Escape to the Movies: Lucy - It's Almost a Black Widow Movie

[Machine Man 1992]

I am very displeased with all the people in this topic failing to grasp the importance of suspension of disbelief in fiction.

It's like the Spoony One said: "There's 'suspension of disbelief' and then there's 'get the fuck out.'"

Suspension of disbelief works in other fiction is due to mitigating factors; Take Superman for example. The guy can fly super fast, is super strong, and can shoot lasers from his eyes and breathe ice on bad guys. We can buy that because he's from Krypton, an alien. We know starting out that the world Superman starts in slightly different from our own. Superman's biology is couched in the fact that it's unprovable by science. Suspension of Disbelief works by operating in that grey area where science can't explain it, but isn't so fantastical it compromises the plot.

Lucy starts from completely bullshit myth that anyone with some understanding anatomy can easily disprove. And even then, her powers are so overpowered that theres no point in even having a plot.

(Am I making sense or should I sober up first?)

 

[SacremPyrobolum]

The big backlash I'm hearing about Lucy is how it's another white girl kidnapped by racial stereotypes as a premise, and then the white girl gets to have her revenge on the kidnappers and that's okay because they started it. Thanks, tumblr.

you mean it isn't? I'm pretty sure I would do the same thing if I gained super powers after being cut up and imprisoned.

 

[sleeky01]

I think 10% mainly annoys people because it's so well known as false. It's less that it's a handwave and more that it's an obvious one being played straight. Some mumbling about 'super biology science' would've served the same role without continuing something that is well known as a wive's tale.

"Uses 10% of your brain" is pretty well connected in my mind (And probably others) as an excuse for hacks to peddle quackery under the guise of real science - For example that "What the bleep do we know?" movie however long ago. It's a statement known to be false but regularly used by people who legitimately are trying to convince others that it's true, which means it automatically gets a negative response.

So yeah: Not that it's false and known to be false, but that it's false yet still frequently believed to be true.

So, just out of interest (because I admittedly did not know that what I'd been told about this several times was untrue until relatively recently), how did the myth start? And, as we apparently know it to be completely flase, how much of our brain power ARE we actually using on a day to day basis?

EDIT: It also occurs to me that the premise of Lucy, as described by this review, is in broad strokes no different from that of River Tam in Firefly, and I don't remember anybody ever bitching about that...

Have a look here for a start to answer your question:

http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/10percent.asp

As to River Tam, I agree. I see this movie as little different than the other superhero movies we've had over the past 10 yrs or so. Nobody bitched about how spider man could cling to walls and was able to produce a substance that he shot directly from his wrists. Or a scientist was injected with a serum that turned him into.....

[
Did nobody think to ask where Hulks extra mass came from?

But only 10% of your mind use theory causes people to get upset?!?

 

[Ukomba]

Hey Bob? For all that talk about Knowledge being good and all, are you completely forgetting the fact that the further her powers get, the less empathetic Lucy gets and how little concern she has about randomly killing people?

She killed a taxi driver just cause he didn't speak English for fuck's sake!

Actually that's precisely what getting that mentally advance would provoke really, considering how "emotions" are usually something that gets in the way, and if she's thinking "rationally" and as it seems, she has limited time, getting things done quicker is kinda of what she'd go for.

Ya but bob was arguing that she was becoming a more emotional and caring person the more logical she got. Not saying strict logic wouldn't, and tends to, drive brutal ends justify the means calculations, but Bob was saying she got more moral.

 

[SacremPyrobolum]

2. Racism

By putting gibberish on the wall, and implying that its Chinese, its hugely insulting, basically saying "Hey, entire language is bullshit gibberish goobidy gook" That is real racism.

No, it's implying that this was an American production where most people would not be able to read Chinese characters. Compared to all of the things on the list of priorities that comes with making a tripe A blockbuster, making sure characters which most of the audience would not even beginning to be able to interoperate accurate does not rank highly, if at all.

And it shouldn't. Because in the end only the greatest cluster of nerves would interpret such a minor oversight as an assault on the identity of an entire peoples.

 

[Pogilrup]

I think 10% mainly annoys people because it's so well known as false. It's less that it's a handwave and more that it's an obvious one being played straight. Some mumbling about 'super biology science' would've served the same role without continuing something that is well known as a wive's tale.

"Uses 10% of your brain" is pretty well connected in my mind (And probably others) as an excuse for hacks to peddle quackery under the guise of real science - For example that "What the bleep do we know?" movie however long ago. It's a statement known to be false but regularly used by people who legitimately are trying to convince others that it's true, which means it automatically gets a negative response.

So yeah: Not that it's false and known to be false, but that it's false yet still frequently believed to be true.

So, just out of interest (because I admittedly did not know that what I'd been told about this several times was untrue until relatively recently), how did the myth start? And, as we apparently know it to be completely flase, how much of our brain power ARE we actually using on a day to day basis?

EDIT: It also occurs to me that the premise of Lucy, as described by this review, is in broad strokes no different from that of River Tam in Firefly, and I don't remember anybody ever bitching about that...

Have a look here for a start to answer your question:

http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/10percent.asp

As to River Tam, I agree. I see this movie as little different than the other superhero movies we've had over the past 10 yrs or so. Nobody bitched about how spider man could cling to walls and was able to produce a substance that he shot directly from his wrists. Or a scientist was injected with a serum that turned him into.....

[
Did nobody think to ask where Hulks extra mass came from?

But only 10% of your mind use theory causes people to get upset?!?

By this time everyone know the Hulk's transformation is unreal, so the audience just rolls with it.

Unfortunately, there is a percentage of people who either still believes this 10% theory or susceptible to believing it.

It just hasn't gotten to the point where we can treat it as retro super science.

That and as someone on this thread pointed out, it isn't a simple embellishment of something valid, it is total discredited fabrication.

 

[Baralak]

I saw the film last night, and, scientific fallacy aside, it was a FANTASTIC film. I took my family and we all absolutely loved it. Honestly, Guardians of the Galaxy will have to work to top Lucy in my mind. Easily a day 1 blu-ray buy.

It really channeled Akira near the end, I felt. One of the best films I've seen in years.

Also, for those wondering just how pervasive the myth is, you get a giant black screen every so often, with a nice, big, screen filling percentage to show just how much of her brain she's using. It's really not a "Revenge" Flick, either. Within 20 minutes of getting her powers, she's done all the revenge she wants, and spends the rest of the film getting to Morgan Freeman's character to do good for humanity.

 

[Ukomba]

Hold on. So she swallows a philosophers stone that's slowly giving her magic powers right? The ability to control the cells of her own body and mater amongst them, and she's supposedly on a race against time before she incorporeal? Is the drug not some kind of mater effecting the cells of her body? Why can't she just stop the progression, giving her Infinite time? Can't give her magic like that and not expect her to save her own life with it.

 

[Baresark]

Looks interesting enough, and my girlfriend is interested in watching it. I could rail on about the 10% thing, but why bother. It's an interesting enough concept for a movie, even if the jumping off point is openly known to be bullshit. Who really cares at this point. Remember when watching a movie required a certain amount of suspension of disbelief. Why the hell are people attacking this one because it expects that from the viewers for a single thing that is based on a fallacy. Where are all these nerd/geek culture science snobs when Iron Man builds a suit that can do just about anything. Hell, or even when Batman is forced to use everyone's cell phones in order find the Joker.

 

[nightmare_gorilla]

i'll say this, the marvel cinematic universe has given us much more friendly versions of almost all the characters it's used save for maybe captain America who is just himself pretty much. in the comics, tony stark is an asshole, nick fury is not some dreamer who believes in superheroes he barely trusts them, and black widow is kind of a heartless assassin/spy/ mini-nick fury, a black widow movie is not a bad idea exactly but the essence of her character is kind of rooted in not knowing where she is at any given time and the knowledge that where she is and what she's doing isn't very nice or clean. so yeah I would love a female lead super hero movie, and the movies have made black widow WAY more popular than she is in the comics but if you want a female lead who isn't aggressively torturing and killing in the name of protecting SHIELD or whatever fury is currently working on you need to go she-hulk, ms. marvel, or even tigress.

 

[Baresark]

Hold on. So she swallows a philosophers stone that's slowly giving her magic powers right? The ability to control the cells of her own body and mater amongst them, and she's supposedly on a race against time before she incorporeal? Is the drug not some kind of mater effecting the cells of her body? Why can't she just stop the progression, giving her Infinite time? Can't give her magic like that and not expect her to save her own life with it.

I took this very issue with other movies that had the same kind of idea. There was the movie Phenomenon, where Travolta's character can understand the very fabric of reality and manipulate energy with his thoughts, but then the brain tumor that gives him that very ability is going to kill him and he isn't smart enough or able to even stop it's growth. Then there was Limitless (a movie I very much liked). He was so smart that he could learn a language without any issue, predict what the financial markets were going to do (something that is so complex that it's actually impossible to obtain the level of predictability he had), but he had to hire a lab full of people who were a fraction of his intelligence to find out how it worked.

It's like a glaring plot hole that is so large, people can't even see it as they fall into it.

 

[Pogilrup]

Perhaps the day we can treat the 10% thing as retro super science is also the day when it also the butt of a joke in several sci-fi or superhero pastiches.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I don't think human beings have the potential to be gods no matter how much of our brains potential we gain access to, but as the premise to a movie this does sound interesting.

 

[Drake Barrow]

I haven't seen The Rock 100% state Captain Marvel/Shazam, so I'm curious as to whether or not he'll be playing the Big Red Cheese or if he'll be starring as Black Adam. He certainly looks the part. Buzz cut, dusky skin, large enough to have his own senators and get federal funding, all the essentials.

I'll be satisfied either way, at least in theory. It's not the choice of actor here that bothers me, it's that D.C. has been in full-on panic mode since the Marvel Cinematic Universe took off and can't seem to avoid tripping over its own feet.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

It sounds like I'll hate the main character for being a god mode sue from the get to, also, I'm pretty sure that everywhere in the world that's not america people know science is true (a depressing sentence to write), so it's not progressive.

Yes, I'm sure the backwards farmers in India and China ( the most populated countries in the world) know all about neuroscience and can just look it up on the internet that doesn't exist out in their rural country villages.

It's not that the US is any more or less ignorant than the rest of the world. It's just that our dumb people are really, really loud. And have internet connections.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

Perhaps the day we can treat the 10% thing as retro super science is also the day when it also the butt of a joke in several sci-fi or superhero pastiches.

Like the "radiation gives you super powers" and "Air on Mars" retro science?

 

[Vault101]

I think il give this one a pass

Mainly because I'm not interested in an emotionless god type character, especially if she stared out sympathetic

 

[Arakasi]

The primary difference between the pseudoscience of sci-fi generally and the 10% brain thing is the following. When sci-fi movies tend to use technology as a means to the end, they tend to explain it in terms of future realms of possibility, they rarely try to justify it on current science, and when they do they tend to do better than say 'breathing space air'. The 10% of your brain thing, however, has not only been the justification behind so much stupidity (ironically) but is a phrase that has been debunked over and over, and a sci-fi movie is using it as its central premise. If the chemicals or whatever simply 'enhanced her brainpower' that would be absolutely fine, but that it uses this tired and frustrating trope, people find it jarring.

Although, it does sound like my kind of movie. Even if I won't necessarily agree to the 'knowledge = greater empathy' thing. I'm more of a Dr Manhattan fan.

 

[faefrost]

are you joking? The Rock would be PERFECT as Shazam. He has the muscle bound super hero look down but can also bring a naive child like wonder to the part. The only other actor that could do it would be Chris Pratt

as for Black Widow... ehhh her own movie wouldn't be that interesting, I mean she's an assasin ok neat. I would rather have Ms Marvel as the first Marvel Female Superhero to get her own movie.

The only thing that works against the Rock as Shazam, is that he would be soooo much more perfect as Shazam's main nemesis. The equal and opposite Black Adam. Who really is a much more nuanced and fun character to play. But I could live with the Rock as either.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

I've got a pretty limited understanding of neuroscience myself, but would the movie perhaps have garnered less ire had the drug instead basically overclocked her cognitive functions with the same result but with the caveat that her brain and/or body are basically going to burn out?


Hell I think there was an episode of Babylon 5 that did this.