- “I wonder if it will be friends with me!”
- —The whale's attitude to the fast approaching ground[src]
The Magrathean sperm whale was the co-product of the Infinite Improbability Drive and its reality-warping field interacting with two guided missiles above Magrathea, the other outcome being a bowl of petunias.
The probability of this occurring was 8,767,128 to 1 against.[1] The whale has an existential life of discovery which lasts a minute before it hits the ground, leaving a large crater and whale remains.
Appearances[]
The Magrathean sperm whale appeared in:
- Fit the third of the radio series.
- Chapter 18 of the novel The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
- Episode 3 of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy television series.
- The film The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Behind the scenes[]
The whale at the start of its fall, from the 1981 TV series
- The whale was voiced by:
- Stephen Moore in the radio and TV series.
- Bill Bailey in the movie.
- While the whale was falling in the television series, the song Whale Theme played, a composition by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop.
- In Fallout 2, there is a special encounter with a carcass of a dead sperm whale and a broken bowl of flowers. This is a reference to the Magrathean sperm whale and the accompanying bowl of petunias.
- Another reference to the whale and bowl of petunias is in the video game Kerbal Space Program. On the moon Laythe, there is a sperm whale skeleton and a smashed bowl of petunias.
Notes and references[]
- ↑ In the book this probability is spoken by Eddie the Computer, while in the movie it is spoken by the Guide, voiced by Stephen Fry
External links[]
- Crashed whale on Fallout Wiki