Best sci-fi movie questions of all time

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Little Shop of Horrors picture

Question: Near the end of the song "I am a dentist", is Orin saying "and a success" or "and I say sit"?

Answer: He says "and a success". He's singing about his mother telling him he'd become a successful dentist.

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Planet of the Apes picture

Question: Why did Thade kill the two apes that were with him after they showed him the trail left by Leo's pod?

Answer: To prevent anyone else from learning that Leo came from space. After Pericles' ship crashed, there was a prophecy of a second coming of Semos, the founder of Ape civilization. Thade wants to kill all humans, so if anyone found out, it would be considered a sign and the council might consider making peace with the humans.

Captain Defenestrator

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Species II picture

Question: When the Debutante examines herself in the mirror, why does she center on and support her breast just before doubling over in pain?

Answer: She was most likely giving herself a breast-self examination. Doing this would enable her to feel for lumps, distortion or swelling which if felt early would mean that she might have early stages of breast cancer and could get it checked immediately.

Her breast was sensitive and painful because she could sense that something wasn't right with her.

So the alien embryo inside of her body was giving her cancer?

No. It wasn't giving her cancer. She probably does a breast-self examination periodically to insure that there's nothing wrong with her breasts.

Plus, it wouldn't make any sense for an alien embryo to give her cancer since after giving birth to an alien hybrid she would immediately die.

Answer: She could feel discomfort in her breast as she moved her hands down to her stomach.

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Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan picture

Question: When Khan speaks to Kirk, he tells him that he wants revenge for the death of his wife. Who was Khan's wife?

Answer: Lt. Marla McGivers was the crew member.

Answer: This is a reference to the TV show episode that this movie is a distant sequel to. In that episode, one of Kirk's crew falls in love with Khan and helps him take over the ship. When Khan is exiled to the planet, she chooses to go with him. So it would be that after the catastrophic events of one of the planets in that system exploding and causing all sorts of damage to their new planet, she was killed there and Khan blames Kirk for it.

Quantom X

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Chosen answer: There's a limit as to how much the shields can protect the ship. Depending on the force of the explosions, the ship still suffers some damage from any weapon blasts. Also, the shield only holds for so long and gradually loses it protectiveness with successive attacks, causing increasing damage to the ship.

raywest

Answer: The depiction of the shields in this movie is actually interesting because it seems they deliberately tried to show how the ship could plausibly take damage while the shields are up. Here the shields seem to be "on" the hull (or perhaps emanate from the hull itself) and their function seems specific to preventing hull breaches. In TNG and onwards the shields appear as a kind of energy bubble wrapped around the ship, and accordingly they seem to absorb much more impact.

TonyPH

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Star Trek: First Contact picture

Question: Deanna Troi states that they will get rid of poverty, disease, and war within next 50 years. How would they get rid of things like autism, ADHD, or dyslexia? Aren't those medical conditions that cannot be cured?

Answer: Troi says that future medical research is far more advanced and humanity has learned to work together and overcome many social problems without being specific. It's unknown how these conditions will be cured, but possibly through advanced gene therapy, new drugs, new surgical techniques, etc.

raywest

Answer: The things you listed are not diseases, they are conditions. It is more plausible that she was referring to things like cancer, diabetes, stroke, and other similar disorders which, at some point in time, there might be a cure.

Troi said poverty disease war would all be gone within the next 50 years. I thought she meant things like autism ADHD and dyslexia would be gone too not just disease.

No, that's why she said disease.

Well the movie tells us that all bad things on earth would be gone within the next 50 years. I thought that would have included conditions like autism dyslexia or ADHD as well as disease.

The movie doesn't say "all bad things." She specifically says "disease." In other words things that can be cured, get cured. No doubt some things will be curable that we currently can't cure, and some things will never be curable. You're overanalysing a line used simply to explain that humanity advances itself in a short space of time.

Jon Sandys

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Terminator 2: Judgment Day picture

Question: One of the taglines for this film is "It's nothing personal". I have no idea what that has to do with the film and was hoping someone could explain it.

Gavin Jackson

Chosen answer: Two possibilities. 1: The Terminator is emotionless, so the killing isn't personal, but rather what it's programmed to do. 2: Sarah Connor's plan to kill Miles Dyson to stop Skynet's creation.

Captain Defenestrator

It's also a sly nod to another famous tagline, Jaws: The Revenge. "This time it's personal."

BaconIsMyBFF

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28 Days Later picture

Question: At the end we are left with the question of the pilot's intentions, and what happened. Is he going to help them, or pull an about-face and machine-gun them down thinking they're infected?

Answer: That question is actually answered. The pilot is speaking Finnish, and he says into the radio "lähetätkö helikopterin" which translates as "Can you please send a helicopter?" Looks like he was actually helping them after all, and there is still some civilization (or at least people with radios and helicopters).

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Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams picture

Question: When Donnagon is about to fire the transmooker on Juni, Carmen and Ingrid. Did Carmen try to grab Juni and protect him?

THE GAMER NEXT DOOR

Answer: Yes.

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Superman III picture

Question: How come Superman is so nice to Gus at the end? He was working with the baddies, he created a computer and the Kryptonite to kill Superman! Yet Superman is totally cool and even asks the coal miners to give Gus a job. Did I miss something?

Answer: The only reason that Gus was working with Ross, Vera and Lorelei was because he stole money from the company he worked at. To avoid going to prison, Gus was forced to do anything that they wanted. After realizing that his computer was designed to do anything it was ordered to, including killing Superman, Gus removed a small screw which shut down the power momentarily but, after the computer brought itself back online, Gus attempted to destroy it with an axe to save Superman. Superman saw this and realised he was wrong about Gus and after the computer was destroyed decided to help Gus find a job.

That makes sense, thank you! Been bugging me for years.

Jen Hen

You're welcome.

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Answer: Turn back to/from what? Can you please expand on the question so we know what you're referring to?

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Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves picture

Question: Near the beginning, what does Wayne mean when he says "Nothing like the smell of 2-part apoxy resin"?

Answer: Epoxy resin is sometimes sold in two seperate tubes. You have to mix the contents of both for the epoxy to harden into plastic. It also shows how weird he is, as epoxy tends to smell pretty foul.

Grumpy Scot

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Chosen answer: A sequel was not only planned, but money was spent developing sets and costumes. However, Dolph Lundgren did not want to reprise the role, so Laird Hamilton was picked to play He-Man with Albert Pyu set to direct. Canon Films, who produced the first movie, was also planning on producing a Spider-Man movie. However, Canon Films still owed money to Mattel and Marvel for the character rights that they couldn't feasibly pay, so both projects had to be scrapped. Incidentally, not wanting to let money go to waste on sets and costumes, they had Pyu come up with a movie to utilize them, which resulted in Cyborg starring Jean-Claude Van Damme.

Bishop73

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The Fly 2 picture

Question: After the gene-swapping sequence, why was Bartok placed in observation? Also, what was that food they gave him?

Socks1000

Chosen answer: Obviously, he was kept alive so he could be studied, which was a nasty twist on the fact that he kept the dog alive, and suffering, for so long. As far as the food, there is no way to know what it was. Probably some kind of bland mush.

wizard_of_gore

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Tremors 2 picture

Question: Does anyone know the song that plays on the radio after a Graboid swallows it?

Answer: Trouble by Travis Tritt.

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2010 picture

Question: In the original film, the Discovery's onboard computer states: "I am a HAL 9000 Computer, Production Number 3. I became operational at the HAL plant in Urbana, Illinois, on the 12th of January, 1992." So, "HAL" was a manufacturer identification prefix (standing for Heuristically-programmed ALgorithmic Computers), "9000" was its model number, and "No.3" was its production lineage. In this sequel, however, Dr. Chandra is chatting with one of HAL's earth-based twin computers which has a feminine voice and is called "SAL"; but how can they arbitrarily change its manufacturer identification prefix? Being produced by the HAL plant in Urbana, Illinois, and being identical to the computer aboard the Discovery, the twin's name should have a different production number, but it should still be called "HAL," should it not?

Charles Austin Miller

Answer: The most likely reason the name was changed was probably a literary one. It makes it easier for the audience to differentiate SAL from HAL, showing how they are two distinct computers playing different roles in the film. It may also just be a feminine nickname being that SAL has a female voice.

raywest

I thought perhaps "SAL" was a nickname, also, until I saw that the computer's maker nameplate reads "SAL 9000" (visible in close-ups of SAL's glowing eye).

Charles Austin Miller

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Star Trek: Generations picture

Question: How did Kirk die? He got hit by a lot of debris but from what was seen, not enough to do real damage.

Answer: Kirk also fell a considerable distance, clinging onto the platform as it dislodged from the cliff and rolled several times. In addition to being crushed/hit by debris, the fall and the rolling would have caused further serious trauma.

Sierra1

In addition to this statement, Kirk would have had servere internal bleeding as seen by the blood coming from his mouth.

Quantom X

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Time Bandits picture

Question: Evil tells of his assistants, "tell me about computers". And he later says, "show me subscriber trunk dialing". Why does such a powerful entity have an interest in technology? (01:30:45 - 01:31:35)

Chosen answer: This technology may pose a threat, as a counter, to Evil's magic, or it could be used to enhance his own powers.

Phixius

Answer: Remember his whole speech about technology being his version of the universe, while the Supreme Being concentrated on nature?

Brian Katcher

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The X-Files Movie picture

Question: If the "cold drink" vending machine was unplugged and the buttons were unresponsive, WHY did the saboteurs deliberately illuminate the front of the machine? Wouldn't this ATTRACT people to the machine, only to subsequently arouse curiosity when it failed to function (as it did with Mulder)? The more logical approach would be to disable the vending machine (including the illumination) and tape an "out of order" sign on it. People would then just ignore the machine, arousing no suspicion. The illuminated vending machine gimmick looks like an illogical contrivance to advance the plot.

Charles Miller

Chosen answer: If they had put an "Out of Order" sign, or left it unilluminated, someone in charge might try to have it fixed or replaced, or could have checked to see if it's plugged in, etc. By leaving it illuminated, it doesn't look out of place and simply not taking money wouldn't arouse too much suspicion. In my own life, when I've come across a seemingly working vending machine that won't take my money or dispense drinks (but gives my money back), I just find another one instead of calling someone or reporting it. But yes, it is very convenient to the plot that Mulder just happens to try and use this particular machine.

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Young Frankenstein picture

Question: Dr Frankenstein tells a student at a lecture he is giving that he is not interested in death but the preservation of life. If this is true then why would he continue in the footsteps of his grandfather?

Answer: That's how he felt at that moment. He became inspired to follow in his grandfather's footsteps after reading his books.

Maria Santos

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