Ishmael ragdolls after being shot by the helicopter.
After all that Ishmael and Ahab go through together, you’d think a windshield shattering wouldn’t be the thing that finally does Ishmael in, but it is. There’s no blood spatter like there is when he gets a knife to the shoulder, so there’s not a strong reason to believe he has been shot. And, if the timestamps are to be believed, Big Boss makes a full recovery from whatever he experienced as a result of that helicopter within a very short timespan – about 40 minutes at the most. Which is also interesting considering that the attack helicopter is so damn persistent.
The timestamps don’t make sense – but not the timestamps everyone is talking about.
A while back, everyone made a big deal about the timestamps because they called into question Ocelot’s and Big Boss’ movements on the night of the ambulance crash. Here are the facts:
Big Boss crawls out of the ambulance at 2:32 AM.
Venom crawls out of the ambulance at 3:07 AM, is rescued by Ocelot, and seemingly boards the ship with Ocelot.
Big Boss talks with Ocelot later, after the bridge is destroyed, at 5:59 AM.
I believe we have all come to accept the fact that Ocelot hides Big Boss (likely in a cardboard box full of supplies) right around 2:32 AM, rescues Venom right around 3:07 AM and brings him to the ship, then goes back to meet up with Big Boss right around sunrise, and then meets back up with Venom later on – maybe at Port Said where he first appears on the ship with Venom in the Indiana Jones-esque travel montage (let’s not forget that Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom came out in 1984).
But Ocelot is not who – or what – we should be focusing on. Instead, we should be focusing on the attack helicopter. So, it’s not clear at exactly what time the hospital scene starts (it’s either 2 weeks or 2 weeks and 48 hours after waking up – depending on what version of the hospital scene you’re playing), nor is it clear at what time the ambulance crashes, but there are a great many things that suggest Venom is not knocked out long enough for anything to happen that we are shown in the Truth ending.
For example, when he comes to, the first thing he sees when he crawls out of the ambulance is a very persistent helicopter barreling down at him. But this is highly suspicious. The tunnel takes 10 seconds for them to drive through at breakneck speed (yes, I timed it). Ten seconds at, say, 60 miles per hour is an easy calculation – the tunnel is likely somewhere around 880 feet long. A really terrible 2-seat helicopter (nothing like the one chasing after Venom) can reach a top speed – at the slowest – of about 90 miles per hour. There’s a bit of time dilation that happens during the slow-motion scene right after breaking through the tunnel, but even if you count everything that happens in slow-motion as just 1 second of actual time, it’s still 15 seconds between exiting the tunnel and Venom blacking out. It’s an additional 37 seconds from the time that Venom wakes up to the moment he spots the helicopter, which means the helicopter has at least 52 seconds to simply fly approximately 880 feet and over a hill that we can all see is barely taller than the tunnel entrance itself. This doesn’t even take into account the additional real time in the truth ending that shows Venom passed out (an additional 43 seconds).
Now, beyond the real time that we can actually observe, we’re also told to believe, based on the time stamps, that Venom is out cold for at least 35 minutes (between 2:32 AM and 3:07 AM). So, what was the helicopter doing that whole time – let alone in the 1 minute and 35 seconds (and more) of real time after Ishmael and Venom escaped its clutches? It’s certainly not coming after Ishmael (who again utilizes his right eye to glare at Ocelot). All is quiet when Ocelot fishes him out of the ambulance. It’s also not in a hurry to investigate the gunshots and catastrophic vehicle collision that occurs when Ishmael and Venom crash into the blockade.
But it’s not just the helicopter that suggests Venom is not knocked out for long. The car chase from the hospital takes approximately 2 minutes and 38 seconds. Again, assuming a speed of approximately 60 miles per hour gives us a distance of about 2.5 miles between the hospital and the ambulance’s final resting place. Completely ignoring the fact that the Man on Fire and Tretij Rebenok are straight up magical beings – no parasites or nanomachines for them! – a horse travels, at a trot, at an average of 8.1 to 12 miles per hour. Taking that slower speed as a baseline, a normal horse – not even a flying fire unicorn pegasus – would be able to lazily travel from the hospital to the site of the ambulance crash within a mere 18.5 minutes. With the 35 minute – or more – window suggested by the time stamps, that gives the Man on Fire 16.5 minutes to wrap up any revenge-fueled decimation at the hospital before even beginning the journey to the ambulance crash.
Of course, he and Psycho Mantis are magical beings, so your guess about their average rate of travel is as good as mine. But I bet they could make the trip in the minute and 35 seconds that we know Venom is knocked out – plus the additional 40 seconds between when the helicopter shows up and the Man on Fire arrives. After all, the third boy legitimately teleports instantaneously.
For a development team that created backstory about a refueling ship to accommodate the helicopter’s range from Mother Base to the different areas of operation, these time inconsistencies are inexplicable indeed.
While we’re talking about the chopper, it’s also interesting to note that Venom’s rage is powerful enough to control psycho mantis just long enough to get him to use the Man on Fire’s powers to destroy the helicopter. Of all the things to be upset about, Venom is the most angry at the helicopter? Odd. #SuchALust.