Stuff bothering me about inception

[adam_grif]

This has all probably been raised before, but...

- Why were the characters so worried about going down to Limbo? In the end they just kill themselves to wake back up from it, so what was the issue?
- The Sydney to LA flight they are on goes for like 12+ hours (I've been on it), why did the characters all wake up just as they were about to descend? Did they only start dreaming 5 minutes prior to that in the real world?

[Chaotic Neutral]

- The Sydney to LA flight they are on goes for like 12+ hours (I've been on it), why did the characters all wake up just as they were about to descend? Did they only start dreaming 5 minutes prior to that in the real world?

They took drugs to keep themselves in a deeper sleep.

- Why were the characters so worried about going down to Limbo? In the end they just kill themselves to wake back up from it, so what was the issue?

What makes you so sure they woke up?

[Stofsk]

I really like the film but ever since seeing this picture I can't get the idea out of my head (haha i've been inception'd!!). If you can't go home because you're facing an unjust murder charge, why bother trying? Why not just get your dad to bring your kids to the country you live in which has no extradition treaty? Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

[Marcus Aurelius]

I really like the film but ever since seeing this picture I can't get the idea out of my head (haha i've been inception'd!!). If you can't go home because you're facing an unjust murder charge, why bother trying? Why not just get your dad to bring your kids to the country you live in which has no extradition treaty? Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

Ken Watanabe's super-influence is just standard Hollywood make-believe and I had no problem with that thanks to active doublethink (which some people also call suspension of disbelief, although it isn't exactly the same thing for me). The going home part, I rationalized, was because he wanted to actually spent an unlimited time with his children without upsetting their environment, and he thought that it would do them more bad than good to make them move to France or something. Now, kids move to other countries all the time without too much trouble with their parents, but perhaps he thought that there were now other people in the children's lives, who also should have followed them and it all would have been too much to demand from everybody involved. After all, he had not been a really active father for them after he had to leave the country.

[Stofsk]

I know it's a suspension of disbelief issue, and I can suspend it because the film is otherwise solid. But it's still one of those things I couldn't help scratch my head over. The idea that someone has super-influence +5 charisma and can make a phone call to cancel an arrest warrant for murder, really stretches SoD IMO. I can accept it otherwise the plot of the entire movie is irrevocably broken, but I don't know if it's strong writing. Leo expresses scepticism at some point in the film about it, but that was whether Ken would honour the agreement IIRC, not that he was capable of honouring it.

[Simon_Jester]

It may well be that Saito (Watanabe) put a great deal of time and resources into setting this up, and that the 'one phone call' is just 'call guy A and tell him the go code to call guys B through N, who in turn call guys O through Z, who...'

The great influence that allows him to do this is, yes, over the top- but then again, this is clearly a near future setting with hints of corporate dystopia; remember that the whole point of the inception stunt is to keep a megacorporation from acquiring some kind of important global monopoly (and stomping all over Saito's business in the process).

Given the kind of world we live in, I think it would be shocking but not that surprising to learn that someone had managed to accomplish this: either by screwing with government files or by having unlawful influence over the government.

So... it's an issue, but not a colossal one for me.

[phred]

- Why were the characters so worried about going down to Limbo? In the end they just kill themselves to wake back up from it, so what was the issue?

They were drugged to keep them asleep, and the farther down you go the more time you spend there. The problem was that after so long in the dream world, they risk losing track of reality. We know this because of Cobb, who keeps playing with his totem just to be sure, and Mal, who killed herself in an attempt to wake up.

I really like the film but ever since seeing this picture I can't get the idea out of my head (haha i've been inception'd!!). If you can't go home because you're facing an unjust murder charge, why bother trying? Why not just get your dad to bring your kids to the country you live in which has no extradition treaty? Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

You need the parents'/legal guardians' permission to get the kids out of the country. He may have had trouble convincing whoever was caring for them to do that.

[adam_grif]

They took drugs to keep themselves in a deeper sleep.

That only makes the problem worse. Each layer of the dream makes time move at 20x speed, if they were sleeping for 5 minutes in real time, the first layer has 1 hour, second layer has 20 hours, third layer has 400 hours and in Limbo (assuming the 20x holds true here too, the characters act as though it's faster but they don't specify how much) 8000 hours.

The "they slept deeper than usual" was stated by the movie to make the time-acceleration effect increase, not decrease, as explained by Yusef when he's discussing the drugs with them during his recruitment.

What makes you so sure they woke up?

It doesn't matter, the characters decided to "Follow them down to limbo", which would have been pure lunacy if they couldn't wake up as normal. As it happened, when they got down there they all just suicide and act as though it's going to wake them up. Further, Cobb and his wife wake up from Limbo in the films back-story the same way. It's implied that in order to go that deep, the individual must be extremely heavily sedated, so they must have been when they first went there too.

Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

Although I agree it was a bit of a stretch, he certainly would be an influential man as the world's #2 supplier of energy (the #1 of course being the mark). Maybe he threatened to leak some diplomatic cables or something

They were drugged to keep them asleep, and the farther down you go the more time you spend there. The problem was that after so long in the dream world, they risk losing track of reality.

I know, but as I've just said, it should have been as simple as "Oh, this is Limbo." and then blown their brains out. The dream-space is unconstructed so it should be pretty obvious when they get there; even if it wasn't, the characters who go down there voluntarily to get Saito out obviously had no problems identifying the place as Limbo.

It's just really strange that the whole death-tension thing was built around Limbo, but then the solution to get out of Limbo was... to die again, something they can easily do.

[Lusankya]

It seems heavily implied that when you're in limbo, it becomes harder to tell the difference between the dream and reality. If you look at all of the cases in the movie of people going into limbo, not once did anybody leave while they were on their own. And since time is infinite down there, it's quite easy to fall into the trap of "well, I'll just wander around a bit and explore, since it won't cost any time in the real world". Then the next thing you know, you've been exploring for decades and you've forgotten exactly what you were planning to do in the first place.

I really like the film but ever since seeing this picture I can't get the idea out of my head (haha i've been inception'd!!). If you can't go home because you're facing an unjust murder charge, why bother trying? Why not just get your dad to bring your kids to the country you live in which has no extradition treaty? Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

The film tries to leave it ambiguous as to whether or not Leo was still dreaming. We never actually saw his little spinning top topple over (save for that one time when he didn't have time to spin it properly), and Ken Watanabe's delicious sexiness and charisma and super-influence (yum yum) seems like a stretch for the Real World, but for a dream it makes perfect sense. When you're having a dream and some super sexy Japanese guy with a beard comes up and tells you that doing this job for him is the only way you're going to see your children again - well, you just accept that, because that's the way dream logic works. Just like the way that in a dream you simply accept it when the guy who wants to hire you conveniently comes and rescues you from the thugs who are chasing you through Bamako, or wherever it is you are. Because super powerful Japanese energy tycoons just hang out in Bamako all the time.

Think about translating the movie this way: rather than events transpiring as Leo saw them, what really happened was that he and his wife were stuck in a dreamstate, and she escaped. Afterwards, she attempted to get him out, by turning Leo's dream world into a nightmare, and also by simulating entry into new dreams - where she would insert herself and sabotage the dreams, perhaps in her own attempt to implant an idea into his mind. The idea this time, being "the dream-state is dangerous". Unfortunately, Leo is too convinced that his dream is real to believe her and constantly drives her away. Since he still expresses love for her, however, she constantly holds out hope that she can ultimately get through to him.

Eventually she comes up with one last plan - with the assistance of Saito, she can convince Leo to return to limbo, where they can both once more spend an eternity together. This fails, however, as Leo rejects her offer, killing her dream-self, and she gives up hope of ever finding a way to get through to him. All she can do is (with Saito's help) amend the dream state that she created for Leo, making it a peaceful dream rather than the nightmare she created for him.

[adam_grif]

If you look at all of the cases in the movie of people going into limbo, not once did anybody leave while they were on their own.

At the end, every single character totally knew they were in Limbo, except maybe Saito (since he would presumably leave otherwise?). Obviously Cobb and his wife knew they were in Limbo, they went there deliberately. It wasn't until they were there for a long time that she started to believe that this was the real world (he says as much during the narration).

[lucretiabrutus]

His wife didn't, that's why he had to use inception to convince her that her world wasn't real, which backfired IRL.

[Lusankya]

If you look at all of the cases in the movie of people going into limbo, not once did anybody leave while they were on their own.

At the end, every single character totally knew they were in Limbo, except maybe Saito (since he would presumably leave otherwise?). Obviously Cobb and his wife knew they were in Limbo, they went there deliberately. It wasn't until they were there for a long time that she started to believe that this was the real world (he says as much during the narration).

So what? Just because they know they're in Limbo, it doesn't mean they can leave without some kind of psychological assistance. They're in a world of pure, unbridled subconscious. Perhaps when they're down there, their subconscious survival instinct is so strong that they're incapable of killing themselves unless they have someone there to reassure them that they're not really going to die.

[adam_grif]

I didn't see any kind of reassurance when Ellen Paige just casually threw herself out a window. Knowing that it's Limbo is the same thing as being reassured you won't really die, because if you know it's Limbo you know you won't really die. I think you're stretching this an awful lot.

Even if this was the case, they wouldn't have all got panicky when they found out that Limbo was where they would go if they died in the dream, they would have been like "Oh, if you die you go to Limbo, and then we have to follow you down so we can mutually suicide to get back out." It's honestly more like a minor inconvenience than an actual threatening situation.

[Bakustra]

I didn't see any kind of reassurance when Ellen Paige just casually threw herself out a window. Knowing that it's Limbo is the same thing as being reassured you won't really die, because if you know it's Limbo you know you won't really die. I think you're stretching this an awful lot.

Even if this was the case, they wouldn't have all got panicky when they found out that Limbo was where they would go if they died in the dream, they would have been like "Oh, if you die you go to Limbo, and then we have to follow you down so we can mutually suicide to get back out." It's honestly more like a minor inconvenience than an actual threatening situation.

Keep in mind that 1) Limbo isn't all that understood, seeing as Cobb is the only member of the group that's been there, 2) Cobb knows that Mal will be waiting in Limbo too, 3) Cobb has a visceral fear of Limbo, and 4) (what I think was most important for the others) the time dilation is significantly worse. Saito was an old man by the time Cobb washed up on the beach, and that all happened within twelve hours, or rather significantly less. There's no way to wake somebody up without a kick while they're under the drug, but if you're in a deeper level, then the kicks have to occur in that level to boost you up to the next level- and they don't know enough about Limbo to ensure that they can produce a kick. They could, but only because they ended up in Cobb's city and Cobb/Saito gambled that dying in Limbo could produce a kick. (Remember that dying in a dream while sedated kicks you to Limbo) So you'd be stuck in Limbo till you woke up naturally, and with the drug, that translates to decades, if not centuries spent under (Mal and Cobb spent fifty years in Limbo while in the course of an interrupted night's sleep). You probably would go a little crazy if you spent several lifetimes sitting around in a dream- Saito had practically forgotten about the mission by the time Cobb arrived. I think that the fear is understandable.

[Stargazer]

This has all probably been raised before, but...

- Why were the characters so worried about going down to Limbo? In the end they just kill themselves to wake back up from it, so what was the issue?

You apparently forget that you are dreaming when you go down to limbo involuntarily.

- The Sydney to LA flight they are on goes for like 12+ hours (I've been on it), why did the characters all wake up just as they were about to descend? Did they only start dreaming 5 minutes prior to that in the real world?

1 hour in a dream = 5 minutes in the real world/next level up.
They were supposed to be in the first level for 1 week.
(7*24)/12=14 hours.

I really like the film but ever since seeing this picture I can't get the idea out of my head (haha i've been inception'd!!). If you can't go home because you're facing an unjust murder charge, why bother trying? Why not just get your dad to bring your kids to the country you live in which has no extradition treaty? Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

Any authority who caught wind of it would likely arrest Cobb and hand him over to American authorities. The won't look too closely if he is just wandering around by himself, but if he has his kids they would likely think that they are in danger.

As for Saito's call -- yeah, it's a stretch. He probably arranged it beforehand, though.

[CaptHawkeye]

I really like the film but ever since seeing this picture I can't get the idea out of my head (haha i've been inception'd!!). If you can't go home because you're facing an unjust murder charge, why bother trying? Why not just get your dad to bring your kids to the country you live in which has no extradition treaty?

To be fair, Cobb didn't just want to see his kids again. He wanted to live with them. He could bring his kids to France, but bear in mind he's a wanted criminal internationally. His conversation with Michael Caine early in the movie implied he could be in France but not for a long time. Someone would figure out he was there eventually.

Plus it was a bit of a leap to expect me to believe Ken Watanabe can make a phone call and 'fix' things so that Leo could return to the country.

Saito is the head of the only energy company in the world not bought out by Fischer. I'm willing to believe he wields considerable political power. Though admittedly his "single phone call" was still a stretch.

[Simon_Jester]

Again, I think the single phone call was just a trigger to something he'd preplanned: have his Men A through F ready to call or otherwise contact people in the government while G through J do some hacking. And the trigger is when Saito makes that phone call- within an hour or so, everything is taken care of because he set it up ahead of time.

[hongi]

So you'd be stuck in Limbo till you woke up naturally, and with the drug, that translates to decades, if not centuries spent under (Mal and Cobb spent fifty years in Limbo while in the course of an interrupted night's sleep). You probably would go a little crazy if you spent several lifetimes sitting around in a dream- Saito had practically forgotten about the mission by the time Cobb arrived. I think that the fear is understandable.

Realistically speaking, what sort of psychological effects would that have on a person? Wouldn't you be...well, a little worse for wear?

[Chaotic Neutral]

Realistically speaking, what sort of psychological effects would that have on a person? Wouldn't you be...well, a little worse for wear?

There haven't been many people that have survived centuries without aging, and it's probably difficult to test anyway.

[hongi]

4) (what I think was most important for the others) the time dilation is significantly worse. Saito was an old man by the time Cobb washed up on the beach, and that all happened within twelve hours, or rather significantly less.

So why didn't Saito kill himself the moment he got into limbo? He'd wake up instantaneously.

There's no way to wake somebody up without a kick while they're under the drug, but if you're in a deeper level, then the kicks have to occur in that level to boost you up to the next level- and they don't know enough about Limbo to ensure that they can produce a kick. They could, but only because they ended up in Cobb's city and Cobb/Saito gambled that dying in Limbo could produce a kick.

It's not a gamble, it's worked before. Mal and Cobb killed themselves to wake up. At the first rainy level, all they needed to do if they wanted to bail was kill themselves repeatedly until they hit limbo, then kill themselves another time.

In the Modern Warfare dream, Fischer is shot by Mal and dies. How in the hell did they revive him, and why couldn't they do the same for Saito?

Can someone clarify this for me: the architect constructs the world of the dream. Ariadne constructed all the landscapes. But since she wasn't originally going to get on the plane, how did her ideas get into the dream? I'm thinking that she showed her designs to each of them individually via her little architecture miniatures or through shared dreaming.

[Ryushikaze]

4) (what I think was most important for the others) the time dilation is significantly worse. Saito was an old man by the time Cobb washed up on the beach, and that all happened within twelve hours, or rather significantly less.

So why didn't Saito kill himself the moment he got into limbo? He'd wake up instantaneously.

There's no way to wake somebody up without a kick while they're under the drug, but if you're in a deeper level, then the kicks have to occur in that level to boost you up to the next level- and they don't know enough about Limbo to ensure that they can produce a kick. They could, but only because they ended up in Cobb's city and Cobb/Saito gambled that dying in Limbo could produce a kick.

It's not a gamble, it's worked before. Mal and Cobb killed themselves to wake up. At the first rainy level, all they needed to do if they wanted to bail was kill themselves repeatedly until they hit limbo, then kill themselves another time.

In the Modern Warfare dream, Fischer is shot by Mal and dies. How in the hell did they revive him, and why couldn't they do the same for Saito?

IIRC, he was dying, not dead, as Saito was. Rewatching the scene, they act like he's not 'dead' yet. Alternately, there's a chance they COULD have revived Saito on Shadow Moses if they found him in Limbo the first time. They needed to get Fischer back from Limbo because they needed to bring his mind back up a level with a kick. Had they found Saito, they could have brought him up too.
On second thought, I think there's no reason that being 'dead' matters. They just needed Fischer's mind to come back. The Defib probably works like a life spell in an RPG in dream physics.

Can someone clarify this for me: the architect constructs the world of the dream. Ariadne constructed all the landscapes. But since she wasn't originally going to get on the plane, how did her ideas get into the dream? I'm thinking that she showed her designs to each of them individually via her little architecture miniatures or through shared dreaming.

She created the dreamspaces, but it would be the job of each member of the world to carry a particular dreamspace with them, yes.

[hongi]

IIRC, he was dying, not dead, as Saito was. Rewatching the scene, they act like he's not 'dead' yet.'

But then how could he have been in limbo without being dead?

Alternately, there's a chance they COULD have revived Saito on Shadow Moses if they found him in Limbo the first time. They needed to get Fischer back from Limbo because they needed to bring his mind back up a level with a kick. Had they found Saito, they could have brought him up too.
On second thought, I think there's no reason that being 'dead' matters. They just needed Fischer's mind to come back. The Defib probably works like a life spell in an RPG in dream physics.

Couldn't they just dream up some insta-heal for Saito then?

Another question. After Fischer was shot, Cobb was ready to call it in and said that they should plant the charges. Assuming that Fischer was dead and in limbo, if they had never followed Ariadne's advice and instead got the kick, would Fischer have gone up with them or would he stay in limbo and fry his brain?

She created the dreamspaces, but it would be the job of each member of the world to carry a particular dreamspace with them, yes.

I thought you weren't meant to share the details of the dreamscape with others, in case their projections find a way through it.

[Ryushikaze]

But then how could he have been in limbo without being dead?

You got me on that one, though it might just be death is an inconvenience if you can grab someone back and shock them into the current layer.

Couldn't they just dream up some insta-heal for Saito then?

If they found him, yes. I think the real problem, considering it, is that they need him to get 'kicked' from Limbo back up for it to work.

Another question. After Fischer was shot, Cobb was ready to call it in and said that they should plant the charges. Assuming that Fischer was dead and in limbo, if they had never followed Ariadne's advice and instead got the kick, would Fischer have gone up with them or would he stay in limbo and fry his brain?

You know, I'm not sure. It could go either way. Saito missed the kick despite being there, but Ariadne went up just fine.

I thought you weren't meant to share the details of the dreamscape with others, in case their projections find a way through it.

Well, one person would be given each world, with no knowledge between them. Only the person constructing the current level would know it. The person one down would be the only one to know that one, etc.
One person per level, per dream is the usual rule.

[hongi]

but Ariadne went up just fine.

Ariadne went up because she had been kicked up from limbo just in time to receive the next kick. She wasn't dead, whereas Saito was.

Still, if both Saito and Fischer were going to miss the kick, I find it strange that Cobb and the others were so cavalier about leaving them behind. Cobb was like 'I'm sorry, we've failed. Okay, lets set the charges.'

After the sedative wears off and vegetative Saito and vegetative Fischer wake up on their own, the team has accidentally burned out the brains of two of the most powerful men in the world. And Cobb is going to be arrested the moment the plane lands on American soil, because of his previous charges. I'm missing something here.