The #1 Fansite for John Marsden's "Tomorrow, When The War Began", The Tomorrow Series and the upcoming Tomorrow movies
“Darkness, Be My Friend” is now out in Portuguese, and along with it comes some beautiful cover art.
Thanks heaps to Laércio who emailed me the cover.
If you know of any Tomorrow covers that aren’t on Tomorrow-Movies.com, please feel free to email me and let me know!
An excellent post appeared recently on one of the several million blogs in existence which discusses Ellie’s reaction to murder.
Strangely this made me smile as I remembered a particular post on the Tomorrow-Movies forum where several members planned to blow up a lawn mower Ellie style. Now that’s commitment.
Best Murder in Literature – Confessions of a Watery Tart
There are an awful lot to choose from and I have by no means read every book in existence, but my favorite murder in literature was committed by Ellie in Tomorrow When the War Began. Why? Because it truly and deeply changed her and how she looked at herself. Her sense of right and wrong underwent intense scrutiny. She was a leader of sorts, however unofficially, of a group of teens when Australia has been invaded by an enemy. She and her friends are running for their lives, being chased by people who are shooting… she devises a simple explosive out of a riding lawnmower, and guess what… it works. She and her friends are safe. The book, wisely, instead of glorifying her success in keeping her friends safe, sends her into a tailspin about the enormity of this one event—the change it makes of her.
It was incredibly moving, and one of the reasons I love the series so much. Something like that WOULD change a person. But it doesn’t make them a monster—she was forced into doing something awful, but arguably for the right reason. It doesn’t remove her humanity. I think this is true of more murders in the world than it is NOT true for. Murder is more often done by loved ones for a reason—murderers aren’t all heartless psychopaths, but people who either get into really messed up reasoning, or people who feel they are forced into something.
Have your say – Respond to this post.
Ellie had several relationships in one form or another throughout the Tomorrow Series. Crystal1, a member of the Tomorrow-Movies Forum created a great topic about who she wanted Ellie to end up with.
crystal1 said:
As a hopeless romantic I’d love to see her end up with Lee because I think he’s deep, and thoughtful and thats what Ellie needs. I think she loves Homer more as a brother but I think they’re too alike for it to work out. And I’m not actually a huge fan of Jeremy, probably because I got to know everyone else so well over the first 7 books that I can’t allow Jeremy into my heart just yet.
Original Forum Post
Who do you think should be Ellie’s man? Have your say
Recently John Marsden appeared on ABC’s Q&A and the subject of the nationality of the invading country was heavily discussed. The ex-Western Australia premier Geoff Gallop claimed that Marsden cannot “escape from the politics” of a “very, very strong racist undercurrent” deep within Australian history towards Asia.
Race of invaders hidden in film based on John Marsden books
THE race of the invading army in the film adaptation of John Marsden’s hit novel, Tomorrow, When The War Began, will not be identified on screen, according to the producers.
The much-anticipated movie, which will begin filming in NSW’s Hunter Valley within weeks, has the potential to spark another Balibo-like clash with Australia’s neighbours.
Marsden admitted on ABC TV’s Q&A on Thursday that he had kept the racial characteristics of the marauding invaders indistinct “because I don’t want people to use the books to justify some kind of racist belief they might hold”.
He said the film’s producers had taken the decision not to identify the army against whom the book’s hero, teenager Ellie Linton, and her friends wage a guerilla war.
“I don’t want to pre-empt the producers and what they plan for the movie,” Marsden said.
“It’s their choice and I have no input to that.”
Former West Australian premier Geoff Gallop, also appearing on Q&A, countered: “I don’t think John can escape from the politics of this.”
Dr Gallop, now a professor of politics at Sydney University, said the issue of race in Marsden’s books “is quite dangerous and evokes the very images in Asia that we don’t want to have in Australia”.
The film’s producer, Andrew Mason, said the Tomorrow series of books allowed Ellie’s enemy to remain ambiguous.
“We’re happy to confirm we are not identifying the invading army in the film,” he said.
The stakes in this movie are higher than usual for an Australian film. The Tomorrow series is the closest thing this country has to a Harry Potter series, with sales running well beyond a million. The seven books have also sold internationally and have proved so popular that a number of fan trailers, in which fans create their own clips for an imaginary film, emerged on YouTube. Fans also created an online petition to take to US studios to prompt the financing of a film.
The enemy in the Tomorrow series is widely seen as Asian, and Marsden’s tribute in the latest book, The Other Side of Dawn, to the people of Tibet, East Timor and West Papua suggests his antipathy towards the Chinese or the Indonesians.
In the books, Japan, Papua New Guinea, India, the US and New Zealand (where the teenagers seek refuge) are viewed as allies. The enemy has a population many times that of Australia, is led by a military dictatorship and speaks with a guttural, unrecognisable language.
Any hint or depiction of an Indonesian or Chinese enemy is likely to exacerbate tensions.
The Chinese government protested vehemently at the Melbourne International Film Festival screening of The 10 Conditions of Love, about Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer, and Indonesia protested about this week’s decision by the Australian Federal Police to investigate the killing of five Australia-based journalists in East Timor in 1975, as depicted in Balibo.
Source – The Australian
The invading army was never identified in the series and John Marsden went to great lengths within the Tomorrow series to specifically rule out several countries as being the invaders. Richard Simpson explores the nationality of the invading country on his website.
Who they are not:
- New Zealand (as they fight on our side)
- Papua New Guinea (as the fight on our side)
- The United States of America (as they supply us with equipment)
- Japan (as they supply us with equipment)
- India (as they try and broker a peace deal)
Richard Simpson further explores the characteristics of the invading country specifically mentioned within the Tomorrow series further on his website, including the question of whether an invasion of Australia is even possible. Richard has built a fantastic website with very in depth information about the Tomorrow series. Make sure you check it out!
An editorial was also written about Geoff Gallop’s claims:
Yesterday once more
Spare us from a return to politically correct censorship
TO a generation of teenage readers, and many of their parents, John Marsden’s classic novel Tomorrow, When The War Began and its sequels are gripping, inspirational stories. The books, now being made into a film, tell of a group of teenagers’ courage under pressure as they resist an army that has invaded Australia to “reduce imbalances within the region”.
But former West Australian premier Geoff Gallop sees darker, political undertones in Marsden’s work that evoke “the very images in Asia that we don’t want to have in Australia”. His criticisms, made directly to Marsden on the ABC’s Q&A program on Thursday, are a depressing return to the stultifying world of political correctness that we hoped was behind us.
Mr Gallop claims that Marsden cannot “escape from the politics” of a “very, very strong racist undercurrent” deep within Australian history towards Asia. Citing “Western imperialism and colonialism defined by race” he suggested “bringing race into the question of … the invasion of Australia is quite dangerous”.
In fact, the Tomorrow novels, with strong characters and fast-moving plots, do not identify the invading army. Nor are they racist. In a nation that grew up and gained confidence during the vigorous debates of the culture wars, Mr Gallop’s views remind us of the arid arguments that shut down debate for a decade or more and fostered resentment among those who don’t share such arrogant assumptions. While it would be instructive to see Mr Gallop’s approved abridged version of Marsden’s novels, we doubt if they’d sell.
Source – The Australian
John Marsden recently appeared on the television show ‘Q&A’, speaking about Tomorrow, When the War Began, particularly about the character of Ellie and the nationality of the invading country in the series.