Best crime TV plot holes of all time

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The Adventures of Tintin picture

Tintin and the Picaros: Part 2 - S2-E9

Plot hole: When the helicopter flies over the jungle, Haddock inadvertently walks in view of the helicopter and the pilot of the helicopter notices him, assuming it to be a Picaro. Haddock then trips into the river, but despite being watched by the pilot of the helicopter the entire time, the helicopter pilot doesn't notice him falling into the river and instead assumes he just disappeared. (00:26:20)

Casual Person

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Batman: The Brave and the Bold picture

Triumvirate of Terror! - S3-E8

Plot hole: After Superman thwarts Lex's plan and knocks the Kryptonite into the sewers, Lex yells in frustration, splits his power suit off and flies away on a jet pack. Superman just lets him go. Wouldn't Superman chase him and catch him, especially seeing as how weak Lex would be like that? (00:07:35)

Quantom X

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The Listener picture

The Bank Job - S3-E1

Plot hole: When Toby, McCluskey, and the others are looking at the bank's security camera footage, Toby asks to zoom in on Newman's tattoo, and then Toby asks if he can borrow someone's cell phone so he can ask Oz about the bank manager. It cuts to Oz at the hospital as his cell phone rings - when Oz picks up his cell he presses the button and promptly says, "Hey, Toby, what's up?" It's quite impossible for Oz to have known that it was Toby calling him if Toby was using someone else's cell, and he did not even have the chance to hear Toby's voice. Those telepathic abilities belong to Toby, not Oz.

Super Grover

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Matlock picture

The Professor - S1-E11

Plot hole: Matlock figures out that The Professor wouldn't have been able to see the security guard from 50 yards without glasses, and that's what tips him off about The Conspiracy: the guard testifying that the man wasn't wearing any. However, when we see the scene happen at the beginning of the episode, the person posing as Prof. Erskine Tate is, in fact, wearing glasses. (00:04:15 - 00:22:15)

Sammo

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Father Brown picture

The Daughters of Jerusalem - S2-E6

Plot hole: Dinah Fortescue's fingerprints are supposed to be on a teacup but she's wearing gloves in the flashback. So how did they get there? (00:24:35 - 00:33:34)

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Silent Witness picture

Show generally

Plot hole: When Nicky goes into prison in Mexico to give a criminal a shot of insulin, two errors are seen. 1) The needle and syringe are far too big for an insulin shot, which takes a one ml syringe and a small sub-cutaneous needle. 2) When we first see the syringe, there is a small amount of insulin in it, but it grows the more times we see it, until a large syringe is two-thirds full - insulin is enough in a one ml syringe.

kh1616

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Batwoman picture

Down Down Down - S1-E3

Plot hole: Kate in the Batcave says with absolute certainty "Alice doesn't know that Bruce Wayne is Batman. Whoever stole the gun, knew that Bruce had to have the suit to test it on." Both statements are leaps in logic with no foundation. Alice knows that Kate is Batwoman, and that Bruce's office is her center of operation (she even shines a bat-signal there!). It would be perfectly logical to assume that she made the connection. The testing bit is simply a non-sequitur; plenty of weapons can be made and tested on armor which fits the specifications, real or inferred, of a particular target, without being in possession of the item as a whole. (00:16:00)

Sammo

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The Twilight Zone picture

The Monsters are Due on Maple Street - S1-E22

Plot hole: The street sign in the beginning is all wrong: it faces the camera rather than the street where the story takes place. In a typical American city, street signs are almost always placed in the direction of the street they are indicating, so drivers on the other street in the intersection know what they are turning onto or passing. In other words, the story is not set on Maple Street! Maple Street is the intersecting street at the end of the road the story is set on.

mirtom

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Haven picture

Over My Head - S3-E4

Plot hole: Daphne was able to hurt Duke because his name appears on her cell when he called, but names only show up on a cell phone if the person's number and name are programed into the phone, and Duke has already said he doesn't know her.

brianjr0412

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Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) picture

My Late Lamented Friend and Partner - S1-E1

Plot hole: When Jeff and Marty are parked, waiting for Sorrenson to exit the building opposite, Jeff says he should call the police. But he immediately follows Sorrenson and has no time to do so. Later, they arrive even though not called.

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Justified picture

When the Guns Come Out - S3-E6

Plot hole: Raylan has a hunch that Winona took the money again from the evidence room, so checks the locker, finds the empty box, and assumes she stole it. When they returned the money in the previous season, he said "Put it back anywhere except for where you found it", so as to make it easier for someone to assume it had been misplaced, rather than lost. So the locker being empty is hardly a smoking gun for him to assume Winona's taken the cash.

Jon Sandys

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Wu Assassins picture

Ladies' Night - S1-E8

Plot hole: The captain's wife tells him that she's taking his daughter with her, not giving him a chance to even say goodbye. During the episode it turns out that she's angry because he missed lunch with them, and when the Metal Wu texts the boss, it also turns out that all this just happens at 1:11 AM! It does not make much sense: she waited over 12 hours to complain to her husband, and she's driving her kid in the middle of the night.

Sammo

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Brooklyn Nine-Nine picture

Halloween III - S3-E5

Plot hole: Amy lets Scully place the watch in the break-room, but how could she have known that after Captain Holt steals the crown out of the locker, he would go there? And not, for example, go back through the window he came from.

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Law & Order: Special Victims Unit picture

Her Negotiation - S14-E24

Plot hole: Although William Lewis burns his fingertips in an attempt to avoid identification, the Special Victims Unit could have identified him early on by examining the remaining unburned area of Lewis' hands, and in good police procedure still record the newly scarred fingerprints, as these new scars actually make his fingerprints more unique. His scarred fingerprints would still be at Alice's apartment crime scene, and during the trial at the end of the episode the prosecution would still have a strong argument for placing Lewis at Alice's apartment, even if the DNA evidence is thrown out because of alleged cross contamination.

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The Practice picture

Honor Code - S6-E7

Plot hole: In the previous episode, when Jimmy offers to apologise to everyone about stealing money to pay back gambling debts, Eugene tells him not to, since if the other firm members found out they'd be obligated to report the theft, which could endanger the firm. This episode, Eugene justifies reporting Jimmy to the bar for saving the boy's life against the client's orders by shouting about Jimmy's gambling theft in front of all the firm members whom he previously said he didn't want to know about it.

Vader47000

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Bad Girls picture

Show generally

Plot hole: In series 5 episode 13 where Jim Fenner frames Karen Betts, the CCTV footage shows this to be July 2003. Yvonne Atkins is killed a few episodes later. In season 7 episode 10 it is said to the be the 1 year anniversary of Yvonne's death, placing this as sometime after July 2004, yet Jim Fenner's tombstone shows a death date of 12th July 2005. In series 7 episode 1 Tina O'Kane sets fire to a clothes shop and is sent to Larkhall, where in series 8 episode 7 it is said she has served 4 months on remand and set free. But in series 7 episode 11, Neil Grayling tells police that Jim Fenner has only been in the post for a few months. The time periods of all of these events cannot be reconciled.

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The Fugitive picture

Second Sight - S4-E7

Plot hole: Kimble enters the bar in the midst of a fight between photographer Howie and a man he tried to blackmail. Kimble comes in too late to hear what the scuffle is about, yet after breaking it up, he somehow knows all about the incriminating photo that sparked it. (00:06:00)

Jean G

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