228
votes
Accepted
Why does Watney’s notebook in The Martian have four holes?
I've reached out to the film's Prop Master and the film's Senior Graphics Artist who both kindly responded to my (more than slightly odd) email.
I assume they won't mind my quoting verbatim.
I don't ...
- 677k
32
votes
Power sources on Babylon 5
Those gigantic panels aren't solar panels, they're there to help cool the station. Showrunner JMS refers to them as 'heat dissipators' or 'heat radiators'.
...those solar panels are wayyyyyyy to ...
- 677k
21
votes
Accepted
Why are there American-style vehicles in "Mad Max: Fury Road"?
Lots of US muscle cars are being brought over to Australia currently, as the law now states that if they are older than 30 years, they are able to be registered as a classic and don't need to be ...
- 504
20
votes
Why does Watney’s notebook in The Martian have four holes?
The Martian was filmed in Hungary and Microsoft lists A4 as the default paper size for that country in its applications adding weight to the suggestion that it was just cheap to go and buy some ...
- 201
14
votes
Accepted
What is the Physical Distance Between Mos Espa and Mos Eisley?
Based on the map seen in Star Wars: Complete Locations, the distance (as the crow flies) is 84.6 miles (136.1 km).
Luke's Landspeeder has a top speed of 155 mph, which means that the journey would ...
- 677k
13
votes
What is the earliest worldbuilding fiction?
My suggestion would be Utopia by Sir Thomas More, written in 1516. In it, More gives a very detailed description of a fictional society, religion, and political system on the equally fictional ...
- 39.6k
12
votes
Power sources on Babylon 5
According to this technical diagram of the station, those are radiators, not solar panels:
Space stations need radiator panels such as those in order to reject excess heat out into space. The ISS has ...
- 15k
8
votes
What is the earliest worldbuilding fiction?
I think we need to say that worldbuilding has been a characteristic of science fiction
from the outset.
Let's pull out that old history-of chestnut -- Lucian of Samosata's True History, also ...
- 15.3k
7
votes
What is the most frequently mentioned proper noun/adjective in Star Trek that remains undepicted?
Captain Boday, a Gallamite with a notably transparent skull is mentioned in five episodes of Deep Space Nine but is never seen, nor have we ever seen a Gallamite ship or planet, nor any other member ...
- 677k
7
votes
What is the most frequently mentioned proper noun/adjective in Star Trek that remains undepicted?
I strongly suspect the answer is
The Iconians
They receive mentions in each of TNG, Voyager, Lower Decks, Discovery and DS9 but are never seen nor depicted, presumably because they went extinct over ...
- 677k
6
votes
What is the earliest worldbuilding fiction?
I don't know if you would consider philosophical speculation as world building, but certainly The Republic of Plato is an example of a constructed fictional society with a lot of thought put into it.
...
- 10.8k
6
votes
What is the earliest worldbuilding fiction?
Edit as recommended (but may be valuable to someone else):
Well, while not definitive, worldbuilding was created as far back as Ancient Egypt if not further. The goddess Nun (Nunet?) was associated ...
- 1,141
4
votes
Accepted
Does Bacigalupi's whole oeuvre take place in the same universe?
Word of God is that they are separate universes:
When I think about it, your books all seem to happen along the same messed up timeline. Is there a Bacigalupiverse?
I deliberately say I’m not writing ...
- 216k
3
votes
Accepted
Does Alagaësia have a moon?
Yes, there's definitely a moon. Just grabbing my copy of Inheritance (I don't have e-books of the first 3) I can find:
Darkness lay all around them, heavy and oppressive. A thick layer
of clouds ...
- 121k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible