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: Throughout the film, Coach Bolton says that the championship game is in two weeks but the decathlon is in a week. How do they happen on the same day?

Answer: It is because in the movie Sharpay got the decathlon rescheduled and the callbacks to be on the same day as the championship game so that Troy and Gabriella can't make the callbacks.

Answer: The decathlon was most likely rescheduled.

Chosen answer: Because both of them are former Death Eaters who have the Dark Mark branded on their arm. Karkaroff's was getting stronger, so he kept trying to talk to Snape to get information if he had any, as he was convinced that Snape was still a Death Eater (as we saw in the book in the trial scene). Karkaroff was terrified of the prospect of returning to Voldemort, as he had betrayed several Death Eaters to the law when he was caught.

Question: Why is the cartridge for Donkey Kong 64 yellow instead of grey?

Answer: It's the color of bananas, which feature prominently in the Donkey Kong Country franchise.

Phaneron

Question: How did Sauron take the form of a fiery eye? Isn't he powerless without the ring?

Answer: Most of Sauron's power was poured into the One Ring, but not all of it. Sauron cannot take a true physical form until the ring is returned to him but he can still use his power to form the eye to keep watch over Middle Earth.

BaconIsMyBFF

Is the eye actually his true form?

If by "true form" you mean the form he originally took when he was created, it is unlikely. Sauron was a good, just, and respected being prior to being corrupted and likely wouldn't have such an evil appearance in his original form. It is important to note, however that the Eye of Sauron takes on a much more physical form in Peter Jackson's film that it does in the books. In the books, the eye is a red light hovering over the tower that has the vague appearance of an eye. The films makes the eye look like an actual, literal eyeball that moves and seems to have a personality.

BaconIsMyBFF

I meant has the eye been his true form ever since he lost the ring?

Sort of, yes. Sauron's spirit existed in a non-corporeal form and eventually built enough strength to form the eye.

BaconIsMyBFF

No, his true form is seen at the beginning of the film.

Question: Sid eats a lotus berry and becomes paralyzed. Would he suffer bad effects other than being paralyzed? He doesn't appear to be suffering any other ill effects.

Answer: No. Lotus berries won't cause paralyzing, but sleepiness. They are narcotic, not poisonous.

Triviani

But Diego said that the berry would paralyze him.

Diego was probably unaware of its real effects.

Question: Who organized and ordered the killing of all the dons at the meeting where only a few come out unharmed. And why?

Answer: Don Altobello was behind the plot to assassinate the other Dons. The motive had to do with the Immobiliare deal that Michael had attempted to keep free of any Mafia involvement.

raywest

Question: John McClane wraps a fire hose around his waist, and uses it to jump 100 feet until the coil catches the lip of the building, the hose catches him. Wouldn't that have seriously injured him, given the inelastic materiel which fire hoses are made of, and the fact that he was not wearing a safety harness?

Answer: In reality, yes tying a fire hose (or any rope strong enough to hold your weight for that matter) around your waist and using it as shown in the film could cause serious injury. It was worth it to try, however because staying where he was would have meant certain death when the bomb explodes.

BaconIsMyBFF

Question: I know Patton really did slap a soldier named Bennett. I have two questions. Firstly, is the dialogue in the scene where Patton slapped Bennett accurate? Secondly, was Bennett really a coward?

Answer: The entire slapping incident is surprisingly accurate, including the second slap knocking off Bennett's helmet. The dialogue is not verbatim but the scene is accurate in spirit. By today's standards Bennett would not be considered a coward. He suffered from what we call today post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). During Patton's time PTSD was called "shell shock" or other terms and was not treated with the same compassion as today. Patton himself did not believe in the concept of shell shock and thought men like Bennett were simply cowards.

BaconIsMyBFF

Question: How does Sauron know Frodo has the ring? He doesn't even know who Frodo is.

Answer: He doesn't. He only knows that someone named "Baggins" from the Shire has the ring. He learns this from torturing Gollum. He sends the ringwraiths to the Shire to search for it, and they sense it enough to figure out who has it.

Why do the wraith have to find it if they can sense it?

The wraiths at this point aren't powerful enough to simply know where it is by sensing it. At this point they can only sense it when they are close and it is put on. Once Frodo put it on, they knew who he was and where the ring was.

lionhead

Question: Is it true that the Jamaica bobsled team performed poorly at first during training as shown in in the film?

Answer: The real Jamaican team performed poorly throughout the Olympics and did not finish.

Greg Dwyer

Question: How did chief survive getting hit by a train, and falling down, and only ending up with an injured leg?

Answer: He fell into the water so he could have very easily broken his leg on something in the water like a rock.

Question: How does Connie have authority over the control room? Yardmasters are not in charge there. Yardmasters only have authority over the yards they are assigned to manage. A railroad employee higher ranked than a yardmaster is in charge of the control room. I don't know what his job is called. So how is Connie giving orders to the people in the control room when she wouldn't any have authority over them?

Chosen answer: When Andy is fighting Claude in the subway car, he looks at Claude's right shoulder and see a wound on it. He suddenly remembers back in the sewers of Paris how he took a part of a broken gate and stabbed a werewolf with it giving it the very same wound.

Question: How did Claude survive getting hit by train even when he was dragged under the train?

Joey221995

Answer: I watched this today and I thought he should be dead but he is a bad ass werewolf and most likely they can take a beating.

Adam Busuttil

Question: What did Claude say in French to Jacques when he choked him for allowing Serafine and Andy to go through the door?

Joey221995

Answer: Claude says in anger while choking him, "Depuis quand tu laisses partir mes invites, Jacques?", which in English translates to, "When did you let my guests go, Jacques?"

Question: When Josh is in the further looking for Dalton, what is the deal with the family that looks like mannequins and has the creepy smiles? Why does the one girl shoot the family? Is there any back story on it?

Answer: It's implied that the girl went crazy and killed her family, but it's not really elaborated on. They're just some of the many spirits to be trapped in and haunt the Further, likely due to the violent nature of their deaths.

Answer: They are just people trapped in the further after their terrible death. It would be nice to later find out the back story on them in a future film.

Sarah Kotzbauer

Question: After Miles accidentally mentioned the rehearsal dinner to Maya, she asked him who's getting married and obviously (though not on camera), he told her Jack, thus starting a big fight with each other. Why did Miles tell her Jack instead of making up a random stranger he could say they knew since already slipping out info about the dinner? She would not have ever known, no fight would have taken place, and Jack would have saved face - literally.

Answer: Miles himself answers this question in the film. He tells Maya that he could have made something up, but chose to tell her the truth because he respected her and didn't want to lie.

Question: How exactly did Stan know IT was a female and was expecting?

Answer: On the ground there were opaque eggs with moving objects seen inside, indicating that the spider creature was a female that had laid them.

raywest

Answer: It's never specified: somehow Stan just knew, perhaps through a vision or a nightmare.

Answer: It's never specified: somehow Stan simply knew.

Answer: Because when the Losers found It in its side form, only Stan saw its egg sac, writhing with soon-to-be-laid eggs.

Question: When Lucius was walking the perimeter painting a yellow stripe on the poles and he sets the bucket down to go into the woods and pick the berries, he saw a "creature." You can see a flash of something but it isn't red. So what exactly did he see? Lucius claimed he saw a creature through a letter in the village meeting but maybe he actually saw one of the Elders and that's why he was so upset and that's why the elders didn't get angry at him for crossing the perimeter and instead Walker said he was brave. Just to continue the show. Or maybe he saw Noah and that's why Noah was so excited in the town hall. What did Lucius see in the woods when he picked the berries?

Answer: It's not known what Lucius saw. It was either one of the elders who was in costume perpetuating the ruse that dangerous creatures roamed the woods, or it was Noah, who'd discovered the secret and took it upon himself to frighten the other village youths who occasionally overstepped the boundaries.

raywest

Answer: He wrote the letter because he believed this was all happening because he went into the woods and touched the red berries. You (and lucius) only see a branch move which would make one assume a creature had been there.

Question: Would the military really have sent a rescue mission to save one man during world war 2?

Answer: No, not really. There is no evidence of any such mission. While the U.S. military does have a policy of excusing the last remaining members of a family from combat after their siblings have been killed-known as the Sole Survivor Policy, officially implemented in 1948 but followed de facto before then - they never sent a unit into enemy territory to "save" anyone. The real soldier upon which the film is based, Frederick Niland, was simply taken out of active duty and sent home when it was learned that his three brothers were dead (though his eldest brother, Edward, was later revealed to be alive in a Japanese POW camp and ended up outliving Frederick).

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