Corrected entry: When Marty is in the Delorean ready to go back to 1985, he gets upset that Doc Brown tore up the letter and that he didn't have enough time to warn Doc about his future death. When Marty realizes that he can use the Delorean to go back early and warn Doc Brown of 1985 that he will be killed, Marty says,"Ten minutes oughta do it." Marty actually gives himself eleven minutes.
Corrected entry: When Marty goes back to Nov. 5, 1955, the time is set for 8:30 AM. When he arrives he walks around a bit in amazement and then heads towards Hill Valley. The sign he passes says "Hill Valley 2 miles." When he gets there, look at the clock tower, the time is about 8:30 (give or take). He couldn't have run the two miles in under a minute even without hiding the DeLorean.
Correction: No such thing occurs. When he's being chased by the Libyans at the mall, the display reads the destination time at sometime during the 6 o'clock hour (the minutes are not visible). This is the last time we can see the precise time on the time circuit display until the night of the storm. Regardless, in the scene in question, the time circuits are out of power and malfunctioning so they could have given a false reading.
Which scene, the storm or the Libyan attack? Also, "the time circuits were out of power and malfunctioning"? I'm pretty sure they weren't properly failing until part II.
Trivia: The town hall building is also seen in the Voyagers TV show.
Suggested correction: The Town Hall building is in over 100 movies and TV shows since it is a building in Courthouse Square at Universal Studios. It has also appeared in Gremlins, The Twilight Zone, To Kill a Mockingbird, Knight Rider, Leave It To Beaver, Parenthood, Saving Mr. Banks, and Psycho II, to name some of a few of the more commonly known. I don't think its common appearance makes this trivia relevant.
I'd say it makes it more relevant. Just add the multiple appearances of the building.
Corrected entry: When Doc is on the clock tower in 1955 during the storm, a closeup of his feet is shown. He is wearing shoes with velcro straps in this shot. Velcro did not yet exist in 1955, and Doc had not yet traveled into the future.
Correction: The concept behind Velcro was conceived in 1941, the idea was submitted for a patent in 1951, and the patent was granted in 1955. Not impossible that Dr. Emmett Brown, a member of a wealthy family and fellow inventor, could acquire some.
Corrected entry: When Marty escapes the Libyans at the Twin Pines Mall, hits 88mph and ends up in Old Man Peabody's barn, driving in through a large opening in the barn before crashing. However, the cut to the inside of the barn shows no form of entry other than the closed doors the family are entering. In addition the inside of the barn is very small compared to the outside view. (00:30:10 - 00:31:55)
Correction: He doesn't enter the barn where the family enters the barn. He enters through the back of the barn and goes all the way through, hence why the family are facing the lights from the door they enter through, not the back of the car.
Actually there are no openings behind the car when the Peabodys enter so he couldn't have gone through.
The car spun 45 degrees when it enters the barn and comes to a stop. They enter it through the side so what you see behind the car is the other side of the barn, not the back (or front whatever you want) where he came in, that's on the right side of the car.
Corrected entry: Even with Marty's brief instructions, it is near impossible that each backing band member (each, and as a whole) could have pulled off a near perfect rendition of Johnny B. Goode, not ever having rehearsed, known or heard the song, etc.
Correction: 1. It is NOT a perfect rendition. 2. "Near impossible" is not impossible. 3. This posting renders every musical ever made impossible.
Also, Johnny B Good is a three-chord song. Any musician, especially one in a professional band, could follow the pattern, knowing the key.
Question: If Doc doesn't want to know what's going to happen in his/the future, then why did he tape the letter Marty gave him in 1955, which he tore up, back together instead of throwing it away? Also why did he have it on him at the end to give to Marty, if he had no idea Marty would show up at Lone Pine Mall after coming back to 1985?
Chosen answer: It's not stated directly in the movie, but it's easy to infer that Doc Brown was subject to the one thing that just about all scientists fall victim to... Curiosity. You can guess that after Marty vanished back to the future, Doc became too curious to resist and assembled the paper back together to read it. In turn, this would give him the information he needed to save himself with a bulletproof jacket, and know the important of why Marty would go back in time when it is 85. And he would have kept the note on him because he DID know Marty would come back to that point. After all, he did send him back off 30 years prior, with the intent of going back to that very day. Doc is intelligent, and would have expected things to turn out that way given the unwritten laws of time travel and paradox.
But after this, it poses a new question. Wouldn't he have found a new power source instead so he won't be shot?
Question: During one scene in 1955, Marty mentions John F. Kennedy, and nobody has any idea who he's talking about. Would Kennedy really have been a totally unfamiliar name to most Americans in 1955? True, he wasn't President yet, but he was a popular Democratic senator from a prominent family.
Answer: He was both a war hero and a senator, but unless Lorraine's father followed politics closely he might not have recognized the name, especially since Kennedy wasn't a senator for their state.
Plus it would be unheard of to name a street after a living politician from across the country.
Answer: Keep in mind, there was no TV news in that house (they just got a TV). And I don't see the dad being one to read any further than the sports page, or listen to anything but comedy on the radio.
Question: Doesn't anybody think that when the Star Wars movies were released, that the name of the enemy, Darth Vader, would get George McFly a little suspicious? After all, he had to have remembered the name of the spirit that "came down to him from planet Vulcan" since it is on the cover of his book at the end.
Answer: Suspicious of what? He never finds out Doc Brown has a time machine or that Marty affected his past. It might make him believe in some sort of "The truth is hiding in plain sight" conspiracy theory. Oh and BTW, he'd see Star Trek in 1966 (with the Vulcan reference) before he sees Star Wars.
Marty says that he is "Darth Vader from the planet Vulcan", and unless George doesn't remember "meeting him", he might think back to it and be like "wait a minute..." Regardless of when Star Trek and Star Wars would come out, a nerd like him would be able to put two-and-two together and see that they don't add up, unless he thinks that it's just a coincidence.
Answer: I think it was mostly as a shock to him waking up like that with loud noises right in his ear. Disoriented and confused and already being kind of a jittery and craven person he just did what he was told. Doesn't matter at that point how unalien the encounter actually was. I mean the music was guitars, Vulcan is a common word, the "alien" spoke plain english and i'll bet people from the 50's have seen an environmental suit before (basically a diving suit with a gasmask).
Answer: In a special "front page wrap" of USA Today for October 22, 2015, written by Michael Klastorin. The name of the alien is "Garth D'Vade." Obviously done as a joke, it does show that George may have not remembered the name and didn't associate it with Darth Vader, so there's nothing for him to be suspicious about. It's also possible he believes Darth Vader to be real and thinks Vader must have visited George Lucas.
Answer: Vulcan had long been used as the name of fictitious planets (when 19th century astronomers thought they'd discovered a planet closer to the sun than Mercury, they were going to name it 'Vulcan'). As for Vader, George wouldn't have heard the name again until more than 20 years after his 'dream, ' and either chalked it up to coincidence or misremembering what he heard.
Question: How is Marty able to play a 1980s videotape on a 1950s television set? Is this just another example of Doc's ahead-of-his-time inventiveness?
Answer: The video camera was in the DeLorean. With the right kind of adapter, which was common enough in the 80s that Doc might've had it on the camera or been able to jury-rig something in the 50s, it would have been possible to connect it into the antenna screws in the back of the TV like an old Atari and play it directly from the camera.
TVs in the 50s had a two prong antennae connection (two screws in the back that you put a prong antennae into) TVs in the mid 80s also had this. The coax connection (the one wire that screws in) was starting to become common, but, the two prong connection would have been more likely on any given TV at the time, so, whatever wire they used to preview recordings probably had that. very convenient that Marty brought those cords with him.
An old Atari 2600 RF Adapter would be how one would link a video camera to an old-fashioned television. A simple-enough part that Doc could probably make one with 1950s technology.
Answer: Video tape system back then could output an NTSC video signal, just like broadcast at the time, and up to HD in the 2000s. Usually there was a switch on the video device to change the output frequency between channels 3 or 4. Depending on what was an open channel in your area.
Correction: So he can't do math in his head in a few seconds. Character mistake.
shortdanzr ★
Or, he was just rounding down.