Batman Begins $$Spoilers$$

[Xero Cool Down]

In batman begins we see a microwave weapon designed to "boil away enemy fresh water supplies." I see two problems in the movie. The first being that the thing has no power source, and the other that when it was making all the water boil in gotham, why weren't the people exploding from the blood boiling in their bodies. Could be just some sci-fi magic, but if there is a good explination could someone enlighten me?

[The Grim Squeaker]

The human body is nearly 90% water, the density of it might be a problem, was there a limit on how much it could "dust"?

[Guy N. Cognito]

At my last check, I thought the body was closer to 70% water. Sec on google. Yup, about 73%. If we were only 10% non water, we would look closer to jellyfish.

[The Grim Squeaker]

At my last check, I thought the body was closer to 70% water. Sec on google. Yup, about 73%. If we were only 10% non water, we would look closer to jellyfish.

My mistake .
Still it is a large quantity at a decent density (blood is thicker than water )

[Zero]

I'm pretty sure microwaves do kill living shit. I aint sure about people, but I know animals die in microwave ovens, so it stands to reason that people should be dying too.

[Thinkmarble]

Could be just some sci-fi magic, but if there is a good explination could someone enlighten me?

Water boils at 100°C, people die by internal temperature much lower.
Somewhere between 40°C and 50°C I would guess.
Slight above 50°C most proteins denaturate.

[Guy N. Cognito]

Story from my father's past. He used to work at microwave towers throughout Canada. One day there was a new person in the tower, a friend of my father shut down the microwave dish and climbed the tower to do some work on the dish. New person saw the dish was off and turned t back on without checking as to why it was off. Said friend feels a bit light headed and climbs back down the tower, get's "I'm not feeling well, I'm gonna go home and rest" Out of his mouth before he fell over, but he was dead before he hit the ground. His insides were cooked. Yes microwaves will kill you. And you may not notice on lower intensities.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Did the new guy get fired?

[Guy N. Cognito]

You know, I never asked that, but I would imagine he would feel like shit having killed a guy and being new at the job. It was more a safety story, beware of other people.

[Xero Cool Down]

Story from my father's past. He used to work at microwave towers throughout Canada. One day there was a new person in the tower, a friend of my father shut down the microwave dish and climbed the tower to do some work on the dish. New person saw the dish was off and turned t back on without checking as to why it was off. Said friend feels a bit light headed and climbs back down the tower, get's "I'm not feeling well, I'm gonna go home and rest" Out of his mouth before he fell over, but he was dead before he hit the ground. His insides were cooked. Yes microwaves will kill you. And you may not notice on lower intensities.

Ah well that answer's my question, and I don't think those microwave towers are nearly powerful enough to boil water at a distance.

[CaptainChewbacca]

You know, I never asked that, but I would imagine he would feel like shit having killed a guy and being new at the job. It was more a safety story, beware of other people.

Sorry, whenever I hear a cautionary tale, I always get the wrong question in my head. Could you ask, though?

[Veramocor]

You know, I never asked that, but I would imagine he would feel like shit having killed a guy and being new at the job. It was more a safety story, beware of other people.

Sorry, whenever I hear a cautionary tale, I always get the wrong question in my head. Could you ask, though?

Lock out-Tag out. Its standard procedure when doing any work on equipement. It seems to me it was more managements for not having a safety procedure in place then the guy who turned the microwave tower back on. He should have never been physically able to turn it on if someone was performing maintenence.


As for Batman, a partial solution is that it was set as a directed microwave pointing down towards the pipes.

Still there are other problems such as penetration of the microwaves. Also the power source would have to be incredible to vaporize that much water.

[Tsyroc]

Did the microwave device vaporize water on it's own or did it interact with the metal pipes causing them to heat up enough to vaporize the water?

Having seen metal twist ties glow in a microwave after only a few seconds exposure this might explain how the device was able to work without killing everyone around it.


Unfortunately, it doesn't explain how the microwaves were strong enough to get through all the surrounding concrete and heat up the pipes without killing all the people, or why they didn't interact with the metal of the the train, it's tracks, or any other piece of metal in the city.

Must be some of them thar "special" microwaves. Specially tuned so they only effect water or water pipes.

[Shroom Man 777]

They probably reverted the deflector dish's quantum emissions to match the frequency modulations of the ionic bonds of the water's molecules

It's a comic book movie, so they're entitled to some scientific leeway, man.

[Superman]

This is a spoiler thread, so I want to post an obvious thing here because not everyone seems to get it.

Everyone realizes that Ken Watanabe was never Ras Al Gul, right?

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

I thought Leam Neeson was Raz Al Gul

[Admiral Valdemar]

Liam Neeson was, hence the deception. And the microwave emitted would kill (in fact, Wayne Enterprises would be producing something like that in real-life given the US' interests in directed energy weapons includes a Humvee with a planar array for crowd dispersal and as directed EMP).

The idea in the film is sound so long as you don't overthink it, I can easily accept that it was directed downwards where most water will be naturally and so humans didn't get cooked, though a city full of steam would be a bad place to live in.

[Ender]

Did the microwave device vaporize water on it's own or did it interact with the metal pipes causing them to heat up enough to vaporize the water?

Conservation of energy dude. Even if it was heating the pipes, it still has to apply a sufficient ammount of energy in the first place.

Having seen metal twist ties glow in a microwave after only a few seconds exposure this might explain how the device was able to work without killing everyone around it.

That's because its reflecting most of the energy directed at them, not because it is causing the metal to release extra energy somehow.

[NecronLord]

I just assumed it was designed using $Wayneenterpriseswank as targetting only open water.

[Tsyroc]

Conservation of energy dude. Even if it was heating the pipes, it still has to apply a sufficient ammount of energy in the first place.

So that would mean it would actually have to pump more energy into the pipes (presuming they don't conduct 100% of the energy they are hit with) to transfer the same amount of energy into the water contained in the pipes as it would be transmitting to water that wasn't in a pipe?

So basically we're back to the idea that a bunch of people probably should have been fubard because of this device unless they somehow made it very directional.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Making a microwave directional is piss easy, what do you think your microwave oven is? Omnidirectional?

[Tsyroc]

Making a microwave directional is piss easy, what do you think your microwave oven is? Omnidirectional?

No, but then the effects of this device didn't seem that focused. I suppose they could have been focused and the steam just spread outward from where the device first boiled the water. More water comes in as the steam goes out? Spreading away from the focal point of the microwave device.

[Admiral Valdemar]

No, but then the effects of this device didn't seem that focused. I suppose they could have been focused and the steam just spread outward from where the device first boiled the water. More water comes in as the steam goes out? Spreading away from the focal point of the microwave device.

One would assume the arrays were set so they pointed out from the bottom at 45 degrees of so to produce a cone of energy being emitted downward that would cover a larger area than having one big array point directly down. That would allow the pipes to have water vaped inside and the vapour to cause a pressure build-up that would explode out, as we saw, and likely transfer thermal energy to untouched water aiding it to evaporate.

[Tsyroc]

So I guess we're stuck with Comic Book science explaining why it didn't kill anyone or visibly interact with all of the metal in the way, especially the train.

[Kuja]

So I guess we're stuck with Comic Book science explaining why it didn't kill anyone or visibly interact with all of the metal in the way, especially the train.

But then, can we really be surprised when we need comic book science to explain comic book events in comic book movies?