I know Vader needed the life support system in his suit to live, and he was already partially depending on the force to survive. But with the masking technique that the Sith Lords sometimes use. Was there canon indication (based on Vader himself as well as other Sith powers known) that he could have left the suit and restored himself?

Are there any existing in/out-of-universe evidence that suggests whether Snoke is a Sith or not? It seems that it is generally agreed he is not a Sith Lord from the Banite order of the Rule of Two, given that he is believed to be at least a thousand years old. But is it possible he is a Sith Lord not from Darth Bane's order? The Jedi believed the Sith are extinct but they are mistaken. The Sith believed there are only two of them in existence, but that belief originated from Bane - I haven't seen anything that externally supports that belief. That opens the possibility that Snoke could be a fellow Sith Lord who survived the war, escaped the Jedi's notice, and wasn't aware of fellow Sith survivors - and as such he's not compelled to follow the Rule of Two. In other words, even if Snoke is proven to not be a Banite Sith, he's not necessarily not a Sith from a more ancient era. Putting aside the above speculations in my head, what in/out-of-universe resources are ...

As elephant-like creatures called 'oliphaunts' were used in the movies and the books, I'm wondering how many died in all of the Lord of the Rings battles? Whether they were stabbed or whatever, is there an exact number of these animals that died in the Lord of the Rings?

The TARDIS is one of the few fictional objects that could contain themselves. Firstly, because "it's bigger on the inside" but secondly because the TARDIS has some means of sustaining paradoxes (which have their bounds, but it is capable to allow some paradoxes if you don't overdo it). So if you had some sort of Portal technology (like in the game of the same name) which allowed you to create portals at will, you could shoot one portal inside the TARDIS and the other outside and fly through the outer Portal with the police-box-shaped TARDIS, assuming the portals were big enough. If you remove the portals, where would the TARDIS be? Would this even work? I realise canonic answers are probably hard to give, so I'm fine with some well backed-up hypotheses. Answer As @Daniel Roseman points out in his comments, this has actually happened in the Children of Need special mini-episodes Space and Time (contained on a Doctor Who DVD and confirmed to be "canon...

Stating first off, I do not have any background reading any of the comics, and am coming to the Avengers wholly from the knowledge presented in the various movies. After seeing The Avengers , I kind of got the feeling that the members comprising the Avengers group felt ... almost disdain, I guess, for SHIELD, as an organization, and sort of simply tolerated SHIELD's influence as a necessary logistical evil, but would just as soon have moved away from working with SHIELD if they got the chance. Was there such a relationship in the comics, or was this something just in the movie, or ? Answer The Avenger's relationship to SHIELD or other government agencies varied depending on which Marvel Universe you were in. There are currently two, the primary comic universe #616 or the Cinematic/Ultimate Universe, #19999/#1610. But the general consensus was, government and its attendant agencies (SHIELD, SWORD, HAMMER) were never too fond of people with the power to alter the status quo or...

"The Whispers" a new ABC scifi is using a storyline from an old Bradbury/Asimov short story about children and an "imaginary" friend called Dril. Can you tell me the name of the short story and who wrote it. I have gone through all of my OTR scifi programs and cant find it. It bothers me that they didn't give credit to the original author.

It's popularly known that Wolverine has survived a nuclear bomb blast. And I just learned that Hulk has been directly hit by a nuclear bomb. Other than these two, how many of Marvel's mortals have survived a nuclear bomb blast, or can survive a nuclear bomb blast? Answer Invulnerability or regeneration powerful enough to allow one to survive a nuclear attack of any real magnitude is fairly uncommon in the Marvel Universe, but the biggest of the big guns of the Marvel Universe can survive, if barely, a standard ten megaton nuke; though probably not under optimal conditions. NOTE: A nuclear device utilized under optimal conditions will likely kill almost everyone on this list. When confronted by nukes in most stories, they are usually smaller, not configured properly, too far away or some other aspect which allows the reader and the character enough of a possibility of survival to allow suspension of belief. (See: Indiana Jones and the Refrigerator of Nuclear Resistance) This i...

As best I can remember, when people in the real world (or the supposed real world) went into the Matrix, they always looked the same in the Matrix as they did in reality. Was that always the case, or were people able to adopt false appearances, perhaps to deceive agents or other humans? Or were there cases where the Matrix gave them different appearances for its own reasons? Answer The claims in the Matrix Wiki's article on Residual Self Image is a bit difficult to follow: Zion operatives who re-enter the Matrix appear as avatars with appearances that can be totally different from their true appearance within the real world. "Appearance" here probably means clothing and hairstyle, not physiology. The former aspects of appearance can and do change. Clothing, it seems, can be loaded at will. Hairstyle seems to reflect the person's self-perception (like Neo's in the sequels). A person jacking in could probably manage a false mustache but not much more. It seems th...

Basically a guy comes to the other guy, who offers him a second virtual life for everything he has got. He agrees puts on some sort of helmet and experiences his second life where everything is nice and dandy. He then is taken out of that reality. The guy asks him "What did you see?". To which the main character replies something like nothing special. Pays him everything he has got, which is pretty much a bunch of post-apocalyptic garbage and exits. Thanks in advance.

The Clone Troopers in the prequel trilogy were genetically engineered to fight the Clone Wars. This question establishes that each trooper was individual and some excelled at different things. The cloners boasted about how the troopers were immensely superior to droids due to their autonomy and individuality. If a trooper decided that they didn't want to be a solider any more and wanted to retire could they? Were they slaves to the republic or were they free to make their own choices? Answer Not very many, unfortunately. Freedom from Slavery / All are Born Free: False The clones were "born" into a life where they were meant to serve whatever purpose they had been commissioned for - in this case, as soldiers. They were property of the Republic, bought for money from the Kaminoans. According to Star Wars: The Clone Wars: New Battlefront , they were considered the flesh and blood / mentally superior equivalent of battle droids, when it came to value of their lives. Of cou...

I've been desperately searching for a book I loved on every level that I read when I was at school (20 odd years ago). I've asked the local librarians, Google, you name it I've looked (even thought of calling my old schools to see if they would have my library record). The few bits of memory I have of this book are that it was set on an earth where the stars were blocked out by some other interstellar race with a veil or bubble of some kind. The main character feels that this veil/bubble may have been put in place due to their fear of what the human race was capable of and often makes references to personal Nano-tech upgrades and quotes the dollar price. I think it was about a detective or a guy who was trying to look for someone/something and used these devices on a nano scale to find them. Sorry to say that's all I can remember other than loving the book. Please kind folk help my sleep deprived mind rest.

It's in a similar vein to Flatland , except in 3D. A 4D creature attacks Earth, using its 4-dimensional capabilities to its advantage. The protagonist defeats the creature by staking it to the ground. I'm fairly sure it's a well known story but the name evades me. Answer Might be "The Monster From Nowhere" by Nelson Bond (1939). The detail of capturing a four-dimensional creature by impaling it is mentioned in a summary of the story by Michio Kaku in his book Hyperspace , on pages 75-77 which are available on google books here : Suddenly, the answer came to him: If a Flatlander were to try to capture our finger as it poked its way into Flatland, the Flatlander could stick a needle through our finger , painfully impaling it to the two-dimensional universe. Thus Patterson's strategy was to drive a spike through one of the blobs and impale the creature in our universe!

At the end of season 6 of Game of Thrones , Cersei claims the Iron Throne. It is not explained how. Is it normal for a Queen regent to assume the throne once there are no longer any other apparent heirs? If so, would she need to seek out and destroy any distant blood relations of the Baratheons, or does it not matter as they wouldn't have a significant army? If it's held by coup powers, shouldn't Jaime be King? He is presumably still Lord of Westerlands and in charge of the Lannister forces. Answer Cersei can't establish her claim on Iron Throne. She is the Dowager Queen and Queen Mother, nothing more than that. She has claimed the Iron Throne because she could . Baratheon Claim King Aegon V Targaryen's daughter Princess Rhaelle married Lord Ormund Baratheon. They had a son named Steffon who is father of Robert, Renly and Stannis. Robert's claim to Iron Throne came due to his descent from King Aegon V. Cersei has no such claim as she is not descended from Tar...

How could Kylo Ren lose the fight against Rey? I find the outcome totally illogical even though the Force may be strong in the woman. Furthermore, I would expect a man to be physically stronger than a woman. It is like having a very intelligent but uneducated person beating a math Phd in a math exam. Answer It's not like a novice beating a master. It's more like a talented novice with experience in a related discipline managing to hold out against an overconfident, injured, emotionally unstable student, capitalising on their mistakes, then reacting quickly when their misjudged endgame fails: For most of the fight, Rey was on the defensive . The fight reached a point where Kylo could have killed her, but instead chose to try to convert her to the dark side - he'd pretty much won, but made a mistake she reacted quickly to. Kylo was injured . He had an absolutely massive Chewie-crossbow wound on his side - and despite what certain films like to lead viewers to believe, inj...

I just watched The Empire Strikes Back , and noticed the part of the cave where the Dark Side was strong on Dagobah. What is its story? Also, Luke slew Darth Vader there, showing someone's face under the mask, but I didn't catch whose face it was. Answer It was Luke's face under Vader's mask in that vision fight. From The Empire Strikes Back script : INTERIOR: DAGOBAH -- TREE CAVE Luke moves into the almost total darkness of the wet and slimy cave. The youth can barely make out the edge of the passage. Holding his lit saber before him, he sees a lizard crawling up the side of the cave and a snake wrapped around the branches of a tree. Luke draws a deep breath, then pushes deeper into the cave. The space widens around him, but he feels that rather than sees it. His sword casts the only light as he peers into the darkness. It is very quiet here. Then, a loud hiss! Darth Vader appears across the blackness, illuminated by his own just-ignited laser sword. Immediately, he ...

In comparing characters' actions in Episodes I-VI vs. The Clone Wars , one consistent difference is the physical ability of the Jedi. When the same Jedi character is depicted in both sources--for example, Anakin Skywalker--in The Clone Wars that character is invariably much faster, more graceful in movement, and able to perform more difficult and dangerous acrobatic feats. Out-of-universe, I assume this is because it is possible to exercise tighter control over movement by a computer-generated character than by a stunt performer. But is there an in-universe explanation as to why the Jedi are more physically fit in T-Canon than as seen in G-Canon? I'm looking for an explicit reference in T-Canon to, e.g., a type of Force usage training that is absent from G-Canon and would account for the difference in characters' physical prowess. Or is T-Canon simply meant to represent a more "legendary" depiction of Jedi action and G-Canon a more "realistic" one, hen...

From the old canon but also non canon sources it always seemed to me that you can't get into hypserspace too near to a gravity well (canon it is with the interdictor class ship in rebels but also a few comments here and there in the films). But now there was a hyperjump right into far within a gravity well. Is there any explanation anywhere for this? Or was that just artistic freedom that it could work? I'm talking about when Han solo hyperjumped into the atmosphere of the planet the starkiller base is located on. That is WAY within the planets gravity well I would dare say as he is almost at ground level there. Answer Novelization by Alan Dean Foster clarifies what happened. They didn't exit hyperspeed/hyperspace on the surface of the planet. They approached the planet at lightspeed to be able to get through the planetary shields (which aren't right on the surface), THEN slowed down. “No planetary defense system can be sustained at a constant rate. It would take too...

This short story concerns an alien creature of some kind that is slowly feeding on the surface of its home planet. It must stay "in its lane" so to speak because others of its species feeds on either side of it. It encounters something in its path which turns out to be a probe from somewhere. The creature can't go around (due to the feeding rules) it so it attempts to go OVER it and ends up inside and is amazed to find itself immersed in "liquid food" (a formula culture provided to sustain any alien samples collected). It suddenly reproduces, even though the alien concedes it was not the right time to do so. AND the food bolsters its intelligence. It argues with its spawn, explaining that "they" must get to the planet's surface. One does but the other does not! Any ideas? Answer This is J. F. Bone's " On the Fourth Planet ". It's based on an early NASA probe concept called Project Gulliver . The probe shot out sticky strings and...

The prophecy about "the one who will bring balance to the force" is mentioned several times. From the discussion, the implication is that virgin birth is part of it, along with a few other factors that would make Anakin seem like the person it described. But is the actual prophecy ever stated anywhere? Just how much do we know about what it said? Having just re-watched The Phantom Menace , the only clues we get are that it seems to include virgin birth and the high midichlorian count. It's also interesting that this is the only prophecy, at least in the movies and TV show, that is ever mentioned. Answer This is from the novelization. It expands a little bit on it but doesn't fully answer your question. This is the only time prophecy is mentioned in the book. There was a prophecy, so old its origins had long since been lost, that a chosen one would appear, imbued with an abundance of midichlorians, a being strong with the Force and destined to alter it forever. It w...

Saruman isn't stupid. In fact, he's called Saruman the Wise, so he must have known a thing or two about strategy. In the Battle of Helm's Deep/Battle of the Hornburg, according to this wiki , 10 000 Uruk-Hai, 5 000 Orcs and 5 000 Dunlendings fought against around 2 000 soldiers (who probably weren't even trained to fight in the siege). This looks like a lost battle to me, especially if we assume that this enormous battle of fierce Uruk-Hai were led by Saruman the Wise. How could he lose? I'm reading the book in English, and it isn't my native language, so I might have misunderstood something simple. Could someone help me understand what's led to this crushing defeat of Isengard? At which point the tables have turned?

During the climactic scene of Deadpool , our eponymous hero travels to a new location in order to face down Ajax and rescue Vanessa. The setting of the scene looked quite familiar, like it was one of the damaged helicarriers of S.H.I.E.L.D., possibly from the events in Captain America: The Winter Soldier . Is there any source, official or otherwise (press publication, Twitter status, blog post, etc.), to indicate whether or not that's what it really is? Since Deadpool is part of the X-Men Cinematic Universe, is it even allowed to have such a reference (if officially acknowledged anywhere)? This is not asking where the Amix Group got/came into possession of the carrier, like the linked duplicate below. Answer They didn't have the rights. “We wanted the carrier to be a Helicarrier,” said Reese of the concluding fight scene’s setting, “but we couldn’t get the rights to that, so it was just a regular old kind of aircraft carrier.” Flickering Myth, Exclusive: Deadpool “couldn’t g...

In the eighth episode of the first season , Jon Snow and Jeor Mormont come across two dead rangers. The rangers were dead for weeks and once accompanied Jon's uncle, Benjen Stark. After Jon and Jeor bring the men's bodies back to Castle Black, one of the bodies reanimates into an ice zombie. Jon runs it through with a sword, but that eventually destroys it with fire. [embedded content] Sam read that corpses touched by the White Walkers are reanimated and can only be killed by fire. Why weren't the corpses converted to wights minutes after being killed by White Walkers? Why did it take them weeks to reanimate? Edit to add: The other question linked to this one asks if dead bodies can become wights south of the wall, while this one asks if they become wights weeks after White Walkers touch them. That one is about the location of becoming a wight, and this one is about time since being killed and transformed by a White Walker. Close, but not a duplicate. :-) Please give cita...

During Order of the Phoenix Harry gets regular insights into Voldemort's thoughts and feelings. He gets snapshots of where Voldemort is and what he's doing. These visions stopped during Half-Blood Prince because Voldemort was practising Occlumency. "So tell me, Harry," said Dumbledore. "Your scar...has it been hurting at all?" Harry raised a hand unconsciously to his forehead and rubbed the lightning-shaped mark. "No," he said, "and I've been wondering about that. I thought it would be burning all the time now Voldemort's getting so powerful again." He glanced up at Dumbledore and saw that he was wearing a satisfied expression. "I, on the other hand, thought otherwise," said Dumbledore. " Lord Voldemort has finally realised the dangerous access to his thoughts and feelings you have been enjoying. It appears he is now employing Occlumency against you." (Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 4, Horace Slughorn) . It seem...

Obviously, women can become Death Eaters. Bellatrix was the Dark Lord's most loyal Death Eater, and she was a woman. Although she had a much lesser role and importance, Alecto Carrow was another female Death Eater. But were they the only two women in the Death Eaters mentioned in the seven books? (Keep in mind, Narcissa was never a Death Eater, so she wouldn't count.) There are probably a few female Death Eaters in the movies. There are at least three at one of the Death Eater meetings (which includes only the inner circle), although it's theoretically possible that, like Narcissa, they're related or married to a Death Eater without actually being one. However, I think Narcissa was a special case, and I doubt the Dark Lord would usually allow people who weren't Death Eaters at their meetings. There are also a few more women present at the final battle, to be six different women among the Death Eaters at the battle, and at least two of the ones at the meeting were al...

I recall when I was young (about 30+ years ago) I saw on TV a movie about a civilization (possibly humans in the future) with limited life span (they died young) and if I recall correctly, an integrated red light indicator in their hands showing when they were about to die. When the light indicator turned on or turned off (I dont recall exactly) it meant they were about to die soon. Does anyone have an idea which movie it could be? Answer You're describing Logan's Run . In the year 2274, the remnants of human civilization live in a sealed city contained beneath a cluster of geodesic domes, a utopia run by a computer that takes care of all aspects of their life, including reproduction. The citizens live a hedonistic life but in order to maintain the population levels everyone must undergo the rite of "Carrousel" when they reach the age of 30. There, they are vaporized and ostensibly "renewed". To track this, each person is implanted at birth with a "li...

OK, so here is a sequence of facts: It's prohibited to use magic in Muggle areas. Before boarding Hogwarts Express, Hermione lived in a Muggle area. (this one I'm less sure about) Hermione and her parents must have been told, upon getting a wand, about restrictions on use of magic. Or she would have read about it in Hogwarts: A History or some other book. If so, this being Hermione , she would never have violated the rules. Yet, Hermione told Ron in the beginning of PS, on the train, that she already successfully tried out some spells after witnessing him trying to turn the rat yellow. This was right after they boarded Hogwarts Express, so she must have done it before. So, how could she have possibly practiced any magic? I'd strongly prefer canon or JKR based answer if available. Answer Based on the following quotes I suggest Hermione had time to practice these spells on the train. "I just take the train from platform nine and three-quarters at eleven o'clock....

Can't remember the name but it's a novel I read in the 80s, in which two kids from an underground society go through a old mechanism that transfers them to the above ground domed society.

According to Wookieepedia , the the props are made of wood. Also, due to the brittleness of the stunt blades used during this fight, which were little more than wooden dowels, Diamond was forced to instruct Alec Guinness and David Prowse to stop their blades before contact due to their fragility. If there isn't any particularly special feature about the props to separate them from the rest of the image, were they done manually? How were the lightsaber effects accomplished? I'm interested in all the movies, but mainly episode IV/original trilogy. Answer In the video below, Mark Hamill and George Lucas briefly discuss the methods used to create the lightsaber effects in the Original Trilogy films. The effect was largely achieved by coating a thin wooden tube with reflective material (made out of movie screen) and shining bright spotlights onto it in order to make it appear fluorescent. They then used film filters in post-production to make that effect seem substantially more pr...

I know that the movies were written to be a stand alone universe on their own, but what key elements were missing in the movies that were vital in the books that viewers are missing out on? Answer Here’s an incomplete list of the biggest things I can remember that were omitted or simplified significantly in the movies versus the books. The whole post is riddled with spoilers so I won’t even try masking them; you have been warned: Overall: Probably the largest single overt omission from the entire movie series was the character of Peeves the Poltergeist. He plays a relatively minor role in most of the books, but the comic relief would have been good in areas, and his role became more important in book 5 and book 7 as he actively fought against the bad guys. The movies in general leave out a LOT of Quidditch matches from the books. The existence of Squibs (non-magic children of wizarding parents; the reverse of a Muggle-born) is never explicitly stated, though the characters of Filch a...