In time travel movies, when the time traveler asks 'What year is this?!?' they're always treated like they're being weird for asking.

When in reality, if you go 'What year is this?!?' people will just say '2024. Crazy huh.' and you go 'Wtf where has my youth gone.'

And if you ask 'And what month??' people won't judge you, they'll just go like 'SEPTEMBER!!! Can you believe it?!?!' and you go 'WHAT?!? Last time I checked we were in May?!?'

That is a great point. Especially if you time travel to a period of Big Historical Events, when everybody's looking a little wild about the eyes.

"Hey, what month is it?"

"January already, can you believe it? I swear I was just at Pompeii, but no one's going there again."

In the same vein:

Stumbling into a diner and asking "What town is this" isn't weird, the workers will think you're on a road trip

If you ask them "Where's the nearest Nano Deck?" they'll assume it's a shop they've never heard of and say "Sorry, I don't know where any of those are"

Going into a store and telling a cashier "I need pods for my comm device" will just get you a "Never heard of those, maybe try Radio Shack?"

I think the problem is that people who create sci-fi movies have never had to work customer service jobs

Leeloo, The Fifth Element by Travis Charest

I had a very interesting discussion about theater and film the other day. My parents and I were talking about Little Shop of Horrors and, specifically, about the ending of the musical versus the ending of the (1986) movie. In the musical, the story ends with the main characters getting eaten by the plant and everybody dying. The movie was originally going to end the same way, but audience reactions were so negative that they were forced to shoot a happy ending where the plant is destroyed and the main characters survive. Frank Oz, who directed the movie, later said something I think is very interesting:

That’s a real gem of a thought in and of itself, a really interesting consequence of the fact that theater is alive in a way that film isn’t. A stage play always ends with a tangible reminder that it’s all just fiction, just a performance, and this serves to gently return the audience to the real world. Movies don’t have that, which really changes the way you’re affected by the story’s conclusion. Neat!

But here’s what’s really cool: I asked my dad (who is a dramaturge) what he had to say about it, and he pointed out that there is actually an equivalent technique in film: the blooper reel. When a movie plays bloopers while the credits are rolling, it’s accomplishing the exact same thing: it reminds you that the characters are actually just played by actors, who are alive and well and probably having a lot of fun, even if the fictional characters suffered. How cool is that!?

Now I’m really fascinated by the possibility of using bloopers to lessen the impact of a tragic ending in a tragicomedy…

If we shadows have offended

Think but this and all is mended

MOVIES + BATHS

Baths and Bubbles.

Near Future NASA  on film part 1: Space Shuttles, Next Generation Shuttles, and Shuttle-adjacent

1. Moonraker’s passenger shuttle 2. Heavy Metal’s personal shuttle 3. Airplane II: The Sequel’s passenger shuttle 4. Lifeforce’s Churchill Shuttle 5. Armageddon’s Freedom and Independence shuttles 6. Deep Impact’s Messiah shuttle and interplanetary booster 7. Species II’s Excursion shuttle and interplanetary booster 8. Mission to Mars’ Mars II interplanetary craft

jimmy mcgill + movie quotes

— better call saul cinematic references

1 + 10. Candyman (2021) dir. Nia DaCosta 2. The Karate Kid (2010) dir. Harald Zwart 3. The Lion King [stage musical] (1997) dir. Julie Taymor 4. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 (2010) dir. David Yates 5. Raise the Red Lantern [ballet] (c. 2005) dir. Zhang Yimou 6. Buffy the Vampire Slayer 7x15 – “Get It Done” (2003) dir. Doug Petrie 7. Twice [music video] (2007) by Little Dragon dir. Johannes Nyholm 8. Mulan (1998) dir. Barry Cook & Tony Bancroft 9. Raji: An Ancient Epic [video game] (2020) by Nodding Head Games