MovieChat Forums > Approaching the Unknown (2016) Discussion > Instant communication was so dumb...

Instant communication was so dumb...

posted 8 years ago by romaarn
40 replies | jump to latest

Such a stupid way of portraying communication process between the mission control and the spaceship. One of the fundamental problems with space travel is that the further you go, harder it gets to communicate. The speed of light is finite and radio waves travel at that speed (about 300,000 km/s). In other words, when you send a message to the spacecraft away from earth by about a couple of light minutes, it takes a couple of minutes to reach it and the same time vise versa.
The distance between Earth and Mars varies between 55 million kilometers and 400 million kilometers. To put it in the light minutes, it varies between 3 and 22 light minutes.
In the movie you can witness how William D. Stanaforth (Mark Strong)has instantaneous video calls and chatting back and forth with the mission control back on Earth even about at the halfway point of his journey (which would've been impossible). It turned me off so bad and was such an easy thing to fix that I can't just suspend my disbelief and give a pass. Unfortunately, that's not my only issue with the movie...

[–] tom-1674 8 years ago

That's why they used hypercom. Didn't you see the hypercom antenna, you silly goose?

[–] romaarn 8 years ago

I hope you're kidding but if you're not, no matter what kind of antenna you use, you can't communicate faster than the speed of light and if you can't grasp that concept due to your limited intellectual capabilities, It's not me to blame, but yourself.

[–] tom-1674 8 years ago

It is understandable why you lash out at your betters. Your overlords have hidden from you the fact that a hypercom uses FTL tech.

[–] romaarn 8 years ago

Hey, how long are you going to keep using those insulting words, *beep* The movie neither show nor hint in any way, shape or form the existence of any kind of FTL technology, and you simply assume it's FTL just because the name "hyper"? In what universe does "hyper" instantly mean "FTL"? If you've heard the term hyperspeed in certain movies it doesn't justify making the assumption that every time "hyper" is used in a flick, they are talking about FTL. It's just plain stupid. The only "Hypercom" I've heard of was the one manufacturing payment hardware and it's not in the business anymore, as far as I know.
"Approaching the Unknown" is somewhat grounded and realistic (to some extent) movie, using as little fictional concepts (for the modern, real life tech) as possible. FTL communication is a very far-fetched idea and the thing of distant future. It has no place in this movie and the issue I was talking about is just a flaw of the film and nothing else.

[–] tom-1674 8 years ago

It is clear that your hostility has clouded your perception. We understand this is common with your kind. Do not trouble yourself further with what you cannot understand.

[–] tempests 8 years ago

This exchange is priceless... I'm laughing so hard, I'm crying into my coffee.

[–] blondewoman 8 years ago

Tempests, I thought I was the only one laughing at this exchange haha! It is priceless!

This exchange is priceless... I'm laughing so hard, I'm crying into my coffee.

[–] murad23 8 years ago

Nah, just an exchange by a person making a valid science based point about a jarring flaw in the film for anyone who knows the science, vs an idiot.

[–] paraisos_audiovisuais 7 years ago

How old are these guys??? How can someone waste his/her precious time arguing like that? lol

[–] ChefC 8 years ago

[–] excalibur1814 8 years ago

FTL is mentioned once in the movie near the start.

[–] sharpnova 7 years ago

Actually they did hint at the existence of FTL technology.

You may remember at a few points in the movie, he communicated instantaneously with people on Earth from light minutes away.

Also, the implication that not grasping that you can't communicate faster than light implies an intellectual shortcoming is silly because I think even Newton would have assumed it was possible. It wasn't until a VERY abstract breakthrough did we realize the light speed limit.

[–] 7 years ago

[deleted]

[–] ian1000 8 years ago

Sarcasm is jolly hard to transmit over the Internet, but I did receive yours.

I agree with the original posting. If you're going to have near-future instant communication you may as well save a tonne of money by inventing a gravity generator for your intrepid cast; throw in some hand laser weapons and you have.... Space 1999 (and many more).

[–] lamieur 8 years ago

Most of the communication in the movie happened in the first month of his journey (at which point the lag was still seconds) and then between two spaceships (second one launched 35 days after his).

The only situation when I couldn't believe it can be lagged was when he docked with the space station and the guy there was actually arguing with mission control. Other than that, usually there was some pause between question and response, and one time Skinny started speaking when Stanaforth was talking (as if he didn't yet receive the signal). Slight suspension of disbelief was enough there.

Plus, you were watching a movie about a guy who makes water from rocks (Mars soil contains no hydrogen at all!) and explaining he's creating them in nuclear fusion from super hot plasma like the beginning of the Universe?!

Even if we could create such plasma in a 20 cm tube (his device was made of those), hydrogen is the lightest element, you can't fuse it from heavier elements (aka everything else) :D

So instead he'd need to somehow split up Magnesium/Calcium/Iron/Nickel/etc. Good luck :)

But yeah, that was all scientific and only free communication over a million kilometers was unbelievable? ;)

[–] romaarn 8 years ago

I pointed out only one of the problems. What felt very wrong and cringeworthy to meand I've never stated it to be the only problem. As I said: "that's not my only issue with the movie".

[–] lamieur 8 years ago

I know, but still, it's really a tiny problem, easily forgivable when you take into account the actual suspension of disbelief required :)

[–] TimeTravel_7 8 years ago

The way they send a man who was behind the main invention that lets humans stay in mars, and not only that - but send him with only a prototype, an unfinished version of the water maker is so stupid.

My "top" 200:
http://www.imdb.com/list/g41XE9AVM7k/

[–] Thrill_KillZ 8 years ago

The thing is, he never did make water from rocks, his dumbass died in the desert and this was a delusional fantasy he had during his last moments of life.

Plus the guy was loony tunes when you hear him narrate how he only wanted to go to Mars to be alone and how great it would be to open the hatch and his utter joy of the idea of getting ripped apart by space. You don't sent people like that on such important missions.

IMO there is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that this guy died in the desert, we were just along for the ride of his delusional space trip fantasy. There were constant hints as to this being the case and the end pretty much confirms it, he lost his water supply so landing on Mars was an impossibility, there was no way he could have made it there

[–] colman01 8 years ago

Thank you. This is the only plausable conclusion one can come to. The only problem stems from the expectation of watching a sci-fi movie which this is clearly not. Marketing it as anything else would be a major spoiler so...

People get butthurt about seeing a movie they didn't pay for which is understandable. I can't say I thought the it was very interesting either way.

[–] Granulated 8 years ago

Yes. It was disappointing.

Even if one put's it down to just being a sci-fi device it still wouldn't feel right, because if they had the level of tech to create an FTL communications device, then they really should have also developed far 'faster' methods of thrust.

[–] terrencepatrix 8 years ago

Everyone knows that radio waves move faster than light you dumb-dumb. It's because they bounce off asteroids and planets which makes them faster!

[–] MadRotaryOne_DDCgod 8 years ago

OMG, You dummy, they obviously used the subspace bandwidth to communicate.
Geez.....

[–] bigbeataudio 8 years ago

To the op...
Yes I agree that would "screw" with the reality of the movie. You are of coarse correct about radio and light, this is why the rover on mars has to be very "automated", we dont really drive it, we simply give it instructions, it must do all the real time work itself due to this very problem.
But, I always find with scifi that at times I can "make up" stuff to cover mistakes.
You may be aware of quantum mechanics. There is a possibility we could use quantum theory to communicate to any point in the universe, instantly, (check out Quantum entanglement). Hey its all theory, but, I just pretend that maybe we have made a quantum communicator. Its all scifi, anything goes...as long as physics allows on paper at least.
Cheers

[–] jeremiahdaigre 8 years ago

The speed of light is 300,000 km/s, not per hour. I cant stand people like you. Your obviously intelligent, but you dont know as much as you think you do. FTL communication is within the realm of possibility theoretically speaking. Also, you saying that its not FTL comms because they call it something else in the movie makes no sense. If it is instantaneous in the movie and the average distance to mars is 12.5 light minutes then logic dictates it must be FTL. Your argument is invalid.

[–] romaarn 8 years ago

300,000 km/s, not per hour.

It's just a typo, (hope you don't think I don't know that) thanks for pointing it out, though.

you saying that its not FTL comms because they call it something else in the movie makes no sense.

I never said that. I said that just because "hypercom" was mentioned (according to another user) somewhere in the movie, it doesn't mean that FTL was implied.

If it is instantaneous in the movie and the average distance to mars is 12.5 light minutes then logic dictates it must be FTL.

No, it doesn't. The logic dictates 2 things:
1) The people who worked on this movie made a blunder, which was easily fixable.

2) IMDB Board users tend to overcomplicate things and try to shove concepts into films without any hint or implication of them being in there.

I don't even believe I'm arguing about such an obvious thing.

[–] mitzelplick_ 8 years ago

Or, you completely missed the idea, that this guy died of thirst in the desert, and the whole film was hallucination. Perhaps the instant communication was deliberate. To add an underlying sense, that something, just isn't quite right. The ship was the metaphor for his body. Everything slowly and irrevocably breaking down.