One of my best loved science fiction stories, in the way it weaves together legend and science to create a story that is believable and complete. As an atheist, believing that all things run according to physical laws, the world can seem cold and uninspiring. If science fiction can offer an hour or three of escapism in which devils, martians, ghosts and aliens can really exist then I really treasure it. This story succeeds admirably, with the plot reaching back to ancient history as well as recent history, making the premise real and relevant. Cleverly, the audience is always ahead of the dry establishment insisting to the end that the discovery is just some super V2, but behind Quatermass in piecing together the awful truth about the hull and its occupants. I have seen the 1967 film and appreciate both versions, but this low resolution version leaves more to the imagination and is therefore all the more powerful.
Review of Quatermass and the Pit
