8 Sci-Fi Movies Built On A Lie

4. Lucy

lucy scarlett johansson
EuropaCorp

If 2014's Lucy was based on truth, Scarlett Johansson's Lucy Miller would likely have ended up dead by the end of the film's opening act.

At the start of Lucy, the titular character ends up being tricked into becoming a drug mule. After her boyfriend is shot and killed, Lucy has a packet of the CPH4 drug sewn into her stomach. When someone kicks Lucy in the stomach, that then leaks this drug into her system and allows her to access the full capacity of her brain - in addition to essentially gaining superpowers.

This is also, of course, lazily based on the notion that humans only ever use 10% of their brains.

In reality, we humans actually use far, far more than 10% of our brains. Different areas of the brain are reserved for different uses, such as storing old memories, for creative purposes, or even for sleeping. If, like in Lucy, someone was to miraculously be able to use 100% of their brain capacity all at once, the tragic result would be that that person would immediately fall into a coma and would have an extremely high chance of dying.

The other elephant in the room here, is that if Lucy Miller had an entire bag of high level drugs emptied into her system then she would have again been facing the Grim Reaper - this time due to a drug overdose.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks/Saints, Jamie Hayter, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.