Tom Cruise’s Massive Sci-Fi Blockbuster Has Been Totally Forgotten

Tom Cruise’s War of the Worlds is now streaming on HBO Max, where it is currently the 7th most popular film.

By Phillip Moyer
| Published 37 seconds ago

Tom Cruise is known for a lot of things: the Mission: Impossible spy film series, the Top Gun movies, and his role in A Few Good Men, to name a few. However, his effects-heavy 2005 blockbuster, War of the Worlds, fell off the radar soon after its release. It deserves better.

The movie is an adaptation of the 1898 book of the same name by H. G. Wells, detailing an alien invasion of Earth using tall tripod-like war machines. The film generally follows the book’s plot, though it does so in the modern era, with humans using modern technology to fight the aliens rather than late-19th-century artillery. It uses Tom Cruise’s everyman character, Ray Ferrier, to show the destruction and futility of the fight.

There had been several adaptations of War of the Worlds before Tom Cruise starred in the 2005 version. This includes a 1953 film and multiple direct-to-video films released in 2005 to capitalize on Cruise’s movie. The most famous adaptation was the 1938 Orson Welles radio drama that convinced some listeners they were hearing a newscast rather than a fictional story. 

Audience And Critical Reception In 2005

Tom Cruise’s take on War of the Worlds was fairly well-received when it was released, earning more than $600 million on a $132 million budget. That made it the fourth-most-watched movie of 2005 and should have guaranteed War of the Worlds a permanent spot in the public consciousness. That didn’t happen.

It also earned generally positive (though not enthusiastic) reviews. There were complaints about some elements of the film’s plot, including the unexpectedly positive ending that didn’t seem earned. While part of this comes from the original book’s plot, the fact that everyone Ray Ferrier loves gets through the apocalyptic war unscathed was almost enough to take viewers out of the entire experience.

Why Tom Cruise’s War Of The Worlds Has Been Forgotten

After the film left theaters, it almost disappeared from public consciousness. Tom Cruise went on to star in Mission: Impossible III the next year and continued on as if his War of the Worlds had never happened. 

The movie is relentlessly bleak, emotionally cold, and built around panic rather than wonder, which made it hard for audiences to revisit the way they revisited films like Jurassic Park or Independence Day. Tom Cruise’s increasingly bizarre public image during the film’s release also poisoned its long-term reputation. The Oprah couch-jumping era, which was around the same time, became inseparable from the movie itself.

Most importantly, 2005 was one of the last years where studios could still brute-force gigantic box office numbers through sheer event marketing. War of the Worlds was sold as mandatory viewing, but not as something people would build fandoms around afterward. It made money because everyone showed up opening weekend. Then almost nobody talked about it again.

 Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire were also released in 2005, as were Batman Begins and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Those movies simply overshadowed it. They had a larger cultural footprint. Tom Cruise’s star power helped bring people into theaters, but it didn’t help keep the film in their minds after they left.