Things which don't make sense in films

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

I find the Midichlorians to make perfect sense. Completely needless, but sense-making. They are an attempt to make the idea of the Force just a little bit less spiritual and more scientific. By the way, I don't get why some people have ever thought that anybody can become a Jedi. It has always been determined by the natural connection someone has to the Force. You can't "learn" to get a better connection with it.

 

I did enjoy the Prequel Trilpogy, but it just can't live up to the Original Trilogy. The story is great in the Prequel, but it seems Lucas has put too much emphasis on the effects and less on some of the acting. Some of the lines are very cheesy (I do like them - but they seem perhaps a little too cliché), and one particular scene between Padmé and Anakin has dialogue that leaves you cringing on the floor.

[ReZourceman]

Another Star Wars thing. Jake Lloyd managing to pull Natalie Portman.

 

This picture illustrates just how outrageous the situation is.

 

 

Definition of epic.

[Dog-amoto]

Natalie Portman has two necks! Noooooo!

 

While we're on the Star Wars theme - and bear with me for this one, I'm a little confused over the time frame involved in the whole Jedi training procedure. It sounds like a bit of a clusterfuck to me.

 

Ok, let's start at Episode 1. Yoda deems an 8 year old Anakin "too old" to begin Jedi training. So we are led to believe that training to be a Jedi involves a lifetime of commitment, hard graft and, shudder, midichlorians or whatever they're called.

 

Fast forward (or rewind) to Empire Strikes Back. After escaping Hoth, Luke bids his comrades goodbye to go the the Degobah system to find Yoda while they go to cloud city. Luke finds Yoda, then begins his training a fraction later in life than his father did. Obviously Yoda has changed his viewpoint about maximum age, which is understandable considering Luke's the last hope and all so we can let that one slide.

 

Anyway, my problem with the whole thing is that while Luke is being trained, his friends are chased to Cloud City and are then captured by the Empire, by which time, Luke has finished his training. So unless months and months worth of unseen Millennium Falcon travelling to cloud city footage was left on the cutting room floor, then the whole event passed by probably in an afternoon.

 

So whereas we have been led to believe that training as a Jedi is a long and arduous process, in reality, it can be done in a few hours. Which makes Luke seem even more like a whiny bitch because although he's been given superpowers in less time than it takes to cook a turkey, he moaned throughout all of it.

 

Yes, I know that Yoda told him his training wasn't over before leaving to save his friends, but when he came back in Return of the Jedi, he was told he had nothing more to learn and that his final test would be to face Darth Vader, the most powerful Jedi in the universe.

 

Bit of a steep learning curve isn't it really? It would be a bit like the final stage of your driving test being for you to win the Formula 1 championship.

[Pookiablo]

Natalie Portman has two necks! Noooooo!

 

While we're on the Star Wars theme - and bear with me for this one, I'm a little confused over the time frame involved in the whole Jedi training procedure. It sounds like a bit of a clusterfuck to me.

 

Ok, let's start at Episode 1. Yoda deems an 8 year old Anakin "too old" to begin Jedi training. So we are led to believe that training to be a Jedi involves a lifetime of commitment, hard graft and, shudder, midichlorians or whatever they're called.

 

Fast forward (or rewind) to Empire Strikes Back. After escaping Hoth, Luke bids his comrades goodbye to go the the Degobah system to find Yoda while they go to cloud city. Luke finds Yoda, then begins his training a fraction later in life than his father did. Obviously Yoda has changed his viewpoint about maximum age, which is understandable considering Luke's the last hope and all so we can let that one slide.

 

Anyway, my problem with the whole thing is that while Luke is being trained, his friends are chased to Cloud City and are then captured by the Empire, by which time, Luke has finished his training. So unless months and months worth of unseen Millennium Falcon travelling to cloud city footage was left on the cutting room floor, then the whole event passed by probably in an afternoon.

 

So whereas we have been led to believe that training as a Jedi is a long and arduous process, in reality, it can be done in a few hours. Which makes Luke seem even more like a whiny bitch because although he's been given superpowers in less time than it takes to cook a turkey, he moaned throughout all of it.

 

Yes, I know that Yoda told him his training wasn't over before leaving to save his friends, but when he came back in Return of the Jedi, he was told he had nothing more to learn and that his final test would be to face Darth Vader, the most powerful Jedi in the universe.

 

Bit of a steep learning curve isn't it really? It would be a bit like the final stage of your driving test being for you to win the Formula 1 championship.

 

I think the length of time of these events is longer than it appears in the film. Obviously, if they'd made it all seem longer, it probably would have made the film incredibly boring. It's just fast forwarded for viewer pleasure so to speak. We're never given a specific period of time for how long Han and Leia etc. have been in Cloud City before they encounter Vader.

 

Also, there's a time gap between Empire and RotJ. It's surprisingly quite long, despite what the end of Empire actually depicts. In this time, Luke does all that funky shit like creating his new lightsaber (remember the old one gets owned along with his hand). Although, not official at the time, Shadows of the Empire, is technically episode 5.5, and that explains what happens in the meanwhile. If you're interested in the Star Wars Expanded Universe, then it's probably the best book available in it.

[MoogleViper]

Another Star Wars thing. Jake Lloyd managing to pull Natalie Portman.

 

This picture illustrates just how outrageous the situation is.

 

 

Yeah but in Episode II, Anakin has aged by over ten years whilst Padame has only aged by about two.

 

Thus it all makes sense.

[Happenstance]

Natalie Portman has two necks! Noooooo!

 

While we're on the Star Wars theme - and bear with me for this one, I'm a little confused over the time frame involved in the whole Jedi training procedure. It sounds like a bit of a clusterfuck to me.

 

Ok, let's start at Episode 1. Yoda deems an 8 year old Anakin "too old" to begin Jedi training. So we are led to believe that training to be a Jedi involves a lifetime of commitment, hard graft and, shudder, midichlorians or whatever they're called.

 

Fast forward (or rewind) to Empire Strikes Back. After escaping Hoth, Luke bids his comrades goodbye to go the the Degobah system to find Yoda while they go to cloud city. Luke finds Yoda, then begins his training a fraction later in life than his father did. Obviously Yoda has changed his viewpoint about maximum age, which is understandable considering Luke's the last hope and all so we can let that one slide.

 

Anyway, my problem with the whole thing is that while Luke is being trained, his friends are chased to Cloud City and are then captured by the Empire, by which time, Luke has finished his training. So unless months and months worth of unseen Millennium Falcon travelling to cloud city footage was left on the cutting room floor, then the whole event passed by probably in an afternoon.

 

So whereas we have been led to believe that training as a Jedi is a long and arduous process, in reality, it can be done in a few hours. Which makes Luke seem even more like a whiny bitch because although he's been given superpowers in less time than it takes to cook a turkey, he moaned throughout all of it.

 

Yes, I know that Yoda told him his training wasn't over before leaving to save his friends, but when he came back in Return of the Jedi, he was told he had nothing more to learn and that his final test would be to face Darth Vader, the most powerful Jedi in the universe.

 

Bit of a steep learning curve isn't it really? It would be a bit like the final stage of your driving test being for you to win the Formula 1 championship.

 

To be fair Luke is very much Jedi Light. He would not stand a chance against a Jedi in their prime before they were all wiped out. He only seemed to learn the basics.

[EEVILMURRAY]

Yeah but in Episode II, Anakin has aged by over ten years whilst Padame has only aged by about two.

 

Thus it all makes sense.

It still doesn't make it right.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Officially, Padmé is only 14 in Phantom Menace (I think), though she looks much older, and thus she is "only" 5 years older than Anakin. I don't think there's anything serious between them in this film, only a child's infatuation and the cuteness effect. Later on it develops.

[Chris the great]

the whole idea of the jedi jumping around, sommersaulting and being ott in the new triliogy was justified as they were jedi in their prime, and that in the origional trilogy, obiwan was old, and vader mostly robot. to me this dosent fit as

A. yoda is old in episode 2, walking with a stick (well, twig), yet he does swass (some wild ass silly shit) during his battle

and B. that general grevious fella, hes a robot, yet can do some pretty sweet fighting.

 

either lucas idea of the jedi was techniqualy impossible during the origional trillogy, or they got all "lets see what we can do with the light saber fights and a computer" for the new trillogy. i belive the later is the case.

 

 

 

 

oh, and aniken making c3po. thats just fucking stupid.

[Hellfire]

About the training:

Ok, let's start at Episode 1. Yoda deems an 8 year old Anakin "too old" to begin Jedi training. So we are led to believe that training to be a Jedi involves a lifetime of commitment, hard graft and, shudder, midichlorians or whatever they're called.

 

Fast forward (or rewind) to Empire Strikes Back. After escaping Hoth, Luke bids his comrades goodbye to go the the Degobah system to find Yoda while they go to cloud city. Luke finds Yoda, then begins his training a fraction later in life than his father did. Obviously Yoda has changed his viewpoint about maximum age, which is understandable considering Luke's the last hope and all so we can let that one slide.

First, training varies according to the era, in the prequels there wasn't an overflow of Jedi but there were some so they would only start training them if they were young, now when Yoda trains Luke he specifically says he's too old to start the training, but since Luke's their only hope, there's no choice. And like you say, the training wasn't complete and he was pretty weaksauce, but since Vader was conflicted and pretty much all fucked up it wasn't a big deal. After ep VI, since they need as many Jedi as possible, many things changed, Jedi were trained after being adults, they could marry, etc...

A. yoda is old in episode 2, walking with a stick (well, twig), yet he does swass (some wild ass silly shit) during his battle

and B. that general grevious fella, hes a robot, yet can do some pretty sweet fighting.

Neither of those invalidate them being "super human" in the prequels. It's like saying that "grandpa A is 60 yrs and healthy, grandpa B is 90 and has er.. hair cancer, if grandpa A can jump in a pogo stick, so can B".

Obi Wan is human, while Yoda's race obviously lives very long, he can um... do swass, because he was one of the most Force sensitive Jedi there was. Basically he was on steroids compared to other Jedi. Vader is basically a burnt torso with machine implants that were destroyed over and over, grievous has Jedi blood, very high tech implants and was trained by Dooku.

 

Not to mention that they did that kind of stuff too and even more gargantuan stuff a lot before the prequels in the Expanded Universe.

Of course that it was pretty much because it was technically impossible and it takes a lot suspension of disbelief to make sense of some things, but they're explained. Good thing about any magical background is that you can always say "a wizard did it!". In this case, during the original trilogy, since most Jedi are dead and the Dark Side runs amok, the Force is pretty much absent or murky, thus, not as effective. It's farfetched, but hey, a wizard did it!

[MoogleViper]

Neither of those invalidate them being "super human" in the prequels. It's like saying that "grandpa A is 60 yrs and healthy, grandpa B is 90 and has er.. hair cancer, if grandpa A can jump in a pogo stick, so can B".

Obi Wan is human, while Yoda's race obviously lives very long, he can um... do swass, because he was one of the most Force sensitive Jedi there was. Basically he was on steroids compared to other Jedi.

 

What I think he means is (or at least I do if he doesn't) if he can do "swass" then why does he walk with a walking stick?

[Happenstance]

What I think he means is (or at least I do if he doesn't) if he can do "swass" then why does he walk with a walking stick?

 

I was wondering that again the other day while watching episode 2 and the best explanation I could come up with the explain it is that maybe he is so intune with the force that he can actually use it to manipulate his own body to do all those moves and as Anakin says in that movie, Jedi arent supposed to use the force all the time for normal reasons so Yoda wouldnt to walk.

[Chris the great]

either way. its a load of bollocks.

 

it can be explained, but its clearly just a case of got cgi? make story fit around it.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

I was wondering that again the other day while watching episode 2 and the best explanation I could come up with the explain it is that maybe he is so intune with the force that he can actually use it to manipulate his own body to do all those moves and as Anakin says in that movie, Jedi arent supposed to use the force all the time for normal reasons so Yoda wouldnt to walk.

Yeah, I wondered that, too, but I figured something along those lines. You can't call upon the Force constantly.

[Hellfire]

I was wondering that again the other day while watching episode 2 and the best explanation I could come up with the explain it is that maybe he is so intune with the force that he can actually use it to manipulate his own body to do all those moves and as Anakin says in that movie, Jedi arent supposed to use the force all the time for normal reasons so Yoda wouldnt to walk.

Pretty much.

 

either way. its a load of bollocks.

 

it can be explained, but its clearly just a case of got cgi? make story fit around it.

So what? It's explained, it's explained. And these Jedi abilities appeared in books and comics before the prequels, so it's not just a case of cgi. Also it looks awesome.

[Goron_3]

I just watched Back To The Future..one of my favourite movies ever.

But like yeah, i'm pretty sure if you channeled the power of a lightning bolt into a Flux-capacitor in the back of a car, the car would explode..

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Don't even get me started on the various flaws in the time travel theory in those films ... Don't get me wrong, I love them, but despite being very ambitious in trying to explain the theory and make it fit together, it does a poor job at it.

[Mokong]

With Yoda and needing a walking stick but then turning into Ninja Monkey when fighting. Could it not be possible he uses the walking the stick to give people a mistaken impression of his abilities? That way when he kicks their ass their more surprised.

 

Plus it could be a conservation of power. Using the walking stick saves him a ton of energy which he saves up if ever he needs to fight.

[jayseven]

Don't even get me started on the various flaws in the time travel theory in those films ... Don't get me wrong, I love them, but despite being very ambitious in trying to explain the theory and make it fit together, it does a poor job at it.

 

*ignites Danny* Whatever are you talking about? It all makes perfect sense. off you go. What is the time travel theory you speak of that the movie phails at so badly? really I just want everyone to shut the fuck up about fucking star wars, aight?

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

*ignites Danny* Whatever are you talking about? It all makes perfect sense. off you go. What is the time travel theory you speak of that the movie phails at so badly? really I just want everyone to shut the fuck up about fucking star wars, aight?

There are a lot of things and I'm too lazy to fit them chronologically. I'll just mention them as they come.

 

You asked for it.

 

The whole deal with disappearing in film 1 has some problems associated with it. First of all, it doesn't make sense that the people on Marty's family photo are disappearing, leaving an empty photo. The photo itself is still there, meaning someone took a picture of nothing. My main gripe with the disappearance thing, though, is that as soon as Marty disrupts the timeline, he should vanish immediately. This is turn would mean that he never existed to mess with the timeline at all, meaning he would reappear. It's a loop.

 

These things (with the picture being the exception) CAN be excused since the timeline theory deals in somewhat not so strict terms. Affecting the timeline is slow and gradual and paradoxes do happen. Another example is in the second film when Biff steals the time machine and changes the past. As evident by the rest of the timeline alterations in the films, changing the past and then going forward in time will simply speed you ahead in the current timeline, which means Biff wouldn't go "back" to the unchanged future he came from. This is also explained by the gradual changing of the timeline, as he seems to collapse after coming "back" to the future because he doesn't exist in that timeline, nor will that timeline continue to exist much longer.

 

Another problem with the theory is that time travellers remember events that didn't even happen because the timeline was changed. The general problem is that when dealing with a timeline theory where it is possible to alter the timeline, the problem of paradoxes occur, and it's very hard to resolve those paradoxes.

 

There a few other things that don't add up not related to the timeline theory, for instance that Doc wrote in his letter to Marty that the necessary parts weren't available in the old west to rebuild the time machine, yet at the end of the third film he has constructed a completely new and functional time machine. Also, the hover board is suddenly able to outrun the train after Doc gets on it despite Marty havign trouble keeping up seconds earlier.

 

I do really love those films, but they are far from flawless.

[Mokong]

There are a lot of things and I'm too lazy to fit them chronologically. I'll just mention them as they come.

 

You asked for it.

 

The whole deal with disappearing in film 1 has some problems associated with it. First of all, it doesn't make sense that the people on Marty's family photo are disappearing, leaving an empty photo. The photo itself is still there, meaning someone took a picture of nothing. My main gripe with the disappearance thing, though, is that as soon as Marty disrupts the timeline, he should vanish immediately. This is turn would mean that he never existed to mess with the timeline at all, meaning he would reappear. It's a loop.

 

Maybe he doesn't vanish immediately because there is a "cut off point", a point at which if he didn't set things right they never would be able to (his parents kissing at the dance), but before that point things can still go either way, so the possibility of things going "the right way" keeps his from vanishing right away.

 

These things (with the picture being the exception) CAN be excused since the timeline theory deals in somewhat not so strict terms. Affecting the timeline is slow and gradual and paradoxes do happen. Another example is in the second film when Biff steals the time machine and changes the past. As evident by the rest of the timeline alterations in the films, changing the past and then going forward in time will simply speed you ahead in the current timeline, which means Biff wouldn't go "back" to the unchanged future he came from. This is also explained by the gradual changing of the timeline, as he seems to collapse after coming "back" to the future because he doesn't exist in that timeline, nor will that timeline continue to exist much longer.

 

This i'll give ya cuz it annoys me too... When Doc and Marty go back and end up in the alternate 1985 Doc says they can't go to the future to stop Biff taking the Time Machine cuz they'd end up in an alternate future based on their current timeline...therefor so should Biff and Doc and Marty should be stuck without a timemachine and lost in time.

 

Another problem with the theory is that time travellers remember events that didn't even happen because the timeline was changed. The general problem is that when dealing with a timeline theory where it is possible to alter the timeline, the problem of paradoxes occur, and it's very hard to resolve those paradoxes.

 

This is simple if you go with the "alternate reality/universe" theories. Where if you went back and altered time the timeline your in shifts to an alternate reality but doesn't change the original timeline... you just get stuck in that new timeline, if that makes sense.

 

[jayseven]

Oh oh oooh I thought of the most obvious one - in LOTR why didn't they use that flying thing to drop the ring into the magma? No? ok i'll get my coat.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Maybe he doesn't vanish immediately because there is a "cut off point", a point at which if he didn't set things right they never would be able to (his parents kissing at the dance), but before that point things can still go either way, so the possibility of things going "the right way" keeps his from vanishing right away.

I see your point. Thing is, I see it as a either/or case. Either his parents end up together or not. But this again follows the logic of slowly changing timeline.

This i'll give ya cuz it annoys me too... When Doc and Marty go back and end up in the alternate 1985 Doc says they can't go to the future to stop Biff taking the Time Machine cuz they'd end up in an alternate future based on their current timeline...therefor so should Biff and Doc and Marty should be stuck without a timemachine and lost in time.

Exactly.

This is simple if you go with the "alternate reality/universe" theories. Where if you went back and altered time the timeline your in shifts to an alternate reality but doesn't change the original timeline... you just get stuck in that new timeline, if that makes sense.

 

Sure, it does. Except that'd ruin the plot entirely, for if Marty ends up back in an alternate past in film 1 and screws up that timeline, he wouldn't disappear as he was from a "safe" timeline in which his parents were still together.

[Roostophe]

Oh oh oooh I thought of the most obvious one - in LOTR why didn't they use that flying thing to drop the ring into the magma? No? ok i'll get my coat.

 

*Laughs*

 

To anybody who asks that, the best answer is: "Because the book wouldn't have been very good."

 

Or, maybe, if they're completely stupid: "Why don't you ask Tolkien?"

[EEVILMURRAY]

*Laughs*

 

To anybody who asks that, the best answer is: "Because the book wouldn't have been very good."

The book wasn't very good.