Answered 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: How did Elsa and her subjects find out about the duke's intention to kill her, giving Elsa the reason to banish him?

Answer: The duke was the strongest opponent of Elsa from the start, calling her a monster and noting how dangerous she was the second he saw her ice powers. Later, his guards (who Elsa had already seen at the ball and were dressed in his colors) showed up at her ice castle and actively attacked her, trying to kill her even as their own lives were in danger. She could naturally assume they were following his orders and that he wanted her dead.

Season 1 generally

Question: Is it ever explained why the assassin who attempts to kill Bran (he finds Catelyn Stark and tries to kill her as well, only to be killed by Bran's direwolf) uses Tyrion's blade in his attack, as identified by Littlefinger? Tyrion claims he's innocent, despite the damning evidence. And really, it makes little sense that anyone other than Jamie and Cersei Lannister would be the culprits. So why and how does the assassin end up using Tyrion's blade?

Answer: SPOILER: It is revealed in the season seven finale, The Dragon and the Wolf, that the blade did not belong to Tyrion, but in fact belonged to Littlefinger and that he hired the assassin to kill Bran, and gave the assassin the blade so that he could claim that the blade belonged to Tyrion and create a conflict between the Starks and the Lannisters.

Casual Person

Answer: This has been revealed in the books but it doesn't appear that the show will ever address it. In the books Jaime Lannister deduces that it was actually Joffrey who hired and supplied the would-be assassin with the dagger in an attempt to impress his "father" King Robert after Robert states that it would have been more merciful for Bran to die rather than live as a cripple.

Phaneron

Answer: SPOILER ALERT: In the season seven finale, The Dragon and the Wolf, it is revealed that Littlefinger was the one who hired the assassin and handed him the Valyrian steel dagger to kill Bran. He did this to create a conflict between the Starks and the Lannisters, by claiming that the dagger belonged to Tyrion, so that the Starks would believe that Tyrion attempted to have Bran killed, in addition to having Lysa Arryn accuse the Lannisters of poisoning Jon Arryn, when in actuality it was he and Lysa who poisoned him. The dagger belonged to Littlefinger and it was him who hired the assassin to kill Bran.

Show generally

Question: I know the Big Bang Theory has hired scientists and physicists to write the technical science parts of the scripts and the white board equations. Since Mayim Bialik has a doctorate in neuroscience, does she collaborate with the writers to write those parts of the script?

Answer: She has helped them out when she can, but this is not part of her formal contract with the show.

kristenlouise3

Question: When Vito Corleone visits Sicily with his family, he is received by an old woman and a man. These people are the ones who helped Vito to escape when he was a child. However, when they are having lunch together, Vito refers to her as "grandmother". Are the old woman and the man members of the family? What are their names?

Luiz Iervolino

Chosen answer: They were not his actual grandparents, just people that knew his family and who helped Vito after his mother, father, and brother were killed. Vito refers to her as "grandmother" because they treated him like family. Their names are unknown.

raywest

Question: How on earth did agent O'Reilly manage to survive the gas explosion? He is in the crowd at the end of the movie.

Answer: When it is revealed two years later that he is alive, there is no explanation given as to how he survived the blast. Any answer would be speculation.

raywest

Question: In the scene when Celie is first brought home with Mister there are three kids waiting outside. Harpo and two sisters. No one ever says their names and after the hair combing you never see them again. What happened to them?

Answer: It is never explained what happened to them in the movie, but in the book they marry and move away from home. Neither character is ever mentioned by their name in the book or the film.

raywest

Question: Do the sewers of New York really fill up with toxic waste every night as stated in the movie, or was this just for the purpose of the plot?

lartaker1975

Chosen answer: No they do not. This is only for the purpose of the film's plot.

raywest

Question: How come Trudi sometimes needs an oxygen mask but mostly doesn't - I can understand her not needing one (apparently, there is a glass partition between her and the rest of the helicopter; so whoever is with her has to wear masks, as they are behind the glass partition. But at one stage, Trudi and Norm are up front and Jake and Grace are behind them, and none of them are wearing masks - is the glass partition movable? And during the battle scene, you can see a bullet hole in Trudi's helicopter glass - shouldn't she need a mask now, as the outside air is getting in? Finally, how come Trudi needs a mask just after the home tree is destroyed and she and Norm and Jake and Grace (who was shot and is dying) escape and head for the Tree of Souls? What makes this time so special?

kh1616

Chosen answer: The cabin on the Aerospatiale SA-2 Samson is pressurised, and there are two sealed doors with windows separating it from the open cargo area. There are actually four seats in the cabin which is why Jake and Grace don't need masks. The cabin pressure is slightly higher than the atmosphere (+0.3 psi) which means that if there is a small rupture in the hull or canopy (such as a bullet hole) the oxygen will leak out rather than toxic gas leaking in.

Sierra1

Answer: Modern tempered glass was developed and patented in the early 1900s and was in general use by the 1940s. It would have been routinely used by businesses at the time Irving was breaking out store windows when he was a boy.

raywest

Question: When the man who was looking for the cat, before he was killed, there is water dripping from somewhere, where is it coming from?

Answer: The water is condensation coming from the cooling towers of the ship. The ship is seemingly powered by a nuclear reactor, and the towers above Brett are the ship's equivalent of the large hyperboloid towers seen in traditional power plants. Following this scene Ripley remarks about Brett's abduction "...then it disappeared into one of the cooling towers." This is furthered by the end sequence - Ripley shuts off the cooling system ("Mother; I turned the cooling unit back on!") - which coincides with her action of raising the 4 towers, which would presumably cut off access to the cooling water which serves to keep the core from melting down. This is also supported by her not being able to stop it after a certain point - when the imminent temperature for meltdown is reached coolant can not be returned, because it will flash boil from convective heat before reaching the core, which prevents the required conductive cooling.

Question: Does anybody know what Calypso's yelling when she's finally being freed?

Answer: She says "Malfaiteur en tombeau, crochir l'esplanade, dans l'fond d'l'eau!" which is an incantation in French that translates roughly to "Across all the seas, find the path to he who wrongfully entombed me!"

Question: In the final scene, Wilee is doing a narration whilst he rides his bike. In the background a song is playing. What is this song? The song also continues to play as the end credits go along. (01:20:30 - 01:21:00)

Chosen answer: The song is "Baba O'Riley" by The Who.

Question: During the chase scene at the impound lot, Wilee is chased by a cop onto a high platform and another cop climbs on top of the platform. To avoid the other cop, Wilee jumps off the platform with his bike. In a sudden close-up of Wilee, a slash sound is heard. What is this slash sound I am hearing? (01:11:40)

Chosen answer: I think that sound is the front wheel giving way. If you look closely, you can see that his front wheel is wobbling a little as he escapes. This may be why he ditches his bike and steals the cop's bike soon after.

Question: If Ripley was operated on and an alien removed a few days ago, how come they have a fully grown queen who is laying eggs, 8 to be precise as there are 8 people who have been ingested and turned into aliens? But later, when most of the crew have ejected successfully or been killed when a hand grenade was thrown into their escape pod along with an alien, one of the scientists says there are 12 more? How can that be?

kh1616

Chosen answer: Well firstly the queen was probably genetically engineered, like Ripley herself. A few days might be all the time they need to have a fully grown queen created. Secondly the 8 incubated victims were only the latest batch, they had been incubating people with xenomorphs for quite a time I suspect.

lionhead

With regards to the quick growth of the alien queen, it is standard for the xenomorph in nearly every film they appear (Aliens is the only exception, the only chestburster shown in the film is quickly killed by Apone) to grow to full size in around one day. Presumably the same is true for the queen.

BaconIsMyBFF

Question: Why did all of the slaves have such beautiful teeth? The elderly woman slave who sang had a perfect set of white teeth. I can't imagine that slave owners took their "property" to the dentist on a regular basis. And how good was the dental work in the mid 1800's anyway?

Answer: Few slaves would have had healthy, straight white teeth or had access to professional dental care, which was not very advanced at that time and it was painful. This is a detail the filmmakers either deliberately chose to ignore or were careless in how they depicted the characters' conditions.

raywest

Question: Can you still get this film in 3D? I heard that it's only in 2D now, but does anyone actually know if there's a DVD that has it in 3D?

Hamster

Chosen answer: It's was finally released in 3D on DVD in 2009.

Answer: Friday the 13th Part III in 3D is also available on Blu-ray as part of a set of all the films from 1980 to the reboot. I know because I own it. There are two pairs of 3D glasses included in the tin.

Alan Keddie

Question: Hermione had to go to the hospital wing after partially transforming into a cat. How did she explain her condition to the hospital staff and/or teachers (if she had to miss classes), without revealing that she made the Polyjuice potion?

Answer: As there are lots of ways for young witches and wizards to get into various predicaments like this, Madam Pomfrey doesn't ask too many questions, she simply treats the students for whatever ailments they present with (this information comes from the books).

kristenlouise3

Question: If Voldemort is attached to Quirrell in this movie, then he heard Snape arguing with Quirrell and threatening him. Wouldn't he then become aware that Snape is actually loyal to Dumbledore? And wouldn't he be angry that Snape tried to protect Harry during the Quidditch game?

Answer: Voldemort believes that Snape is playing a role, not that he is actually loyal to Dumbledore.

Phixius

Question: I swear that I remember Bond, on his way to Baltimore made love to the co-pilot, and when M says "he's well on top", that was because he was on top of the co-pilot making out...am I hallucinating?

Answer: Pussy Galore was the pilot and he doesn't make out with her at that point. You may be thinking of Moonraker, where M asks Moneypenny if Bond is back from Africa, she replies "He's on the last leg of his journey," and it cuts to Bond romancing a woman in a plane.

Captain Defenestrator

Answer: Various reasons, but mainly to drive the Dukes out of Hazzard County because the family have been foiling his schemes since his and Uncle Jesse's bootlegging days.

Captain Defenestrator

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