Stupid movie cliches and impossibilities

[mxyptlk]

Something that always bugs me is that when someone is being chased in a building, they always run UP the stairs. As if there are a bunch of magical escape routes on every roof. A lot of the time, it seems to result in the baddie being on the roof looking over the edge and probably thinking 'Hmm, maybe I should have thought this through a bit more.'

Personally I think looking for a ground level exit would make more sense.

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[Historian]

Originally Posted by squigg58

That's another classic in films.

"Okay, there are two ways to do this ... the quick, simple, foolproof and risk-free option; or the fiendishly complicated one which even a half-wit could see is pretty much guaranteed to go tits-up. I vote for the complicated one!"

Yep, the classic 'No Mr Bond I expect you to die' moment, isn't it?

Put yourself in Goldfinger's shoes after capturing Bond. Do you just say to your henchmen 'OK lads, take him out the back and shoot him'?

No, that's far too simple, so instead you decide to sod around with a giant industrial laser for added dramatic effect, giving plenty of opportunities for the scriptwriter to throw in a couple of memorable quotes, and for Bond to come up with an escape plan...

[xenontrioxide]

On an early episode of the new "Hawaii 5-0": McGarratt and team are trapped inside McGarrat's house, surrounded by heavily armed mercenaries. 5-0 is armed only with side arms and they're running low on ammo. Steve-O has only a commando knife. One merc tries to sneak in through a window, Steve reaches out, hauls the Merc in and offs him with the knife. But no one picks up the dead mercs unfired H&K MP-5 laying there on the floor or searches the body for additional guns or ammo! Then McGarrat says to Kono "Stay here,I'm going outside" (WTF!) Where he takes on the boss merc - who for some reason declines to shoot him- in a knife fight.

[HugoHackenbush]

OK, Star Trek, the re- boot, step up and take your lumps.

Kirk, Sulu and unknown crew member parachute down to the drilling rig that is boring a hole in planet Vulcan. Anyone who has watched Star Trek knows that this means the unknown crew man will die shortly, which he promptly does.

Though on a sabotage mission, Kirk is unarmed, and Sulu is armed with a sword. That's right, it's the 23rd century and Sulu is armed with sword.

The two Romulans that arrive to fight Kirk and Sulu on the drilling platform immediately fail to shoot them with their phaser rifles, losing them on the deck. Instead of trying to regain their weapons, they engage in hand to hand combat with Kirk, and the other Romulan produces a sword (again?) mainly so he and Sulu can have a sword fight.

Kirk is knocked over the side of the platform, where he hangs by the fingertips of one hand, a feat of physical strength that is impossible to maintain for more than a few seconds. This is the first of three times in this movie that this will occur.

In the aftermath of the fight, Kirk and Sulu are free falling off the platform without functioning parachutes. Chekov, aboard the Enterprise, has time to leave his station at the flight deck, and run all the way to the transporter station, and set up the transporter beam, all before Kirk and Sulu hit the surface.

Chekov is able to successfully transport people free falling at a high rate of speed, saving Kirk and Sulu.

A mere two minutes later, when Spock is saving his family from the destruction of planet Vulcan, he tells his mother NOT TO MOVE in order to ensure successful transport, whereupon she slips on a rock, her transport fails, and she dies. Did the script writers forget what they had written three pages before?

Kirk and Spock have a fight, resulting in Spock accusing Kirk of mutiny and having Kirk ejected from the ship in a survival pod. Did star fleet forget to equip their ships with jails? Kirk is, after all, a star fleet OFFICER.

Kirk lands on a planet consisting solely of ice. He is able to climb out of a freezing crevice 100 meters deep, up a sheer wall of ice using only his bare hands, no gloves, and wearing only his star fleet uniform.

Through a series of laughable coincidences, Kirk then runs into Spock, not the new Spock but the old Spock, who proceeds with three minutes of turgid exposition of time travel gobbledygook. Spock then remarks that there is a star feet base nearby, and then they go there! Why didn't Spock go there long ago and get himself off this frozen hell- hole of a planet? Why that might be LOGICAL!

There they encounter Scotty, (?) who is able to beam them all aboard the Enterprise, which is traveling at warp speed. This has never before been possible in the ST universe, but is now possible. And remember, Spock's mother died because she moved just a little bit.

Kirk and Spock, despite being the two most senior officers on the Enterprise, go to destroy the Romulan ship. No one else was available?

At least Kirk and Spock remember their phasers this time, but after a while, Kirk is disarmed, a fist fight ensues, and we are treated to Kirk hanging by his fingertips over the precipice, part two. The Romulan grabs Kirk and lifts him up, instead of just stepping on his fingers or kicking Kirk over the edge. Kirk grabs the Romulan's phaser off of his belt, and kills him. If the Romulan had a phaser, why not just shoot Kirk? Why engage him in a fist fight?

In the final nonsense, we are treated to Kirk hanging by his fingertips part 3 and Spock making like a pointy eared Luke Skywalker both of whom who are transported out of the Romlulan ship at the last possible second. This occurs even though

A) Spock is in a space ship traveling at a high rate of speed and

B) Spock's ship is inside the Romulan ship.

But of course, Spock's mother is dead because she moved a bit...

The Romulan ship is being consumed by a black hole caused by Spock (don't ask) but the Enterprise escapes the same black hole by chucking a bunch of explosives out the stern.

[Elvis16/03/14]

The final frontier. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhuzjkE65f8

[DTravel]

Originally Posted by HugoHackenbush

OK, Star Trek, the re- boot, step up and take your lumps.

You liked it a LOT more than I did.

[HugoHackenbush]

It occurred to me later, that if you can transport people who are in free fall, then there is no reason for the parachute jump down to the drilling platform, why not just transport them there?

That way, the expendable crew person does not accidentally swing into the drilling beam, vaporizing himself along with the explosives he's carrying.

Next, being bereft of the explosives, Kirk and Sulu after dispatching the Romulans who can' t shoot straight, simply pick up the Romulan's phasers and shoot the hub of the drilling platform, causing it to explode. Now if that's all it takes, no explosives would be necessary, and you could simply use the phasers or photon torpedoes of the Enterprise to destroy the drilling platform. No need to even send crew people there.

Wouldn't that be logical?

[DTravel]

But if Abrams had used a logical story he wouldn't have had any excuse for all those "cool scenes" he wanted to shoot.

Below are a couple of postings I've made elsewhere expressing my opinion of the Star Dreck reboot.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


TOS was written by people who had some idea of what the military was
really like, many of them having served themselves. Yes, they bend
things a bit for story purposes and the limits of filming a TV show, but
their starting point was a working military. Characters stay at their
posts. Kirk didn't tell his subordinates how to do a task, he just said
"do it". Every time he sits down there's a yeoman handing him a report
to read and sign. How often did we see Picard doing paperwork?

With the re-boot movie they display a level of military discipline that
Somali pirates would laugh at. Civilian cargo and fishing vessels have
better discipline than the 2009 version Starfleet! In the middle of an
action while at General Quarters a bridge officer leaves his post,
without even telling anyone let alone asking permission or arranging a
replacement, to go interfere with a superior officer doing their job in
a different part of the ship! (Literally running thru the ship yelling
"I can do that!"?!?!?!) One of the duties of an executive officer is to
play Devil's Advocate for his CO, presenting alternatives and pointing
out potential problems with the CO's plans. Its both to help his own
training and to serve as a necessary sounding board for his CO. In the
re-boot, when Spock is in command his reaction to his exec (Kirk)
disagreeing is to literally throw him off the ship! And do you really
want me to go in to the whole idea of a cadet who hasn't even graduated
being given command of a major ship ahead of literally thousands of more
senior, more experienced officers? All of which would be horrid whether
it was a Trek movie or some new setting.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The 2009 movie crew had a level of discipline that makes Somali pirates look
like elite special forces. While the original crew was the trained,
disciplined crew of a military ship. The original Kirk wouldn't have
had to worry about the original Chekov suddenly leaving his station on
the bridge, during a red alert, without even informing anyone let alone
requesting permission, to run thru the ship shouting "I can do that! I
can do that!" so he can push a superior officer away from their station
and interfere with the job they were doing.

The original Kirk may have been the youngest in Starfleet to ever get
command of a Starship, but he did it by graduating from the academy and
working his way up the ranks. He _didn't_ go directly from "suspended
for cheating" to Captain, jumping half-a-dozen ranks and thousands of
superiors, because some now dead ex-captain happened to know his father
and had "a good feeling" about him.

The original Scotty was an experienced, calm, engineer who could be
depended on no matter how bad the situation got. The "new" Scotty's
reaction to seeing two officers having a fist fight on the bridge is
"Oh, I like this ship. Its exciting!" *retch*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Abrams took characters I liked and respected and turned them into asshats that I wouldn't share public transit with while putting them in a universe that made no sense. TOS may have simply retold old fables and morality tales but at least they were decent stories told by decent writers. Abrams doesn't care about story except as an excuse for expensive FX and "Wouldn't It Be Cool" shots.

J J Abrams basically stood over the dying body of 'Star Trek' telling fans "Hey, look at me, I'm so popular that I can do whatever I want to your beloved show!" while he gave fans the finger with one hand and masturbated with the other.

[TCO95]

Originally Posted by HugoHackenbush

...

Wouldn't that be logical?

Logic and movies seem to exist in parallel universes. As much as I like the Lord of The Rings the biggest flaw in the logic is the introduction of the giant eagles. Why not just hand them the ring they fly it to Mount Doom drop it in and problem solved. Better yet, you give the ring to Gollum then give Gollum to the eagles and have him and the ring dropped into Mount Doom solving two problems at once. (Directors Cut Version : The eagles fly Liv Tyler to my house for a celebration they then do not crap all over my freshly washed car and everyone is happy especially me, Ms Tyler, however, may require some therapy.)

[DTravel]

Originally Posted by TCO95

Logic and movies seem to exist in parallel universes. As much as I like the Lord of The Rings the biggest flaw in the logic is the introduction of the giant eagles. Why not just hand them the ring they fly it to Mount Doom drop it in and problem solved. Better yet, you give the ring to Gollum then give Gollum to the eagles and have him and the ring dropped into Mount Doom solving two problems at once. (Directors Cut Version : The eagles fly Liv Tyler to my house for a celebration they then do not crap all over my freshly washed car and everyone is happy especially me, Ms Tyler, however, may require some therapy.)

I can't find it again at the moment but someone made a cartoon explaining why this was a bad idea. It showed the eagles rescuing Bilbo and the dwarfs in The Hobbit, one of the eagles gets hungry and uses one of the dwarfs as an in-flight snack.