Question: When Bob Morton is giving his speech just before Robocop is introduced, he touts one of Robocop's advantages as "A lifetime of law enforcement experience." But Murphy's memory was wiped before he was completed. Wouldn't this effectively remove all of his law enforcement experience?
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: I never understood why Peter wanted to avoid a relationship with Mary Jane in order to keep her safe from his enemies. Doc Octopus and the Green Goblin already found out about her and captured her before she was his girlfriend, so why avoid being with her if his enemies were finding out about her anyway?
Answer: The Goblin grabbed her only after he figured out that Spider-Man was Peter Parker. Doc Oc grabbed her because she was with Peter and he needed to send Peter to get Spider-Man, since he knew that Peter had some kind of working relationship with Spider-Man. In other words, her relationship with Peter puts her in danger because Peter already has a direct connection to Spider-Man through his pictures. If he were able to distance himself from her as both Peter Parker and Spider-Man, it would reduce the chances of her being specifically targeted, especially if the villain figures out that Spider-Man is Peter Parker to begin with, which seems to happen at an alarming rate. When Eddie figures it out in the third movie, he grabs her again because he knows Peter cares about her. And Harry used her as a pawn to get his revenge on Peter. Clearly, her relationship with Peter puts her in danger.
Question: Is Rick Dicker (from The Incredibles) supposed to be a parody of Rick Deckard? Thanks.
Answer: There doesn't appear to be any evidence for that. The names are vaguely similar, but, other than that, there's nothing to link the two.
Question: I recognize one of the paintings parodied in Other Spink and Forcible's show as Botticelli's "Birth of Venus". What is the other one?
Answer: It is probably the painting of the scene where a sea-siren (mermaid) tries to lure the Greek hero Odysseus and his men into the water to eat their bodies and souls.
Answer: It's Van Gogh's Starry Sky.
Question: I can see at the end of the movie that it tries to convey a message, but what is it?
Answer: It can mean 2 things. 1) It can mean that they were wishing they can turn back time that's why the clock was going counterclockwise. 2) It can also mean that they were talking about Benjamin because the clock was going counterclockwise.
Question: When Coraline comes back to save her parents, why is the other mother's face all cracked looking, and her body taller and thinner?
Answer: Throughout the movie, she starts looking less like Coraline's mother and more like the creature she really is. This is never explained, but it could mean her powers are weakening, she is putting less effort into them, or that Coraline is getting better at seeing the truth.
Answer: It's because the other mother feeds off the childrens souls, without Coraline's soul, she'll die of starvation so because she is so hungry, she is cracking up and falling apart.
Answer: At the end of the movie when Coraline is crawling in the tunnel the Baldam yells "I'll die without you..." The dolls lure the children in, the children have fun, and then they let her see the buttons. This allows the Beldam life and continues to find her next victim, Coraline. Without Coraline, the Beldam really is left to die.
Answer: This happens because the Beldam (Coraline's other mother) feeds off souls as seen when she gets trapped in that room for not listening to her mother she can see the other soul of a little boy and 2 little girls. Those souls are souls the Beldam has already eaten, so from there we know that those souls had a doll that looked like them too. Now the Beldam is after Coraline's soul because she needs food, and so by not being able to get Coraline to sew buttons in her eyes or stay in the world with the other mother her powers start to fade, and everything goes back to what it was before. So it's clear that Coraline's other mother was the Beldam all along and that's what the Beldam looks like at the end of the movie.
Answer: The first we see of the "Other Mother", is when Coraline enters the other world. This is the Beldam taking the form of Coraline's mother. As the movie progresses, the Beldam is losing energy without food, and by that, she is losing her powers too. Without powers, she can't shapeshift into Coraline's mother, so you see as she becomes grimmer, skinnier, and overall more broken. This mortified look might as well be her original form.
Question: Everything that happens in the bedtime stories and then occurs to Skeeter in real life has a (pretty much) rational explanation (e.g. the rain of gumballs, "Abe Lincoln" actually being a penny), but why on earth do the women in the restaurant jump up and start doing the hokey pokey, apparently against their will?
Answer: The only reason for them to do the hokey pokey is because it's possible. Patrick said that they would do it in the story, and even in the story it's not impossible. Patrick made it happen.
Question: This is admittedly more a matter of opinion than actual mistake, but could anyone offer up a logical explanation for why, out of the numerous ways AUTO could have destroyed the plant (chucking it in the reactor/tossing it down into the garbage compactor area/having the stewards crispy fry it with their lasers in private to name a few), he settled for having GO-4 place it in an escape pod and blast it a short distance from the ship before blowing it up? I'm aware plot convenience and an easy means for it to be recovered is obviously the main reason, but that still doesn't really explain why he would take such a unnecessarily risky course of action, given the waste of the escape pod would no doubt be noticed and rouse suspicions and, as WALL-E and EVE demonstrate, the chance of the plant being intercepted and saved from destruction is increased significantly.
Answer: The autopilot probably had to make sure every single cell of the plant was either destroyed, or eliminated from the ship. The computer concluded that putting the plant physically off the ship was the only certain way to do so. It's also a computer and its creativity may be limited - the garbage is thrown off the ship and thus eliminated, and it is possible it concluded it was the only way the plant could be properly eliminated as well.
Player Under Pressure - S3-E11
Question: The Season 3 DVD set has two versions of the "Player Under Pressure" episode. I've just watched the unaired version, which seems to fit into season 2 - Hodgins hasn't yet convinced Angela to marry him, and the credits don't contain Larry the psychiatrist. Does anyone know why the episode was not aired in Season 2 as seems originally intended?
Answer: The episode was initially part of Season Two but it was not aired on its originally scheduled date because of the Virginia Tech massacre, a college shooting. Fox thought it was inappropriate to air an episode with a similar plot, however vague the similarities may be, so it was replaced by a repeat of "Aliens in a Spaceship".
Question: In the scene where James and Victoria find Waylon on his boat and proceed to have him for dinner, it looks like Waylon is wearing an Oregon Country Fair T-shirt. Can anyone verify this?
Answer: No - he's wearing the green "Kiss me, I'm Irish" shirt that you see Victoria wearing later. You also see James later wearing Waylon's leather jacket. The director, Catherine Hardwicke, said she decided to make her hunter vampires steal clothes from their victims, as trophies.
Question: The whole line of events leading to Gollum's capture by Faramir seems a bit out of place. 1. Where was Gollum when the hobbits were captured? 2. Wouldn't he be wondering where they are instead of fishing and singing carelessly? Did he know what had happened to them? 3. When Frodo finally appears, Gollum - suddenly - becomes suspicious. How so?
Answer: 1. Gollum ran off as soon as he heard the Rangers coming. He did not want to get caught, as he figured the Rangers would kill him. 2. Gollum was certainly curious, but he still has to eat. He wouldn't pass up a pool full of fish. He also suspected that the Rangers had taken them. 3. Gollum is suspicious of Frodo showing up randomly. He didn't expect him to be there, and he found it strange that Frodo would want them to leave right at that moment.
Question: Near the beginning of the movie, at Isolde's mother's funeral, what does she mean when she says that her mother's heart killed her?
Answer: Isolde's mother was forced into an arranged marriage and it tore her apart because she really hated her husband. Isolde's mother believed in true love and was depressed. Even though you can't die from unhappiness that's what it seems like - especially to little Isolde.
The Last Temptation of Krust - S9-E15
Question: What is meant when Krusty says, "How 'bout those TV dinners. Had one the other night. Lightning strikes, the peach cobbler goes out!"?
Answer: He means the TV dinner turned off during a lighting storm, as if it were an actual TV. Awful, awful joke.
Question: Why does General Purcell want Virgil to fail? It seems all he's trying to do is stop them from achieving their goal. He knows full well DESTINI stopped the core in the first place and is determined to fire it again with Virgil down there, knowing they will die. Why would he want Earth to die?
Chosen answer: The General does not want Virgil to fail. The main reason he wants to fire DESTINI is because they have just found out that the core is actually a lot thinner than they originally thought, which means, as Zimsky stated, the amount of explosives they brought in Virgil would not be enought for their original idea of one blast. Also stated by Zimsky, what happened with the core and DESTINI was just like a heart and an electric shock. If an electric shock can stop a heart and also restart a heart, then DESTINI has a chance of restarting what it stopped.
Question: Was Valerie Malone introduced this season to balance out Brenda's departure?
Chosen answer: Yes, she was.
Question: After Tess (Anna) is on the TV show, Ryan, Harry and Grandpa leave when they find that Tess has already left. When Anna (Tess) gets home to find Harry on the table, he and Grandpa are at home, so why is it that when Tess is riding home on the motorbike Ryan drives past, only to arrive home again?
Answer: The guy said that she had been removed from the building, the dialogue never said she'd gone home. In the very next scene you see her in the coffee shop where Jake works...so by the time that Ryan sees her on the back of the bike he could have taken Grandpa and Harry home and then gone out for some other reason.
Question: Jack's title of 'The Pumpkin King' always left me a tad perplexed. Is it in fact a legitimate title of authority, signifying he's the ruler of Halloween Town or of a sub-community of those who dwell within, or is it more of a stage name, referring to his status as the planner and main star of the Halloween holiday?
Answer: Jack is certainly the leader of the realm, with even the mayor deferring to him on important matters. Whether the "Pumpkin King" is actually an official title or simply an affectionate nickname given to him by the rest of the community is unrevealed.
Question: When the Joker is giving his speech to the people on the ferries, there is a shot of him in the Pruitt building. The camera is behind him and in the reflection on the glass you can see him reading his speech from a piece of paper. Why is he doing this? Is it to make sure he remembers his own plan? Or is there something else going on?
Answer: He's got a big speech to make - seems reasonable that he might have made some notes so that he didn't forget anything. Most people do that under such circumstances. There certainly aren't any indications in the film that it was anything else - while it might be a mistake, it fits the scene well enough that there's no way to tell either way.
His voice also definitely sounds like he is reading, in this scene and also when he calls into the talk show to threaten Coleman Reese. It does not sound like "off the cuff" dialogue. Apparently the Joker writes speeches like this down and reads directly from his notes.
Question: Any thoughts on whether or not General Glozelle actually killed his three men, like Miraz 'told' him to? He did attempt to follow Miraz's order to assassinate Caspian, but then hesitated to give the order to fire into the courtyard, didn't shoot Peter, and didn't stab Caspian. Maybe he told the three men to hide?
Answer: Without additional information, we have no way to tell. However, given the number of Miraz's supporters that were around at the time, it seems likely that he would have no option but to obey a direct order and kill his men. This may well have been the impetus for his subsequent dissatisfaction with Miraz.
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.
Chosen answer: This can depend on two things: the nature of the memory wipe and what is meant by the term "experience". It is possible that they were able to wipe only those memories pertaining to personal identification and specific case memories. In which case the basic understanding of law and law enforcement could have been left intact. And the "experience" referred to could be referring to instinct. His mind has been working the streets for a long time. That can cause the brain to wire itself more specifically to think in certain ways that help that kind of activity. Even if the memory wipe were complete, it is possible that those rewirings in his brain were left intact, thus giving him a brain already designed for law enforcement. I admit, though, that the statement can appear, on the surface, to be at odds with the methods used to create him.
Garlonuss ★