Your most pointless TV/movie/book nitpicks

[JEB]

They used the term "Shadowfell" which was not in use at the time. Terminology at the time was "the Demi-Plane of Shadow". The Upside-Down actually appears to be based on the NWN2: Masks of the Betrayer version of the Shadowfell (2007). I expect the Duffer brothers played Masks of the Betrayer and nelsonmandelaed it back to the 1980s.

They called it the "Vale of Shadows", apparently, in-universe. (There's also a place called the Vale of Shadows in the Forgotten Realms, but that was very different, and would be just as anachronistic.) Otherwise agreed on the likely provenance.

Appeared in Japan or appeared in the US? I only ask because I had a friend whose mum worked in Japan, and she regularly brought him back Transformers which were not yet available (and in some cases, never available at the time) in the West, she even gave me a couple. That said that is an actual reason and Dustin doesn't seem to have any such connections.

I can't vouch for every toy Dustin had, but Season 3 was set in 1985, and he had an UItra Magnus - which wasn't released until 1986 here or in Japan. (There was a precursor toy, "Powered Convoy" from the Diaclone line in Japan, but it had a completely different color scheme.)

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I can't vouch for every toy Dustin had, but Season 3 was set in 1985, and he had an UItra Magnus - which wasn't released until 1986 here or in Japan. (There was a precursor toy, "Powered Convoy" from the Diaclone line in Japan, but it had a completely different color scheme.)

Loving the level of detail here! Good old Diaclone!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

How about how virtually every woman fighter in a movie seems to be an archer, because of course archery doesn't take any upper body strength? It's not at all like the skeletons of medieval archers showed pronounced lopsided development due to the strain of drawing a 100# plus bow, or anything.

Yeah that's a weird one isn't it? Like, you want to have female warriors, cool, please do, but for some reason you can't envision them using melee weapons and armour (even though you don't need exceptional strength to use stuff like spears, lighter polearms or even sharp slashing swords and be pretty dangerous with them), so they give them "easy to use" (lol!) bows? I wonder where this odd convention originated. Is it derived from "skinny" elves using bows in fantasy or something? Or is just working backwards from guns = dangerous regardless of user = ranged weapons = dangerous regardless of user? Crossbows would make more sense with that logic (and they really were incredibly dangerous - a child with a crossbow killed one of the French or British kings at a siege, I forget who), but crossbows are less "cool" than bows.

Not all fantasy is equally vulnerable - I notice the warrior-women we've seen so far in WoT for example mostly use spears and slashing swords (though I think that's more to do with the culture they're from rather than intentional).

The biggest historical/fantasy "nitpick" is beyond a nitpick and into a full-on trope though - all pre-modern armour is close to 100% useless in close to 100% of historical and fantasy TV/movies (it often works pretty well in videogames and, oddly, books, though).

 

[Old Fezziwig]

a child with a crossbow killed one of the French or British kings at a siege, I forget who

Richard I was shot by a boy with a crossbow, but he died of gangrene rather than the wound. So I guess partial credit to the boy?

 

[Ryujin]

Yeah that's a weird one isn't it? Like, you want to have female warriors, cool, please do, but for some reason you can't envision them using melee weapons and armour (even though you don't need exceptional strength to use stuff like spears, lighter polearms or even sharp slashing swords and be pretty dangerous with them), so they give them "easy to use" (lol!) bows? I wonder where this odd convention originated. Is it derived from "skinny" elves using bows in fantasy or something? Or is just working backwards from guns = dangerous regardless of user = ranged weapons = dangerous regardless of user? Crossbows would make more sense with that logic (and they really were incredibly dangerous - a child with a crossbow killed one of the French or British kings at a siege, I forget who), but crossbows are less "cool" than bows.

Not all fantasy is equally vulnerable - I notice the warrior-women we've seen so far in WoT for example mostly use spears and slashing swords (though I think that's more to do with the culture they're from rather than intentional).

The biggest historical/fantasy "nitpick" is beyond a nitpick and into a full-on trope though - all pre-modern armour is close to 100% useless in close to 100% of historical and fantasy.

When a less strong fighter comes to mind I tend to think of weapons like the rapier which is still 3 pounds of steel, that needs to be held at arm's length for extended periods. It's not like a Warbow, however, and with being horribly out of practice I would now struggle to properly draw my 45# Flatbow.

The spear has been in use in many different iterations, for thousands of years, with good reason; it's an excellent weapon. It's not as flashy as a sword, so it doesn't get the play that it deserves.

Oh, indeed. How many times do people get stabbed right through their presumably tempered and proofed plate in movies? Ridiculous. I think "The Mandalorian" might well be one of the best representations of how effective armour is, and yet it's Science Fantasy.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Richard I was shot by a boy with a crossbow, but he died of gangrene rather than the wound. So I guess partial credit to the boy?

Yeah that's the one, and Richard's merc captain gave the boy 100% credit and exotically tortured him to death despite having been explicitly told not to by Richard before he died, so it seems churlish to not give him full credit on that account!

 

[Deset Gled]

I wonder where this odd convention originated. Is it derived from "skinny" elves using bows in fantasy or something? Or is just working backwards from guns = dangerous regardless of user = ranged weapons = dangerous regardless of user? Crossbows would make more sense with that logic (and they really were incredibly dangerous - a child with a crossbow killed one of the French or British kings at a siege, I forget who), but crossbows are less "cool" than bows.

Historically, the ur-example of this trope may be the mythical Amazons. Archers are very prominent in those stories (including the legends of their body "modifications".)

More recently, I would blame Katniss.

 

[briggart]

Richard I was shot by a boy with a crossbow, but he died of gangrene rather than the wound. So I guess partial credit to the boy?

Yeah, I'd give the boy only half XP.

 

[MarkB]

Yeah that's a weird one isn't it? Like, you want to have female warriors, cool, please do, but for some reason you can't envision them using melee weapons and armour (even though you don't need exceptional strength to use stuff like spears, lighter polearms or even sharp slashing swords and be pretty dangerous with them), so they give them "easy to use" (lol!) bows? I wonder where this odd convention originated. Is it derived from "skinny" elves using bows in fantasy or something? Or is just working backwards from guns = dangerous regardless of user = ranged weapons = dangerous regardless of user? Crossbows would make more sense with that logic (and they really were incredibly dangerous - a child with a crossbow killed one of the French or British kings at a siege, I forget who), but crossbows are less "cool" than bows.

Not all fantasy is equally vulnerable - I notice the warrior-women we've seen so far in WoT for example mostly use spears and slashing swords (though I think that's more to do with the culture they're from rather than intentional).

The biggest historical/fantasy "nitpick" is beyond a nitpick and into a full-on trope though - all pre-modern armour is close to 100% useless in close to 100% of historical and fantasy.

I wouldn't underestimate how much of this you can lay at the feet of Tolkien and Legolas. Not that Legolas was female, but the "strong swordsmen, burly axe warrior, lithe archer" paradigm established by the Fellowship does a lot to solidify the notion that archers rely upon agility rather than strength.

 

[Irlo]

How about how virtually every woman fighter in a movie seems to be an archer,

I must be watching different movies.