Bits of films that make no sense

[Halb]

ClockworkCupcake said:

This has been bugging me for more than two decades, and this is the ideal thread to voice it.

In the film Demolition Man, Simon Phoenix (Wesley Snipers) obtains a super-gun that is the size of a small assault rifle that can fire a devastating bolt of energy, but then can't fire again for several minutes whilst it recharges (like a flash gun).

This just makes no sense at all (outside of the plot need for Sly Stallone to have a chance). In reality, such a slow rate of fire would have been unacceptable to the designers and they would have had to trade size and weight for rate of fire - making it much larger and bulkier and used as a Squad Support Weapon. Maybe even making it a Ghostbusters-style large backpack weapon with a heavy cable from the gun to the backpack.

I seem to recall that in the book of the film, that is exactly what it was.

It would be like a piett gun? Someone special in the squad to carry the big gun?

[ClockworkCupcake]

Halb said:

It would be like a piett gun? Someone special in the squad to carry the big gun?

Pretty much. I think the general term is Squad Support Weapon, which in current military is a big machine gun like a LMG, MMG, SAW, etc. Or an RPG. A big weapon that one member of the squad carries.

It just wouldn't make sense to have a small weapon like that which could only be fired occasionally. Although I suppose the analogous weapon of today would be a small one-shot anti-tank weapon.

I guess it doesn't really matter, and that in the film they just wanted the Simon Phoenix character to have a BFG and for it not to be too bulky for the action sequence.

Talking of which, what museum would have weapons that had not been deactivated, with plenty of live ammo lying around?

[Halb]

One where there have been no murder-death-kills for eleventy years?

[Lance Catarmaran]

ClockworkCupcake said:

Halb said:

It would be like a piett gun? Someone special in the squad to carry the big gun?

Pretty much. I think the general term is Squad Support Weapon, which in current military is a big machine gun like a LMG, MMG, SAW, etc. Or an RPG. A big weapon that one member of the squad carries.

It just wouldn't make sense to have a small weapon like that which could only be fired occasionally. Although I suppose the analogous weapon of today would be a small one-shot anti-tank weapon.

I guess it doesn't really matter, and that in the film they just wanted the Simon Phoenix character to have a BFG and for it not to be too bulky for the action sequence.

Talking of which, what museum would have weapons that had not been deactivated, with plenty of live ammo lying around?

On that subject, it may be iconic but the Smart Gun in Aliens makes no logical sense. Since you carry it by your waist the only way it could be used would be by standing up or walking towards your opponent, and it being so bulky you couldn't throw yourself to the ground or take cover easily. All it would do would be to make you a very large and very obvious target

[Halb]

I thought the swivel arm (which was a camera arm) could be swung round to lock onto an object or from a mounted position, like the big guns in Gears of War?