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: When Chucky pops out to surprise Andy in his apartment towards the end (while Andy is still holding the bat), what does Chucky say?

Answer: When he jumps out, he screams a generic "Ahhh!" and then quickly shouts "Surprise!"

TedStixon

Question: When Conan is learning how to use a sword, why did the teacher slap Conan in the face and then kick the other student in the chest?

Answer: Like an Army Drill Sargent, he was berating them for not doing it better. Toughening them to become the best they could be.

Also, the other student laughs at Conan's punishment, so the teacher kicks him to teach him some humility.

Question: There is something I don't understand about Linus in this special. He is flattered when Sally flirts with him by saying he says the cutest things, and that he's so intelligent. Linus usually rejects Sally's feelings whenever she flirts him. Why should this be any different?

Answer: From what I've seen, usually Sally is often annoying Linus with her flirting when he has nothing in common with her, or he's just trying to do something to help her and she tries to make it into more. Here, Sally's comments make Linus think she believes in the Great Pumpkin too, or is at least interested in hearing more about it. It's more that he's excited she likes the same thing as he does. Later in the pumpkin patch, he's happy she's there because he wants to share the experience with someone, not because he has any feeling towards Sally.

Bishop73

Answer: He can enjoy and bask in the flattery without reciprocating any feelings she may have.

raywest

Except he's never basked in her flattery in the past.

Bishop73

Question: The Spartans come across a village destroyed by Persians, and not long afterwards they arrive at the Hot Gates where they see the Persian army arriving by sea. Granted I wasn't paying full attention, what's going on with the geography?

Jon Sandys

Chosen answer: The village was destroyed by a Persian scouting party. The emissary talking to the Spartans at the Phocian wall told Dienekes that the hills were swarming with scouts. It would make sense that they had a large party going ahead of the partial army on the ships.

LorgSkyegon

Answer: This scene is cut from most adaptations (the 1935 and 1984 movies being two of the only ones that include it). It is most likely cut because it doesn't directly involve Scrooge, and only serves to show what happened to Belle after she broke up with Scrooge. Since it doesn't directly involved Scrooge, it was probably deemed worthy of cutting to bring down the runtime.

Answer: Probably to make the movie's overall length shorter and not every movie version is going to be the same. It is common for films adapted from books to cut scenes and characters or otherwise streamline the plot. Disney family films particularly have shorter, simpler, and age-appropriate story lines, designed for kids who tend to have briefer attention spans. A shorter run time also means the movie can be shown more times per day in theaters during the busy holiday season, increasing profits.

raywest

Question: Why is the rescue pilot helicopter such a selfish person? He complains about working over lunch, refuses to embark on a search-and-rescue mission without hiking his rates, and even extorts desperate townspeople trying to evacuate on his helicopter for all their money. Why was he such a greedy and insensitive egotist?

Answer: Because the character is written to be the stereotypical antagonist whose sole purpose is to create the obligatory plot conflict. This was such a silly, unrealistic, and all-around bad movie, that the two-dimensional villain guy fits right in. I live in Washington and remember when Mt. St. Helen's erupted. Dante's Peak, which was based on it, was nothing like the real-life event.

raywest

Question: When Clark was locked in the attic, watching old home movies, are they clips from real black and white movies and just edited together to make it like Christmas was like when Clark was young?

movielove

Answer: No, they were made for the movie. It was obviously young Clark and younger Uncle Lewis in the clips.

Brian Katcher

Question: Why did John send the elevator down to floor 31 and then floor 30 with the body inside it? Wouldn't it have been better to send it straight to floor 30?

Answer: He sent the elevator down and stopped it halfway between floors so he could get on the top of the car. Once he's on top of the car, he won't be able to hit the button for the 30th floor, so he has to hit both buttons before he gets on top of the car.

BaconIsMyBFF

Answer: I always thought of it more of a last resort thing. His plan was to get on top of it, but if he ran into issues he had time to get out. If he sent it to floor 30 and found out he couldn't stop it or anything to climb up on top, the baddies would have got hold of him. By sending it to 31 and then 30, if he found out he couldn't stop it then he'd just be able to get out on floor 31 instead meaning the baddies wouldn't catch him.

Question: If the guy at the reception desk knew that the only ones left in the building were on the 30th floor, why did he tell John to use the screen?

Answer: Most large companies, particularly hi-tech or multinational ones, require visitors to check-in, especially afterhours. By having John search for Holly's name, it can be verified that he actually knows someone who works there, that there is an actual employee with that name, and otherwise assess whether John is a legitimate visitor. This scene's real purpose, however, is for plot exposition. John learns from the monitor that Holly now goes by her maiden name (Gennero) rather than her married surname. We see John's annoyed reaction to learning this, which sets up a later confrontation between him and Holly over their troubled marriage.

raywest

Answer: Any answer is speculation; but a simple explanation is he may have forgotten the only people left were there for the Xmas party until John mentioned the 30th floor. The guard also seems fairly proud of their new high-tech touchscreen system so he might have just had John use it to show off how nice the building is.

BaconIsMyBFF

Answer: Most likely he just wanted to showcase a nifty (by 80s standards) piece of technology to a visitor.

Jukka Nurmi

Answer: The party was on the 30th floor and John was asking for a specific employee, his wife. He had no idea where she was exactly.

Question: Why did Lewis start ignoring Scott after it was revealed that Scott was a werewolf?

Answer: Because Lewis knew that Scott wasn't being true to himself by letting the Wolf take over his personality. Lewis, like Boof, liked Scott for who he was as a person, not as a werewolf.

Question: When the Evil Stepmother wakes up Danielle (who is hungover, from being with Henry and the gypsies the night before), and asks Jacqueline to boil water, why? And what was done with it? Nothing was ever explained about the boiling water. I don't believe Evil Stepmother had Jacqueline boil water to make their breakfast with. She wouldn't have relented that easily. The very next scene has Danielle getting water from the well, looking fine.

Shipper

Answer: It could be a daily chore and for a variety of reasons such as providing the step-mother and step-sister hot water for their morning wash; sanitizing drinking water, making tea, etc.

raywest

Answer: Near the beginning of the movie after Danielle comes back from whipping apples at Henry, the stepmother and sisters are having breakfast. At the beginning of the scene Marguerite says, "I wanted one four minute egg, not four one minute eggs and where in GOD'S NAME IS OUR BREAD!" Therefore the boiling water was probably to make hard boiled eggs for their breakfast.

Answer: I think the boiling water part was to actually boil water for the breakfast.

Disagree. She isn't the type to relent and tell Jaqueline to boil water, for their breakfast. The tone that the evil stepmother uses, suggests some specific use of the boiling water to punish Danielle, somehow.

Shipper

Answer: Disagree. The Stepmother says it, in too resolutely a manner as if she has a specific purpose for the boiling water. As if it will be used as a punishment on Danielle, somehow. Btw, it can't be related to the whipping, either, as that doesn't happen till a few scenes later. Script error?

Shipper

Probably not a script error but something explaining this may have been edited out post-filming. It's typical in movies that filmed scenes are later deleted entirely or partially edited during post-production for a variety of reasons-to cut down the film's running time, speed up the action, etc. As a result, it often leaves small plot inconsistencies.

raywest

Answer: Kenny Baker stated that there was never an actual feud between them, though they were never good friends. Baker said Daniels never seemed to get along well with anyone on the Star Wars set. Daniels has since said that he didn't want to respond to Baker's comments.

raywest

Question: What is surrounding the famous Jell-O mold? Is it shredded carrots?

Answer: The red "garnish" around the Jell-O mold looks like ribbons of sliced tomato that was cut in a spiral pattern.

raywest

Answer: If it is the Jell-O mold that Aunt Bethany brings, it's cat food.

Cat food is in the Jell-O mold, but it doesn't look like cat food around the Jell-O.

Bishop73

Answer: They're a warrior race, when something gets in your way, you either ignore it or smash it to pieces.

Answer: Yes.

Answer: Technically Steve was never intended to die in Stranger Things. The Duffer brothers wrote a pilot script for a miniseries called Montauk that would eventually become Stranger Things. In that version of the story Steve is a more overtly villainous character and is killed by a monster. The Steve character was reworked once Stranger Things was created due to Joe Keery's more likeable approach to the character.

BaconIsMyBFF

Answer: No. Steve has not died in any of the 3 seasons so far.

Question: I was watching this movie last night, and I noticed there were a few people of color in Lake Town. The vast majority of people shown in The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings films are white, so are there any particular places in Middle Earth where people of color might be more prevalent, at least according Tolkien's writings?

Phaneron

Chosen answer: People with brown skin come from the land of Harad, to the south of Gondor and Mordor. Really black people probably exist south of it, but is unknown to the people of Middle-Earth. Any land east of Rhun is just as unknown, it's possible people of colour came from there and settled in Lake-Town.

lionhead

Question: Who's the actress who played Loengard's wife (the woman who says the gold he acquired was blood-money)?

Every Witch Way but Loose - S5-E1

Question: Did Salem take Mr. Kraft's life? The last we see of Sabina's vice principal (and royal pain in the butt) is when Salem hits him with Sabrina's car. It's used as a laugh, but you never see Mr. Kraft again. Did Salem really take his life?

sabrinafan17

Answer: This is a family TV show so it is safe to assume Salem did not murder Mr. Kraft in cold blood.

BaconIsMyBFF

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