# Was (this) inspired by (that)? Similar plots in movies/TV **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 22, 2004, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462 "2004-02-22T03:50:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**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:** [February 22, 2004, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/1 "2004-02-22T03:50:23Z")
Occasionally I’ll see a common theme from two unrelated sources and I’ll wonder: Did the makers of movie/TV show X take their inspiration from earlier movie/TV show Y? For example, was _Lost In Space_ (a family journeying through space in a saucer-shaped craft) inspired by the Twilight Zone episode _Third From the Sun_ (a family steals a saucer-shaped spacecraft to escape an upcoming atomic war)? Any other examples where you’d swear the writers were influenced by an earlier appearence of a theme? ---
**Author:** ![Helena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c68b51/32.png) [@Helena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helena)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/2 "2004-02-22T04:22:51Z")
I’ve been wanting to ask about _The Three Amigos_, _A Bug’s Life_, and _Galaxy Quest_. I’ve been told they’re all based on _The Seven Samurai_, but I haven’t seen that one. The samurai aren’t actually performers/actors, are they? ---
**Author:** ![sleeping](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/839c29/32.png) [@sleeping](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleeping)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/3 "2004-02-22T04:35:16Z")
A lot of the Family Guy plots are very similar to some Simpsons episodes, enough that I think the entire series is an attempt to rekindle the Simpson humor (which has obviously declined since Groening left to work on Futurama). ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/4 "2004-02-22T05:18:14Z")
Jennifer Connelly has a scene of her standing on a foggy pier in _The House of Sand and Fog_ that is eerily similar to earlier scenes in both _Requiem for a Dream_ and _Far Harbor_ yet all three directors swear that it was purely coincidental and that none of them watched the other films. _The Magnificent Seven_ is a more-or-less direct remake of _The Seven Samurai_ if that helps. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/5 "2004-02-22T05:32:35Z")
That’s actually _Dark City_, not _Far Harbor_. And _Dark City_ came first, so it couldn’t have borrowed it from the other two movies. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/6 "2004-02-22T05:41:22Z")
Since _Memento_, there have been several other films featuring characters with some form of anterograde amnesia. I can believe that Dory in _Finding Nemo_ was inspired by the common belief (popularized by Ani DiFranco) that fish have no memories. However, every time I see an ad for _50 First Dates_ I imagine a pitchman saying “It’s _The Wedding Singer_ meets _Memento_!” ---
**Author:** ![Darkhold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@Darkhold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darkhold)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/7 "2004-02-22T05:48:38Z")
> [@](#): > > Since Memento, there have been several other films featuring characters with some form of anterograde amnesia. ahh and didn’t Dana Carvey have a movie Clean Slate before Memento?!?!?! ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/8 "2004-02-22T05:53:04Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Any other examples where you’d swear the writers were influenced by an earlier appearence of a theme? I’d swear that Stephen King was thinking of _Watership Down_ and _The Lord of the Rings_ when he wrote _The Stand._ After all, the first half of his book is where various someones step up as a unexpected leaders to herd a bunch of _hlessi_… er, stragglers to the Promised Land. And then one theme melts into another as the new colony decides to send some volunteers to the Enemy to do mighty deeds. Or maybe King just read a lot of Joseph Campbell. Who knows? ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/9 "2004-02-22T07:30:57Z")
Ken Russell’s _Performance_ – shamelessly cribbed from Ingmar Bergman’s _Persona_. _Mirai Ninja_ (_Warlord_) (Japan, 1988) visually very similar to _Star Wars_, with some plot elements intact-- plot elements which Lucas borrowed from Kurasawa’s _Hidden Fortress_, so I guess it’s a three-fer. (Should we bring _The Wizard of Oz_ into it, just to be crazy?) _Twelve Monkeys_ – from the short film (more of a narrated slide-show, actually-- there’s only one scene with some subtle motion in it) _La Jetee_. _Sunset Boulevard_, from Eric von Stroheim’s unfinished _Queen Kelly_. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/10 "2004-02-22T09:05:48Z")
_Twelve Monkeys_ is an adaptation of _La Jetee_ - that was credited. ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/11 "2004-02-22T13:19:08Z")
> [@Helena](#): > > I’ve been wanting to ask about _The Three Amigos_, _A Bug’s Life_, and _Galaxy Quest_. I’ve been told they’re all based on _The Seven Samurai_, but I haven’t seen that one. The samurai aren’t actually performers/actors, are they? Another film inspired by _The Seven Samurai_ is Roger Corman’s _Battle Beyond the Stars_. But trust me, this is not a film you want to spend money on. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/12 "2004-02-22T13:36:11Z")
The first time I saw _Titanic_ at the movies I insisted to my partner that I had seen the “winning tickets on the Titanic” bit before. I figured _Twilight Zone_ but I have never tracked down the source of my memory. ---
**Author:** ![Dizzy\_Fingers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dizzy\_Fingers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dizzy_Fingers)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/13 "2004-02-22T13:49:31Z")
The Simpsons episode “Bart’s Comet” looks like it was based on “Deep Impact,” which was not released until three years after the episode aired. . . ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/14 "2004-02-22T17:53:39Z")
Having bought the DVD just the other day, I’ll toss out that I’m one of those who believe **The Lion King** was based on/a rip-off of **Kimba: The White Lion.** ---
**Author:** ![Wumpus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8c91f0/32.png) [@Wumpus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wumpus)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/15 "2004-02-22T18:10:53Z")
There was a Simpsons episode where Homer teams up with Mel Gibson to remake Mr. Smith Goes To Washington–this time as a gory action movie. The big joke in the sequence has Mel goring someone to death with an American flag as a parody of how tastless and over-the-top Homer’s movie is. …The thing is, this aired several months _before_ Mel pulled the same stunt, perfectly seriously, in The Patriot. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/16 "2004-02-22T19:20:16Z")
> [@Sublight](#): > > Another film inspired by _The Seven Samurai_ is Roger Corman’s _Battle Beyond the Stars_. But trust me, this is not a film you want to spend money on. I strongly disagree. “But, the Varda says ‘That which is not organic-’ " " ‘Shall not destroy that which is.’ I know.” “Now, Zaydar wears his left foot.” “Lazuullliiiiiiiiiiii !” An actual space cowboy, complete with stetson. A spaceship with breasts And starring, John boy! This is definitely an MST3k, so-bad-it’s-good film. ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_Rhosis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@Sir\_Rhosis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_Rhosis)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/17 "2004-02-22T19:39:59Z")
LOST IN SPACE always struck me as being based on THE SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON; even believe it may have been originally called SPACE FAMILY ROBINSON (or maybe that was an unrelated comic). Sir Rhosis ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/18 "2004-02-22T19:44:34Z")
There were a number of X-Files episodes which seemed to take inspiration from past films or TV shows. Two that stand out in my memory are: the episode with the deformed killer twin (a la _Basket Case_ ) and the chicken cannibal episode which ends with the bad guy’s mask being pulled off, revealing the Sheriff which was clearly inspired by Scooby Doo. ---
**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/19 "2004-02-22T19:55:27Z")
> [@Helena](#): > > I’ve been wanting to ask about _The Three Amigos_, _A Bug’s Life_, and _Galaxy Quest_. I’ve been told they’re all based on _The Seven Samurai_, but I haven’t seen that one. The samurai aren’t actually performers/actors, are they? They are, as far as film is concerned, the archetypal “reluctant heros” and Kikuchiyo, Toshiro Mifune’s character is an impostor. And while we are at it, it is a wonderful film, one of my all time favorites (If you don’t mind 206 min of b&w subtitled japanese 🙂 ). ---
**Author:** ![Wumpus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8c91f0/32.png) [@Wumpus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wumpus)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462/20 "2004-02-22T21:04:41Z")
A Bug’s Life, Three Amigos, and Galaxy Quest are all a combination of two basic storylines. First, the Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven story: embattled villagers hire a group of mercenaries to defend their town against the bad guys. (Three Amigos spoofs Magnificent Seven explicitly in places, if I recall correctly.) Second, what you might call the Brave Little Tailor storyline: cowardly wimp is mistaken for someone brave and powerful (you might also call it the Danny Kaye/Bob Hope storyline, since they both played that role more than once.) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-inspired-by-that-similar-plots-in-movies-tv/230462.md?page=2)