The Martian Project Sculpture Design Contest

In anticipation of the 85th anniversary of Orson Welles’ infamous radio broadcast in which Martian tripods were said to have landed in West Windsor, West Windsor Arts, in collaboration with the Historical Society of West Windsor, is hosting a sculpture design contest! The winning design will be used to create blank, fiberglass sculptures, which will be given to local artists to decorate, and the designer will win a cash prize of $500.  This creative Martian invasion will be on display at various West Windsor locations during October 2023. 

More information here.

Thanks, Mike!  This is a very cool contest.  My Martian in the basement is showing signs of life.

War

There was something fungoid in the oily brown skin, something in the clumsy deliberation of the tedious movements unspeakably nasty. Even at this first encounter, this first glimpse, I was overcome with disgust and dread.

Suddenly the monster vanished. It had toppled over the brim of the cylinder and fallen into the pit, with a thud like the fall of a great mass of leather. I heard it give a peculiar thick cry, and forthwith another of these creatures appeared darkly in the deep shadow of the aperture.

I turned and, running madly, made for the first group of trees, perhaps a hundred yards away; but I ran slantingly and stumbling, for I could not avert my face from these things.

H.G. Wells

Lurking In The Basement

 

Hill House Halloween

No one gave a thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. 

-The War of the Worlds

Click for more photos.

BBC: Victorian-Era War Of The Worlds TV Series

I'd be interested in seeing this, as the non-modern setting would be way more interesting.

Click below...

Image by Roger Dean.

It's War

The Great Martian War

Currently watching this faux documentary, hilariously produced as though it were the real deal...  and trying to stay true to the timeline in H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds.

Click below:

NASA Curiosity Rover

Step 1:

Step 2:

Step 3:

Story here.

And here.

War

There was something fungoid in the oily brown skin, something in the clumsy deliberation of the tedious movements unspeakably nasty. Even at this first encounter, this first glimpse, I was overcome with disgust and dread.

Suddenly the monster vanished. It had toppled over the brim of the cylinder and fallen into the pit, with a thud like the fall of a great mass of leather. I heard it give a peculiar thick cry, and forthwith another of these creatures appeared darkly in the deep shadow of the aperture.

I turned and, running madly, made for the first group of trees, perhaps a hundred yards away; but I ran slantingly and stumbling, for I could not avert my face from these things.

In another moment I had scrambled up the earthen rampart and stood upon its crest, and the interior of the redoubt was below me. A mighty space it was, with gigantic machines here and there within it, huge mounds of material and strange shelter places. And scattered about it, some in their overturned war-machines, some in the now rigid handling-machines, and a dozen of them stark and silent and laid in a row, were the Martians--dead!--slain by the putrefactive and disease bacteria against which their systems were unprepared; slain as the red weed was being slain; slain, after all man's devices had failed, by the humblest things that God, in his wisdom, has put upon this earth. 

H.G. Wells

The Martian

Apparently the vegetable kingdom in Mars, instead of having green for a dominant colour, is of a vivid blood-red tint. At any rate, the seeds which the Martians (intentionally or accidentally) brought with them gave rise in all cases to red-coloured growths. Only that known popularly as the red weed, however, gained any footing in competition with terrestrial forms. The red creeper was quite a transitory growth, and few people have seen it growing. For a time, however, the red weed grew with astonishing vigour and luxuriance. It spread up the sides of the pit by the third or fourth day of our imprisonment, and its cactus-like branches formed a carmine fringe to the edges of our triangular window. And afterwards I found it broadcast throughout the country, and especially wherever there was a stream of water. 

H.G. Wells

Used one of my props from Halloween 2012 to make something I've wanted to build for a long time - my version of the Martian from the 1953 film War of the Worlds.
He's not finished yet, but a morning fog offered a fun opportunity to shoot some photos.

Click here to see the inspiration.

Now Playing: Order Of The Ginger Gild

By Tangerine Dream.

War of the Worlds on the brain, apparently.

Click below:

Invader

Not going to lie. I've been in love with the War of the Worlds alien since the first time I saw it. And I always felt such pity for it when Dr. Forrester cleaned its clock and it ran away screeching. It would have been a great creature pet/buddy to have in the house. You come home from school and it's waiting there. You can read a book at night from the light of its tri-colored glowing eye.

Though I guess it'd have to live in a bubble. Common bacteria and all.


Found these GREAT photos on flickr. I had always assumed it was a smaller creature, and certainly not a costumed actor. I figured it was just a puppet.

More images here.

Tripod Sirens

All this had happened with such swiftness that I had stood motionless, dumbfounded and dazzled by the flashes of light. Had that death swept through a full circle, it must inevitably have slain me in my surprise. But it passed and spared me, and left the night about me suddenly dark and unfamiliar.

If It's War They Want

It is still a matter of wonder how the Martians are able to slay men so swiftly and so silently. Many think that in some way they are able to generate an intense heat in a chamber of practically absolute non-conductivity. This intense heat they project in a parallel beam against any object they choose, by means of a polished parabolic mirror of unknown composition, much as the parabolic mirror of a lighthouse projects a beam of light. But no one has absolutely proved these details. However it is done, it is certain that a beam of heat is the essence of the matter. Heat, and invisible, instead of visible, light. Whatever is combustible flashes into flame at its touch, lead runs like water, it softens iron, cracks and melts glass, and when it falls upon water, incontinently that explodes into steam.

Image source.

War Of The Worlds

Back in the 80s, I watched every episode of the War of the Worlds television series. After watching this fan tribute, I'm not entirely comfortable with that.

Click below:

War

At any rate, as the dusk came on a slow, intermittent movement upon the sand pits began, a movement that seemed to gather force as the stillness of the evening about the cylinder remained unbroken. Vertical black figures in twos and threes would advance, stop, watch, and advance again, spreading out as they did so in a thin irregular crescent that promised to enclose the pit in its attenuated horns. I, too, on my side began to move towards the pit.

Then I saw some cabmen and others had walked boldly into the sand pits, and heard the clatter of hoofs and the gride of wheels. I saw a lad trundling off the barrow of apples. And then, within thirty yards of the pit, advancing from the direction of Horsell, I noted a little black knot of men, the foremost of whom was waving a white flag.

Image source.

Even More Beksinski

I've been a fan of Zdzislaw Beksinski for a long time and never saw the painting below:


This one reminds me of the Red growth in WAR OF THE WORLDS.


Gallery.

War Of The Worlds

The costume in the previous post reminds me of the alien design in the original 1953 WAR OF THE WORLDS film (and the short-lived TV Series in the 90s). Turns out there was a plan to make a television series sequel back in the 70s.

Here's a sketch of one of the revised aliens for that series:

More information.

War of the Worlds

"All this had happened with such swiftness that I had stood motionless, dumbfounded and dazzled by the flashes of light. Had that death swept through a full circle, it must inevitably have slain me in my surprise. But it passed and spared me, and left the night about me suddenly dark and unfamiliar."


flickr source.

some more information.

and more.