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Krel Guest
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Posted: Thu May 09, 2019 1:55 pm Post subject: |
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Maybe it wasn't an anger issue, as much as he wouldn't back down from a dare, and/or didn't like being called chicken (it's been a couple of decades). It almost got him into a gunfight. He was always so levelheaded in the first two movies, then it came out of nowhere in the third film.
In "The Time Machine", during the fight on the time machine, they do something to the big round tank on the left side of the machine, and steam comes shooting out. That's when I remembered Doc Brown's statement about his time train.
David. |
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Thu May 09, 2019 4:10 pm Post subject: |
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Ah-ha! Now I understand my confusion on both points!
Krel wrote: | Maybe it wasn't an anger issue, as much as he wouldn't back down from a dare, and/or didn't like being called chicken (it's been a couple of decades). It almost got him into a gunfight. He was always so levelheaded in the first two movies, then it came out of nowhere in the third film. |
First of all, Marty delivers that line — "Nobody call's me chicken!" in all three movies, so his anger issue didn't really "come out of nowhere" in the third movie. In fact, the way Marty finally realizes that his irrational need to prove his own bravery in the third movie is an important moment of personal growth for Marty.
Frankly though I was a bit disappointed by way the trilogy never explained why Marty was so sensitive on that point.
But in one of the final scenes of Back the Future III, Marty avoids a wreck with a white Rolls Royce by refusing to race with "Needles", the obnoxious teen in the other car, thereby changing his future and not injuring his hand, which prevented him from playing the guitar.
As near as I can tell, there seems to be no "first incident" which causes Marty to hate being call "chicken". But his reaction to the insult caused several situations that got Marty into trouble, right up to the gunfight he avoided by finally realizing that he didn't have to prove himself.
And yet . . . my own life as a teenager offers an explanation!
As a 70-year-old man who attended high school in the mid-sixties, I vividly remember defending my youthful honor in several schoolyard fights when a bully challenged me and announced that I would be "chickenshit" if I didn't show up!
There was no personal incident that caused me to react to this insult by feeling obligated to show up and face the bully. All the boys my age just knew that I would be branded a coward by my peers if I didn't!
And that's exactly what director Robert Zemeckis portrayed in the barroom scene when the elderly patrons told Marty he had to face Mad Dog in the gunfight or he'd be branded a coward!
So, Marty's "anger issues" were really just the typical teenage insecurity which caused young people like him (and ME) to think that the opinions of our peers were so important we had to face bullies in school year fights!
The problem that Marty and I both faced wasn't "anger issues" . . . they were just "peer pressure issues".
If you'd like to read a description of my own "showdown with a bully" in 1967, read the latter part of chapter 1 from my novel, The Hero Experience. It's base on a real event . . . and I won the fight!
Krel wrote: | In "The Time Machine", during the fight on the time machine, they do something to the big round tank on the left side of the machine, and steam comes shooting out. That's when I remembered Doc Brown's statement about his time train. |
As for your comment that the time machine in the remake was "steam powered", I'd actually forgotten the moment during the fight when the combatants caused damage to the machine which resulted in a spray of white steam to erupt!
Perhaps the steam was actually caused by a break in a line of coolant which served the machine's superconductor circuits. That would be more likely than the idea that such a high-tech device was "steam powered" like something from the Jules Verne era. _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Last edited by Bud Brewster on Fri May 01, 2020 2:41 pm; edited 3 times in total |
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Eadie Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 1670
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Posted: Wed Jun 05, 2019 7:26 pm Post subject: |
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Commemorative posters:
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Art Should Comfort the Disturbed and Disturb the Comfortable. |
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ralfy Mission Specialist

Joined: 23 Sep 2014 Posts: 473
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2020 11:16 am Post subject: |
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Hollywood Reporter wrote: | He pointed to 1985's Back to the Future, writing, "Back to the Future SEEMINGLY could be imperfect (why don't Mom and Dad remember Marty?) |
To me, the most obvious plot hole in Back to the Future isn't the fact that Mom and Dad don't realize that Calvin Klein was the spittin' image of their son Marty, it's the alarming fact that at the end of the movie Marty wakes up and is shocked to find that his family members have completely changed!
Hell, he grew up with these folks just the way he sees them in that morning scene . . . so why is he surprised by the big change? Marty lived a completely different life in the changed timeline, so he would have all new memories of that life, not the life we see in the movie up to that point!
So, why does he have the "old memories"? The answer is obvious; it's more fun that way.
The trilogy is loaded with illogical elements that would be caused by time travel, but Robert Zemeckis skillfully avoided calling attention to these, because he didn't want the move to be confusing or overly complicated.  _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Last edited by Bud Brewster on Thu Jun 16, 2022 11:06 am; edited 2 times in total |
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Fri May 01, 2020 4:29 pm Post subject: |
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Here's just one example of a paradox that Back to the Future II deliberately ignores for the sake of presenting an entertaining story the audience can understand.
At the beginning of Back to the Future II, Marty and Jennifer are picked up by Doc Brown and whisked off to the future to deal with a problem which involved their kids.
Here's the paradox.
From the moment the Delorean vanished and traveled to 2015, the world kept going right along as normal for the next thirty years . . . in spite of the fact that Marty, Jennfer, and Doc did not exist during all that time.
Let's look at the situation from a real world perspective.
The two teens disappeared under mysterious circumstance, their parents were devastated, the police were dumbfounded, and the mystery was never solved. Marty and Jennifer were absent from the universe for thirty years. And thus . . . they never had any kids.
That's the horrible fact they would discover when they arrived in 2015. They both vanished and never returned.
Bear in mind, guys, that Doc Brown visited the version of the future in which Marty and Jennifer never vanished in a time machine. They got married and had those kids we see in the movie. So, Doc came back to 1985 to tell Marty and Jennifer about their family problems, and then he removed them for existence for thirty years!
With that in mind, how can we explain the fact that the teens actually did get marred and have children in 2015, despite the fact that they ceased to exist in 1985 and popped back into the universe in 2015?
Well . . . here's how.
The moment they returned at the end of the movie, the timeline began to rewrite itself and create a world in which Marty and Jennifer were only gone for minutes or hours (maybe even seconds), So, the entire thirty year period in which they didn't exist simply did not occur.
Therefore . . . they did go on to get married and have kids.
And since Marty and Jennifer had kids which existed in 2015, we can't argue with the assumption that they returned to 1985[/u]. I must have happened, because the future they visited does include the fact that they made it back!
Was it fated that they would return safely?
Nope. They were just lucky. The Delorean didn't break down, none of the three character got killed, and nothing else happened to prevent them from making it back to 1985.
Bare in mind, however, that when Doc picked them up in 1985 and took them to 2015, there was no guarantee they would find their older selves there, married and with two children.
Again, they were just lucky.
The point here is that they arrived in a future where there was no police report of two teenagers who vanished and were never found in 1985. History in 2015 recorded the continued existence of Marty and Jennifer after they left with Doc Brown . . . simply because they DID come back.
Therefore, ladies and gentlemen, this particular element of Back to the Future II works just fine, because the "history" of 2015 just happened to include the successful return of our two teenage characters to 1985.
To reiterate: Marty and Jennifer were just lucky enough to return to 1985 and eventually have the kids, the same ones they went to 2015 and rescued from a bad situation. They were not fated to have those kids OR to make it back from 2015.
It could have gone either way. _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958) |
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Maurice Starship Navigator

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 542 Location: 3rd Rock
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Posted: Sat May 02, 2020 2:06 am Post subject: |
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All that "they got lucky" nonsense brings this to mind:
FORD: But look, how did you escape from the Haggunennon?
ZAPHOD: Simple, I got lucky!
ARTHUR: How did you get this ship back?
ZAPHOD: I got lucky.
FORD: But how did you find us?
ZAPHOD: I got your towel.
ARTHUR: What?
ZAPHOD: Mailed by meteorite. Hey, that was a really neat trick! How did you do it?!
ARTHUR: Do what?
ZAPHOD: Get the towel fossilised, so when the planet blows up two-million years later, it gets hurled off into space and picked up by the Improbability Drive!
FORD: Hey?
ZAPHOD: How did you work it all out!?
ARTHUR: We didn’t. I just dropped the towel.
ZAPHOD: Ohhh. So you got lucky too! That’s cool. _________________ * * *
"The absence of limitations is the enemy of art."
― Orson Welles |
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Gord Green Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 06 Oct 2014 Posts: 3001 Location: Buffalo, NY
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Posted: Sat May 02, 2020 6:12 pm Post subject: |
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Ah yes, Maurice......But....
It was all controlled by...
The Infinite Improbability Drive
The unique thing about the Heart of Gold is that it is powered by the Infinite Improbability Drive, a small golden box at the heart of the ship — hence its name. This is, of course, powered by an infinite improbability generator.
Therefore it was not "luck" but the results of the outcome of the Infinite Improbability drive...which DID seem to be under some kind of omnipotent direction. _________________ There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child. |
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Gord Green Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 06 Oct 2014 Posts: 3001 Location: Buffalo, NY
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Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 4:14 am Post subject: |
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Netflix is showing an edited version of BTTF 2!
Chatting to The Hollywood Reporter, Bob explained why Netflix shouldn't be held accountable, after fans of the franchise voiced their confusion.
"The blame is on Universal who somehow furnished Netflix an edited version of the movie. I learned about it some 10 days ago from an eagle-eyed fan and had the studio rectify the error," he confirmed.
"The version now running is the uncensored, unedited, original version."
Bob went on to reveal: "Apparently, this was a foreign version – which neither director Robert Zemeckis nor I even knew existed – for some country that had a problem with the Oh La La magazine cover.
" I asked that the studio destroy this version. FYI, Netflix does not edit films — they only run the versions that are supplied to them. So they're blameless.
" You can direct your ire at Universal, but I think they will be a lot more careful in the future — and with 'the future.'"
All three Back to the Future movies are available to stream on Netflix. _________________ There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child. |
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Krel Guest
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Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 3:11 pm Post subject: |
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Bud Brewster wrote: | Hey, was the time machine in the 2002 remake really steam powered? What did you notice about it which indicated that it was? I've always thought it had some awesome power source that enabled it to distort the space time continuum while creating that force field around it.
And ummm . . . where's the water tank?  |
How did I miss this post. The water tank is on the left side of the Time Machine. It is the a round tank. During the fight on the machine, damage is done (or the Time Traveler opens a valve, it's been years) to the tank, causing it to release a jet of steam.
David. |
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 4:00 pm Post subject: |
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I'm having trouble spotting the "round water tank". Can you help me out? _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958) |
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Gord Green Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 06 Oct 2014 Posts: 3001 Location: Buffalo, NY
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Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 6:02 pm Post subject: |
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Here it's shown on a scale drawing/plan :
And here :
This picture shows the pressure steam gauge on the tank :
I would imagine that the "horn" shaped pipe was to be for natural steam release as it's pointed away from the pilots seat. _________________ There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child. |
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Mon May 25, 2020 11:00 am Post subject: |
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Ah-ha. So that's a "water tank", eh? Frankly it's a lot smaller than I expected . . .
But then, that's exactly what my ex-wife said on our wedding night.
Well, I guess that's what I get for "marrying for looks", eh?
__________ __ _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958) |
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Krel Guest
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Posted: Mon May 25, 2020 1:57 pm Post subject: |
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The round tank is the boiler. But the question is, what is the heat source for the boiler.
David. |
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Gord Green Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 06 Oct 2014 Posts: 3001 Location: Buffalo, NY
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Posted: Mon May 25, 2020 2:48 pm Post subject: |
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Small compact heat source? Hmmm...
How about decaying radium? _________________ There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child. |
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