2010

Factual error: While the Leonov has a centrifugal section to simulate gravity, the ship's bridge is not part of it (evidenced by the stationary views outside its portholes). Yet in various scenes, including the one when Floyd rushes in to discuss his plan to return to Earth sooner with Tanya, gravity seems quite evident. Floyd marches across the compartment onto the raised pilot area's floor, then steps down from it, his foot landing audibly. Tanya's open jacket also hangs down normally as she moves about. Yet when Floyd demonstrates his plan using two pens, they float in mid air. (01:26:50)

johnrosa

Factual error: In the scene where the crew members are doing a simultaneous countdown in Russian and in English, the Russian crewmember skips the number four (chetiri). She goes straight from 5 (pyat) to three (tree). (01:44:14)

Factual error: In the vast majority of cases, U.S. Astronauts wear the US flag on their left arm. On the rare occasion the flag is on their right arm, the flag is reversed so that the blue field remains toward the front of the person wearing it. The patch on Dr. Chandra's space suit during the launch countdown to leave Jupiter is on his right sleeve but is a left-sleeve patch. (01:37:00)

johnrosa

Factual error: The filmmakers here forgot how a centrifuge works to mimic the effects of gravity. It is centripetal force wherein an object is pulled away from the center of rotation (you feel its effect on a merry-go-round when it spins really fast and you are tossed off by the centripetal forces). No gravity is actually created. So when the two astronauts are walking along the outside of Discovery and Curnow announces he is getting heavier, it is impossible. First, he's not within Discovery (and if he were, the force would pull him toward the ends of the ship - correctly depicted later when the men are shown walking on the inside of the pod bay doors). The area they are walking on is dropping away from their feet. Both men should be motionless in space as the ship falls away 'below' their feet, then rotates around and kills them when it clobbers their heads half a rotation later. (00:47:50)

johnrosa

Factual error: While the Leonov has a centrifugal section to simulate gravity, the ship's bridge is not part of it (evidenced by the stationary views outside its portholes). Yet in various scenes, including the one when Floyd rushes in to discuss his plan to return to Earth sooner with Tanya, gravity seems quite evident. Floyd marches across the compartment onto the raised pilot area's floor, then steps down from it, his foot landing audibly. Tanya's open jacket also hangs down normally as she moves about. Yet when Floyd demonstrates his plan using two pens, they float in mid air. (01:26:50)

johnrosa

More mistakes in 2010

HAL-9000: Dr. Chandra, will I dream?
Dr. Chandra: I don't know.

More quotes from 2010

Trivia: In the nursing home scene, the nurse at the desk is reading Time magazine. The cover concerns the US/Soviet conflict integral to the plot. If you look closely, the US President's picture is a colored drawing of Arthur C. Clarke and the Soviet Premier's picture is a colored drawing of the director of 2001, Stanley Kubrick. (01:17:18)

More trivia for 2010

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

More questions & answers from 2010

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