Best crime TV stupidity of all time

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Batman: The Animated Series picture

Heart of Ice - S1-E3

Stupidity: Ferris Boyle tries to cover up his sabotage of Victor Fries' experiment, but he opts to store the incriminating security tape of the event in a filing cabinet instead of simply destroying the footage.

Phaneron

More Batman: The Animated Series stupidity
Monk picture

Mr. Monk and the Astronaut - S4-E14

Stupidity: Steve Wagner is shown expertly constructing an elaborate hanging machine, but he adds a superfluous complication by having it triggered by a garage door remote control that he posts to the address in question. Anything could (and does) go wrong! Why doesn't he simply have it triggered by a bog standard timing device that you can buy in a hardware store for a tenner? I am not sure I'd trust him with my space shuttle.

More Monk stupidity
More Batman stupidity
Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: He was being blackmailed by Gary Roberts. He "reopened" the case as a ruse to kill Roberts.

Bishop73

More Murder, She Wrote stupidity
Castle picture

Crossfire - S8-E22

Stupidity: When Castle and Beckett discuss the trap LokSat set for them at the dead drop and any forthcoming retribution, Beckett comments that her dad should be relatively safe from reprisal because he's on business out of town. Someone as smart as Beckett would never make such brain-deadly dumb assumption; considering how powerful and how dangerous he's supposed to be, especially with the resources of the CIA at his disposal, LokSat surely would have no trouble finding and getting to, and certainly no qualms about eliminating, Beckett's dad if it stopped her in her pursuit of him.

Cubs Fan

More Castle stupidity
Spider-Man picture

The Return of Hydro-Man: Part 1 - S5-E7

Stupidity: When Spider-Man is working in the lab, he uses his webbing to barricade the door shut so no-one interrupts him. When Debra Whitman shows up and asks who is in there, he identifies himself as Peter Parker. When he is finished with his work, he leaves out of the window so that by the time the security guards break the door down, he has vanished. Since he used his webbing to keep the door closed, it would be pretty easy for Debra and the security guards to figure out that Peter is Spider-Man since Spider-Man's webbing is at the scene and Peter seemingly vanished into thin air.

Phaneron

More Spider-Man stupidity
Line of Duty picture

Episode #3.1 - S3-E1

Stupidity: Ronan Murphy is left handed. Watch carefully as he disarms himself. His weapon is replaced in his right hand. In a suspicious shooting, they never thought to check something so basic? (00:04:12)

More Line of Duty stupidity
CSI: Miami picture

Point of Impact - S8-E8

Stupidity: After talking to the bartender, Calleigh goes back the lab and talks to Caine, and he wonders if they got a false positive from the vic's blood alcohol. Calleigh then gives a detailed description of how that could happen; Caine already knows how (obviously this was done for the audience, to explain it, but in the context of the show, it makes no sense).

brianjr0412

More CSI: Miami stupidity
Justified picture

The Promise - S6-E13

Stupidity: Markham lets Ava call her uncle's phone, and she doesn't let on that Boyd answers instead. He later says "I don't trust anyone", but he didn't demand she put the call on speaker for transparency, he's quite happy (at the time) to just hear one side of the call.

Jon Sandys

More Justified stupidity
Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries picture

King Memses' Curse - S1-E13

Stupidity: The bad guys tied up, bound and gagged a 100 pounds teenager, but left the policeman they captured completely free of any restraints whatsoever in the same room (no real reason why they wouldn't have killed him).

Sammo

More Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries stupidity
Hustle picture

Lest Ye Be Judged - S5-E3

Stupidity: The plan to infiltrate Emma into the coroner's office in a body bag is stupid. She is wearing a paramedic's uniform, and we see later when Mickey arrives, nobody is checking ID papers. How would she know that there was nobody in the room when she emerged from the body bag? If she could walk about the building without being stopped, why couldn't she simply walk in through the wide open front door in the first place?

More Hustle stupidity
CSI: NY picture

Zoo York - S2-E3

Stupidity: When Mac and Lindsay are reconstructing the stab wound found on their victim on their pig specimen, a couple of the weapons they use are long, thin knives; since they obviously don't match the circular wound, Mac at the very least would know those could be excluded by default.

Cubs Fan

More CSI: NY stupidity
Prison Break picture

Allen - S1-E2

Stupidity: Michael is shown to test the dimensions of the Allen key against a tattoo. Why not just try it in the bolt? It would be a lot more accurate. (00:37:00)

Ssiscool

More Prison Break stupidity
Death in Paradise picture

Episode #3.2 - S3-E2

Stupidity: Throughout the whole episode, no effort at all is made to find out where were the chocolates purchased, and the bottle of champagne that accompanied the box(es) is completely ignored, not even addressed in a throwaway line (such as that it's too common to trace, or whatnot). It's not directly part of the murder trick so it not even considered. The explanation of why the other incriminating box is still there is also quite ridiculous, since the murderer is left alone for enough time to do strike again with a very timely effort involving her leaving the only room of her bungalow (which involves her, the most known and conspicuous person on set, stalk her in plain view for an undisclosed amount of time), but could not find a few seconds to take a walk a few feet away and bury the box in the sand or bushes, flush the poisoned chocolates down a toilet, throw them at sea, just about anything. It's a bit of chocolate and cardboard, not exactly hard to dispose of that in a big set in the wild.

Sammo

More Death in Paradise stupidity
Batwoman picture

Pilot - S1-E1

Stupidity: Batman and his security guy Luke Fox have the worst IT security in America, since the security network of Wayne Enterprises has had the same password for years, and it is just six letters.

Sammo

More Batwoman stupidity
The Blacklist picture

The Forecaster (No. 163) - S4-E10

Stupidity: Farnsworth tells Charnquist they've been compromised by a girl listening in on their phone calls and that Charnquist needs to take care of it. He is able to identify the girl, elude FBI, tries to burn his apartment down, is able to gains access to Maggie's apartment and knock out Aram in order to kidnap Maggie. He's a killer who works for someone who has arranged dozen of murders, and knows "take care of her" means kill her. There is absolutely no reason for Charnquist not to have just killed Maggie, Aram, and Fiona. He had opportunity and he ends up killing 3 cops in order to kidnap her and kidnapping Maggie would not have solved anything.

Bishop73

More The Blacklist stupidity
Magnum, P.I. picture

Tropical Madness - S2-E6

Stupidity: The elaborate plan of the bad guy obviously involves driving Magnum increasingly crazy and create a rift between Higgins and him, but practically all the most damning episodes are outside the bad guy's control, and all the steps he takes are actually harmful towards him should have Magnum been in any way competent at his job. He couldn't have predicted that Magnum would paint the whole episode under the ridiculous light of "sumo wrestler and midget" instead of "big guy and small guy", he couldn't have predicted he'd stain himself, he'd try and force himself upon the girl, he wouldn't check the girl's background.

Sammo

More Magnum, P.I. stupidity
South Park picture

The Succubus (a.k.a. Chef's Mama) - S3-E3

Stupidity: When Kenny and Cartman are sitting on the bench, Cartman can't start the tape as he has fallen asleep. Kenny then tries to wake him up, but wouldn't it have made far more sense for him to just start it himself, as he is sitting right next to it? Cartman's job was to push the play button. It was not like he had to rewind, fast forward or even eject the tape, so all Kenny had to do was just simply push the play button and tape would have started to play.

Shay

More South Park stupidity
NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service picture

Trojan Horse - S4-E23

Stupidity: When the bad guys are discussing the plans inside a private jet, the scene finishes and there's a shot of the plane in the sky. The plane immediately veers to the right, and spins almost 90°, as fighter jets do when they turn quickly. If there were three people inside, (one of whom was in the bathroom) they would have been thrown about the cabin quite violently. (00:11:25)

yallmindifipraisegod

More NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service stupidity
Dexter picture

Goodbye Miami - S8-E10

Stupidity: After Dexter tells Hannah that the U.S. Marshals have distributed her picture everywhere, she questions how she will be able to flee Miami for Argentina. Dexter reasons he and Harrison can leave with her because the authorities won't be looking for a woman traveling with her "husband and child." It doesn't matter who she is or isn't traveling with. If the authorities have shared her picture, she's going to be flagged when she goes through security at the airport, which Dexter should certainly know. This is made all the more egregious when she takes Harrison to the hospital later in the episode and is ID'd by the receptionist.

Phaneron

More Dexter stupidity

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