. Ray grabs his handgun and a few supplies and steals a minivan from his friends service station, begging the friend to come with them, but leaving him behind when he doesn't understand the danger and refuses to get in. The mother and her new husband have already left for Boston so the Ferriers hole up in their house. Overnight, the Martians show up around their and cause great destruction. A news van is outside and the reporter informs Ray the Machines are in all cities. They decide to try to make it to Boston They start running for their lives and are just ahead of the Martians, when they get caught up in a frantic mob of people in upstate NY who are also fleeing the machines. The mob tries to get in the car or take it away from them.
In a Mexican standoff, Ray relinquishes the car to an armed gunman in exchange for letting him get Rachel out of the car. Ray drops his gun which is picked up by another mobmember who shoots the other gunman. They manage to get on a ferry as several more machines rise in the distance and the ferry leaves before it's full.
A machine rises from the river and overturns the ferry but the Ferriers swim to shore. Robbie follows an Army unit into battle against Ray's wishes but he cannot stop him.
Ray and Rachel are taken in by a sole man holed up in the basement of his rural house. Machines are all around and they send a camera tentical into the basement where they are holed up to look for humans which they avoid by moving and hiding.
Then some Martians come in personally to investigate, but they're called back to the ship before they find the humans. Ray and the homeowner dispute over how to handle the situation. The machines have increased in number and are everywhere, and they can not be destroyed by our military. They make it to Boston and the Martians start dying from various sickness caused by germs that humans are built up immunity to, but the Martians don't have.
Douglas Young (the-movie-guy) Ray Ferrier is a dock crane worker who leaves his shift in Brooklyn and drives home to meet his ex-wife, Mary Ann, and his two kids, Robbie and Rachel, at his home in Bayonne, New Jersey. When he arrives, late, they are all waiting for him. Ray sees that Mary Ann is pregnant.
After a few minutes of debate, over the children sharing a room and Robbie's homework assignment due on Monday, Mary Ann and her new husband leave for Boston to visit her parents for the weekend. Ray mildly orders his son to play catch with him in the back yard. Ray notices that Robbie now wears a Boston Red Sox hat; Ray is a Yankees fan. While the two play catch it becomes clear that father and son share a strained relationship.
After a brief argument, Robbie allows one of Ray's throws to fly past him and break a window in the basement. Rachel comments that Ray 'won't reach' Robbie by being belligerent.
Rachel asks what they should have for lunch and Ray coldly replies 'you know, order.' Ray goes upstairs to his bedroom to get some sleep. When he wakes up several hours later, he finds Rachel watching cartoons in the living room. She also informs her father that Robbie has taken off with his prized Mustang.
Ray becomes furious and rushes out to the street to find Robbie. People have gathered on the street. Ray also sees everyone looking to the north of his block where a strange storm appears to be swirling in the wrong direction. Ray goes into his backyard, taking Rachel with him. The wind picks up, but blows towards the storm. Suddenly, several bolts of lightning begin to strike the ground, some hitting dangerously close to Ray's yard. He and Rachel rush back into the house for shelter and find that every clock has stopped and the power is out.
Ray's watch has stopped and his cellphone is dead. After telling Rachel to stay in the house, he goes outside and finds Robbie nearby; his son had taken his car downtown and left it there when it stalled. Ray orders Robbie to watch his sister until he comes back.
Ray passes by an auto repair shop where the owner, Manny, tells him that the starter is burned out on a minivan he's looking over. Ray tells Manny to replace the solenoid. Ray walks downtown to the site where the lightning struck.
A crowd has gathered around a large hole in the street. Ray touches a piece of the cracked pavement and finds that it's unusually cold. Suddenly the ground under the hole surges upward and everyone scatters. A car that fell into the hold is thrown out. A huge machine on three stilted legs bursts out of the hole and observes the crowds. It lets out a loud blast like a fog horn and as the crowd continues to scatter, it begins to incinerate dozens of people with blasts of heat beams; people are turned instantly into ash when the beams strike them. Ray runs, escaping through a department store; as he does, the ash from an unfortunate victim covers him.
Ray hides behind a building and watches the monstrous machine walk. He is reminded of Robbie and Rachel when a man runs by carrying his own child. Ray returns home in utter shock. Barely speaking to his kids and washing the ash from his face and hair, he tells them both that they're leaving immediately.
Ray has Robbie take everything in his refrigerator and Ray retrieves a small pistol, tucking it into his belt. They go to Manny's garage and climb into the minivan the mechanic had been working on; since he'd replaced the solenoid, the car is able to run. Manny thinks Ray is joking with him until Ray tells him in a serious tone to come with them.
As he tells Ray to get out of the car, the nearby Bayonne Bridge collapses. Ray speeds off while his kids become panicky, especially Rachel, who has a problem with enclosed spaces. Robbie tries to calm her. Ray tells Robbie about the machine and the destruction it caused.
Ray plans to take his kids to a safe place, hopefully their mother and stepfather's house. Arriving at Mary Ann's house, they find it deserted. The trio have a brief argument over what to eat and Ray takes them down to the basement where they'll spend the night. After a few hours of restless sleep, Ray wakes up and hears a commotion outside, which becomes a deafening roar. The three rush into the basement's utility room and lock the door against a wall of flames. When Ray wakes up several hours later, he walks upstairs to find most of the house demolished. The commotion from the previous night was caused by a plane that had crashed in the neighborhood.
While Ray walks by, he sees a man in the wreckage of the plane, cleaning out the food service carts. Ray finds out that he's a cameraman for a news network and is there with a woman reporter. The woman tells Ray that the reports about the tripods are all the same, once they start moving, no more reports or news come from the area they attack. The woman eagerly asks Ray if he's a survivor of the plane crash; when he tells her he isn't, she and her crew hastily leave. Ray gathers his family and they set out again in the minivan. They drive for a while and pull over when Rachel needs to relieve herself.
She defiantly walks farther than Ray wishes her to and stops by a creek. While she looks at the water, she sees dozens of human bodies floating. She is terrified by the sight until Ray suddenly finds her and scolds her for wandering off too far. Back at the truck, and Army convoy passes.
Robbie seems overcome with anger and wants to join them in their counterattack against the invaders. Ray tries to reason with Robbie, telling him that the idea of them joining up with the Army is ludicrous. Ray lets Robbie drive for a while so he and his daughter can get some sleep.
They come to a small town where evacuated people have gathered. The crowd quickly becomes hostile toward Ray's family and wants their vehicle. Ray and Robbie are forcefully pulled from the truck and beaten by the mob.
Rachel panics and Ray, gathering his senses, uses his gun to force the crowd to retreat a bit. Moments later, he is forced to drop his pistol when another man, determined to take the truck for himself, holds a pistol on Ray. Ray is permitted to get Rachel out of the truck and walk away. The crowd again becomes violent and the man who took the minivan is attacked.
The family continues to walk with the crowds of evacuees. At a railroad crossing, a train zooms by, the entire length of it is on fire. At a ferry crossing in Athens, New York, the family waits to cross the river on one of the boats. Ray meets a woman he knows who has her own daughter in tow. The sound of the alien call is heard nearby and the crowd of people begin to rush the ferry. Army guards close the gates and deny Ray, his friend and their kids entry. The see a way to bypass the gates and make it to the boat, but only Ray and his kids are able to board.
Robbie sees that several people are trying to climb over the ferry's ramp and goes to help them. As the boat crosses the river, another tripod rises from the river and attacks, turning the ferry over and spilling cars and people into the water. Ray and the kids surface and swim for shore as tentacles from the tripod grab people out of the water. Ray and the kids make it to the opposite shore.
While they steal away, they see garments floating down from sky. Still walking, the family passes by a battle between the aliens and the Army.
Jets zip by overhead and Robbie somehow becomes entranced by the battle, which is unseen and taking place over a hill. Robbie approaches it while Ray and Rachel yell for him to come back.
Robbie ignores them and is stopped at the top of the hill by Army personnel. Ray leaves Rachel under a tree and confronts Robbie, telling him that he doesn't need to become involved and that his sister is very worried about him. Robbie insists that he needs to see the battle and Ray reluctantly lets him go, accepting that he can't stop his son's obsession and needs to protect his daughter. Ray picks up Rachel just as a final assault of helicopters fails to stop the tripods. The last thing Ray sees after Robbie rushes over the hill is a tripod looming over a wall of fire.
It also becomes obvious that the tripods have a protective shield covering them that repels all bombardment. Just then Ray and Rachel are called by a man who owns a nearby house. The owner, Olgilvy, offers them sanctuary in his basement. However, it becomes clear to Ray that Olgilvy is mentally unstable and plans to tunnel out of the basement.
A series of loud noises from upstairs prompt the group to hide. A snake-like probe is sent into the basement. The group narrowly avoids detection and the probe is withdrawn after a few minutes. Later, three of the aliens enter the basement - they are three-legged and very curious.
Ray also stops Olgilvy from shooting them with his shotgun, knowing the noise will attract more of them. The aliens leave when their horn sounds. Ray also discovers that the aliens are covering the landscape with a mysterious and rapidly-growing red vine and they are using blood harvested from humans they've captured to fertilize it.
At this revelation, Olgilvy becomes extremely agitated, digging frantically in his basement and muttering 'Not MY blood!' Ray realizes that if Olgilvy continues to act the same way, he'll only grow worse and they'll all be found. Ray tries one last time to calm the man but fails. Ray has Rachel put on her headphones and listen to her music while he confronts and kills Olgilvy behind a closed door. After he emerges from the room, Ray and Rachel fall asleep. When Rachel awakes, she sees the alien probe has returned and they've been discovered.
Ray uses an axe to cut the eye of the probe off, however, Rachel has fled the house. Ray rushes out in time to see her captured by a tripod.
The tripod attacks Ray, who hides in a nearby Humvee, and he's flipped over. The tripod loses interest in him, however Ray uses a grenade from a belt he finds to get it's attention. It uses a tentacle to lift him into an underslung cage filled with other people. Ray finds Rachel, who's in deep shock. While Ray figures out how to escape, a large valve opens overhead and sucks up one of the captives. The valve then tries to capture Ray, who takes the grenade belt with him.
His fellow captives keep hold of his arm and drag him back. When Ray lands in the cage, he shows a soldier that he'd pulled the pins from two of the grenades.
They explode inside the tripod and the cage is released, falling onto a nearby tree, freeing everyone. Ray and Rachel make it to Boston. While being directed by more soldiers, Ray notices that the red weeds are dying and that a tripod has come down. Another nearby tripod sounds it's horn and everyone flees. Sven co-op listen server. Ray notices that a small flock of birds have landed on the tripod - it's shield is not functioning. Ray relays this discovery to a captain standing by, who orders his platoon to bring up Javelin missiles.
Several rockets are fired at the defenseless tripod, which collapses, demolishing a building. The evacuees and soldiers approach the tripod, which opens a hatch, spilling a bright orange fluid. An alien arm with a pink hue (instead of the steel-gray color Ray had seen on the aliens in the basement) falls out limply. The aliens are dying of some unknown cause.
Ray walks Rachel to his in-laws' house. His ex-wife and her new husband are there, along with her parents. Rachel runs to her mother. Robbie steps out of the house too and he an Ray embrace. The narrator's voice returns and informs us that the aliens had killed billions, however they were defenseless against disease-carrying bacteria to which humans have long been immune.
Well, here's some strange news: Astronomers are reporting what appear to be a series of explosions on the surface of Mars. Even the two Mars rovers sent back data on several 'seismic events' before mysteriously going silent.
NASA attributes the lack of communication to a software glitch, and engineers are working to resolve the issue.Of greater concern is the loss of contact with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which had been mapping the surface of the red planet. Some experts are speculating that perhaps Mars was hit by several meteors, one of which may have also struck the Orbiter. The odds of such a collision, however, are believed to be a million to one. Still, if true, that would represent the loss of a valuable exploration tool.-Lugosi, 12:01 A.M. Well, so much for going right back to sleep. Now all sorts of sirens keep going. Normally that's not that unusual.
I live near a major intersection, and you can occasionally hear emergency vehicles as they go up one road or another. What's different this time is that I've counted well over 20 sets of sirens go. That's surprising, since I didn't think Warrenton had that many fire trucks, police cars, and ambulances.I still don't know what that noise was, but it apparently wasn't that nearby. Assuming those sirens are responding to whatever happened, it must have been several miles away. The sirens keep fading off in the distance rather than stopping right away.Anyway, it's still not too late for John McCain to win my vote.
All he has to do is promise to let me get a decent night's sleep.-Lugosi, 4:44 A.M. Well, things have finally quieted down. There's still an occasional helicopter, but at least the sirens have stopped for the most part. That orange glow in the distance seems to be gone as well, so I guess that means they succeeded in knocking down the fire.
Not surprising, since earlier it sounded like every fire truck in the state was heading in that direction.Still, I've decided to take the day off. I don't want to leave, then find out this evening that I can't come home for three weeks. Do you have any idea how much two cats can poop in that amount of time?No way I want to come home to a litter box that full.-Lugosi, 6:36 A.M. Just when you think things have quieted down, a new set of sirens goes screaming. And just in case that's not enough to wake the dead, several helicopters have been circling overhead. I've pretty much given up on trying to go back to sleep.I went outside to see what was up and ran into several neighbors. According to them, there was a pipeline explosion a few miles away.
Sure enough, you can even see an orange glow in the sky off to the north.That would certainly seem to account for what's going on. I know that several of the big pipelines from the Gulf pass through Fauquier county, but I had thought they were down in the southern part of the county-the exact opposite direction from whatever the hell is happening.Anyway, now it looks like the cops are blocking off Route 17 going north.
If they tell us to start evacuating, I'm not going. I'll be like those people in New Orleans who refused to leave ahead of Katrina. And everything worked out well for them, didn't it?If you're lucky, maybe you'll see me tomorrow on the roof my building waving at the news choppers.-Lugosi, 5:39 A.M. I recognized one of the deputies manning the road block near my house as someone I went to school with.
What he had to say was nothing short of incredible.It turns out that what happened last was NOT a pipeline explosion. Rather, something had crashed in the woods about five miles outside of town and set off a large fire. Most people seemed to think it was an airplane, but there were also rumors that it may have been some sort of satellite. Witnesses near the crash described a 'large ball of fire' that had come straight down out of the sky and plowed into the ground. Whatever it was, the flames were still preventing the authorities from getting close to the impact site.I went back and told the neighbors.
One of them has a 4WD pick up, so a group of us are going to try and get close to the action by taking some back roads. If need be, we can cut through some fields. Some of you may think that's a little sick, but it's really no different from looking at a car crash along the highway. And don't even try to tell me you've never done that.This may sound dorky, but I'm going to grab my laptop and let you know what I see.-Lugosi, 8:09 A.M. We've been able to get surprisingly close to the impact site. Despite having hundreds of people on the scene, there's no real crowd control.
That road block back in town is apparently only for show.The fires are mostly out. In fact, there are a number of what appear to be military personnel that are trying to get all the rescue equipment moved out of the area as fast as possible. Oh, and what I had thought was one helicopter periodically circling over Warrenton? Now it looks like it was actually several helicopters merely on their way up here. I count about 14 or 15 of them sitting on the ground in an open field near.
Near whatever. The choppers are all camouflage green, so I'm guessing either army or air force.So why would the military be on the scene of a plane crash? Well, probably because that's clearly not what happened here. There's a large crater with an actual raised rim visible amid a bunch of charred trees. If I had to guess, I'd say this was a meteorite.
![]()
Or maybe some sort of large satellite, which would account for the military presence. The inside of the crater is still obscured by either smoke or some sort of mist, so there's no telling what's in there.-Lugosi, 10:17 A.M. Well, this is certainly interesting. I overheard a couple of the military guys talking, and apparently this isn't the only such impact site in the country. According to them, there have even been reports from overseas.But that's not the alarming part. What's REALLY scary is the noises coming from inside the crater: It's almost like metal banging against metal, accompanied by some sort of mechanical sounds.
If I didn't know better, it almost sounds like something being assembled. There's still some sort of heavy smoke or mist in the crater, so none of the helicopters has been able to get a look at what's going on.A number of big black SUV's rolled up a while ago. Quite a few army type people got out and have clearly taken charge of the area.
They've pushed everyone except the actual military personnel further back.Looks like they're getting a small team together to climb the side of the crater and get a better look at what's making that noise. And they're not dicking around: Several of them are armed with some pretty big guns. Why do you need weapons to go look at a meteorite?All of a sudden I'm thinking I should have stayed home.-Lugosi, 11:50 A.M. Things are definitely getting scary now.About half an hour ago six soldiers went up the outside of the crater. Evidently they still couldn't anything see because of the smoke, and so they actually climbed down inside.
Suddenly there were screams followed by some shooting. There was also some sort of other sound, kind of like an electronic buzzing.Only two of the guys back out of the crater, and they were obviously in a hurry. After a quick conference, several ran to a new helicopter that had showed up here just a little while ago. This one appears to be armed with missiles of some sort.Meanwhile, I just checked Yahoo. I thought I saw a headline about some sort of military attack in France and clicked on the link, but it come back as 'Page not found.' So I went back to Yahoo and hit refresh, and the headline was now gone entirely. Then I tried going to news.google, but that site was down entirely.
What the hell is going on? No wonder crazy rumors are circulating.I'll let you know what happens after the helicopter takes off.-Lugosi, 12:29 P.M. I'm now hiding in a a small creek bed.Earlier a military helicopter took off and launched several missiles into the crater. They never made it, instead exploding well outside of the rim.
Moments later some sort of beam of intense light shot out of the crater and hit the chopper. It immediately exploded, and some of the falling debris hit several soldiers on the ground. The others began to scatter. Some ran towards the woods, others went for the SUV's. Looked like one group was going for one of the remaining helicopters.Suddenly something emerged from the crater. Hard to say exactly what it was, except that it appeared to be some sort of mechanical giant that stood maybe 30 or 40 feet tall. It began firing the same bursts of energy (or light or whatever) that had brought down the first helicopter.
Whenever the beam hit a person, he or she ended up bursting into flame. It pretty much had the same effect on the helicopters and the SUV's, reducing them to smoldering piles of twisted metal. Then it started going for the remaining firetrucks, destroying them as well. At this point there must have been hundreds of people running and screaming.
Unfortunately for them, they were way out in an open field, with no cover nearby.The group of spectators I was with were further away, so we had a little more time. I decided to head for the cover of some trees and a stream. My neighbors, unfortunately, made a break for their truck.
Last I saw them was when that beam caught up with them.The robot eventually trudged off towards the east, which also happens to be the direction towards DC. I started to come out of my hiding place when suddenly another of those machines whirred to life in the crater. Over the course of the next hour or so, six more of them emerged from the crater.As near as I can tell, all of the giant robots are finally gone. After they made mincemeat out of everyone and everything within their range-which appears to be line of site regardless of the distance- they went off in various directions. One actually passed within fifty yards of me.
I thought for sure I was about to die, but it just kept going.Since then I've been checking various news sites. For the most part they're all showing the same headlines about the Fed's latest rate cut, or presidential poll numbers, or the World Series. And that's what's curious: They're ALMOST always the exact same headlines. It's been that way since this morning.I have found, however, a number of other sites claiming that the government has stepped in and taken over all official news outlets. Apparently it's part of an effort to prevent panic from sweeping the country. I've never been one for conspiracy theories, but based on what I saw earlier, it makes sense.I'm going to try and make my way back home.-Lugosi, 2:19 P.M. Most of Warrenton is either still in flames or reduced to rubble.
The machine that did this appears to be gone, and a few survivors are roaming the streets. Most appear to be in shock, incapable of taking in the devastation around them. A few others are just sitting in the wreckage of their lives, weeping uncontrollably.
I passed by one guy who was talking to a small pile of ash that I'm guessing used to be his wife.That police road block? The squad cars were just piles of wreckage. No sign of my friend the cop.I finally made it to my apartment building, or at least what was left of it. My half of the structure was gone. I spotted one of my cats off in some bushes. When I called to him, he just took off running.The lower two floors of the other half of the building were mostly intact.
I forced my way into one unit and found that the electricity, though flickering, was still on. I turned on the TV but the cable was out.
That's no surprise; Comcast goes out if you as much as sneeze.Found another apartment on the second floor that had a small satellite dish mounted on the balcony railing. Everything seemed to still be hooked up, but all the channels came up either blank or with test patterns.-Lugosi, 4:30 P.M. I was having what seemed like an intelligent conversation with another survivor when he suddenly said that today's horrible events are proof of God's existence. According to him, all the death and destruction was a the lord's way of punishing us for allowing abortions, legalizing same-sex marriages, and giving Obama a double digit lead in the polls.I tried to point out that wherever these creatures came from, they had arrived in space ships. And if they were from heaven and sent by God, then why did they need space ships?Instead of answering my question, the man said that if I wanted to be saved, then all I needed to do was accept God.
Then He would protect me from all harm. As proof, he cited himself. 'I have accepted God, and in return he is protecting me from all harm.'
Then he closed his eyes to offer up a prayer of thanks.That's when I hit him in the head with a baseball bat and stole his car.-Lugosi, 6:24 P.M. When I first, er, 'commandeered' that car a few hours ago, I really had no idea where I was going to go.
I just knew I had to get the hell out of Warrenton before more of those things came back. Now I think I made a mistake.Since most of those machines headed east, I decided to go west. Seemed logical at the time.So now I'm in Charlottesville, and I'm seeing plenty evidence that machines have been through here as well.
Much of the city is destroyed and in flames. I spoke with one survivor who said that the things came out of the mountains with no warning. Unlike the 'ship' that landed in Warrenton, this one had ended up in a much more remote area. I'm starting to realize that attack is much more widespread than I had thought, perhaps even effecting the whole world.
If so, that would mean that no where is safe.There still seems to be a news blackout in effect. Can't say if it's the aliens blocking the signals or our own government censoring things, but the effect is the same: No one knows what's going on. Even the official internet news sites are down.I'm going to hit the road again. Just keep heading west, I guess.-Lugosi, 8:14 P.M. Well, this is f.cking great.I just ran out of gas. I have no clue as to where I am, except that I'm somewhere south of Lynchburg and north of Roanoke.
Still can't get any real news, but there are plenty of other sites on the internet with information.From what I've been able to piece together, these craft began crashing into Earth early this morning. For the most part, they seemed to end up in remote areas where they could assemble their 'walkers' unencumbered by human interference.One notable exception was one that ended smack in the middle of the Seine River in Paris. The occupants of the ship drowned when they opened their craft. Divers quickly entered the vessel and discovered components for six of the 40 foot tall walkers, and as many as 20 alien beings. They are described as being about five feet tall, with six limbs.
It is believed they are from Mars, where they apparently live underground.One French astrobiologist theorized that these 'Martians' were forced to move underground when the surface of their planet became uninhabitable. This may well have happened several thousand years ago, and they've spent the intervening centuries planning the invasion of Earth so they could rebuild their civilization.The walkers were devised as weapons, as well as provide the occupants with needed transportation. Earth's higher gravity is apparently a serious problem for them.Gotta go. I'm hearing voices from somewhere up ahead.-Lugosi, 10:03 P.M. As I was walking towards the voices, I began to sense that there was a large object in the road up ahead. At first I thought it was a tree, though it was hard to tell in the dark.
I was just thinking it was good I ran out of gas when I did, or I would have plowed right into it.My heart just about ended up in my throat when I realized it wasn't a tree, but one of those damned Martian walkers. It was lying on its side and appeared to be disabled. There were no noises coming from it at all. My first thought was that somehow the people surrounding it had brought the thing down.Turns out that wasn't the case at all. In fact, they had been fleeing from it, and its death ray had picked off about 40 people from the original group when the machine suddenly froze up. Download movie one piece.
After a few minutes it just toppled over. After a while the survivors cautiously approached it, and that was about the time I heard them.We've found what appears to be a hatch of sorts. Now we're debating whether to try to open damn thing. The rest of these idiots can do what they want, but I'm going to hide in the treeline.-Lugosi, 10:34 P.M. Just as we're standing there arguing about who's going to be stupid enough to open this thing, the issue was settled for us. There was a sudden hissing sound, and before any of us could react, the hatch opened on its own and an alien body just kind of plopped out onto the ground.As near as any of us could tell, the creature looked like it had bled to death.
There appeared to be blood-assuming that's what it was-oozing from its eyes and nose. As to the body's overall appearance, well, its skin was blotchy and cracked. Without having a healthy live version to compare it to we couldn't say for sure, but this particular Martian looked sick as hell.Someone shined a flashlight in through the open hatch. There appeared to be two more dead creatures inside.-Lugosi, 10:55 P.M. Our group had decided to set up camp for the night near the wreckage of the Martian walker. Just as we began to settle down for the night, someone noticed lights in the distance.
They were moving fast, and straight for us. There was some panic that it might be another Martian machine, but we soon realized it was a bus.The new group turned out to be from Roanoke. Several machines had been leveling the city when they began shutting down one by one. That's when this particular group of humans decided to make a run for it on a bus they had found.Someone had a shortwave radio but its rechargeable battery had died earlier in the day. Our group has plenty of flashlights, so we're going to try to jury rig some sort of connection from our batteries to the radio.-Lugosi, 11:27 P.M.
We got the radio going and quickly found a broadcast from France. Fortunately it turned out we had a French major from nearby Radford University in our midst, and he was able to translate.The bottom line is that the initial Martian attack was absolutely devastating. Major cities all over the world had been wiped out, and as many as two billion people were feared dead. However, the threat now appeared to be over. Over the course of the last several hours, all the Martian machines seem to have shut down. In the cases where humans succeeded in opening them up, the occupants were found to be dead.Then that French astrobiologist I had seen quoted earlier joined the broadcast.
His theory was that the Martians, having come from an otherwise dead world, had forgotten about the threat posed by microbes. When exposed to the alien viruses and bacteria of Earth, their bodies quickly succumbed to the onslaught of germs.Does that mean we were now safe? The astrobiologist was cautionary on that. He said it depended on what kind of capabilities the remaining occupants of Mars had left, and whether they would realize their mistake. But for now at least, yes, we were safe.So where does mankind go from here? It's hard to say, except that we have a massive job ahead: Rebuilding civilization. That will clearly require a great deal of international cooperation.
But what happens after that? Will the petty jealousies between nations once again conspire to pull us apart from one another? Or have we as a species learned once and for all that we must live together as one, or eventually die? Only time will tell.On the bright side, there are unconfirmed reports out of Alaska that Sarah Palin was vaporized when she tried to field dress a Martian.There is, however, one thing that is absolutely certain: The next time I get a cold, I'll be thankful as hell.-Lugosi, 11:59 P.M.
Comments are closed.
|
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |