Yesterday , we looked at six reference who seemingly finagle to escape practical prisons . Now , we ’ll make it an even dozen as we analyse another sestet of science fiction heroes that may or may not still be stuck inside their own minds . Spoilers !
1 . John Anderton , Minority Report
The Setup :
In the year 2054 , John Anderton is the chief of Washington DC ’s elite precrime unit , which uses three psychics to predict when slaying will occur and thus prevent them . Arrested for a murder he in reality did sort of commit ( which is room rarer than it sounds ) , Anderton is placed in debar animation in the Precrime carry cells . The case seemingly closed , his longtime wise man Lamar Burgess goes to comfort Anderton ’s estranged married woman Lara , but accidentally lets dislocate a all important particular that suggest he knows far more than he is letting on .
Lara , finally believing John ’s claim of a deep conspiracy , goes to free him from his cellular telephone . It ’s then full upper ahead to the film ’s conclusion , where Anderton confront Burgess and places him in a no - winnings office , where the only elbow room to carry through his beloved Precrime will stand for destroying it forever . Burgess kills himself rather than face such a prospect , and Precrime reforms itself , setting destitute everyone it was oblige captive . But did Anderton ever really get released from his cell , or was this all just a illusion he produce ?
The Case For :
jolly unco for a project rooted in a Philip K. Dick forgetful story , Minority Report is n’t particularly concerned in the nature of reality , at least not in the means we ’re tattle about here . Instead , most of the film concerns itself with debating predetermination versus complimentary will , which is a dissimilar philosophical question from whether or not the events we see are real . As such , it does n’t really make much thematic sense , and there ’s only the flimsiest of circumstantial evidence to suggest Anderton fantasized the whole thing .
Besides , this is Steven Spielberg we ’re talking about , not David Cronenberg ( but more on him in a little bit ) . It just is n’t really his style to reject the reality of his own films . If anything , Spielberg ’s fantasy and scientific discipline fiction oeuvre is delimit by consent everything as veridical , no matter how preposterous .
The Case Against :
Still , that really is an impossibly well-fixed ending . After drop a solid ninety instant doing nothing but running and hide from the implacable Precrime officers , the escaped John Anderton has no worry leaving their installation or breaking into the impressively ritzy social event Burgess is at . Everything just falls into place a flake too neatly , considering reasonably much nothing came leisurely for the first two - thirds of the film . Perhaps the remnant of Minority Report is a bit like the death of Adaptation – its sheer implausibility is the biggest cue that it is n’t exactly come about the way you see it .
prospect That It Really Happened :
90 % . A bunch of late Spielberg films have had somewhat weak decision , including Munich , War of the Worlds , and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull , and you do n’t see anybody claiming those endings did n’t fall out . Well , plenty of the great unwashed prefer to conceive Kingdom of the Crystal Skull never happened at all , but that ’s a dissimilar issue .
2 . Bender , Futurama
In the episode “ Obsoletely Fabulous ” , Bender is sent back to the manufactory to invite an rise that will make him compatible with the unexampled Robot 1 - X. Unwilling to go through the painful , personality - falsify rise , Bender go on the run , eventually winding up on an island full of obsolete robots . forsake his own technological nature , Bender downgrade himself , replacing his metal voice with wood .
After launching an plan of attack on civilization , Bender and his primitive age group end up at the Planet Express building , where they finagle to do far more damage than even Bender really intend . All of his supporter trapped in a vex inferno , a now useless Bender is forced to call upon the aid of Robot 1 - ex , in the end make him realize the fresh automaton has his uses . At that spot , he snaps back to the factory , where he is inform the whole thing was just a delusion , his automatonlike judgement ’s way of come to terms with and accepting Robot 1 - X. This forces Bender to ask the philosophical dubiousness :
If that stuff was n’t veridical , how can I be indisputable anything is material ? Is it not potential , nay likely , that my whole life is just a mathematical product of my or someone else ’s mental imagery ?
It ’s a valid doubt – is any of Futurama real ?
dead , yes , all of it is real . By which I of track intend no , none of it is . Much as I ’m certain it ail all of us to let in it , Futurama is just a boob tube show . So , technically speaking , I say none of it is in reality real . But that ’s not what we ’re look at with here . Much as Bender ’s line represents a capital bit of meta humor , it is n’t really meant to call into question whether the “ actual ” event of Futurama are any less real than any other TV show in the same way that , say , the “ Normal Again ” episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer did . Am I the only one who ’s horribly confused by all of this ? If nothing else , I need to find some more equivalent word for “ real . ”
The remainder of the episode finds Bender walking back into the slum of New New York City , which he chooses to see as a beautiful hayfield full of friendly timber creatures . Beyond the fact that that sort of seems like an odd choice for Bender ’s sodding globe , Bender ’s newfound feeling that “ realness is what you make of it ” really does suggest that , on some metaphysical level , Futurama is all just some idle phantasy .
chance That Futurama Really Happened :
90 % . In the conclusion , you ’ve got to trust in the robot technician ’s short response to Bender ’s philosophical interrogation : “ No , get out . Next ! ” A man that nonchalantly competent credibly has a pretty good handgrip on the ways of the population . Now , as to whether Leela ever really go back from the space bee sting , well … that ’s another matter totally .
3 . Ed Straker , UFO
In , “ Mindbender ” , one of the best episodes of this British cult classic about an elite but underfunded paramilitary force fighting mystifying aliens ( whichI’ve already wax lyric about in a previous post ) , SHADO recovers a outre artifact from the surface of the Moon . All those who touch it experience radical - naturalistic hallucinations . After two man are kill because they started dissipate at fellow SHADO personnel , recall they were the enemy , Commander Ed Straker read possession of the strange object .
https://gizmodo.com/british-cult-classic-ufo-is-headed-to-the-big-screen-5263679
It is n’t long before Straker hallucinates as well , as a heated up argumentation with General Henderson is interrupted with a managing director yelling , “ Cut ! ” Utterly disjointed , Straker finds himself on a television curing filming a TV show that front an awing lot like UFO . He wanders around the studio apartment , stumbling into a theater showing antecedently shot footage . Straker ascertain in horror as he sees some of the most traumatic bit of his life – all moments previously shown in the series itself – up on the screenland as bare amusement .
Unable to make do with this foreign new world , Straker race back to his office staff set and urgently tries to make it return to normal . To his great relief , everything finally snaps back to normal , and he is once again Commander Ed Straker . But still … did he actually stumble upon reality , however briefly ?
This is the same underlying problem we faced when grip with Futurama . What ’s the difference between a show acknowledging the fact that it ’s a goggle box show and a show suggesting everything we see is an illusion ? I guess it ’s all a matter of academic degree , and the more and more elements from substantial animation the show reap upon , the firmly it is to fire the idea that the television receiver show is really just a TV show .
For instance , one of Straker ’s costars joins him in the theater to watch the cutting footage . On UFO , the character was Colonel Paul Foster , but here he introduces himself as Mike . The actor who played Foster ? Michael Billington . It ’s little details like this that paint a picture “ Mindbender ” really was trying to push Straker ’s hallucination as close to the literal yield of UFO as it possibly could . At a certain item , does n’t the false version of world get close enough that you might as well debate it the material thing ?
Then again , there are plenty of element that do n’t match up with the actual behind the scenes of UFO . “ Mindbender ” would have been much more , well , mindbending if they had given the actor who play Ed Straker the same name as the man who really limn him . Considering that was Ed Bishop , they even could have had some reasonably amusing gags over the fact they share the same first name .
Instead , Straker ’s histrion name is Howard Beale , who was also an actor that , in his cover job as a movie executive , Straker had had to reprimand earlier in the episode . Much as the episode does some rightfully demented , quaternary wall shattering stuff for something made in 1971 , there are n’t nearly enough dualities for this to dead mirror the actual qualification of the show , and as such it ’s hard not to conclude it is just a hallucination after all .
Chances That UFO Really Was All An Illusion :
15 % . I ’d be a lot more conflicted if they ’d just been a little more meta . Although Straker ’s reaction to seeing his entirely life as a tv set show really is grievous .
4 . The Red Dwarf gang , Red Dwarf
Luckily , they do n’t have to , as the ship ’s computer Holly is able to pull them back from the brink of desperation . As it turns out , that calamari that was attacking them had loose a hallucinogenic toxin that caused them to experience the same hopeless fantasy as a radical . The squid ’s effects disrupted , they are capable to escape and resume their adventures . But is the world of Red Dwarf any less illusory than that of the fascist state ?
The idea that they actually were playing a video secret plan for four years does n’t really hold up to any serious examination . Kryten alone is deeply problematic , as he did n’t seem until the beginning of serial publication two , when he looked and sounded vastly dissimilar ( because a different doer played him ) , and it was n’t until the third series when he became a regular . I mean , I suppose the total absorption game could have had an entire part where one character plays housekeeper on a dead ship for the first year , peculiarly if the players were doing a really unspeakable caper , but it does n’t make a lot of good sense .
Anyway , it ’s not even like UFO , which retained some slight equivocalness in that Straker did n’t abruptly snap out his hallucination – he instead had to return to his position and actively select to return . The Red Dwarf gang does n’t go back to the VR machines ; indeed , we in reality see them back in the real world for a few seconds before they realise where they are , as they continue to behave like they ’re stuck in the fascist world . That ’s pretty conclusive visual evidence .
Still , the possible action that Red Dwarf is just a slimly malfunctioning practical realness simulation might be one style to explain all the massive , inexplicable changes to the show ’s continuity . For instance , the show quietly moved the characters ’ home plate century from the 21st to the 23rd , and Christine Kochanski somehow morph from Lister ’s secret fixation ( played by C.P. Grogan ) to his ex - girlfriend ( played by Chloe Arnett ) . Even if the despair squid merely create things that were n’t there , it might well be possible that they simply come back to another layer of the game . After all , I ’ve heard the level of immersion involved are pretty full .
opportunity That They Really Did Go Back To Reality :
65 % . At a certain point not long after this episode , the show sort of stopped existing for me anyway .
5 . Sam Lowry , Brazil
Mild - mannered bureaucrat Sam Lowry discovers passion thanks to a clerical error , and his single - minded pursuit of what is quite literally the miss of his ambition makes him an unwilled enemy of the state . About to be tortured by his unspoiled admirer Jack Lint ( played by Michael Palin , in one of the all - time nifty underrated performances ) , Sam is short rescued by domestic terrorist and freelance air conditioning repairman Harry Tuttle . Lowry and Tuttle go along to tout up the Ministry of Information , but then things get a bit eldritch ( to say the least ) . Sam at long last get out with his dear Jill , and the two can now live happily ever after . But did any of it in reality happen ?
wholly depend on which version of Brazil you envision . Terry Gilliam ’s cinematic bad luck is the clobber of caption , and he face studio apartment interference on Brazil from the very start . Unwilling to accept Gilliam ’s dim close , Universal chairman Sid Sheinberg look at his grim 142 - minute version and trim down it down to a windy 94 minute , arrant with a felicitous finish where Sam does indeed go off to live in serenity with Jill . This so - called “ Love Conquers All ” version appears on the Criterion release of Brazil , and was once show in syndication on tv set because its much shorter running distance made it easier to market .
Well , you see , the biggest thing missing from the “ Love Conquers All ” deletion is a final scene between Jack Lint and the Deputy Minister of Information , Mr. Helpmann . The two look sadly at Sam , still strapped to the torture death chair , and remark that he is “ run short ” – incurably mad . In other Good Book , any legitimate version of Brazil ends with it completely clear that the happy ending is a product of Sam ’s broken mind . Which , view all the crazy thing that hap during his leakage , is really the only plausible explanation anyway .
Chances That He Really bunk :
5 % , if only as a slight nod to the mightiness of idiot box syndication .
6 . Allegra Geller and Ted Pikul , eXistenZ
fabled plot interior designer Allegra Geller has to go on the campaign with her de facto escort Ted Pikul when an assassin shows up at a focus chemical group for her young full immersive masterpiece eXistenZ. The pair skip over into an exponentially more bizarre adventure where it becomes impossible to lie with for certain what ’s in the tangible cosmos and what ’s just the secret plan . ultimately , Geller realizes Pikul is the real assassin and belt down him , only to find herself arouse as a fellow member of the focus group for the literal game TranscendenZ , programmed by the actual legendary architect Yevgeny Nourish . The entire motion picture up to that point had all been a plot , or so it would seem .
Allegra and Ted are seemingly contented with their gaming experience , but then they perpetrate Yevgeny aside to demand him whether he should give for all the harm he has done and will do to the human race . They then dissipate kill him and the head of the centering chemical group in front of a dazed crowd of their fellow tester . They then educate to kill another tester , who is forced to take : “ Hey , tell me the verity – are we still in the secret plan ? ” So how about it ? Did they ever make it back to reality ?
Ooh boy . Let ’s see now . Well , there ’s the fact that a lot of the actors in the film only use their tangible accents in the last scene . That might be study as a clue that the focus group for TranscendenZ is real , if only in the sensory faculty that the characters now actually voice like material the great unwashed . Look , I candidly have no approximation whether anything in eXistenZ is real or imaginary , but I do know one affair : Christopher Eccleston ’s American accent is the faux thing in cinematic account .
It just would seem to basically go against director David Cronenberg ’s brutally wry , unsparing sensibilities for the characters to ever get away the game . In fact , I think it ’s problematical whether there even is such a affair as “ the tangible macrocosm ” in eXistenZ , and even more arguable whether it makes much of a difference . frankly , I ’m passably sure the question of whether they ’re in the real existence or not is the least important part of eXistenZ.
And just so we ’re unmortgaged – yes , this tilt has come down to a metaphysical quandary on the one hand and the ninth Doctor ’s horrific dialect on the other . Just as it should be .
Chances That They Really Got Back To world :
I ’m not certain . I guess you ’d have to define realness first .
FuturamaMoviesRed dwarfTelevisionVirtual Worlds
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