FAQ

Newly-awakened from extended hypersleep on the spaceship Elysium, Corporal Bower (Ben Foster) and Lieutenant Payton (Dennis Quaid) struggle to remember the nature of their mission and to find out what happened to the rest of their fellow crew members. While Payton works the command center, Bower begins to explore the seemingly abandoned ship in order to find and jumpstart the malfunctioning nuclear reactor. He quickly learns that they are not alone and that the ship has become a hunting ground for cannibals.

Pandorum is based on a script by screenwriter Travis Milloy. The screenplay was actually the result of two earlier scripts, one written by Milloy in the late 1990s and the other a screenplay titled No Where, written by director Christian Alvart. Milloy's script was set on a prison ship transporting hardcore criminals to another planet, while Alvart's screenplay was about four amnesic astronaunts aboard a settlers' ship. When the two scripts were merged, the story became Pandorum.

In Milloy's original script, Pandorum was the name of the spaceship transporting prisoners to another planet. When the script was changed to feature a settlers' ship, the ship was re-named the Elysium, and the name "pandorum" was used as a nickname for orbital dysfunction syndrome (ODS), a fictional type of psychosis that can develop during deep space travel. In the movie, pandorum/ODS is described as beginning with tremors and nosebleeds and leading to paranoia, delirium, and hallucinations. As such, it is similar to a real disorder known as high-pressure nervous syndrome (HPNS), which can develop in deep sea divers when they descend to a depth of 500 feet or below while breathing a mixture of helium and oxygen.

1969: Man lands on the moon. World population: 3.6 billion 2009: Kepler telescope is launched to search for earth-like planets. World population: 6.76 billion 2153: Paleo-17 space probe lands on planet Tanis. World Population: 24.34 billion. Food and water shortages are commonplace. 2174: The battle for earth's limited resources reaches the boiling point. Spacecraft Elysium is launched.

The Elysium originated on Earth and was heading for a distant Earth-like planet called Tanis. The trip was expected to take 123 years and was carrying 60,000 passengers plus various crew members whose goal it was to colonize the planet. Because of the length of the trip, the passengers were all placed in extended hypersleep, while the crew was divided into several shifts, each shift alternately awakening to service and run the ship for two years before being returned to hypersleep when the next shift takes over.

It seems to symbolize that there is something abnormal with their minds and most likely suggests that they all developed Pandorum. This is further implied with the drawings depicting blood running from their noses, which is a symptom of the disorder. This seems to hint why these crew members willingly played Gallo's cannibalistic game.

Bower asks this question about Nadia's theory that the creatures are transformed crew members. She replies that maybe they were awake longer than them. However, there are a couple of contradictions to this theory, making her an unreliable expositor. The first being that Gallo was awake for decades without any changes. Secondly, it's later revealed that over nine centuries have passed since Gallo awoke others from hyper-sleep, making it impossible for them to be those crew members. It is very possible that Nadia does not remember how the enzyme works due her amnesia and she even states that she is not certain if she is correct. She did say that the accelerating enzyme was suppose to jump start "evolution", but a person doesn't evolve in one lifetime. Populations evolve over generations, so the genetic changes most likely didn't start happening until generations later like natural evolution, but instead of thousands of years it was cut down to centuries. This would explain why they weren't affected at all.

They were feeding on the 60,000 passengers in hypersleep (feeding tubes in hypersleep provided the passengers with nutrition) as well as on each other. Other food sources were shown throughout the film. Nadia had her biolab and is shown eating grasshoppers. When Nadia was leading Bower and Mahn to her lab, water was shown dipping from the ceiling as well as algae covering the walls. Leland used the algae to make soup.

When Leland tells the story, he says "that's what some would say". It can be assumed that he heard it from other victims of Gallo.

The film was set up to be a three movie franchise. Whether or not there would be sequels, however, depended upon how the first film would do at the box office. The film had a $33-million budget and only grossed $20 million. As such, there have been no plans for a sequel, due to the poor box office performance. When things like this happen, the book is usually closed for at least a decade, and when/if reopened, rebooting is acquiesced.