'Historical Documents' Plot Hole
-
Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Galaxy Quest
pianomangidley — 14 years ago(September 29, 2011 08:04 AM)
So, if the Thermians all believed that all the video feed they received from planet Earth was legitimate "historical documentation" instead of fabrications, what did they think when they saw cartoons? Furthermore, what about those behind-the-scenes features or anything else that explained the process of making film, theatre, or acting in general? And since the concept of lying itself is something that comes up in television showsfictional and nonfictional alikethen how could they have possibly missed this, since they seemed to be such obvious fans of our planet's television programming?
-
virgiltx — 14 years ago(September 29, 2011 06:58 PM)
I only caught that they watched Galaxy Quest, not anything else. You could make a case that they recorded transmissions over a period of a few months, at a certain opportune time for the reception of Galaxy Quest only, on one certain frequency.
In other words, for them to be able to isolate a signal, it might have been a matter of the earth's position in its solar orbit, and its own rotational position at a certain tim of day,
-
scribe1270 — 13 years ago(February 08, 2013 11:51 PM)
I agree with virgiltx. Isolating a signal from all the background noise can't be easy since the Thermians home world has to be around 18 light years or maybe a little less from the Earth. Say they are some 16 light years from us and the show went off the air 18 yrs ago. They would probably have caught the last year or so of the show and any re-runs that they stumbled across after that. And even if they heard of the concept of lying or something that doesn't mean they would have understood it. A blind person can understand that people with sight see things in color but they can't understand colors themselves. How do you describe red or blue or green?
-
Cornelius_Sneed — 14 years ago(September 29, 2011 11:54 PM)
Remember that this is spoofing the original Star Trek series, which ran in the sixties. Television was quite a bit different back then. Reference was made to Gilligan's Island, to which the Thermians responded "Those poor people."
However, during the sixties there were almost no behind the scenes features, or things that explained the process of making entertainment in general, unless you count a few things like short features that showed how Disney cartoons were made and such. Television in nearly every household was a pretty recent thing, and people just watched it for entertainment. Most people were not interested in how shows were made, they just wanted to see their shows.
Also, remember that while television broadcasts travel at the speed of light, the nearest star to us is over four light years away, and it is unlikely the Thermians would be from anywhere nearly so close. The premise of the movie seems to be that the Thermian home world was many times that distance, so they received programming that was decades old.
Regarding cartoons, I don't recall that being addressed. I suppose you could call that a plot hole, if you like, although since cartoons of the day very rarely involved real people, one might think the Thermians at least savvy enough to discern that they were not historical documents. -
virgiltx — 14 years ago(September 30, 2011 06:01 PM)
Re the speed of light and the Thermians: their voice communicator worked with no delay when Jason called Brandon. So apparently there's a wormhole of some sort between the Thermians' location in space and earth.
-
-
MysticYoYo — 11 years ago(July 12, 2014 05:27 PM)
Wow, you're really smart aren't you? Light travels at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second), television signals travel at around 6,800 miles per hour. The broadcast would have never traveled far enough to reach a planet.
Please take a physics class some day and then get back to me.
And you might take a manners class and then get back to
us.
Is there really any reason to be that rude?"I miss Dwight. Congratulations, Universe. You win."
-
chefz2 — 14 years ago(January 16, 2012 11:24 PM)
The Thermians seems to be easily killed, so maybe a few of them died re-enacting 'duck season! rabbit season!'
Maybe the whole group should have been dressed in red shirts and be done with it.
I need three days notice to
"Have a wank." -
philm94 — 14 years ago(March 06, 2012 06:45 AM)
I saw it as a nod to all those TOS episodes where budget constraints meant they visited a REMARKABLY earthlike planet every week.
There's even one (A piece of the action) where a developing world gets hold of a copy of a book detailing 1920s mob wars which forms the basis of their society.