Go to the linked site – there are lots of pictures.
We’ve seen this story before. They did it on the original Outer Limits in 1964 in an episode titled “City of Silence”, about a couple traveling cross-country when their car breaks down and, traveling on foot, realize they’re being stalked by – tumbleweeds. They take refuge in a house, and are besieged by the plants. It’s like an all-vegetable version of Night of the Living Dead. (Actually, considering that the husband is Eddie Albert, it’s like the REALLY weird pilot for Green Acres “Oh, Oliver, New York is where I’d rather stay. I get allergic being attacked by tumbleweeds.”)
(The Outer Limits episode is supposed to be similar to Algernon Blackwood’s story “The Willows”. I’ll put in a vote for Fredric Brown’s the Mind Thing, as well. That story started life as a low-budget movie script.)
I was attacked by a tumbleweed once. I was driving south on I-5 north of Bakersfield a ways, It was November which is one of the seasons when the damn things are ripe and there was a steady strong wind blowing from about 2 o’clock. Quite a few weeds were seen traversing the empty fields in the distance and some had fetched up against the freeway boundary fence. Nothing like those horror pics in the link but enough to look like the opening stages in a zombie attack.
Then one tumbleweed a bit bigger than the others caught my attention. A quick mental calculation came up with an intersecting solution to the two vectors. “No need to worry; the fence will stop it.” Ha! A gust of wind at an inopportune moment let the damn thing easily vault the fence and roll aggressively across the right of way. A quick check in the mirror revealed someone coming up in the number one lane so there was no place to dodge to and I didn’t want to risk jamming on the brakes. Stand by for collision!
Wham! The thing struck the front of the car about half way between the centerline and right fender in an explosion of dust and sticks. The car shook and DesertWife, who was dozing beside me, awoke with a little shriek. The fiend was stuck on my car’s front end but luckily did not obscure the view ahead (it was certainly tall enough). About a half-mile ahead was an exit, one of those along the freeway with absolutely nothing there. I took it, stopped, then drove around in a 360-degree circle hoping that when the wind was from behind, it would fall off.
No such luck; it was stuck fast. Reluctantly I got out and started gingerly pulling at it. They have tiny thorns and if you get scratched, it raises welts. If I’d had a pair of work gloves handy I would have put them on, but no such luck. A couple minutes and it was free; I stepped aside and let it pass to galumph down the overpass, not nearly as round as before. No serious damage was done and we continued on to San Diego with no further incident.
It’s an almost unknown fact that the “Outer Limits” episode was based on a true incident, and now it’s happening again! Don’t believe me? Just leave the tumbleweeds alone for a while. They’ll eventually dissolve the house and consume the people inside. :eek:
they just sort of dissolve since there actually dead… living about an hour from Victorville (antelope valley) we used to have them rolling around but were built up too much these days
And why are you posting this?
Don’t get me wrong – it’s one of my all-time favorite SF stories. A lot of people agree with me, because it’s in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame – Vol. I because it was voted one of the all-time bests. It’s been ripped off lots of times – with the Outer Limits episode “Fun and Games,” for instance.
Supposedly the Star Trek episode of that title, and credited to Brown, started life as an independent story by Gene L. Coon, until someone noticed the similarities. That’s probably why it differs in so many particulars from Brown’s story. That, and Roddenbery’s idea of how interstellar politics ought to operate.
I’d love to see Arena properly adapted as a movie. I’ve filmed it in my head countless times. Done right, with moden CGI and good writing, you don’t need voiceovers and such crutches. And you could give it Brown’s original ending.
But it’s got nothin’ to do with the Tumbleweeds stories,m except the author.
