In Woking, England, there stands a tribute to H.G. Wells and those badass Martian tripods that he brought to Earth in 1898. You can’t really point to the tripod itself and say, “Ooh, that’s cool.” I mean: you can, because it is cool. But the fact is the setup there tells the whole story of the novel in a nutshell. That to me is what’s really cool.
Nearby is the cylinder that the thing arrived in. You can see that and more pics of the tripod here. And also nearby is what saved our asses from the Martians: bacteria. There’s slabs with representations of the bacteria on them–indeed, the tripod has stepped on one of the slabs and shattered it: “The bacteria pattern on this slab continues up the leg of the sculpture, as if to suggest the inevitable progress of decay upon a seemingly invincible enemy.”
Awesome. I started thinking about the shitload of tripods there must be and homages to the novel and films (well, the ones that didn’t suck). I found this page chocked full of various War art. They also had this 1949 test reel from Harryhausen, pitching the concept of a film to RKO. The film, of course, wouldn’t get made until George Pal’s version in 1953 for Paramount…
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Direct link for the feedreaders.
This page has a lowdown on the various films that have been inspired or adapted from War, including “Kitty Kornered,” which I haven’t thought about it aeons. And any excuse to get some classic cartoons, you know me:
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And there’s The Tripods, which I remember reading in comic book form somewhere, though I couldn’t tell you where. Probably when I was in the waiting room at my piano teacher’s house, many many moons ago. Is it just me or does this vid make it looks like H.G. Wells’ The Goonies?
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All of this kicked off by Neatorama.
Update: If you want the trailer to the George Pal film, you can snag that here. And if you’d like to see the entire film acted out with dolls (AHH! DOLLS!) then find that here.
I read the book, but the movie had better tripods. Those things were awesome. Too bad the rest of the movie kinda blew.