Stupidity: Whatever Batman thought he was throwing instead of the confetti bomb from the belt the Joker switched with his own, the Joker had already long left - why would he throw anything at all, in an empty room? (00:12:35)
Sammo
28th Dec 2019
Batman (1966)
28th Dec 2019
Along Came a Spider (2001)
Stupidity: Mercusio is looking through FBI files on his computer. The FBI has a horrible database then, since the agents' postings are listed all in random order (otherwise Ben would be working at the White House and not at the school - which is also suspiciously listed without any hint about its location). (01:11:30)
27th Dec 2019
Knives Out (2019)
Stupidity: Spoiler. The protagonist is a trained and competent nurse, paired with one of the greatest murder mystery writers. Neither finds strange in the slightest that after jabbing his vein with a dose of drugs 30 times the norm he is absolutely fine, not just conscious but even able to concoct on the spot a convoluted plot, speaking normally and quite at length, no trouble at all. He should be dead "in 10 minutes" sure, but it's not a time bomb. You'd think one would not be so blasé about slitting their own throat and the other would have to notice how amazingly unaffected and lucid the other appears to be minutes later. Not to mention that his plan would have never worked with the toxicology report, which should be routine in a suicide case also to assess the mental state of the person who left no note or anything behind.
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Suggested correction: It is explained that the drug overdose will kill Harlan in 10 minutes based on the dosage. The implication is that Harlan's heart will stop, not that he will become gradually and obviously sick over those 10 minutes. Regardless, based on what they believe will happen, even if they did notice that Harlan wasn't getting sick they wouldn't have the time to test that theory. The fact that neither Marta nor Harlan thought about a potential toxicology report is a pretty major part of the plot, and it is perfectly reasonable given the circumstances. The plot was hatched on the spot within a few minutes and there are several holes in the plan that drive the story throughout the film. Although a brilliant man and a great writer, Harlan simply didn't think of everything.
She explicitly says "You'll feel symptoms in 5" and when he shuts her up putting a hand on her mouth she says "We have 6 minutes."Then his daughter interrupts them and more time is wasted. By the time when he begins his convoluted explanation of the big plan he should have already been disoriented, sweaty and the whole gamut leading to his respiratory failure. And he goes on for minutes after that. It's very true, it moves the plot along, but by what they say themselves (which is from I understand not medically accurate and contradicted also by what happens later in the movie with the second death) they should have realised that time has passed with nothing happening. You could even say it's Rian Johnson's intentional deconstruction of the artificial nature of the whoddunit contrivances! But also, just saying, one of those "Stupid actions and decisions people take in movies, which no-one would ever do in real life."
Even taking that into account, what you are saying is Harlan should have said "Hmm, a few minutes have passed and I haven't felt any symptoms, so I'm not actually poisoned. Carry on then, false alarm." It moves the plot along because Harlan isn't willing to risk Marta getting in trouble for poisoning him and they have less than 10 minutes to act. This would count as a stupidity entry if Harlan didn't care about who took the blame for killing him, but obviously he does. Remember, stupidity entries are not for poor decisions by characters, they are for minor plot holes. This being "an act no-one would ever do in real life" is kind of the entire point of the movie. Nobody believes Harlan would do this because, well nobody cares about their nurse that much. But he does.
The part I was quoting is the description of the category in the metadata on google, or if you prefer the hover text description just above this very page go by "Something just plain stupid. Not as deal-breaking as a plot hole, but something daft, like running upstairs with a killer behind them, instead of out of the front door." I call "slitting your own throat feeling totally fine after you yourself have been calling the minutes with precision earlier", pretty silly, to say the least. Again, this is all stuff the script itself unnecessarily calls attention on. If he didn't mention twice the time before, if she hadn't said that the symptoms happen after 5 but just "your heart is gonna exploded at the 10 minute mark", then, maybe, I would have simply reported the factual error that this is not how it works. It's the script itself that points out (Harlan himself says it twice) the exact minutes, and the symptoms and how they are gradual.
This still ignores the fact that they don't have time to test the theory. They would have to notice the lack of symptoms, and assume somehow that the lack of symptoms after 5 minutes must mean that Harlan isn't actually poisoned, and stop their plan right then and there. The audience knows that Harlan isn't really poisoned, but we don't find that out until later. I doubt very seriously that anyone watching this film for the first time believed, as you suggest, that Harlan obviously wasn't poisoned because he didn't show any symptoms and it was therefore stupid for him to kill himself. It seems to you to be stupid in hindsight, but I honestly don't believe, based on what the characters knew, that Harlan's action was so egregious that it constitutes a mistake in the script.
We definitely had a very different impression watching it the first time. The thought that this old man could be shot a big dose of morphine in vein and calmly think of perfect murder plans for the next minutes was 200% absurd on first view here. I could say that others thought the same but it's just anecdotical and I respect you having a different take. For the rest, it's again just the script itself drawing attention to it. From the mouth of the same character who nonchalantly slits his own throat feeling still fine. It seems egregiously stupid and contradictory.
But he wasn't shot a big dose of morphine. He got his normal meds, they only think he overdosed.
We don't know that yet. We know that, in their words, he was shot 100 mg instead of 3 (does not matter if true or not, we are fed this information and the characters believe it). Again, the whole scene would have worked if they didn't, themselves, add details. Makes the overdose sound huge, and inserting the 6 minutes mark (which means, barely 1 min till the symptoms show up) before the daughter arrives when more than half of the scene has still to be played, weakens it terribly. Some things are maybe just stupid in hindsight, like the fact that all he needed to do was to write in his own penmanship a suicide note saying he killed himself with an injection once Marta left, but the overdose bit felt absurd on first viewing.
18th Dec 2019
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019)
Stupidity: The commando mission to save Chewbacca starts gunning down a few Stormtroopers in the hangar. The heroes then go on leaving the troopers lying down on the floor in front of the ship, in plain view. They don't hide them nor ask the droids (who have enough strength and tools to pull them in) to, in fact they tell them to stay put. No wonder they are found out later (after a ridiculously long amount of time).
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Suggested correction: Hiding the bodies would have been a waste of time, anyone who came to the hangar would immediately notice that the guards stationed there were missing and there was now a strange ship parked there.
The droids have all the time in the world, and people just passing by are "more immediately" bound to notice corpses in the middle of a hangar rather than possibly maybe question the fact that you don't see guards in that part of the hangar or investigate the ship - which could approach without anyone taking exception by appearance alone. At least remove the bodies directly in front of the damn ship!
Why would they be more likely to notice dead guards than no guards?
Anyone passing by might well thing the patrols were just out of sync, or a shift change. Sure they might investigate further, but they might not bother. Whereas a couple of dead bodies? Immediate red alert. Worth taking 30 seconds to hide them, surely.
Perhaps, but then it's made irrelevant 1 minute later as Finn and Poe run down a hallway blasting about a dozen stormtroopers.
For that matter, 1 SECOND later they kill stormtroopers in the far part of the hangar. They are killing people all over the ship during their mission and it's not like they hide every single one of them, but they leave two bodies *exactly* in front of their ship (and telling the droids to stay put). You can even see later that there is a stormtrooper with his weapon pointed exactly where those two corpses are, with the 'smart' commanding officer asking "whose ship is this?" at the sight of that. Maybe I am spoiled by a trope here, but it's the first time that I see someone in an action movie leaving corpses right in front of their only escape route/vehicle, that's so counterintuitive. (Did they even have an escape plan, actually? I don't like hypotheticals, but gee, if only she did the Jedi mind trick thing to those 2 guards who came over to inspect the ship instead of doing it later. But I digress).
23rd Nov 2019
Batwoman (2019)
23rd Nov 2019
Along Came a Spider (2001)
Stupidity: Mr. Soneji's class is so advanced that they use encrypted files to pass each other notes and whatnot, but their assignment, which takes them a long time to complete, is to "find the official website of Charles Lindbergh." Even in 2001 with search engines not quite well developed as they are now, it wouldn't take them the minutes it is taking here, especially with the whole request being designed as a contest.
23rd Nov 2019
Along Came a Spider (2001)
Stupidity: The sequence when Tracie is found out does not make sense in the way it happens; how does grabbing someone to solicit a blowjob involve sticking a finger in the ear of the opposite side? Also, the earplug is shaped and made to look like a hearing aid, so the trained agent that she is should really have that as an easy answer when she is found out, especially considering that her hair is short and styled in a way that makes it entirely possible he could have noticed it when he picked her up in a better lit place than the car (in fact she should have brought it up first to avoid suspicion). In fact, the 'sticking finger in ear' gesture makes sense only assuming he did not just find out but had spotted the earplug before. In that case, he could only have noticed before having her in the car, so he would have not picked her up to begin with. (00:04:00)
16th Nov 2019
Batman (1966)
15th Nov 2019
Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero (1998)
Stupidity: Robin uses the high pressure water from the pump to neutralize the bear next to Batman (which is like 10 meters away from him and still the water jet is so strong that it pushes the 1000 pounds bear away and flips it on its back,), but does not use it to push away the other bear that is literally breathing on his face centimeters away from him. He has all the space and time to do that (especially after Batman's intervention). (00:50:30)
12th Nov 2019
Batwoman (2019)
Stupidity: The access to the Batcave is controlled by a mechanical lock with no security measure whatsoever. Not just that, but the butler guy even moves the key away putting it 3 inches away right next to the lock, making it all the more conspicuous because the lock this way is exposed and revealed as such! It even looks 'wrong' from a purely aesthetic point of view, nobody would have an odd hole in their shelf that makes the furniture look cheap and broken, it would be anyone's natural instinct to cover up something like that. (00:25:30)
8th Nov 2019
Baby's Day Out (1994)
Stupidity: The whole movie necessarily has to be filled with stupidity (we're talking about a 9 months kid besting 3 adults), but there's one part perhaps not so obvious and that may be related to a mistake about the ransom note. When the bad guys watch the news, it's obvious that their original plan failed, since they cannot retrieve the money at the designed drop zone, the police have been called and they'd need to rethink the whole operation. Yet they make no comment about it and don't seem bothered by that at all.
11th Oct 2019
Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero (1998)
10th Oct 2019
Batman: Hush (2019)
Stupidity: After making love, Selina notices Batman's scars. She surely was caught in the moment, but, it's something she really was bound to notice sooner. (00:53:10)
Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.
Suggested correction: She notices the scars on his back first, which are the worst of those on his body, this may well be the first time she sees his back.
10th Oct 2019
Adventures of Aladdin (2019)
10th Oct 2019
Agatha Christie's Poirot (1989)
The Kidnapped Prime Minister - S2-E8
Stupidity: In the episode, Hastings stalks Mrs. Daniels, being parked for hours literally in front of her windows, and the army surrounds the destroyed family mansion 'hiding' behind bushes totally visible, not scattered and standing in a way that makes them perfect targets. Nobody knows the first thing about secrecy.
10th Oct 2019
Agatha Christie's Poirot (1989)
Stupidity: The policemen in car 7 are able to take pictures and talk to Japp with total ease, with a direct eyeline at such a low distance from the 3 people that is quite amazing they haven't been discovered - everyone was blind and possibly deaf, since they were so close and with the window open, you'd think they could even easily be heard.
10th Oct 2019
Agatha Christie's Poirot (1989)
Stupidity: The gang is brutal enough to have Lavington killed; considering they know where he lives and that there's just a single housekeeper, it would have been miles easier for them to just kill or tie her up and ransack the house themselves with all the time they wanted, rather than involving the most famous detective with an obvious ruse and hope he'd find the object.
9th Oct 2019
Dragonball Evolution (2009)
Stupidity: The characters wish for the resurrection of just one person (Roshi) rather than everyone killed by Piccolo as would be natural (and as they do in anime and manga). Okay, Piccolo in this movie sucks at killing and resurrecting Muten covers 50% of the total body count, but they can't know that.
9th Oct 2019
Escape Plan (2013)
Stupidity: The security system is able to automatically ascertain the malfunction to the exact valve, and the electrical problem, but the alarm is not triggered at that point, but only when the holding cells are already filled with water and Breslin is making his return. They are on a ship, the fact that it's taking on water feels like a pretty important issue to monitor.
9th Oct 2019
Captain Marvel (2019)
Stupidity: For being a ruthless race of conquerors, every Kree in this movie is awfully cautious when pulling the trigger. From the kree soldiers who don't shoot the prisoners who were already set to be "ejected into space" (instead of being shot on the spot) nor the space monster attacking them with tentacles, to Yon-Rogg and Minn-erva who do not shoot Carol when she is about to destroy the engine (Minn-erva especially should have no problems doing that and it's the whole purpose of a sniper). The best bit about the shooting idiocy happens when "Just a girl" starts playing, and Minn-erva with 2 soldiers armed with rifles from an elevated position do not shoot their precision rifles but rather jump down on the same level as Carol for absolutely no reason. Which soldier with a rifle would get closer to the enemy?
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