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: What did John said to the spider Smith after he said, "Remember the Proteus," and what did he mean by that?

Answer: He meant (as he says shortly after) that the spiders on the Proteus (that infected Smith) eat their dead/wounded, so when spider Smith's egg-sack is ruptured, the babies eat him.

Xofer

Question: Did anyone catch what Mac is talking about thrust? Or is she just mumbling?

Answer: The first bit is "Thrust! I went over my calculations, hen, and I figure that the key element we're missing is thrust". Rocky says that he didn't catch a word of it, and Mac replies "Thrust! Other birds like ducks and geese, when they take off, what do they have? Thrust!"

Tailkinker

Answer: Mac said, "Thrust! The key element is thrust! Other birds, like ducks and geese, when they take off, what do they have? Thrust!"

Question: When they are getting on to Platform 9 3/4, why don't the Muggles notice them running through a brick wall? And if a Muggle did notice them, could he/she get on to Platform 9 3/4?

Answer: Most likely this is part of the magic of Platform 9 3/4 - provided that they're careful and don't do it blatantly in front of Muggles, the Muggles won't pick up on it. Muggles certainly can get onto the platform - after all, quite a number of students have at least one Muggle parent, who would want to see them off. Whether this would be possible for Muggles in other circumstances is unclear.

Tailkinker

Question: When talking to Ramius via Morse code, why does Jack tell Ramius to turn south to the Laurentian Abyssal?

Answer: The trench is too deep to recover anything from the bottom of the trench. They were going to fake destroying the Red October, so they need some way to explain the lack of evidence of its destruction (because the remains were on the bottom of this deep trench).

Bruce Minnick

Question: Violet's force field is a dome when she stops Dash. If Dash is running around in a circle, how can the force field stop him? The only thing I can think of is that as the force field expands, it slams into Dash.

Answer: Violet placed the force field specifically in Dash's way. She was not about to place it in the middle of the circle that Dash was running in.

Garlonuss

Question: At the end of the movie, as Rick, Evie, and Johnathon are leaving Humanatra, we see that Rick's bag is filled with gold from the city. How, where and when did Rick find the time to get some of the gold if him and his friends were fighting for their lives?

Answer: Beni (the bad guy serving the mummy who eventually gets killed by the bugs) can be seen carrying the gold out of the city. He then returns to get more, but can't get out any more. Rick and Evie just take the camel that Beni planned to use for the transport of his gold; they don't bring any gold out of the city themselves.

nightline

Question: What was the original plan of the Trade Federation and Darth Sidious? I saw TPM six times in the theaters and a few times at home and I still don't know why they were blockading Naboo. What was with the treaty that they wanted Amidala to sign? If their plan had worked and she signed this treaty that gave them control over the planet what good would that do?

Charles Fraser

Chosen answer: You have to bear in mind that the Trade Federation and Darth Sidious probably have very different views of what the plan actually is. From the point of view of the Trade Federation, they're probably under the impression that the aim is to get the treaty signed, with the likely effect of bringing Naboo into the Trade Federation. This would allow them to exploit the natural resources of the place, and benefit from any trade carried out from that planet. Sidious, on the other hand, doesn't care in the slightest about the Trade Federation - he has carefully manipulated the situation to get Amidala to call for the vote that will remove Chancellor Valorum from office and force the election of a new chancellor, allowing Palpatine (who either is Sidious or is some sort of clone under his control) to advance to the leadership of the Senate. That's pretty much the sum total of his plan, which, as we see, is a complete success.

Tailkinker

Question: When asked if she would allow a group from the senate to go to Naboo and investigate her claims, Amidala says "no" and asks for a vote of no confidence in Chancellor Valorum. Why? Unless I interpreted this incorrectly they were offering to go and look into the situation. Why not say, "great, let's go" and they would have seen what was happening? Also, what would have been an acceptable course of action for her? This didn't make any sense to me.

Charles Fraser

Chosen answer: She was sick and tired of no action being taken. She wanted them to do something about it now, not send people out there to investigate, that would take too much time. This is coupled with the notion that Palpatine was somewhat brainwashing her into believing that Valorum was a poor/incompetent leader, and that following Palpatine's cause/actions was the best way for help.

Timothy Conard

Question: I've seen some different Spiderman-magazines and on some of his costumes they have very large white eyes and some are significantly smaller, more like the costume in the movie. So is there anything that differs between the two costumes? Or is it just that the pictures are from different years or editions?

Answer: The artwork is always altering to some extent, generally based on the artist who's doing the drawing. Peter makes his own costumes, so it's not out of the question that he might make alterations from time to time, which can provide a 'story' reason, but the real answer is just that each artist will have his own interpretation of the character.

Tailkinker

Question: Did they change the CG Jabba the Hutt's appearance? It looked like he was a lot more green than in the original special edition. If they did, then why? I thought he looked fine in the original.

Answer: Yes, they have altered Jabba a bit - after he appeared in Episode I, they tweaked the model used in the special edition to bring it closer to what we've seen elsewhere.

Tailkinker

Question: Who is Legolas' mother? Is she still alive? They only ever mention his father - Thranduil, King of Mirkwood. Does he have siblings?

Answer: Tolkien never mentions Thranduil's wife, mother to Legolas - whether this is meant to imply that she has died, or gone into the West is an open question. He also never mentions any siblings.

Tailkinker

Question: During the anime scene, is the sword wielding killer that finally finishes off O-Ren's father supposed to be Bill? Could this be the connection between Bill and O-Ren?

Answer: Bill was behind the killing of O-Ren's parents, we think. It is never clarified.

XIII

Question: After the D-day battle and Capt. Miller is informing the Colonel about the types of mines, what was the purpose of Capt. Miller taking such a long pause during his discussion?

Answer: Their discussion was talking about a mission they recently completed and that it claimed a lot of troops lives. Throughout the film every death seems to affect Miller and was probably reflecting on the tragic situation.

Lummie

Question: After all of the snow melts, wouldn't it go into the ocean and cause the same disruption as before?

Answer: Who says it's going to melt? The point of the movie is that global warming has upset the ocean currents and triggered a new Ice Age. The snow is going to be there for a long time to come yet - say 10,000 years?

Oscar Bravo

At the end of the movie the astronaut reports that he 'has never seen the air so clear.' Perhaps suggesting that the storm has cleared the air. So maybe it does melt. Also, to create 15 feet of snow on top of 1/2 the world, the air moisture would have to come from somewhere, the oceans. And thus bringing back the pre-storm sea levels when melted.

Maybe it will be there for a long time unless we introduce gases in the northern hemisphere re trapping the heat, and melting the snow.

Question: Why aren't Arwen's brothers - Elladan and Elrohir - ever mentioned? They were, at least, talked about in the LotR books.

Answer: They're very minor characters in the books - there'd be little point in having them in the film unless there was a good reason. The filmmakers have made something of an effort to remove minor characters - the decision to use Arwen to rescue Frodo after Weathertop, rather than Glorfindel from the books, would be an example of this. In storytelling terms, Elladan and Elrohir serve no purpose, hence their non-appearance.

Tailkinker

Question: I don't get this: When Nigel Powers is first taken to the submarine, at one point he looks down, sees Mini Me and says "I thought I smelt cabbage." What's that all about?

Answer: In the first Austin Powers when he is talking about his two fears, one of them was carnies. He then said they have small hands and smell like cabbage. Most likely then Mini-Me reminded him of a carny.

Lummie

Answer: I thought cabbage patch kid.

Question: Holden tells a fan that he likes to think of Bluntman and Chronic as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern meet Vladamir and Estragon. I know who Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are, but who are Vladamir and Estragon?

Answer: They are the two main characters of the play Waiting for Godot. They spend the entire play in one place waiting for a person who never shows up and talking about random nothingness.

wolfchild

Question: Dr Frankenstein tells a student at a lecture he is giving that he is not interested in death but the preservation of life. If this is true then why would he continue in the footsteps of his grandfather?

Answer: That's how he felt at that moment. He became inspired to follow in his grandfather's footsteps after reading his books.

Maria Santos

Question: It was mentioned that the mermaid from Knick Knack is in the fish tank. Where is it and when do you see it?

Answer: The mermaid from Knick Knack can be seen on the front of the shipwreck model in the tank.

pinkwafer

Question: When Liesl and Rolf are sitting outside just before it rains, why does Rolf keep pulling away when Liesl tries to kiss him?

Answer: Believe it or not, kissing or even holding hands for that matter was a very big deal back then. Kissing indicated the onset of a serious relationship which Rolf probably wasn't prepared for.

William Bergquist

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