Life on Mars: Internet pranksters show how things could have been when Curiosity touched down (with a little help from Photoshop)



There was only one thing inevitable about Nasa's mission to Mars - and it was that the internet would find ways to gently mock it.

Pranksters from across the world - with a little help from Photoshop - took the first images beamed back by the Curiosity Rover following its successful landing yesterday, and imagined the results if something a little unexpected had happened.

With their help, we now know what it would be like if the rover had landed to discover it had been beaten to the punch by the Vikings or - more chillingly - the aliens from the Aliens trilogy of films.

Vikings did it first: Apparently, the Red Planet was first visited more than 2000 years ago

Imagine the panic that would have descended on planet Earth if NASA beamed this around the world It's not even funny to joke about: One of H. R. Giger's aliens pops up on the Red Planet More aliens from Ridley Scott's film series pop up - and thanks to Mars's (thin) atmosphere, this time they can hear you scream The images were posted on Imgure, the image sharing website regularly used for internet 'memes' - short-lived cultural phenomenons which create a flash-flood of copycats before dying off as the world moves on to something else. RELATED ARTICLES Previous

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Next Good morning, Mars: Curiosity sends back first colour... Share this article Share A similar meme started when Nasa technician Bobak Ferdowsi and his eye-catching Mohawk haircut was spotted during the Mars coverage. He quickly became a minor internet celebrity as fans alternately laughed and gushed over his hair-cut and obvious glee as the rover touched down safely. Monday's mission saw the Curiosity travel 352 million miles in eight-and-a-half months, before finally landing on Mars at 5.32 GMT (1.32 EDT).

The first alien to greet the Curiosity was Marvin the Martian - and he doesn't look happy by our approval The Doctor pops in Nasa's historic occasion - hopefully he won't mistake the Curiosity's protruding camera for a Dalek eye-stalk

Usain Bolt passes the finish line ... and just keeps on going ... and going

The high-tech craft hit the top of the Martian atmosphere at 13,000mph, and was then slowly lowered by a radical floating 'sky crane' before gently arriving in a massive crater.

The news was greeted with cheers and shouts in Nasa's Pasadena Mission Control, and within seconds the craft had sent back the first pictures of its new home.

The Nasa robot will soon begin beaming high-definition images of the Red Planet's surface in the next day or two.

Let us hope these types of images stay in the collective imaginations of web denizens - and doesn't ever become a case of fiction becoming reality...

What we actually saw: This image was taken with a 'fisheye' wide-angle lens on the left 'eye' of a stereo pair of cameras

The mission ahead: Curiosity shows us its main science target, Mount Sharp



