Questions tagged [interstellar]

For questions about the film Interstellar, a 2014 film directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain. This tag is not to be used for travel between galactic bodies.

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68 votes
2 answers
13k views

Were the Moon landings faked in Interstellar?

In Interstellar, Murph's teachers explain to Cooper that the moon landing was fabricated; a successful piece of propaganda that bankrupted the Soviets. Is it ever mentioned if this statement was true ...
25 votes
3 answers
14k views

What books are shown on the bookshelf in Interstellar?

What books are visible on the bookshelf in Interstellar? I could only focus on The Stand, by Stephen King, since it's one of my favorites. But I'd love to see a more complete list.
18 votes
3 answers
9k views

Are the equations in Interstellar real?

Are the equations appeared on the blackboard in the Interstellar movie real equations of Kip Thorne while working out equations for computing the image of a black hole? Or they are just random ...
8 votes
1 answer
942 views

Why Coop doesn't control a pencil to communicate directly using gravity?

In the movie Interstellar, Coop uses the watch he gave to his daughter as a communication mean. He can do that since he masters gravity. He can also drop books to send Morse messages, etc. Gravity is ...
-9 votes
2 answers
2k views

Is there any "in universe" link between Matt Damon's character in Interstellar and The Martian?

I was just wondering because both movies star him as an astronaut trapped on an isolated planet. They also had fairly close release dates. I am wondering if there is a link between the two characters ...
17 votes
1 answer
5k views

Why didn't the crew see the waves as they descended onto Miller's planet?

While it was an awesome scene, I have to wonder about the realism of the dramatic moment where Cooper says Those aren't mountains and then it dawns on him to look behind them and he sees the second ...
2 votes
2 answers
472 views

In Dragon's Egg, the effect on time due to extremely high gravity is inconsistent

This has been messing with my head for a while. The Cheela in/on Dragon's Egg book/planet, had their time move much faster, compared to the humans out in the space. This was explained as due to the ...
18 votes
2 answers
5k views

Wouldn't Miller's planet be fried by blue shifted radiation? [closed]

In Interstellar, wouldn't Miller's planet be fried by blue shifted radiation? The 61,000x time dilation multiplier would make even cosmic background radiation photons into Extreme UV photons.
2 votes
1 answer
349 views

In Interstellar, how did Cooper and TARS provide momentum while detaching from the main ship?

Cooper refers to Newton's 3rd law while detaching. I didn't understand the physics behind this scene.
13 votes
3 answers
28k views

How did Murph know what happened to Dr Brand?

At the end of Interstellar, Murph tells Coop to and her closing monologue suggests she knows that Brand is How did she know anything about Brand's whereabouts or survival?
12 votes
2 answers
3k views

Why Cooper did not provide correct planet number to "himself in the past"?

Coop is able to communicate with his past self. So why does he not provide the correct data about which planet is the viable one, saving lives and resources?
1 vote
1 answer
220 views

How does the Endurance navigate to a particular system through the wormhole?

In the movie Interstellar, the protagonists' spaceship, the Endurance, travels through a wormhole. As it is explained in the movie, the wormhole allows them to travel to a couple of systems, one of ...
6 votes
6 answers
13k views

How does the wave on Miller's planet cost Cooper and Brand "decades"?

After the wave hits on Miller's planet, Cooper asks Brand "How much is this gonna cost us?". To which Brand replies "decades". How does the wave and resulting damage from the wave cost them decades ...
11 votes
4 answers
17k views

Where is this character going at the end of Interstellar?

Towards the end of the movie Later, I don't understand what he expects to find there. Wouldn't
25 votes
5 answers
20k views

Bootstrap Paradox in Interstellar

So, the plausible explanation to who put the wormhole and the tesseract in the place is But this explanation raises another question and yet another (similar) paradox. Question - Paradox - ...
-4 votes
2 answers
244 views

Was Matt Damon’s casting in the Martian at all influenced by interstellar?

In both the Martian and Interstellar Matt Damon plays a stranded astronaut who wants to get home. I realise that the roles are different, the movies are different and there is no in universe tie in. ...
-4 votes
1 answer
4k views

Exactly how much time does Cooper spend on Miller's planet?

In the movie Interstellar, Cooper & the crew landed on Miller's planet & they got hit a by a wave. After that Dr. Brand states that it cost us decades, & to be precise 23 years. So, in ...
7 votes
3 answers
3k views

Time dilation effects near the end of the movie

There are two main occurrences of time dilation having effect in the movie: Having said that,
27 votes
4 answers
3k views

In Interstellar, how could you build a space colony without bringing the Blight with you?

In Interstellar, there is a Blight destroying all the world's crops. If Plan A involves launching a space colony, presumably full of crops, etc., how could they avoid bringing the Blight with them?
5 votes
3 answers
23k views

In Interstellar, why does Cooper leave Brand?

Near the end of Christopher Nolan's space adventure film, Interstellar, Cooper and Brand are the only ones left to save the mission, and they're both flying around the black hole Gargantua. Cooper's ...
26 votes
4 answers
8k views

Why do the Rangers and Endurance in the film "Interstellar" not have an apparent fuel source?

In the film Interstellar... However, neither ship has a visible fuel tank, with the one exception when a Ranger is launched into Earth orbit on top of a rocket. But... Is there an in-universe ...
8 votes
1 answer
4k views

How big is Cooper Station?

The scene in which kids were playing baseball shows the curvature of the station and it seemed very small to host a colony. But later, it looked very big to host several buildings and agriculture land....
10 votes
2 answers
5k views

Why can Murph still read the Morse Coded wrist watch when she has brought the watch back to her office in NASA, which is out of her room?

We see Murph finally realised that Cooper is her ghost. Cooper has transmitted the quantum data encoded via manipulating the gravitational waves affecting the watch's seconds hand on Murph's bookshelf....
4 votes
4 answers
2k views

Why go to another galaxy?

Was it ever explained why did they decide to go through the black hole and to another galaxy instead of simply going to Mars? Mars is much closer than Saturn and we know much more about it, so they ...
24 votes
7 answers
42k views

How can the frozen clouds on Dr. Mann's planet stay afloat?

When the crew is entering Mann's planet's atmosphere, their ship hits a frozen cloud. How can a frozen cloud stay afloat even though the planet contains 80% of Earth's gravity?
15 votes
1 answer
2k views

How did Romilly's food supplies last 23 years?

The spaceship, Endurance, was small, barely having enough space for 4 astronauts. One astronaut, Romilly, was left behind on the Endurance for 23 years. He hibernated for much of that time, but he ...
11 votes
2 answers
2k views

How long could Miller's Planet remain in orbit [closed]

In Christopher Nolan's movie Interstellar, Miller's Planet is in orbit around a supermassive black hole affectionately (??) called Gargantua. Miller's Planet orbiting Gargantua: It is orbiting "at ...
9 votes
2 answers
8k views

What happened to Cooper's son?

I was watching Interstellar again and I had a serious question. What happened to Cooper's eldest son Tom? I mean when we last saw him he came back to the family home after extinguishing the fire ...
6 votes
1 answer
378 views

In the movie interstellar, how far was Cooper station from Saturn?

When Cooper was seen floating near Saturn he was well beyond the ring system. Is it explained anywhere how far the station was from Saturn?
20 votes
2 answers
11k views

What precisely was the discovery facilitated at the end of Interstellar?

Near the end of Interstellar, (HUGE and nearly utter SPOILERS follow): What was the discovery? What was the problem that needed to be solved?
2 votes
1 answer
451 views

What would "Plan B" have looked like beyond establishing a big enough gene pool?

I'm new to science-fiction and I'm intrigued by the consequences of "Plan B". This explains the "how". My question pertains to the "why". I don't remember what Edmund's planet would have been like ...
3 votes
0 answers
2k views

Interstellar: Why did they go to Miller's planet? How was Miller even able to send a green light? [duplicate]

Apologies if this has already been answered, but I was not able to find it. After re-watching Interstellar, I am not able to make sense of the scene where the crew decides to visit Miller's planet, ...
6 votes
1 answer
1k views

How are TARS and CASE powered?

What kind of power supply do TARS and CASE and other such automatons use? How do they recharge? Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator? Solar power? Eating small rodents? It appears they can operate ...
9 votes
1 answer
1k views

Why bother with the planet at the event horizon?

In the movie Interstellar, if I remember right, they explain that a group of scientists were sent to the system on the other side of the worm hole, before the ship and crew we witness in the movie. ...
2 votes
1 answer
636 views

How come Engineers became obsolete over traditional farmers?

Well, right now the world doesn’t need more engineers. We didn’t run out of planes, or television sets. We ran out of food. The world needs farmers. Good farmers, like you. And Tom, we’re a caretaker ...
2 votes
1 answer
1k views

Why did US government need NASA to drop bombs on civilians?

In Interstellar, NASA denied the US government's order to drop bombs on civilians. But, why did government order NASA in the first place? Isn't this the job of the military/Air Force?
1 vote
1 answer
1k views

How did Cooper Station sustain agriculture? [duplicate]

The Cooper Station is able to sustain a healthy atmosphere and crops. The fundamental motivation to get humanity out of Earth in Interstellar is the blight induced hunger. Moreover, in the movie they ...
7 votes
1 answer
1k views

Why did Cooper give his daughter NASA's coordinates?

When Cooper jumped into Black Hole, he was already in agony because he now knew that Plan A was a lie. So, he made lots of efforts to make his daughter stop his past self from leaving. He even ...
0 votes
0 answers
321 views

In Interstellar, did the people from plan A and plan B intermix?

We know at the end of the movie What I'm trying to understand is, was there regular immigration, visitation, trade, etc. between A and B. That would certainly have an effect on the mission at B to ...
29 votes
5 answers
19k views

Why had humanity not visited this planet?

I've been thinking about this since I saw the movie a few weeks ago and I haven't been able to put my finger on a definitive answer so I figured I'd ask here. At the end of Interstellar Why hadn't ...
-2 votes
2 answers
2k views

Where was the rest of the crew in Interstellar?

In the movie Interstellar they left Earth to another galaxy. Five people left for the mission. When they arrive, part of the crew explores the planet with waves. Where is the last member of the crew, ...
-6 votes
2 answers
12k views

Interstellar and Newton's Third Law [closed]

In the scene where Cooper ejects himself into space, towards Gargantua, he quotes Newton's Third Law of Motion: "You have to leave something behind to go forward" We all know that that Law states: ...
33 votes
1 answer
5k views

Is Interstellar an allegory of the Holy Trinity?

A while back, a friend of mine told me that Christopher Nolan's Interstellar was an allegory for the Holy Trinity. Here was his evidence: SPOILERS... obviously. Too many to mark up. Cooper ...
8 votes
1 answer
2k views

In Interstellar, why does zero gravity only exist some of the time in space?

For instance, the characters float around in zero gravity right after the Ranger docks on the Endurance, but in the following scene they walk around more or less normally.
18 votes
1 answer
6k views

How did Cooper and Brand survive Gargantua's gravity?

Cooper's spaceship travels around (and very close to) the event horizon of Gargantua. Romilly explains to Cooper... Romilly: Gargantua's an older, spinning black hole. It has what we call a ...
9 votes
0 answers
451 views

Why didn't the crew of the Endurance experience undertow from the massive waves on Miller's planet? [duplicate]

When the crew lands on Miller's planet and notices the giant wave approaching, it seemed odd to me that there would be a lack of current pulling towards the wave. The giant waves would command a ...
13 votes
3 answers
4k views

In Interstellar, what does the Hindi text displayed for the drone say?

Notice something in the above screenshot? The PC's language is Hindi. Do you have any idea what this means?
1 vote
1 answer
1k views

Why didn't the black hole Gargantua swallow the planets? [closed]

If Gargantua is a black hole in Interstellar, why didn't it swallow the planets?
4 votes
2 answers
915 views

The atmosphere and landscape of Edmunds

Here is a panoramic view of Edmunds (in Interstellar), or at least where Edmunds (the man) landed. Dr. Amelia Brand is in the foreground, at his grave. There is no sign of life besides Dr. Brand ...
8 votes
2 answers
14k views

How fast is Miller's planet orbiting Gargantua in the movie Interstellar?

In the movie Interstellar, Miller's planet is so close to the black hole that it experiences severe time dilation - one hour on the planet is seven years for every one else. The planet is (...