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Leisher 
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Posted on: Jan. 05 2015,08:11 |
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Spoilers galore
Here are my questions:
1. So sticking his arm out the window for 7 minutes resulted in it being so frozen that a simple hammer swing shattered it, yet at the end of the movie they could walk around in the mountains without proper protection and were fine?
2. So Noah...I mean Willford, was the only guy who saw that chemical freezing the Earth? Nobody else planned ahead?
3. Didn't they effectively kill the human race at the end? At the very least, they killed off whitey.
4. Even with proper survival gear, it'd be tough to survive, let alone two train babies (17 and 5 years old)with no survival experience who just have coats.
5. Did anyone else think he was eating a Timmy steak at the end? (That's not really a criticism.)
6. Ok, I get culling the numbers from time to time, but 7? Really? And did you notice that there were only 5 people where the 7 failed?
7. All these intricate plans, and they weren't prepared for the massive push these guys made? Really? Those defenses were the best they could come up with?
8. They knew everything he was up to, but not the torches? And how the fuck did he know they'd need torches?
9. It seems like the train would need to be longer to accommodate the lifestyle of the rich folks.
10. The gun fight between train cars around a bend was just stupid.
11. What was with the Terminator guy? His rampage was really bad. He was an unstoppable killing machine who later became easy for one guy to hold off, while his opponents who stomped their way through endless bad guys forgot how to fight. As they were fighting him in the sauna I was thinking of Andre the Giant's line when he was fighting Wesley: "I just realized why you're giving me so much trouble. I'm used to fighting groups."
12. I realize he had been shot, but wouldn't you be pissed if you just gave the last cigarette on Earth to a guy and he talked instead of smoking it? The scene of all the people watching that first smoke get lit up was fucking hilarious. (In a good way.) Very well directed scene.
13. It seemed like they fucked up the scale on a few of the cars.
14. I hated the look of the final car. It was too boring.
15. WTF was with the bridge? WTF was with the mob coming well, well after they had their drugs taken without any resistance?
16. The hero's revelation didn't have the impact for me that I believe they wanted. If they weren't giving them food, they weren't giving them water. Doesn't matter if they're eating people because they're not getting enough water.
17. He ate babies, but then the guy cut off his own arm to save another...what? Why then?
18. What was in the protein bar vat? Looked like bugs, but I couldn't make it out.
19. How well thought out was this "culling" stuff that they had dozens of night vision goggles and timed the tunnel perfectly? Yet they never thought that maybe a simple display of force in a single machine gun would have stopped the revolt in its tracks?
I think that's a good start for discussion.
Edited by Leisher on Jan. 05 2015,08:16
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 05 2015,10:19 |
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(Leisher @ Jan. 05 2015,11:11)
QUOTE Spoilers galore
Here are my questions:
1. So sticking his arm out the window for 7 minutes resulted in it being so frozen that a simple hammer swing shattered it, yet at the end of the movie they could walk around in the mountains without proper protection and were fine?
Wind will leach heat a lot faster than just standing there in clothes. Â I still think the train babies are dead, because they don't know how to be outside at all, much less in an ice age.
QUOTE
3. Didn't they effectively kill the human race at the end? At the very least, they killed off whitey.
I read the director's intent, yes, they were supposed to be the new Adam and Eve. Â However, I think more realistically, one or both of them was being eaten by a polar bear about 5 minutes after credits roll. Â Movie made it look that way. QUOTE
5. Did anyone else think he was eating a Timmy steak at the end? (That's not really a criticism.)
Yes, I did.
QUOTE
9. It seems like the train would need to be longer to accommodate the lifestyle of the rich folks.
Yes, some things that train was doing did seem pretty fantastic. Â Where was the chicken farm.... or at least, the chicken cloning vats?
QUOTE
18. What was in the protein bar vat? Looked like bugs, but I couldn't make it out.
Yeah, I think it was bugs (where did they come from?), and I don't know why he was so horrified.... in the first place, at least he didn't see Timmy in the vat. Â In the second place, it woudln't have been the first time, would it.
QUOTE
19. How well thought out was this "culling" stuff that they had dozens of night vision goggles and timed the tunnel perfectly? Yet they never thought that maybe a simple display of force in a single machine gun would have stopped the revolt in its tracks?
I think that's a good start for discussion.
As I said before, you aren't supposed to get hung up on how the train works... you are supposed to watch what happens when the entire universe is only on that train. I also read that the train was supposed to be an allegory, possibly for how capitalism makes poor people eat themselves and needs to be fed children to keep it from breaking down or something.
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Leisher
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Posted on: Jan. 05 2015,11:06 |
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QUOTE However, I think more realistically, one or both of them was being eaten by a polar bear about 5 minutes after credits roll.
YES! I thought the same thing. A 17 year old Asian girl and a 5 year old black kid are standing there looking at a polar bear. He was probably thinking, "Is this my lucky day?"
QUOTE Yeah, I think it was bugs (where did they come from?), and I don't know why he was so horrified.... in the first place, at least he didn't see Timmy in the vat. Â In the second place, it woudln't have been the first time, would it.
I thought it was going to be people too. Not the kids though as that wouldn't have made sense considering quantity and her measuring.
QUOTE I also read that the train was supposed to be an allegory, possibly for how capitalism makes poor people eat themselves and needs to be fed children to keep it from breaking down or something.
Unless the author specifically comes out and says such things, I never buy into them. Having a piece of work get dissected by people who think they're intellectually superior only to have the author of that work come out and say, "No, I was literally just telling a story about X and there was no hidden meaning." happens far more often than those intellectually superior folks would like to admit.
Here's what the train is supposed to look like:
I think it's far too small. Particularly the areas for animals. The inclusion of the peasants really doesn't make any sense. The only thing they're good for is making kids to stuff into the machinery. Considering the rich worship Wilford as a god, you don't need the peasants. Rich kids could do the job until they've outgrown it. Did they ever mention what happens to those kids? Do they become food? Do they win citizenship among the rich? The window for their service has to be pretty small.
If the goal is to sustain humanity, then the peasants are far more efficient than the rich. They eat shit protein bars and live in a shanty town, while the entire rest of the train is to give the rich a live of luxury. However, if this movie/book is about the evils of capitalism, then it contradicts itself because:
a. End of the day, if the peasants accept their place the system works.
b. Their selfish greed and actions cause the end of humanity.
c. They want what the front wants because of greed. What economic and/or social system would eliminate the natural human need for more/better? Hint: Nothing, so you just shot your own argument in the foot. (If that was the author's intent.)
What did they feed the cattle that we never saw?
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TheCatt
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Posted on: Jan. 05 2015,11:16 |
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(Leisher @ Jan. 05 2015,11:11)
QUOTE 16. The hero's revelation didn't have the impact for me that I believe they wanted. If they weren't giving them food, they weren't giving them water. Doesn't matter if they're eating people because they're not getting enough water.
17. He ate babies, but then the guy cut off his own arm to save another...what? Why then?
18. What was in the protein bar vat? Looked like bugs, but I couldn't make it out.
19. How well thought out was this "culling" stuff that they had dozens of night vision goggles and timed the tunnel perfectly? Yet they never thought that maybe a simple display of force in a single machine gun would have stopped the revolt in its tracks?
I think that's a good start for discussion.
1) Gordon's point about wind and convection. Plus, they may have been at a different altitude / colder.
3) Yes.
4) See #3.
7) I think they were supposed to let them win, and be the new train leaders. So they could only win so much.
8) I assume the back of the train people learned from a past rebellion. Or other times not shown in the movie.
9) Agreed.
10) Yes.
11) Yes.
15) This didn't really make sense.
17) The guy couldn't take it any more. He hit a breaking point, and offered up his arm instead of another baby.
18) Looked like bugs to me, which given trends seemed like a non-event.
19) Where's the drama in that? 
I wonder if the original source material is better. I think this was originally a comic book, or inspired by one.
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Malcolm
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Posted on: Jan. 05 2015,11:23 |
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French source material. After watching Babylon, A.D. this weekend and seeing a couple scenes from The Fifth Element, I'll say that French sci-fi has an unmistakable watermark. Not in a good way.
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Diogenes of Sinope:
"It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
"Other dogs bite only their enemies, whereas I bite also my friends in order to save them."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC:
"Better dead than smeg."
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 05 2015,12:49 |
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One of the interesting things in the movie was that Cap was saying that he could never be a leader to these people, because he still had both his arms. We don't know what that means until the end, of course. Then at the end, he sacrifices his arm for the kid in the machinery.
Too bad he also died just then.
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Leisher
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,06:14 |
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(GORDON @ Jan. 05 2015,16:23)
QUOTE In the other thread TPR asked: QUOTE
Why a train? Â Why not a building? Â What possible reason could there be that all humans must be on a moving platform that never stops?
I think the best answer to this, if we dont want to get allegorical, is that the dude was already building the train long before the climate problem was created by the global-warming-hippies who destroyed the world. Â He just turned it into a life raft.
That's a legit explanation.
Although, he is correct that the movie would be far more plausible if Wilford designed a building. It worked for Blast From the Past.
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,08:06 |
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It sort of mentioned, too, that they get their fresh water from the train plowing through snowdrifts and collecting it.
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Leisher
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,08:10 |
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Yeah, I remember that line, but no reason they couldn't do the same thing from a building on the entirely snow covered planet.
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,08:20 |
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Well can you picture a building plowing through a snow drift for water collection? Come on.
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Leisher
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,08:32 |
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Again, the world is covered in snow. The building wouldn't really need to move to collect it.
Also, if we're being nitpicky, collecting snow only when you hit drifts would be crazy inefficient. Especially considering how the train reacts when it hits them in the movie.
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,08:40 |
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I don't even know what a building would do on those tracks.
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TheCatt
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,09:06 |
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(Leisher @ Jan. 06 2015,11:32)
QUOTE Especially considering how the train reacts when it hits them in the movie.
Yeah, that whole thing was bothersome.
Did anyone else wonder what the polar bear was eating? They mostly eat seals, as I understand it. So why was it up in the mountains? And if the world was that frozen, surely the oceans were frozen, thus no seals.
And in order to have seals, and whatever seals eat, and whatever those things eat, etc, you'd have to have quite an ecosystem that seemed pretty impossible for 18 years.
And don't polar bears hibernate in the coldest part of winter?
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TheCatt
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,09:12 |
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Oh right, and:
The translator device. Sometimes they needed it, and sometimes they suddenly just started understanding each other's complete sentences. Ok.
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| Post Number: 16
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Leisher
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Posted on: Jan. 06 2015,09:20 |
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QUOTE Did anyone else wonder what the polar bear was eating? Â They mostly eat seals, as I understand it. Â So why was it up in the mountains? Â And if the world was that frozen, surely the oceans were frozen, thus no seals.
And in order to have seals, and whatever seals eat, and whatever those things eat, etc, you'd have to have quite an ecosystem that seemed pretty impossible for 18 years.
And don't polar bears hibernate in the coldest part of winter?
I had the same thought about the bear's diet and said out loud, "What the hell is he doing in the mountains?"
Maybe in this world the food moved there, so he moved there?
And Gordo, the movie was entertaining, but that doesn't mean we can't discuss better options for surviving what killed off the human race in the movie.
A static building would be far superior to the train in just about every way. Who's to say that there isn't a building or buildings doing just that in this world? After all, there view of the world is somewhat limited. There are bunkers out there designed to help folks survive nuclear wars. Perhaps they were modified to survive the cold and the folks on the train were just one group of survivors in this world?
20. Why did it take them so long to start feeding the poor folks the protein bars? That wasn't ever explained.
QUOTE The translator device. Sometimes they needed it, and sometimes they suddenly just started understanding each other's complete sentences. Ok.
I forgive them for that bit of laziness. I could see them losing track of that. Although, I do think the sound on it sucked. Blame the sound techs for that one.
Edited by Leisher on Jan. 06 2015,09:21
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Leisher
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Posted on: Jan. 07 2015,08:03 |
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The ferroequinologists or railfans I work with weigh in...
Here’s what happens when a real train hits a slide.
This is what happens when train cars start tilting to one side (and in this case tight-lock couplers caused the whole string of cars to roll over).
Real trains need tractive effort consistent with the weight of the train.  (we can discuss the physics of that – it’s not about the power output of the engine itself per se, but how many powered wheels are in contact with the rail)  Note in the caption, Amtrak required 3 engines to power this 30 car passenger train.
Interestingly, the “Snowpiercer” is a 60 car trainset and the quoted car lengths are roughly equal to the north american standard 85 foot passenger car length – making the passenger section 5,100 feet long.  Add in whatever the engine length is and you’re pretty much at a mile long (5,280’).  In North America the class I railroads regularly run freight trains in excess of 10,000’, but a mile long passenger train would be pretty unique.  The graphic from the day before suggests the “tail” is 20 sections.  A 85’ coach (in the US) could be configured for anywhere from 60-100 seats (depending on layout & density) so even at an average of 80 per car x 20 cars that could be 1,600 people.  The movie states 1,000 people were (originally) put in the tail – so oddly enough some of the numbers in the movie are not implausible.  There are a whole trainload of logical inconsistencies and problems with the concept though.
Here's a train specifically built to bust through snow drifts.
I'm having lunch with them today. I look forward to it. I honestly love Snowpiercer if only because it has sparked all this debate. Reminds me of the great Terminator time line debate from our days at OAPI.
Edited by Leisher on Jan. 07 2015,08:11
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 07 2015,08:39 |
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I've read a lot of new Terminator theories lately. Feel free to find an old thread.
Snowpiercer:
the tail section people, if I understand it right, hopped aboard without tickets, right before the end. Even after the front enders culled them by letting them take care of their own overcrowding, they were still pretty packed in. Didn't I see triple decker bunks?
And yeah, I know a train isn't going to go up on its side wheels... but there also isn't any sound in space yet we all like Star Wars.
As I said from the very first post about this movie.... one has to get over the feasibility of the train and just enjoy the movie.
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| Post Number: 19
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GORDON
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Posted on: Jan. 07 2015,09:03 |
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I just realized we are discussing how impossible it is that the guy who built the train could have designed an anti-derailing system on a train that is pretty much magic in every other way.
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TheCatt
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Posted on: Jan. 07 2015,10:27 |
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If it were really magic, it wouldn't have needed the kids.
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