Question: Why were the people walking towards the ferry so desperate to get Ray's car? Considering the power was on in that area, the ferry was operating, and the army were driving round in humvees, tanks, and trucks a few scenes earlier, then surely Ray wouldn't have been the only person with a car?
raywest
5th Jan 2024
War of the Worlds (2005)
Answer: Agree with the other answer, but would add that Ray had figured out that cars were not working because the starter solenoids were knocked out by the alien's technology. He and his friend fixed Ray's car. Unlike military mechanics or marine engineers, most people were likely clueless about what caused the problem, didn't know how to fix a vehicle, or lacked the means, particularly in a crisis. People were desperate to acquire any car they could.
15th Aug 2023
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: Why does the first tripod kill every human in sight if that just leaves the others with not so many humans to harvest? The only purpose of the heat ray would be in defense.
7th May 2018
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: Do we know the human casualties by the end of the war?
Answer: No such numbers are ever discussed in the novel or in the subsequent radio and movie treatments. What we may surmise, however, is that the human casualties were comparatively minor. Once the Martians were exposed to earthly microbes, they were wiped out pretty quickly.
Voiceover by Morgan Freeman at the end of the movie: by the toll of a billion lives.
Morgan Freeman says "By the toll of a billion deaths, man had earned his immunity, his right to survive among this planet's infinite organisms." He is saying that Mankind evolved with microorganisms for countless generations on Earth, making Mankind immune to most of those microorganisms. Perhaps a billion humans or more died of bacterial and viral plagues throughout human history; but, as a species, we gained immunity. Freeman's quote has nothing to do with the number of Martians that died because they had no immunity.
Answer: The ending dialog states a death of 1 billion.
The billion deaths spoken of don't refer to those that died in the alien attack but the billion deaths from the microorganisms that killed the aliens. "By a billion deaths man earned his immunity."
I feel that he meant that the organisms that killed the aliens killed a billion humans first before we got our immunity from them.
They are saying that.
Exactly.
17th Jan 2020
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: So I know this was asked but I'm going to go a little deeper, How were the aliens killed by microbes/bacteria? They are so much more advanced then we are that they didn't think to protect themselves from this possible threat? They were ready for battle with the lasers how did they not think about what is in our environment?
Answer: I think the issue of they're more advanced than us therefore how would they not know about Earth's diseases is a bad assumption. Having knowledge of space travel and weaponry doesn't mean having knowledge of microbiology, even if we think it must because of our own advancements. We know when Europeans came to the Americas, the diseases they brought over were devastating to the indigenous people who had no immunity. There's a theory that the Americas never had such plagues or diseases because they didn't live in overcrowded cities like the Europeans. Had the indigenous people carried unique diseases that they were immune to, their diseases could have easily wiped out of the Europeans, despite being "more advanced." Mars may simply never had experience with plagues or diseases that required the concept of immunization or they may have thought they were protected.
Answer: They had never been to Earth and test out of the biological nature of the planet and its life. They just assumed to be protected in their machines from any hostility against them and never thought to protect themselves from the bacteria. They thought that if they would just destroy the life they wouldn't be affected by it.
So you said they had never been to Earth, but how did the machines they are using get here? If they are so intelligent and have these fancy machines how did they not think to look more closely at the life on this planet first when they brought the machines?
They didn't bring them, they sent them. A long, long time ago too. Who knows why they didn't think of it? That's just the story. They want the planet and kill everything on it to gain it. Why study an inferior species?
20th Aug 2020
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: Why did Ray get Robbie and Rachel into the car before he even knew that Manny had fixed it?
Answer: They were in immediate danger and needed to flee. Ray knew that all the vehicles around him had dead batteries, but Manny and his helper were working on fixing the van - which meant that the van was THE only possibility for a working vehicle. Ray was not necessarily certain that Manny had fixed the van, but knew that Manny agreed with his recommendation to try changing the solenoid. The van was not only a good prospect, it was the ONE immediately available chance at getting to flee in a vehicle. If Ray's assumption that Manny DID fix the van turned out to be wrong (the van did not start), little time had been wasted. Ray and his kids would then be running for their lives ("hoofin' it") like everyone else. In short, Ray put the kids in the van because he presumed Manny changed the solenoid and it was now in running condition; fleeing in a vehicle would be much faster than fleeing on foot.
1st Apr 2018
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: How come the grandmother's house was not attacked while the tripods were taking down every neighborhood.?
28th Mar 2018
War of the Worlds (2005)
3rd Aug 2005
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: At the end, a tripod collapses after behaving erratically for an hour, because the aliens inside were dead or dying. If so, wouldn't the tripod just stop moving and stand there because the aliens were too sick to operate it?
Answer: Or they had a mental link with the tripods.
The tripods are a mech suit for the aliens.
Answer: Depends on exactly how the disease affected the aliens. They might have entered a state of dementia and started piloting erratically, or even just have muscle spasms that knocked the controls around inside the cockpit.
Answer: Remember, when the tripod is spotted acting erratically, a cloud of birds are seen swarming the vehicle (presumably feeding on the dead/dying aliens inside). We can speculate that, although the aliens inside were incapacitated by disease, the tripod itself was probably functioning on auto-pilot with no precise operator control. Vulnerable, the staggering tripod was then an easy target for the military rocket-propelled ordnance, which easily brought the tripod down.
The birds weren't feeding on the dead aliens. Ray noticed that they were landing on top of tripods, showing that the force fields that had protected the machines and were impenetrable to military weapons were no longer operable. The military could then destroy them.
In the original H.G.Wells story, it is plainly stated that the birds were feeding on the dead aliens. So, the aliens are already dead, even though some of the tripods were still staggering around on autopilot.
Answer: Its theorized the tripods are bio-mechanical (half organic half machine) and so the system itself can get infected.
Answer: In the original H.G.Wells story, it is plainly stated that the birds were feeding on the dead aliens. So, the aliens are already dead, even though the tripods are still staggering around on autopilot.
Answer: It's a vehicle. If the driver dies or begins to die and is unable to control it properly, it's not going to be a smooth ride. Just like someone might drive erratically when sick or incapacitated, the tripods are going to movie a little "wonky" due to what's happening to the drivers.
7th Jan 2018
War of the Worlds (2005)
8th Dec 2009
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: When all of the people are trying to get on the boat, how does a tripod just randomly come out of the water like that?
Chosen answer: While it's never explained, there are several possibilities: as all the tripods were buried deep underground, this one may have been lodged below the lake and was just emerging. Also, a tripod could have "walked" from somewhere else, then went underwater to explore, and, attracted by the ferry's noise and movement, surfaced to investigate. It's also conceivable that, observing how ferries worked, it slipped underwater from further away and ambushed the boat, or the tripod was simply making a crossing from one shore to the other (traveling underwater if it was deep enough) and just happened upon the ferry when it did.
23rd Jun 2009
War of the Worlds (2005)
23rd Jun 2009
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: What's all the orange liquid that comes out of the tripods?
Answer: If you're referring to the liquid that pours out at the end when the alien piloting the tripod that was shot down dies, it may stand to reason that since the tripods themselves are built the same as the aliens (three legs and the same shaped head) it's a type of liquid that allows them to neurologically connect to the tripods and control it as though it's a dream. Sort of Pacific Rim-esque except no suit is needed.
Answer: I believe that this orange liquid has nothing to do with the red weed or something like this. As this liquid is only visible when tripods are being attacked from inside or seriously damaged, this may hint that it is blood from the creatures or some kind of liquid flooding the whole habitable spaces inside the tripod, as the creatures look a little amphibious. Both theories fit the fact that in the last scenes, the liquid comes from the same door the alien puts his arm out.
23rd Jun 2009
War of the Worlds (2005)
22nd Jul 2005
War of the Worlds (2005)
6th Jul 2005
War of the Worlds (2005)
Question: Why didn't the aliens take over earth for their own means millions of years earlier? And why send machines millions of years before any humans or life that could be considered a threat?
Answer: The aliens needed human blood to grow their blood vine, for future colonization. Precisely why they waited perhaps millions of years to create the harvest of human blood, because there was enough humans now to grow an acceptable crop for colonizing us.
Answer: It's not known when the aliens sent the machines-the 'millions of years' comment was just one bystander's speculation. The machines could have been sent well after humans evolved and for whatever reason, the aliens did not journey to Earth until much later. Obviously, humans were never considered a threat-just an inconvenience to be eradicated after being used as fertilizer to re-foliate Earth. Because we don't know who the aliens are or how their society and technology works, many questions will remain unanswered.
I've read that they buried the tripods on earth before us and that they made us they sent a meteor containing the key ingredients for life and that they were waiting for enough humans to collect their blood and use it.
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Answer: He may not be the only person with a car, but you can imagine there are fewer cars than people around, since a lot of the people there came from areas where the cars had stopped working. Or else they wouldn't be walking. That's why they were going on the ferry, for transport to anywhere.
lionhead