Spider-Man 2

Plot hole: Harry tells Doc Ock that in order to find Spider-Man he must find Peter first. Doc Ock finds Peter with Mary Jane in the cafe and throws a car through the window straight at them, then later throws Peter against a brick wall. Any normal person would've been killed instantly (or very badly injured), and Doc Ock doesn't yet know that Peter is Spider-Man. Given that Peter is his only lead on Spider-Man, it makes no sense that Doc Ock would try to kill him.

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

Suggested correction: Doc Ock is being controlled by the arms. They aren't behaving rationally.

Creating a series of silly explanations for obvious plot holes never resolves them. These arms were not behaving irrationally. In many scenes they were shown to be very intelligent. A good example is the scene where they attack doctors who try to remove them from Doc Ock's body. Saying that they weren't behaving rationally is absurd.

He may not have been trying to kill Peter, he could've been trying to make more of a scene of his entry, so Peter would take him more seriously and tell him where Spider-Man was. He could've been thinking of it as a risk of killing Peter though, but his arms made him go crazy.

This is only a theory. Theories never resolve mistakes.

It's not a theory. When Otto is first giving his demonstration to everybody at his apartment, a woman asks if the advanced AI for the tentacles would make him susceptible to being controlled. Otto says that yes it would so he shows everybody the inhibitor chip that he designed so he would not fall under its control. After the inhibitor chip gets destroyed, it's seen that the tentacles have not only taken control of his mind by forcing him to commit crimes, but have slowly driven him insane.

This scene is much too confusing for many people. This entry is correct. This is a mistake.

If these tentacles wanted him to finish the experiment then they wouldn't make him kill the person who has valuable information for him.

The arms are influencing his thoughts but not controlling every part of him. Doc Ock still seems to have control when defending himself but they seem to work in tandem with Ock. The only time they work on their own is when he under anesthetic. As we don't see him before he throws the car, we can only speculate the arms were trying to hurt Peter by themselves.

Lummie

It's a cool scene regardless man.

Rob245

Killing Peter would probably send a message to Spider-Man as well, so Ock probably wasn't concerned about being gentle.

Factual error: Dr. Octavius says his fusion relies on tritium and that there is only 25 pounds of the substance in the world. In reality, tritium is a good deal more common than that. From this article (http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/tritium.htm): "It is used in various self-luminescent devices, such as exit signs in buildings, aircraft dials, gauges, luminous paints, and wristwatches. Tritium is also used in life science research, and in studies investigating the safety of potential new drugs." There's also a large region of water near Antarctica which is rich in tritium.

Phoenix

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

Suggested correction: According to the link provided, as well as Wikipedia (and its resources), Tritium is actually quite rare on Earth, and uncommon in natural sources.

The link provided said that tritium "is produced naturally in the upper atmosphere when cosmic rays strike atmospheric gases. Tritium can also be produced by man during nuclear weapon explosions, in reactors intended to produce tritium for nuclear weapons, and by reactors producing electricity." https://trainex.org/web_courses/tritium/reference_pages/tritium%20EPA.pdf.

Other mistake: The Spider-Man outfit that Peter throws in the trash appears to either have the head attached to the body or a very long neck on the mask. It hangs too far down over the edge of trash can to be the same, separate headpiece, with a short neck, that Jameson receives from the trash collector. (Though this may be a deliberate nod to the comic book, it is still a mistake.)

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

Suggested correction: Jameson must have tucked the neck up inside the mask so it would hang correctly on the wall. If he hadn't, the extra material would have bunched up under the chin area and pushed the face upward. Jameson clearly wanted the mask to "look" straight ahead.

Phixius

This entry isn't about how Spider-Man's costume was hung up on Jameson's wall. It's about how the mask was attached to the body portion of the suit when Peter threw it in the trash.

Stupidity: Early in the film, Peter Parker desperately wants to see Mary Jane's performance, but he is turned away at the theatre doors because he is a few minutes late. Defeated, Peter shuffles away and sulks. Seriously? Why couldn't Peter simply enter the theatre through a side door or the roof? He's Spider Man.

Charles Austin Miller

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

Suggested correction: There's two things to consider here. First, a major theme of the film is Peter struggling with keeping his Spider-Man and Peter Parker lives separate. Peter makes every attempt to get to the show on his own, as Peter by riding on his scooter. Simply breaking into the theater after he has been turned away would ruin the idea that keeping his two lives separate is a struggle. It would instead imply the opposite, that Peter can simply use his powers to solve his problems whenever it's convenient. Secondly, the usher makes it clear that no-one is to be admitted after the show has started as this would disturb the guests and possibly the performers as well. Sneaking into the theater could very well ruin the performance and Peter obviously wouldn't want that.

BaconIsMyBFF

If there's one thing we know about Spider-Man, it's that he is incredibly stealthy, often coming and going without any detection whatsoever. He could have easily accessed the building and watched the show from a secluded vantage and even met Mary Jane backstage afterwards. Certainly in this case, using his powers would be justified, given that it was more important for Mary Jane to know Peter attended the show, rather than simply giving up.

Charles Austin Miller

He doesn't want to do any of that, though. He wants to go to the show as Peter, with a ticket, sit in a seat with the rest of the people, enjoy the show, and see Mary Jane afterwards. He stops the car chase as Spider-Man after his scooter is wrecked and instead of web-swinging to the theater, which would have been much faster, he chooses to change back into his regular clothes and drive the criminal's car. Sure, he certainly could have used his powers to get into the theater but the point is he doesn't want to. The fact that he chooses not to use his powers and instead deal with the consequences of hurting Mary Jane's feelings is the entire point.

BaconIsMyBFF

And besides he'd probably get kicked out of the theater if he was caught.

Deliberate mistake: Perhaps to avoid getting an R rating or parental complaints notice how in the operating room massacre none of the doctors appear to bleed nor do Doc Ock's tentacles have blood on them.

Rob245

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

Suggested correction: The problem is in both versions of the film, basically all of the deaths either happen off-camera, or are things like people being shocked to death or killed by being tossed around and presumably having their backs/necks broken. Most of the deaths would be bloodless or near-bloodless anyways, and the camera simply doesn't linger on the bodies enough to show any blood. This is also why the tentacles aren't really bloody. Sure, it was probably ratings-related, but it isn't technically a mistake.

TedStixon

Revealing mistake: When Peter returns to his old life and walks on the notes of "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head", at a certain point he stumbles and behind him some people look at the camera.

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

Suggested correction: They are looking in the direction of the camera. It doesn't necessarily mean they are looking at the camera. They could just as well be looking at Peter since he stumbled and fell, which is a pretty normal thing for people to do when someone falls down.

Phaneron

Actually people behind him keeps watching even when Peter restarts to walk normally. I think if they were really watching just him, they would have looked away immediately as he got to his feet.

Spider-Man 2 mistake picture

Continuity mistake: During the train scene, Spider-Man's mask had gone partially black. We also see it when Spidey puts his mask back on. Yet when Doc brings him to Harry, we don't even see a patch of darkness on his mask.

More mistakes in Spider-Man 2

Dr. Otto Octavius: I finally got lucky in love when I met Rosie here. She was discussing T.S. Eliot, and I was discussing... I still don't know what she was talking about!

More quotes from Spider-Man 2

Trivia: When J. Jonah Jameson is thinking of a name for Octavius, Hoffman shouts out "Dr. Strange" and JJJ says "Already taken." Dr. Strange is another Marvel hero who lives in New York. Director Sam Raimi would later go on to direct Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness after original director Scott Derrickson stepped down.

T Poston

More trivia for Spider-Man 2

Question: How did Harry know where Doc Ock was later located, when Peter asks him for instructions on how to find him and save MJ?

Answer: Unless there is is a deleted scene to shed light on the issue, then it's not really addressed in the movie. It's possible that Doc Ock and Harry had a second meeting that took place off-screen in which Ock revealed to Harry where his hideout was, but as there's nothing really to go on, it's anyone's guess and it's reasonable to consider it a plot hole.

Phaneron

More questions & answers from Spider-Man 2

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.