Question: Why does Melvin, who looks about 15, live out there alone, in a shack, with no adult supervision?
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.
Answer: It is never stated that Melvin lives in the shack. He just climbed onto the shack's roof because it was the nearest structure. In fact, earlier in the movie when Val and Earl are pumping the septic tank, Melvin is sitting on the porch of the house. Earl even says to Melvin, "Why don't you give us a hand? most of this **** is yours."
Question: How is that powerful telepath Professor Xavier can use Cerebro to find mutants on the other side of the world, yet he does not pick up on Mystique running all over his house in some guise or another? Or Jean Grey, for that matter? Surely they would sense the foreign brainwaves.
Answer: It's hard to find something that you're not looking for. They weren't keeping an eye on the school grounds.
Question: Do Nightcrawler and Storm have a crush on each other or something? They seem pretty close...
Answer: Not a crush, they just connect. Storm feels for him because of the pain and suffering he has been through, and Nightcrawler feels for her because she is angry at the world and he tries to comfort her. Besides that, he is closer to her because she was the first of the group to try and get to know him.
Question: How come Ming-Na Wen is only credited as Ming-Na?
Answer: Ming-Na made the decision to drop her last name, Wen, at the time she married actor/screenwriter Eric Michael Zee in 1995; apparently out of a desire to be like one-named headliners such as Cher and Ann-Margret.
Question: When Van Helsing was on the carriage on the way to Budapest and the horses were about to go over the broken bridge, how did the horses fly over a considerably huge gap like that and land on the other side of the bridge? Why didn't Van Helsing try to stop the horses?
Answer: Because having them jump the gap looked really cool. In reality, horses are not stupid. If they see a huge drop off like that, they will stop by themselves!
Question: What is that song that plays whenever Uma Thurman sees someone from her old gang who tried to kill her?
Answer: It is called Ironside and is made by Quincy Jones. On the soundtrack, it is track no. 16.
Question: Is it ever explained how Ramius' wife died?
Answer: According to the book Natalia Ramius was in hospital for an apparently routine appendix operation. The surgeon was drunk, botched the operation and she died. The surgeon couldn't be prosecuted as he was protected by his father - a Party high-up - which led directly to Ramius' decision to steal the Red October. His reasoning was that, if the doctor could not be made to pay, then the State that protected him would.
Question: Does anyone know why they changed Jimmy's last name to 'Markum' from 'Marcus' (which it is in the books)?
Answer: 9 times out of 10, a character's name is changed to avoid legal action, ie, there may be only one man in the US named Jimmy Marcus who might complain that a character is named after him.
Question: Throughout the film you can see that Tank, played by Dave Power, has funny-looking thin black scars on both cheeks. Was this a makeup effect for the character (and if so, why did they do it), or does the actor really have these scars on his cheeks (and if so, what from)?
Answer: The scars you see on Tank's face are fake, pure makeup. They wanted the character to have a gritty look.
Question: Someone mentioned in the Trivia section that 'The Temple of Doom' is set before 'Raiders of the Lost Ark'. Could someone explain how and why that is, and possibly where there is evidence of that?
Answer: For one thing, it says right at the start of Temple that it's 1935. At the beginning of Raiders it says 1936. What more evidence do you need?
Question: In Star Wars: A New Hope, Obi-Wan tells Luke that he and Anakin Skywalker were very good friends, as well as teacher and student. Now, lack of actor chemistry aside, in this movie, Obi-Wan and Anakin are still very firmly in the role of Master-Padawan, as it should be, and therefore rather formal with each other. My question is, are they speeding up the timeline of how things happen in this movie? It doesn't seem like they're allowing enough time for things to occur as we supposed they ought by the time the first movie begins. It's hard to believe this Obi Wan and Anakin became good friends- it seems they barely tolerate each other.
Answer: Quite often when you lose someone who you spent so much time with, you often remember the relationship as being better than it was. Having said that, we didn't see their relationship for the previous 10 years, and we don't know what will be happening in the next few.
Question: Near the end, when Lex and the Predator are trying to kill the Alien Queen, Lex says "Got it." when she hooks the Queen's chain to the water tower. When she says it, there is a Spanish subtitle on the bottom of the screen for the only time in the movie. Why is this?
Answer: I think there was a malfunction in your theater. I haven't seen any subtitles in the film yet.
Question: Does anyone know if Noah knew all along that the elders were dressing up as the "monsters?" I think he did, and that he thought it was just a game. Is that why he laughed and clapped every time the bell went off and they had to hide? Perhaps the elders didn't hide this from him because he was simple-minded and couldn't talk. So, when he went after Ivy in the woods, he thought it was all for fun. Does anyone else agree with this?
Answer: When the Elders found Noah missing, they referred to a costume that had been hidden under the floorboards. My guess is that at some stage Noah found that costume and may have figured out that it was a game then. I doubt if the Elders realized this until he went missing. Also, given that Noah had already stabbed Lucius, I don't really think that he was joking when he went for Ivy in the woods.
Answer: Noah had figured out shortly before the movie begins that the monsters were a hoax made by the Elders, having found a creature suit in the "punishment room." This can be seen early when everyone is eating. They hear howling from the woods (it's actually sound devices in a big tree deep in the forest that create sounds from the wind), and Noah simply laughs at it. He probably thought it was all a game, never understanding the true purpose of why the Elders created the hoax. During the Covington Woods quest, he most likely went to kill Ivy. Recall the "daring game" played by the children. We learn that creatures imitate their victim before they attack. Noah does the same to Ivy. She snaps her cane, and the creature also snaps something. She throws a rock, he does the same. Noah was actually smarter than we think. He was THE creature, the usurper of the Elders' hoax. So, he tortures Ivy mentally first before trying to kill her. He was kinda sadistic (he also massacred the livestock).
Question: What is the song played at the end of this episode?
Answer: The song is "I don't like Mondays", originally recorded by the Boomtown Rats. This version is sung by Tori Amos.
Question: In this movie, Saruman says that orcs were elves once, and were mutilated by the dark forces, but when reading the book I saw no evidence of this. What exactly is the origin of the orcs?
Answer: Orcs are believed to be corrupted elves, but it happened so long ago that they wouldn't mention it in the Ring trilogy. It would most likely be discussed in The Silmarillion.
Answer: In the books, Treebeard says something about Trolls being corrupt Ents, just as Orcs are corrupt Elves.
Slouching Toward Bethlehem - S4-E4
Question: I know the name of this episode is a Biblical reference because of mention of Bethlehem, but what exactly does Slouching Toward Bethlehem mean, I haven't seen the episode in a while but I think it is only mentioned when Lorne says "Do the words Slouching Toward Bethlehem mean anything?" Which doesn't explain much.
Chosen answer: It's a line from the W.B. Yeats poem "The Second Coming" - "And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" - sort of a beast/anti-christ on the way sort of thing.
Question: Does anyone know the alternative endings for this movie? I can't wait until the DVD. Was this the ending the M. Night Shyamalan wanted in the theaters?
Chosen answer: According to Shyamalan, the ending we saw was the only ending created for the film. He has stated numerous times that the rumors of any alternate endings were untrue.
Answer: The only "alternate" ending was one of the movie ending with Ivy climbing over the wall. There was a stolen script, and M. Night Shyamalan didn't want the movie spoiled by it being leaked, so he added everything after that originally intended ending.
I watched a version of the movie that had added scenes, not necessarily an alternate ending, and have been trying to find it ever since. It had, for example, a scene where Ivy finds huge chimes hanging in the forest that give voice to "those we don't speak of." Any info on that?
Join the mailing list
Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.
Answer: In the original script Melvin has parents, but they constantly abandon him when they make trips into Las Vegas. This was reaffirmed by the directors.