# Silly, weird, perhaps unanswerable questions about movies and TV **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 31, 2013, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401 "2013-03-31T03:09:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2017, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/241 "2017-08-05T20:41:46Z")
[quote=“AWB, post:240, topic:654401”] [li]Tom and B’lanna were the only ones to have a baby. [/li][/QUOTE] And Ensign Wildman. I took it there were other babies born, but not to significant characters. ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2017, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/242 "2017-08-05T20:59:27Z")
One thing that’s always puzzled me about _Rocky Horror Picture Show_ is the reference to a “mission.” Before Riff Raff kills Frank, he sings, “Frank N. Furter, it’s all over. Your mission is a failure; your lifestyle’s too extreme.” So what, exactly, was Frank’s mission? Why did the Transylvanians come to Earth in the first place? Whenever I ask a RHPS fan about this, I get a blank look or a shrugging “Take over the world, I guess” answer (which doesn’t make sense, because they simply leave Earth after Frank is dead). It’s a silly, dumb question, but I think about it every time I see the movie. BTW, the stage version doesn’t explain it either. ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2017, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/243 "2017-08-05T21:16:01Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > I always thought there was a spacesuit in the airlock, and Dave took the helmet from that one. Here’s an [image](https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/800/0*sqT-4rzYfkVtjlSB.jpg) from that scene. It’s just in that alcove behind the control panel; can’t see it too well, but it looks like it has the same chest pack as on Dave’s suit. And when we see Dave deactivating HAL, he has a green helmet. The suits in the pod bay were red, yellow, and blue. THANK YOU for posting this! I have seen that movie more times than I can count, and I NEVER noticed the spacesuit in the airlock before! I had always assumed that Dave went to the pod bay to get a helmet—which, as **ftg** pointed out, doesn’t make sense. > [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > I remember thinking this was rather obvious in the movie, but I found the airlock scene on youtube and you don’t really see more than that image. Maybe there’s a better look at it at some other point in the movie, or it could be explained in the book and I’m just getting them confused. In the novel, Dave doesn’t attempt to rescue Frank, who is obviously dead. Instead, he realizes that HAL is nuts and asks for control of the hibernation capsules so he can wake up the crew. HAL resists at first, but finally complies. HAL then opens the pod bay doors, the ship starts decompressing, and Dave barely makes it to some kind of emergency chamber that has a spacesuit in it. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/244 "2017-08-06T01:39:55Z")
Has Popeye ever gotten super-strength from spinach in any manner other than eating it? Smoking it? Snorting it (as in _snuff_)? A spinach-juice transfusion? A pureed spinach enema? BTW: is his actual Christian name really “Popeye”? His surname maybe? ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/245 "2017-08-06T03:22:56Z")
> [@erysichthon](#): > > So what, exactly, was Frank’s mission? Why did the Transylvanians come to Earth in the first place? Whenever I ask a RHPS fan about this, I get a blank look or a shrugging “Take over the world, I guess” answer (which doesn’t make sense, because they simply leave Earth after Frank is dead). I’ve never thought much about it, but Frank is a scientist and was presumably supposed to be researching or making something (weapons?) that would benefit Transylvania. Maybe his superiors thought his experiments were going to lead to, say, a race of super soldiers. ---
**Author:** ![Asuka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@Asuka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asuka)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/246 "2017-08-06T03:48:11Z")
So how exactly does the world work after Inglourious Basterds? Honestly it seems like the world becomes so much more complicated. So after Hitler is dead does the German military sue for peace with figures like Rommel leading the charge, or does Himmler take over and the war somehow becomes much worse? Do the Soviets take this as an opportunity to rush for Berlin much earlier knowing the German military is demoralized? Do the Germans on the Western Front all surrender en-masse to prevent the Soviets from getting to Germany first? With FDR and Henry Wallace still-in-charge of post-war 1944 Europe does that mean they allow even more Soviet concessions than it would have under 1945 Truman? Do the Soviets launch an invasion of Japan before the US does and split Japan into a North and South? Will the Basterds now have to kill Stalin to prevent the world from becoming even more Communist? ---
**Author:** ![Murph1111](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@Murph1111](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Murph1111)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/247 "2017-08-06T04:28:00Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Segregation wasn’t legal, but it was pretty much _de facto_. School integration didn’t start until 1954, and I remember racial riots in school in the late 1960’s. It wasn’t like someone snapped their fingers and VOILA–total integration. > > I do think a 1955 school would be lily white, except possibly for the cleaning and kitchen staffs. I went to high school in the deep south from 1956 to 1959. There were black students, and apparently it wasn’t such a big deal, since I can’t recall whether there were a few or a lot. Afterward, I went to college in California, and was surprised at how few black students there were. I had been working side-by-side with black folks in every part-time job I had during HS and afterward, so it surprised, and sometimes annoyed me that they were isolated from the rest (socially, if not legally). As for the band - yeah. WAOK played “race music” (e.g. Chuck Berry, etc.) and was on every Atlanta teenager’s car radio buttons. (Another button for when the parents were in the car was tuned to a station that played Sinatra or Patti Page.) So it wouldn’t be out of the question for a graduating class to hire a black band. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/248 "2017-08-06T06:33:57Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > Isn’t there a guy on NCIS that constantly compares various situations to movie plots? This was done all the time on _ **Remington Steele** _. The episode I remember best is the one where Brosnan cracked the case by realizing it was just like the plot of _ **The Producers** _. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/249 "2017-08-06T06:39:14Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > Is there some kind of unwritten law that fictional characters can never use the experiences of other fictional characters? I.E., no one on, say, “Bones,” would ever say, **I saw them do this on “Law & Order: SVU” the other night; let’s try it**. They did this a lot in the series produced by MTM back in the '80s. I first noticed it when a male stripper was hired for Lucy’s birthday on _ **Hill Street Blues** _, and the same thing was done a few weeks later for someone else on _ **St Elsewhere** _. The woman who hired the stripper there even said she got the idea from “some cop show.” ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/250 "2017-08-06T06:42:23Z")
> [@AWB](#): > > Because in the TV/movie world, computer programs can only “move” from place to place (computer to computer). Okay, but couldn’t the woman also have just been left in the transporter buffer until Doc had finished with Kim? I don’t remember the exact circumstances, but I don’t think they were under attack at the moment, or anything like that. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/251 "2017-08-06T06:58:49Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > Is there some kind of unwritten law that fictional characters can never use the experiences of other fictional characters? I.E., no one on, say, “Bones,” would ever say, **I saw them do this on “Law & Order: SVU” the other night; let’s try it**. I remember an episode of _The West Wing_ where Leo was trying to convince some television producers to continue their primetime coverage of a political convention. The TV people complained that the viewers were bored by the convention and they planned on running their regular primetime entertainment schedule. In the midst of this, there came news that a new candidate had entered the race and the producers all began scrambling to cover the emerging event. Leo said, _“Does this mean I won’t be watching Law and Order tonight?”_ ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/252 "2017-08-06T07:01:03Z")
[quote=“nevadaexile, post:163, topic:654401”] [li] **How did Cheers get so much business with only two fairly unattractive waitresses?** - Face it…Rhea Pearlman and Shelley Long aren’t going pack them in unless they were located in a bar in a remote mining town.[/li][/quote] Because it was a sports bar and Sam and (in the beginning) Coach still had loyal fans who remembered them. [Quote] [li] **Why didn’t more agents want to work on The X-Files?** - Mulder had an apparently unlimited travel budget, his own large office where his boss rarely stopped by, extremely limited oversightand sanction to do do almost whatever he wanted to. Why wouldn’t agents want to be in a unit like that?[/li][/quote] Because to perpetuate their coverup of the existence of extraterrestrials, the government deliberately kept the number of agents limited to a select few? [quote] [li]**Why didn’t Uncle Charlie (or Bub for that matter) on My Three Sons have a girlfriend?** - I mean even in the 1960s I would have to assume that older men still liked women. Why didn’t they show them having any female companionship? Were they closeted gay men? Or was it ED?[/li][/quote] Because inserting a woman into an all-male household would have led to romantic complications the series was not equipped to deal with. It was essential that Bub and Charlie be asexual seniors. (Though it was a very different show, a similar situation was seen in _ **Bachelor Father** _, where the housekeeper was a lovable asexual Asian.) [quote] [li] **Where did all of Thomas Magnum’s money come from?** - It’s clear that Robin Masters was paying for teh gas in his vehicles and he stayed on teh estate in exchange for his security services. Where did he get the money for the beer and the dates that he went on? And the kayaks. His cases never seemed to pay that much….[/li][/quote] Because he presumably received a salary in addition to all his perks. Even if it was only a nominal sum, it seemed he always had lots of money because he didn’t have to spend it on anything else. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/253 "2017-08-06T07:04:53Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Leo said, _“Does this mean I won’t be watching Law and Order tonight?”_ In at least one episode of _ **The Green Hornet** _, the bad guys were watching _ **Batman** _ on TV. The two series came from the same production company. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/254 "2017-08-06T07:10:54Z")
Would Magnum have received any sort of pension from his years in the navy? ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/255 "2017-08-06T07:18:18Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > I also fanwank that everyone in Hogan’s crew spoke perfect German. We just never “heard” it because the show translated for us. In the first episode with Lt DuBois, he asks LeBeau (in French) if the Germans at Stalag 13 know French. LeBeau snorts derisively and says (also in French) no, they only know German and English. So the POWS apparently would have had no problem communicating with the guards even if they didn’t know German. Schultz is, of course, listening to the above conversation the whole time and doesn’t understand a word. Later, when Hogan is trying to give Klink a red herring, he says he heard it from LeBeau. When Klink asks how LeBeau would know, Hogan says DuBois told him. Schultz immediately chimes in with “It is **true** , Herr Kommandant! I heard them speaking **French**!” ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/256 "2017-08-06T07:19:21Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > Would Magnum have received any sort of pension from his years in the navy? Yes, he would. Even more money to spend! ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/257 "2017-08-06T07:23:49Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > It was supposed to be more or less in central Germany. Hammelburg, I believe. Midway on a line between Berlin and Paris. And Hammelburg was just outside Dusseldorf and (IIRC) 60 miles from the North Sea. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/258 "2017-08-06T07:32:33Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > From the beginning, it was a “aren’t the 70s a crazy mix of yesterday’s moralism and today’s liberalism” kind of thing. Too bad every plot boiled down to mistaken identity. It should be noted that _ **Three’s Company** _ was the American version of a Britcom, _ **Man around the House** _. I’ve always wondered just how well the situational humor of the copy coincided with that of the original. I just realized there are episodes of this show on YouTube, so now I can find out! ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2017, 9:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/259 "2017-08-06T09:39:30Z")
As a kid, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out the Batpole costume-change system on the _Batman_ TV series. That way madness lies. The most plausible fanwank I’ve heard is that there’s a changing room located halfway down the shaft. Bruce and Dick stop there, change into their costumes, then jump back on the poles (or maybe there’s a second set of poles). Unfortunately, the producers invalidated this theory by showing us an “Instant Costume Change Lever” in the 1966 feature film adaptation. :mad: ---
**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:** [August 6, 2017, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401/260 "2017-08-06T09:45:39Z")
> [@AWB](#): > > Speaking of Voyager: > > [ol] > [li]Why was Harry Kim never promoted? Paris was given a field commission, demoted, and repromoted. [/li][li]Chakotay, Torres, and Paris were given field commissions, but only Paris got standard pips. Why ?[/li][li]Tom and B’lanna were the only ones to have a baby. Really? Over 140 consenting adults (most human) and no other babies? They were expecting to take decades to get home. Surely they weren’t thinking of remaining faithful to their S.O.s whom they never expected to see alive again, or at least until they were very old.[/li] > At some point, they’d _have_ to have babies, or there’d be nobody to crew the ship. > [li] Whatever happened to the Borg baby that Seven beamed over to the Doctor.[/li][/ol] I think an[online reviewer who I follow](http://sfdebris.com/) put it the best: “_Voyager_ is where potential goes to die.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silly-weird-perhaps-unanswerable-questions-about-movies-and-tv/654401.md?page=14)