# "Reign of Fire" -- the dragons LIVE on ASH?! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 28, 2006, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450 "2006-06-28T04:39:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/1 "2006-06-28T04:39:55Z")
[The idea of long-buried dragons emerging from deep caves to again rule the Earth is, I will admit, an excellent concept for an SF-fantasy film.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0253556/) But . . . **They eat ash?!** **That’s** why they breathe fire?! That makes about as much sense as running a chemical engine on water! I mean, ash is what is left in organic matter **after** combustion! After all the useful energy has been expelled! ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/2 "2006-06-28T05:19:59Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] [The idea of long-buried dragons emerging from deep caves to again rule the Earth is, I will admit, an excellent concept for an SF-fantasy film.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0253556/) But . . . **They eat ash?!** **That’s** why they breathe fire?! That makes about as much sense as running a chemical engine on water! I mean, ash is what is left in organic matter **after** combustion! After all the useful energy has been expelled! [/QUOTE] And they killed all the dinosaurs, and the males mate by spaying sperm (or whatever) into the air and impregnating vast numbers of females at once, and all manner of highly technological weapons were useless against them, and they’re are thousands of them just underground, but no one has ever stumbled across them, and a creature bigger than an elephant is apparently able to fly with the relative wind surface area of a bat, and can pull amazing super high G maneuvers in mid air, and … well .. making any kind of sense was not that movies strength by any stretch. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/3 "2006-06-28T05:23:39Z")
[QUOTE=astro] And they killed all the dinosaurs, and the males mate by spaying sperm (or whatever) into the air and impregnating vast numbers of females at once, and all manner of highly technological weapons were useless against them, and they’re are thousands of them just underground, but no one has ever stumbled across them, and a creature bigger than an elephant is apparently able to fly with the relative wind surface area of a bat, and can pull amazing super high G maneuvers in mid air, and … well .. making any kind of sense was not that movies strength by any stretch. [/QUOTE] [All the same, there ought to be limits!](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=376644) ---
**Author:** ![Grossbottom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba8739/32.png) [@Grossbottom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grossbottom)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/4 "2006-06-28T12:39:29Z")
A bizarre and idiotic film, but I enjoyed it for some strange reason. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/5 "2006-06-28T13:07:13Z")
God, I hated that movie. The guys who came up with it should be severely beaten. ---
**Author:** ![Snickers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@Snickers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snickers)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/6 "2006-06-28T13:17:53Z")
Y’all did realize that this movie’s just Moby Dick, but with dragons instead of whales? I was watching it, thinking, “this is just like Moby Dick.” Then, when grizzled veteran (Matthew McConaughey {sp?}) gets eaten by big daddy dragon I was all, “it IS Moby Dick!” ---
**Author:** ![Subway\_Prophet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecb155/32.png) [@Subway\_Prophet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Subway_Prophet)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/7 "2006-06-28T13:23:20Z")
I, too, enjoyed the film in spite of all its flaws. I suppose I entered the theater expecting fantasy rather than sci-fi, and I was not disappointed. (But then I also enjoyed Dragonheart, for reasons that still elude me.) The writing surprised me in a few places. For example… I thought the idea of using highly-trained, unprotected soldiers as free-falling bait for the dragons was followed through for a bit of delicious (and crunchy) irony, in that when they are inevitably killed the audience is okay with it because, hey, they’re just _soldiers_ - and yet the commanding officer is furious that he lost 3 men. There’s, like, at least a dozen overused cliches and an after-school special rolled up in that package. But I still enjoyed it. I was also amazed by how short it was - barely 100 minutes. Though I would be hard-pressed to come up with a way to extend the movie without turning it into a complete suck-fest. ---
**Author:** ![Antinor01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecae2f/32.png) [@Antinor01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antinor01)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/8 "2006-06-28T15:37:23Z")
I fell asleep during this movie. Which is odd, cause I normally like things involving dragons and/or Matthew M. (I’m not even gonna try to spell it at this hour of the morning) ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/9 "2006-06-28T15:50:34Z")
…Since Dragons don’t exist… and fall into the realm of magic and make-believe pointing out flaws in Dragon flying mechanics and physiology is pretty much the most worthless thing even a nitpicker could chose to do. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/10 "2006-06-28T16:31:36Z")
[QUOTE=Push You Down] …Since Dragons don’t exist.. and fall into the realm of magic and make-believe pointing out flaws in Dragon flying mechanics and physiology is pretty much the most worthless thing even a nitpicker could chose to do. [/QUOTE] Remind me not to invite you into any threads having to do with discussing the internal consistency / logic of any non-real universe created as part of a story in: - sci-fi and fantasy - movies - comic books - etc. C’mon - it’s fun! If you don’t engage in the right spirit, then you don’t get to opine on such critical issues like “Can Superman Tear His Own Head Off?” which is one of the greatest threads and thread titles ever conceived!! As for the OP - yep, frustrating. The premise was sucky, and the movie only a moderately enjoyable B player… ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/11 "2006-06-28T16:49:20Z")
There’s a huge difference between fun nitpicking and flat out bitching. Most people (not just in this thread but in general) are just bitching. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/12 "2006-06-28T17:10:22Z")
First, the movie sucked. Dammit, it could’ve been so cool. However, I have a theory which partially saves it. Okay, maybe not, but I like it. The dragons weren’t from around here. They were actually nanotech VonNeumann machines from another planet. This explains how they can fly- they’re actually composed of carbon nanofilaments, so they can be much stronger and lighter than they should be. Were do they get the carbon? From burning things- they don’t burn things and eat the ash for energy- they do it for more body mass. It explains their reproductive system, and why they’re so unlike everything else on Earth, and how they can hibernate for so long. What’s their powersource? Uh… lemme get back to you on that. Solar? Fusion? Dunno. But I bet they were designed to terraform planets. Lame, I know. Still, it’s better than the movie was. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/13 "2006-06-28T17:46:27Z")
I have to admit, the “mythology” bit based on _The Empire Strikes Back_ made me chuckle. And if you want to nitpick, try analyzing how the dragons managed to multiply so fast they overwhelmed modern air defenses (one well-armed Apache helicopter should be able to shoot them down at will) and somehow managed to cross the Atlantic to invade the Americas (or the Pacific to get to Australia). ---
**Author:** ![LiveOnAPlane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3d9bf3/32.png) [@LiveOnAPlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LiveOnAPlane)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/14 "2006-06-28T21:20:03Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] I have to admit, the “mythology” bit based on _The Empire Strikes Back_ made me chuckle. And if you want to nitpick, try analyzing how the dragons managed to multiply so fast they overwhelmed modern air defenses (one well-armed Apache helicopter should be able to shoot them down at will) and somehow managed to cross the Atlantic to invade the Americas (or the Pacific to get to Australia). [/QUOTE] [Olivia Newton-John] Got to believe we are maaaaagic; Nothing can stand in our way…[Olivia Newton-John] ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/15 "2006-06-28T21:50:42Z")
[QUOTE=Lightnin’] Lame, I know. [/QUOTE] Not lame at all - that’s one of the best retroactive explanations for bad sci-fi I’ve heard ever. I kinda liked the movie, BTW. I liked the three leads a lot. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/16 "2006-06-28T23:17:58Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] I have to admit, the “mythology” bit based on _The Empire Strikes Back_ made me chuckle. [/QUOTE] 😕 I forget that bit . . . Who said what? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2006, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/17 "2006-06-28T23:46:56Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] 😕 I forget that bit . . . Who said what? [/QUOTE] Early in the movie, two men are entertaining the kiddies by staging a swordfight complete with fourth-wall narration. Man 1: [dressed in white]: The White Knight said “I will never join you. You killed my father!” Man 2: [dressed in black, occasionally wheezing loudly] “No,” said the Black Knight. “I _am_ your father!” ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2006, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/18 "2006-06-29T02:57:26Z")
For me the movie was doomed because it showed the wrong part of the human/dragon conflict. Armwave it any way you wanna, but if you’re gonna do a story about dragons taking over the world, show them taking over the world, not 20 years after they took after the world with humanity reduced to a few skulking creatures hiding among the ruins. What you show is clouds of fire-breathing dragons descending on big cities, being met with missiles, tanks, Blackhawk helicopters, F-16s, anti-aircraft guns, 50 caliber machine guns, RPGs, and evneutally, automatic weapons fires and whatnot. It’d be TREMENDOUS. You show the human race exhausing its arsenal against them. You show dragons flying OUT OF nuclear thunderballs. You show the military, confident at first, then increasingly desperate as nothing works against the dragons’ numbers. You show cities destroyed, small bands of humans taking to the hills, the whole apocalypse thing. Compared to what the could have been, it was feeble indeed. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2006, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/19 "2006-06-29T03:19:23Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Early in the movie, two men are entertaining the kiddies by staging a swordfight complete with fourth-wall narration. Man 1: [dressed in white]: The White Knight said “I will never join you. You killed my father!” Man 2: [dressed in black, occasionally wheezing loudly] “No,” said the Black Knight. “I _am_ your father!” [/QUOTE] I kind of liked how they chose an old Norman keep to take refuge from the dragons. As if, that’s (one reason) why the medieval castles were built in the first place! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2006, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450/20 "2006-06-29T04:14:19Z")
[QUOTE=Push You Down] …Since Dragons don’t exist.. and fall into the realm of magic and make-believe pointing out flaws in Dragon flying mechanics and physiology is pretty much the most worthless thing even a nitpicker could chose to do. [/QUOTE] If the premise was that they were magical that would be fine, but the movie was played straight, and one of the movies main conceits was that it was going to present a plausible evolutionary and biological basis for the existence of hordes of invincible dragons. The odd thing was that it really wasn’t that bad a movie action wise, and had some interesting ideas (paratrooper bait) but the whole setup was so insanely implausible you couldn’t lose yourself in the story. Every time you got past one nonsensical plot point, another would be be wheeled onstage with the introduction "Now if you thought that last bit was insanely stupid, wait till you see this! [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reign-of-fire-the-dragons-live-on-ash/362450.md?page=2)