Continuity mistake: With a gun pointed at his head, Gibbons retorts that General George Deckert does not seem to do "any of the dying." Look at the shadows on the doorframe, and look at them again when the camera is back on Samuel Jackson; big change even if he surely didn't go anywhere. (00:29:40)
Continuity mistake: As Ice Cube waltzes into the truck after the boat stunt, Shavers stares at him. Behind him you can see the car window is half/a third of the way up. With all the commotion, it's unlikely that Shavers decided to close it a bit; it was practically all the way down before, when Darius told him to get his butt off the driver's position, and up when he was saying there was a problem. (00:24:50 - 00:25:20)
Plot hole: Agent Kyle Christopher Steele ordered roadblocks for 10 miles, Stone just destroyed a state police patrol car blocking a major bridge, but he is able, with no explanation, to just get away with that one encounter with the police and bring back his hyper-recognizable monster van from the countryside to Georgetown with no problem. (00:25:00)
Continuity mistake: When Ice Cube jumps off the speedboat he crashed on top of the bridge, the natural light in the shot when he is walking towards the explosion without looking is quite different from the crash shots. (00:25:05)
Character mistake: When the unlikely trio of heroes gets off the helicopter and calmly boards the GTO, Samuel Jackson fails to properly close the car trunk, that stays semi-open. (00:13:55)
Factual error: The sniper that lets Ice Cube roam free the roof all cat-like tries to make up for his mistake by shooting him repeatedly as he boards the heli. Which is nothing short of miraculous, since he's doing it with a Remington 700PSS bolt action rifle, in his capable hands suddenly turning into semiauto. (00:13:00)
Revealing mistake: The wider shot (after the POV) of the boat going up the ramp to rescue Agent Toby Lee Shavers from the Virginia police is a miniature work recognizable at first glance. (00:24:55)
Continuity mistake: When we see Ice Cube move from boat to boat cutting the fuel line, we see also the disconnected pipes flopping down. But in close-up the little fuel tube we see pumping gas letting it pool into the deck is carefully propped to stays up and spurts at full force. Darius did not take time to fix any engine that way, though. (00:23:30)
Continuity mistake: When XXX stuns with rather unorthodox techniques the two guys the idiot co-protagonist left alone to guard the base, the first one to go down collapses with his right arm straight in front and the left hand below his elbow. When Scott Speedman gets back and start chasing Ice Cube, you can see the same man on the floor, right arm all the way down along his side, and his body turned so the left hand is not in the same position. (00:21:40 - 00:22:20)
Plot hole: The NSA base in Virginia is assaulted. Gibbons escapes after noon/early afternoon and gets to the United States Disciplinary Barracks in Kansas, the day after. Another day passes for the prison escape, and then another day to get back to DC. The FBI agents are hanging out at the crime scene in full force three days after, but during all this time nobody sealed or covered with as much as a tarp or put any perimeter around the huge entrance holes; makes little sense to guard the doors with a dozen agents and leave huge uncovered (not to mention dangerous) holes leading to the core of the building. Even worse, the hard drives of the people they are supposedly investigating (Gibbons) are still there. They would have been sent to the labs to be analyzed, especially since they have been wiped clean, which would only enhance the suspicions. (00:21:00)
Plot hole: The destroyed NSA base is in the middle of nowhere and patrolled by dozens (we see at least 8 agents just by the barn outside) of federal agents, but Shavers, who provides nothing of relevance to the mission since he's not even the getaway for Stone, is able to just park in plain sight in the vicinity and stalk it with binoculars. With that level of surveillance, his van would have been spotted and approached for identification by the feds in no time. (00:20:35)
Continuity mistake: In a problem already spotted in the previous movie of the saga, the departed Michael Roof had poor ring discipline; when the scene of the assault at the barn begins and he reminds 'X' that it's a covert operation, he's holding the binoculars with ring-free hands, but in the shot when he sighs saying "Subtle..." he sports an obvious metal band (exactly like in the original movie) at his right ring finger. (00:20:40)
Continuity mistake: When Gibbons asks Agent Toby Lee Shavers to fit the rocket he picked from the car into a personal weapon, Michael Roof holds the rocket in two different ways (grip on the pipe or between the fins) depending on the camera angle. (00:20:10)
Other mistake: Gibbons and Stone have been been together in the same car for over 15 hours at least, from Kansas to Washington DC, and at Lo's they still talk as if they haven't exchanged a single word. (00:19:15)
Other mistake: We know exactly when Darius escaped from prison; 12:06, so, at noon. The moment he gets in the car, he asks to enjoy some carnal pleasures with a burger, and so we see them in the next scene at the burger restaurant...at night. And they haven't talked about anything yet, not even where are they going. So...it's completely unexplainable what they've been doing all afternoon and how could they restrain a hungry Ice Cube all that time. Just a random time skip. (00:13:30 - 00:15:00)
Continuity mistake: When Ice Cube reverses the Gibbons' "Three strikes" speech, the waitress behind him keeps changing position throughout the scene, serving the table to the right of the door, or to the left, back and forth. (00:14:40)
Plot hole: Movies constantly cheat with helicopters that suddenly and silently arrive to save the day, but the scene goes beyond that; Ice Cube is fighting guards on the rooftop of the military maximum security prison at Fort Leavenworth. He suddenly jumps off the roof to catch the passing helicopter. Without even mentioning the noise problem, which is obvious and huge, that helicopter would have been spotted already by radars, prison snipers, the same guards that were battling Ice Cube, it flew in plain sight of a military installation! And raised no wind at all on the terrace flying at jumping distance from its ledge. (00:12:45)
Continuity mistake: When Ice Cube fights three guards on the rooftop, the light varies significantly; just look at the guards when they are on the ground, the first one in particular, and where the shadow of the building extends. (00:12:40)
Continuity mistake: After for some incredibly silly reason the sniper does not shoot Darius thus ending the movie early, the convict jumps off the roof and finds more guards to beat up. He faces the first one, punches him, a new one joins...only, not, since the next shot is of Ice Cube kicking some more the first, while the second is just now coming out of the door giving him more time to kick more butt. (00:12:20)
Continuity mistake: Darius Stone is fighting the first two wardens, the ones who have him in cuffs. One of them decks the other by mistake with the baton; the stuntman goes down on the ground next to Darius, face first, in the wide angle, but the actor is limp with his back to the door in the next shot. (00:11:00)
Answer: To break the surface of the water making an easier penetration. Hitting water at high speeds can be like hitting concrete. By stirring up the water it "softens" the impact.
EMTurbo