Tailkinker

Question: I've read that all 5 children in the story represent one (or more) of the seven deadly sins. What is the exact rundown of this?

Answer: There's some debate over this one, but certainly there's some lining up between the characters in the movie and the seven deadly sins, although whether this was necessarily intentional is entirely open to debate. Some are pretty clear - Augustus Gloop is obviously Gluttony, Violet Beauregarde is Pride, Mike Teevee would be Sloth and Veruca Salt Greed. Charlie himself is Envy although unlike the other children he ultimately overcomes his sin and therefore escapes punishment. Wrath is less easy; Veruca Salt shows elements of it, as does Mike Teevee (especially in the Tim Burton remake), but arguably Wonka himself is the best representative, with his outburst at Charlie towards the end of the movie leading to him ultimately begging for forgiveness. Finally there's Lust, which, when interpreted as an intense desire for something rather than something strictly sexual, could readily be assigned to quite a number of the main characters or indeed the world in general, where we see people going to extraordinary and ludicrous lengths to find one of Wonka's golden tickets.

Tailkinker

6th Aug 2013

The Terminator (1984)

Question: When John Connor sends Kyle Reese back in time to protect his mother, Reese then becomes Connor's father, how could John Connor be the same person he is if a different man's sperm produced him?

dan coakley..

Chosen answer: The whole thing's a paradox, which, as time travel doesn't exist, we have no way to determine how it would work out in reality, and thus any movie dealing with time travel can make up its own rules. Effectively an infinite loop has been set up - Sarah gives birth to John, John grows up, meets Kyle, sends Kyle back to meet Sarah, they make love, Sarah gives birth to John and so on and so on. There may have been an original father to John at the beginning, but he was supplanted in the loop by Kyle and thus, in the timeline the film presents, the John who sent Kyle back is the one fathered by Kyle himself. Alternatively, maybe John Connor wasn't the original resistance leader, that some other leader sent Kyle back the first time, leading to the birth of John Connor, who then became the resistance leader instead; thus Kyle has always been John's father. This is the nature of a paradox, that there are things about the situation that don't necessarily seem to fit together, but they somehow come about anyway. The detail can be debated ad infinitum, but no concrete conclusion can be drawn, because that's just how this works.

Tailkinker

6th Aug 2013

The Terminator (1984)

Chosen answer: Kyle was. It's a paradox, an infinite loop; Kyle goes back, fathers a son who later meets the younger Kyle and sends him back to father a son who later meets the younger Kyle... etc. etc. There are no hard and fast rules governing this sort of thing, so there doesn't necessarily have to have been an original father who kicked the whole thing off before being supplanted by Kyle. Or maybe there was. Or maybe there was originally a different resistance leader who sent Kyle back, leading to the birth of John who became resistance leader instead. This sort of thing can be debated until the cows come home, but ultimately the only answer is "it's a paradox".

Tailkinker

6th Aug 2013

The Wolverine (2013)

Question: Approximately what year is the film set? The adamantium would place it after the Origins film (which I believe to be set circa 1979) in which he loses most if not all of his memories. This begs the question, how is it that he remembers WWII and the atomic bomb?

Answer: The chronology of the X-Men film series is, to put it mildly, somewhat screwed up. The first movie was released in 2000 and is described in an on-screen caption as being set in "The not too distant future", which isn't the most helpful statement, could be two years, could be ten years, who knows. The Wolverine is set about two years after the events of X-Men: The Last Stand, which is in turn about a year after the events of the first movie, so think about "the not too distant future", whatever that means, and add about three years onto that. This does mean that, yes, it is indeed set some decades after the events of the Origins movie, during which he lost his memories. It is, however, also set after a period during which he worked with Professor Xavier to regain some of his memories. It could therefore be suggested that Logan remembering his experience at Nagasaki represents that they had at least a partial success in recovering some of his memories.

Tailkinker

23rd Jul 2013

Star Trek (2009)

Question: The guy who plays Chekov in this movie uses a Russian accent that, to me, sounds fake. Is it fake? The original guy's sounded pretty real.

Quantom X

Chosen answer: Neither accent is particularly accurate. Anton Yelchin was born in Russia and, while his family moved to America when he was only a baby, he has no difficulty doing an authentic Russian accent, but the accent he selected for the movie was principally based on the accent used by Walter Koenig as the original Chekov, which is effectively a 1960's Hollywood stereotype Russian accent that bears little resemblance to anything overly genuine. Yelchin tweaked it slightly, making it marginally closer to a genuine accent and exaggerating it rather more than Koenig, but, ultimately, neither accent is overly authentic.

Tailkinker

17th Jul 2013

Looper (2012)

Question: The guy who was sent back in time to run the loopers, Abe, is he the same person as Kid Blue but just his older future self?

Quantom X

Chosen answer: Writer/director Rian Johnson has stated that he didn't write the script with the intention of having Abe and Kid Blue be the older and younger versions of the same character, but that he likes the widespread fan theory that they are, acknowledging that the dynamic he wrote for the two characters very much lends itself to that interpretation. So that's an official "No, but it's a cool idea".

Tailkinker

17th Jul 2013

General questions

How does Blu-ray conversion better the quality of old movies? The "Film Foundation" or whatever they are called is going back and restoring countless old movies like The Red Shoes to DVD and Blu-Ray. And they keep saying that the Blu-Ray makes it better than ever and clearer. How is that? The original film was the original format. So how can changing the format better something that was in a lesser form originally?

Quantom X

Chosen answer: Any movie shot on film, as all older movies obviously were, has to be scanned into a digital format in order to be placed on a DVD or BluRay disc. Generally speaking, for DVD releases, films were scanned at the minimum resolution necessary for that format, and thus using the same scan for the high-definition BluRay release wouldn't result in any improvement to the picture quality. What companies are doing now is returning to the original film negatives, if available, or original film reels if not and rescanning them as a much higher resolution, generally after going through them painstakingly frame-by-frame to remove imperfections in the original images. Thus the versions of those movies now being released on BluRay are not only cleaned up versions of the original, resulting in a better image, but are taken from new high-definition scans, allowing the full resolution of the BluRay disc and the high-definition television it's being played on to be utilised, making for exceptional quality.

Tailkinker

11th Jul 2013

Star Trek (2009)

Question: When on the drill, Sulu pulls out a collapsible sword. Is that a standard issue item for them or that suit, or is that just something that Sulu had? If it was just his, where did he get it and where was it before he got in the space jump suit?

Quantom X

Answer: In the original Star Trek universe, Sulu had a fondness for antique weapons. Episodes "The Naked Time " and "Shore Leave." Just before they land on the drill, Kirk asks," What's your best fighting technique?" Sulu replies, "Fencing."

Chosen answer: Given the standard issuing of phasers, it's safe to say that a relatively archaic item like a sword (even a high-tech one), which requires certain training to use effectively, is not going to be standard issue (note also that Kirk doesn't have one, as he's forced to resort to trying to hit his opponent with his helmet). As such we can safely assume that this is Sulu's own personal property, and thus, given the stated possibility of hand-to-hand combat, he retrieved it from his cabin before donning his suit.

Tailkinker

11th Jul 2013

Star Trek (2009)

Question: After his talk with Pike, Kirk holds a salt shaker shaped like the Kelvin's class of ship. That is awesome. Where can I find salt and pepper shakers like that? (00:24:55)

Quantom X

Chosen answer: Sadly, despite the obvious merchandising possibilities and the availability of other models of the Kelvin, the salt and pepper shakers are not, as yet, available to buy.

Tailkinker

12th Jul 2013

Predator 2 (1990)

Question: Why do the Predators keep skulls as trophies? At the end of the film, we see a lot of skulls hanging up in the Predators' spaceship, most of them are not human skulls and one of them looks like a dinosaur's skull, is this to make us think that the Predators came to earth millions of years ago and killed a few dinosaurs, or is it to make us think that they're the skulls of huge creatures that they killed on their own planet?

dan coakley..

Chosen answer: Why do some human hunters mount the heads of their kills on the walls of their house? To denote the kills that they've made, to commemorate a successful hunt. Same with the Predators. The skulls on the wall depict previous kills, one of which does indeed strongly resemble that of an Earth dinosaur. Whether this is intended to imply that the Predators have been around for so long that they hunted an actual dinosaur, or that it's supposed to be an alien species of a similar nature is unknown. Most likely the production designer simply thought it would look cool and didn't really give it any further thought.

Tailkinker

Answer: At the end of Predator 2, the old Predator throws Danny Glover a 17th century French flint lock pistol. In Alien vs. Predator, scientists find an Aztec temple over a thousand years old.

9th Jul 2013

Doctor Who (2005)

Chosen answer: In one way or another, eight times. He dies twice in the episode "Amy's Choice", once in each of the two dreams, firstly killed by an Eknodine in the Leadworth version of the dream, then again when the Doctor blew up the TARDIS in the other dream to allow them to escape it. He's then killed by the Silurian Restac in "Cold Blood", shortly before his body is consumed by the cracks in time, erasing him from history completely. He returns as an Auton duplicate, restored from Amy's memory, in "The Pandorica Opens" - this duplicate is destroyed in "The Big Bang" when the universe is reset, although some memories live on in the human Rory recreated in the rebooted universe. He died again in "The Curse of the Black Spot", but was successfully resuscitated by Amy. He's seen to die of old age in "The Angels Take Manhattan", then kills himself in the same episode by jumping from a high roof (as does Amy) to set up a paradox to eliminate the Angel threat. He then finally dies off-camera at the age of 82 after having been sent back in time by a surviving Angel, having lived out a long and happy life with Amy.

Tailkinker

Answer: The hearts are required in order to keep the Gentlemen alive. Precisely how, whether they eat them, or they're used in some sort of ritual, is unspecified.

Tailkinker

Question: After Talia orders Foley and the other cops to be gunned down, Foley's body is shown and he doesn't appear to have any bullet holes in him. Even with his black uniform you can see that his clothes don't have tears. Although it's possible that he was shot in the back, wouldn't the type of guns that are on the Tumblers be powerful enough to cause exit wounds?

Phaneron

Answer: He was hit by the tumbler. It wasn't included in the final cut due to how graphic it was when filmed.

Chosen answer: Almost certainly, yes, in fact, if the weapons demonstrated by the original Tumbler give any guide, his body would likely be severely damaged if not torn apart completely. However, as we don't actually see the precise circumstances of his shooting, we can't say that he was hit by one of the Tumbler's guns; given the intact state of his body, it seems far more likely that he was gunned down using a smaller weapon carried by one of Talia's remaining henchmen.

Tailkinker

23rd Jun 2013

Arrow (2012)

Show generally

Question: Is this show going to be a part of the Justice League universe DC is creating with the Man of Steel? I'm just wondering, because A) The Green Arrow has been a member of the Justice League in the past and B) they haven't done anything yet in the show to deny or confirm that it's going to be part of that.

Friso94

Chosen answer: There is no evidence at this point to suggest that this is the case. Most indications at this point suggest that Green Arrow is not under consideration as a likely character for any proposed Justice League movie.

Tailkinker

Question: Has it ever been stated where witches and wizards go to school before they go to Hogwarts? I mean Hermione and Harry obviously went to Muggle primary school, but what about people like the Weasleys?

Heather Benton

Chosen answer: According to J K Rowling, most wizarding families choose to home school their children prior to sending them to Hogwarts. A few enrol their children in nearby Muggle schools in order to give them a more rounded view of the world, but most take the home schooling option.

Tailkinker

28th May 2013

Iron Man 2 (2010)

Question: The boxes which contain the particle accelerator are marked "Project Pegasus". Is this some sort of comic book reference?

Friso94

Chosen answer: Yes, it is. Project PEGASUS (standing for Potential Energy Group/Alternate Sources/United States) is principally a scientific base used in multiple stories set in the Marvel Universe, although it has also served as a place of incarceration for super-powered individuals at various points in its existence. Within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Pegasus is the SHIELD scientific base used in the Avengers movie to study the Tesseract, that is destroyed when the portal used to bring Loki to Earth implodes.

Tailkinker

Question: How could Louis be the son of a king and Phillipe be the son of D'Artagnan if they're identical twins?

Answer: Both Louis and Philippe are actually D'Artagnan's children. This is why D'Artagnan continues to defend Louis for much of the early part of the film, despite the King's callousness, because he feels that he must defend his son, even against his oldest friends. It's only when he discovers Philippe and realises that he has another son, a humble and decent man, that he's finally able to feel pride as a father and can stand against Louis and his excesses.

Tailkinker

17th May 2013

Oblivion (2013)

Question: Maybe this was explained in the film and I missed it, but it has been bugging me for a while. What happened to all the rest of the clones of Jack and Victoria after the Tet was destroyed? Presumably their daily instructions in the form of Sally would cease. Wouldn't they get suspicious? Some reasonable explanation would be nice.

Answer: They would obviously notice that the Tet was gone and would no doubt have questions, but, without outside intervention, would be unlikely to be able to do anything about it, as they would have no reason not to believe that the "radiation zones" confining them to their particular area weren't real. Some would likely die fighting Scavenger groups in their areas (without the drones, they'd be increasingly vulnerable), others might be successfully contacted by those groups and thus could join with them, some may have ultimately starved without resupply from the Tet. The film only covers what happens to Jacks 49 and 52; the others likely met with a variety of different fates.

Tailkinker

15th May 2013

Star Trek (2009)

Question: Spock, in the Jellyfish, warps and leads the Narada away from Earth. Then both the Jellyfish and Narada jump out of warp. Where are both ships located in the universe? There is a debate with a friend where I believe that they warp somewhere outside of Earth's Solar System, not near any other planets, but there is not enough data to determine the exact location. The person that I am debating with believes that they are somewhere near Saturn because the Enterprise appears. I dispute this with my friend because all the Red Matter got destroyed, creating a huge black hole. Wouldn't a black hole near Saturn also endanger the planet and anything near it? (01:45:55 - 01:47:40)

Answer: There's certainly no evidence that they're still within the solar system; the Enterprise arrives dropping out of warp, which would seem to be good evidence that they're not anywhere near Saturn any more. While no specifics are given, Spock jumps into warp to get the red matter on board well away from anything it could endanger; as a handy side-effect, this also serves to draw the Narada away to a location where it can be taken out safely. Given that, Spock would most certainly have ensured that he came out of warp well away from any major celestial bodies; the most logical place would be to emerge somewhere outside the solar system.

Tailkinker

15th May 2013

Iron Man (2008)

Question: If Tony's suit (Mark II) is powered by the miniature arc reactor in his chest, what powers War Machine?

Answer: Stark has constructed independent power sources for his older suits, presumably on the off-chance that he might need to use Rhodes, who he has given voice access, as backup, or possibly because, as he believes himself to be dying, he would want somebody he trusts to be able to access the suits after his passing. That power source is used when Rhodes takes the suit to battle Stark at his birthday party, and is subsequently used to power the upgraded War Machine armour.

Tailkinker

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