The First Men in the Moon

The First Men in the Moon is the name of an H. G. Wells novel about two Edwardian-era Englishmen who utilise some Applied Phlebotinum to fly to the moon for a bit of a jolly gadabout. It Got Worse. There have been two filmed adaptions - one in 1964, directed by Nathan Juran, and more recently by Mark Gatiss

In the 1964 film, the United Nations has launched a rocket flight to the Moon. A multi-national group of astronauts in the UN spacecraft land on the Moon, believing themselves to be the first lunar explorers. They discover a Union Jack Flag on the surface and a note naming Bedford and Cavor, claiming the Moon for Queen Victoria. This discovery drives the plot, as the UN and many journalists seek out these men to get them to recount their first mission to the moon in the 1800s. Only Bedford is still alive and tells the story.

The 2010 film sticks much more closely to the H.G. Wells original, with Professor Cavor and Bedford engaging in their flight to the moon alone.


 * Actual Pacifist: Cavor
 * Alternate History: It's just no-one believes Bedford.
 * Anti Gravity: Cavorite blocks gravity. Put a sheet of it between yourself and the Earth and you're weightless -- or, rather, you're now in the weak gravitational grip of the Moon.
 * Artistic License Physics:
 * Brain In a Jar:
 * Cassandra Truth: The 2010 film is set in 1969, just prior to the "first" official moon landing. Bedford's been to the moon, and has kinematographic evidence. No-one believes him, and his films are regarded as fakes.
 * Cool Starship: Cavor's polyhedral spaceship is not only the first spaceship; it's the first spaceship with curtains.
 * Crippling Overspecialization: Cavor is good at physics and only physics. The Selenites get even more extreme. Bedford in the novel gets to exploit that.
 * Dawn of an Era: Averted. Cavor desperately wants the voyage to be this trope, but events conspire to prevent this.
 * Dilating Door: The Selenites' lunar iris is a physically huge example of one.
 * Easily-Thwarted Alien Invasion:
 * Damsel in Distress: Kate in the 1964 film, who does nothing but nearly get them killed.
 * Eldritch Abomination: The Grand Lunar
 * First Contact: It doesn't end well.
 * Fungus Humongous
 * Foreshadowing: Bedford's repeated use of the word "Imperial" as a suplerlative sets up
 * For Science!: Cavor's entire motivation.
 * Fridge Brilliance:
 * Fridge Horror:
 * Fridge Logic: In the novel the ending is not
 * Giving Radio to the Romans: An alternative version.
 * In the novel he gives them
 * Gold Makes Everything Shiny: In the novel the Selenites see gold as Worthless Yellow Rocks and use it to make mundane items.
 * Heavyworlder: Inverted. Well, the Selenites are from the moon, where the gravity is lower, after all...
 * Heroic Sacrifice: In the 2010 version,
 * Humans Are Bastards: Cavor is afraid that humanity will fight over the moon, as they do the rest of the Earth.
 * Idiot Plot: Apparently completely intentional in Wells's novel, given its themes.
 * Interplanetary Voyage
 * Just Eat Gilligan: Really Cavor, you should have shot Kate with the Elephant Gun the moment she handed it to you. She has done nothing but cause problems, particularly after she's on the sphere.
 * My God, What Have I Done?:
 * Panty Shot: In the film version, Kate falls victim to this when the pod leaves Earth's atmosphere. Of course, she's wearing white Victorian bloomers, but still...
 * Science Marches On: The depiction of the moon can be rather jarring, what with air and food...
 * Averted entirely by Gatiss' version; at the beginning it looks like the science will be utterly outdated
 * Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale: Despite Cavor mentioning that the moon is 250,000 miles away, they make the journey in an unspecified, but nonetheless shorter space of time than it would take...
 * Shout-Out: In the 2010 film, Beford has a dream sequence that is almost exactly identical to the fantasy cinema of George Melies.
 * Speculative Fiction: well, it is HG Wells. Given how Science has marched on, the speculative part is quite emphatic.
 * Starfish Aliens: The Selenites are a particularly strange breed - each is born to the life role they will have, the roles allocated by The Grand Lunar
 * Starfish Language
 * Steampunk: Especially the Gatiss adaption.
 * Strawman News Media: The media are type 4. Once the first reporter attempts to interview a United Nations official, the message spreads and soon dozens of reporters are present.
 * Too Dumb to Live: Bedford shines among the cast of the novel for having some self-preservation instinct. Cavor not so much. Even the Grand Lunar for all its intelligence made some serious errors
 * Weaksauce Weakness: The Selenites are pretty vulnerable to a punch to the head. It's like hitting cinder toffee, apparently...
 * Your Head Asplode: See Weaksauce Weakness above.