The Time Machine (1960): The History of the Eloi and the Morlocks
In Part 3 of my four-part review, we look at the difference the Cold War made to how the Eloi and the Morlocks are portrayed
Last time, we saw that the time traveler had found the hapless Eloi and learned about the dreaded Morlocks. His new friend Weena has decided to show him something that will give him a better idea about the history of these two groups. She takes him to a cave that looks like the remains of a museum. Here, she shows him some rings and says the rings can talk. She shows him how the rings work. She picks one up and spins it. Then a voice begins to explain pieces of what happened in the time before the Eloi and the Morlocks.
It turns out there was a long war, a 326-year-long war in fact. The rings say only that this was a war between the East and the West. During this war, the earth’s environment was destroyed. There are so many germs in the air that the atmosphere is impossible to breathe. The future people had built oxygen factories, but those too were destroyed, and, according to one ring, even the food was destroyed.
However, this record can’t be entirely accurate because another ring says that the last of humanity has broken off into two groups. One group has decided to go underground. The other group has decided to take its chances in the open air. Gradually, these two groups of people changed: one becoming apathetic forest people, the other becoming a species of underground primates who still know how to operate machines.
Evolution: The book vs. the film on the Eloi and the Morlocks
The book reflects H.G. Wells’s opinions on evolution and communism. Wells had his criticisms of communism but he never abandoned the idea entirely — he went so far as to meet with Stalin in 1934. But in his novel, the distinction a communist would make between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is central to the origins of the Eloi and Morlocks. The Eloi were the bourgeoisie. They continued to evolve, as a class, by forever chasing more and more comfort at the expense of the proletariat. This process continued until the Eloi forced the proletariat underground, presumably so they wouldn’t have to look at the unwashed masses.
The proletariat continued to make products for the bourgeoisie until they eventually forgot why they were making things in the first place. They just continued to work. Over time, the bourgeoisie grew weaker and more childlike, while the proletariat became more bestial. Then some catastrophe happened, and the subterranean proletariat ran out of food. That’s when they decided to turn the bourgeoisie into cattle. By the time they decided to do this, the bourgeoisie didn’t have enough sense to fight back. And this was the origin of the Eloi and the Morlocks.
And the film…?
Because the film was made during the Cold War, the screenwriters weren’t going to touch that storyline with a ten-foot pole. So they opted to invent a war between the East and the West. It was more socially acceptable to push an antiwar narrative than to remain true to Wells’s worldview. I’d say that was a good call.
After learning the history of the Eloi and the Morlocks, the time traveler decides to retrieve his machine. However, he can’t break into the large doors at the base of the sphinx-like building, which is actually the entrance into the Morlocks’ lair. However, he finds a group of wells in a sand-covered plain. Assuming these wells will lead to the Morlocks’ home, he tells Weena to wait for him and begins to climb down one of the wells.
However, as he begins his descent, familiar sirens start to wail. The time traveler recognizes them as the old air raid sirens that rang during the past bombings in Britain. He looks up from the well and realizes that Weena is gone. He climbs out of the well and sees all the Eloi walking toward the sound like zombies. He runs to them and tries to break them out of their trance, but he can’t. He begins calling out for Weena and sees that the doors to the sphinx-like building are open and that some of the Eloi are walking through the doors. Weena enters the building as well, and then the doors close.
The time traveler tries to convince the Eloi to help him rescue their friends. But they tell him that it is now all clear (a little bit of social commentary to twist the knife). He tells them that it isn’t all clear, but none of the Eloi listen. He then decides to save Weena himself. He returns to the well and climbs to the bottom. Once he reaches the bottom of the well, he grabs a stick and wraps some of the Morlocks’ hair around it. Presumably, he’s going to use it as a torch, but I don’t know why he doesn’t immediately light it.
The Morlocks’ kitchen
The time traveler begins exploring the cave and comes across the Morlocks’ machines. He then discovers the horrible fate that awaits the Eloi. The Morlocks are cannibals . . . sort of. Since they’re basically primates at this point, I’m not sure cannibalism is the best description, but it’s the description the movie goes with. And for another thing, I’m not sure why the movie treats this as a big reveal. Given the fact that the Eloi don’t go out at night, I’d just assumed the Morlocks were hunting the Eloi like prey. I also figured the time traveler knew the Morlocks were eating the Eloi because he was desperate to rescue Weena.
At any rate, after the reveal, the time traveler sees the Morlocks herding the captured Eloi into a cave. He sees Weena, and the fight begins.
During the struggle, the traveler remembers that the Morlocks are blinded by fire. Personally, I thought this was a plot hole because he should’ve remembered scaring a Morlock away with a match sooner. Plus, this would’ve been a natural assumption since the Morlocks live underground and only come out at night. So, why didn’t he light the torch when he first entered the cave?
Anyway, he finally lights the torch, but then, after all this hype about fire, one of the Morlocks knocks the torch out of the traveler’s hand. Then a Morlock has the traveler pinned to the ground and is strangling him. We’ll cover what happens afterward next time.
“If you’d like to read more of my work, The Familiar (a dark urban fantasy) comes out February 3rd, 2026. Gerome is a Familiar who gave his blood to a vampire. But now the vampire wants his wife. This book is the first of a larger series called Annals of S.O.L.M. If you’d like to support my work, The Familiar will be found on Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, and more. I hope you enjoyed this entry of The Starward Exiles.”
