Answered questions about specific movies, TV shows and more

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Chosen answer: One Borg ship is usually enough. You notice, they were only able to destroy it because their assimilation of Picard ended up giving his crew a unique 'backdoor' into their system. No one had ever tried to retrieve an assimilated crewman before, because it is usually such a futile effort. So if the Borg feel that one ship is enough, they will send one ship. They are big on efficiency. Sending more ships diverts ships away from other potential targets and missions.

Garlonuss

Question: Why do the kidnappers take Thornhill to the Townsend home and pretend to be Lester Townsend and members of his household? They could have taken him to some obscure place instead, at less risk of being found out.

Answer: More than likely, they felt that Roger would be dead and they would not be found out. The fact that he survives their DUI plot and returns to the house with the police only serves to makes him look more suspicious and guilty. It's to move the plot along, nothing more.

ChiChi

The bigger plot hole is, if Van Dam really believes Roger is Kaplan, why would he think that Roger would bring the police and go through the trouble of preparing "Mrs. Kaplan" to make the police think he's crazy? If Roger really was a spy, he doesn't need help from the police and would have just disappeared instead of retracing his steps. So if Van Dam anticipated the actions taken by Roger, he must believe at some level that Roger is telling the truth and would have looked deeper into it.

Question: The Jets and Sharks are supposedly in their 'teens, from broken homes, no jobs, and living in poverty. Where then, did they get the money to buy the fancy clothes they wear to the dance at the gym?

Answer: You're making unnecessary assumptions. They are teens so they live with their parents. Tony works at the drugstore. Maria and Anita work at the bridal shop. The others may have jobs that are not shown. Their parents may provide for them. Even if their parents are poor, the mothers and the girls could make the clothes. They could buy the clothes used, etc. Plus of course they're gang members who presumably are capable of stealing money.

Myridon

Question: Why exactly does Obi-wan go have a drink at the bar in the club, while Anakin is looking for the person that tried to kill Padmé? It seems strange that he would do that in a serious situation.

Answer: He's giving the impression that he's letting his guard down, relaxing while Anakin does all the work. He's hoping, correctly, as it turns out, that their quarry will take advantage of his apparent lack of caution to try to take him out, giving herself away.

Tailkinker

Question: The ending of this film seems rather vague on the actual outcome of destroying Skynet's HQ. Does that mean the humans have won the war or is Skynet still a threat? The ending of Terminator 3 would suggest the latter since there it was confirmed that Skynet is capable of moving from transferring itself from one installation to another when needed, yet here everyone seems to believe they accomplished a significant victory. So which is it?

Answer: It's suggested that they've succeeding in destroying a major node in the Skynet network, possibly the key node in that region of North America, but, no, Skynet is still a functioning entity.

Tailkinker

School Reunion - S2-E6

Question: The Doctor says he's regenerated half a dozen times since last seeing Sarah Jane. This would mean he last saw her in his fourth regeneration. But surely this is wrong? They last saw each other when The Doctor was in his fifth regeneration, during "The Five Doctors."

Socks1000

Chosen answer: The phrase "half a dozen" is often used as a round number, i.e. "half a dozen" is a little more than "a few." He didn't want to pause and figure it out as it's been a long time in his time line so he just estimated. That said, with the 50th anniversary reveal of the War Doctor, making the 10th Doctor actually the 11th, it's now exactly 6 regenerations since the 5 Doctors, making his statement accurate.

Myridon

Question: In the alternate opening of this movie, there have been many rumors of Captain America's cameo frozen in the ice as the Hulk smashes it and a big wave of ice shatters. If you look at it very carefully it does seem that it is him. So does anyone know if there has been any confirmation that it is him?

mark91575

Answer: Yes. In the alternate opening, after Bruce turns into the Hulk and causes the ice to collapse, a huge chunk of ice is broken free from the ground. In this ice is a figure dressed in blue holding a round shield with circular red and white stripes. The best way to see this is waiting until the huge ice wall breaks and then slowly advance frame-by-frame and eventually Captain America and his shield will be seen.

Chosen answer: No, none whatsoever. It's something thrown in by the effects department and that fact that it only exists in a deleted scene makes it a mere curiosity and not any sort of canonical representation of the movie version of the character. With a dedicated Captain America film in production, intended to be released in 2011, they would not have thrown in anything definitive regarding the character into an earlier film, to avoid placing constraints on those making the character's own film. While, yes, Steve Rogers will almost certainly end up frozen in ice at some point, that will be dealt with by his film without worrying about an Easter Egg thrown into a previous movie.

Tailkinker

Question: Why wasn't Optimus Prime, or any other Autobot for that matter, surprised to see Megatron? Especially since none of them knew about his resurrection.

Answer: An aircraft carrier was sunk. A submarine was destroyed. Surely information was passed on regarding the reasons behind it. Megatron had enough time to travel to the Fallen ship. Plenty of time for information to be passed on.

XIII

Chosen answer: Her agent/manager negotiated a special billing as part of her contract. It distinguishes her from the rest of the cast, probably when she became a producer on the show.

JC Fernandez

Answer: She became a producer.

Incorrect. Her billing changed in season 4 but she didn't become a producer until season 5.

Bishop73

Chosen answer: The ghosts are real.

raywest

Answer: Both Kubrick and King stated there were ghosts in interviews so as they are essentially the creators I would say there are.

In all fairness, Kubrick, unlike King, leaves the existence of ghosts somewhat questionable. The whole thing can just as well be just Jack succumbing to cabin fever: he loathes his family, and the long isolation just pushes him over the brink. Wendy witnesses the ghosts, too, yes, but she could also be suffering from cabin fever, not to mention the stress of her husband finally going insane, and trying to murder her and her child. In short, the whole existence of ghosts is a lot more ambiguous in the movie.

Jukka Nurmi

Chosen answer: You are no doubt referring to the old "urban legend" that a Munchkin actor who, despondent over a failed love affair with a Munchkin actress, committed suicide on the movie set, and his lifeless body can be seen hanging in the background trees. This never happened, of course, but there have been countless rumors as to just what people think they are seeing. The most plausible explanation is that this is probably one of the many live birds that were used to add realism to the set, and it may have been one of the larger birds, such as an emu or a crane, that was standing in the background. It has also been pointed out (see Snopes.com) that this particular scene was filmed "before" any of the Munchkin actors were working on the sound stage, and it would be impossible for there to have been a dead body on a movie set without the many crew noticing it. Also, the idea that the filmmakers would use a scene in which a dead body appeared in their finished film or that a suspended body could go undetected while filming is underway is beyond belief.

raywest

Logopolis - S18-E7

Question: If The Master had closed the CVE it would have resulted in the total destruction of the universe. Would he have really closed the CVE if the peoples of the universe hadn't responded to him? Isn't that the complete opposite of what The Master wants, i.e. complete control of the universe? Also, if the universe had been destroyed, who and what would he have left to control?

Socks1000

Chosen answer: The Master is insane. If he can't control the universe, he'd rather see it destroyed.

Captain Defenestrator

Question: How could The Masters' trial and execution take place on Skaro when it was destroyed in "Remembrance of the Daleks"?

Socks1000

Chosen answer: They don't specify at what point in Skaro's history it took place. Only the passage of time on Gallifrey is absolute.

Captain Defenestrator

Chosen answer: The Master knows that deep down, he deserves death for the crimes that he's committed throughout his life, and since he regards The Doctor as his arch-foe, he expects it to be at his hands. The fact that The Doctor is still willing to forgive him for all of his crimes hurts him more deeply than death would.

Captain Defenestrator

Show generally

Question: If Davros created The Daleks from his own cells then why don't they fully trust him? He's been shown to manipulate The Daleks on the genetic level, so couldn't he use that to some way make them more obedient?

Socks1000

Chosen answer: When Davros created the Daleks, he conditioned them to hate everything that was not a Dalek. They decided that although he was their creator, he was not one of them.

Captain Defenestrator

Question: During the first film, there is a huge battle in the middle of downtown L.A. (Mission City), witnessed by thousands of people and causing millions of dollars in damage. In this movie, this is just an Internet rumor? How did they cover this up? Did the government pay off thousands of people and repair all the damage that quickly? And, most importantly, in the first movie didn't Jon Voight go on TV and tell the whole world they were dealing with a superior technological civilization?

wizard_of_gore

Chosen answer: Per IMDB Trivia: The novelization states that the government created a fake corporation called "Massive Dynamics" as a cover for the events of Transformers (2007). The cover story stated that Massive Dynamics had developed robotic search-and-rescue robots which malfunctioned during tests and caused the damage seen in that movie's finale.

shortdanzr

Chosen answer: A Drill Instructor is always mad at the recruits in order to forge discipline. Private Pyle was the biggest screwup in the unit, thus creating more work for him.

Captain Defenestrator

Answer: It also promotes unity and brotherhood against a common enemy, the drill instructor.

Chosen answer: It was never stated directly in the series, although Lister does mention at one point that it was Kryten's fault. The first book based on the series states that the ship crashed after Kryten carefully washed the navigation console using soapy water, but it's unclear whether this is intended as a canonical explanation.

Tailkinker

Chosen answer: They reconstructed Red Dwarf as it was supposed to be, hence going back to the original plans, rather than the cut-down versions that were actually used to build it. A ship without a crew isn't much use, so they brought the crew back as well, possibly using the physical and personality information stored by the ship's holographic recreation unit as a template. How they might have restored the prisoners is another matter, probably best explained by the venerable science-fiction standby of "don't ask, they just did".

Tailkinker

Chosen answer: In-universe, after leaving Red Dwarf after his first appearance, Kryten managed to crash Lister's space-bike into an asteroid. Lister found his remains and decided to rebuild him, however, due to the high level of damage and Lister's questionable repair skills, he was unable to recreate Kryten exactly, leading to changes in appearance, personality and accent. In reality, the original actor wasn't available, coupled with presumably practical concerns about one-off makeup as opposed to makeup for a regular cast member, so some visual changes were made.

Tailkinker

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