BBC's War of the Worlds

[timebug]

Watched what was labelled as 'Part Two' on my streaming doodab, and it was,like 'Part One', 90 minutes long. So as it is a three one-hour-per-episode job, I guess I have seen it all,including next weeks 'Part 3'. Not great. Don't want to 'spoiler' it, but it's one I won't be watching again*.
Whereas the ancient Gene Barry one, I will watch all day long! Yes it got so many things wrong, but it was true to the FEEL of the book,and to the main plot structure. The Mighty Midget Cruise one, had some great sound effects for the Martian calls, but was otherwise shite.
One thing this new version did do, was inspire me to re-read the book.Which I will do, tomorrow!

*And Demelza from Poldark isn't nearly a good enough actor to portray most of the emotions she was given!

[JesusAndYourBush]

I wish they'd just tell it in chronological order.  The flash forwards are pissing me off.  Just tell the fucking story.

[alan nagsworth]

i haven't watched this but i can assuredly say that the only way it could be good is if, at the end, we fade to danny dyer in a high-backed leather armchair by a calmly flickering fireplace, huge dusty hardback of the book in his lap, open at the final page. he looks up to the camera as he closes the book and says "can't believe it's been nearly 125 years since them slags smashed into horsell common it still freaks my nut out to this day".

[touchingcloth]

I can't read "high-backed armchair" without thinking about Richard Herring wanking.

[Butchers Blind]

Pile of shit! 

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

i haven't watched this but i can assuredly say that the only way it could be good is if, at the end, we fade to danny dyer in a high-backed leather armchair by a calmly flickering fireplace, huge dusty hardback of the book in his lap, open at the final page. he looks up to the camera as he closes the book and says "can't believe it's been nearly 125 years since them slags smashed into horsell common it still freaks my nut out to this day".

I laughed

[JesusAndYourBush]

Well it was an interesting adaptation, but I'm not sure I liked it.
Every other version of War Of The Worlds I've seen has ended with andthemartiansalldiedofasimplediseaselikethecommoncoldTHEEND so it was nice to see the Martians downfall and the aftermath dealt with in more detail.  I just wish they'd kept it in chronological order and not skipped back and forth like a fucking yoyo because it added nothing and just served to confuse.

[poo]

thought this was terrible don't know why I stuck with it

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

A load of meandering, utterly pointless shit.

[Norton Canes]

I think anyone involved in scripting past episodes of Doctor Who is doing their upmost to make sure they're not picked at Chris Chibnall's successor.

[jobotic]

I laughed

I ullaed

[Spoon of Ploff]

War of the Worlds Adaptions in Order:

1. 1950s War of the Worlds
2. Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds
3. Tom Cruise's War of the Worlds
4. BBC's War of the Worlds


haven't heard the Orson Welles radio one.

[Butchers Blind]

I didn' t see the problem with doing a more faithful adaptation of WOTW seeing as one hasn't been done but no, the BBC gave us this 20% pointless version instead. 

[Norton Canes]

Haven't caught up with episodes two and three yet but on the whole I'd much prefer a version that takes risks over an adaptation that stays faithful to the book. If I wanted something that stayed faithful to the book I'd just... re-read the book.

Obviously a shame this one was pants though.

[Butchers Blind]

Haven't caught up with episodes two and three yet but on the whole I'd much prefer a version that takes risks over an adaptation that stays faithful to the book. If I wanted something that stayed faithful to the book I'd just... re-read the book.

I do agree but to disregard most of the plot points of the original, why call it WOTW?  Just call it Aliens on Earth or something just as bland.

[Deanjam]

Haven't caught up with episodes two and three yet but on the whole I'd much prefer a version that takes risks over an adaptation that stays faithful to the book. If I wanted something that stayed faithful to the book I'd just... re-read the book.

Obviously a shame this one was pants though.

I'd argue if you're not gonna be faithful to the source then why not write something new.

[Jim Bob]

The chances of anything good coming from the BBC are a million to one, he said.

[Norton Canes]

But still...

[Norton Canes]

to disregard most of the plot points of the original, why call it WOTW?  Just call it Aliens on Earth or something

Well, there was...

[Spoon of Ploff]

I didn't feel this adaption was taking risks... it looked like it might be with how the 'aftermath' scenes were playing out, but then they pissed it away with a conclusion that was laughably bad.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

A large proportion of the runtime seemed to be close-ups of the redhead girl's face while she looked watery eyed and let her bottom lip tremble a bit. Unfortunately she's not a good enough actor to carry the film, as she seemed to have been cast to do. Ralph Spoons just frowned a lot.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Near total shit except for the start which would take awe inspiring incompetence to mess up anyway.

All the people slagging off HDM should have tried watching this, for the epitome style over substance. Not only was it relentless but it was boring too, with characters doing things that didn't make sense as they weren't justified, while the editing happily hopped characters around from place to place despite the near constant threat.

[Pranet]

Why did she smash the little greenhouse things at the end? They'll still need them won't they? Unless at the end she is moving the clouds with the power of her mind.

While watching the last episode for most of it I was going to say that it wasn't as bad as people were making out, there were some interesting ideas etc but that bit with her taking to her kid and doing the pointless garden vandalism ended the whole thing on a bit of boring and confusing note.

Thinking about it, I am not sure how much of it I would have understood if I had not recently read The Space Machine by Christopher Priest, which is a retelling of War of the Worlds. If that wasn't fresh in my memory then I may not have realised why the post invasion world had gone to shit.

I liked bits of it, the bit on the beach when they are trying to evacuate I think I will remember.

[JesusAndYourBush]

Why did she smash the little greenhouse things at the end? They'll still need them won't they? Unless at the end she is moving the clouds with the power of her mind.

She assumed the plants weren't growing, so smashed the glass things and oh look - a plant has started to grow.  Earlier the kid had mentioned never having seen a blue sky, and right on cue the clouds start to clear and there's the beginnings of a blue sky.

The bloke didn't have to sacrifice himself to the martian.  When it tottered towards him it seemed literally on its last legs.  He should have gone back inside and waited another day.

[Spoon of Ploff]

The bloke didn't have to sacrifice himself to the martian.  When it tottered towards him it seemed literally on its last legs.  He should have gone back inside and waited another day.

I think this was done so Poldark lady could do her 'but i can't leeeeeeave yooooooooo!' bit, for the third time.

[Alberon]

I think they were also trying to show she might lose the baby because she wasn't eating or drinking.

[Old Gold Tooth]

Bloody hell. I was looking forward to this but only made it through the first episode. How do you make an alien invasion boring as fuck? The Beeb almost deserve an award for managing it.

Didn't help that I'd recently picked up volume 2 of Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen in a comixology sale.

[H-O-W-L]

Have the Martians grabbed anyone and twatted them into a tree yet?

Ooh, right, that was an odd bit of the novel wasn't it?

Should clarify this, in the original novel the Tripods have fuckloads of additional tentacles and grabbers and manipulators as opposed to just being lunking barely-animated cunts, and there's a pretty big point made out of the fact they grab soldiers and slam them against tree trunks. It's a sort of odd thing when you consider that they have a Heat Ray but I suppose they wanted a larf and a bit of a war crime.

I also suppose back when it was written the idea of a machine physically grabbing someone and hauling them into a tree trunk in order to murder them was actually legitimately a bit graphic and horrific. In today's post-Spiderman, Doctor Octopus saturated world, the idea of a hero (or even bystander) getting flung about by a mechanotendril would make someone, even in the real world, wonder how it couldn't be survived.

[H-O-W-L]

Every other version of War Of The Worlds I've seen has ended with andthemartiansalldiedofasimplediseaselikethecommoncoldTHEEND so it was nice to see the Martians downfall and the aftermath dealt with in more detail

Additionally, the Martians died to necrotic skin bacteria (you know, the kind we're mostly immune to unless you have a particularly vulnerable cut and have on our skin in the billions) as opposed to just influenza or the cold. They were literally eaten apart from within and their deaths were a lot more graphic and drastic than people make out. The prequel-adaptation by Dark Horse that leads into Scarlet Traces depicts this with wonderfully brutal visuals. I think you can still read it (legally) for free on the 'net, too.

also any War of the Worlds adaptation that doesn't have The Spirit of Man is donkey shit even if it's hewn from godswood by Christ himself, sorry!

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

They were literally eaten apart from within and their deaths were a lot more graphic and drastic than people make out

They didn't really exist. Which people made out?

... . Sorry, for a second it seemed like this was a contentious point.