I Am Legend Trap Debate

*Godfather* · 12-23-2007, 07:23 PM

*Spoilers*

Alright.... I debated this with a friend when we got out of the movie, and in an attempt to look up the answer, realized that this debate is going on all over the net.

The Trap:
When Neville gets caught in his own trap, he is confused as to why the mannequin (who looks like or is Fred from the movie store) is out in the street. He shoots it, and is then caught in the same trap that bags him an infected earlier in the movie.

So the question is, did Robert simply forget about one of the many traps he'd set over the course of his three years alone, or did he underestimate the infected and get trapped by them.

One argument is, the infected must have done it because there was one waiting for him with dogs. But this also has a hole in it: Neville was bleeding into a pool of water below him for what looks like several hours while Sam barks her head off. The infected could come from a long way hearing and smelling that.

And Neville being the head of the search for the cure, believes that the infected now lack any human intelligence. For the infected to have set a trap, he would have to have been totally wrong. Yet in the book, I Am Legend, some of the night seekers are in fact still intelligent.

Personally I say that it was his own trap. Neville talked to dolls all the time, hadnt seen a person in years, was constantly being chased, lost his family, his only friend was a dog, and when later in the movie he runs into humans has no idea how to deal with it. I thought he was losing it the entire movie, and the downward spiral from being caught in his own trap onwards highlighted it.

Maybe the creators will clear the air, maybe not. Wadya think?

**Noodles** · 12-23-2007, 08:48 PM

He said they lacked any human traits, not intelligence.

I think the infected moved Jeff to one of Neville's own traps or they learned how to
make one from his. The one with the dogs was the one that seamed to be the leader
of that group of the infected.

I was a cool ending when they all got better and went out for ice cream.

*Lisey* · 12-24-2007, 06:55 AM

Tell me you're joking about the ice cream......

I went with a big group and we were baffled about that as well. I lean more towards the infected set him up.....BUT.....in the movie it was very unclear to me. He made the infected sound animalistic yet not intelligent.

And the leader?! Every infected looked the same...that was confusing me as well.

*Godfather* · 12-24-2007, 11:02 AM

Same here Lisey...

I went again last night cus my group of friends from back home was going. The second time around it became far more clear to me that it was Frank from outside the movie store, and that it was the same night seeker who saw Robert with the first trap, released the dogs and then later appeared in his basement. I think those bastards lured him!

Two more confusions though.... It's pretty shaky how the night seekers would know where Frank was, and if he would even attract Robert. They almost certainly would know nothing of Robert's usual habits such as saying hello to Frank and where he was, as they cannot move from building to building watching him right?

AND

How the shit did Anna and Ethan get onto Manhattan island? The tunnels were flooded, and traffic jammed, and probably infested with night seekers. Bridges were gone. And yet she showed up with not just any SUV, but a decked out one with UV lights already on it, meaning she didn't just hop a boat and steal a car. And again at the end, she showed up at the survivor camp in the same truck, meaning she must have parked it a ways away from Robert's house (or it would have been blown the hell up) and then carried/dragged an unconscious and injured 170lb man onto the couch

Dont get me wrong, I loved it. But these two questions, combined with what I thought was a very rushed ending (oh look, the cure...here hide(in this coal chute wont heat to 450 degrees when a hand grenade blows up and then cooks my lab)) made it a little disappointing, when I'd been re-watching other post-apocalyptic science ficiton movies in anticipation of this one for months

....I'm still guna buy it

**Noodles** · 12-24-2007, 11:35 PM

We can pick apart so many good movies with leaps of faith that things just happened that
do not make sense. The Anna part is more baffling than the snare trap scene.