A tearful witness reports Ray Bradbury’s house has been torn down.

There was no ceiling overhead. The dining room wall is now the dining room rug. The living room is the only place that’s remotely intact, but its floor is littered with twisted metal and broken glass.

While sad, this was not unexpected.

Fortunately, Ray’s ideas are immortal – as these three news items demonstrate.

(1) The Whispers, the TV series inspired by Bradbury’s story “Zero Hour” and produced by Steven Spielberg, is coming to ABC. Beware spoilers in this synopsis —

The Steven Spielberg-produced show is about children who play games with an invisible force, with plans to eventually invade and take over Earth. Their parents think it’s just a game of pretend with imaginary friends, until the invasion actually occurs.

In the setting of Washington D.C., several kids play dangerous games with their imaginary friend named Drill. FBI child specialist Claire Bennigan is a grieving widow and newly single mother of her son Henry. She’s called to investigate the matter involving the children’s imaginary friend, but she has no idea that her own son has been communicating with Drill, also.

Defense Department operative Wes Lawrence is carrying on an affair with Claire, and his wife Lena has found out. They have one daughter Minx, who has begun talking to Drill, also. Wes travels to the middle of the Sahara Desert to discover a startling geological phenomenon. There could be a connection between his findings and the mysterious unseen presence the children are talking to.

Answers will be sought about what this presence is and what it wants — and why it only communicates with children. Will they discover the truth before it’s too late?

(2) Jason Sheehan on NPR’s All Things Considered has had enough of dystopias:

But here I am, sitting on the cusp of a new year, knowing already the evil and sadness that has passed and fully expecting more to come. And I’m wondering if this obsession in our fiction with our own inevitable destruction hasn’t reached a saturation point. I’m wondering what ever happened to Ray Bradbury.

Ray was the Man. A grandfather of dystopias, true, who set the nation ablaze with Fahrenheit 451. But he was also our loopy, sideways-smiling prophet who could show you dinosaurs and time machines, spaceships and sea monsters and all the wonders of a future I’m still hoping will come true.

(3) In March, Indiana University’s Cinema program will have several showings of films written by Bradbury or based on his work. Click on Spring 2015 IU Cinema Program Book and load page 52 to see the details. Moby Dick, Fahrenheit 451 and It Came From Outer Space are on the schedule.