Great Beginning, Great Middle, Weak Ending

Rating: 7/10 (29 June 2005)

My entire comment will be about the ending of the film, so if you haven't seen it and don't want to know what happens, stop now.
Let me start off by saying that my mouth was open the entire time. The effects and action in "War of the Worlds" were so amazing, that I found it hard to believe that it wasn't really happening. Seeing the Tripods from a distance gave me the chills, it was amazing.
But thats about where the amazement stops.
Like any movie of this genre, it revolves around your typical protagonist, usually a male who has a bad relationship with his children and/or wife, then when the world starts coming to an end, he realizes what they mean to him, blah, blah, blah...unfortunately, War of the Worlds falls under this category. It wasn't as bad as most other films, in fact, some of the moments between Dakota Fanning and Tom Cruise were hilarious, like when the lightning storms first arrive and the two of them hide together under the table.
However, my biggest beef with this film (and that is something I regret to say, because I have been looking forward to this for a long time), but my problem with this film is the ending.
The Narrator (done by Morgon Freeman) tells us that the aliens, who have been planning this attack for 1,000,000 years, died because of bacteria, the most abundant life form on Earth. Over the course of 1,000,000 years, these creatures learn to adapt to our oxygen, learn our traits, and yet they cannot figure out that the most abundant life-form on Earth will kill them. It's like the problem with "Signs," where the aliens one weakness was water, yet they come to invade a planet made of 2/3 water.