Best Bond movie plot holes of all time

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The Living Daylights picture

Plot hole: Necros had absolutely no way of knowing that Bond and Saunders had arranged to meet at the café when they did and wouldn't have had anywhere near enough time to track them down and set up his elaborate booby trap. Saunders only suggested the meeting place and time a few hours earlier, and it was kept strictly between him and Bond. The scene in Tangier, where Whittaker tells Necros to kill another British agent, takes place on the same day Bond arrived in Vienna; meaning that Necros got from Tangier to Vienna (a 5-hour plus flight), tracked down Saunders, acquired the materials to booby trap the café doors (or had planned this ahead of time - unlikely), and set the trap up well in advance of him and Bond getting to the fairground. There was nowhere near enough time for all of that to happen without Necros having psychic knowledge of Saunders' movements.

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Die Another Day picture Die Another Day mistake picture

Plot hole: In the pre-title sequence, James Bond travels in a hovercraft along the dirt road, which is full of landmines. Soon after reaching the waterfall at the end, trucks drive up along the road he just drove in on to capture him. As there was only one road into the waterfall complex, the landmines must have all disappeared, as earlier on in that sequence, we are informed that the only way that the North Koreans can avoid the mines along that road is by hovercraft. (00:12:05)

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For Your Eyes Only picture

Plot hole: Bond makes a huge tactical error after diving to the St. Georges. He knows the Russians and their operatives are after the ATAC. The ATAC itself is expendable to Britain, since it has a self-destruct mechanism that, under proper procedure, would have been set off when the ship sank. So why is Bond trying to retrieve it? Because he disarms the self-destruct, he actually allows Kristatos to get his hands on it, forcing Bond to track it down again and, to stop the Russians from getting it, HE DESTROYS IT! So why doesn't Bond, instead of disarming the self-destruct, set a timed charge or toss a grenade in the room to destroy the ATAC while it's at the bottom of the sea? The answer is, of course, that if Bond destroys the ATAC before the bad guys can get at it, the movie's over. Even so, at the end, when Bond finally does destroy the ATAC, he tells Gogol it's "detente. You don't have it. I don't have it." Clever line, but it reinforces the fact that the British don't need it. They can build another one.

Vader47000

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You Only Live Twice picture

Plot hole: Right after Bond escapes Blofeld and joins Tanaka and Kissy, they say they need to get to the control room (that Bond just left from). They look at the "front door" to the room, and Tanaka says, "Impossible! It's too well defended!". Why did they not go back the way Bond just came from, through Blofeld's "apartment"? Instead, they fight their way across the entire launching complex and go through another entrance, which also leads through Blofeld's apartment.

poehitman

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Tomorrow Never Dies picture

Plot hole: In the final showdown, when Bond is fighting with Stamper, the girl is wrapped in a chain, hanging from a crane and dropped into the sea. After the boat blows to bits, the chain continues to hang down, even though there's nothing holding it. It even keeps hanging after Bond's swum down to untie her. What's keeping it there? Do all stealth battleships come with buoyant chains? With both arms at least partially free, why doesn't she just climb back up the chain?

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No Time to Die picture

Plot hole: At the end of Spectre, Blofeld loses his eye in the crash. In No Time To Die, he is being held in Belmarsh Prison, which is a high-security facility and houses many terrorists like him. However, despite the stringent security measures, he somehow has access to a bionic eye, which was provided to him during his imprisonment. This would have been thoroughly checked multiple times to ensure its safety before being granted to him.

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Suggested correction: Blofeld loses the eye in an explosion earlier in Spectre, before he went to London. He likely already had the eye with him when he was captured after the crash.

In the UK there are several TV shows about police and prison corruption. It isn't much of a stretch to imagine that one of the guards was bribed and smuggled the eye in for him. Blofeld is a criminal mastermind - he would have many resources at his disposal despite capture.

He just happened to have a bionic eye on his person as a backup in case he lost one of his real ones in an accident?

Phaneron

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Octopussy picture

Plot hole: Bond would not have had (nor taken himself) time to lay a complete and careful clown make-up while changing clothes in the circus trailer.

Jacob La Cour

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The Man with the Golden Gun picture

Plot hole: When Bond and Scaramanga are duelling, Bond has no tie or jacket on. After Bond drops his gun and gives his hiding place away, he somehow has the time to not only crawl back onto the staging but to move the wax replica of himself and also to put on the dummy's jacket and necktie.

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The Spy Who Loved Me picture

Plot hole: If they assembled the wet bike on the submarine, they wouldn't be able to get it off as it would be too big to fit through the hatch.

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Dr. No picture

Plot hole: When Bond is escaping through the metal ducts, presumably of Dr No's air-conditioning, he is deluged with torrents of water. He then leaves the pipe work through a metal grille into a passageway - why didn't the water leave the same way? (01:33:05)

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The World is Not Enough picture

Plot hole: In the Banker's Office, Bond takes the strap from one of the window blinds to facilitate his escape. Overlooking the large quantity of cable he ties round the belt of the villain and his own belt, there must be an awful lot of strap for one blind to allow him to drop from that high up to the ground (well over 50ft?).

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Spectre picture

Plot hole: There's no good reason for Hinx to attack Bond on the train. Blofeld was expecting him to turn up at the crater, that's why he sent the car to pick them up.

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Live and Let Die picture

Plot hole: James Bond shouldn't have gotten away at the end of the airport scene, where he steals an aeroplane and pretends to be a flying instructor. He had no wings with which to fly away, and he ended back up right outside the airport. So, the henchmen, who seemed to still be chasing him one shot before he parked, should have been right on him, waiting when he got out of the plane.

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Licence to Kill picture

Plot hole: Bond goes after Lupe after she leaves the casino table, and they have quite a lengthy, hush-hush conversation. It's a casino, and there are cameras everywhere. Certainly, this would have been brought to Sanchez's attention since he was already leery of Bond and possibly Lupe.

Lynette Carrington

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A View to a Kill picture A View to a Kill mistake picture

Plot hole: When Bond and Tibbett break into the underground lab and find the device which drugs the racehorses, you can see that it has a large light emitting diode (LED) on the top of it. What possible use would that be, since the device is implanted in the horse's leg, and is supposed to be covert? (00:37:20)

Madstunts

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Skyfall picture

Plot hole: Silva spent years planning his revenge against M, yet the ability to carry out his plan depended on conditions that were entirely out of his control, such as being captured by MI-6 despite having no way of knowing that Bond was coming for him, and only escaping custody because Q triggers the Trojan - there's no way Silva could predict when that would happen, could have been hours, days, weeks, or never. He then ambushes M at the courthouse despite having no way of knowing that she would be there that day.

Phaneron

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Suggested correction: His plan was always to blow a hole in the tube to have a train crash at that location. This would have caused mayhem and take up a lot of resources (police/ambulance/fire). Bond chasing him had no impact on this part of the plan. Then when his team picked him up, his team would have known where M would have been on that day and would have driven him there. With resources on high at the train crash site, it would have made it easier to reach M.

XIII

This aspect is a bit of a plot hole for me too - one of the factors outside Silva's control is when he can escape MI6 custody, which depends on when Q triggers the 'Granborough' Trojan, which Q only spots with a bit of help from Bond. That triggering could have been hours, days, weeks or never - pretty fraught with risk to rely on individual(s) making that happen at a plot-convenient moment... otherwise Silva has a bunch of associates hanging around London for a few days permanently on a few minutes alert for a random event.

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From Russia With Love picture

Plot hole: Bond lies to Tanya on the date the embassy would be bombed (Karim and Bond knew the 13th) and Tanya denoted the deception by telling Bond when he came in the decoding room she thought it was the 14th. How did Grant know to A: be on the train and B: have an entire escape plan set up for the wrong day?

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Casino Royale picture

Plot hole: As they're escaping the Smersh lair, Bond tells Mata to put her finger in the tiger's ear to operate the doors. How does he know this? The only other time he was in that room, the tiger's eyes were pressed to operate the lift. (02:03:00)

jle

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Thunderball picture

Plot hole: The Disco Volante puts to sea and Bond comes aboard disguised as one of the divers. Largo tells the captain to set course to Miami Beach. After being exposed and captured within the underwater cave, Bond is eventually rescued by Leiter in a helicopter. Bond tells him that the Volante's course is Miami Beach and that the bombs are transferred to a wreck on Fowley Point. There is no mention of Fowley Point before - the wreck just serves as a location for the final underwater fight. (01:53:00)

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