Grumpy Scot

26th Jan 2008

I Am Legend (2007)

Corrected entry: The jet that Neville was golfing off of, the SR-71 Blackbird, was never an aircraft-carrier compatible aircraft. Furthermore, the SR-71 was retired in 1998, and of all remaining models, only two were kept by NASA, and the rest were not airworthy, and moved to museums. The SR-71 would certainly not have been physically able to be on an aircraft carrier.

Correction: He is on the USS Intrepid, which was converted to a museum in 1982. She sits off the shore of Manhattan and has a Lockheed A-12, a similar-looking precursor to the SR-71 Blackbird, on deck as one of her exhibits.

Grumpy Scot

12th Jan 2008

Thunderball (1965)

Corrected entry: Two Vulcans left the airbase together. They would have flown together as well. Where did the other go? Why didn't it follow the other plane when it got in trouble - and reported where it had gone to?

Jacob La Cour

Correction: It's not odd to think the Vulcans separated at some waypoint in the flight for simulated bombing runs or as practice for some sort of decoy maneuver and were to return at different times.

Grumpy Scot

Spot on. The Vulcans were nuclear armed. There's no point having 2 aircraft drop a nuclear bomb on the same target.

stiiggy

Correction: No it was standard procedure to have multiple bombers, missile silos and subs go after the same target. That's so if the primary aircraft is shot down etc. another would take its place, it's called target redundancy.

8th Oct 2002

Splash (1984)

Corrected entry: Later on in the movie after the scientists place Madison in the "fish tank", she stays there for a while until Allen comes to visit her. When he runs up to the tank, and she swims up to the surface, watch all of her fin. Now think, people...would a fish bend his body as if he had knees underneath? It looks as if Madison had knees underneath her fin, since it's bending in that sort of manner.

Correction: If we assume Mermaids are a divergent human evolution, then the bones in her tail might be more like two legs fused together instead of a structure more similar to a real fish. She might very well have a joint there.

Grumpy Scot

14th Dec 2007

Futurama (1999)

Xmas Story - S2-E8

Corrected entry: When Fry and the others are talking about "Xmas" trees, they tell him that pine trees died out a long time ago. But, how can they say that when they were skiing around them, and over them, throughout the first scene?

Correction: They're artificial. Remember how they fold up so Fry and Leela ski over them?

Grumpy Scot

12th Dec 2007

Transformers (2007)

Corrected entry: We are shown that the Transformers have to scan an object in order to transform into it. However, Megatron came to Earth in the 19th century and was frozen up until the point in the movie where he unfreezes, and he gets away by turning into a jet and flying away. There was no possible way that Megatron could have scanned a jet inside the Hoover Dam.

Correction: You'll notice that the jet he transforms into is no jet from Earth. It's either his original transformation mode or one he picked up on another planet looking for the Allspark.

Grumpy Scot

11th Dec 2007

The Dirty Dozen (1967)

Corrected entry: As the convicts are building their training camp, Posy is shown with blueprints and a clipboard on which he is writing something. Later, when Posy comes out from talking with the psychologist, it is firmly established that Posy is illiterate: "The captain thinks he can teach me letters." How can he be reading blueprints and lists?

Correction: That's not the point. Posey is functionally illiterate. There is no way he would be trusted with an important task like keeping track of designs and the progress of his team through written lists, which would inevitably demand skills he simply did not possess.

Correction: Being illiterate wouldn't keep you from reading a diagram or drawing like blueprints. Posy could have been putting markings on the blueprints, not actually writing words.

Grumpy Scot

28th Sep 2006

V (1984)

The Wildcats - S2-E15

Corrected entry: When Marta is sent out into space at the end, the doors open and the guards push her coffin outside. In reality everyone would be sucked out of the room, because space is a vacuum. (00:46:20)

Daz

Correction: The visitors are highly advanced. There couldn't be a one way force field covering the opening?

Grumpy Scot

21st May 2006

V (1984)

V: The Final Battle: Part 3 (2 Hrs) - S1-E5

Corrected entry: When Steven is making his escape at Visitor HQ, he runs through a room full of dead Visitors, most of them slumped in their chairs. This indicates that they have been killed by the red dust. But if that's true, then the room would still be contaminated, and would kill Steven and his colleague before they got any further. (01:21:35)

Correction: The red dust is a medium to spread the bacterium that kills the Visitors. Since its a powder and not an aerosol, it would settle on surfaces after a few minutes. The bacteria in it would also take considerable time to spread into the ecosystem. It is possible that if he didn't breathe any actual dust that he and his buddy could make it out.

Grumpy Scot

17th Jun 2004

V (1984)

V: The Final Battle: Part 1 (2 Hrs) - S1-E3

Corrected entry: There have been some occasions - particularly the L.A. Medical Center - where the Resistance fighters could have picked up Visitor weapons. So why is Donovan the only one (until near the end) to use a Visitor blaster regularly?

Correction: There must be a good reason considering how easy it would be to pick up at least one or two of them in each battle. Perhaps Donovan knows they are very difficult to recharge with Earth power sources (He uses a pistol instead of his laser in a few scenes after he has it). Perhaps they are coded like the lasers in Lost in Space? (This would also make sense since he didn't capture his, he got it from Barbara who would have it "unlocked" while on duty.)

Grumpy Scot

22nd Jul 2006

V (1984)

V: The Final Battle: Part 1 (2 Hrs) - S1-E3

Corrected entry: The Visitors (both the golden-helmeted Guardsmen and the Troopers) wear bullet-resistant flexible armor which proves effective even against .223 Remington rifle rounds at close range. But in the hospital scene, the Guardsmen are blasted with machine pistols and shotgun buckshot, and do not stand up again. Pistol rounds and buckshot pellets have lesser velocity and killing power than rifle rounds, so how can they affect the Guards' armor? Ham Tyler and his armor-piercing ammo appear in the story AFTER the hospital raid.

Correction: Considering the spread of a shotgun, its entirely plausible that the troopers took a shotgun pellet in the spot between helmet and collar where they are not armored. It could also be that sheer blunt trauma from the MAC-10 .45 rounds stunned them or rendered them unconscious.

Grumpy Scot

Skin of Evil - S1-E23

Corrected entry: When starting the warp-core the matter / antimatter is injected in the ratio 25:1. Four episodes earlier (S01-18, Coming of Age) Wesley solves the trick question at the Starfleet entrance exam with the only solution : The ratio has to be 1:1. (00:05:05)

Correction: Is this the proper ratio for a Galaxy class or a generic warp core? 1701-D is Starfleet's newest, most advanced vessel. It's possible that her core uses a different procedure for start up. Also, academies historically use older equipment for training purposes, since the state of the art is "on the front lines", making it even more likely that procedures on Enterprise are different from those in other vessels.

Grumpy Scot

29th Nov 2007

American Beauty (1999)

Corrected entry: The scene with Carolyn cleaning the dirty house herself is totally impossible given everything we're told about her character. We are over and over shown how Carolyn is obsessive about details (matching her gardening clogs to the tip of her pruning shears, for example) and her agency is Burnham and Associates - meaning she either owns the business or is a partner in it. You don't get to be that level without hiring a paid cleaner to come in and do a thorough job on the house before trying to sell it; this a basic first step, and omitting it is like having a brand-new patient come in and get surgery without even filling out a health history survey or consent form. (And again, nor is it in Carolyn's character.) This, it's a character decision that benefits the plot - in this case, trying to show poor Carolyn humiliating herself to sell the house - despite making no sense.

Correction: She, or her agency, is apparently not doing well (as evidenced by her early dislike of Buddy Kane). It would be perfectly in character for her to blame this on underlings like a cleaning service and decide to go "do it right" even if it means doing it herself.

Grumpy Scot

26th Aug 2003

Tremors (1990)

Corrected entry: When Val and Earl are pumping out a septic tank, the hose springs a leak and sewage jets out all over them. In real life, these hoses suck (negative pressure, like a vacuum cleaner), so if the hose had a hole, it would just suck air through the hole, not shoot out liquid.

Correction: It appears the tank used is homemade, and that the hoses are stored on it when it travels. It's entirely possible that Val or Earl reversed the in and out pipes. It's implied earlier a few times that they aren't great handymen.

Grumpy Scot

8th Jul 2007

Dogma (1999)

Corrected entry: Bethany gets pretty tipsy when she's chatting to Bartleby on the train; she slurs words and has the giggles. But she sobers up instantly when Rufus walks in and starts arguing with Bartleby.

Correction: She's relaxed and a bit tipsy. As soon as she realizes she's talking to a pissed-off ANGEL bent on genocide, the adrenaline rush and fear overrides the alcohol she's consumed.

Grumpy Scot

6th Jul 2007

Predator (1987)

Corrected entry: When Dutch and his team find the crashed helicopter they use a grappling hook to climb up, on the interior shots you can see the grappling hook attached to the bottom of the helicopters doorway (it almost skewers Poncho in the stomach as he climbs in) but in the exterior shots you can see that the rope is attached to the helicopter well above the doorway.

Correction: Pancho was the first one in. He just tied the rope off to make it more secure for the others to climb in and look.

Grumpy Scot

23rd Aug 2005

Tron (1982)

Corrected entry: The ship begins to "de-res" at 1/3 of the ship in 4 seconds. Then the scene cuts to Yori and Flynn. After their 35 second conversation, the ship has not "de-res-ed" any more than it was before the conversation. (01:21:20)

luchador

Correction: As a user, Flynn is keeping the ship from completely de-rezzing.

Grumpy Scot

Correction: Reading the show's credits is not trivia.

Grumpy Scot

19th Nov 2006

Casino Royale (2006)

Corrected entry: After James Bond has just won the poker game at Casino Royale, he tips the croupier with a £500,000 chip. In this game, the chips only have nominal value and cannot be cashed in as all the money is being held by the casino to be paid out on the entering of the winner's password. The chip is therefore worthless.

Correction: It's not at all unreasonable to think that the casino deducts handling fees and tips from the prize money. Pretty negligible amounts from 130 million dollars. It's also reasonable to think that the tip will be billed to Bond's account at the hotel, footed by MI6.

Grumpy Scot

Correction: I've played in and watched many tournaments where the winner will toss the dealer a chip as a promise of a tip from the winnings. While the act itself is symbolic, it's a gesture to the dealer that a tip is coming.

Show generally

Corrected entry: Throughout the show the humans refer to the Cylons as a "race". They should be referring to them as a species. Among the humans there are different races present and it would be more correct to refer the Cylons as different species in that they are as different from humans generally as humans are from rats, for example.

Correction: This is really expecting far too much from characters who have no scientific training. I know if I, an average Joe, met other intelligent lifeforms, I'd use both "race" and "species" to describe them.

Grumpy Scot

18th Jan 2007

Conspiracy Theory (1997)

Corrected entry: Near the end of the movie, when Jerry is holding Jonas underwater with a mop, Jonas pulls out a six-shooter (revolver) from an ankle holster and shoots Jerry in an attempt to save himself. There are two inherent mistakes here: One, revolvers don't fire under water; two, even if it had been a double-action so he wouldn't have to cock it, the hammer never moves.

Correction: 1. Any firearm may fire underwater. It depends on the brand of ammo and how long it has been submerged. 2. The hammer was shown from the rear, not from the side, making its movement far less obvious. It was shown while firing for less than a second, underwater, making any hammer movement very difficult to see.

Grumpy Scot

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