As pointed out in previous essays, Stephen Spielberg seems to have incorporated a variety of H.G. Wells stories into the making of his "War of the Worlds."

While the main character, Ray Ferrier was in part drawn from a bumbling caretakers in "Food of the Gods," other even more important character traits seemed to have been lifted from the pages of Wells' "The Time Machine."

Some of the features and conflicts facing Ray's children, Rachel and Robbie, echo some of the divided tendencies of the future human race as depicted in The Time Machine - particularly in the division between nature and industry The Time Machine explores (fodder for future essays).

The Time Machine, however, appears to offer valuable clues as to whom the aliens in Spielberg's War may actually be.

As pointed out in a pervious essay, War of the Worlds involved class struggle - working class vs. middle and upper class (Ray vs. Tim). By looking through the lens of The Time Machine, we can see that class struggle may also involve the aliens as well.

While Spielberg faithfully reflected the general outline of Well's novel, War of the Worlds, depicting an invasion of alien beings who feed on humans, he also included materials from other books, such as the Food of the Gods and The Time Machine that helped fill out the details of the themes he wanted his film to convey. In some cases, his characters and situations appear to be lifted straight out of the pages of other Wells' book - and The Time Machine seems to play a prominent role even to the point of sound effects being lifted straight out of the 1950s film adaptation.

In some ways, we might look at Spielberg's War as a retelling of the conflict between the working class Morlocks (the aliens) and the upper middle class Eloi (humans) from The Time Machine as part of some comment on contemporary society.

In The Time Machine, the time traveler from 1900 journeys nearly a million years into the future where he finds that the world has become a social nightmare where the working class morlocks with control of machines and technology feed off the flesh of the upper class nature-loving Eloi.

Although references to The Time Machine seem to crop up throughout the film, the Newark scene seems an apt place to examine some of these references - where the Morlock-like aliens rise up out of the ground to slaughter and consume the Eloi-like humans on the surface.

In The Time Machine, the time traveler speculates that working class people whose factories were underground or out of sight evolved into Morlocks, and because they maintained talents for making things eventually dominated the privileged classes who had to depend upon their services - and so evolved into two societies, the morlocks who cloth and provide for the Eloi only to eventually eat them the way we do cattle.

The use of The Time Machine may explain some of the mythological references in the film that may have been carried over unintentionally from the source material - such as Wells references to Chronos devouring his own children.

In Wells, the Time Machine is stolen from the time traveler setting the stage for the drama. In the Newark scene, Ray's Mustang is stolen by his son, setting the stage for the drama in the film. We have good reason to equate the Mustang with the time machine. While Ray's character is based partly on t the careless caretaker from Food of Gods," he also resembles the time traveler who has constructed his time machine in a spare room just as Ray reconstructs his car in the garage and kitchen.

The aliens arrive in bolts of lightning (26 strikes alluding most likely the letters of the alphabet and a reference to Wells). In The Time Machine, local Eloi confuse the time traveler's explanation for how he arrived, believing he had come from the sun on a bolt of lightning. He thinks them simple or stupid because of this, just as one of the street urchins accompanying Ray thinks another street urchin is stupid over the belief that the cars were stopped because of sunspots.

"The sun does not cause lightning," this urchin scolds.

Like the Morlocks, the aliens rise out of the ground to begin destroying and devouring humanity.

A character later in War of the Worlds speculates that the machines must have been buried a million years ago. The time Traveler, who journeys a million years in the future speculates that the roots of the Morlock society began a million years earlier in his own time.

I haven't yet worked out the exact connection Spielberg tried to make between the aliens and the Morlocks. But since the film is a series of nightmares, we might speculate that alien is the darker aspect of human consciousness, the un-evolved beast in the back of our brains that has traveled with us from the past to pop out and begin destruction when our more civilized parts of our brain fail to keep guard.

Yet it is clear that Spielberg is showing the misuse of technology to satisfy the blood lust of that part of our beings, technology that can be turned to mass murder.

Wells - writing The Time Machine in 1899 - appears to have predicted the possibility for the Holocaust 40 years later. So Spielberg's inferences make for a perfect vehicle in a film that depicts both the Holocaust and the attacks of 9/11.

While the connection between The Time Machine and Spielberg's movie may seem remote, the film and book provide us with numerous concrete references, although one scene makes the point better than most.

While Ray's return to the kids after the holocaust in Newark may seem like a reference to 9/11 since he is covered with the ash of destroyed buildings and the dust of incinerated people, in truth, Spielberg appears to have lifted the scene from one found in The Time Machine.

The time traveler has just escaped a similar violent scene as Ray's in the future and like Ray has arrived back to the safety of his home and where friends are expecting him.

The door from the corridor opened slowly and without a noise.

"Good Heavens, man, what's the matter?" cried the medial man who saw him next.

(The time traveler) was in an amazing plight. His coat was dusty and dirty and smeared with green down the sleeves. His hair disorderly and as it seemed to me grayer - either with dust or dirt because its color had actually faded. His face was ghastly pale. His expression was haggard and drawn as if by intense suffering. For a moment he hesitated in the doorway as if he had been dazzled by the light."

This description from The Time Machine fits nearly perfectly with Ray's return, where his kids ask him also what is wrong.

A moment later, we plunge deeper in the nightmare that follows with even more references to Wells' other books, references we shall explore in future essays.