Kevin's Watch

There must be a dozen movies and TV episodes, otherwise fairly well put-together, but hydraulic nail guns are used as a weapon. Do they really think no one knows that a nail gun will not fire unless it is hooked up to a running compressor?

As someone who used to run sled dogs, I notice when they pull up their sled and park it and walk away. Lol. Seriously, you would have a major snarl on your hands if you don't picket the front of the gangline, and if there is another dog team nearby, Party Time!! Two dog teams or more hopelessly tangled together!!! (Also, they do NOT bark when they are running, they run silently. Although when they are anticipating a run, they go crazy barking.)

Anybody else have specialized knowledge that causes you to find holes in movies or TV? Or just your least favorite "that would never happen" moment repeated over and over again?

Spaceships going WHOOSH. Not exactly specialized knowledge, just something that bugs me.

Sorus wrote:Spaceships going WHOOSH. Not exactly specialized knowledge, just something that bugs me.

Yes, and explosions in space going BANG!!

deer of the dawn wrote: Yes, and explosions in space going BANG!!

Yes, that too! And non-explosive things exploding dramatically.

One of my favorite peeves is when during a western gunfight,
those "endless rounds of ammo" being fired from their 6-shooters.
C'mon, the guns hold 6 bullets, not 20!

Staying on the western movie shoot-out theme,:

My dad used to get a kick out of the scenes were the good guy is chasing the bad guy on horseback
and "throw the bullets" out of the guns.
(Shooting the exact moment the gun levels out in front of the shooter, never aiming,
looking like the shots are being slung out of the pistol.)

Or how an attacking party having a shoot-out with a rival gang,
firing scores of rounds everywhere, and the horses never get hit.
Just the riders get struck... no matter how far the are, how fast the are galloping, or from what angle they are being shot at from.

Right! Or, the hero has a 9mm with half a magazine while 5 guys with automatic weapons are firing hundreds of rounds at him/her, and he/she never gets hit.

Every single computer screen ever shown in a movie or TV show is an abomination of engineering. No one would ever design a real program to work that way.

The worst offenders are the ones that print things out really slowly with a teletype sound effect.

Second worse are database searches where they actually flash all the records being searched on the screen really fast.

Also bad are amazingly specific pop up windows with no supporting data attached. "Alert. Suspect seen at bus station."

Oh, and hackers who have a count-down clock that indicate exactly when they will break into a computer system.

How about the number of times handcuffs and motel door locks are opened within a nanosecond with a paperclip. Not thinking it's that easy.

And yes, the fingerprint-matching or facial-recognition software that zips through ten thousand fingerprints or faces and them BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP MATCH FOUND!

This:

[quote="Sorus"Yes, that too! And non-explosive things exploding dramatically.[/quote]

And this:

wayfriend wrote:Every single computer screen ever shown in a movie or TV show...

--A

wayfriend wrote:Every single computer screen ever shown in a movie or TV show is an abomination of engineering. No one would ever design a real program to work that way.

The worst offenders are the ones that print things out really slowly with a teletype sound effect.

Second worse are database searches where they actually flash all the records being searched on the screen really fast.

Also bad are amazingly specific pop up windows with no supporting data attached. "Alert. Suspect seen at bus station."

Oh, and hackers who have a count-down clock that indicate exactly when they will break into a computer system.

This. To date, no TV show or movie has ever shown computer hacking--or even just general computer use or programming--as it really exists. Attacking any sort of computer system is a process which would take weeks and even if you already had a login for that system if it isn't a "legitimate" login it may have been detected and deleted since the last time you used it.

Any use of forensic science in a show. A DNA analysis takes at least two weeks, presuming you have a sufficient sample--a swab with a drop of blood is not enough.

The whole "smart people play chess and listen to classical music" tropes. Those drive me up the wall. Chess is okay but it is typically very boring. Besides, truly smart people play Go or Pente. Classical music? Ask any random person to name some Baroque, Classical, or Romantic composer other than Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Dvorak, Vivaldi, Ravel, Strauss, or Wagner and I suspect they cannot. I bet they probably couldn't even tell you the differences between Baroque, Classical, and Romantic. I find much of that music boring these days, as well. You know what I listen to for something different? Tejano, Cumbia, and "Asian" music, mostly from India or Pakistan (and a lot of the songs they play on the radio come from Bollywood movies).

Explosive devices which beep. Only a moron uses a timer, presuming there is one, which makes sound.

People who shoot their guns while holding the gun sideways. That's a good way to break your wrist, presuming you can hit your target.

Sword fights which go on for several minutes. In real life, most sword duels would be over in 30 seconds or less--one hit, even on the arm or leg, and you are done, given that you are in pain and bleeding.

Ninjas. In fact, most depictions of martial arts. Too flashy and usually over-the-top.

Hashi Lebwohl wrote: Any use of forensic science in a show. A DNA analysis takes at least two weeks, presuming you have a sufficient sample--a swab with a drop of blood is not enough.

Reminds me of the last time I got summoned for jury duty. The first question we were asked was, "Do any of you watch TV crime dramas?" Almost everyone said yes. They immediately followed up with, "You know it's not really like that?"

I'd never heard of Pente. Looks fun...might be an easy way to get the GF into Go.

--A

I don't have much specialized knowledge. However, while I ultimately left the program, I was in a radiography program for about a year. Fans of Breaking Bad probably remember that Marie is a radiographer (not a radiologist). In one scene (about 95% it was during a conversation about Walter's cancer), she mentions something like "you'd be surprised how often doctors come to us for advice/info." While I was in the program I heard it had once been like this, but my experience spent in 3 hospitals over about a year of clinical work was that radiologists very rarely came to talk to techs about the images. In fact, the only time I can remember seeing a dr approach a tech was because the tech in question had done something wrong. It may be different in other hospitals, or perhaps there's a difference between clinics and hospitals - I admit I'm not sure and that I have a narrow perspective on the matter.

EDIT-IIRC there was also some hilarious depiction of IRC use in some episode of Law and Order or NCIS.

Pretty much everything about The Andromeda Strain didn't add up scientifically. It still bugs me to this day, even though I enjoyed the book and movie.

Two words: Michael Crichton.

--A

No kidding, Av. He's the king of plot holes and spurious science.

How about when someone spills water (or any other beverage) on a electrical device, it automatically catches fire or does weird things.
Case in point: one of the Final Destination movies, a glass of water spills on an electrical box on a tanning bed,
causing it to go haywire and the bed's temperature dramatically soars and cooks the victim.
As an electrician, I know that things like that just doesn't happen.
Either the fuses/breaker would blow/trip, or the wires would blow.
The device would no longer work.

Lots of 60s and 70s low budget sci fi movies will show high tech computers displaying Lissajous curves. How calculating harmonic phase shifts can monitor rockets flying through space is beyond me.

Lissajous figures for tuning amplifiers use two oscilliscopes on the output transistors and adjust the phase angles for optimum harmonic compatability.

A theory I have for tuning guitars and bass to reduce decibel clash and clang. If the music is bouncing on a vertical plane, as opposed to the horizontal {tilt}, then the sound can be more felt than heard. Power output in theory is limitless without increased volume.

(see: Doc Brown's CRM-114 amplifier in Back to the Future).

Viz, it's because they look so cool and scientific, and again they assume no one will actually know.

What you are talking about could be caricaturized by sine waves, yes? Lots of power, but not very interesting in terms of sonic texture or depth. I think to get the power you are talking about, the wave has to be so "pure" that it would become flat and boring.

I learned a few years ago about creating sonic "space" in a mix for each instrument using equalization, so each can stand out without being turned up louder. I became a mix geek, appreciating or hating certain songs just because the mix made the singer's voice stand out so amazingly well (Guetta is exceedingly good at this) or making a good singer's voice just part of the mush (there was a Norah Jones song like this a couple years ago). But that should go in the Sonic Mixing Pet Peeve thread, which maybe you or I could be geeky enough to start...

Having delivered two children into this world without anesthesia, I look on just about every labor/childbirth scene as complete crap! "Omigosh, I just broke water, call 911." Get a grip, girl!!

Ah yes, one more. My husband and I met working in a sawmill. Every machine has safety switches that require you to really intend to turn them on. Saws and conveyor belts do not simply start running!!! And the craziest thing is those ominous Chippers, that seem to lie at the end of every conveyor belt waiting to liquefy hapless minions. Chippers literally take a good 15 minutes to reach grinding speed, and again, safety switches keep them from coming on unless someone really means to turn them on-- often with a key. Scenes where people burst into a sawmill (or other factory) at midnight and someone flips a switch and all the blades whirr to life... again, complete crap.

I can't remember if anyone mentioned hot wiring cars yet... Haven't steering column locks been in place since, like, the 70s? Even if you start the car's motor, you can't steer, right?? (not having hotwired a car recently...)