Stuff wrong with space movies

[TechnicalK3rbal]

This is my #1 peeve, and it applies to games as well.

#2 is having a 'top speed' that an engine is able to maintain.

Though in games, the top speed is a limit due to the fact that the game engine cant process/detect collisions at such speeds.

[Accelerando]

outside of hard science, the main thing i want to change in hollywood sci-fi is One Race, One Culture. it really takes me out of the immersion when the entire plethora of species in a science fiction epic are written like travel brochures on "The Quaint Mystic Mongoloid Peoples" or "The Warlike Negro Tribesmen Of The Dark Continent"

[vger]

Not to be ticky tacky, but that's not centripetal force. Centripetal force is the force acting inwards to keep you from flying off. (Swinging something at the end of a rope for example) All you are experiencing is inertia when you go flying off a carousel.

Point taken. Inertia is quite probably the most insulted thing in movies. And while I don't really care when I see an X-Wing doing dogfight moves in space, I get really cranky when I see a Space Shuttle do it.

[Fingal]

And for Armageddon:

-Engines always on WHILE LANDING.

-Shuttle flies like a fighter jet. Out of atmosphere. When in real life it's a cargo plane when it comes to handling...

-Physics lesson: Nuking an asteroid is not gonna work. Go back to kindergarten.

We could be here all night if we do Armageddon. In the opening sequence the dinosaur killing asteroid hits the wrong spot at the wrong angle and the reason I know it's the wrong place is because the continents are unchanged from today. Also the size the narrator gives for the explosion is woefully small (it probably sounded big) before the impact proceeds to consume the world with fire.

So that's five errors in the opening scene alone. It's possibly the worst film for science ever made.

[Creature]

So many levels to this. I hate it when a plot revolves around some scientific thing which is just wrong or completely made up so the plot has no real traction. This is especially a thing in japanese manga/anime stuff, which is the reason I don't watch it.

But then there's things that are there for the looks and story, like everything in Star Wars for example which I think is 100% fine. If you're starting to pick all the things that aren't scientifically plausible, you're missing the point of the movie.

Then there's the already mentioned One Culture, which also with humans incidentally just happens to be white, mostly male and english-speaking with the token other ethnics and an european/asian accent.

Next one is more a thing with books as they don't make nearly enough scifi/space television, but I just hate it when an author is so focused on making everything scientifically correct and "hard scifi" that they completely forget they're writing fiction which should have at least some character developement or generally a plot that's not "spaceships aren't jet fighters." I mean I love a good setting, but there should still be a story there. I think Alastair Reynolds does it right.

One thing to remember with real life science in general is that it's super boring to watch most of the time. Imagine a a realistic scifi space battle. There's just some dude with a supercomputer getting some data and then he reports back to his superior officer about what the drone fleet did during the seven milliseconds the entire engagement lasted. They now control the local space around planet X.

[Accelerando]

One thing to remember with real life science in general is that it's super boring to watch most of the time.

oh, stop that. there's no reason there can't be battles of wits in hard scifi battles, and any war in space is likely going to have a lot of politicking and intrigue surrounding it - not to mention, it's not necessarily just going to be about "one guy uses the supercomputer and wins everything, period". there's a good read on how combat within cisplanetary or translunar orbital space may well play out with much less calculation and premeditation than an interplanetary war between united planetary powers, on rocketpunk manifesto.

even in interplanetary wars, any spaceship with crew in it, and you may well have a few of these if crew are necessary for fleet command or maintenance, and especially for diplomacy, is going to have tension where the hull has to be patched up, shots are going to tear through the ship and space people, there may be a lot of drama even if you don't necessarily see the enemy at all times.

just because there aren't pew pew lasers doesn't mean real life science stuff is "boring", you just have to turn the camera where you don't usually expect

that said, indeed there's hard scifi that wanks its technology a lot - like planetes, which has a great story, yet it looks like while all engine technologies are completely realistic and everything, computer technology has not advanced further than the 2010s while the manga takes place in 2060s-70s. and that kinda disturbs the immersion a bit...

Edited May 9, 2014 by Accelerando

[EdFred]

Then there's the already mentioned One Culture, which also with humans incidentally just happens to be white, mostly male and english-speaking with the token other ethnics and an european/asian accent.

That's because movies wouldn't do very well all the actors spoke Mandarin or Swahili. If people want subtitles they will read a book - which is also most likely written in English.

[Accelerando]

That's because movies wouldn't do very well all the actors spoke Mandarin or Swahili. If people want subtitles they will read a book - which is also most likely written in English.

so yellow and black actors can't speak english, however accented, and the audience can't accept that they're speaking a foreign tongue that is being translated for us?

we could do with some more roles cut out for asian actors for sure - and latino actors, and black actors, especially who can do genuine accents. just because they're not white and speaking english to each other doesn't mean the movie can't translate for us

[EdFred]

so yellow and black actors can't speak english, however accented, and the audience can't accept that they're speaking a foreign tongue that is being translated for us?

we could do with some more roles cut out for asian actors for sure - and latino actors, and black actors, especially who can do genuine accents. just because they're not white and speaking english to each other doesn't mean the movie can't translate for us

If the actors can't speak English, I'm not going to watch the movie - along with the majority of movie goers. How many foreign language films are #1 at the US Box office? Like zero. Not to be Ameri-centric, but that's still where a significant portion if not the majority of money is made off of big movies. There's also zero need for any actors in a space movie to stray from their natural accent, so I don't get the issue.

Will Smith has done well, and he's not white. But he does speak English.

Plus any sort of space movie set in the future, any race - even ours - is going to have a universal language. Why? Communication requirements. Imagine a space crew of 12 people with 12 different languages and none of them speak the same as another. How well will that mission go?

Edited May 9, 2014 by EdFred

[Creature]

oh, stop that. there's no reason there can't be battles of wits in hard scifi battles, and any war in space is likely going to have a lot of politicking and intrigue surrounding it - not to mention, it's not necessarily just going to be about "one guy uses the supercomputer and wins everything, period". there's a good read on how combat within cisplanetary or translunar orbital space may well play out with much less calculation and premeditation than an interplanetary war between united planetary powers, on rocketpunk manifesto.

You're not wrong at all, it's just I've never seen a good implementation on film. It works in books, but as I said, science or operating complicated processes is usually very very boring to watch even though it can be interesting in itself. From what little I know of it, modern day high-tech combat is already just a bunch of guys watching screens or going over data and I'd say it gets only more automated and complicated in space with more advanced, stealthy, faster and more powerful weaponry. And this I think is why film makers just blatantly ignore lots of stuff. It gets in the way of the visual storytelling.

That's because movies wouldn't do very well all the actors spoke Mandarin or Swahili. If people want subtitles they will read a book - which is also most likely written in English.

Of course they'll speak to us in english usually even when they're "speaking another language", that's just a suspension of disbelief. I'm more talking about the within-setting cultural unity which is based on western culture and values and those alone, even when the civilization is not even Earth-based (from the top of my head Battlestar Galactica - I love it but it's essentially a western democracy through and through, all pretty homogenous throughout 12 planets).

[EdFred]

Of course they'll speak to us in english usually even when they're "speaking another language", that's just a suspension of disbelief. I'm more talking about the within-setting cultural unity which is based on western culture and values and those alone, even when the civilization is not even Earth-based (from the top of my head Battlestar Galactica - I love it but it's essentially a western democracy through and through, all pretty homogenous throughout 12 planets).

The assumption is that all civilizations will eventually homogenize. They either get dominated by one culture that takes over the planet, or they simply mesh. Even we are less segregated than we used to be. Give it another couple hundred years, and we'll all be slightly tan skinned with one common language standard.

[Accelerando]

If the actors can't speak English, I'm not going to watch the movie - along with the majority of movie goers. How many foreign language films are #1 at the US Box office? Like zero. Not to be Ameri-centric, but that's still where a significant portion if not the majority of money is made off of big movies. There's also zero need for any actors in a space movie to stray from their natural accent, so I don't get the issue.

Will Smith has done well, and he's not white. But he does speak English.

Plus any sort of space movie set in the future, any race - even ours - is going to have a universal language. Why? Communication requirements. Imagine a space crew of 12 people with 12 different languages and none of them speak the same as another. How well will that mission go?

maybe i phrased that wrong, but my point is that you don't need to not speak english to convey the meaning that the person on screen is not speaking english. creature raised the objection that most scifi movies are more full of white male native english speakers than anyone else in the human race, you countered "if the actors spoke mandarin or swahili then movies wouldn't do well" - so my point is why do non-white people need to speak foreign languages to convey that they are not native english? we can have other cultures in our movies without using subtitles, dubbed animu is certainly an example of pretty widespread foreign film that makes it to market in English speaking countries

[Accelerando]

You're not wrong at all, it's just I've never seen a good implementation on film. It works in books, but as I said, science or operating complicated processes is usually very very boring to watch even though it can be interesting in itself. From what little I know of it, modern day high-tech combat is already just a bunch of guys watching screens or going over data and I'd say it gets only more automated and complicated in space with more advanced, stealthy, faster and more powerful weaponry. And this I think is why film makers just blatantly ignore lots of stuff. It gets in the way of the visual storytelling.

that's true in the visual scifi market, though, there are very good implementations of the base concepts on film; they just never make it to the scifi market. spy flicks, submarine films, naval dramas, legal dramas, cop shows, somewhere between those is about where i'd place the "feeling" of realistic scifi - and add some HP lovecraft inspired horror for hard SF that ventures into the territories of aliens, advanced civilizations, so on. the tension of the investigation, the thrill of this crazy technology, the silent kill, grand strategies of war... hell i'd kill to see someone make a version of Burn Notice set in the 2200s, if anything

Edited May 9, 2014 by Accelerando

[Vaporized Steel]

I Facepalmed for 10 minutes with the movie armageddon when they performed the lunar slingshot boost. Using a engine exhaust flame equivalent to what seems of a 12000 kn srb on a shuttle without room for such propellent and some how gravity assisted with 22.500 mph behind a asteroid at supposedly a acceleration rate that caused 11 g and somehow the 400 pound fat mommy kid didn't break through from his chair or through the fuselage and survived.

[ScallopPotato]

Can we talk about the whole "space is an ocean" theme? I'm surprised no one has brought that up.

I was actually thinking about this earlier and I want to ask: Why is a bad thing for sci-fi movies to have inaccuracies? What sort of harm does it do to the quality of the movie or the public's understanding of space, other than annoy the nerds?

I can say that it can break the immersion in the movie, especially if it's already mediocre (i.e. armageddon). Secondly, it makes for bad habits when people start playing KSP.

But what does it do to the perceptions of the voting public or the inspired children, who likely have been receiving most of their impressions of space from science fiction and maybe the occasional education program? We can tell about the examples of people being inspired by star trek or star wars, or how movies like Deep Impact and Armageddon thrusted the dangers of asteroids into the public's consciousness.

I think one of the biggest problems is that it makes sci-fi writers used to working with the broken tropes instead of finding ways to be creative within the bounds of physical laws. It also makes it harder for genuine sci-fi fans to appreciate hard and near future sci-fi, because they think's going to be slow paced as 2001, when really it doesn't have to be.

[pebble_garden]

Here's a tiny thing that bugged me from an accuracy standpoint:

In Ender's Game (which I kinda liked!), the space cadets train in an orbiting station which spins for gravity. They train for freefall combat in a big glassy bubble that doesn't rotate, and sits along the station's rotational axis. So far so good.

But the entry to the training area is a non-rotating hallway, right on the central axis of the station, and while the cadets stand there, they experience weight. How the heck does that work? It's either an oversight or a case of directorial not-caring.

Obviously the cadets have to enter via the axis, because it's the only stable point of connection between the stationary bubble and rotating station. But if you're going to posit a station rotating for gravity, and design the zero-gee arena in a way that makes sense, why not just go that extra 2% and make the entry weightless as well? Ugh.

It didn't ruin the movie for me, I just wish they had been a little more diligent.

[Yoha]

Here's a tiny thing that bugged me from an accuracy standpoint:

In Ender's Game (which I kinda liked!), the space cadets train in an orbiting station which spins for gravity. They train for freefall combat in a big glassy bubble that doesn't rotate, and sits along the station's rotational axis. So far so good.

But the entry to the training area is a non-rotating hallway, right on the central axis of the station, and while the cadets stand there, they experience weight. How the heck does that work? It's either an oversight or a case of directorial not-caring.

Obviously the cadets have to enter via the axis, because it's the only stable point of connection between the stationary bubble and rotating station. But if you're going to posit a station rotating for gravity, and design the zero-gee arena in a way that makes sense, why not just go that extra 2% and make the entry weightless as well? Ugh.

It didn't ruin the movie for me, I just wish they had been a little more diligent.

The film is poor compared to the book (unsurprisingly). The whole space station is indeed rotating while the battle room sits in the middle. Ender asks the question of why they experience gravity in the hallway and get a “there are things you should not knowâ€Â. It bugged me too.

Faster then light video phone links,

I mean if it takes like 26min to send intructions to couriosity on mars how can they expect us to believe that a starship on the other side of the galaxy/universe depending on movie can simply dial earth and have a 2 way convo with perfect reception

I cant even call do that when calling locally

Ender's Game use ansibles, which are special devices that allow instant communications (but cost a lot). Bear in mind that physics does not forbid us to make such gear, as long as we are not pretending to move stuff faster than light in space. You could basically take a shortcut through space curvature.

Edited May 11, 2014 by Yoha

[pebble_garden]

Yeah, I don't have a problem with FTL comms. There's enough progress being made in quantum entanglement to suggest it's not impossible.

[deadshot462]

Just in general - the notion that when you're in space, you're now weightless and won't fall back down to the planet.

[Brethern]

Here's a tiny thing that bugged me from an accuracy standpoint:

In Ender's Game (which I kinda liked!), the space cadets train in an orbiting station which spins for gravity. They train for freefall combat in a big glassy bubble that doesn't rotate, and sits along the station's rotational axis. So far so good.

But the entry to the training area is a non-rotating hallway, right on the central axis of the station, and while the cadets stand there, they experience weight. How the heck does that work? It's either an oversight or a case of directorial not-caring.

Obviously the cadets have to enter via the axis, because it's the only stable point of connection between the stationary bubble and rotating station. But if you're going to posit a station rotating for gravity, and design the zero-gee arena in a way that makes sense, why not just go that extra 2% and make the entry weightless as well? Ugh.

It didn't ruin the movie for me, I just wish they had been a little more diligent.

If you read the book, it makes it pretty clear the entire spinning things is a ruse. Humanity recovered artificial gravity technology from the buggers.

[pebble_garden]

If you read the book, it makes it pretty clear the entire spinning things is a ruse. Humanity recovered artificial gravity technology from the buggers.

Oh, well that makes perfect sense. Just like the British had a way of breaking the German Enigma code, but couldn't act on it without betraying their ability to read the encrypted messages.

So in the case of Ender's Game (the movie) why use the jealously guarded secret of gravity control in such a frivolous case as the entrance to the freefall training arena?

I have read the book, but it was decades ago so I don't recall little details like that.

[Brethern]

Oh, well that makes perfect sense. Just like the British had a way of breaking the German Enigma code, but couldn't act on it without betraying their ability to read the encrypted messages.

So in the case of Ender's Game (the movie) why use the jealously guarded secret of gravity control in such a frivolous case as the entrance to the freefall training arena?

I have read the book, but it was decades ago so I don't recall little details like that.

I think the reasons used in the book is that most of the information regarding the buggers is on a need to know basis, the battle school is different in that only the best make it everyone else washes out. So they hide the tech behind station rotation so that anyone who washes out wouldn't know the difference.

In the case of anyone smart enough to see the holes in the explanation would be the ones who they want for command.

Just my two cents.

[Yoha]

If you read the book, it makes it pretty clear the entire spinning things is a ruse. Humanity recovered artificial gravity technology from the buggers.

The ansible was another technology they got from the buggers but never understood. It felt a little bit of an excuse from the author not to have to explain himself, but that's still better than movies where they try to justify everything with dubious claims.

[Red Iron Crown]

We could be here all night if we do Armageddon. In the opening sequence the dinosaur killing asteroid hits the wrong spot at the wrong angle and the reason I know it's the wrong place is because the continents are unchanged from today. Also the size the narrator gives for the explosion is woefully small (it probably sounded big) before the impact proceeds to consume the world with fire.

So that's five errors in the opening scene alone. It's possibly the worst film for science ever made.

Have you seen The Core? It makes Armageddon look like a physics Ph.D thesis.

[KOCOUR]

I dont care about scientific mistakes if the storry is good enough.

What bothers me in scifi films theese days is.

- Bad story. Apparently modern film makers got an impression that any **** can be succesfull if you label it Sci Fi. Most of the TV production especially Stargate series.

- Using film for propagation of autors ideological, political, or religious beliefs. It is ok if you put a bit of your own beliefs in your creation, but revolving entire story around them

changes the storry to propaganda. U.S. "Book of Eli"( religious) and "Elisyum" (That one reminded me of the old comunist propaganda films ,i know from my part of the world hystory, so much), Austria "the Cloud" (enviromental antinuclear).

- Million times repeated cliches. like defusing the bomb just second before explosion. Seriously it was entertaining the first few thousand times, but now it is getting annoing.

- Awkward (wannabefunny, wannabebadass, wannabesmart) characters. "PACIFIC RIM" The characters in this piece of **** was so bad, i just refuse to believe that the same guy who made Labirinto del fauno made this.

- Misplaced Actors. Profesional soldier played by 20yearold 60kg hairstylemodel/emoguy or Fashionmodel annorectic girl. Well this is more of an issue with cartoons than normal films, but still bothers me.

- Katanas. I maybe saw one or two Scifi with katana in it, that was somewhat OK. But in General, if there is Katana in SciFi, then the film is trash.

- Putting Martial arts in scenes where shooting would fit more. This is not problem of only SciFi but almost every action film ever.