“Uh, It Doesn’t Work Like That”: 40 Unrealistic Movie Moments That Require Viewers To Suspend Their Disbelief
Interview
According to Hollywood, you’ll be totally fine if you jump out of a moving car. Maybe you’ll get a few scrapes. Babies come out of the womb perfectly clean and looking three months old, and hacking into a government database only requires smashing a keyboard for a few seconds.
We all know movies aren’t real life, but sometimes, they could try a little bit harder to be realistic. Reddit users have recently been discussing moments in films that cause them to seriously suspend their disbelief, so you’ll find their most spot-on replies below. Enjoy scrolling through, and keep reading to hear from the man who started this conversation in the first place, as well as film critic and founder of Every Movie Has A Lesson, Don Shanahan!
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We reached out to the Reddit user who started this conversation in the first place, u/czp55 or Ryan, and lucky for us, he was kind enough to have a chat with Bored Panda. As far as what inspired him to ask this question, the OP shared that he's been over-analyzing media for as long as he can remember.
"I had watched one film in particular that day which prompted the question, but I honestly can’t remember what it was now," he noted. "Could have been one of the Fast and Furious movies, but I might be wrong. I definitely never expected the question to pick up activity the way it did. I had to silence notifications for a while."
When a baby is born and it’s a beautiful, squeaky clean 3-6 month old twice the size of a newborn. They are tiny, goo covered, swollen purple aliens IRL.
::15 seconds of keyboard clicking::
"I'm in. Now we have access to all the super secret classified government files and can control anything that runs on electricity anywhere in the world."
Mr. Robot was far far better, much more realistic as a hacking story. So many U.S. productions feel like they pulled words one by one out of the bag.
We also asked Ryan which scenes he always has a hard time taking seriously in TV shows and films. "As a Software Engineer by profession, I’ll go with almost any scene with a 'computer expert' in it showing off their 'skills,'" he says. "There were several great comments to that effect in the thread which explain the problems with those scenes much better than I could."
My dad was a pipe engineer for 35 years. Every time he watches The Titanic, when Jack is handcuffed to the pipe, he has to point out to everyone in the room how the curved elbow pipe in the shot didn’t exist at the time. The correct setup should have been two straight pieces soldered together to make a corner pipe. I love him and his obscure dad facts!
Obscure dad facts are the best! Then again, I have a soft spot for dad jokes, so...
The extent that people can get punched in the face and just keep going. No one is having Jason Bourne style fights and able to keep going for as long as they all do.
I think the most realistic fight scenes have to be the ones in Bridget Jones - Tee Hee
On the other hand, we also asked the OP if he could share any films that he appreciates for how surprisingly realistic they are. "This movie is fantastic for many reasons, but I loved the unexpected depiction of iterative design in How to Train Your Dragon, when Hiccup is creating a replacement tail fin for Toothless," Ryan shared.
"The first few times he tries, he runs into problems, which he designs around before trying again. He eventually figures out he needs unique positions for different maneuvers before having a complete working product," the OP explained. "There was a surprising amount of experimenting and redesigning for a fictional, animated movie. Contrast that with most movies treating first generation prototypes as flawless artifacts that work perfectly."
Crawling through air ducts. Most aren't that big. Or they aren't that strong to not bend or break at all. They are also incredibly filthy. I have taken out enough duct work to know that you could almost create another person with how many skin cells end up in your air ducts. I also am not doubting the strength of the large threaded supports some duct work has. I'm doubting the strength of the 20 gauge metal to not end bend in the slightest under the weight of a full grown man.
90% of the depictions of women going into labor. It's rarely 'Mom feels fine all day > suddenly has one sharp contraction > water immediately breaks and makes a puddle on the floor. Everyone I know who's given birth has had at least a few hours contracting before the water breaking, if it breaks at all, and then it can be even longer before you're in active labor.
As a labor doula, I get annoyed at how labor and birth is portrayed on tv.
Ryan also told Bored Panda that the responses his post received were amazing. "I found myself nodding furiously at most of them as they came in," he noted. "One that sticks in my mind is the mention of a certain GI Joe movie scene where they torpedo icebergs, which then sank. There was also a fantastic reply to it: 'I have the perfect scientific explanation for this: That movie sucked.'"
Pretty much any scene where there's some magic computer program that turns blurry, heavily-pixellated images into razor sharp photos?
Yeah. That doesn't exist.
Every time they perform CPR in a movie. Bonus points if the victim wakes up immediately and is totally fine and talking.
Can work for drowning victims but pretty much everybody else will need adrenaline and a defibrillator to get a working rhythm. CPR is usually just for keeping the brain oxygenated until the medics arrive.
Ryan shared that he actually posted the question shortly after he started writing his first novel several years ago. "It certainly helped motivate me to do my fair share of research for certain aspects of my story, and I hope it’s better for it," he told Bored Panda. "I published the novel in 2022, and I’m working to publish the sequel soon. Having delved into the art of writing a fair bit more now, I can confidently say that, for fiction at least, we all generally want realism to take a backseat to effective storytelling."
"There was one comment that mentioned unnaturally perfect dialogue without stuttering or pauses for instance, which is absolutely true, but depending on the genre and tone of the story, the audience may appreciate the efficiency of the dialogue to allow time for other things," he went on to explain. "Still, even when we appreciate the trade-off, it’s always great fun to harp on everything stories get wrong!"
Chloroform. It takes several minutes to knock you out, and you won't be out for that long. I promise I know this because we use chloroform to clean stuff in the lab I intern at, and my advisor told me this. In case the FBI is reading this.
Right, you use chloroform to "clean your lab." Sure, I believe you. *wink*
If someone is falling, and say Superman catches them, they're actually f****d because the forces involved are still going to tear them apart. Superman would have to catch them and decelerate them over time, but this almost never happens. He just catches them. You also can't just lift an enormously heavy object. The object has to have the structural integrity to remain in one piece - all that pressure at one point (Superman's hand) would make the object break apart.
Imagine falling onto two superman arm shaped pipes at terminal velocity. That's what it would feel like.
To gain even more insight on this topic, we also reached out to film expert Don Shanahan, founder and writer of Every Movie Has a Lesson. Don shared that, aside from being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic, he's also a fifth grade school teacher by day. "That makes me notice movies have inaccuracies or impossible conveniences that take place in school settings," he told Bored Panda. "For example, there are so many movies (Back to the Future, the Tom Holland Spider-Man movies, Ender's Game) where outside, non-active student characters somehow just infiltrate a school and wander the hallways undetected or unstopped by school personnel."
Rolling out of a speeding car. Na man, you're about to look like you made out with a cheese grater.
exact same thing as laying a bike down or high siding, you're going to need some paramedics even with the best gear
Anytime sword fighting or fencing in a movie is related to dancing (looking at you Pirates of the Caribbean and GoT.)
It’s the exact opposite of dancing. The point is to have a completely unpredictable tempo and, if your opponent does have a specific rhythm, to interrupt it in unpredictable ways.
Source: fenced for ten years.
This is correct for "I americký actively trying to kill you" sword fighting. Which is what they are trying to present in The shows. But for The stage sword fights or reenactment it is, exactly like dance. You Need counting, tempo, precise choreography si it looks cool but you do NOT kill each other. Basically The fightchoreographers should use their routine and techniques from stage fighting to máme it look like unpredictible "killing" fighting, but... It is, hard. Classic form over substance fight (punc intended).
"In today's day and age, especially in this sensitive era of school shootings, visitor security protocols would never let that happen," Don explained. "That and the staff know everyone. No stranger would get through without getting spotted and questioned by even the most low-level school employee."
"Another school setting inaccuracy are those moments when a big speech scene that interrupts a school event is allowed to happen with all kinds of bystanders," the film expert continued. "Take the big graduation public confessional that goes down at the end of Crazy, Stupid Love. The number of school staff members or witnessing parents would squelch and shun those moments in a heartbeat."
The amount of time between responses in phone conversations.
"Hi mom."
*1.37 seconds later*
"What do you mean Larry and his ferret were hit by a scooter in Moscow!?"
EpiPen usage!! You HAVE to call the ambulance or rush to the hospital after administering it. EpiPen’s are not a magical fix they simply buy you enough time to get to medical care. It bothers me relentlessly when movies show someone being given and EpiPen and they just take a big gasp of air and go back to eating dinner like nothing happened.
We also wanted to know if Don ever has a hard time taking scenes seriously, when he knows they're extremely unrealistic. "I tend to pride myself on suspending my disbelief and letting things play out," he shared. "In most cases, those examples I'm talking about are done with humor where the fish-out-of-water or public spotlight circumstances make for good laughs. I may chalk them up to lazy research or uninspired screenwriting, but they don't take me out of the movie like I know they do for others with more sensitive antennae for accuracies."
Pretty much everything to do with sleeping:
* No awkward clean up after doing the deed
* Ever so gently waking up in a room that is already brighter than the sun
* Immediately kissing and talking right at each other without recoiling from morning breath
* Perfect hair and make-up, both going to bed and waking up
* The infamous L-shaped sheet of modesty
As a Goth, my favorite is when I hook up with a fellow Goth, spending at least 20 minutes going through the mass of black cloths on the floor. Also figuring out how you both ended up naked except for your boots. Pants, chains everything but the boots. I've done it a few times and I still can't figure out how I do it.
When the guy stalks the girl and gets the girl in the end
I blame "Twilight" for promoting this toxic concept of "love" and making it somehow the standard in modern romance novels, films, tv shows.
As far as scenes Don has noticed were done quite accurately, he shared, "Sticking with the school teacher hat I wear and the education setting, one of the best examples of a realistic school teacher was Woody Harrelson's character Max Bruner in The Edge of Seventeen, written and directed by Kelly Fremon Craig, who's an awards contender this year for Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret."
How "beautiful" depression and disorders are. How it makes you so dainty and pretty and soft. If you threw up your guts every night you would not be bright eyed and gentle with luscious hair and strong nails. If you were depressed you aren't sitting prettily, and looking mysterious. And don't get me started on how suicides are NOT that easy, nor that painless and perfect.
Our hero is beaten, stabbed and shot. Next scene he wakes up bandaged in the hospital. Within seconds, he yanks out all the tubes and wires, jumps out of bed, finds his - suddenly clean - clothes, and rushes out to continue his quest. In the next scene he's full of energy as he pursues his foe, and while his face may have a single scratch or bandaged cut - usually above one eye - there's no sign of what would ordinarily be a yellow-purple swollen pulpy mess with blood-red eyes.
In the movie Total Recall the Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Sharon Stone characters get into a fight. The Stone character kicks the Schwarzenegger character in his nuggets. He goes down in pain. I am sure that every almost every man in the theater clenched up in horror. Well, it took less than five seconds for the Schwarzenegger character to get back up and start fighting again. Lordy! I think that I would have been down for a week.
"Harrelson's blunt honesty and callous expectations in his interactions with Hailee Steinfeld's Nadine Franklin are spot-on for high school teachers," Don explained. "Yet, his stern and sarcastic persona still balances an available empathy that 99% of teachers have and never lose when it comes to supporting their students. He's far more realistic than the usual book-smart, naive idealist stereotypical traits they lather on actors and actresses playing school teachers. Give me more movie teachers like Max Bruner."
If you'd like to hear more of Don's thoughts on popular films, be sure to check out his site Every Movie Has A Lesson!
When someone shoots 10000000000000000 bullets with a single magazine in a pistol but then it runs out when they have an actual shot at someone
There's the trope of people in advertising having to stay late around the holidays, rushing to finish up the holiday campaign for the new client and having to choose between their career and their family. Yeah, that would not happen very often.
In reality the holiday campaign would have been finalized quite some time ago after months of planning, back-and-forth with the client, reviewing layouts/proofs, etc. Around the holiday season we would most likely be working on planning stuff for the spring/summer of the next year.
I've worked for a couple fortune 400 companies. Advertising takes December off. Them working the week of Christmas would be like Martin Scorsese working in the editing room after the movie has been out 2 weeks already.
There are non-marketing projects that gear up towards year end. IT is notorious for this.
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I work for a big company and I can tell you leading up to the holidays... little work is getting done because it's all been done for weeks now. In fact, I was in office yesterday (12.20) and there were barely anyone employees there because a lot of people are already taking off.
I used to work in import/export for a big retailer. Helloween stuff came in around Easter time, Christmas items were on in August. Around Helloween we had the carnival goods and coming in after Christmas break, I started on Easter things. You really wouldn't make a buck if you started your Christmas campaign on Christmas, lol.
Hollywood xmas shopping is always last 30mins store is open. Sure the staff will be so smiley.
Huh. When I worked in advertising, The last two weeks of the year was when every client we had wanted to run their ad just one more time on the old year's budget. No one in our agency got both Christmas and New year's Eve off.
Makes a lot of sense, to me and I'm not even in advertising. People tend to forget things take time to do. I used to work for a semiconductor manufacture and for a company that supplied their equipment. Each of these "takes time". So, one person's holiday season (retailer) was proceeded by the "buyer" and happened months before that "supplier" (middle man), and then months before that there is the manufacturing, and before that buying of new equipment, ...
Pretty much any scene that involves biologists. “Look, the DNA is a perfect match!” as the computer superimposes two identical graphics that are basically just the symbol for DNA 🧬.
There was one CSI where the victim had plucked a guitar in a p**n shop and they got DNA from the guitar strings. That miniscule amount of DNA, cross contaminated with everyone else - not gonna happen.
There was a scene in the GI Joe cobra movie where they torpedo ice bergs, and then they sank. Yeah, ice doesn't change its density to be heavier than water just because EXPLOSIONS
When some random person in a bar yells out ”next round is on me!", Everybody cheers, and the bartenders instantly start handing out drinks without ever talking to the person or getting any kind of payment.
It always takes me out of the movie when say someone will be like “you’ll never believe what’s on the news. Put it on”. Their tv is off, they turn the tv on, and it’s on the EXACT station of said news crew, at the EXACT moment they’re talking about I said topic. That’s not how it works. And it could be anything. Not just news. They turn on the tv and it just so happens to be on what their looking for. Just a small aspect of television/movies that takes me out of it and I’m always like “that’s not how this works.”. Lol
This actually happened to me. I found out my aunties parents got shot by walking into it on the news. My parents wanted to tell me in person and asked me to drive back from the lake as soon as possible. The timing was crazy. They were front page.
Hitting animals with tranquillizer darts and they collapse immediately.
The reality is that it can take 30-45 minutes for an animal to go down completely, longer if the animal is agitated.
This is why when kids fall into gorilla pits, the lethal weapons are used. Responders don’t have 30-45 minutes to wait for a large, agitated dangerous animal to stumble around and possibly injure someone. The response has to be immediate, and tranquilizers don’t do that.
“The neutrinos are mutating!” -2012.
Neutrinos can’t f*****g mutate. They can’t even decay.
2012 was pretty much all bad science. Right there with The Core in terms of garbage science.
Basically any time they show lab work being done.
They either don't wear PPE, or they do wear it but don't wear it properly, or for the right things. Food/beverage/chewing gum in a lab is a big big no. If some character in a drama TV show walked into my lab demanding results, the first thing I'd do is give them safety glasses...
Not necessarily the lab, but I loathe the trope of "coroner eating lunch while performing autopsy." Makes me want to scream.
An explosion nearby and everyone talks and hears fine. I love that scene in The Other Guys about this.
People getting knocked out and waking up a bit later, shaking their heads, and then heading off like normal. Getting knocked out is not like lightly bumping your head on something.
When I was, like, 8, I fell off a friend's swing set and got my head bonked by the seat. I can't remember if I passed out - I think I did because I remember one minute being on the ground, seeing my friend's shocked face and then seeing their mother squatting next to me. I do remember that, because of that bonk, I completely forgot my address and phone number for about 10 minutes, even though I just lived down the block and had memorized my number years earlier. The brain and any injuries to it should never be taken lightly.
I refused to see the movie Lucy because it was based around the myth "we only ever use 10% of our brain." Like, no we don't? We use the whole thing. We cannot just unlock our brains with fancy tech or drugs and suddenly have telekinesis and s**t.
I think that Lucy is a very interesting, and entertaining, movie. I know that 10% brain use thing is a myth.
Pumping the shotgun every time you mean business. You're just ejecting fresh shells on to the floor.
I was taught its better to have a shotgun than a handgun for home defense. First, everyone knows the noise when you pump it the first time and the movies have made it scary. Hearing that coming from upstairs should encourage someone who broke in to steal a TV to leave. Life is better when you don't shoot someone (for both parties).
The protagonists and antagonists fighting on the streets and not giving a s**t about thousands of people dying while the cars explode and buildings fall.
I take issue with the example picture. Zod was out to kill every human on earth, starting with Metropolis. Superman was trying to stop him.
One that always gets me is when "medical professionals" shock a flatline heart rhythm.
For those who don't understand, shocking doesn't restart the heart, it actually stops it in an attempt to get it to restart naturally. If a patient's heart flatlines, it is already stopped, thus stopping it again isn't going to do anything further. In that case, you'd give an injection to attempt to force the heart to begin beating again.
There is no cleaning up before or after sex. Everyone is just ready to go allll the time!
I really don't want to watch the cleaning up part of sex. I don't need every piece of reality.
People in movies being "scientists", meaning they are good at all forms of science - biology, electrical engineering, physics, programming, communication protocols, advanced mathematics, hacking, robotics...
Sure, you could have some knowledge in all of those fields - but specialising in just one of them takes decades... These characters are usually wizards in all fields.
The Professor on Gilligan's Island. He was a professor and thus knew everything about everything tech and Science. Because that's exactly how Science works.
In Interstellar when they have combines running through a field of green corn. They spent a ton of time getting little details of astrophysics right, then fell flat on their face in the depiction of farming.
Movies set a long time ago trying to emulate people from 500-2000 years ago but they all have perfect skin and white teeth.
Actually, I'm pretty sure peoples teeth were in good condition before sugar was available? Skin though? Not so sure lol
Scenes that involve swimming. I try to hold my breath whenever a movie character (non super hero / fantasy) dives underwater and try to hold it as long as he/she is swimming or submerged. I end up dying 9/10 times. I mean there’s probably a lot of things to consider but the amount of time some characters can hold their breaths is super human.
OP just isn't free diving trained. Most movies just use editing, but plenty actually have actors hold their breath (most notably the newsest avatar movie).
When a movie thinks that people with autism are like superhumans. They just have random powers like being super smart and instantly recognizing patterns and s**t. Not exactly how it works. Autism is like having a glitchy brain, not some sort of supercharged intellect.
The problem is that the general population doesn't know what autism is so any strange mental abilities must be autism.
When the hero gets shot in the shoulder, but he’s still able to climb up onto a roof or pick somebody up and carry them or keep punching the bad guys.
But then when the girl goes to clean his wounds, all of a sudden it hurts too much.
I watched a movie once where geologists ignored signs of a massive natural disaster, blaming it on sensors... tell me if I’m wrong but I feel like real scientists don’t hesitate to double check Seems like scientists ignore sensors in a lot of movies!! Dante’s peak, The Day After Tomorrow, Spider-Man, and 2012. I’m specifically talking about The Wave!
"We put up sensors to keep track of every movement." "The sensors are changing, off-the-chart readings!" "Nonsense! The sensors must be faulty."
All the movies with science babble in them. Or tech babble. All of them. At least it's pretty funny. Just stick "dark energy" or "quantum physics" somewhere. "The quantum dark energy is spreading to his a*s!" Hacking is babbling about "I'm in" and you always have to "trace the source" I'm pretty sure. "I'm in his h****i collection, tracing the sources now."
This is really bad in Interstellar because Kip Thorne came up with the b******t and he really should know better.
Most explosions. I was in ammo and it ruined most movies for me. They're still fantastic movies and I love them all, but when a building explodes you're not gonna walk out casually barely beating the flames, and those thousands of pieces of wood aren't all going to magically not impale you as they're hurdled all around you with incredible force.
Hollywood explosions are usually just big bags of propane. They want big showy fireballs that roll across the shot at a jogging pace. Real explosions happen in milliseconds. That shockwave is literally traveling at the speed of sound and that shrapnel is right behind it traveling hundreds of miles an hour. Pardon my freedom units.
Avalanches, particularly when someone gets buried and then just bursts out of the snow unharmed. Avalanche debris sets like concrete, you're not getting out without help. And most deaths/injuries occur from being bashed up during the slide, so you're not likely to emerge unscathed if it's big enough to bury you.
Avalanche victims can definitely die from trauma but it's not even close to "most". In a study of 56 avalanche deaths in Utah only 3 were from trauma alone. 48 were strictly the result of asphyxiation.
Dude walks up to a bar and orders "beer" and gets it no questions asked.
MANY years ago now, I had a work visit to England. Went through 2 - 3 cities. What I noticed was, at that time a lot of the smaller pubs were based around a single brand. Sure, they offered a number of options, but there was clearly the star brand. I found it great that we could walk into a pub and say "I'll have a pint" and we'd get one. Consistently the best beer I have ever had. Of course that was compared to 1990's American "beer" so of course it was good.
Anytime paintball is shown in a movie. The idiots keep taking their mask of during a game, while shooting is going on. Those things are meant to protect your eyes, not just look cool!
It's always a pet peeve of mine when in movies, they're working on a computer and the thing is constantly chirping and beeping with some kind of dumb sci-fi looking interface to it. Like dude, we all have computers now. We all know software doesn't do that and if it did it would be annoying as hell.
I've even seen scenes (can't remember which movies) where they're clearly using photoshop or something similar and it's constantly making little sci-fi noises.
Airplane Two played this one for laughs. "Striker. I mean, down here there are literally hundreds and thousands of blinking, beeping, and flashing lights, blinking and beeping and flashing - they're *flashing* and they're *beeping*. I can't stand it anymore! They're *blinking* and *beeping* and *flashing*! Why doesn't somebody pull the plug!"
Pretty much the entire fast and the furious franchise is a big "it doesn't work like that".
Also Happy cake day!
I made it halfway through the first one before I rage quit. Cars don't work like that. THERE IS NO TURBO BUTTON FFS!
Characters making perfect sentences without stuttering or making pauses
And everyone takes takes turns talking. If I'm at a table with a bunch of people there's more than one conversation going on and people interrupt irl
That thing were a tech/lab procedure suddenly takes half the time because someone offers to pay more. Uh no, if it needs to be centrifuged for 24 hours it's still going to take 24 hours even with 100k on the table.
Also not as jarring, but everyone always wakes up with perfect makeup and no one ever seems to clean their face
Wait, money doesn't change the properties of time? Damn, there goes my world view! 😄
I might get some downvotes for this, but in John Wick 2 in the subway when John and Common are shooting at each other stealthily with silencers... that's so f*****g unrealistic, that s**t would have been so loud, and echoing throughout the subway station.
SILENCERS are not a real thing. They're called suppressors and the guns are still very loud.
Tv butchers most ultrasounds.
Because of TV and movies people seem to be under the impression ultrasound techs just scan babies, in actuality that is 1/3rd of the job.
Atleast twice a week I have a 60-something year old man ask if it’s a boy or girl as I’m gelling up his beer belly...Sir unless you ate a baby there shouldn’t be one in there and I can only fake laugh so many times without dying alittle inside.
When they pull the fire alarm, and the sprinklers set off. When a lighter sets a sprinkler off (it will), and all the heads go off.
Each head is independent of all others, and set off by heat.
Not true. There are deluge systems that fire off all heads at one. Granted they are uncommon.
The movie 2012.
Just like....all of it.
I know! I know! But I love John Cusack and I was obsessed with the whole 2012 thing so I really suspended some reason there to enjoy a good, old fashioned, disaster movie!
Firearm discipline in almost any movie, TV show. No one asked how to correctly clear a room? Really? And Jesus Christ your gun just swept right across your partner's head, why?
The big a*s computer room in the basement of the airplane where 6 special ops soldiers can hide. They would sell seats down there if there was that much room.
So many military-related things: Clumsy uniforms, ranks that make no sense, general misunderstandings of military culture and practices
There was an episode of ER where the one character is going to a military base to find her brother. Goodness, it was stupid. It's a base, in the states. But everyone is driving the green jeeps like they're on the set of MASH. She goes to the base clinic to find her brother and there are MPs stationed at all the entrances and all around the hallways. They're just all standing at full attention, randomly in the hallways. Why? Why would they do that? And they had their covers on...inside while they're just uselessly standing guard over hospital hallways. It is one of the absolute worst depictions of something military related I've ever seen on tv. Another one is Leverage (a show I love) when they go onto a base and the gate to get on is just a small booth, and an arm. It looks like something from a parking garage. They're able to sneak onto the base with no problem at all.
Almost any scene involving someone being shot or stabbed.
Getting hit with a bullet and flying back. No, a tiny little bullet is not going to make a 170 pound person fly back, and still have energy to get through the out tissue and cause damage. A person gets hit with a bullet, they keep on doing whatever they were doing until the damage causes parts of the body to shut down. A really powerful rifle with a large low speed bullet may snap your head back or cause you to twitch, but then you will simply fall where you are, not be thrown back dramatically.
Every single movie where somebody dies and then someone closes their eyes, and their eyes stay shut.
Not a movie but in the show "You" when he gives that guy the latte with nuts in it and he drops dead less than a minute later...nah. It takes a bit longer than that. It would be a much longer, painful demise.
Just about every movie where anything does anything in space. I can count the exceptions on one hands. Ships burning prograde into reentry, maneuvering hilariously close, and 99% of the time burning in the wrong direction.
Imagine an action movie where everyone runs into the big fight shooting themselves in the head as if that would kill their enemy. *It's painful*.
On this specific topic, I'm always sighing for a second when in Armageddon they have the two space shuttles take off simultaneously and (for space travel) incredibly close to one another. If this really was the one mission to save humanity without a second chance, you wouldn't take that unnecessary risk.
Every movie scene where anyone is using a chainsaw. They don't start from cold with just one pull, they need a little while to warm up, and you sure as s**t can't cut through flesh and bone without f*****g that chain up real good (looking at you, Evil Dead)
Hey. That’s not true. When I used a chainsaw to dismember an annoying neighbor the chainsaw….Uh. Never mind. The neighbor is fine. He just left town one day, and chose to not tell anybody where he was going. Yeah. That’s it.
Telling co-workers to cover your shift on the fly like okay like I dont have to run it by the manager and the manager doesn't have to do a whole bunch of computer s**t beforehand to fix the hours up.
This is genuinely how things work at my company, but then again, I work for idiots...
Individual rooms in a hospital are not surrounded by glass so anyone can look through.....HIPAA!
Without going into full detail, when I was stopped and cops handcuffed me to take me to the station, no one said "you have the right to remain silent... yada yada"
Police are required to read you your Miranda rights before they interrogate you, not when they arrest you.
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When characters are in a bar and actually have a conversation. Most bars are so loud you can’t hear someone shouting as loud as they can. Also when women run in high heels.
I asked a friend who wore heels all the time about this. She said you get used them, and can even run a bit.
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Something I never considered until it was pointed out, and now I can't unsee it. The trapdoor in the roof of an elevator that people always climb through? Those don't open from inside the elevator, their locked on top, so emergency personnel can get in to save you. If they opened from the inside, there would be a billion videos of dumbasses on TikTok climbing up through one for likes
My personal favorite is when action hero dude takes his custom, very expensive guns with him, fires shots until they're empty and then throws the guns away.
When movies get airbrakes wrong. Semi-trucks use airbrakes. In movies the air lines get cut/shot-off whatever and the truck has no brakes. In real life, not so much. The air pressure in a big truck is holding the brakes OFF. Without air pressure, heavy springs APPLY brakes automatically. A loss of air pressure locks the whole truck up. It's a safety feature.
This. They also seem to be stuck in the 70s or 80s about simple regulations like hours of service.
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My funniest: characters are supposed to be experts in a given field, yet we the spectators understand everything they say. Series with doctors or computer engineers make me laugh. A more annoying: the whole plot is based on people remaining silent in a conversation or situation when anyone would have reacted. My favorite: people driving in a dense city yet they find somewhere to park right in front of the building they're heading to.
Do you prefer to spend a few minutes watching the protagonists drive around looking for a place to park?
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A big one that annoys me is someone setting off a fire sprinkler in a building and ALL the sprinklers go off in the building, flooding everything. Or they pull the fire alarm and all the sprinklers go off. That's not how it works and no one would ever tolerate their entire structure being destroyed by water damage to save it from fire damage. Only the triggered sprinkler goes off to douse the flame directly under it. If the heat from the fire spreads, more sprinklers will activate.
During car/ motor chases. They always seem to have an infinite number of gears. And always going up in gears....
The medical stuff should be realistic. Some doctors at a hospital in my city were sued by a guy for not providing proper care because they didn't shock his father when his heart stopped. You don't shock when there is no rhythm but people think that's how it works because they see it in movies and on TV. The resuscitation attempt was done correctly. I think the lawsuit was thrown out.
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Okay, but would you actually want to watch a movie where they portray all this stuff realistically?
The medical stuff should be realistic. Some doctors at a hospital in my city were sued by a guy for not providing proper care because they didn't shock his father when his heart stopped. You don't shock when there is no rhythm but people think that's how it works because they see it in movies and on TV. The resuscitation attempt was done correctly. I think the lawsuit was thrown out.
Load More Replies...
Showing someone waking up from a coma like they're waking up from a nap. Edit: grammar
And they can instantly hold a perfectly lucid conversation.
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Unless it's a documentary or something based on a true story, I overlook the obvious inconsistencies. When we watch or read fiction, there is a certain amount of suspension of disbelief that comes into play. I know it's not real, so I can ignore impossible sounds made in space, or doctors performing lab tests, etc. Jurassic Park and the Matrix are good examples. They're just fun to watch!
Librarians. For the love of Dewey, stop portraying us as single, older women with glasses, a bun, and a cardigan. I am a tattooed, mohawk-sporting... older...woman... with glasses and...cardigan. Hm. Well. I don't have a bun! lol
Of course you need a sweater if the library is cold!
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I can't unhear the squeaking noises of doors opening in movies ever since I learnt that the squeaking noise of the door hinges is always the same in every movie since the seventies. Also hearing the clapping noises of hoofs even on soft grass and without horseshoes. In reality you can only hear horses walk if they're running on asphalt or over a bridge. In sand, on dirt or grass you hear nothing. They can sneak up on you like cats
Heroes and villains: you can't be smug, cool qnd cocky ALL the time.
One thing that bugs me in movies is how the baddie is trying to kill the goodie and the goodie will just knock them out as if they think "They won't not come after me again now I've knocked them out" only for the cycle to continue a few more times. Also guys who get kicked in the meat and two veg department that get up after about 5-10 seconds as if nothing has happened.
Explosion that consume all oxygen in confined spaces (tunnels, ducts, etc), but somehow the main characters have no problem breathing.
military movies where the do NOT get the insignias on the uniforms correct! also military movies that do not understand the mechanics. e.g. the 1979 film, "the final countdown" when kirk douglas picks up a "phone" and orders to "splash the zeroes". that was an inter ship communication phone. no way he could have reached the F 14 pilots with that. i served on that ship, 87-91 and we all laughed when that happened!
Military insignia ann decoration and uniform are REQUIRED to be wrong.
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driving in movies/TV is usually ridiculous, especially when there's another passenger in the car. I'm always on edge when someone is talking and looking at the person for forever instead of, you know, driving and watching the road. Eeeeevery once in a while, they'll actually get in a car accident, like would happen after 2 seconds of not watching the road.
My two pet peeves are tyre noises in car chases - the car is on a gravel road, the tyres do not make a noise like they are on concrete - and whenever they show an IP address, at least one part of it will be greater than 255, which is not possible (yes, I know why they do it, but it still yells at me!).
All the cop shoes, get in a shootout keep on working. Tasers knocking people out. Searching cars without probable cause. I could go on.
When there is always a parking space right in front of the building the hero/bad person has to go in to. Especially in big cities like NY or Chicago. Pulls me right out of the movie every time.
Driving scenes where the driver is talking AND looking at the passenger for long periods of time. In real life, you would crash.
Action/war movies where they are all big muscle bound guys. I was sent to Jump school in my wayward youth and had several of these "Arnie' types start with me. Surprised me but they all washed out the first day. Lots of strength but zero stamina. We were up and moving from the time out feet hit the floor at 0530 and they just could not do it.
My husband and I were watching RoboShark (a classic SyFy original movie), and one scene was a swim meet where high school boys and girls were competing. My husband got disgusted and said, "that would never happen. Boys and girls have separate competitions." My reaction was, "We're watching a movie about robotic alien sharks attacking from space, and your sticking point is a coed swim meet?"
Sprinkler systems for fire prevention - they don’t all go off at the same time. That’s the whole idea, they are supposed to extinguish the fire at it’s source as quickly as possible. There is no master valve to turn them all on. If there is a fire bad enough to initiate three or four of them, basically, you've had it.
Over-the-top, elaborate, ballroom glammed up school dances and kids from other schools showing up, uninvited to just cause trouble, with little to no teachers supervising and keeping kids in check. When I was going to school dances the teachers were walking around the scantily decorated gym, watching us all like vultures ready to pounce on anyone dancing "too sexy" or stopping kids from leaving before the dance was over. We weren't allowed to leave whenever and had strict, limited access to most of the school. In shows and movies, the kids are allowed to leave whenever, they're wearing formal wear, and they're going all over the school and getting into other classrooms for a quick romp.
WHOOOSH!! - that was the sound of all the life leaving the room. What a silly list. If all of these things were "corrected", we'd end up with all films being two people talking. What else are people going to have problems with? That events of the film don't happen in real time?
Someone passes out and the friends immediately start CPR. You do not need CPR if you are breathing and have a pulse. EVERYBODY with cancer is scrawny and bald. Not all oncology trestments cause hair loss, and some drugs make you plump up, which is why so many kids with cancer are desperately sick but have chipmunk cheeks. People in the hospital ALWAYS have IVs regardless of their condition, are perfectly made up with great hairstyles, yet wear frumpy hospital gowns. Most people send home for PJs, or stay dressed. Just be ause you are in the hospital does not mean you're in bed the whole time. I put on my jeans each day.
Star Lord played a cassette constantly for nigh on 20 years and it didn't jam, twist, crumble or feed itself into the mechanism
Everything about NCIS: Sydney. It's all so completely wrong and, frankly, offensively so.
I like the original NCIS, but not even bothering to watch the Sydney spin-off. Too PC.
Load More Replies...
First, there are umpteen movies where the phrase "eat lead" and "lead poisoning" are euphemisms for being shot. That joke was funny once, having lead poisoning is not like getting shot. Second science fiction - telepathy (as portrayed) is impossible, travelling back in time is impossible, force fields (as portrayed) are impossible, teleport (as portrayed) is impossible, faster than light (as portrayed) is impossible, huge starships are impossible. And please please learn the difference between a metre per second and a kilometer per second, objects collide in space at speeds exceeding 10 kilometers per second. Third, let's clear up this complicated murder mystery in a day, as if.
When characters are in a bar and actually have a conversation. Most bars are so loud you can’t hear someone shouting as loud as they can. Also when women run in high heels.
I asked a friend who wore heels all the time about this. She said you get used them, and can even run a bit.
Load More Replies... Something I never considered until it was pointed out, and now I can't unsee it. The trapdoor in the roof of an elevator that people always climb through? Those don't open from inside the elevator, their locked on top, so emergency personnel can get in to save you. If they opened from the inside, there would be a billion videos of dumbasses on TikTok climbing up through one for likes
My personal favorite is when action hero dude takes his custom, very expensive guns with him, fires shots until they're empty and then throws the guns away.
When movies get airbrakes wrong. Semi-trucks use airbrakes. In movies the air lines get cut/shot-off whatever and the truck has no brakes. In real life, not so much. The air pressure in a big truck is holding the brakes OFF. Without air pressure, heavy springs APPLY brakes automatically. A loss of air pressure locks the whole truck up. It's a safety feature.
This. They also seem to be stuck in the 70s or 80s about simple regulations like hours of service.
Load More Replies... My funniest: characters are supposed to be experts in a given field, yet we the spectators understand everything they say. Series with doctors or computer engineers make me laugh. A more annoying: the whole plot is based on people remaining silent in a conversation or situation when anyone would have reacted. My favorite: people driving in a dense city yet they find somewhere to park right in front of the building they're heading to.
Do you prefer to spend a few minutes watching the protagonists drive around looking for a place to park?
Load More Replies... A big one that annoys me is someone setting off a fire sprinkler in a building and ALL the sprinklers go off in the building, flooding everything. Or they pull the fire alarm and all the sprinklers go off. That's not how it works and no one would ever tolerate their entire structure being destroyed by water damage to save it from fire damage. Only the triggered sprinkler goes off to douse the flame directly under it. If the heat from the fire spreads, more sprinklers will activate.
During car/ motor chases. They always seem to have an infinite number of gears. And always going up in gears....
The medical stuff should be realistic. Some doctors at a hospital in my city were sued by a guy for not providing proper care because they didn't shock his father when his heart stopped. You don't shock when there is no rhythm but people think that's how it works because they see it in movies and on TV. The resuscitation attempt was done correctly. I think the lawsuit was thrown out.
Load More Replies... Okay, but would you actually want to watch a movie where they portray all this stuff realistically?
The medical stuff should be realistic. Some doctors at a hospital in my city were sued by a guy for not providing proper care because they didn't shock his father when his heart stopped. You don't shock when there is no rhythm but people think that's how it works because they see it in movies and on TV. The resuscitation attempt was done correctly. I think the lawsuit was thrown out.
Load More Replies... Showing someone waking up from a coma like they're waking up from a nap. Edit: grammar
And they can instantly hold a perfectly lucid conversation.
Load More Replies... Unless it's a documentary or something based on a true story, I overlook the obvious inconsistencies. When we watch or read fiction, there is a certain amount of suspension of disbelief that comes into play. I know it's not real, so I can ignore impossible sounds made in space, or doctors performing lab tests, etc. Jurassic Park and the Matrix are good examples. They're just fun to watch!
Librarians. For the love of Dewey, stop portraying us as single, older women with glasses, a bun, and a cardigan. I am a tattooed, mohawk-sporting... older...woman... with glasses and...cardigan. Hm. Well. I don't have a bun! lol
Of course you need a sweater if the library is cold!
Load More Replies... I can't unhear the squeaking noises of doors opening in movies ever since I learnt that the squeaking noise of the door hinges is always the same in every movie since the seventies. Also hearing the clapping noises of hoofs even on soft grass and without horseshoes. In reality you can only hear horses walk if they're running on asphalt or over a bridge. In sand, on dirt or grass you hear nothing. They can sneak up on you like cats
Heroes and villains: you can't be smug, cool qnd cocky ALL the time.
One thing that bugs me in movies is how the baddie is trying to kill the goodie and the goodie will just knock them out as if they think "They won't not come after me again now I've knocked them out" only for the cycle to continue a few more times. Also guys who get kicked in the meat and two veg department that get up after about 5-10 seconds as if nothing has happened.
Explosion that consume all oxygen in confined spaces (tunnels, ducts, etc), but somehow the main characters have no problem breathing.
military movies where the do NOT get the insignias on the uniforms correct! also military movies that do not understand the mechanics. e.g. the 1979 film, "the final countdown" when kirk douglas picks up a "phone" and orders to "splash the zeroes". that was an inter ship communication phone. no way he could have reached the F 14 pilots with that. i served on that ship, 87-91 and we all laughed when that happened!
Military insignia ann decoration and uniform are REQUIRED to be wrong.
Load More Replies... driving in movies/TV is usually ridiculous, especially when there's another passenger in the car. I'm always on edge when someone is talking and looking at the person for forever instead of, you know, driving and watching the road. Eeeeevery once in a while, they'll actually get in a car accident, like would happen after 2 seconds of not watching the road.
My two pet peeves are tyre noises in car chases - the car is on a gravel road, the tyres do not make a noise like they are on concrete - and whenever they show an IP address, at least one part of it will be greater than 255, which is not possible (yes, I know why they do it, but it still yells at me!).
All the cop shoes, get in a shootout keep on working. Tasers knocking people out. Searching cars without probable cause. I could go on.
When there is always a parking space right in front of the building the hero/bad person has to go in to. Especially in big cities like NY or Chicago. Pulls me right out of the movie every time.
Driving scenes where the driver is talking AND looking at the passenger for long periods of time. In real life, you would crash.
Action/war movies where they are all big muscle bound guys. I was sent to Jump school in my wayward youth and had several of these "Arnie' types start with me. Surprised me but they all washed out the first day. Lots of strength but zero stamina. We were up and moving from the time out feet hit the floor at 0530 and they just could not do it.
My husband and I were watching RoboShark (a classic SyFy original movie), and one scene was a swim meet where high school boys and girls were competing. My husband got disgusted and said, "that would never happen. Boys and girls have separate competitions." My reaction was, "We're watching a movie about robotic alien sharks attacking from space, and your sticking point is a coed swim meet?"
Sprinkler systems for fire prevention - they don’t all go off at the same time. That’s the whole idea, they are supposed to extinguish the fire at it’s source as quickly as possible. There is no master valve to turn them all on. If there is a fire bad enough to initiate three or four of them, basically, you've had it.
Over-the-top, elaborate, ballroom glammed up school dances and kids from other schools showing up, uninvited to just cause trouble, with little to no teachers supervising and keeping kids in check. When I was going to school dances the teachers were walking around the scantily decorated gym, watching us all like vultures ready to pounce on anyone dancing "too sexy" or stopping kids from leaving before the dance was over. We weren't allowed to leave whenever and had strict, limited access to most of the school. In shows and movies, the kids are allowed to leave whenever, they're wearing formal wear, and they're going all over the school and getting into other classrooms for a quick romp.
WHOOOSH!! - that was the sound of all the life leaving the room. What a silly list. If all of these things were "corrected", we'd end up with all films being two people talking. What else are people going to have problems with? That events of the film don't happen in real time?
Someone passes out and the friends immediately start CPR. You do not need CPR if you are breathing and have a pulse. EVERYBODY with cancer is scrawny and bald. Not all oncology trestments cause hair loss, and some drugs make you plump up, which is why so many kids with cancer are desperately sick but have chipmunk cheeks. People in the hospital ALWAYS have IVs regardless of their condition, are perfectly made up with great hairstyles, yet wear frumpy hospital gowns. Most people send home for PJs, or stay dressed. Just be ause you are in the hospital does not mean you're in bed the whole time. I put on my jeans each day.
Star Lord played a cassette constantly for nigh on 20 years and it didn't jam, twist, crumble or feed itself into the mechanism
Everything about NCIS: Sydney. It's all so completely wrong and, frankly, offensively so.
I like the original NCIS, but not even bothering to watch the Sydney spin-off. Too PC.
Load More Replies... First, there are umpteen movies where the phrase "eat lead" and "lead poisoning" are euphemisms for being shot. That joke was funny once, having lead poisoning is not like getting shot. Second science fiction - telepathy (as portrayed) is impossible, travelling back in time is impossible, force fields (as portrayed) are impossible, teleport (as portrayed) is impossible, faster than light (as portrayed) is impossible, huge starships are impossible. And please please learn the difference between a metre per second and a kilometer per second, objects collide in space at speeds exceeding 10 kilometers per second. Third, let's clear up this complicated murder mystery in a day, as if.
