There’s something oddly comforting about the fact that noted astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson enjoys bitching about movies on Twitter just as much as we do. The Cosmos host took to Twitter to offer his highly literal take on Noah Baumbach’s critically beloved drama Marriage Story and its potentially misleading title:
The film “A Marriage Story” (2019) should instead have been named “A Divorce Story” pic.twitter.com/5mKGgCzb08
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) February 24, 2020
Netflix, the film’s distributor, quickly responded, positing an alternate theory for the title:
that’s assuming the title is referring to Nicole and Charlie, but what if the title is referring to Nicole and her boyfriend @ the end of the film and that it’s a story about how she came to marry HIM pic.twitter.com/LwDABGDruX
— Netflix US (@netflix) February 24, 2020
Many chimed in to respond to Tyson and to criticize the “science” of other films:
— comporary figurative figures (@daemonite) February 24, 2020
it’s really “star war” when you think about it
— Dave Itzkoff (@ditzkoff) February 24, 2020
Ah but Neil, how much of the running time do they spend legally married, and for how much are they legally divorced? I think you’ll find the math is on Noah Baumbach’s side
— Andrew Todd (@mistertodd) February 24, 2020
By most standards, they were actually Average Sized Women
— Sean O’Neal (@seanoneal) February 24, 2020
A field cannot physically consist of dreams
— Cosmik Slop (@BrightAnimal) February 24, 2020
“It is impossible for BB-8 to be real. A ball can’t roll on sand!” NDT pic.twitter.com/sypSfK6SKJ
— TurboFC3S (@Fc3Turbo) February 24, 2020
Despite the widespread mockery on Twitter, Tyson is still going on with his movie observations. Here are some more gems:
In the film “Arrival” (2016) nobody wondered whether the circular patterns drawn by the creature were backwards. The septopoid Alien drew them from the other side of a transparent glass wall. pic.twitter.com/QfTfJlpHAQ
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) February 25, 2020
And of course, the film “Gravity” (2013) should instead have been named “Zero Gravity”. pic.twitter.com/DTiH2NdxKw
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) February 24, 2020
Not that anybody asked, but if Elsa from “Frozen” has a Human-sized Head then she has Horse-sized Eyeballs — occupying 4x the normal volume within her cranium. I’m just sayin’. pic.twitter.com/UujtGa3z5h
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) February 24, 2020
Tyson is not new to being the focus of social media attention as well as controversy. He was accused of sexual misconduct last year, and issued an apology online. He’s also been criticized in the past for favoring science over sensitivity, as seen in his inappropriate comments on school shootings.
It’s still nice to know that even world-famous scientists aren’t immune to the passionate trollery that is Film Twitter. I mean, even Dictionary.com got in on the action:
We got to the sixth word of the definition and decided everything is fine. https://t.co/FVnFIFaqHl
— Dictionary.com (@Dictionarycom) February 24, 2020
At least Tyson seems to be enjoying his dad joke based analysis of these films, and really, aren’t we all? In a world that is violently divided, where online discourse is filled with hate and vitriol, there is something almost quaint about people from walks of life coming together online to bitch about movies.
And for the people claiming his tweet was a spoiler: get over it, that movie came out last year.
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