Skip to main content

Why was the DeLorean in Back To The Future not always covered in ice after time travel, and why didn't it fly in 1885?


I have noticed some things that I can't understand in the Back To The Future films about the DeLorean.


In part I, when Einstein is sent 1 minute into the future the DeLorean comes back completely frozen. Why wasn't it cold in any of the other times when it was used for time travel?


In part III, the fuel line goes and this prevents it from going up to 88mph which they use a train to get up to 88mph instead. Since the DeLorean was turned into a flying car in part II, why didn't they just have it fly instead of using a train to get it to 88mph?



Answer



The formation of ice requires at least 3 things.




  1. Cold

  2. (The normal, linear passage of) Time

  3. Moisture


The time factor is clearly seen in both Einstein's short trip and Marty's trip from 1955 back to 1985 at the end of the movie.


Here is the return of the DeLorean with Einstein just as the car is spinning to a halt.


Einstein's return - 1 - No Ice


But here it is a few moments later.


Einstein's return - 2 - Ice



Here is the car just moments after it has crashed on return from 1955 to 1985. Some mist, but not much ice, if any.


Marty's return from 1955 to 1985 - 1


And by the time the terrorists are coming to get revenge on the Doc., ice is apparent.


Marty's return from 1955 to 1985 - 2


So the Doc. mentioned cold, we've seen the effects of time, the other factor is moisture, or in this case, humidity.


The scenes where Marty goes from 1985 to 1955 are slightly different, in that the car is surrounded by mist, but there is little evidence of ice on it while in the barn. By the time Marty drives it back out of the barn, the effect has vanished.


Here is the first part of the time in the barn, the mist is obvious but there is not much ice, if any.


Marty's trip from 1985 to 1955 - 1 Mist


A few moments later we see that the mist has cleared, and though there is no ice on the car, there is a sheen of moisture on the bonnet and windscreen.


Marty's trip from 1985 to 1955 - 2 Sheen





My conclusion is that in this trip, it was a lot less humid (to gain less ice), & significantly warmer, to melt it faster.




I was going to review the other movies, but I think this explanation covers why the ice might vary according to the trip.




DVK covered the other question, the flying circuits were destroyed by the bolt of lightning that hit the car at the end of Back to the Future 2. Here is the relevant part of the letter read near the start of BttF 3:



Doc. Brown: The lightning bolt that hit the DeLorean caused a gigawatt overload which scrambled the time circuits and activated the flux capacitor and sent me back to 1885.


The overload shorted out the time circuits and destroyed the flying circuits. Unfortunately the car will never fly again.




Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...