Tolstoi published two science fiction novels, both of which appeared in the experimental 1920s & which were revised during the following decades of Stalinist terror. Aelita (1923) is a science-fiction fantasy in the manner of H.G. Wells, telling the story of a Soviet expedition to Mars with the aim of establishing communism. A Red Army officer forments a rebellion of the native Martians, who are in fact long-ago emigrants from Atlantis. The story was adapted into a screen play in 1924. Its futuristic, expressionistic sets were designed by Isaac Rabinovitch of the Kamerny Theatre. The film influenced the design in Flash Gordon, a space opera, which was created by the artist Alex Raymond in 1934 & led to a popular radio serial & several films. Giperboloid inzhenera Garina (1926, The Death Box) described an attempt of an unscrupulous inventor to use his death ray to conquer the world. He manages to rule a decadently capitalist USA for a short period.