The men, except for the archaeologist Spender and Colonel Wilder, break out the alcohol rations and begin to celebrate their successful landing, becoming more boisterous. The scientists find that all of the Martians have died of chicken pox accidentally brought from Earth by the first two Zeus crews. The crew discovers five ancient cities in the vicinity of the spacecraft, one of which apparently was inhabited only a few weeks ago. Wilder himself with five other astronauts (Spender, Parkhill, Briggs, Cook, McClure) as subordinates. In fact, the Martians use the memories of the astronauts to lure them into their old homes, where they are killed in the middle of the night.Ī third mission, "Zeus III", lands on Mars in June 2001. They are warmly greeted by close relatives and loved ones who all died years ago. To their amazement the crew (astronauts Arthur Black, Sam Hinkston and David Lustig) discover that they have landed in a town that looks exactly like Green Bluff, Illinois. Wilder (who has shepherded the project for ten years) refuses, among other things because he believes mankind might escape environmental pollution and war on Earth by colonizing Mars instead.Ī second mission is launched and the "Zeus II" crew lands on Mars in April 2000. John Wilder to abandon the Zeus project because of concerns that Mars may already harbor life. Mission control on Earth does not know the fate of the crew, and one of the senior astronauts Jeff Spender urges the project director Col. He kills the two-man expedition, astronauts Nathaniel York and Bert Conover, as soon as they arrive. Her husband, though he pretends to deny the reality of the dreams, becomes bitterly jealous, sensing his wife's confused romantic feelings for one of the astronauts. On Mars, Ylla (a Martian woman trapped in an unromantic marriage) dreams of the coming astronauts through telepathy. The Zeus project represents the beginning of a major effort by NASA and NATO to explore and eventually colonize the outer planets. The next scene places the viewer at the Kennedy Space Center in January 1999 when the first "Zeus I" manned spacecraft to Mars is carried into orbit by a Saturn V rocket. At the close of the scene the camera pans back to show a larger view of the probe's landing area, with what appears to be indigenous Martian settlements in the surrounding terrain, with the narrator noting that, "If the probe had landed just a few miles further on, things might have been different." Afterwards the opening credits roll. Each has its convincing arguments, but ultimately the probe indicates that Mars does not harbour life. As the narrator is speaking, the viewer becomes aware that there are two viewpoints at NASA amongst the scientists who launched the probe: One group obviously believes Mars is uninhabited, the other is open to the possibility of indigenous life on the planet. A narrator explains that the purpose of the probe is to determine whether Mars is inhabited. The first episode starts at the scene of Viking 1 unmanned probe landing on the surface of the planet Mars in July 1976. The miniseries was directed by Michael Anderson and written by Richard Matheson.
The series depicts Mars as having a "thin atmosphere" which humans can breathe with water-filled canals and desert-like vegetation. It was aired on NBC in January 1980 in three episodes with a total running time of just over four hours (nearly five hours on the DVD version). The series starred Rock Hudson, Darren McGavin, Bernadette Peters, Roddy McDowall, Fritz Weaver, Barry Morse, and Maria Schell.
The Martian Chronicles is a 1980 television miniseries based on Ray Bradbury's 1950 book The Martian Chronicles and dealing with the exploration of Mars and the inhabitants there. ( March 2018) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message) Please edit the article to focus on discussing the work rather than merely reiterating the plot. It should be expanded to provide more balanced coverage that includes real-world context. This article consists almost entirely of a plot summary.