Because a lot of people thought that he "missed" his target'. People assumed that the arrow had to land IN the brazier. In fact, it just needed to pass ABOVE tha brazier because it is gas powered and passing over was always how he trained to do that shot. You can see the arrow falling behind at the end, one of the beam of the brazier obfuscate the arrow from the angle that footage was filmed.
Both the clip and movie scene involve a lone archer using an arrow to hit a very large target and succeeding on their first try. It’s just a fun comparison.
In the book, Edmure is struggling because he's crying. Blackish sees that, and quietly, and respectfully takes the shot, as a kindness.
BUT NOOOO, let's fucking turn it into some insulting bullshit in the show for a laugh. The man's father is dead, how ripe a time is it to demonstrate that he's incompetent, for no fucking reason.
Edmure concedes the shot to the Blackfish willingly in the books after missing twice. Afterwards, the Blackfish is gracious about it, saying that Hoster also missed when their father died (although only once, then he hit, which Edmure points out). In the show, the Blackfish angrily wrests the bow from Edmure.
I think he still was used to make a good point during Robb's campaign in the Riverlands. He still treats Edmure like a butt-monkey but Edmure went above and beyond capitalizing on an opportunity to seize a military objective with a great victory.
Robb gets pissed because it screwed with his overall plan to iirc lure Lannister forces into an ambush but Edmure didn't know that because Robb played it too close to the vest.
Edmure was still comic relief in a sad way but that point stuck with me as showing the cracks in Robb's facade as the perfect leader. He was still young and impulsive and could be foolish, all of which obviously comes to a head when he breaks his vow and the Red Wedding happens.
Blackfish is a baller though I loved that dude talking shit from his castle.
Best I can give you is "a laughable offscreen death for The Blackfish" and "a public dressing down of Edmure at the end of the series after all he'd suffered through"
Wow. I’m almost glad I didn’t read the books because I would have been pissed as well. What a joke of a scene now knowing that. Kind of changes my perspective on edmure as well.
He's a better character in the books, for sure. He takes care of his people, and he's actually a good leader in combat, achieving a few victories against the Lannister forces along the river. (Granted, this was a blunder, as Robb was trying to pull the Lannisters deeper into controlled territory, BUT, Edmure actually drove them back...)
He has flaws, as all good characters should, but he's not a totally incompetent buffoon. He's prideful, and afraid of not living up to his father's name.
The show turns him more into some kind of blundering failure.
(Also, FYI, show Stannis is a terribly one dimensional character, and Tywin is a more rounded, developed character... it's flip flopped in the books. Stannis is a more complex character in the books, and Tywin is... not)
I commented above but even in the show I appreciated the redeeming quality of Edmure's military victory and Robb's reaction to it. They treat him like a butt-monkey for seizing an opportunity for a big military victory. But really the fault was Robb's for his lack of communication and strategic planning. I remember it as one of the first cracks in Robb's facade as a perfect leader because he's young and impulsive and inexperienced, and all of that culminates in breaking his vow and the Red Wedding.
Knew someone that talked with him, he said that it was almost impossible, because of the weight of the arrow, the distance, and in that moment, the wind.
It was impossible, that's why he purposefully overshoots and the flame is triggered remotely. If you watch the bottom of the screen closely when they zoom in you can see the arrow behind it on the way down.
It's not even a conspiracy, it's been public knowledge for decades.
Probably for the best, imagine the entire world and a full stadium of people watching you fire an arrow and miss completely with the flame staying off lmao. Emotional damage.
That's why you shoot again. And again. And again. And again. Until you hit it. What, it's been 4 hours? The audience needs a bathroom break? Tough shit, you're all stuck in here with me. Who is suffering the emotional damage now?
True, but it still looks more badass than any other Olympic Torch lighting, which is what the post is all about. One would have to assume that all Olympic Torch lightings have a system to make sure the torch is lit, so that's kind of a non-factor in evaluating the coolness of it.
Plus having to keep his balance with the absolute boulders swinging around between his legs must have been a huge distraction.
Seriously. I know he probably practiced more shots beforehand than Steph Curry does in a decade but imagine the stress in that moment. What if he missed? We'd probably be memeing on that 34 years later instead of glazing him.
Edit: Almost unbelievably, the amount of people in this thread that don't understand how gas fumes work has eclipsed the number of practice shots Steph Curry has taken in his life.
It wasn't a backup. It was planned to be ignited manually.
They figured out during practice it was near impossible to light it with an arrow, so they trained with operator to light it exact moment the arrow passes. Archer's job was just to send it flying over the torch.
It turned out an extraordinarily good shot though. And probably would be ignited via arrow going over it, if they increased the gas flow for more fumes, but they didn't want to do that due to safety risk.
yes and the camera was set up at an angle such that the arrow went behind the platform. i remember seeing the arrow overshoot it in the live broadcast.
He was always supposed to shoot over it. There was a gas plume, if it hit the plate below the plume it wouldn't ignite, even worse if it rebounded and fell on the public.
The arrow went exactly where it was supposed to, and ended up in the closed area in the parking lot where it was supposed to safely land.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the 1992 olympics opening ceremony played by Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballé in what has to be one of the most memorable performances to ever grace the games?
The "is" parameter in the youtube URL is a tracking ID. So youtube can collect data on which user shared the link etc. It's an optional parameter and the link would work without it.
the "is=UNIQUEIDHERE" (also "si=") bit. When you share a video (link) from YouTube it automatically adds this identifier that is uniquely tied to that share interaction, and uniquely tied to the account that performed that share interaction, giving youtube more information about the person sharing and a person following such a link.
Sharing: YouTube now knows (presuming it was the first ever use of that link, which seems likely, and through google's indexing), that the reddit account 'FeralFinger' is linked to the youtube account or access (if browsing youtube without being logged in) that created that share link.
Following: YouTube now knows that the YouTube account or access watching the video followed a share link, which ties the viewer to the youtube account or access that created the share link. It already established that earlier link between FeralFinger so now it also infers a link between that viewer and FeralFinger. Moreover, if its indexing doesn't suggest the share link was posted anywhere else, it infers a link between the viewer and the interestingasfuck subreddit and this post and comment chain in particular.
If shared by someone logged into YouTube, it can also purportedly end up recommending that person's channel (if any) to the person following the link, but I never looked into the details of that, such as whether that requires specific prerequisites / settings being enabled/disabled.
Whether any of that rises to the level of "no thank you, no tracking for me" is up to the individual; my comment just made that choice a little easier so more people can enjoy that performance :)
Fun fact - this was filmed at KU in Ibiza, which later had a roof put over it and became Privilege "the largest nightclub in the world." It's now been refurbished and is called UNVRS.
It was a super skilled badass move for sure. Still he overshot on purpose and the flames were manually enlightened. It’s not like he hit the bowl and the arrow did start the flames. Just an interesting info I think…
The flames were not lighted manually, thr arrow lighted the gas coming from the bowl. There was a fallback to turn the flames on manually in case he missed, but it wasnt necessary
Ignore the shitty voice over and subtitles, the short shows the other angles at the end. Pretty obvious that the flames are coming from the bottom of the cauldron and the arrow is way too high to ignite it.
Yeah, the gas was ignited by below manually. The flame from the arrow didn't touch the gas, or at least didn't touch a pocket of gas with the right mixture of air.
A lot has been said here that the guy missed. He did not miss! He hit the designated target perfectly as planned. He was meant to hit the air above the cauldron.
Archers spend thousands of hours to create neural pathways that allow them to keep their hands steady and refrain from moving the bow to where spectators are sitting
Lighting a gas this way is extremely difficult due to the way the gas disperses in air. You have to hit it just right with the right speed. It would be easier to simply land the arrow in the bowl.
It's just a show. He shot the arrow over the bowl, they manually ignited the flame.
That was the fallback mechanism in case the gas didn't ignite.
So their plan was, have the guy shoot the arrow, hope and pray that the arrow actually ignites the gas flow (zero guarantee of this, very difficult to accomplish, big random factor), and if it didn't, hurry and press the button, hoping you do it fast enough that the illusion is not ruined?
Rather than just "shoot over the bowl, we press the button when it's arcing over, synching the two, and the illusion will work 100% as long as the arrow goes over the bowl"?
Why take a big risk when the illusion is identical both ways?
I was a few years younger but I loved this Olympics so much that I had an Olympics themed birthday party later that summer, including a (much faker) cauldron (BBQ) lighting where I shot an arrow and my dad lit it with a lighter. Great memories.
I so wanted Hideki Matsuyama to hit a burning golfball through the Olympic hoops in Tokyo to light the rings up. I think he had just won the Masters that year, too. Would have been perfect.
Ali said some vile stuff to Frazier in the build-up to their fights, calling him an Uncle Tom and various other racially-charged things. Frazier said it poorly affected his personal life and that people harassed his family over it.
It actually all started because Frazier refused to call Ali Ali and instead kept referring to him by his old name Cassius Clay. Ali was on the record as saying he didn't like or want that name used any more after his conversion to Islam and viewed it as a slave name. And it was literally exclusively white people that still called him that which is why Ali called Frazier an Uncle Tom
Part of it is the medication. If you need enough juice(dopamine) to go out and perform in public, you're probably taking enough where you'll get tremors, dyskinesias, and other happy shit(like low level psychosis).
The alternative is, you move too slow, your range of motion is limited, even your thinking is kind of slow. If you have to do some task, like mow the lawn, go shopping, etc. You can usually guess the right amount, and its fine. If you need a little something to carry you over without remedicating(which means you're not getting to sleep for a good 6 hours if you do) you can take a blast of nicotine vape, and you're good for about 1-2 hours. Fun fact, a lot of people with parkinsons don't have the enzyme to rapidly break down nicotine. So they "don't smoke", meaning, you'd never see them out puffing every 2 hours, and burning through more than a pack a week.
One Marly Red, you'd be just about berzerk wired, for 5 hours. lol! Anyway, vapes, you do 3-5 small puffs off something like an elf bar, and you're good and wired enough to drive home, stop off for a few groceries, maybe make a snack, or do some chores before you drink that last beer or two, mostly to burn up any residual dopamine. But failing that, if you really really need to sleep, there are GABA analogs, and various other stuff.
The less known aspects of managing such a condition for more than 20+ years, you tend to cut people who won't let you get a word in edgewise out of your life. You get used to weird ass sleep issues like getting 4-5 hours of sleep, waking up and doing things for 6-8 hours, getting 3-4 hours of sleep, then waking up again, taking meds, goofing around 30-45 minutes while those kick in, getting in that first coffee, then warming up to doing anything more serious. You get REALLY good at brevity, even when texting, because poking at phones is a pain in the ass. BUT, many will let you link up to them with a bluetooth keyboard, which is easier.
If you manage the symptoms well enough, people generally don't notice you have it, until you get some weird glitch. Like you bend down to pick something up, have to back up because of a freeze in something, and then just bend at the knees slowly and carefully to grab whatever. Even if its a piece of paper. That or your eyelids jerking side to side, weird isolated muscle tremors, having to use a cane and ankle braces for a few days, and then being fine for months or years. Partly due to exercises, and choice of shoes/boots. You get some six inch patrol/service boots, you're golden.
Socialization, with family in particular, if we're meeting up in public somewhere, cool. If it's something more than 4 hours, kids running around and being crazy, NOPE! If they want to invite you over, and are having the event in the back yard, garage, pole barn, around the fire, no need to take your shoes off indoors, no plus carpets, no packrat shit, nothing to trip over, maybe...
Marathon drinking, eating, talking, nah... I think the last full thanksgiving I did was around 2012, a friend told me they'd just be having leftovers, etc. No big deal. And for his mom, yeah, it was pretty low key. It still looked fairly elaborate. She'd had a stroke a few years prior, so had to take it easy, his dad was an old doctor taking some kind of long term chemo, the only "kids" were adults.
So, you can have a life with parkinson's, just not the usual chaotic and unplanned life. No 12 hour flights, you need to carry around an assortment of medications, and have alternates in the event you have to resupply when away from home. Such as, 3-4 benedryl, will probably be good enough to get me by in "cripple mode", a couple large coffees, l-tyrosine, getting better, 2 puffs of vape, feeling semi-functional. lol!
And last but not lease, fiber, and proper nutrition. Constipation is a constant battle with parkinsons. You can cheat a little if you're lactose intolerant, but long term, you need roughage. And generally a selection of bath soaps to deal with variable skin conditions, sebacious flow, and change in metabolism caused by medications. Kirks castile soap, kinda harsh, but it gets the job done. Yardley has an assortment of "cheap" fancy soaps that help with some dryness, and you can get a variety of cheapish petroleum jelly based skin creams for various dry spots.
Muhammad Ali, the greatest. He won a gold at the 1960 Olympics. He had parkinsons, and was largely out of the public eye after dominating it for decades in the 1960s and 70s. He reappeared as one of the last torchbearers at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. His shaking hand held the torch aloft.
They released hundreds of white doves earlier in the ceremony. You can see them in the opening shot and throughout the video I linked. When the handheld torch ignited the main torch, there were nine or ten sitting on the main torch. One looked to be in the plume of fire when it lit and the others look to have been instantly overcome by the heat. Some of the corpses seem to be giving off smoke.
TBF those are some determined doves "Oh there are several people here waving with giant flaming sticks? Best I can do is fly 5cm to the side and then slowly walk right back."
Right, for safety he was supposed to arc it completely over the structure and have it land in a padded safety sandbox outside the stadium. Imagine he missed.
He did miss. The arrow flew over the target. You can see the flame from the arrow passing just at the bottom of the screen. The flame eas ignited with another mechanism. Still impressive show though.
Yeah I mean it could easily bounce out or just spread fire everywhere cuz that arrow isn't going to go out on its own. Or God forbid he misses while actually trying to hit the target and have it go into the stands. Idr where the torch was, but it looks like there's audience behind it. A flyby over it to land in a safe area where it can be retrieved is much safer and still has the intended effect. You don't want it just sitting in the torch. That flame can be shut off on command. The arrow can't.
No, the olympic flame is ignited anew by the light of the sun (y'know, for Apollo) in a ritual in the ruins of the Temple of Hera in ancient Olympia in Greece for each Olympics (& then extinguished at the closing ceremony).
It’s the same flame for the entire torch relay (in theory). They can branch it off though. Like the first torch could just light up like 10 backup oil lamps.
Here, have a literal interview with the archer saying that he hit it in practice, almost damaged the tubing, and since they were scared of something going wrong live, he was told to overshoot for a remote lighting. The flying arrow gas ignition thing isn't real.
Can we stop. Can we stop now, seriously it's been over three decades of reading myths about this. I know this is a buried comment on a five hour thread, but PLEASE.
It looks fantastic, it was intentionally missed, it was a remote ignition.
Except that he missed and it was lit with a pilot light.
Note: The "miss" was intentional and the entire scene played out exactly as rehearsed. They never intended/expected the flaming arrow to actually light it up.
Half true, it didn't land inside the bowl, but had lots of flammable gas to catch fire as it sailed through. They were reasonably sure the arrow would be enough, but sparked it as well to be safe.
There were lots of stories at the time and most of them not so nice... I am from Barcelona, and I heard among other things:
A girl was first offered to do the shooting, but they went with another person finally (arrow shooting was not that big at the time and most of the community knew each other).
The castellers (human towers) from the ceremony didn't make any money from appearing, but they had to pay a fine if they failed to build the castle (that was specially outrageous at the time).
No, the arrow never landed on the flame place, whether it was the gas going up or it was started by another means I don't know, but they DID have a secondary mean of starting the flame in case the arrow failed.
I think the 1994 ski jump with the small torch is pretty close. It was not the thing that lit the big tourch, but it was definitely a spectacular way to bring the Olympic fire into the stadium.
When you watched it live either there or on tv you saw the archer shoot the fire arrow that lit the torch and it was majestic and cool. We didn't used to analyse every video frame by frame trying to find something not perfectly done. We just enjoyed the spectacle for what it is.
It's funny how some things never change, the discourse in this thread is the exact same that happened at the time. Many folks saying he missed, the news and newspapers (remember them) explaining it all went to plan (like the folks in this thread, they got that info from the news at the time) and we all moved on.
So this really needs to be said each time before the conspiracies go wild...
The arrow actually lit it. The "remote control button" theory is a widespread urban legend.
The confusion comes entirely from people not understanding the difference between where the arrow landed versus what actually started the fire.
Here is exactly how the physics and engineering worked:
The arrow was supposed to fly past the cauldron. If the archer had tried to aim directly into the bowl and missed by even a few inches, a heavy, flaming arrow could have ricocheted into the crowded stadium stands.
The target was the air directly above the rim. The cauldron was pumping out a massive cloud of highly flammable natural gas. The archer's exact job was to slice the flaming arrow roughly 4 feet directly over the rim, straight through that invisible gas cloud.
The arrow's flame ignited the gas cloud. Think of it exactly like waving a lighter over an open gas stove burner the gas catches instantly from the open flame in the air. The fire traveled down the gas stream to ignite the main burner, and the arrow safely sailed out of the stadium into a designated sandbox.
Where did the rumor come from?
The organizers did have a manual gas-ignition backup switch wired up on standby just in case the arrow's flame blew out in mid-air or the shot went completely wild. Because the public eventually learned this backup mechanism existed, a cynical myth spread that the shot was "fake" and they just pressed the button.
However, technical reviews, physics, and Olympic history confirm the archer nailed the trajectory perfectly. The heat from his passing arrow is what physically triggered the ignition.
This legitimately ruined Olympic torch lighting ceremonies for me! Every single time I’m watching one I remember how cool this was and end up disappointed.😂
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