Good Science and Bad Science And Lack Thereof In Science Fiction Films and TV Series

[BAYLOR]

Prometheus featured a scientist crewmember removing his helmet after summarily "testing the chemical composition of the atmosphere"

There were not many bright bulbs in that whole crew.

 

[Venusian Broon]

There were not many bright bulbs in that whole crew.

Yes, it also irritated me that the geologist who had brought gizmos to map the space of the alien weapons storage space, left the party first with the biologist (why did he leave when he found evidence of something alien and animal - wasn't that his frickin' job to study such things ?!?!?) and got lost on the way back to the ship - being beat back by the rest of them somehow...

One could possibly argue that such mistakes might all add up, but no, I found it all a bit silly.

 

[hardsciencefanagain]

go see this one VEEB

 

[hardsciencefanagain]

I remember dust settling like there was gravity in ARMAGEDDON
Uhm..
the lack of inertia during high speed manoeuvres?
er...
not counting Transformers?

 

[J Riff]

Well, try The Astounding She Monster. 1957? ... in which the 'rulers of the Galaxy' send a beautiful gal to Earth - to grant us admission to the Galactic Federation. The Earthers manage to kill the gal, but there is a note, a hand-written note on a little piece of paper, inside her locket. A note from the Galactic rulers. A hand-written note, not a radio message or a UFO, just a note. I can't get over it. )

 

[BAYLOR]

Yes, it also irritated me that the geologist who had brought gizmos to map the space of the alien weapons storage space, left the party first with the biologist (why did he leave when he found evidence of something alien and animal - wasn't that his frickin' job to study such things ?!?!?) and got lost on the way back to the ship - being beat back by the rest of them somehow...

One could possibly argue that such mistakes might all add up, but no, I found it all a bit silly.

Your in an alien space ship you encounter a mysterious snakelike animal life form that you know nothing about and you decide to pet it? Not the best Idea.

 

[BAYLOR]

Well, try The Astounding She Monster. 1957? ... in which the 'rulers of the Galaxy' send a beautiful gal to Earth - to grant us admission to the Galactic Federation. The Earthers manage to kill the gal, but there is a note, a hand-written note on a little piece of paper, inside her locket. A note from the Galactic rulers. A hand-written note, not a radio message or a UFO, just a note. I can't get over it. )

A written note, that one is pretty bad . Of course is was a B movie with a limited budget.

And why would they send a representative whose touch that can causes instant death ? Wouldn't that defeat the whole message of " We come in Peace" ? And why land in the boonies where you will likely run into people who will misunderstand you , wouldn't have been a better idea to land at the UN building ?

 

[BAYLOR]

The First Spaceship on Venus 1959 A ship from Earth finds the remains of an advanced civilization on Venus. Im thinking that around this time , scientist already had a idea that Venus was inhospitable to any kind of life.

 

[Venusian Broon]

The First Spaceship on Venus 1959 A ship from Earth finds the remains of an advanced civilization on Venus. Im thinking that around this time , scientist already had a idea that Venus was inhospitable to any kind of life.

Apparently it was still in debate on what lay beneath the Venusian clouds at that time, although there had been some readings from Earth observations, many still thought they might not be correct. It was the first pass-by from a probe in 1962, a few years after that movie, that settled that there was no steaming hot jungle there, but a dry extremely hot hell instead.

 

[BAYLOR]

Apparently it was still in debate on what lay beneath the Venusian clouds at that time, although there had been some readings from Earth observations, many still thought they might not be correct. It was the first pass-by from a probe in 1962, a few years after that movie, that settled that there was no steaming hot jungle there, but a dry extremely hot hell instead.

I seem to recall an old documentary piece on Venus with Carl Sagan taking an atmospheric analysis.

 

[Jennifer L. Carson]

Anyone watching the TV show Dark Matter? Just watched the episode where they had to fix some kind of coupler. Problem was, it was outside the ship. I didn't think twice about this till they finally went outside to fix it...then I had a problem with it. First it was in a corridor defined on at least three sides (essentially a hall with an end wall, forth wall was never visible). Overhead were joists/struts on the sides and across the gap, making the "roof" area look like it had large panels missing. So my first question is, why did they make a corridor that was 4/5th the way to being enclosed? Why not throw those panels in place and enclose it? Especially since (second complaint) it was lined with what appeared to be access panels to ship systems (and indeed, the robot character fixing the coupler opened one of these up to reveal said part, so I can only assume all the panels are for that purpose). So again I ask...why not enclose the last 5th of the corridor so you can fix it from the safety of the ship and not have to wear a suit for a space walk? Thirdly & finally (and the reason, no doubt, the the repair corridor was open), owing to radiation-generated electrical surges across the hull, the robot character gets zapped into shutting down. Crew members go out and get her. When they get there, they switch off the electromagnetic boots holding her to the hull. I wasn't sure, so I asked hubby, "Would they still be working if all her other electronic components got a big enough jolt to shut down?" He didn't think so. Any one else on that subject? I know computer components can be more delicate.

 

[Dennis E. Taylor]

From Galaxy Quest: What is this thing? I mean there's no useful purpose for there to be a bunch of choppy, crushy things in the middle of a hallway!

Whenever some book or show presents some stupid plot device to force a scenario, I remember the choppy, crushy things.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

My favourite parody of all that's daft on TV /Cinema so called SF.

 

[BigBadBob141]

In the recent film "Elysium" a shuttle craft is shown approaching a wheel shaped space habitat.
Instead of docking at the axis it fly's inside the ring, it's then that you see there is no inner wall.
It lands inside on the inner side of the outer wall where all the houses would be.
I suppose the idea is that the side walls would be keeping the air in but I can't see this happening in real life, if there nothing to contain the air it would just leak straight into space.
Larry Niven did the same thing in "Ringworld" but the walls there were hundreds of miles high.
P.S. A chap I know at work said one of the reasons he divorced his first wife was that after watching the space walking scene in the film "Destination Moon" she said that's silly you could not do that because the wind would blow you away!!!

 

[Ray McCarthy]

side walls would be keeping the air in

You'd need impracticable rotation speed!
Also the diameter of Ringworld allows illusion of 1G approx without excessive Coriolis forces. Though no currently known material is strong enough to make ringworld.

 

[BAYLOR]

You'd need impracticable rotation speed!
Also the diameter of Ringworld allows illusion of 1G approx without excessive Coriolis forces. Though no currently known material is strong enough to make ringworld.

Then there's the problem of what to do about potential asteroid and meteorite collisions on the ring.

 

[JunkMonkey]

My most recent "Duh Wha...?" moment came in Lockout (2012) - an overlong (it was 95 minutes and felt like two hours) violent piece of action sh*t which proved, yet again, that all futuristic prison movies are crap.

As a measure of the overwhelming stupidity of the script I offer in evidence the fact that our heroes' bosses, safe on-board an orbiting police station and closely monitoring the situation, only notice the gigantic orbiting space prison has deviated from its usual orbit and is plunging towards the earth after it has collided with, and totalled, the International Space Station....

Later the hero and heroine jump out of the plummeting space prison (wearing space suits) and start to fall to earth faster than it is falling. (Huh? I'm really not sure how that works but the script writers obviously couldn't think of another way to get our protagonists out of the way of the cataclysmic explosion about to occur - the usual bomb with a digital display timer on the outside - YAWN!)

I apologise if I have posted this here before but my favourite all time science Duh! moment is this cracker from Manhunt in Space (Two Rocky Jones TV episodes nailed together into the rough simulacrum of a movie.) in which Professor Newton's Cold Light Device, is explained, almost thusly, by heroic Rocky Jones to his comedy side-kick 'Winky'

Quote:
"The filament in the vacuum tube is quickly bought to a temperature of about minus 342 degrees centigrade. Heat can affect us so that images that can't normally be seen, can be seen by the human eye - like the mirages that appear in a hot desert. Intense cold can have the opposite effect and blot out images that are actually there. When this is switched on, the rays sent out by the terribly cold light will surround the spaceship and make it invisible."

Why this incredibly cold ray doesn't freeze the tits off anyone within a couple of miles, or coat the ship in a frosting of ice when it lands on a planet with atmosphere is never explained - though it may be the reason I can never find anything in my freezer when I'm looking for it.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

temperature of about minus 342 degrees centigrade.

That's clever
Out the other side of absolute zero. (-273.13 C approx)

You are looking at 1000 C to 2000 C for a vacuum tube filament depending on type
http://www.john-a-harper.com/tubes201/

 

[JunkMonkey]

Rocky Jones was a good place for WTF? science moments, in Crash of the Moons (1954), another TV movie nailed together from episodes, our hero dons a space suit to deal with a red hot meteorite (in interstellar space?) that has become attached to his ship's tail planes. He deals with it by taking a fire hose out the airlock and squirting the thing with water - then shooting it with a hand gun till it falls off.

I nearly hurt myself laughing.

 

[BAYLOR]

Rocky Jones was a good place for WTF? science moments, in Crash of the Moons (1954), another TV movie nailed together from episodes, our hero dons a space suit to deal with a red hot meteorite (in interstellar space?) that has become attached to his ship's tail planes. He deals with it by taking a fire hose out the airlock and squirting the thing with water - then shooting it with a hand gun till it falls off.

I nearly hurt myself laughing.

Ive seen a few episodes of Rocky Jones. It did make attempts at being as scientifically as accurate as the tv executive would allow. Though It is marginally better then most other science fiction tv offerings in that era, it is still a very painful tv show to watch.