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: In the graveyard scene, I'm absolutely sure that Wormtail cast the Avada Kedavra spell on Cedric, but why is everybody saying that Voldemort killed Cedric then?

Loesjuh1985

Chosen answer: You're right. Wormtail did kill Cedric on Voldemort's orders. At that point, Voldemort did not yet have his body back and was unable to kill Cedric himself. Some of the confusion may come from the fact the Wormtail used Voldemort's wand to kill Cedric, which is why his ghost comes out of the wand during the fight with Harry.

Guy

Why was Voldemort unable to kill Cedric? He could kill the muggle caretaker at the beginning of the movie himself, wasn't he? He didn't have his body then.

Question: How on Earth did the Joker know that Reese wasn't dead when he blew up the hospital? It seemed like he just guessed and blew it up anyway.

Brad

Chosen answer: Why not? That'd be Joker's style to blow up the hospital anyway, so it's very likely he didn't care whether Reese was dead or not.

Phixius

Chosen answer: There's a behind the scenes feature on a Friends DVD that shows an example: In "The One After Vegas"(Season 6 premiere), Chandler's line was originally "I don't think they're as much dating as they are drunk." Matthew Perry thought the line wasn't funny and came up with the alternative seen in the episode: "I don't think they're as much dating as they are two bottles of vodka walking around in human form."

Brad

Question: SPOILER: What exactly was Bane's and Talia's plan? Had Batman not thwarted the attempt at blowing up the bomb, were the bad guys simply content with being killed in the blast also as long as Gotham was destroyed as well?

Answer: Yes. Their entire purpose was to finish what Rha's had started; no matter what the cost.

Chosen answer: The drug is supposed to prevent a person from turning into a werewolf during a full moon. However, one batch is bad, and it causes immediate transformation.

raywest

Question: I don't remember if this is explained in the book, but when it is discovered that Umbridge has the locket, assuming she wore it while she had it, wouldn't she be possessed by its powers like Ron was when he wore it? And did she know it was a piece of Voldemort's soul?

Answer: This was never answered in the book, but in The Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter, it is speculated that Umbridge may have been unaffected because her own evil nature was more aligned to the dark locket. Also, the locket being somewhat sentient may have sensed that she posed no threat to it, whereas Harry, Ron, and Hermione's sole intent was to destroy it.

raywest

Question: How exactly did Merida get her mother to transform back into a human? Did she do it with her tears or was it by mending the tapestry and putting it on her mother along with the sun to help break the spell? (01:33:00)

Answer: It wasn't her tears, exactly, but rather her genuinely heartfelt confession of love for her mother, admittance of guilt, and regret for her own behavior that broke the spell. But not until the dawn's light touched her.

Phixius

Answer: It was sewing the tapestry, for sure.

Sewing the tapestry was just a symbol of mending the bond (as the witch said "Fate be changed look inside, mend the bond torn by pride"). However, we see she sewed the tapestry and that didn't actually turn her mother back to human. It's not until Merida hugs her mother, apologizes, and says she loves her that the bond is mended. After that the tapestry magically seals and her mother turns back to human. Phixius is right.

Question: After Hamish, Harris, and Hubert help distract Fergus and the lords as Merida helps Elinor, who has turned into a bear, escape, Merida offers her brothers to help themselves to anything in the kitchen. Why doesn't she warn them not to eat the cursed tart? (01:33:00)

Answer: She was rather preoccupied with getting her mother to safety. It didn't occur to her.

Phixius

Question: As the triplets misguide Fergus and the lords through the castle with a dead frog on a stick they use as a bear's shadow, Fergus and the lords end up on top of a tower. Since they are locked out, they manage to climb down on their kilts, which they remove from themselves and tie together. Why couldn't they just break through the door to get back into the castle instead? (01:33:00)

Answer: They didn't want to destroy the door, probably.

Phixius

Question: Thor asks Loki who showed him the true power of the Tesseract. Then, he gets interrupted by Iron Man. But when Captain America asks Thor about Loki's plan, he knows exactly who is coming and why. Did we miss something? Did Thor already know? Or is he just guessing with a hundred percent accuracy?

Friso94

Chosen answer: Odin knew about the army. It is why he used the dark powers to send Thor to earth (a very difficult task according to mythology). Thor was probably referring to Thanos, although we don't find out about his role until the end of the movie.

Gibbsdoc

Question: The cave paintings found in the Isle of Skye are reckoned to be 35,000 years old. Is this possible? Would not Skye have been under several metres of ice 35,000 years ago?

Answer: While the dating given in the movie does put it during the last major glacial period, which lasted from about 100,000BC to around 10,000BC, that period saw a number of advances and retreats by the ice, with the maximum ice coverage only occurring around eighteen thousand years ago, a considerable number of millennia after the dating given for the paintings. As such, it's certainly plausible that Skye was inhabitable during the time frame stated by the movie.

Tailkinker

Question: Barbossa tells Sao Feng about Calypso to win him over to their side. Feng, mistakenly believing that Elizabeth is Calypso, wants Calypso for himself. Barbossa knows that Elizabeth isn't Calypso, so why does he allow her to be handed over to Feng? And what assurance does he have that Elizabeth won't spill the beans that she's not Calypso? Surely, that would just get Feng mad at Barbossa and wouldn't help matters in the slightest.

Brad

Chosen answer: They need Feng on their side. Elizabeth and Barbossa are both willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. If Feng is willing to help because he's smitten with Elizabeth, believing her to be Calypso, then that's how they'll play it.

Phixius

Question: What did General Ross mean when he told Betty that she couldn't see things?

Answer: Maybe that she is blind from her love for Bruce and she couldn't see that Hulk is a monster that can devastate a whole city in minutes.

Anastasios Anastasatos

The way I've always seen it, General Ross is the one who can't see things, considering he wants to use the Hulk as a weapon.

Answer: No. Each is a progression of several weeks or years.

Captain Defenestrator

Show generally

Question: In the majority of the episodes, whenever one of Howard's friends, or he himself, knocks on his front door his mother yells out, "Is that a sex criminal" or something along those lines. Is that referencing anything in particular?

Russel

Chosen answer: I can only recall one episode where this happens more than once. Perhaps there are others episodes where this line is spoken but this does not occur enough times to be a specific reference or a regular on-going theme.

XIII

Question: How in the world did McClane manage to track Simon Gruber through an aspirin bottle? I know the North of the Border name was on it, but how would anyone know that was Gruber's CORRECT future meeting place?

Eyexpress333

Chosen answer: Simon and his crew had to get in/out the country somehow. He knew about the FBI was watching out for him. Flying was out of the question. The bottle from the pharmacy there gave him a clue on how they came in. THEN he needed to move a load of 13 (McClane drowned one) great big dump-trucks. He knows there is a large port there. John put 2 and 2 together. If they came in that way, probably was a good bet that they'd leave that way.

XIII

Answer: The pole was removed after the first six episodes, when the series was renewed.

MovieFan612

Didn't this pole make a return in the episode when Monica hurt Ben, and Ross ran into it while mocking her for the incident?

Question: Could someone please tell me where I can find a good quality picture of the back of Jean Grey's coat? I want to copy the Phoenix symbol that you see on the back of her coat (it's when Jean and Storm enter the church looking for Nightcrawler). I can't get anything resembling a decent picture on my TV (I even went frame by frame), and various Google image searches haven't even yielded a crappy picture. For something that should be simple, it's sure driving me up a wall. If anyone can help me out I will be extremely grateful.

Answer: I don't know if this is exactly because I can't see it very good in the movie, but give a try: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_AnPqTL-MV8I/SWgBkLw-GWI/AAAAAAAABIU/7Bfy-T3svkw/s400/Phoenix.bmp. Or try this: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3nijF7x6U6U/Tlf3DATcm4I/AAAAAAAAJKE/fuaw3BXPHRY/s1600/Phoenix+Tattoo+Pattern56.jpg.

Anastasios Anastasatos

Answer: Simple, he's always depressed this time of year. He's ugly, he's alone and getting older. Christmas is the worst time of year to be all of all the above. That's why he tries to off himself every Christmas, and lucky for us he fails.

Rydersriot87

Question: Is there any particular reason that Leaven refers to the Z coordinate as "zed?" I know that it would be used to differentiate between similar sounding letters, but since spacial coordinates only use X, Y, and Z, (to my knowledge) it doesn't really seem necessary. I'm guessing it's a mathematics thing that I just don't know, but if anybody can answer, it would be greatly appreciated.

Knever

Chosen answer: Cube is a Canadian film. In Canada, the last letter of the alphabet is pronounced "zed" rather than "zee".

Phixius

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