{"id":430,"date":"2010-01-23T13:00:39","date_gmt":"2010-01-23T21:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/?p=430"},"modified":"2013-06-14T20:48:48","modified_gmt":"2013-06-15T03:48:48","slug":"nasa-uses-the-movie-armageddon-in-their-management-training-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2010\/01\/nasa-uses-the-movie-armageddon-in-their-management-training-program\/","title":{"rendered":"NASA Uses the Movie Armageddon in Their Management Training Program"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Michael<\/a>Today I found out<\/a> that NASA uses the 1998 film, Armageddon, in their management training program.<\/p>\n

It turns out, to absolutely no one’s surprise, that this is not because it’s an incredibly well thought out movie in how to stop an asteroid from hitting the earth…\u00a0 No, they use it because it contains over 168 distinct things that are impossible (not just improbable, but impossible.\u00a0 there are many many more if you want to talk about improbable).\u00a0 Because of this, it makes for a great exercise in seeing how many of those things their staff can recognize, both the impossible things and the improbable.<\/p>\n

Now personally, I’m not one to criticize a film for having scientific inaccuracies, so long as they are entertaining.\u00a0 I mean, that’s the point of movies right?\u00a0 If a film maker wants to make true “art”, they’ll be sure and always stay consistent with the world they create and things of this nature, but in most cases, they are just looking to entertain and make a lot of money.<\/p>\n

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That being said, in this case, I’m willing to make an exception due to the amazing number of inaccuracies (168 impossibilities in 150 minutes of film, averaging over 1 per minute; that’s not even talking about the improbables;\u00a0 just the impossibles) and the fact that it’s a film based in space and about things happening in space.\u00a0 So it would stand to reason that some part of the plot should actually have something to do with something that could actually happen in space.\u00a0 I mean, it would be like taking the movie Sleepless in Seattle<\/em> and randomly having it based in South Africa, then have gravity pull upward instead of down, then instead of breathing air everybody breaths cotton candy, then add about 165 more things just like that randomly and\u00a0 never address in the plot why any of these things might be the case in this world the writers and directors have created.<\/p>\n

Phil Plait said it best “Here’s the short version: Armageddon<\/em> got some astronomy right. For example, there is an asteroid in the movie, and asteroids do indeed exist. And then there was… um… well, you know… um. Okay, so that was about all they got right.”<\/p>\n

The other head scratcher is that many of the impossibilities introduced weren’t necessary in regards to the plot.\u00a0 So they actually intentionally injected these additional impossibilities into the story for no reason other than to make the film longer and possible to introduce more explosions… in space.\u00a0 They just added minutes and cost to an already too long film.\u00a0 This implies a lack of effort on the part of Michael Bay in actually developing the script.\u00a0 Now granted, it is Michael Bay.\u00a0 I imagine his script writing sessions tend to go something like:<\/p>\n