Of Martians and JJ Abrams

One day, a week or two ago, I came across this story about images sent back from the Mars Spirit Rover.  What you see to the right is a small version of a panorama taken at a crater on Mars from this mission, and you can see a super high quality version at Nasa’s site (or by clicking on the image to the right). 

The thing that is most interesting about this image is when you look in the lower left corner in further detail:

Then you look a little bit closer and see this:

What the shit?  Okay seriously it is most likely just a small (or large?) rock formation that happens to look like a happy martian friend strutting along a cliff-line.  You can read the FOX News article about this whole thing, or just gawk at that image a little while longer.  Seriously, is he strutting or what?  That must be the most pimp mars rock / martian in the universe.  What adds to the creepiness is that NASA didn’t notice this, not too surprising, but posted it on their website and some enthusiasts happened upon it while checking out the high-res image. 

When I showed this to a couple of my co-workers they freaked out, because no matter what this is really showing it makes you honesty wonder for a split second if it could be real.  While pondering that feeling I realized that this is much the same feeling that a lot of JJ Abrams’ work builds upon.  There are countless elements in Lost which represent something based in our world / reality but are wholly disturbing to contemplate and send chills down your spine.  It is built up even further by the fake corporations that are created in the world of Lost, with Alternate Reality Game websites set up for them that take these themes even farther.  Some examples are the Dharma Initiative website that was up during Season 2 (and may still be around) which had an interactive map that listed research stations and affiliates all around the world, each going into depth about the different paranormal and scientific fields the company was studying.  The same thing was done for his film Cloverfield before it was released, with fake corporate websites being set up advertising fake products with stories and information that are entirely fabricated for the movie.  This happened to include a similar interactive map, this time locating drilling platforms the company was operating in different oceans around the world, featuring one that had been set up in September of 2007 in the mid-atlantic (off the coast of New York).

The odd part is that these things don’t even really need to have any impact on the show/movie which they are based, because not everyone who watches will have visited, scavenged, and read every little tid-bit on the websites so the information provided cannot be a requirement for enjoying the material.  It is entirely complimentary, and its sole purpose is to build upon the themes and ideas present and absorb people further into the fictional world.  These kinds of things really build excitement and interest in the work that JJ Abrams is doing, but most of all it works best with the kind of stories he is producing.  If they didn’t have a solid base in reality, but add in fantastical and mystical elements, then these fake corporations and their websites would be obvious and not keep up the illusion.  They thrive on the anonymity and facelessness that the internet provides, and as you browse the site you unconciously put yourself in the shoes of someone who didn’t know anything about it and had just randomly stumbled upon the site.  How would they react, thinking that this was an entirely real and serious website? 

Back to the images from Mars, it really stunned me when something in real life brought about those same feelings of mystery and pondering the ‘what if?’ side of things.  I feel like I have a greater appreciation for how Abrams does things now, but it doesn’t hurt either that Season 4 of Lost is really freaking great so far.