History Headscratchers / TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy

* For those curious what "Stayin' Alive" would sound like in reverse, [[https://youtu.be/ro2CIp6B0eA here you go.]]

*** IIRC, there's a line in the book where Zarniwoop turns off the artificial universe via some sort of control in his briefcase; everything goes staticky for a moment, then reappears exactly the way it was before. Except, as Zarniwoop points out, the Frogstar fighters are actually a different color in the normal universe. (Since this is H2G2, we are of course using a fairly broad definition of the word "normal," but yeah.)

*** Well, YMMV, but as far as this Troper understands, it has nothing to do with self-esteem. It's just that the brain/mind cannot deal with the extreme dissonance between the scale of the world it has known so far and the true immensity of the universe. It's beyond the capacity of a mind to process. Quite frankly, if such a thing was possible in real life, this Troper expects 100% of the people plugged into it would come out brain dead, including the above two Tropers. There's no 'instant depression' involved.

** It's actually a pretty straightforward use of the GoMadFromTheRevelation trope. It's just that unlike the ones in H.P. Lovecraft, this one is brought on by SufficientlyAdvancedScience applied to a slice of cake.

** I've heard this kind of appeal to faith used a lot by Christians as an explanation for why god doesn't just provide some kind of unambiguous evidence for his existence. If god showed everyone he was real, then everyone would just know it and wouldn't need faith, which is important for some reason, so the fact that there is no evidence is exactly what god wants; therefore god exists. The joke was basically taking this to its illogical conclusion.

**** Sounds to me like he enjoys the state of being depressed. The act of complaining about everything that happens is what keeps him going. And it obviously works well enough to keep him going for three times the lifetime of the universe.

** I always assumed that some of the Golgafrinchams mated with caveman, resulting in the decendants of hair dressers and television executives still having the Question (albeit a fundementally wrong one) in their brainwaves.

* Putting aside my feelings about Zaphod Beeblebrox's portrayal in the film, and accepting the fact that movie!Zaphod would lose to a dingo's kidney in a battle of wits, why did no one ''else'' realize his plan made no sense? The video he had ''said'' that the Question was elsewhere, and the new computer was planet-sized, so going to Magerathea for the Question is pointless! Even if the people there knew where the Question was, 1. the place has faded into myth centuries ago so anyone there is probably dead, and 2. the fact that he asked Deep Thought shows that asking one of the natives was clearly not his intention.

** It's sadly rather common when a later 'iteration' of something gains a lot more popularity. (Take, for example, any comic book title you like after a movie of that comic comes out: characters that weren't in the movie are shuffled OutOfFocus, minor characters that ''were'' in the movie become a CanonImmigrant or AscendedExtra, etc.) Adams was always looking for new ways to expand his creation, while those trying to 'keep the flame alive' would have a somewhat more conservative view of what is and isn't ''Hitchhiker's.'' Besides, do anything groundbreaking and it's HateDumb time.

* So, when Zaphod attempts to use the Point-of-View gun on Trillian, she says something along the lines of "It won't work on me, I'm a woman." Um, what? Why exactly does that make her supposedly immune to it?
** Two possibilities: either she's saying that women can already understand others' perspectives, or s
** Trillian was being comically sexist (that is, comically in the sense of the movie, not the character, and don't tell me it wasn't funny because I'd agree with you). She was saying that only TheUnfairSex ''needs'' to be hit by the gun to see someone else's point of view. It's like Bruce banner in ''Film/TheAvengers'': "That's my secret, Cap; I'm ''always angry''."

* Why was it deemed necessary to throw out any possible continuation of the Secondary Phase and simply adapt the books almost wholesale with very little alteration, retconning the entire previous series out? (Some of us might have had rather a fondness for Lintilla...)

** By use of Bayes's Theorem, computers routinely arrive at statistically reliable probabilities without complete information. And that's with Earth computers, which are Sumerian clay tables in comparison to Deep Thought.

** That would turn them from an ironic commentary on the low intelligence of the average man into a ShaggyDogStory. No, I think Adams was just using them to make the point that despite constant pettiness, idiocy, warmongering and CompletelyMissingThePoint of ''everything,'' humanity has managed to stagger along against all odds.

** Ford's relationship with Arthur never struck me as inconsistant with either personality: Ford is mercurial, capricious and shallow. He rounds on Arthur the second someone he regards as cool - Zaphod - appears. Enjoying Earth and liking its inhabitants is a guilty pleasure for Ford. Arthur exposes Ford's secret uncoolness ot others (particularly Zaphod, of course). Having Arthur tagging along once Ford is back playing with the cool kids is a bit like having invited someone from your secret D&D group to a party of your cool mates on the spur of the moment. Their relationship reminds me a lot of Vince and Howard's in TheMightyBoosh: one party may have delusions of being too cool for the other one but ultimately that's the person they always return to.

::But mostly the only thing that passes between them that could be construed as showing affection is that they spend time in each other's company even when they could avoid it. Did they get along better on Earth? Did Ford think exploring the galaxy would make Arthur more fun to be around? Did he not have any more agreeable friends? Is he just very reserved about his presumable friendliness toward Arthur? Or are they just stuck together by authorial fiat[[note]][[StealthPun dohohoho]][[/note]] in order to have a StraightManAndWiseGuy? And what's the deal with the fact they seem to increasingly dislike each other throughout the series?

** By the time of ''So Long'' and ''Mostly'', Arthur had aged probably ten years. Ford being an alien probably looked the same since it was established that Zaphod was 200 years old and Ford was his cousin. Ten years is nothing to him. After a certain point, Arthur probably viewed Ford as the best friend who acted like they were still college kids while Arthur grew up and accepted on the responsibilities of adulthood. Arthur also wanted to find love and became less interested in Ford's freewheeling lifestyle that he was probably getting to old for anyway (assuming that many years did pass between the beginning of the first book and the fourth and fifth). It's also important to remember that Arthur is a nice guy and Ford's attitudes towards women and relationships wasn't much different from Zaphod's. In ''So Long'', Fenchurch didn't warm up to Ford and asked Arthur if he could be trusted. Arthur responded in the negative, probably not out of resentment but out of courtesy to Fenchurch who was a nice proper girl for him. I don't think there was any mutual dislike between Arthur and Ford in later years, just that sense of Arthur having outgrown him. For one thing Arthur had the Earth back in ''So Long'' and Ford probably assumed he was living happily ever after with his new girl. Also, Arthur had become a seasoned and experienced independent traveler by the time Ford showed up in ''Mostly''. So Ford's was no longer needed in his old role as Mr. Exposition. It also is worth noting that in ''Mostly'' when meeting Arthur, Ford was a bit more grumpy and not his usual ''let's find a party and be generally weird'' self. He was on a serious mission probably for the first time in his life, probably because his way of life was under threat. Come to think of it, the reunion of Arthur and Trillian in ''Mostly'' wasn't particulary warm either. Yet more proof that Douglas Adams was going through some ruff times while writing Mostly Harmless.
** Interestingly, in the radio sequels (i.e. the Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential phases), adaptor Dirk Mags and the actors imbue the Ford/Arthur dynamic with more warmth and less vitriol that the books upon which they are based. The chilliness of their relationship in the books (as well as that between Arthur and Trillian, Trillian and Zaphod etc) might have been due to Douglas Adams' ambivalence towards the Hitchhiker's books and his frustration with the limitations of the the universe at the stage he was writing. [[YourMileageMayVery One's mileage may vary]] as to whether the Tertiary - Quintessential phases count as canon (and for that matter whether there even IS such a thing as canon with Hitchhiker's. But this troper appreciates that Dirk Mags was able to evoke a genuine feeling of affection between the characters. No doubt it was in part down to the real-life warmth between the actors as well - mostly returnees from the original series and old friends themselves.

** Because.

** Can't believe I'm standing up for the movie here, but: 1) The only discription of Marvin I recall is that his eyes are red triangles. They nailed that. 2) The books describe Ford as a ginger and Trillian as vaguely Arabic. If that doesn't bug you, there's no reason for Marvin to. 3) Tech marches on. Marvin's discription might've sounded cool by early 1980s-standards (I don't know, I don't remember it and don't have the book in front of me) but the film was going for a more [[EverythingIsAnIpodInTheFuture 2000s]] look, which is perfectly reasonable.

** Yeah. Every try to imagine infinity? Most people have a concet of infinity that's really, really small compared to even the big numbers used in real mathematics. The TPV just makes your brain ''understand'' those numbers. And then you start screaming and never stop, because people aren't designed for that.
** It's actually a pretty straightforward use of the GoMadFromTheRevelation trope. It's just that unlike the ones in H.P. Lovecraft, this one is brought on by SufficientlyAdvancedScience applied to a cake.

* Random...just...[[TheLoad Random]]. And how Trillian somehow believes that because she got an artificial insemination that it's Arthur's responsibility to take care of her mentally handicapped, violent, and unbelievably unstable daughter. [[WhatTheHellHero What the hell, Trillian!]]

** Earth is an artificial planet. It's likely that it's years and days are specifically designed to fit the UniversalUniverseTime.
** Also, English might be similar enough to whatever Golgafrichans speak that Ford was able to learn rudimentary English, monitor Earth communications to learns some more, then program the guide with the language option.

**** Don't forget that as a different incarnation of the [=H2G2=] series, it is supposed to divulge from the other series. They could just add some more movie like plot points at whim.

** But the other side of the slice would be cold, and cooked to the last person;s toasting preference. Anyway, I think that the so-called "anything you want machine" was like Eddie's drink dispenser in the books: gives you either what your taste buds say you'll like, or a vague approximation of (i.e., "almost entirely unlike") what you ask for, and mostly sticks to thinks that can be poured.

** No, 'personally' was specified. Well, he won't be getting to the Zs for quite a while. I suppose he could hire somebody to assign them all serial numbers while he's doing the stretch from "Zc..." to "Zd..."

** StraightManAndWiseGuy dynamic?

* In a 1998 interview, DouglasAdams was talking about the prospects for making a ''Hitchhiker's Guide'' movie, and he said that the success of ''Film/MenInBlack'' had boosted the hopes for a sci-fi comedy film to be made. Then he said, "And ''Men In Black'' is... How can I put this delicately? There were elements of it I found quite familiar, shall we say?" What made him think MIB was a ripoff of H2G2?

* In a 1998 interview, DouglasAdams was talking about the prospects for making a ''Hitchhiker's Guide'' movie, and he said that the success of ''Film/MenInBlack'' had boosted the hopes for a sci-fi comedy film to be made. Then he said, "And ''Men In Black'' is... How can I put this delicately? There were elements of it I found quite familiar, shall we say?" What made him think MIB was a ripoff of H2G2?

** I can't speak for the TV series, but the radio-series release uses a cover of ''Sorcerer'', cuts or alters the PinkFloyd bits (specifically, Marvin's humming is changed to only sound vaguely like something the band might release and Arthur's line is changed accordingly), and...um...really not quite sure what the BeeGees thing is, but my guess is that the song played backwards sounds little enough like the song played forward for it to be a non-issue. In any case, if ''FreaksAndGeeks''--which includes songs by Music/TheWho, Music/VanHalen, Music/{{Rush}}, Music/{{Styx}}, Music/TheGratefulDead, Music/TheMoodyBlues, and Music/BillyJoel--can be released with it's soundtrack untouched, than I see no reason why licensing issues for Music/PinkFloyd and the Music/TheBeeGees should be ''that'' big a problem.

* Second headscratcher. It is explained elsewhere that a big reason why so many series have not seen release on video/DVD, or have been butchered on release, is the fabuluous cost of paying musical royalties on other people's copyright songs. I can appreciate that. But the BBC has released every episode of the radio series on cassette, despite the radio show being chocca with borrowed, lifted and sampled tracks. Even the theme tune, ''Journey of the Sorcerer'', is an Eagles track; Pink Floyd instrumental is extensively borrowed; and to cap it all, the Alien Disco dance song, that sublimely horrible thing, is a BeeGees track ''Stayin Alive'' played backwards. Surely the licence costs payable to three big acts should be crippling?
** I can't speak for the TV series, but the radio-series release uses a cover of ''Sorcerer'', cuts or alters the PinkFloyd bits (specifically, Marvin's humming is changed to only sound vaguely like something the band might release and Arthur's line is changed accordingly), and...um...really not quite sure what the BeeGees thing is, but my guess is that the song played backwards sounds little enough like the song played forward for it to be a non-issue. In any case, if ''FreaksAndGeeks''--which includes songs by Music/TheWho, Music/VanHalen, Music/{{Rush}}, Music/{{Styx}}, Music/TheGratefulDead, Music/TheMoodyBlues, and Music/BillyJoel--can be released with it's soundtrack untouched, than I see no reason why licensing issues for Music/PinkFloyd and the Music/BeeGees should be ''that'' big a problem.

** The BeeGees thing: on his way to the total Perspective Vortex in the radio series, Zaphod is in the uprooted office building being tortured by a sadistic custody officer who is appointed specially to give him a hard time. allowed to beleive he's escaping, Zaphod ends up in an Alien Disco where the clentele are dancing robots (sirius Cybernetics again) and the smell of hot sweat is being sprayed over everything. The insane music playing does sound vaguely familiar, but I had to read the scripts to find out it's a Bee Gees anthem from ''SaturdayNightFever'' being played backwards and otherwise electronically mucked around with. It does sound like vile alien disco music, though, and turns out to be for the Frogstar Custody Officer's sadistic amusement.

** By the time of ''So Long'' and ''Mostly'', Arthur had aged probably ten years. Ford being an alien probably looked the same since it was established that Zaphod was 200 years old and Ford was his cousin. Ten years is nothing to him. After a certain point, Arthur probably viewed Ford as the best friend who acted like they were still college kids while Arthur grew up and accepted on the responsibilities of adulthood. Arthur also wanted to find love and became less interested in Ford's freewheeling lifestyle that he was probably getting to old for anyway (assuming that many years did pass between the beginning of the first book and the fourth and fifth). It's also important to remember that Arthur is a nice guy and Ford's attitudes towards women and relationships wasn't much different from Zaphod's. In ''So Long'', Fenchurch didn't warm up to Ford and asked Arthur if he could be trusted. Arthur responded in the negative, probably not out of resentment but out of courtesy to Fenchurch who was a nice proper girl for him. I don't think there was any mutual dislike between Arthur and Ford in later years, just that sense of Arthur having outgrown him. For one thing Arthur had the Earth back in ''So Long'' and Ford probably assumed he was living happily ever after with his new girl. Also, Arthur had become a seasoned and experienced independent traveler by the time Ford showed up in ''Mostly''. So Ford's was no longer needed in his old role as Mr. Exposition. It also is worth noting that in ''Mostly'' when meeting Arthur, Ford was a bit more grumpy and not his usual ''let's find a party and be generally weird'' self. He was on a serious mission probably for the first time in his life, probably because his way of life was under threat. Come to think of it, the reunion of Arthur and Trillian in ''Mostly'' wasn't particulary warm either

* In a 1998 interview, Douglas Adams was talking about the prospects for making a ''Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' movie, and he said that the success of ''Film/MeninBlack'' had boosted the hopes for a sci-fi comedy film to be made. Then he said, "And ''Men In Black'' is... How can I put this delicately? There were elements of it I found quite familiar, shall we say?" What made him think MIB was a ripoff of H2G2?

** It does seem a little fuzzy. On the other hand, the pre-operation Zaphod wouldn't necessarily have an objection to the tremendous amounts of wealth that he (erroneously) thought were lying around unattended on Magrathea.

** He won't be getting to the Zs for quite a while. I suppose he could hire somebody to assign them all serial numbers while he's doing the stretch from "Zc..." to "Zd..."

* I feel I might be missing something here, but in the non-movie versions, why is Zaphod's first impulse on stealing the Heart of Gold to take it to Magrathea? I can kinda see why he'd ''want'' to do that for its own sake, but it has nothing to do with the ruler of the universe. Did his old self put him up to it? If so, he [pre-op!Zaphod] doesn't seem to have thought it through. He should have just gone straight to Zarniwoop's office on Ursa Minor Beta. The best explanation I can imagine is that Magrathea was to play some ''later'' part in the plan, but his commands came through in the wrong order?