Discussion Fridge / GlassOnion

Removed:

• There's two interesting things about Miles' puzzle boxes...
  • First, none of them are designed to be solved by wit, but rather obscure trivial knowledge (chess moves, the Fibonacci sequence, etc). IQ tests tend to focus on problem-solving skills and pattern recognition, not accumulated knowledge or emotional intelligence. If Miles had built simple logic puzzles into the boxes, a regular person might be able to solve them, even through brute force. But since he built these overly complex puzzles for his other rich friends, it becomes a form of pointless gate-keeping.
  • This ties into the second part, which is that even the Disruptors can't figure out how to solve them. No one would have blamed us for assuming (at least early on) that Miles and the Disruptors are as rich and famous as they are at least partly because of their intelligence. But that turns out to not be the case. Birdie and Duke are hopeless. Claire and Lionel only got to where they are by abandoning their ethics. The only people we see independently solving the puzzles are Peg, Duke's mom and Whiskey, all of whom are more "ordinary" people by comparison. It establishes the theme early on that great wealth is very much not a sign of intelligence.
    • Miles mentions that he had his "puzzle guy" - a commissioned artist - rig up the boxes in advance, demonstrating the lack of personal thought he puts into his schemes. Why think of something clever when you can pay someone to do it for you? Another connection to this is the invitation card asking to forward on dietary preferences/restrictions. Shouldn't this be information a person already knows about his oldest friends?

This entry contains a lot of dubious assumptions and conclusions. For example, who says the puzzle boxes are supposed to be solved by wit? By all appearances, it's supposed to be a game, and the Disruptors have fun figuring it out. Why is this "pointless gate-keeping?" I'm not even sure what the second point is. The sequence is plainly used in the film to help establish the characters. That's not fridge brilliance. The third bullet (don't forget Example Indentation) has a bit of a point in that Miles hiring experts to create his puzzles fits into the revelation that he's not a genius, but it's not all that surprising that a rich tech guy would hire big-name people to do niche work for him. As for dietary restrictions, those can change, and Miles hasn't seen the Disruptors in a while. Someone might have started a diet, become kosher, or gone on a new drug since he last saw them.

When you consider how disposable the other Distruptors are to Miles. He has already shown a willingness to murder them to cover his tracks (as was the case with Duke and Andi), or get them to take the fall for his actions (as was the case with Birdie). Then it is quite obvious that once Klear was rolled out to the public and it inevitably causes a lot of household fatalities due to it being a dangerous fuel source, Miles would have once again pinned the blame on someone else. Since Lionel was the one working to make Klear palatable for domestic use, he would have been the perfect scapegoat to take the heat off Miles. But unlike Birdie Lionel would not only have gotten a lot of public backlash, he would have also faced legal consequences, which includes jail time for gross negligence and involuntary manslaughter on a wide scale. For all we know Miles might have also tried to have him murdered as well to prevent him from revealing his culpability in the whole Klear debacle.