KSP Has Spoiled My Enjoyment Of Hollywood Space Movies

[Rocket In My Pocket]

21 minutes ago, Columbia said:

I was pretty much okay with the "inaccuracies" of Gravity (that I only read about and wasn't too bright to actually realize.) I assumed that the debris cloud was going in erradically different paths and crossed with those of Hubble, the ISS and Tiangong (thats.. rare.). Much like a rendezvous, except the rendezvous isn't deliberate, it's at high speed and the Shuttle's a sitting duck.

And if all else fails, the OST and CGI is glorious.

What? What maneuver is this?!

I mean, why did the German stay there flying straight? How did the P-51D or the pilot go through those intense G-Forces? In fact, how does the P-51 -- a WW2 Propeller-driven fighter -- do such a maneuver? It would be in an immediate stall afterwards, Jesus! It isn't even a matter of "Scientific Accuracy" but common sense?

There were numerous other things in the movie, too, that were pretty bad, too. Buuut let's stay on the topic of Space.

It's called a "Cobra turn" also know as "Pugachev's Cobra." (Although in Pugachev's version you don't finish the roll over, you just level the plane out.)

Although I'm pretty sure a P-51D wouldn't be able to pull one off, at least not one that tight.

That said, modern jets are capable of doing this but it's not considered very useful in an actual combat scenario. (As you pointed out, the German pilot had to be an idiot to keep flying straight and get killed, not to mention what a lucky shot it was.) I only know of one case where this was used successfully to get behind an enemy plane, and it was in the gulf war flying against Migs. Wish I could find the clip on Youtube where the pilot talks about it, saw it a long time ago.

Edited April 3, 2016 by Rocket In My Pocket

[spacebrick3]

Doctor Who is susceptible too. [Spoilers if you are watching this]If you watch the season 3 Christmas special (Voyage of the Damned) [Spoilers if you are watching this], you notice that they are in orbit above Earth. Yet as soon as the engines fail (read: sabotaged), they begin plummeting towards the ground. And no mention whatsoever of the G-forces they would have to pull out of a dive like that as they are reentering.

[dangerhamster]

Doctor Who is a national institution and thus exempt. If only they brought the ginger fox back.....

[regex]

2 hours ago, SSgt Baloo said:

Now, perhaps you understand why veterans yell at the screen during war movies. When I watched the first episode of The A-Team, Face disguised himself as a lieutenant to infiltrate a military installation. His hair was below the collar. In the real military, everyone he met would have made a snide remark about needing a haircut, and someone who outranked him would have collected him and told him "If you can't show me a waiver for that haircut, you'd better come with me. We're going to have a little talk with your commanding officer about your indifference to grooming regulations."

Last night we watched the fourth Hunger Games movie (I actually really enjoy the movies myself, books weren't too hot, Collins is apparently a better "screen adapter"... vOv) and my brother-in-law, who served in Afghanistan a few years back, is laughing at the little tactical mistakes everyone makes.

[Raven Industries]

3 hours ago, zarakon said:

KSP makes Interstellar an awful experience

I thought Interstellar was pretty good, but I suppose it's not everyone's cup of tea.

[MaxxQ]

2 hours ago, SSgt Baloo said:

Now, perhaps you understand why veterans yell at the screen during war movies. When I watched the first episode of The A-Team, Face disguised himself as a lieutenant to infiltrate a military installation. His hair was below the collar. In the real military, everyone he met would have made a snide remark about needing a haircut, and someone who outranked him would have collected him and told him "If you can't show me a waiver for that haircut, you'd better come with me. We're going to have a little talk with your commanding officer about your indifference to grooming regulations."
 

Knowledge works against the willing suspension of disbelief.

To be fair, television and movies are not permitted (by the military) to depict 100% accurate representations.  Any military movie you watch nowadays, you will *always* find some violation of AFR 3510 (and whatever the equivalent is for Army, Navy, and Marines).

At least, that's what I was told at Lackland 32 years ago.

[InterCity]

... And because of that I don't even own a TV. Dang you, education

• CSI Whatever: Oh, so this random piece of hair I found on the white hairy carpet in a house with multiple cats and dogs belongs to the murderer. Aaaand it contains a full DNA match. And this guy just happens to be in our database, because reasons. Cool, let's just have our bulletproof cop pick him up in a police chase.
• Dr. House: Go ahead, House. You won't get fired if you trash talk everyone from your boss to your patients, break multiple laws and ignore anatomy.
• Bones: Oh, so i found this Randomus Whatchimmacalitus in the victim's pelvis *points to the skull*. This particular species of a bug happens to live on the few square kilometres of forest in Brazil, and also in our culprit's trailer. Combine that with the 1080p HD picture of the culprit our tech gal made with her computer out of that grainy 320x240 video from security camera, and the baddie is busted!
• Cobra 11: 20km/h low speed car bump? KABOOM!
• The 100: ERMAHGERD! I got irradiated! *immediately gets burns and dies*.

Just to name a few series from top of my head.

And don't even get me started on movie computers. Punch a fist through the monitor = computer destroyed. Yeah.

Luckily I haven't watched any medical movies yet...

[MaxxQ]

1 hour ago, SSgt Baloo said:

When I saw 2001 with a friend at the Base Theater at McClellan AFB when I was 12, I was the most popular fellow in the auditorium. I had read the book a few years earlier, and I was therefore, the only person who understood what was happening and could explain what the cryptic scenes* were about.

* Most of them were. 

 

Found this a few years ago.  Doesn't reference the book at all, as this seems to be for those who have not read it, and are scratching their heads.  Obviously, not *the* final interpretation, but just one person's idea of 2001.  Pay special attention to the Kubrick quote at the beginning.  Not too bad, IMO:

http://www.kubrick2001.com/

Edit: One other inaccuracy in 2001 was when Dr. Heywood Floyd was having his lunch on the Aries Lunar Transfer craft.  He sucks his food up through a straw, but the food falls back down the straw as it would in gravity.  Much more easily seen in a theater, but it does happen.

Edited April 3, 2016 by MaxxQ

[Markush100]

I enjoyed The Martian up to the point where the blasted a hole in the ship. I just walked away after that.

2001 was a pain to watch, but it has probably the most memorability-Enjoyment ratio of any movie.

I ranted and cringed my way through Gravity.

[regex]

7 minutes ago, InterCity said:

And don't even get me started on movie computers. Punch a fist through the monitor = computer destroyed. Yeah.

"Double hacking" was my favorite.  How those actors could keep a straight face through that scene is beyond me...

[Motokid600]

5 minutes ago, Markush100 said:

I enjoyed The Martian up to the point where the blasted a hole in the ship. I just walked away after that.

 

What was inaccurate about that scene? 

[Robotengineer]

3 hours ago, Kosmognome said:

Not necessarily - The Martian is quite well researched and the orbital mechanics make sense. I much enjoyed the movie (I did not know about the book beforehand and was made aware of the film by the reddit challenges).

although I have to admit those cases are rare.

Meh. I think The Martian gets too much credit for being 'realistic'. You can't have sandstorms that powerful on Mars, and the orbital mechanics are not completely accurate. As a film, it's not bad, but not extraordinary. The book is better IMO. The Mars mission architecture used doesn't make much sense, it should have been Mars Direct (of course if it was Mars Direct, you wouldn't have the Hermes and Watney would have just gone to the Ares 4 ERV and gone straight to Earth without a rescue mission). 

Gravity had some obvious issues, but I don't think it deserves the bad rep it has gotten from the space nerd community. 

Interstellar was a pseudo realistic space opera, overly melodramatic in parts but interesting. 

2001 is just good. 

I think the main difference between these movies, aside from the varying levels of realism, is the level of optimism that they show. Gravity and to some extent Interstellar have a rather pessimistic view (though Interstellar becomes more optimistic at the end). While 2001 and The Martian are more upbeat and optimistic.

[Aetharan]

I have to throw in on this topic with the fact that having learned even the basics of orbital mechanics has utterly destroyed my enjoyment of much the Mecha genre of anime.  Oh, the stories can remain enjoyable, but those space battles?  Nope.  Especially when they're explicitly in a low Earth orbit, I find myself watching somebody launch a missile and comparing its travel relative to both the target and origin and just thinking "Well, that doesn't work."  Target's ahead of the attacker on the same orbit, or behind him, and either way the missile's just thrusting at him in the same way it would in the atmosphere, when in either of those cases the real result of that direction of thrust would be said weapon getting farther and farther away from the would-be victim.  Even worse is the whole 'constant thrust for constant motion' thing that Gundam seems to be stuck with.

Then along comes something like Aldnoah.Zero.  SPOILERS IN THIS PARAGRAPH, SKIP TO NEXT IF NECESSARY!  When the openly physics-breaking enemy tech isn't in play, or isn't strong enough to pull off what's needed, you hear about things like Hohmann transfers, and actually see aerobraking behind massive heatshields.  Two opposing groups who've made bases on asteroids whose low Earth orbits are some 150º off of each other immediately stop shooting the moment they've passed closest approach, because everything they've got shy of lasers doesn't have the acceleration to catch reach the enemy base.  Even the fact that bullets fired in space don't just stop at an arbitrary range is made use of, with one of the antagonists setting a trap by firing off several volleys at a carefully-calculated angle a few hours before the fight then luring his intended target into their path.

Ultimately, while a basic understanding of orbital mechanics makes the baseline space opera stuff harder to enjoy without chanting the MST3K mantra through every scene, I find that it actually makes the shows that pay attention to them that much more enjoyable as well.  When a show's creators show that they've done their research on some level, and you realize that two years ago, it would have gone over your head?  It feels like a bit of an accomplishment.

[regex]

11 minutes ago, Aetharan said:

I have to throw in on this topic with the fact that having learned even the basics of orbital mechanics has utterly destroyed my enjoyment of much the Mecha genre of anime.

Common sense utterly destroyed my enjoyment of the Mecha genre...

[magnemoe]

3 hours ago, SSgt Baloo said:

Now, perhaps you understand why veterans yell at the screen during war movies. When I watched the first episode of The A-Team, Face disguised himself as a lieutenant to infiltrate a military installation. His hair was below the collar. In the real military, everyone he met would have made a snide remark about needing a haircut, and someone who outranked him would have collected him and told him "If you can't show me a waiver for that haircut, you'd better come with me. We're going to have a little talk with your commanding officer about your indifference to grooming regulations."
 

Knowledge works against the willing suspension of disbelief.

This is true in any field, some of the Hollywood standards like the exploding cars was so stupid its rare now. 

Friend of mine thought Hollywood mess up gun handling and shooting on purpose to not teach people who should not have guns in the first place how to use them efficient. 

[Aetharan]

13 minutes ago, regex said:

Common sense utterly destroyed my enjoyment of the Mecha genre...

That goes back to the whole MST3K Mantra thing ("It's only a show...  it's only a show...")  One already has to suspend disbelief concerning little things like the square/cube law, and often basic military tactics to boot.  When it's all about shilling toys (*cough*Gundam*cough*), things get too thin to enjoy quickly.  If it's all just window-dressings to tell a story, it becomes better.  The less one has to ignore of his knowledge about how the world actually functions, the easier it is to enjoy the story being told.

[magnemoe]

33 minutes ago, Robotengineer said:

Meh. I think The Martian gets too much credit for being 'realistic'. You can't have sandstorms that powerful on Mars, and the orbital mechanics are not completely accurate. As a film, it's not bad, but not extraordinary. The book is better IMO. The Mars mission architecture used doesn't make much sense, it should have been Mars Direct (of course if it was Mars Direct, you wouldn't have the Hermes and Watney would have just gone to the Ares 4 ERV and gone straight to Earth without a rescue mission). 

Gravity had some obvious issues, but I don't think it deserves the bad rep it has gotten from the space nerd community. 

Interstellar was a pseudo realistic space opera, overly melodramatic in parts but interesting. 

2001 is just good. 

I think the main difference between these movies, aside from the varying levels of realism, is the level of optimism that they show. Gravity and to some extent Interstellar have a rather pessimistic view (though Interstellar becomes more optimistic at the end). While 2001 and The Martian are more upbeat and optimistic.

Problem with hard sci-fi is that it tend to be judged to hard. Especially in movies you have to do shortcuts to be done in 1.5-2 hours and tell an good story. 

[Markush100]

45 minutes ago, Motokid600 said:

What was inaccurate about that scene? 

As robotengineer said, the Hermes was pretty much useless. And how much delta V would an explosive decompression would even make. let alone all the destroyed piping and the shrapnel expelled. And that scene where watney punctured his glove was just ridiculous.

[Nathair]

2 minutes ago, Markush100 said:

And that scene where watney punctured his glove was just ridiculous.

That was seriously stupid departure from the book.

[Rocket In My Pocket]

8 minutes ago, Aetharan said:

When it's all about shilling toys (*cough*Gundam*cough*), things get too thin to enjoy quickly.

I'm alright with unrealistic aspects being explained away by non existent technology and/or materials. (Gundanium Alloy in this case.)

I find it helps my suspension of disbelief is there is no real world equivalent to compare it to.

Also... Gundam MS-08th team was pretty realistic as far as 100 foot tall walking robots go.

Spoiler

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2016 by Rocket In My Pocket

[MaxxQ]

Just now, Nathair said:

That was seriously stupid departure from the book.

Agreed.  The few minutes leading up to that, I kept thinking, "Don't puncture the glove.  Don't punct... crap!"

[Andem]

1 minute ago, Nathair said:

That was seriously stupid departure from the book.

Like, what the hell were you thinking stupid.

[ProximaCentauri12]

Unless it is a movie based on historical events (like Apollo 13) then things being "not realistic" is simply not a valid criticism.

Batman V Superman was a terrible movie, but not because it had unrealistic superheros. It was filled with plot holes, bad writing and bad acting, and terrible CGI.

[Hobbes Novakoff]

6 hours ago, Kosmognome said:

But, as a student of computer science, it not worse then seeing all the horrible, horrible "hacker" terminals and stuff like that in movies. Most of the times, IT is represented even worse then orbital mechanics on TV.

Even The Martian, a science movie in nearly all respects, screws it up horribly. Why the hell would a NASA supercomputer a) just plug into a laptop and b) have a GUI roughly resembling the menu screen of SUPERHOT?

[Kosmognome]

Just now, Hobbes Novakoff said:

Even The Martian, a science movie in nearly all respects, screws it up horribly. Why the hell would a NASA supercomputer a) just plug into a laptop and b) have a GUI roughly resembling the menu screen of SUPERHOT?

I don't recall that scene specifically, so it was likely unobtrusive enough not to bother me. Most depictions of computer usage on the mars and in mission control are actually somewhat plausible in the movie.

 

Why would a supercomputer not be able to interface with a laptop for access? I have not yet used a really big supercomputer yet, but every high-performance cluster I could work with had access by desktop or laptop, I never needed to use a specific terminal just for it.