That moment you notice a huge plot hole in the story

[Lilani]

I have a job that allows me to listen to things while I work, and I've gotten to where I like to listen to audiobooks and radio plays. There's one Doctor Who radioplay I have called The Professor and Ace: Prosperity Island, and I've probably listend to it more than a dozen times. I simply love it.

But today, I just realized a huge, gaping hole in the plot that is never addressed in the whole thing. The TARDIS just kind of vanishes from the story, and doesn't show up til the very end (for you non-Whovians, basically the TARDIS is the Doctor's personal spaceship that travels through space and time, and it's the size of a police telephone box. It can go basically anywhere and any when, unless they come up with a plot device that prevents it from going somewhere or some when). The story opens with the Doctor and Ace hiding in a trash hopper on a huge spaceship that's headed for a vacation planet. They're hiding because the cost to go to the planet is extremely high. It never occurred to me until today that it makes no sense--they should just be able to use the TARDIS to go straight to the planet, but they never even mention where the TARDIS is or why they aren't using it. And so many other things happen that can be solved by using the TARDIS--the spaceship crashes and they get stranded on an island. They could have been made safer from the crash in the TARDIS, and they wouldn't have been stranded if they had it.

The TARDIS isn't mentioned until the very end, when they've made it off the island by boat and are on the mainland of the planet. At the end, they get in the TARDIS and leave. It's never explained how the TARDIS got there when they had gotten there by spaceship and boat, and it's never explained why they were never with it in the first place.

I still love the story, but it just boggles my mind that they'd forget to address something like that. Just a little thing to explain it away would have worked: maybe they had to take the ship to go through customs and sent the TARDIS ahead. But they never say anything like that!

Anyway, what other plot holes have suddenly dawned on you when it comes to some story or another?

 

[Zontar]

For Captain America: The Winter Soldier. I noticed three.

First:

Spoiler

Zola is shown to be the one who infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. and brought Hydra to its core, but there are two problems with this. First is that S.H.I.E.L.D. would be keeping their eyes on him so closely that he would be unable to accomplish this. Second is the fact that in the first movie it was made clear that he was only continuing his work with Hydra under duress and threat of execution, and that he was not a true believer.

Second:

Spoiler

Hydra, during its revolution, only has three helicarriers to its name. Yes they are formidable weapons which would kill a lot of people, but they also would not be able to kill all their targets in the US before being shot down, let alone the world (at peak efficiency, it would take 3.7 months of continuous fire to kill all their targets, and that's assuming they are killing at peak efficiency while on the move). 70 years of planning for that? What a waste.

Third:

Spoiler

At the end of Thor and during The Avengers we see that S.H.I.E.L.D. has hired Dr. Selvig to help them harness the power of the Tesseract because they are unable to. Yet they show that not only has S.H.I.E.L.D. had it since the end of the second world war in the first Cap movie, in the second they showed one of their founding members was a nazi who had ALREADY found a way to harness its power and was cooperating with them fully (no way he would have lasted more then a year with excuses for not being able to do what he had already done with less resources). So why is it only in 2012 that they started using it for power when they should have had it from the end of the war onward?

 

[Vault101]

Romeo + Juliet

this is the 90's...they had autopsies back then....if your perfectly healthy 16 year old daughter suddenly "dies" you get her to a hospital...then they cut her open to figure out what the hell happned

not that it would have made much difference to the overall outcome but it sheds a new light on things

 

[Zak757]

The time line for Kill la Kill is all fucked up.

Spoiler

In episode 18 we learn:

- Ragyo Kiryuin does life fibre experiments on her newborn daughter, Ryuuko
- Soichiro Kiryuin rigs the experiment to look like a failure, making it look like Ryuuko was dead
- Ryuuko is dropped into the trash chute, Soichiro presumably digs her out of there
- At the age of five, four years after the experiment, Satsuki learns about Ragyo's plans from Soichiro

In episode 19 we learn:

- Ragyo, at an unspecified time sent some minions to kill Soichiro, blowing up his car with an RPG
- Soichiro survives, and undergoes extensive surgery and changes his name to Isshin Matoi to fake Soichiro's death
- Isshin raises Ryuuko in secret

In the flashback, we can see Isshin in the same room as Ryuuko, who only looks like a toddler at the most, sucking on her thumb. Okay, so that would mean that this could have only happened a couple years after the experiment. So how does Satsuki end up talking to Soichiro at the age of 5? He couldn't have changed back and walked into the Ragyo household to tell her daughter the truth. Even if we assume the Ryuuko in the flashback is 4 years old (doesn't look like it) and Soichiro became Isshin after the talk with Satsuki, where was Ryuuko during those 4 years? Still in the garbage chute, at a foster home...?

 

[Kolby Jack]

Pacific Rim. Do I even need to say it?

Spoiler

The sword. Seriously? WHERE WAS THAT ALL THOSE TIMES YOU WERE GETTING YOUR ASS KICKED? Why did you ONLY use it ONCE??? They don't even TRY to justify it's absence up until that one scene in the movie or after the fact. The movie is already written like a mediocre anime, but that one scene just plunged it into bad anime territory for me. If I wanted gratuitous robot violence with baffling plot points, I'd watch G Gundam, because at least it's hilariously nonsensical.

 

[silver wolf009]

Pacific Rim. Do I even need to say it?

Spoiler

The sword. Seriously? WHERE WAS THAT ALL THOSE TIMES YOU WERE GETTING YOUR ASS KICKED? Why did you ONLY use it ONCE??? They don't even TRY to justify it's absence up until that one scene in the movie or after the fact. The movie is already written like a mediocre anime, but that one scene just plunged it into bad anime territory for me. If I wanted gratuitous robot violence with baffling plot points, I'd watch G Gundam, because at least it's hilariously nonsensical.

You know, that's in the same category of North Korea attacking the US in Homefront in terms of hand waving explanations. In both cases, there's brief snippets of news footage. In Homefront, North Korea's basically got all the territories of World War 2 Era Imperial Japan. But it flashes up so quickly, everyone misses it. In Pacific Rim, again, in a montage of news coverage, Kaiju blood is really poisonous, and considering how much of it there is in any given beast, that's bad. That's the reason they fight with fisticuffs. To avoid poisoning the last of the Blue Whales.

You do care about the Blue Whales, right...?

As for Plot Holes, this one was patched, but why the fuck can't I send my Super Mutant/Ghoul/Robot companions to deactivate the Purifier? They even suggest it themselves.

 

[Majinash]

The time line for Kill la Kill is all fucked up.

Spoiler

In episode 18 we learn:

- Ragyo Kiryuin does life fibre experiments on her newborn daughter, Ryuuko
- Soichiro Kiryuin rigs the experiment to look like a failure, making it look like Ryuuko was dead
- Ryuuko is dropped into the trash chute, Soichiro presumably digs her out of there
- At the age of five, four years after the experiment, Satsuki learns about Ragyo's plans from Soichiro

In episode 19 we learn:

- Ragyo, at an unspecified time sent some minions to kill Soichiro, blowing up his car with an RPG
- Soichiro survives, and undergoes extensive surgery and changes his name to Isshin Matoi to fake Soichiro's death
- Isshin raises Ryuuko in secret

In the flashback, we can see Isshin in the same room as Ryuuko, who only looks like a toddler at the most, sucking on her thumb. Okay, so that would mean that this could have only happened a couple years after the experiment. So how does Satsuki end up talking to Soichiro at the age of 5? He couldn't have changed back and walked into the Ragyo household to tell her daughter the truth. Even if we assume the Ryuuko in the flashback is 4 years old (doesn't look like it) and Soichiro became Isshin after the talk with Satsuki, where was Ryuuko during those 4 years? Still in the garbage chute, at a foster home...?

Spoiler

I always assumed he was simply raising her in secret for the first 4 years. Then later when he introduced Satsuki to Junketsu he set things up to fake his death. There could simply be a 4 year peroid where he is keeping Ryuuko a secret under the umbrella of the Kuryuin corporation. I don't think we ever see any flashbacks to Ryuuko before she is 4 years old, which means no memories of her father pre-fake death.

While it seems a bit wonky, I don't think it is a full fledged plot hole.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

I was just shooting a short where an assailant is taken out by a man with OCD. The fist fight was cool but at one point the assailant started pistol whipping when he had a great opportunity to turn the gun on the lead character and put him down.

Worst assailant over? Rushed blocking is my suspect. Kinda sucked the emotion out of the fight for me but whatevs, I got paid.

 

[Diablo2000]

Pacific Rim. Do I even need to say it?

Spoiler

The sword. Seriously? WHERE WAS THAT ALL THOSE TIMES YOU WERE GETTING YOUR ASS KICKED? Why did you ONLY use it ONCE??? They don't even TRY to justify it's absence up until that one scene in the movie or after the fact. The movie is already written like a mediocre anime, but that one scene just plunged it into bad anime territory for me. If I wanted gratuitous robot violence with baffling plot points, I'd watch G Gundam, because at least it's hilariously nonsensical.

Spoiler

Generic White Guy didn't seem to know about the sword either, so I guess that would explain why he didn't use it when he was originally piloting the Gypsy Danger, but when he mind melded himself with Japanese Chick, and therefore gaining acess of all her memories he should have known.
I started trying to explain but just come off with another plot hole... meh, who cares anyway... It's a giant mech with a sword, logic doesn't need to apply %100.

Also, maybe they didn't use because the mech also had a cannon, which was probably was far more pratical due to the fact they didn't need to get close of the giant monster made of death to use it, which is stupid now because Generic White Dude wasted all his ammunition on a clearly dead Kaiju just because...

I am trying to defend this movie, I swear

 

[Silvanus]

There's one that's been on my mind about FF7 recently. I may just be missing something, though, so I'd be happy to accept an explanation.

Spoiler: Spoilers for Final Fantasy 7

So, as far as I understand it, Cloud is actually being called to the crater by Sephiroth-- bringing him the Black Materia, right? Like the other failed Sephiroth "clones", he's being brought there.

But if Sephiroth wanted Cloud to get there (bringing the Materia), why did he get Jenova to try to kill him three times?

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Pacific Rim. Do I even need to say it?

Spoiler

The sword. Seriously? WHERE WAS THAT ALL THOSE TIMES YOU WERE GETTING YOUR ASS KICKED? Why did you ONLY use it ONCE??? They don't even TRY to justify it's absence up until that one scene in the movie or after the fact. The movie is already written like a mediocre anime, but that one scene just plunged it into bad anime territory for me. If I wanted gratuitous robot violence with baffling plot points, I'd watch G Gundam, because at least it's hilariously nonsensical.

It can only be activated when your Honour bar is full.

Spoiler

Personally I'm more wondering why they didn't send the massive fuckers in first and destroy humanity before it developed effective weapons, but eh.

 

[Ix Rebound]

Pacific Rim. Do I even need to say it?

Spoiler

The sword. Seriously? WHERE WAS THAT ALL THOSE TIMES YOU WERE GETTING YOUR ASS KICKED? Why did you ONLY use it ONCE??? They don't even TRY to justify it's absence up until that one scene in the movie or after the fact. The movie is already written like a mediocre anime, but that one scene just plunged it into bad anime territory for me. If I wanted gratuitous robot violence with baffling plot points, I'd watch G Gundam, because at least it's hilariously nonsensical.

It can only be activated when your Honour bar is full.

Spoiler

Personally I'm more wondering why they didn't send the massive fuckers in first and destroy humanity before it developed effective weapons, but eh.

[/

Spoiler

They didn't need to, in the prequel comics it shows that the kaiju they were sending through the breach were doing enough damage before dying that they could keep sending the same category in over and over to get the job done. Humanity making the Jaeger's changed that, so they started sending in larger and more dangerous categories to adapt and overcome the Jaegers. To the point at the start of the movie there are only 4 Jaegers left, and three get absolutely curb stomped by the most recent Kaiju i.e Cherno Alpha getting over-powered by and even larger Kaiju, Leatherback. And Crimson Typhoon's three arms countered by Otachi's two arms and prehensile tail. Even the best Jaeger at the time, Stryker Eureka was put offline by Leatherback's EMP. The only reason that Gypsy Danger was able to beat them both was because they hard already destroyed it in the prologue of the movie, so they didn't send a Kaiju that was adapted to it.

[/

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Spoiler

They didn't need to, in the prequel comics it shows that the kaiju they were sending through the breach were doing enough damage before dying that they could keep sending the same category in over and over to get the job done. Humanity making the Jaeger's changed that, so they started sending in larger and more dangerous categories to adapt and overcome the Jaegers. To the point at the start of the movie there are only 4 Jaegers left, and three get absolutely curb stomped by the most recent Kaiju i.e Cherno Alpha getting over-powered by and even larger Kaiju, Leatherback. And Crimson Typhoon's three arms countered by Otachi's two arms and prehensile tail. Even the best Jaeger at the time, Stryker Eureka was put offline by Leatherback's EMP. The only reason that Gypsy Danger was able to beat them both was because they hard already destroyed it in the prologue of the movie, so they didn't send a Kaiju that was adapted to it.

Spoiler

The reason they know how many jaegers there are and what their specifications are is that that scientist drifted with them, right? That being the case, they should know about Gypsy.

 

[Ix Rebound]

Spoiler

They didn't need to, in the prequel comics it shows that the kaiju they were sending through the breach were doing enough damage before dying that they could keep sending the same category in over and over to get the job done. Humanity making the Jaeger's changed that, so they started sending in larger and more dangerous categories to adapt and overcome the Jaegers. To the point at the start of the movie there are only 4 Jaegers left, and three get absolutely curb stomped by the most recent Kaiju i.e Cherno Alpha getting over-powered by and even larger Kaiju, Leatherback. And Crimson Typhoon's three arms countered by Otachi's two arms and prehensile tail. Even the best Jaeger at the time, Stryker Eureka was put offline by Leatherback's EMP. The only reason that Gypsy Danger was able to beat them both was because they hard already destroyed it in the prologue of the movie, so they didn't send a Kaiju that was adapted to it.

Spoiler

The reason they know how many jaegers there are and what their specifications are is that that scientist drifted with them, right? That being the case, they should know about Gypsy.

Spoiler

Good point, but maybe he didn't know about Gypsy, his field seemed to be Kaiju and their brains, not Jaegers and their pilots. He might not have known it was even Gypsy that was being hauled into the base, considering how heavily damaged it was after the fight with Knifehead. And maybe if he did know it was Gypsy, he might not have known its specifications and weapons and what might have been added to it (e.g the sword). It's a lot of "maybes", "ifs" and "mights" though.

 

[Casual Shinji]

The T-1000 traveling back in time in Terminator 2. Kyle Reese specifically said in T1 that only living tissue can pass through, and that the only reason the first terminator could go was because it was surrounded by living tissue. The T-1000 is head-to-toe metal. Oops!

 

[Thaluikhain]

The T-1000 traveling back in time in Terminator 2. Kyle Reese specifically said in T1 that only living tissue can pass through, and that the only reason the first terminator could go was because it was surrounded by living tissue. The T-1000 is head-to-toe metal. Oops!

In fairness, when he's pressed for details, he says "I didn't build the fucking thing". So, I get the idea he doesn't really know.

 

[Vausch]

For Captain America: The Winter Soldier. I noticed three.

First:

Spoiler

Zola is shown to be the one who infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. and brought Hydra to its core, but there are two problems with this. First is that S.H.I.E.L.D. would be keeping their eyes on him so closely that he would be unable to accomplish this. Second is the fact that in the first movie it was made clear that he was only continuing his work with Hydra under duress and threat of execution, and that he was not a true believer.

Second:

Spoiler

Hydra, during its revolution, only has three helicarriers to its name. Yes they are formidable weapons which would kill a lot of people, but they also would not be able to kill all their targets in the US before being shot down, let alone the world (at peak efficiency, it would take 3.7 months of continuous fire to kill all their targets, and that's assuming they are killing at peak efficiency while on the move). 70 years of planning for that? What a waste.

Third:

Spoiler

At the end of Thor and during The Avengers we see that S.H.I.E.L.D. has hired Dr. Selvig to help them harness the power of the Tesseract because they are unable to. Yet they show that not only has S.H.I.E.L.D. had it since the end of the second world war in the first Cap movie, in the second they showed one of their founding members was a nazi who had ALREADY found a way to harness its power and was cooperating with them fully (no way he would have lasted more then a year with excuses for not being able to do what he had already done with less resources). So why is it only in 2012 that they started using it for power when they should have had it from the end of the war onward?

If you'll permit me to use fringe logic on a few of these:

Spoiler

Selvig could have begun seeing what Red Skull sought over the years and over time was swayed to continue the ways of Hydra. Hydra was very far reaching and it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think hydra agents infiltrated SHIELD in addition to him, intending to carry on the goal. I mean we still have neo-nazis, it's not that hard to believe there's neo-hydra agents.

No real arguing with that one, that's just math assuming the helicarriers aren't able to fire worldwide using repulser ray tech or lasers similar to hydra in minigun style bursts with sniper accuracy.

Giving an unfathomable power source to a guy that worked for an organisation that had the potential to destroy the planet, even if he did manage to get the tech to work in the past, would not be the best idea if they took into account the possibility of betrayals or the neo-hydra agents. Why wait until 2012? Because gods showed up. We can kill humans easily with our own tech without unlimited power sources. Gods and monsters? Use their own weapons and technology for defense against them.

 

[Casual Shinji]

The T-1000 traveling back in time in Terminator 2. Kyle Reese specifically said in T1 that only living tissue can pass through, and that the only reason the first terminator could go was because it was surrounded by living tissue. The T-1000 is head-to-toe metal. Oops!

In fairness, when he's pressed for details, he says "I didn't build the fucking thing". So, I get the idea he doesn't really know.

The whole idea of only living tissue going was kinda silly anyway, and only implemented so they could get around the notion of why Reese didn't bring future tech along.

 

[Squilookle]

The T-1000 traveling back in time in Terminator 2. Kyle Reese specifically said in T1 that only living tissue can pass through, and that the only reason the first terminator could go was because it was surrounded by living tissue. The T-1000 is head-to-toe metal. Oops!

Always made me wonder why they didn't put a massive gun inside some living membrane pouch thing to get it back in time.

 

[laggyteabag]

Spoiler: Skyfall

Oh there are so many problems with this damn car being in the film. Sure it worked as fan service, seeing the Daniel Craig Bond with the classic James Bond car, but it broke the story so much. The one thing that everyone just kind of went with when it came to James Bond was that his face would change as the actor would change and that no real explanation was needed to say why, and as the films went on, the tech would change to suit the release date and everybody would just go with it. Then they added in the DB5 into Skyfall and everything broke. How old is James Bond? That car was released in 1963, and he must've been at least 18 to drive that thing, so that makes him 50, but when Sean Connery played Bond when the DB5 first appeared he was 34, so that would make Daniel Craig's Bond 66. But isn't Craig's Bond a reboot? Well seeing as this car exists, it puts that into question too. The only real explanation that I can think of is that James Bond is in fact a Time Lord, because otherwise nothing makes sense and it makes my head hurt.