Avengers out on DVD

[Ahriman238]

Full armor would be awkward to explain to airport security, or more likely at the docks. Whereas unknown machine or unknown function? Easy.

Re-watched the Avengers with the family. Kind of surprised that it's re-watchable. On a second viewing, I do like the scoring a lot. I'm pretty sure I heard IM and Cap's themes from their own movies during the helicarrier fight.

[Ted C]

Re-watched the Avengers with the family. Kind of surprised that it's re-watchable. On a second viewing, I do like the scoring a lot. I'm pretty sure I heard IM and Cap's themes from their own movies during the helicarrier fight.

Heck, I think I've rewatched it three times since I got the blue ray. The fun doesn't fade much.

[Luke Skywalker]

Because like the scientist also under Loki's control, he faught against it in slight ways. That was one of them. The scientist built a flaw in the shielding device, after all. Is it too much of a stretch that Hawkeye altered his aim?

I might have just missed it, but I sure as hell don't remember the scientist intentionally building a flaw into the portal.

Please, they never got better than semi-auto outa those guns.

This changes my point...how? (and I would question why the hell they don't have semi-automatic weaponry)

"Peak human potential" technically, but honestly, yeah, he's superhuman. Given the suit he was wearing (body armor and all that), that certainly would have helped.

Still doesn't explain why a single alien manages to hit him after he stands in the middle of a NY city street for twenty minutes.

And narratively, where would that leave them?

Han Solo was an entertaining character without taking on Vader or smashing AT-ATs.

Movies run primarily on emotional logic (yes, that is a thing). It's why the air tank explodes like a bomb at the end of Jaws. Logically, that just shouldn't happen, but emotionally--satisfying as all hell.

Even if the stupidity is necessary for the plot, it's still stupid. You might as well concede the point and call it an acceptable break from reality.

Given it's an action movie, that's a really silly question.

Ok, clarification: I don't see why a character has to stand in the middle of a fucking street and take on hoards of armed aliens to be relevant.

"HOW DARE AN ARROGANT HERO UNDERESTIMATE A VILLAIN WHO SURRENDERED AS SOON AS HE SHOWED UP!"

There's arrogance, and then there's leaving a very high profile prisoner, if only for the tesseract, unguarded so you can duke it out with a god for no apparent reason. At the very least, the jet they were flying in could have followed Starks and kept an eye on Loki, but noooo.

Your arrogance apology does not work for Thor, however, who never bothered to tell Starks "let's at least shackle Loki first before we fight."

Next you'll be complaining about where the mass for the Hulk comes from where he transforms

Converted from the antimatter magnetically contained inside Banner's body, of course.

The Hulk's size change is the premise of his character. Now tell me how the portal generator being made of "pure energy" is needed for the plot.

and why Stark loses power in space.

How is this unrealistic? Why would Starks design his suit to work in space? His last version couldn't even reach the upper atmosphere without freezing.

You're suspension of disbelief must be made of tissue paper.

And you surely turn your brain off when you watch movies, if a Magical Fireball in Space doesn't bother you at all. How does this help the plot again?

Let's face it, super hero movies, when the dial is turned up enough, reach near loony toons levels of "realistic". That may be a problem for you, but is limited to primarily yourself. It's a subjective complaint.

That the Science is fucked up is not subjective. It's an empirical observation, and it's hardly illogical to list it as evidence for my thesis, that the plot is stupid. If that doesn't bother you, then fine. But right now, you're actually denying that the movie is full of plot holes.

A message which is undermined by the arc reactor tech spreading around int he same film. You're stretching your negative interpretation to fit any and all aspects of it.

Then please explain what the tesseract was supposed to represent -- or was it just the plot of an entertaining but mindblowingly stupid action movie? Oohhh.

Given the final decision basically amounted to "No one wants to argue with Thor on it" that's a real stretch. Cap hates it, to be certain, but remember where the final decision laid.

What does this have to do with him running around and blaming modern society for "losing" "old fashioned" values?

Pussy must be a scary thing where you come from, because Loki's first appearance in the film has him being shown as bulletproof.

How does this create tension? Who cares if he's bullet proof, when Captain America can hand him his ass, and the Hulk smashes him like a bug at the end of the film? "Pussy" is a relative judgment.

Just look at the finale. When are the heroes in any real danger of losing the battle? It's a wankfest. They go through dramatic shots of the heroes casually kicking ass and making the aliens look like chickenshit, which is entertaining but hardly tension creating. You never worry for any of them.

[Simon_Jester]

There's arrogance, and then there's leaving a very high profile prisoner, if only for the tesseract, unguarded so you can duke it out with a god for no apparent reason. At the very least, the jet they were flying in could have followed Starks and kept an eye on Loki, but noooo.

Your arrogance apology does not work for Thor, however, who never bothered to tell Starks "let's at least shackle Loki first before we fight."

Thor is colossally arrogant and combative, it really shows in his characterization. When someone attacks him, he fights back.

At a guess, he's not so worried about his brother, expecting that he can find Loki again. Whereas an armored man who attacks him is a serious threat to be dealt twith immediately.

The Hulk's size change is the premise of his character. Now tell me how the portal generator being made of "pure energy" is needed for the plot.

Easy. It's a standing knot of force fields- energy density, but no rest mass. And yes, I'm using "force field" in the technical sense of physics, as in "electric field" or "magnetic field."

A message which is undermined by the arc reactor tech spreading around int he same film. You're stretching your negative interpretation to fit any and all aspects of it.

Then please explain what the tesseract was supposed to represent -- or was it just the plot of an entertaining but mindblowingly stupid action movie? Oohhh.

The tesseract represents great power- weaponizable power, you nitwit. They go explicitly above board about this, with SHIELD actively designing the same kind of tesseract-based weapons and WMD that Hydra had.

[Kojiro]

I might have just missed it, but I sure as hell don't remember the scientist intentionally building a flaw into the portal.

Selvig (probably misspelled) says he built in a cut of when talking to Black Widow, after he regains consciousness. Incidentally on the Blu-ray there is a deleted scene where Loki asks Hawkeye, given his skills and knowledge of Fury's body armour, why he didn't head shot him, implying that the mind control isn't absolute. Hawkeye makes an excuse about not being his best with a gun but honestly at that range (to say nothing of when he walks past an immobile Fury) and wit his skill there has to have been a choice to not kill.

There's arrogance, and then there's leaving a very high profile prisoner, if only for the tesseract, unguarded so you can duke it out with a god for no apparent reason. At the very least, the jet they were flying in could have followed Starks and kept an eye on Loki, but noooo.

I'm sure Romanov brought the jet back round soon as she could locate the scene, probably after Thor hit the shield. I doubt Cap walked Loki back to the carrier. Cap probably found them first by virtue of landing closer and having the sound of the battle to follow- something not so easily noticed from a jet 2,000 feet up in a storm.

Your arrogance apology does not work for Thor, however, who never bothered to tell Starks "let's at least shackle Loki first before we fight."

Thor isn't Loki's enemy yet, he's his brother. He even looks up, sees Loki patiently watching and continues. So far as Thor is concerned Stark is just an inconvenience to deal with before getting back to his conversation with his brother. Thor tracked Loki across the galaxy and to a speeding jet (though I have no idea how). I doubt he has much fear of Loki outrunning/evading him on foot.

I'm actually curious with that fight just how much of a role the suit being at 475% power (yes I know Jarvis says 400 but the read out clearly caps at 475) had in making that fight last. I have a feeling without that boost Thor would have made short work of IM.

How is this unrealistic? Why would Starks design his suit to work in space? His last version couldn't even reach the upper atmosphere without freezing.

I'm not well versed in such things but I would think that while it would lose heat in space, it wouldn't lose it that quickly. He only lasts about 15 seconds which I'm pretty sure an unprotected human could (with consequences) survive. I got the impression it actually depleted the arc reactor, at least temporarily and it restarted after he landed.

How does this create tension? Who cares if he's bullet proof, when Captain America can hand him his ass, and the Hulk smashes him like a bug at the end of the film? "Pussy" is a relative judgment.

Captain America can't do shit to Loki, except knock him off balance. Certainly not actually hurt him. Look again at what Cap does to that punching bag. Hell just a guy built like Chris Evans, let alone a super soldier, would seriously hurt someone he punched in the face like Loki. Loki doesn't even blink and proceeds to bash through Caps defense and send him sprawling. That's hardly worthy of being called a pussy, to say nothing of taking a blast from that scepter of his moments earlier. And if your definition of pussy is 'anyone Hulk can beat up' that's a long list.

Just look at the finale. When are the heroes in any real danger of losing the battle?

The point where Cap is downed and wounded, or after the bank when he needs a rest? When Stark is on the ground getting smashed about? When the Hulk is cornered and pummeled into a building? When Hawkeye is discovered and out of arrows? Thor is about the only one who doesn't show fatigue (who knows what that stabbing did to him exactly though). Yes, one for one an Avenger is far more than a match for the aliens. But they're just going to keep coming, and coming and coming. Hawkeye and Widow will run dry. Cap will take even more than he can handle and eventually the Hulk will lose control and flee or become more of a danger as we saw can happen on the carrier. The Avengers were going to lose by attrition, like Cap says.

It's a wankfest. They go through dramatic shots of the heroes casually kicking ass and making the aliens look like chickenshit, which is entertaining but hardly tension creating. You never worry for any of them.

You must have missed the bits where the heroes are exhausted (Widow talking to Cap about getting a ride, Thor asking Cap if he's ready to go another bout after getting hit, IM on the ground getting stomped). Yes, at the end of the day we know the Avengers will win but that's true of 99.9% of dramatic situations involving the heroes. If you go into it with this blocking your immersion of course you won't worry.

[Scrib]

Captain America can't do shit to Loki, except knock him off balance. Certainly not actually hurt him. Look again at what Cap does to that punching bag. Hell just a guy built like Chris Evans, let alone a super soldier, would seriously hurt someone he punched in the face like Loki. Loki doesn't even blink and proceeds to bash through Caps defense and send him sprawling. That's hardly worthy of being called a pussy, to say nothing of taking a blast from that scepter of his moments earlier. And if your definition of pussy is 'anyone Hulk can beat up' that's a long list.

Indeed. Without Stark and his convenient ranged weapons Loki would have taken Cap apart.

Just look at the finale. When are the heroes in any real danger of losing the battle?

No. This is a thing with superhero movies if you didn't know. There is tension though.

It's a wankfest. They go through dramatic shots of the heroes casually kicking ass and making the aliens look like chickenshit, which is entertaining but hardly tension creating. You never worry for any of them.

Surprisingly, you're right. The aliens were just CGI cut outs that the heroes had to beat. The movie was still entertaining as fuck though.

[Simon_Jester]

I'm not well versed in such things but I would think that while it would lose heat in space, it wouldn't lose it that quickly. He only lasts about 15 seconds which I'm pretty sure an unprotected human could (with consequences) survive. I got the impression it actually depleted the arc reactor, at least temporarily and it restarted after he landed.

Again, I'd bet on the explanation being either:

As he said, Stark did "save everything for the turn" and deplete his suit power, which he'd used lots of in the fight earlier. After he lands, a backup power source kicks in- another logical modification to the armor which he'd probably make just so he can walk around and not die of heart shrapnel if something goes wrong with the arc reactor.

Or... there's something about the arc reactor that depends on there being air around. Maybe it has a built-in cooling fan that shuts down when there's no air to circulate.

[JME2]

On a second viewing, I do like the scoring a lot. I'm pretty sure I heard IM and Cap's themes from their own movies during the helicarrier fight.

In Cap's case that's no surprise since Alan Silvestri scored Cap's film. It did seem like he was channeling a little bit of Ramin Djawadi with Tony's first scene.

Still, I wish Silvestri had used Patrick Doyle's Thor theme; I love it.

[Kojiro]

Or... there's something about the arc reactor that depends on there being air around. Maybe it has a built-in cooling fan that shuts down when there's no air to circulate.

Except we see him last longer underwater at the beginning installing the...well whatever it is he installed. I'd put money it being either a) depletion or b) someone thought 'space is cold and IM shuts down in cold' in an attempt to cut off the arguments for him working in space but not high altitude.

Edit: Incidentally I thought his reactor put out a certain (very high) amount of power per second which would put an upper limit on the amount he could draw but should otherwise replenish itself, at least to suit sustaining levels, very quickly.


Also I love the Thor score, and Avenger score in general.

[Simon_Jester]

Re: the 'except:'

Underwater is not the same environment as outer space. Sure, a laptop cooling fan might not work underwater, but some other Stark-tech system might... and yet still fail in vacuum.

It's not a guaranteed thing, but it's a real problem faced by space science. Equipment which works in atmosphere, even high altitude thin atmosphere, doesn't always work in vacuum, even if the vacuum is neither "hot" nor "cold" enough to damage anything directly.

Re: the edit:

I can't speak to how the Mark VII's reactor works. Can it be damaged by excessive power drain? Could Iron Man have had to push so hard to make the turn that the reactor handled it badly and conked out for a while, then returned to function at a lower level of output? How limited is the fuel supply- could Iron Man simply have used up nearly all his total energy in the battle, to the point where the reactor can no longer supply the kind of power he needed?

[Alkaloid]

I'm operating on the theory that each arc reactor is actually sentient because it turned back on after the Hulk yelled at it, so it clearly feels fear and can intuit the correct response to the cause of said fear. This particular reactor was dying, then got terrified and produced one last shot of arc reactor adrenaline, meaning it lived for a few more agonising hours only to be tragically incinerated when the rest of the suit was deemed too badly damaged to be worth repairing.

[Simon_Jester]

Heh.

I'd bet on a peaceful death for the reactor; Stark seems to like to inter his suits in that gallery instead of scrapping them. It's especially obvious when you consider that he must have paid a bunch of guys to go comb a sand dune in Afghanistan for the parts of the Mark I.

Maybe they're just reproductions, I don't know.

[Terralthra]

Heh.

I'd bet on a peaceful death for the reactor; Stark seems to like to inter his suits in that gallery instead of scrapping them. It's especially obvious when you consider that he must have paid a bunch of guys to go comb a sand dune in Afghanistan for the parts of the Mark I.

Maybe they're just reproductions, I don't know.

Raza had the Ten Rings gather up all the pieces to sell to Stane, who took them back to Stark Enterprises in California when designing Iron Monger

[Ted C]

I'd bet on a peaceful death for the reactor; Stark seems to like to inter his suits in that gallery instead of scrapping them. It's especially obvious when you consider that he must have paid a bunch of guys to go comb a sand dune in Afghanistan for the parts of the Mark I.

Stane recovered the Mk I parts and had his team use them to design the Iron Monger armor. Tony presumably just had them moved from wherever Stane was keeping them.

[Kojiro]

Re: the 'except:'
Underwater is not the same environment as outer space. Sure, a laptop cooling fan might not work underwater, but some other Stark-tech system might... and yet still fail in vacuum.

It's not a guaranteed thing, but it's a real problem faced by space science. Equipment which works in atmosphere, even high altitude thin atmosphere, doesn't always work in vacuum, even if the vacuum is neither "hot" nor "cold" enough to damage anything directly.

Sure, I was just responding to your suggestion it shuts down when there isn't air to circulate.

I can't speak to how the Mark VII's reactor works. Can it be damaged by excessive power drain? Could Iron Man have had to push so hard to make the turn that the reactor handled it badly and conked out for a while, then returned to function at a lower level of output? How limited is the fuel supply- could Iron Man simply have used up nearly all his total energy in the battle, to the point where the reactor can no longer supply the kind of power he needed?

There is that line from Jarvis when IM is trying to laser through the space whale of 'Sir we will lose power before penetrating that shell'. Combined with other comments about saving power and it strongly implies the he's actually running on a battery, not a self sustaining power source. But then it comes back on later, generating more power and the whole point of arc reactors is about power generation... so I don't know. You're probably right, it just conked out for a while and came back on at some lower level. I'm guessing Stark swapped in a new fuel cell as soon as he got a chance (which I'm guessing he keeps a spare in a compartment somewhere in the suit).

I wonder if the suit has secondary reactor, one for just movement and life support etc. It would make sense as they're not exactly huge and well, redundant systems for combat equipment are always neat especially if you incidentally use it to keep shrapnel out of your heart. In fact I'm sure it does have one, since the Mk7 seems to be fully functional (certainly capable of powering its CPU and repulsors for flight) without Stark being in it. We probably shouldn't have seen it 'boot up' when it attaches itself since it was clearly already functional.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah.

Arc reactors definitely run on some kind of fuel that can be expended. There's plenty of evidence of this in the first movie, with his first arc reactor. It would have powered his own heart magnet for life (according to Yinsen), and it seems to have been adequate for the Mark I, at least for a while. But when he used the same reactor to power the repulsor-based Mark III, it burned through its remaining fuel reserves in minutes.

In the second movie, when we see Stark pulling out a 'used' palladium ring from his chest reactor and swapping in a new one. The old one is smoking and pitted.

So we can infer that the reactor isn't a perpetual motion machine; it somehow consumes its own fuel and has to be refueled to keep running. And a hard fight can push the armor's power consumption up to its limits, causing it to burn up the arc reactor's fuel.

With its lasers and (it seems to me) reinforced size and bulk, the Mark VII has very power-hungry combat systems, compared to the Mark II through IV armors we saw in the first three movies. Based on this, and given Stark's modus operandi, I'd bet that the Mark VII does have a built-in reactor of its own, uprated for extra power. But Stark could (maybe) still run the Mark VII's basic systems off his chest reactor, even if that's still running at lower output.

[avatarxprime]

How is this unrealistic? Why would Starks design his suit to work in space? His last version couldn't even reach the upper atmosphere without freezing.

I believe you're confused on a few points here:
1) It's "Stark" not "Starks" this is a minor nitpick of a thing, but I thought I'd put it out there.
2a) The suit that froze was the Mark II, the one in the Avengers is the Mark VII, there are several suits inbetween, so last version hardly applies.
2b) From the Mark III on, freezing has not been an issue since in the first movie he uses that as a tactic against Stane's Iron Monger armor.
3) The Mark III is constructed from the same alloy that Stark uses on a tactical satellite, the kind that functions in space, and given that in the conversation with Jarvis where he decides to use that alloy they are joking about traveling to other worlds, I'd figure that from Mark III onwards the suits can handle space.

I can't speak to how the Mark VII's reactor works. Can it be damaged by excessive power drain? Could Iron Man have had to push so hard to make the turn that the reactor handled it badly and conked out for a while, then returned to function at a lower level of output? How limited is the fuel supply- could Iron Man simply have used up nearly all his total energy in the battle, to the point where the reactor can no longer supply the kind of power he needed?

There is that line from Jarvis when IM is trying to laser through the space whale of 'Sir we will lose power before penetrating that shell'. Combined with other comments about saving power and it strongly implies the he's actually running on a battery, not a self sustaining power source. But then it comes back on later, generating more power and the whole point of arc reactors is about power generation... so I don't know. You're probably right, it just conked out for a while and came back on at some lower level. I'm guessing Stark swapped in a new fuel cell as soon as he got a chance (which I'm guessing he keeps a spare in a compartment somewhere in the suit).

I wonder if the suit has secondary reactor, one for just movement and life support etc. It would make sense as they're not exactly huge and well, redundant systems for combat equipment are always neat especially if you incidentally use it to keep shrapnel out of your heart. In fact I'm sure it does have one, since the Mk7 seems to be fully functional (certainly capable of powering its CPU and repulsors for flight) without Stark being in it. We probably shouldn't have seen it 'boot up' when it attaches itself since it was clearly already functional.

Well, since the Mark VII was capable of independent movement I'd say that it should have it's own arc reactor (espcially since Stark went and put one in each of his older suits, even the Mark I), with Stark having the "Starkium" reactor implanted in his own chest since the Arc reactor was killing him. Odds are that the suits are designed to run through the in-built Arc reactors and draw upon Stark's personal reactor as and when required. As to the issue of time, the fight against the Chitauri was likely going on for more than 1 hour, since when Cap is rushing to the cops, one of them is saying that it will take 1 hour for the National Guard to arrive, and we only see soldiers some number of scenes later. That's gotta be the longest fight Stark has ever been in, so it is likely that he could run low on power.

From the first movie we know that an Irontech suit can run through the power an Arc reactor can provide (both the Mark I and the Mark III do this), but that doesn't mean that the reactor is dead (the Mark I escape). We also know that an Arc reactor can unleash all of its energy in a large burst (Iron Monger defeat), so I'd wager the suits are designed to harness the power of the Arc reactor in a semi-controlled version of their overload burst when in combat mode (I have no other explanation for the Uni-beam), while in (what should be) the lower energy requiring normal or cruise modes it just runs based on the steady-state power produced from the reactor. In the Avengers, Stark likely ran through all of his power and was using up his personal reserves (his personal chest reactor) in order to handle that fight. Eventually he used up as much power as his 2 reactors are capable of and the suit turned off. However, they are reactors after all and eventually produced enough power to turn back on and run the suit's life support. You can see the Arc reactor coming back online (no glow to faint glow), with Stark unable to move (likely not enough power yet), but by the time they go confront Loki his chest is fully glowing and he's up and about.

Ghetto edit: I agree with Simon that the Arc reactors aren't perpetual motion machines and run on some kind of fuel, but I though the issue with the chest reactor in Iron Man 2 was that it was getting into his bloodstream and that's why they were burning through. Also, you have to remember that the reactor he has in his chest is basically a regular Arc reactor, it just uses the new element that Stark synthesized in place of the palladium core, so it's fully capable of running an Iron Man suit, having run the Mark VI in the movie.

[Napoleon the Clown]

Didn't the suit shut down after the nuke went off or am I remembering wrong?

[PhilosopherOfSorts]

That's what I thought, EMP fried something out, or maybe caused a system reboot or somthing that shut the suit down temporarily.

[Kojiro]

I seriously doubt the Mk7 isn't hardened against EMP, but more specifically it shuts down well before detonation. It could be just coincidence but it seems to begin losing power as he leaves earth. I think the power thing could have been done better. Looking at the bluray you can see that on the left side of the screen the suit read out is saying 'Critical: System shutdown' in the same place it previously says 'Power level 475%' when fighting Thor. A nice comment by Jarvis or '0%' flashing up would have been nice and probably satisfied a few people better.

Incidentally I'm curious why the rocket pods jettison at shut down and why the call to Pepper seemingly shuts down last, after the OS seems to. These are just curiosities though- I still fucking love that movie.

[Simon_Jester]

Philosopher: You don't get EMP in hard vacuum as far as I know.

Kojiro: If it's equipment failures-

Rocket pods could require a hell of a lot of cooling, especially if they're power-hungry Starktech, and Stark was using them very hard in space. If my theory about the shutdown is right, then they may have crashed first because they overheated badly.

Meanwhile, the call to Pepper is basically a cell phone signal, and the code for call handling could, hell, actually come from a cell phone. The transmitter doesn't have to be especially powerful, so what shuts off the call would presumably be "no signal" or a complete loss of suit power. If the code isn't set to shut down a call mere seconds after loss of signal (by flying through an alien portal), then that call would be one of the last things to shut down.

Makes sense to me, sort of.

[SilverWingedSeraph]

Philosopher: You don't get EMP in hard vacuum as far as I know.

... You can't get pulses of electromagnetic radiation in a hard vacuum? How do you figure? Are you maybe thinking of something else? 'Cause... I can't think of any reason why you couldn't get an EMP in hard vacuum. It's Electromagnetism. Radiation. Afaik, a nuclear weapon's EMP would actually be stronger in a vacuum, as due to the lack of atmosphere, it outputs more radiation because it doesn't get converted to thermal radiation and or a blast. No shockwave, no heatwave, just a fuckton of electromagnetism frying everything for miles.

[Sea Skimmer]

You get a huge sheet of gamma and neutron radiation in space and certain other source radiation effects. You don't get HEMP like you would from a burst at the top of the atmosphere with the effects people normally think of when they think of that so useless term 'EMP'. You would get some other much different effects in space though.

[Ted C]

With its lasers and (it seems to me) reinforced size and bulk, the Mark VII has very power-hungry combat systems, compared to the Mark II through IV armors we saw in the first three movies. Based on this, and given Stark's modus operandi, I'd bet that the Mark VII does have a built-in reactor of its own, uprated for extra power. But Stark could (maybe) still run the Mark VII's basic systems off his chest reactor, even if that's still running at lower output.

The Mark VII must have an independent power supply. Otherwise it wouldn't have been able to self-launch when Loki threw Tony out the window of Stark Tower and catch up to him. It can presumably also connect to the arc reactor in his chest, though.

[Darth Nostril]

Philosopher: You don't get EMP in hard vacuum as far as I know.

... You can't get pulses of electromagnetic radiation in a hard vacuum? How do you figure? Are you maybe thinking of something else? 'Cause... I can't think of any reason why you couldn't get an EMP in hard vacuum. It's Electromagnetism. Radiation. Afaik, a nuclear weapon's EMP would actually be stronger in a vacuum, as due to the lack of atmosphere, it outputs more radiation because it doesn't get converted to thermal radiation and or a blast. No shockwave, no heatwave, just a fuckton of electromagnetism frying everything for miles.

No just a fuckton of direct radiation subject to the inverse square law. Without a planetary magnetosphere to interact with there will be no EMP