Best sci-fi movie questions of 2009

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Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen picture

Question: Sam says that the Energon source is before the Autobots. So to find it they need to talk to a Decepticon. Wheelie is the first one at hand, but how does he know about the source, let alone the Seekers, what they look like and where they are? He doesn't look like he is as old as Jetfire, and as he puts it, "Nobody tell me nothin".

Friso94

Chosen answer: He knows from stories passed down to him from older generations of bots, not much unlike stories about the past passed down to us from our ancestors. His line about no one telling him anything is just a way to avoid being put back in the box or being tortured by Mikayla.

dablues7

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9 (2009)

9 picture

Question: Why were the dolls sent out after the scientist made them? Why didn't they stay with the scientist so he could explain everything?

YellowBird

Answer: They were sent out into the world to create a new world for themselves. Every time the scientist created a doll, he transferred part of his soul into the doll bringing it to life but leaving him weaker. After creating 9 and transferring the piece of his soul into 9, he died so they would never have found out what they were created for.

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Push picture

Question: At the end of the movie we find out that it was really soy sauce that was injected into Nick's arm. Wouldn't injecting soy sauce directly into your blood stream still kill you, or at least have some sort of ill side effects?

Answer: Soy sauce is mostly soy protein and salt in water- it might raise your blood pressure for a while, but assuming you're in reasonably good health, and presuming it wasn't a ridiculously large amount, your liver will filter it out after a short while.

This is incorrect, there are several variables in this but given the syringe size I'm guessing that he injected approx 50ml. Now 50ml injected intravenously would almost certainly cause sepsis and he would die from septic shock within a day or so. The reason for this is that soy sauce is a fermented product full of several different types of bacteria in large quantities which would be quite friendly in the gut but disastrous in the blood stream. Also the sodium and yeasts and funghi in the sauce would not be good either. If however the injection was subcutaneous but not intravenous then it may not be fatal but it would certainly give him a very nasty infected cyst that would have the potential to be fatal if not treated correctly.

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Chosen answer: Jake and Neytiri were holding hands and Neytiri had her hair unbraided. It is also possible that when Na'vi mate, their appearance changes slightly in a way that only other Na'vi could see.

More Avatar questions

Answer: Technopathy which is the ability to control certain electrical devices and Electrokinesis which is the ability to generate, manipulate and/or conduct electricity.

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Jennifer's Body picture

Question: Is it a coincidence that Needy uses the same knife that killed Jennifer to kill the band? Needy wouldn't have know about the knife since she wasn't present when Jennifer was killed.

sunfox35

Answer: When Jen was explaining how the band members through the knife in the waterfall. When needy was walking and found the knife, the knife was beside one of the balls that the scientists were testing where the water went to. It showed the scene where the scientists were putting little red balls down to see where they came up. So no it wasn't a coincidence, she knew that was the knife.

Answer: Maybe coincidence but I think she might knew its the same knife the bad used to kill Jennifer because of the power she got from the demon after being bitten by Jennifer aka the succubus.

Chosen answer: It is no coincidence. Needy killed Jennifer with the same knife that she would later use to kill the band.

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Watchmen picture

Question: I don't quite understand why Dr. Manhattan had to kill Rorschach. That is, I don't quite get why that was the only solution. Rorschach was a valuable member of the Watchmen, and in the type of world they were in (chaos, corruption, murder, etc) one would think that they would want to keep as many of themselves banded together as possible. Couldn't some sort of negotiation or compromise have been reached/agreed to by Rorschach instead of him being killed?

Answer: He has spent years as a costumed vigilante despite the fact that it was illegal. He has a very strict idea of what is right ("never compromise") and has proven himself incapable of doing otherwise. So no, there was no real chance of negotiating with him - Rorschach himself made it clear he'd have to die if they wanted his silence.

Garlonuss

Death was not the only choice. Doc M could easily have teleported/banished Rorschach to Mars/anywhere secluded in an oxygen bubble. He could have spared his life and just made him mute or manipulate his brain chemistry/atoms to remove the memory of what happened. The point is Doc M is all powerful and could manipulate matter at his whim; death was just a plot device creating a chance of an emotive martyrdom/sacrificial ending.

Ethically speaking, exiling him to Mars or erasing his memory of the event can be considered just as cruel as killing him, because then his agency is being taken away from him. Rorshach's malcontent with the situation poses a problem for the other heroes, and since Dr. Manhattan isn't willing to let him tell the truth of what happened, he obliges Rorschach's demand that he kill him instead.

Phaneron

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2012 picture

Question: How come a high tech ship would be unable to start its engine merely with the reason that the gate is unable to close?

gblontok

Chosen answer: Its a safety device so the ship doesn't put to sea and ends up flooding the ship. The passenger ferry Herald of Free Enterprise capsized in the port of Zebrugge in 1987, precisely because the doors were not shut properly.

GalahadFairlight

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Terminator Salvation picture

Question: What causes the explosion near the start which causes John Connor's helicopter to crash? I may be missing something, but they never seem to address it.

Jon Sandys

Chosen answer: It was a strike by Skynet on the attacked facility to try and deny the resistance information and anything useful.

GalahadFairlight

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District 9 picture

Question: Something I couldn't figure out. The black fluid (in the glass cylinder) made Wikus start turning into an alien. If the aliens were mainly interested in going back to their planet, why had they been developing a substance that could turn humans into aliens? How would this help them go home?

Answer: That's more of a side effect of the fluid. See, only the Prawns could use their technology; it was "genetically activated", so to speak. So the fluid which powers their tech is like Prawn-gene concentrate. When Wikus was sprayed with the stuff it affected his genetic makeup.

Phixius

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The Time Traveler's Wife picture

Question: Why can't Henry save his mother from being in the car crash? Couldn't he have warned her when they met on the subway?

Answer: He could have had Claire distract her long enough to delay her car ride and miss the accident.

Answer: Of course not. Why would she listen to him? He's a total stranger. And if he tells her he's her time-travelling son, she'll think he's a nutjob to boot. It's well-established in the book that he tried everything to save her but could never do so, which made him recognise a well-accepted convention of time-travelling lore: big past events can never be changed. Diana Gabaldon wrote an excellent and extensive essay on time-travelling laws, which is probably still available somewhere on the Internet.

Sereenie

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Monsters vs Aliens picture

Question: When Susan grew after being affected by the Quantonium meteorite, why do no other life forms, such as insects in the grass, not also grow?

The Yeti

Chosen answer: Well, it's a fiction movie; some suspension of disbelief is always needed. There could be a number of explanations: for instance, lifeforms such as insects on the grass, bacteria inside them or even grass itself, being unable to absorb quantonium. It might affect only sentient beings. Or Susan might even be the first being to get in contact with the substance - this would be possible depending on the shape of the meteorite container, the exact means by which quantonium touches her body - which isn't shown... but, first and foremost, this happens because its not happening would leave the filmmakers with a plot issue to be dealt with - so, other beings don't grow simply because they don't.

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Star Trek picture

Question: In the Iowa bar where Kirk meets Uhura, he says something about her being from another world. Is Uhura from another planet, other than Earth? I can't remember anything from the original series that states this.

Answer: Kirk's never met Uhura - he wouldn't know where she's from. When he asks her name, she says that her name is "just Uhura" - Kirk's expecting to hear two names, first name and surname (just as he introduced himself as "Jim Kirk"). As such, his first question is to ask whether they don't have surnames on whatever world she comes from. As it happens, she is from Earth, she just doesn't want to tell him her full name; he doesn't know that, so he's making assumptions that are, in this case, completely wrong.

Tailkinker

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Daybreakers picture

Question: Why didn't Chris want the cure to spread in the end?

Answer: Just like the humans, he had a fear of becoming extinct.

Answer: The vampires were now everywhere, with very few humans left in their blood farms. Their food supply was dwindling and it was getting to the point that they were facing extinction by starvation. The only way to keep life going was for the vampire disease to be cured and everybody to turn back human.

Quantom X

Then why didn't he want it to happen?

He successfully created a substitute.

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G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra picture

Question: In the flashback scene of Rex entering the secret facility, what was he looking at on all of the computer screens and why would he use them later on after he faked his death?

Answer: He was seeing some of the first footage of experiments with the Nanobots by Dr. Mindbender. And the whole plot of the movie is about him using them weaponized and for replacing the president.

Quantom X

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Race to Witch Mountain picture

Question: What's the name of the song the woman is singing at the restaurant in Stony Creek?

Answer: It was either Southern Night or Boogie Woogie Saturday Night.

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S. Darko picture

Question: Do we ever find out what the rash was on that guy? And why it was spreading so badly.

Awesomo

Chosen answer: Nope. It was just a reaction to the meteorite. It could have been an alien bacteria causing it, or it could have been an allergic reaction to one or more materials in the meteorite itself.

Phixius

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Land of the Lost picture

Question: Would Rick have regenerated that quickly (overnight) after the blood loss from the giant mosquito and tick that he suffered?

Answer: It would depend on how much blood he lost and his general constitution. Of course, this is a movie, and reality is often fudged in order to tell the story. Having a character take days to recover would unnecessarily slow the plot.

raywest

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