Questions about specific movies, TV shows and more

These are questions relating to specific titles. General questions for movies and TV shows are here. Members get e-mailed when any of their questions are answered.

Question: What does the term "Fire in the hole" mean? It is used in this and many other military films.

Answer: It was originally a mining term. A hole was drilled in a seam and then dynamite pushed into it. As an explosion in a mine is always dangerous, the other miners were warned that there was "fire in the hole". It's since been adopted for most other situations involving explosives.

scwilliam

Answer: According to the IMDB.com's quote page for Blackadder The Third, it's "Aahhhhh. Hot potato, orchestra stalls, Puck will make amends. Owwwwww."

Gary O'Reilly

The Big Superhero Wish - S4-E3

Question: I know that Crocker's villain parodies Dr. Octopus and Vicky's villain parodies Wolverine, but who is Francis' villain supposed to be?

Answer: There is no specific character he is parodying, just brute characters that take animal names and costumes, like the Rhino.

Answer: Old-Biff first comments on the flying DeLorean "I have not seen one of those in 30 years", then he sees what he believes to be two McFly Jr.'s and gets even more suspicious, next he spies on Doc and Marty having an argument about the almanach and how Doc is opposed to time travelling for personal gain! What else does he need to know? And lastly: We're talking about a time machine here! Old-Biff could have stolen it, kept it for how ever long it took him to figure out how it works and returned it at leisure. We don't even have any proof for the days he picked to departed from 2015 or to arrive in 1955. The only verified date is his return from Nov 12 1955 06:38 pm.

Chosen answer: He doesn't, but it's hardly difficult to work out - the date setting readout is pretty obvious. Biff presumably set the date, then just accelerated the car until the time circuits kicked in.

Tailkinker

Answer: It's a plot hole. Biff couldn't have known or suspected the DeLorean's time-travel procedure, which necessarily included Biff setting the precise 1955 destination with no previous instruction. Biff just suddenly "knew" how to operate a time machine. He also changed the timeline by going back to 1955, so there's no way he could have returned to the "normal" 2015. But he does.

Charles Austin Miller

It's not totally impossible that Biff knew how to the time dial worked. He wasn't suspecting what it was, he knew it was a time travel machine and thus knew what the dial was for and possibly being technically educated knew how to use the time dial.

lionhead

We know from the first movie that Biff, by age 48, was waxing cars for a living in 1985. He hardly had a "technical education" and it's doubtful he acquired a technical education by age 78 in the year 2015. It was established in the first movie that he had become a timid underachiever.

Charles Austin Miller

Alright I agree, he's not the sharpest tool in the shed. But he has lived for 78 years by then, till 2015. Even though he has no clue on how the flux capacitor works, he doesn't need to, all he needs to do is work the time circuits, a simple keypad system which even shows which display shows which time. For someone from 2015, it's not so hard to figure out.

lionhead

Answer: He could have taken however long he wanted to figure it out, as long as he returned it to the exact time he took it from. We don't actually see him time travel with it when he takes it, so, for all we know, he could have taken it to his house and taken the few hours/days he needed to figure out how to use it.

Answer: Doc and Marty Were keeping a detailed log via the camcorder, making it easier still.

dizzyd

Yeah old Biff didn't watch the camcorder.

lionhead

Question: Why does Bosie's (blonde Home Guard) nose bleed whenever there's shooting going on? It happens when he's at the Swanger's house and shoots the sons and again at the end when there's the big shootout with Inman.

ChiChi

Chosen answer: Bosie is an Albino. One of the symtoms of Albinism (but only a very rare type) is unsusal bleeding which might include frequent nose bleeds. Gunfights clearly bring these on in him.

Must've been what kept him out of the army, I was wondering.

Question: Are "Happy Tarts" an actual product in America? They're displayed throughout the film as an obvious product placement joke, but is it a product made up for the benefit of the joke, or did the film makers make a real product placement into a joke?

Gary O'Reilly

Chosen answer: No, Happy Tarts is not a real product (unless you live in South Park where Cartman sometimes has them along with Cheesy Poofs and Snacky Cakes).

Myridon

Chosen answer: ACD was a close friend of JMB and they don't make a big deal out of identifying him. One scene he is in is the party after the first play opening. He is also the one who suggests to JMB that his interest in the boys might be a source of gossip.

Myridon

Question: Is Wilbur the Albatross the brother of Orville the Albatross from the first film? It would make sense if they were making a Wright Brothers joke.

Cubs Fan

Chosen answer: Yes, they are brothers.

Question: Is there any particular reason Julia Robert's dress was changed from the blue and white dress she wears at the beginning of the movie to a black and pink version of the same dress on the movie poster and film/disc cover? I've always wondered why - there's really no reason for the change.

Steph_Jared

Chosen answer: Posters are usually designed long after the film has been made, and by the marketing department. Decisions about the outfit may have been based solely on what was considered best by the marketing department (for instance, to match the color of the lettering in the title.) Also, Julia Roberts' head has been super-imposed onto a model's body in the poster image (just as Richard Gere's hair has been darkened). These are all creative marketing decisions.

Question: Is there a reason that Bill didn't mention anything to The Bride at their final meeting about her killing his brother? I would think he would be a little upset when Elle told him his brother died at the hands of the Black Mamba.

moviemogul

Chosen answer: Considering the condition his brother's life was in, he may have considered it a mercy killing. In any event, there was no reason to ask her as he already knew why she killed him, and as his brother said she deserved her revenge. Bill most likely accepted that his brother got what he deserved, like the rest of her victims.

Answer: Considering Elle told him she killed Beatrix and then the latter shows up, proving Elle lied, he probably figured the rest was a lie too. Plus some time passed. Elle could have tried to contact Bill and he realised what happened.

Chosen answer: Helicopter performance is dependent on a number of factors, including air density. As altitude increases, air density decreases and the performance of the helicopter falls as well. At the height of Mt Everest, the air density has fallen to a sufficient degree that most helicopters would be unable to function (few helicopters are capable of functioning above 20,000 feet, nine thousand feet lower than the summit of Everest).

Tailkinker

Question: Is it ever explained how Morpheus knows that Neo is the one initially? In the beginning all we know is that they are looking for each other, what happened before then?

Nick N.

Chosen answer: It's never explained. From what we do know, it's clear that Morpheus and his group have been observing Neo for some time, as they presumably do with potential new recruits. While Neo was too old to be a recruit, it seems likely that Morpheus saw something during that time that convinced him that Neo was the One, leading him to break the rules regarding age and extract Neo from the Matrix anyway. It's also possible that the Oracle gave him some relevant information when she told him that he would find the One - not a name and address, obviously, but something that Morpheus ultimately recognised in Neo.

Tailkinker

Question: When Greg is showing the gang the photo of his "teeny weeny" he says "they turned the hot water off in the showers". what did he mean by that?

Answer: When cold water reaches certain parts of the body, you tend to get some "shrinkage", hence the teeny weeny.

Jason Diehl

Question: Is this supposed to be the same Lestat as the character in Interview With The Vampire? If so, is it just me or does it not follow? At the start of Queen of the Damned he is only just waking up and seems fine. Yet at the end of Interview With The Vampire he's attacking the interviewer guy. I don't get it.

Answer: This movie is a very loose adaptation of the Anne Rice novel to begin with, so it is safe to assume the director took certain liberties with the characters. The plot lines are not meant to be interconnecting, or even related for that matter. Consider "Smallville" vs. the original Superman stories, or "Sum of All Fears" starring Ben Affleck vs. the other Jack Ryan movies starring Harrison Ford.

Macalou

Question: If Sirius Black is innocent, why is he so menacing-looking in his picture on all the Wanted-posters?

Answer: He is angry over his false arrest, being imprisoned without a trial, and he is very concerned about the welfare of his God-son Harry Potter. Also would you want to go to prison and be with the Dementors? I would be yelling my head off as well.

Mark English

Not to mention; Sirius is lucky he came out with any sanity left, given what dementors do to people. A constant state of sadness is enough to make anyone upset.

Question: What's up with the Halloween Town and Christmas Town clocks? I understand the idea of the tension increasing as the clock hands approach the "12" position, but if Christmas in on the 25th of December, towards the end of the month, shouldn't the hands be closer to the "1 o'clock" position then the 12? And why is December at the top of the clock in Halloween Town when their holiday is in October? It doesn't make sense.

Answer: The clocks might not be literal. When the hands are at the 12 position, it could be when their holidays are. And the whole concept of the movie is the people from Halloween try to do Christmas, so they changed the clock month to December.

Question: Who exactly is this Brian Boitano the kids keep singing about and what relevance does he have to the overall plot of the film?

Answer: Brian Boitano is a famous figure skater (2 World Championships, an Olympic gold medal, and 6 Professional World Championships). He is a recurring character on the TV show. The idea is that sports heroes are who kids would idolize/worship (song makes fun of the "What Would Jesus Do" fad) contrasted with figure skating which is perceived as being a rather less than manly sport thus they make up wild heroic acts to "explain" why he is their idol.

Myridon

Question: What is the music playing/who is it by when Clark slits the South African guys throat near the end of the movie?

Answer: The song is the classic "Nessun dorma", composed by Puccini and sung (in this version) by Bruce Sledge.

Question: What is the name of the female child Mecha that is inscribed on the boxes across from the boxes of Davids?

Matty Blast

Chosen answer: Darlene.

Question: Can someone please explain what Spoon Boy says to Neo about there being no spoon, I do not fully understand it.

Sir William

Chosen answer: "There is no spoon" because the spoon doesn't really exist; it's just a bunch of images inside the Matrix. For Neo to use his powers, he can't think of bending the spoon (or surviving a fall, or jumping a gap, or dodging bullets) because in even accepting the existence of the spoon (or the fall, or the gap, or the bullets) he'll be acknowledging it's impossible to do so. He has to see all these things as just reflections of the Matrix (as he indeed does at the end) and manipulate them in those terms, to use his powers.

Moose

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.