The Abyss

Stupidity: Granted, Coffee is suffering from "high-pressure nervous syndrome," but if you're a Navy SEAL, wouldn't you notice whether or not your pistol has a magazine in it? Monk pulls the clip out of his jacket and starts knocking rounds out of it for the rig crew's benefit; the same dramatic effect could have been achieved with a handful of cartridges he could let slip through his fingers. You could argue that Monk didn't have enough time to unload the gun and replace the magazine, but in that case, I think the scene where Monk briefly had the gun should have been a bit longer. (Even had the empty magazine been IN the gun, Coffee still might notice the difference in weight, but that would be easier to suspend your disbelief for.) (01:43:53)

rbryant73

Stupidity: Monk steals the magazine from Coffey's SIG. However, I don't see how he could have jacked the slide to eject the round in the chamber without being noticed. Someone as paranoid as Coffey was at this point would not have left the chamber empty. (Just FYI, when you load an automatic pistol with a magazine, you have to pull back and release the slide to load the first bullet in the barrel.)

Grumpy Scot

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: Since we are never shown that Coffey did chamber a round, we cannot assume that he did based on his personality alone. Therefore this isn't a plot hole. However, it is ridiculous that he is threatening people with a gun without a chambered round. This entry should be listed as "Stupidity."

BaconIsMyBFF

SEALs don't carry weapons without a round chambered. The "maybe" here falls much more on the side of the round being in the chamber. And "Stupidity" wasn't an option available when this entry was originally submitted. :).

Grumpy Scot

Stupidity: Yes it would have affected the rest of the film but it still begs the question why they didn't unhook the cable attached to the rig immediately after setting the rig down? All the disaster could have been avoided from that point on.

jbrbbt

Stupidity: Why wasn't the umbilical to the "Explorer" unhooked from the rig after the rig was set down? Everyone knew things were going to get rough with the hurricane coming, so the umbilical should have been taken care of before the hurricane became a factor.

Stupidity: Coffey uses the submersible "Big Geek" to carry the armed nuclear bomb to the NTIs. If Coffey was that desperate to blow up the aliens, he could have much more easily set the timer for 30 minutes, driven one of the submersibles far out over the abyss past the drop-off, and simply dropped the bomb down and let it sink under its own weight.

Watcher1

The Abyss mistake picture

Visible crew/equipment: During Bud and Coffey's fight in the lab, we see a lightbulb swinging from side to side between the two men. If you look closely, you can see a hand (belonging to a third person) pushing the lightbulb. The only people in the room are Bud and Coffey. (01:44:16)

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Bud Brigman: The guy is on his own, he's cut off from his chain of command, he's showing signs of pressure-induced psychosis, and he has a nuclear weapon. So as a personal favour to me, could you put your tongue in neutral for a while?!

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Trivia: In 1987 Thomas Knoll made a program called "Display", as a side project. He showed it to his brother who worked at Industrial Light & Magic, and they used Display as the basis for their own effects program, which was used to create the alien water tube. The software was refined and named Photoshop, eventually demonstrated to Adobe in 1988, who bought the rights to distribute it.

manthabeat

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Question: In the extended version, when Bud Brigman is met by the aliens, what were the images they were showing him?

Answer: Most of it was television news coverage about the increasing tensions between the US and USSR as it was playing out earlier in the movie. Additional archival footage from previous years' wars implied that the NTIs had been on Earth for quite a long time.

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