There are so many things wrong with Wing Commander, I don't know where to start. So let me begin with the large problem. The whole movie was out of focus. Scenes blending space with live footage were blurred to make the distinction between real and cg seem the same.

Besides that, there were several scientific aspects wrong with this "movie". When the love interest of the main characters best friend dies, the wreckage lands outside the gravity field, which is a whole other problem in itself. So they pull out the meat wagon to sweep the wreckage off the ship. When they do that, what happens? The wreckage falls off. If I need to explain it, no gravity in space equals no falling.

When ships are destroyed, they send out a shockwave. I was initially shocked by this fact, but then two things came to my attention. The shockwave travels out parallel, not in a circular pattern like it should. This allows a pilot to ejects over the blast just as her ship explodes. This brings me to my other point. When the shockwaves hit asteroids, they exploded immediately. But when it hits the P-47, as I like to call it, it just flames up as in atmospheric burn, allowing enough time for ejection.

Then there's the usual problems with space movies, like there's no sound in space.

The actual plot holes begin here:

It is the 27th century or 26th, I don't know or care which one it was. Yet what are our ship like? They rely bullets as weapons. On the destroyers, they use larger bullets. 500 years from now, we still use bullets and missiles. Also in 500 years, we rely on WW II aircraft to save the planet. The destroyers themselves use human labor to load and launch the missiles. This leads to another scientific principle. Bullets usually only work in space.

The pilgrims, as they are called, are the first group to explore space and are persecuted for it. They don't get into major details, but we are given one sided propaganda about the pilgrims. They are bad, no one likes them, we waged war to kill them off. Sound familiar? Earth is apparently run by Hitler clones in the future. Also, a 100 minute film is not nearly enough to describe 500 or 600 years of history, especially when one group is segregated and abused. I can't understand why they hate Freddie Prinze if I don't see why Earth hates his kind.

Freddie Prinze Jr., an inbred "Pilgrim" was the single solitary man with the ability to fly the mission.

The pilgrims, in their 500 years in space have evolved into human computers, able to compute more computations than a NavComm ( sound familiar?). Evolution just doesn't work that fast.

Also, the aliens, whatever they were called, could travel through hyper space because they stole an Earth computer. It doesn't matter if they have engines, they have a computer ( which has a strange resemblance to a car battery ). Another thing that just pissed me off was the subtitles utilized for the aliens. It was in their dialect before being translated into English. This makes absolutely no sense. The purpose of the subtitles is to make it so we can understand what they are saying. Just a way of making the drooling masses of Freddie Prinze fans think the movie is more complex.

The alien conspiracy

There are two reasons why we won the battle.

1. The aliens were cute little teddy bears with cat eyes from the cover of an R.L. Stine novel intended to scare four year olds. When I saw them discussing among themselves the events of the battle, I broke out laughing and kicking the empty seat in front of me. I managed to sustain this supreme feeling of glee for several minutes after the aliens were off the screen, knowing at that point just how bad the movie was.

2. Pure stupidity. The largest ship in the fleet is invaded by humans. After killing less than a dozen aliens, the ship is under our control. The pivotal ship has 8 or nine men on it. This stupidity is even more apparent during the movies climax. The big sneak attack the aliens were planning was discovered by the humans, which I can understand. But when their largest invasion occurs, they utilize the element of surprise. This is mainly ATTACKING ONE SHIP AT A TIME !!!!!! This allows the humans to destroy them one by one, not allowing them time to radio back to hyper space that it was a sneak attack. "Oh great, another alien ship is coming through. Lets blast it." The next minute: "Oh great, another alien ship is coming through. Lets blast it."

To finish off this article, let me sum up the movie. Scientifically inaccurate, blurred camera shots, meager opponent, YOU MUST HATE THE PILGRIMS, WWII planes, and bullets. BULLETS !

See this with a friend, because the best part is trashing it and saying "Hey Capt. Pinacca can't be more ethnic."

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Stephen Pause
3.9.1999