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A ray-gun is a theoretical type of weapon that would affect its target through directed radiation ("ray" being the root of the word "radiation"). Inspired by new technologies like the x-ray tube, ray guns were common in early 20th century futurism and later became widely used within science fiction. Practical weapons that function according to the same principle have been created, but have become generally referred to as directed-energy weapons, since the term "ray gun" has fantastic connotations to it, given its history in sci-fi.

More specific names for ray guns have been developed in modern science fiction, both due to research advances, and as a way to avoid the connotation of campiness attached to the term through their prolific use in pulp fiction, B films, space operas, and comics.

History of the concept

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Early ray-guns

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The idea of ray-guns came about when the science of radiation was new and had just started being employed in practical technology. Effects of the sun had long been described as rays, but there wasn't a clear understanding of how they worked and related to matter. Nonetheless there were three types of rays identified in solar activity — light rays, heat rays, and actinic rays (also referred to as chemical rays).[1][2] By the 1860s, it was demonstrated that all solar radiation was an electromagnetic phenomena, wave-like in form, and that light, heat, and actinic effects simply occurred at different frequencies along a spectrum. The cathode ray was then discovered by passing an electric field through a vacuum tube, and different varieties of cathode ray tubes started being developed in laboratory environments test its effects. Using one of these inventions, the Crookes tube, the x-ray was discovered in 1895, and, shortly after, the Becquerel ray was discovered in 1896, and radium as a powerful source of emanation for Becquerel rays in 1898. Around the same time, John Tyndall had demonstrated in an experiment that the three classes of solar rays could be effectively separated. The use of x-rays for creating "burns" in the therapeutic treatment of cancer and lupus had proved successful, leading experiments in the use of directed ultraviolet light, still understood at that time as "chemical rays"; which also proved successful.

A Martian tripod fires its heat-ray, as imagined in a 1906 illustration for The War of the Worlds.

Because of demand in the medical field, a number of devices were patented and sold on the market. Often x-ray devices were, and still are, referred to as 'x-ray guns', and cathode ray devices as 'cathode ray guns' and sometimes 'electron guns', because they involve shooting a beam of electrons at a target. Around the same time, the market for popular fiction had taken off, and modern scientific ideas started being explored in scientific romances, many of which used destructive devices modeled after contemporary 'ray guns'.

Widely recognized as the first of such uses[3], H.G. Wells in The War of the Worlds (1898) describes a Heat-Ray being employed by Martian invaders, the device situated inside a camera-box-like container — similar to how x-ray devices were deployed at the time. Wells' Heat-Ray was a transparent reference to the class of solar radiation understood as "heat rays", now referred to as infrared light. In his description, a dome would fall out of the box, creating a blinding flash of light that would incinerate anything it was directed towards. The operation of the light in producing the effect is very much like what would have been experienced in the ultraviolet "chemical ray" lamps used for therapy; where the patients and nurses would wear dark glasses to protect themselves from the effects.

1898 illustration in Edison's Conquest of Mars. The disintegrator ray fired on a crow, matched to the vibration speed of the crow's feathers. The men afterwards set it to destroy the crow as a whole.

Garrett P. Serviss, after having completed an unauthorized re-write of Wells' novel, wrote a sequel titled Edison's Conquest of Mars, in which he imagined a response to the Martian threat — the disintegrator ray, used both through a hand-held pistol and through a larger scale device.[4] Like Wells' heat ray device, the disintegrator gun would create a brief flash of light. The cause of the effect was described by the fact that all matter was in harmonic vibration, and that the ray would cause the atoms to undergo such violent motion that the matter of the target would be pulled apart, disintegrating it — only a faint cloud would remain. In the story, the weapon is as a collaboration between Thomas Edison and Wilhelm Röntgen, the discoverer of the x-ray.

Soon after, there was an arms race between different science-fiction authors to come up with new and powerful superweapons in depictions of future wars. Another portrayal of a disintegrator ray came in George Griffith's The Lord of Labour, which he wrote in 1906; posthumously published in 1911. The story features a war in which one side develops atomic missiles, and the other a type of disintegrator ray that worked through demagnetization. Griffith's weapon worked by affecting the magnetic forces which bound matter together and causing them to act in reverse, tearing the matter apart through repulsion.[5]

Another story by Wells, The Invisible Man, didn't feature a ray-gun per se, but involved a similar directed-radiation device, in this case to turn something invisible; later authors would be inspired by this and used his idea in the form of a ray-gun. The scientist in the novella is described as making things invisible by placing them through two centers of radiation, lowering their refractive index and preventing them from absorbing or reflecting light. This has been called an invisibility ray.

Cover of William Le Queux's The Zeppelin Destroyer, showing visible rays being fired over London at a passing German Xeppelin.

Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom series shows radium rays being used for a variety of purposes; but not as a weapon. Instead, "radium bullets", created through a powder that used radium as its base, would fire through "radium pistols" and "radium rifles" and explode on contact with sunlight. Nonetheless, other writers were inspired by Burroughs, and radium later became depicted as a power source for a theoretical ray gun.

During World War I, popular interest in ray-based weapons exploded. William Le Queux, who authored several anti-German invasion fantasies, described the development of a new ray that would destroy German Zeppelins in The Zeppelin Destroyer (1916).[6] The same year, ray guns were featured in a motion picture — The Intrigue — which told the story of a young American inventor who creates a destructive x-ray gun and gets embroiled in international espionage. After the American government declines interest in the inventor's weapon, he offers to sell it to the Germans; but fearing that he'll release the mechanics after the fact, they plot to murder him and steal it from him. Ray guns were also featured in escapist fiction, like The Exploits of Elaine a film serial and novelization released in 1914, and The Iron Claw, a film serial in 1919. In The Exploits of Elaine, an evil mastermind, known as "The Clutching Hand" perfects a type of heat ray, referred to as an "F-ray".[7] After the war, the interest in ray-weapons continued in countless thrillers depicting different arms races, modeled after Griffith's story.[8] In The War of the Wireless Waves (1923) by Percy F. Westerman, for instance, the British "ZZ ray" is depicted as countering a German "Ultra-K ray".[6]

The "Death Ray"

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In addition to the fictional interests, there were several attempts after the war to develop what became popularly known as a "death ray" or "peace ray". It was claimed to have been invented independently by Nikola Tesla, Edwin R. Scott, Harry Grindell-Matthews, and Graichen, as well as others, although none of these accounts had been corroborated. Most versions of the death ray did not in fact involve radiation, since the inventors could not overcome the problem that radiation could not be produced in large amounts and would degrade over a distance. Instead, they were said to utilize a type of particle beam that would conduct the air as such to allow a high-energy current to pass through and hit a target. Because of the lack of radiation involved, Tesla objected to the term "death ray", but it nonetheless continued to be used in the press.[9][10] Another "death ray" invention, by Robert W. Woods was said to kill using ultra-audible sound.[11]

Accounts of various "death rays", though unconfirmed or exaggerated, encouraged the imagination of many writers and filmmakers. Two different films titled The Death Ray were produced in 1924, one a trick film produced in a series by Gaston Quiribet, another was a documentary directed by Grindell-Matthews.[7] Pierrpont Noyes' novel The Pallid Giant (1927) depicted a death ray as causing destruction of a technological civilization.[6] The death ray also makes an appearance in Harry Ashton-Wolfe's book, Warped in the Making: Loves of Crime and Hate, which was claimed to be a "true crime" non-fiction work, but is widely regarded as fiction. In the story, a swindler attempts to sell a phony death ray to the Italian navy. The story is credited in influencing Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in writing his story The Disintegration Machine.

The idea of a practical "death ray" was later revisited in World War II, with projects by both the Germans and the Japanese. There had also publicly been calls for the Allies to create a death ray, as well as claims to have created one by American inventors. All of this, of course, was eclipsed by the creation of an atomic bomb.[12]

Pulp fiction, space operas, and toys

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By the late 1920s, pulp fiction magazines had been taking off and had regularly featured science-fiction stories. The term "blaster" was first used[4] to describe a disintegrator ray in a story by Nictzin Dyalhis titled When the Green Star Waned in Weird Tales in 1925. A magazine devoted to science fiction, Amazing Stories, was established in 1926. Ray guns became a continued presence in pulp fiction, pulp comics, and B films from the 1920s through the 1960s.

Among the most influential franchises was Buck Rogers, which had first appeared in Amazing Stories, and later in comic strips, radio shows, and film serials. Depicting gun fighting using ray and laser based weapons, Buck Rogers is credited with establishing the ray gun as a staple of the genre.[3] Numerous companies tried to cash in on Buck's increasing popularity, and in 1933, a Cocomalt, a cereal company that was one of the sponsors for the Buck Rogers radio drama, created a set of mail-in premiums for a Buck Rogers playset — including a cardboard ray gun. The gun is "fired" with a flick the wrist, causing a sheet of folded paper inside the gun to pop as it snaps out. A second gun called a "Flash Blast Ray," was produced in 1937 by Warren Paper Products Inc. Later cardboard guns were created by Onward School Supplies and Sylvania Electric Products.[13]

In addition to these paper guns, metal guns started being produced by Daisy Manufacturing. The first one produced, the XZ-31 Rocket Pistol, turned out to be an instant success. The toy was so desired in its first two weeks on sale that it caused a pricing war between Macy's and their competitor Gimbels, one which often found the cost of the gun fluctuating by the hour. At times, it dipped so low that the department stores would lose money. According to Cass Hough, Daisy sales manages at the time, "during those first two weeks the Gimbel's and Macy's toy departments looked like a cyclone had struck, and people were still lining up to buy."[13] The next year, Daisy produced the XZ-35 Rocket Pistol, also known as the "Wilma" pistol. The design of the title character's XZ-35 Rocket Pistol, while not strictly speaking a ray gun, influenced almost every laser pistol, phaser and blaster that followed. By the late 30s, toy versions of the weapons started being produced marketed, including the XZ-38 Disintegrator in 1939, the first true ray gun.[3] The Disintegrator featured prominent fluting on the barrel and a large red window behind which a spark would flash when the trigger was pulled.[14]

Ray guns in the comic also included the "flash blast ray gun", the "sonic ray gun" and the "paralysis ray", a type of freeze ray. An early imitator of Buck Rogers was Flash Gordon. One weapon in the comic strips was the "dissolvo-ray gun", which acted much like a disintegrator gun, another wasy the "arresting ray gun", essentially a freeze ray, both of which were later put on the market as toys. By the 1940s, plastic water guns were developed, such as Playcraft's Atom-Matic Water Rocket Gun.

There were also a slew of major horror and science fiction B films in the 30s and 40s that featured ray-guns and helped further define them in the popular imagination. This included The Last Hour (1930), Lloyd of the C.I.D. (1932), and Murder at Dawn (1932), which was re-titled The Death Ray for its English release. Murder at Dawn featured a mad scientist working on a death ray in a mountain hide-away, now a cliché of science-fiction. Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff starred in several films featuring death rays. The first was a horror film in 1932, called The Mask of Fu Manchu, then The Whispering Shadow in 1933. The two later appeared together in The Invisible Ray (1936). In the film, a Hungarian doctor uses a mysterious substance called 'Radium X' to power a death ray gun, called the 'Concentrator', working by disintegrating its target. The use of the letter 'X' after a substance name also later became a cliché. An electrical ray gun was used in another Karloff film, Night Key, in 1937. A "vanishing ray" which caused the target to become invisible, appeared in The Vanishing Shadow in 1934. Daredevils of the Red Circle (1939) featured a 'Gamma Ray' which was used to treat rare diseases, but the wiring was changed, converting it to a deadly 'Delta Ray'.[7] Even Batman had a ray-gun in the 1943 serial.

Space opera novels that involved ray-guns also became popular, and many of these introduced new terms for ray-gun weapons. E. E. "Doc" Smith in Skylark of Valeron introduced the term needler to refer to a type of weapon which punches long but narrow holes in the target either by deadly threadlike beams or with needle bullets. C.M. Kornbluth introduced the term stunner in his 1941 novel Fire-Power. Also known as a stun gun, it would rend its target unconscious without killing it. A bolt gun came to either refer a weapon that shoots lightning or electricity; or a conventional weapon that fires bullets with the speed of lightning. A conventional sidearm that shoots bullets is called a "slug-thrower."

By the 1950s, the use of rocket technologies created an increased interest in space exploration, as well as stories of flying saucers and little green men. Given that, the pulp comics and radio plays of the 30s and 40s easily found an audience in 50s television space operas. The first space TV series was "Captain Video," which began in 1949, after which there was a long series adventurous space heroes like Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, Buzz Cory of the Space Patrol, and Rocky Jones Space Ranger. All of these series led to commercial products, including ray gun toys.

Phasers, blasters, disruptors

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As the models for old ray-guns began to be seen as unrealistic, associated with camp and as new technologies were developed, ray-guns started taking many new forms. Soon after the invention of lasers in the late 50s, such devices became briefly fashionable as a directed-energy weapon for science fiction stories. For instance, characters of the Lost in Space TV series (1965–1968) and of the Star Trek pilot episode "The Cage" (1964) carried handheld laser weapons. By the late 1960s and 1970s, as the laser's limits as a weapon became evident, ray-guns came in forms such as "phasers", "blasters", "pulse rifles", "plasma rifles", "phase pistols" and so forth. Disintegration ray guns generally became known as "disruptors". These new guns were explained with a variety of different scientific concepts that separated them from the original ray-guns — masers, photons, anti-matter, and plasma.[15]

The "phasers" of Star Trek were designed to combine the benefits of lasers and particle beams; like laser weapons, they were capable of penetrating energy force fields; while like particle beam weapons, they were capable of producing disruptive damage. The root word "phase" in "phaser" was a catch-all term to describe a number of effects that could be produced by the weapon. They're described as using "phase-modulated energy", emitting a beam of light similar to the light beam emitted by a laser, but of a pulsating nature that can be "phased" to interfere or interact with the wave pattern of a molecular form; they can also be fired steadily in one long burst, or in intermittent "squirts" which are also described as "phased" energy; and the energy can be created in different "phases" — able to dematerialize, disrupt, heat, or stun, depending on the setting. The name "phaser" originally was derived from "PHoton mASER", implying it used some sort of stimulated emission from photon particles; it was later intended to suggest it had something to do with the phasing principle in physics, in using higher phase velocities of light that in turn would consist of higher energy photons.[16] Phasers in later Star Trek literature are explained as using some currently unknown subatomic physics, involving a fictional particle called a "nadion".

The physical design of the phaser was also revolutionary in that it started to move away from the practice of modeling ray-guns after standard firearms. With the idea in mind that a directed-energy device wouldn't have the same recoil that is experienced with a projectile gun, and that because of that, there would be no need for the 'handle-and-trigger' grip, this was removed from the most basic form of the device. This was what was called the "Type I" phaser, and would be held much like a communicator or a scanner. A "Type II" phaser was a larger design, with a handle like a traditional firearm, but with a button instead of the traditional trigger. In original designs, the Type I model would be inserted in the Type II model much like many designs of vacuum cleaners today where handheld models fit into floor models. Additionally, there was a "Type III" model, a larger rifle-sized weapon. Phasers in Star Trek: The Next Generation were even more radically designed, with ergonomic principles in mind that would encourage the user to point it in a way like pointing a finger.

Retro-futurism

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Since the 80s, classical ray-guns concepts and designs from the 1890s through the 1960s have become a common theme in retro-futurism.

Many of these references are ironic. For example, Powerpuff Girls pays homage to a lot of old clichés from ray-gun films. The arch-villain, Mojo Jojo, lives in a lair on top of a volcano and works on perfecting his death ray, similar to the villain in Murder at Dawn; he also seeks to use the powers of "Chemical X" to power his gun, based on the "Radium X" of The Invisible Ray. The light-flash effects of early ray-gun concepts like that of Wells' Heat-Ray are used in different inventions of the Professor. The Jetsons, even when it originally aired in the early 60s, used ray-gun designs that had already been going out of date, and these were reprised when the series was put back on the air in the mid-80s. Ray-guns which appear like classic designs also are a common prop in Futurama.

Steam punk and atom punk typically tries to imagine how ray-guns would look as if they were actually created at the time that the ray-gun ideas were contemporary. Many of these designs adopt features that were not present in historical ray-gun designs. For example, a common technique is to incorporate elements that look like they're from a cathode ray tube such as a Crookes tube or Hittorf tube.

Examples

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Ray-guns

"Ray-guns" may refer to the classic ray-gun design, where radiation is directed at a target.

Heat-rays

"Heat-rays" involve directing heat and incinerating a target, usually in the form of infra-red light.

Freeze-rays

"Freeze-rays" are used to freeze a target in place, often using some form of cold or cold energy.

Disintegrator-rays

"Disintegrator-rays" are used to tear apart whatever they're targeted at

Fantasy rays

In addition to ray-weapons that are the product of scientific speculation, a number of guns are used for fantasy purposes, that fire things like transformation rays, invisibility rays, shrink ray, sleep rays, and hypno-rays. A few stories have given attempts at scientific explanations.

Laser-guns

"Laser-guns" are weapons that fire high-power lasers.

Particle-beam-guns

"Particle-beam-guns" involve shooting a stream of charged particles through a conduit of air.

Blasters

"Blasters" refer to the typical type of particle beam weapon.

Disruptors

"Disruptors" refer to weapons similar to disintegration-rays that tear asunder the target.

Needlers

"Needlers" are weapons that are designed to pierce targets with narrow beams.

Ion-guns

Main article: Ion cannon

"Ion cannons" use ionized particle streams.

Phase-guns

Main article: Phaser

"Phase-guns" refer to guns that are said utilize "phase-modulated energy", and are considered as hybrids of laser guns and particle beam guns. Like laser guns, they can penetrate energy force fields, and like particle beam guns they can effect disruptive damage to a target.

Plasma-guns

Main article: Plasma rifle

"Plasma-guns" are guns that fire a form of directed plasma.

Real world development

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Main article: Directed-energy weapons


Notes

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  1. ^ Munn & Beach 1880, p. 385
  2. ^ Maxwell 1872, p. 218
  3. ^ a b c Lambie 2011
  4. ^ a b Kelly 2008
  5. ^ Edward & Mendlesohn 2003, p. 23
  6. ^ a b c Stableford 2006, p. 564
  7. ^ a b c Gifford 1971, p. 70
  8. ^ Prucher 2007, p. 162
  9. ^ Cildress 1993, p. 248-252
  10. ^ Windsor 1924, p. 189
  11. ^ Windsor 1927, p. 705
  12. ^ Yanaga 1949, p. 623
  13. ^ a b Metcalf 1998
  14. ^ Dr. Atomic 2009
  15. ^ Van Ripper 2002, p. 45
  16. ^ Roddenberry & Whitfield 1968, p. 193

References

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  • Stableford, Brian M. (2006). Science fact and science fiction: an encyclopedia. CRC Press. p. 564. ISBN 9780415974608.
  • Prucher, Jeff (2007). Brave new words: the Oxford dictionary of science fiction. Oxford University Press US. p. 162. ISBN 978-0-19-530567-8.
  • Munn, O.D.; Beach, A.E. (1880). "What is Light?". Scientific American. Scientific American, inc: 384–385.
  • Maxwell, James Clerk (1872). Theory of Heat. Longmans, Green, and co.
  • Lambie, Ryan (May 16, 2011). "A celebration of the sci-fi ray gun". Den of Geek. Event occurs at http://www.denofgeek.com. {{cite web}}: External link in |time= (help)CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  • Kelly, Kevin (March 24, 2008). "The Secret Origin of the Ray Gun in Science Fiction". io9. Event occurs at http://www.io9.com. {{cite web}}: External link in |time= (help)CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  • Metcalf, Gene (1998). "The Ray Guns of Buck Rogers". Toy Rayguns. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |site= ignored (help)
  • Dr. Atomic (2009). "Space Guns". Atomic Box. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |site= ignored (help)
  • Van Riper, A. Bowdoin (2002). Science in popular culture: a reference guide. Westport: Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-31822-0.
  • Edward, James; Mendlesohn, Farah (2003). The Cambridge companion to science fiction. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521016575.
  • Childress, David Hatcher (1993). The fantastic inventions of Nikola Tesla. Adventures Unlimited Press. ISBN 9780932813190.
  • Windsor, H.H. (May 1927). "Can Inaudible Sounds Kill?". Popular Mechanics. Hearst Magazines: 705–706.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  • Windsor, H.H. (August 1924). ""Death Ray" is Carried by Shafts of Light". Popular Mechanics. Hearst Magazines: 189–192.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  • Gifford, Dave (1971). Science fiction film. Studio Vista. ISBN 9780289700037.
  • Yanaga, Chitoshi (1949). Japan since Perry. McGraw Hill Book Co.
  • Roddenberry, Gene; Whitfield, Stephen E. (1968). The Making of Star Trek. Ballantine Books. ISBN 9780345340191.
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