Best adventure TV plot holes of all time

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The Adventures of Tintin picture

Land of Black Gold: Part 1 - S2-E10

Plot hole: Thomson and Thompson fall asleep whilst driving their jeep and are arrested because whilst they were asleep, they drove into and damaged several people's markets and as well as driving into the wall of a building. Although the decision to arrest them would seem normal due to the vandalism, it does not make sense why both of the detectives would have gotten arrested. Even if they both fell asleep at the wheel, only one of the detectives was actually responsible for the vandalism caused by this. (00:19:00)

Casual Person

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It Takes a Thief picture

Boom at the Top - S2-E19

Plot hole: While Mundy is trying to disarm the briefcase bomb in the study, his time-sensitive work is interrupted no less than 6 times by people barging in from the party out front. The plot device adds comic relief, but there's no earthly reason why he couldn't have locked or barricaded the door in the first place. (00:36:00)

Jean G

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The Legend of Korra picture

Reunion - S4-E7

Plot hole: Guards at a security checkpoint attack Varrick and Bolin, because a wanted poster identifies them as fugitive traitors. The problem is that poster cannot have been there. Varrick and Bolin escape in the previous episode (Battle of Zaofu) but are captured minutes afterwards. (So, no posters needed.) The next day, they escape again by blowing up their imprisoning train car. Their captor, Bataar, thinks they are dead. Indeed, Varrick intended to die. Later, Bataar is actually shown reporting them dead. One might argue that the poster wasn't a wanted poster, but one that warned people about the empire making an example of the traitors.This argument is too flawed: The empire had many examples already, some very high-profile. And a propaganda poster must be placed in plain sight, not in a security booth corner especially designated to let security guards compare the passing individuals. (00:14:00)

FleetCommand

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Once Upon a Time picture

New York City Serenade - S3-E12

Plot hole: When talking to Hook about the photos, Emma states he could have photoshopped them to make it look like she and Henry were in Storybrooke, however she had taken them directly from Henry's camera and had them developed. So Hook had no way to photoshop the pictures from inside the camera. (00:27:00)

Marj Spiritdove

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Dragon Tales picture

Show generally

Plot hole: In each episode, Emmy, and Max travel to dragon land (often for a long time) without their parents ever knowing. This makes no sense. Their parents would notice sooner, or later that Max, and Emmy always go in, and out of the house, or that it's always quiet in Emmy, and Max's playroom. You'd think Emmy, and Max's parents would get suspicious, and would question their children accordingly.

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What If...? picture

What If... Ultron Won? - S1-E8

Plot hole: At the end of the previous episode, the Watcher gets surprised (literally saying "wait, what?") by the arrival of Infinity Ultron inside Party Thor's universe.In this episode we find out the story of Ultron.Ultron realises for the first time that there are other universes to conquer right then because he can'hear' the Watcher talk (to whom?) and goes after him.So the two episodes don't match;Ultron couldn't have reached the other universe "before" his realization, and Uatu is again surprised by it.

Sammo

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Secret Invasion picture

Season 1 generally

Plot hole: The Skrull base is inside an abandoned nuclear power plant with enough radioactivity to force any human (like, say, Nick Fury) to constantly pop iodine pills to fight the symptoms of a poisoning that would kill them in less than half an hour. Despite that, Skrulls also detain prisoners, for years in some cases, in rudimentary shackles without any sort of shield or protection against the radiation.

Sammo

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Suggested correction: Iodine pills don't fight the symptoms of radiation poisoning; they prevent the body from absorbing radioactive iodine. It does not protect from exposure to radiation; it won't save you from it. Secondly, it's all an act by Gi'Ah posing as Fury anyway. Thirdly, they are in the reactor control room where Gravik says the radiation is higher. The prisoners are in a low radiation room, which could be extra shielded from radiation. It could also be that the prisoners are fed iodine to block radioactive iodine.

lionhead

We can make up if we want that there's a special, super-secret anti-radiation serum and/or super-effective shielding, helping humans even during an exposure that lasts years (a decade in the case of Rhodey!), but there has to be something in the actual visuals that remotely hints at it. It's hard to headcanon that the dingy area of the plant where they are racked together, strapped to bed nets behind tarps, can be "low radiation", or that they are given anything to counter it. In particular, in the ending, the rescued people leisurely walk around the plant with zero radiation protection, even casually in the open yard where "Fury's" Geiger counter was going mad earlier. And the radiation was not something induced by the Skrulls that just ended when the baddie died. Not only is there no techno-babble justification (one could argue it's simply a pedantic detail not unlike the lack of hair growth or muscle atrophy), there's a direct flagrant contradiction in how the environment of the location - which is the only reason why they picked that site as a base - is deadly to humans only to a dramatic degree only when it's convenient.

Sammo

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The Flash picture

Revenge of the Rogues - S1-E10

Plot hole: During the fight at sundown, Cold gets a hit on Flash and he goes down. Eddie takes a shield and goes to help. But Flash was in the middle of the street with no obstacles around, and it's implausible that Eddie could have gotten to him without Cold or Heat seeing him.

Knever

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Black Sails picture

I. - S1-E1

Plot hole: Why, of all people on board, would the cook know of a specific entry in the captain's log, exactly where to look for it, and that it contained very valuable information?

Friso94

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GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka picture

Show generally

Plot hole: During the episode "Superstition", Onizuka thinks he has cancer because the magnetic pain-pads he was wearing created strange blobs in the X-Ray he has taken. However, given the fact that the X-Ray was so strange, doctors would have given him a complete physical, and noticed the pads much sooner. Here, they literally just assume he has tumors, and fail to ever take notice of the pads. Simply impossible, given the gravity of the situation. (Obviously, this is to pay off at the very end of the episode.)

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Supergirl picture

Midvale - S3-E6

Plot hole: After Kara and Alex are run off the road, Kara is convinced by "Noel Neill", revealed later to be J'onn, to stop using her powers. From context, J'onn had to have been summoned by Eliza, but in 2007, she would still think he's just Hank Henshaw; she doesn't learn he's not, or even that he's a shapeshifter, until 2016, as seen in season 1's "Myriad", well after Kara and Alex have grown up.

Cubs Fan

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Power Rangers Samurai picture

The Team Unites - S1-E1

Plot hole: This was the first episode of the series and we see that the rangers are unable to figure out how to properly operate their zords; but in Origins Part 1 (which takes place prior to this) they have no issues with the zords at all.

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Lupin III picture

The Sharpshooter - S1-E4

Plot hole: Eric is supposedly masterful at putting people into a coma, creating the 'living dead', but the old geezer was able to drag himself to the hospital without help and perfectly conscious (he is even conscious on the operating table!).

Sammo

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Lexx picture

I Worship His Shadow - S1-E1

Plot hole: As the first prisoner is being pulled towards the organ cutter, you see on the wall the exact shape of the body organs for the brain, lungs, heart, liver, stomach, kidneys and testicles/ovaries that serve as guides and a track for tiny saw blades to come out and cut into the person's body to harvest these organs. The problem is these are in a fixed position, which might work for some people. However people are different sizes, shapes, and heights and most wouldn't match up to these blade guides. So a good majority of the people they cut apart to harvest organs out of wouldn't even give them good ones as the blades would cut into the organs and ruin them. (00:25:20)

Quantom X

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Jackie Chan Adventures picture

Into the Mouth of Evil - S2-E23

Plot hole: While fleeing the guru's disciples through a narrow side street, Jackie gets cut off by the van driven by Dr. Jamba and associates, stun-sprayed in the face, and then loaded into the van. But with three brutish-looking guys being so close to their quarry, the real crooks can take the time for dragging Jackie around to the back door instead of loading him through the side doors?

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Suggested correction: He recognized that there were two Tony Starks in the lobby by the smell of their colognes, and combined with all the other unusual shenanigans going on, he correctly deduced the Avengers travelled through time, though he incorrectly thought it was to prevent his ascendancy.

Phaneron

How exactly do you distinguish the smell of cologne as belonging to two separate people? But besides that, it's pretty wild to jump to a conclusion about time travel when it could be that someone else happens to be wearing Axe.

auroraSLAP

I'm sure he simply recognized his voice.

lionhead

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Jonny Quest picture

Pursuit of the Po-Ho - S1-E4

Plot hole: Dr. Quest is speaking through the Dragonfly's speakers to the Po-Hos as they fly over the jungle, telling them he is their air God and is angry the tribe has taken hostages. Quest could have told the Po-Hos to just release the hostages, rather than putting himself in danger later on by getting captured.

Scott215

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Lost in Space picture

Target: Earth - S3-E16

Plot hole: The Jupiter 2 crew is duplicated; however, the aliens had never seen Penny (or Judy I think). How can they be duplicated? The aliens don't have ability to know who were there, or they wouldn't have questioned Smith about the crew. Also, they do not know Smith and Will are hiding. So, they don't arm to have any special power to know beyond what they actually observe.

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Power Rangers RPM picture

Go for the Green - S1-E4

Plot hole: Dillon was quickly identified by the city sensors as having metal parts, thus classifying him as a threat to the city. Yet Tenaya, who is essentially a cyborg, tries out for the Green Ranger without setting off the same sensors.

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Tenaya wasn't caught because the guards assumed the equipment was faulty. It was giving positives all day because of all the sleeper agents we find out about later.

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