# Science mistakes that ruin films for you (open spoilers) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 6, 2005, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771 "2005-11-06T07:53:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/61 "2005-11-07T15:15:24Z")
There are too many things to write abiout, in truth. The one that always pops into my head is at the end of the first Keaton **Batman** where he and Vicki Vale are hurtling to their doom from the top of Gotham Cathedral. Batman shhots out a grapple, asnd it stops both of them, instantly, with no ill effects. Vicki would’ve been torn out of his grasp and continued earthwards. Batman would’ve gotten a nuclear wedgie, a broken back, and other things so bad that, if he didn’t die, he’d want to. And this is _typical_ of people falling in the movies. The actual stuntman in the Bond film **For Your Eyes Only** actually had a sophisticated rig (not just a rope or a bungee) that was supposed to slow him down when he dropped so that this sort of awfulness didn’t happen to him. But in the film, of course, it was supposed to be a single climbing rope that held him in place. The other common thing that bugs me is people firing guns in enclosed spaces, and then aren’t immediately very deaf. “I got him!” “What?” “I got him” “What?” “I got him!” “Did you get him?” ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/62 "2005-11-07T15:23:51Z")
This one always bugs me in movies: People swimming underwater to safety. And they always seem to overcome these obstacles: 1. Visibility is never a problem. Water is always swimming pool clear even though it may be a lake, river, sewer system, flooded building. 2. Light is never a problem. Flooded sinking ship, sewer, swamp. Always seems theres plenty of light from somewhere to light their way. 3. No need for googles? Because you can always read peoples lips, open a combination lock, find secret exits wile everything is a blur. 4. Super lung capacity. Doesn’t matter that your adrenaline is running cause your about to be shot or drown, you can still hold your breath for over 2 minutes if your trying to escape underwater. Prime example: Lethal Weapon 2. Mel is shackled and thrown off a pier in the middle of the night. However as he sinks to the bottom the water is crystal clear and theres plenty of light for him to recognize his drowned grilfriends face without the aid of goggles. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/63 "2005-11-07T15:28:23Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > The one that always pops into my head is at the end of the first Keaton **Batman** where he and Vicki Vale are hurtling to their doom from the top of Gotham Cathedral. Batman shhots out a grapple, asnd it stops both of them, instantly, with no ill effects. Vicki would’ve been torn out of his grasp and continued earthwards. Batman would’ve gotten a nuclear wedgie, a broken back, and other things so bad that, if he didn’t die, he’d want to. Or how about stopping your fall by grabbing a stationary ledge? Bruce Willis in Die Hard falls over 10 feet down an elevator shaft and stops himself by grabbing a ledge with his fingertips? ---
**Author:** ![Dante](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dante/32/9673_2.png) [@Dante](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/64 "2005-11-07T15:37:46Z")
You have to remember, Spidey has the proportionate anus of a spider. Very strong to hold in the intestines. Speaking of which, I don’t know of any spider species that shoots it’s webbing out of it’s front legs… I’m just saying, movie Spider-Man got lucky is all. Probably why Stan Lee had him invent web-shooters. Ditko refused to draw him the “right” way. If there’s any CGI people on the boards, could you do a webslinging composite with the spinnerets in the right place? Cause hoo-boy, that would be funny! ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/65 "2005-11-07T15:42:26Z")
> [@Podkayne](#): > > No. It couldn’t. > > Texas has a length of 790 miles and a widtih of 660 miles. The largest asteroid in the Solar System is Ceres, which has a diameter of 580 miles. Ceres was discovered in 1801 by Giuseppe Piazzi. > > There are no undiscovered asteroids “the size of Texas” wandering around the Solar System. Well, Charon is about Texas sized and wasn’t discovered until 1978. Sedna wasn’t discovered until 2003. So while you’re correct about the asteroid belt, I guess it is possible that something large with a low albedo could come moseying in from the Oort Cloud. Although I’d guess there’d be some gravitational indications if something that large entered the solar system, it would probably take quite a while for it to get detected. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/66 "2005-11-07T15:50:01Z")
> [@Kaspar Hauser](#): > > > [@Alessan](#): > > > > Doc Cok > > That was a different movie that wasn’t shown in theaters. And those weren’t extra arms. He’s Centauri? ---
**Author:** ![Silentgoldfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Silentgoldfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silentgoldfish)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/67 "2005-11-07T15:52:37Z")
> [@Dante](#): > > If there’s any CGI people on the boards, could you do a webslinging composite with the spinnerets in the right place? Cause hoo-boy, that would be funny! They’ve actually got that as an easter egg on the first Spiderman movie DVD. Seriously! ---
**Author:** ![kidchameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/898d66/32.png) [@kidchameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kidchameleon)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/68 "2005-11-07T16:26:45Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > Incredible hulk , spinning a 70 ton abrams tank around by the gun barrel > > Declan Or Dr. Banner bravely ‘saving’ his lab mate by diving in front of the gamma burst? That would have the great result of killing two people instead of one, as very little of the gammas were going to be stopped by a body. Thus the use of dense materials such as lead and tungsten to shield one’s DNA from gamma rays. ---
**Author:** ![Dorjan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dorjan/32/12440_2.png) [@Dorjan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorjan)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/69 "2005-11-07T16:27:18Z")
> [@Terrifel](#): > > Hmm… totally off-topic here, but as a resident of Florida (“The Sunshine State\*”–really! Practically no hurricanes this year, honest!\*), I strongly suspect that Staff Report is in fact almost completely wrong. At any rate, my many years of admittedly anecdotal experience with different-colored clothing says otherwise; I’m not sure what qualifies as “loose-fitting clothing,” but I generally wear my T-shirts pretty baggy, and black hots up a lot more than white, breeze or no. Regardless of whether black, fluffed plumage cools birds better or not, I think scaling up the data to apply to humans might well result in one of those “bumblebees can’t fly”-type situations Baggy T-shirts and pants aren’t “loose fitting” enough. To work, you need something more like this: [![](http://ededou.free.fr/Tunisie/Bedouins.gif) ](http://ededou.free.fr/Tunisie/Bedouins.gif) ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/70 "2005-11-07T16:38:45Z")
> [@](#): > > Spider-man 2, when Spidey, Doc Oc, and MJ were mere feet from the artificial sun which sucked in everything from miles around…except them. I’d also imagine the radiation would be so intense that they’d be instantly fried. Since it was apparently pulling in metal, that’s not a huge issue. As for radiation, probably not, since there was some sort of implied containment or something. The real problem is this: how the heck does a fusion generator grow by adding heavy metals and die when immersed in water. (For other reasons, it probably would die when immersed in water, but it would be because the regulators would immediately go nuts and the thing would splatter hot plasma everywhere, but with no serious damage.) And again, fusion generators don’t go “critical.” Of course, this is _Sam Raimi_ we’re talking about here. He may well have known exactly what he was talking about, and just found the idea of bull$%^&&^\*# the audience amusing. ---
**Author:** ![rhettbutler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@rhettbutler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhettbutler)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/71 "2005-11-07T16:43:34Z")
> [@Dante](#): > > You have to remember, Spidey has the proportionate anus of a spider. Very strong to hold in the intestines. I remember reading a question about the forces Spider-Man would experience during his swinging here on the SDMB a while ago, and one of the experts mentioned that in a previous thread it had been calculated that he would experience about three gees max. Which I don’t think is enough to splurt the intestines out of even a normal anus (though I’d like to know if I’m wrong about that). > [@](#): > > Speaking of which, I don’t know of any spider species that shoots it’s webbing out of it’s front legs… I’m just saying, movie Spider-Man got lucky is all. Probably why Stan Lee had him invent web-shooters. Ditko refused to draw him the “right” way. In Peter David’s novelization of the recent Spider-Man movie, Peter Parker ponders the placement of his spinnerets during the scene in the school cafeteria where he inadvertently webs things and causes trouble for himself with Flash: > [@Spider-Man Movie Novelization by Peter David](#): > > He pulled even harder on the fork, but rather than separate it from the strand, he instead managed to shoot out another strand, this time from his other hand. And suddenly all the rationalizing, all the reordering in his mind of the morning’s events, went right out the window as he realized, It’s webbing! It’s webbing! **I’ve got spinnerets in my forearms** , oh jeez, what if somebody notices but now it could be worse, could be worse, **at least I’m not shooting webbing out my butt, which is where spiders generally secrete their webbing** , and perhaps it might bear some further investigation as to precisely why the spinnerets choose to manifest themselves and Holy God, I’m shooting freaking webs outta my freaking arms!!! ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/72 "2005-11-07T16:47:37Z")
> [@Podkayne](#): > > In the opening narration, Charlton Heston says that the K-T impactor (a 10-km sized object) hit Earth with the energy of a ten thousand nuclear bombs. Uh, try a _million_ nuclear bombs, Charlton. Yield differences in nuclear weapons make it quite possible that neither statement is wrong. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/73 "2005-11-07T17:04:49Z")
:smack: nevermind. ---
**Author:** ![lno](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a8b319/32.png) [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/74 "2005-11-07T17:16:16Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > The other common thing that bugs me is people firing guns in enclosed spaces, and then aren’t immediately very deaf. > > “I got him!” > “What?” > > “I got him” > > “What?” > > “I got him!” > > “Did you get him?” I was very pleasantly surprised by this in _Black Hawk Down_. Now if only every other movie with machine guns will do the same… ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/75 "2005-11-07T19:43:32Z")
> [@Finagle](#): > > Well, Charon is about Texas sized and wasn’t discovered until 1978. Sedna wasn’t discovered until 2003. So while you’re correct about the asteroid belt, I guess it is possible that something large with a low albedo could come moseying in from the Oort Cloud. Although I’d guess there’d be some gravitational indications if something that large entered the solar system, it would probably take quite a while for it to get detected. Charon is a rather poor example, because it went undiscovered so long only because it was right next to Pluto, and the two were indistinguishable. If Charon had been out there, on its own, it probably would have been detected sooner. And it would also be an easy thing to detect in the inner solar system. There are three reasons that it’s hard to detect Trans-Neptunian Objects (aka Kuiper Belt Objects), of which Pluto and Charon are examples. 1. They have low albedos (they reflect a small amont of the sunlight that reaches them.) 2. They are far from the Sun (so little sunlight reaches them.) 3. They are far from the Earth (so the inherently dim little objects are far away, making them appear even dummer to us.) Once they swing into the inner solar system, factors 2 & 3 go away. While it’s not as easy to detect as a big, light-colored object, if it’s a 1000 kilometers across, its still going to be hard to miss. But I contend that it _won’t_ actually be a low-albedo object. When you bring in a large object from the frigid outer wastes of the Solar System, the many and various volatile ices that make up its surface and interior start to sublime, creating a comet. Even the non-Texas-sized cometary nuclei we have observed thus far, which are only 10s of km in diamter, can create a cometary head the size of Saturn, with a tail that stretches for hundreds of millions of miles. So I’m a bit skeptical of the notion of a low-albedo stealth impactor stealing in from the outer Solar System. So why don’t we see large Texas-sized cometary nuclei swooping toward the Earth? Because it’s hard to change the orbit of such a huge object to bring it into the inner Solar System. Which is a good thing for Life on Earth, because if one of those babies was headed for us, we would not be able to change its orbit, no matter how many years in advance we saw it coming, and we would be pretty well screwed. Just like they _would_ have been screwed in _Armageddon_, if the writers hadn’t been living in a happy, fact-free fairytale land. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/76 "2005-11-07T20:16:51Z")
Despite the various objections to Spiderman et all., remember that these are comic book movies. In the comics, science stopped in 1970 or so. Everything since then is a “special power.” In fact, many of those “special powers” not only can’t be mas-produced, they can’t even be reproduced once. Yet clearly they work, whether or not other scientists can duplicate it. That’s just now science is in the comics. Even seemingly technological things like spaceships and so on are really just special powers possessed by nations or species. That’s how comics are. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/77 "2005-11-07T21:25:31Z")
> [@Terrifel](#): > > Hmm… totally off-topic here, but as a resident of Florida (“The Sunshine State\*”–really! Practically no hurricanes this year, honest!\*), I strongly suspect that Staff Report is in fact almost completely wrong. At any rate, my many years of admittedly anecdotal experience with different-colored clothing says otherwise; I’m not sure what qualifies as “loose-fitting clothing,” but I generally wear my T-shirts pretty baggy, and black hots up a lot more than white, breeze or no. Could it be important that in the desert, it’s a dry heat whereas in Florida it’s a sticky heat? ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/78 "2005-11-07T22:32:23Z")
Two things always bugged me in _The Hunt for Red October_, although I’m not sure if they’re strictly science errors. First, the point is made throughout the movie that the Red October is an aggressive, first-strike weapon; but ballistic-missile submarines serve the exact opposite function. They are designed to be hidden so they can’t be destroyed in a first strike and guarantee retaliation. Second, the Americans are particularly afraid of the new submarine because of its propulsion system that will make it undetectable by their sonar. But the operator on the Dallas figures out how to track it within a day. Once that information gets out to the rest of the U.S. fleet, the Red October is no more of a threat than any other Soviet sub. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/79 "2005-11-07T22:46:26Z")
> [@smiling bandit](#): > > The real problem is this: how the heck does a fusion generator grow by adding heavy metals and die when immersed in water. Yeah, I was kinda wondering why what’s essentially a miniature sun wouldn’t…you know, if nothing else, create a lot of _steam_ when you threw it in a river. ---
**Author:** ![Bippy\_the\_Beardless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ac8455/32.png) [@Bippy\_the\_Beardless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bippy_the_Beardless)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2005, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771/80 "2005-11-07T23:41:55Z")
> [@Otto](#): > > In X2 the guard was injected with massive amounts of, something, iron filings in suspension or whatever, by Mystique. It was that injected material that Magneto was manipulating, not the iron found normally in the guy’s body. > > Although why the guard wasn’t killed by having huge quantities of metal shot into his body I don’t know. I don’t think it was injected intraveinously (sp?) but as a suppository. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-mistakes-that-ruin-films-for-you-open-spoilers/329771.md?page=5)