History IdiotBall / LiveActionFilms

* Downplayed in ''Film/{{Thursday}}''. With just a few moment to arm himself, the hero grabs a frying pan, and then recalls that he has a handgun in the fridge (it's a long story). Granted, he had a ''very'' stressful day, and in the end he made do with the pan as well.

* Granted, the film ''Film/Rampage2018'' starts with the villains- Claire and Brett Wyden of Energyne- making a 'weapon' that turns animals into enranged giants, so they were already operating on an area of questionable intelligence, but they then compound their mistakes by trying to summon the now-giant-and-enraged animals to them by turning on a massive transmitter ''in the middle of Chicago'' that enrages the animals and draws them towards it; Claire states as she turns the transmitter on that they allegedly had 'thousands' of such transmitters, so surely they could have used another one in a less populated area that wouldn't have risked the subsequent collateral damage?

* In ''Film/DieHard'' one must wonder why Tony takes the detonators, one of the ''crucial'' elements to the terrorist's plans, along with him when he goes in alone to hunt [=McClane=]. Why he didn't leave them with Hans, or why the otherwise intelligent Hans didn't ''demand he leave them behind'', is a mystery, and of course [=McClane=] gets his hands on them and almost foils their entire scheme because of it.
** Heinrich had the detonators, and the C4. When Sgt. Powell arrives and circles around in front of the building, [=McClane=] tries to get his attention, another terrorist sees this and warns the rest on the radio. Heinrich and Marco leave the roof they were rigging to blow up to catch [=McClane=]. Why Heinrich took the bag with the detonators and C4 with him is the mystery. [=McClane=] calls Hans after "convincing" Al to call for backup to taunt that he's killed two more of Hans's group (he only caught one name, so said Marco and his friend). After signing off, Hans orders Karl to confirm who's been killed, and Karl reports the Marco and Heinrich were killed, and Heinrich's bag is missing. Hans then reveals Heinrich had the detonators.

* This is one of [[Franchise/EvilDead Ash Williams]] main character traits. He’s a genius when it comes to straight up combat, but when it comes to something he actually has to think about chances are he’s going to screw it up somehow.

*** The partly-disabled Enterprise is threatened by the Genesis Device, which is on a "buildup to detonation." If the Genesis torpedo has to build up energy to detonate, then they could have blown up the ''Reliant'' and cut it short. It's not like they couldn't, either; they proved themselves quite capable of hitting a stationary target even with the nebula interference. Instead, this is never even suggested and the ''Enterprise'' tries to crawl away, necessitating Spock's HeroicSacrifice. This relies on some assumptions that may not be correct. It's stated that once the Genesis countdown is started, a detonation is inevitable (presumably because ingredients are mixed and just need the energy to spark a reaction). It's not explicitly mentioned, but the characters likely believe that hitting the device with a torpedo would trigger the Genesis explosion just as readily as letting the time run out.

*** The whole meeting with Khan. First, how the hell does 1st Officer Chekov, whose duty it is to notify the Captain when they are going into bad situations, completely forget that they are going into that star system where they left that mad tyrant and supergenius Khan Noonein Singh? Given that the man had been a major warlord (at the time in ST canon), had millions slaughtered, and nearly took over and destroyed the Enterprise, you would think that that would be something that he wouldn't forget easily. Second, do the Reliant's sensors not work? Do they not keep star charts or something? The idea that a whole planet could just explode and disappear, causing another planet to somehow take the first planet's identical orbit, and that the two planets were so similar that they fooled 23rd century sensors, and no one thought to question "oh, where's the missing planet that should be in sensor range?" requires a string of Idiot Balls. Chekov was not part of the command crew during "Space Seed". (For that matter, he wasn't on the ''show'' during "Space Seed", although it was later retconned in that he was a minor crewmember somewhere on board that Khan remembered the face of because Khan has total recall). It is entirely possible that Chekov didn't know what star system Khan was dropped off in; after all, Khan's location has to be kept at ''some'' level of security classification, or else any one of several groups that wanted to make trouble for the Federation would simply sail there and turn him loose. Also, even if Chekov ''had'' known, and ''had'' remembered well enough to make the connection, he has no reason to think that there's any connection to the present situation. If he knew the destination, he would also know that Kirk had left Khan without any working means of space travel, he'd know it's not the same planet, and he'd have no reason to suspect that that would have any bearing on the current mission.
*** And once Checkov realised they were in Khan's base why did he not instantly call Reliant and say "Two to beam up, now!" instead of going back outside? Transporters happily work from inside buildings.

** What makes it even worse is that the [[TooDumbToLive blithering idiocy]] of this plan is {{lampshade|Hanging}}d not just by Conner, BUT ALSO BY THE TWO DUMBASS [[WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment INSANO]] REJECTS HE SENT IN THE FIRST PLACE.
** To be fair, he apparently DOES have a means of returning, since he has the Prize (at least, this seems to be implied by the love interest's attempt to confirm that she understood his explanation of the new backstory that completely contradicts the first film). But he clearly has absolutely no interest in doing so. Holding on to an immense IdiotBall seems to be a theme for villains played by Creator/MichaelIronside.

** In ''Film/JurassicWorld'', had Claire or anyone at the Indominus Rex enclosure bothered to check its tracking device ''before'' sending a trio into the pen to investigate, it wouldn't have escaped and none of the bloodshed would have ensued. Even considering that the scientists had no clue it could camouflage as Dr. Wu hadn't told them, and considering the possibility that the tracker may have been ripped out or malfunctioned, checking the location of the tracker and seeing where and if it was moving would have been the first decision of anyone with even a modicum of intelligence, followed by investigating the outside perimeter of the pen for footprints and destroyed foliage, and ''then'' investigating the pen with an entire properly armed team rather than two unarmed men. This is lampshaded in a video by WebVideo/TheCriticalDrinker where he points out that Owen and Claire shouldn't have gone back to the closure that held the Indominus Rex.
-->So Owen and a couple of assholes go inside to investigate. Why are you doing this?! [[DidntThinkThisThrough What are you hoping to find?]] If it really has escaped then you're wasting time looking in the place it escaped from! And if it's still there, it's just gonna spring out and fucking eat you!

** And the townsfolk are perfectly happy to shout "No! It's a trap!" from their doors, but apparently can't be bothered to oh, say, ''pick up the children and/or drag them inside''?
*** Children are outlawed - picking up the children and taking them inside would have gotten them arrested, so taking no action beyond a verbal warning (itself possibly risky) is understandable.

** Poison Ivy: She is shocked that Robin tricked her into revealing her plan and survived her kiss, but after he takes off his rubber lips instead of grabbing him and [[ForcefulKiss forcing a second kiss on him]] to ensure his death she angrily shoves him off of her throne and into the pond so her vines will drone him. Then instead of staying to make sure he drowns, she leaps from her throne and [[BondVillainStupidity tries to leave]], stopping only to taunt Robin by waving him goodbye and saying "see ya!" She treats the situation more like she's breaking up with Robin over a bad kiss instead of trying to kill him for [[HeKnowsTooMuch knowing too much]].

* A very glaring one in ''Film/TerminatorSalvation'' where the Resistance's plot involves sending a stolen shutdown signal to all of Skynet's machines, from their mobile HQ, which needs to be continuous to work. Signals can be traced with current and even rudimentary technology, something anyone with even a feint understanding of signal broadcasting should have known, and pretty much anyone with common sense should have suspected was a possibility. Worse still when it's tested on an HK with a signal strong enough to be received but not strong enough to actually shut it down, the HK detects it and begins ''homing right in on them'' until they increase the power enough to shut it off. [[spoiler:Of course, nothing is made of this possibility, it turns out the signal was just a [[BatmanGambit Honeypot Trap]] by Skynet, and take a wild guess what happens to everyone on the sub]].

* Late in ''Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay'' the T-1000 decides to torture Sarah Connor to force her to call to John, blatantly neglecting its ability to just kill her, mimic her voice and appearance, and do it itself. It's an especially glaring example as mimicking a voice to fool a target is something even the more dated T-800 is capable of and uses to its advantage several times, and the T-1000 just does it itself when it fails to coerce Sarah. [[AllThereInTheManual According to supplementary materials]] the T-1000 behaves this way since it's been programmed to be cruel and sadistic to prevent it from [[WhatIsThisThingYouCallLove developing those pesky human emotions]] (rather than the read-only mode switch the T-800 utilizes), and thus it prioritized the cruel option rather than the pragmatic one.
*** Earlier the T-800 made a strategic blunder when on the phone to the T-1000 pretending to be John's foster mother. By asking a test question the T-1000 could easily discover and then hanging up it alerted the T-1000 that it had been discovered, making it move on to its next target. Had the T-800 said "Sorry Mom, something crazy is going on. I'll be back after midnight" it would have forced the T-1000 to wait for him to return, allowing Arnie and John six hours head start, and they could have rescued Sarah with the T-1000 sitting in John's home waiting. For machines that are supposed to have tactical skills the T-800 screwed up.

* ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' presents us with a number of idiot balls not present in the books. The most blatant example is from ''[[Film/TheLordOfTheRingsTheFellowshipOfTheRing The Fellowship of the Ring]]'', when the Nazgûl attack at Weathertop. Aragorn takes it when he just ''leaves'' the hobbits to fend off the wraiths all by themselves, with the lame excuse of searching out the area. He should know better. Frodo takes it right afterwards when he warns the others and ''puts out the fire'' although the wraiths are afraid of it. They attack immidiately afterwards, and Aragorn fends them off with a ''torch''. The movie, more than the books, drives the IdiotBall home pretty hard.

*** It makes sense if you consider that they're thinking in terms of conventional battle, in which lighting the fire would be a bad idea and putting it out a good one. They simply fail to take into account that the Wraiths don't exist or interact with their environment in conventional ways.
*** Additionally, at no point in the movie prior to this had it been shown that the Ringwraiths were afraid of fire. Frodo and Co. had only just learned of their existence and had no reason to suspect they would be vulnerable to anything in particular. The true Idiot Ball goes to Aragorn, who ''does'' know this and should have warned the hobbits that it could be used to repel them. (It is arguable that Aragorn's sheer badassery in combat is what chases them away, rather than just the fire.)

* In ''Film/MastersOfTheUniverse'', Evil-Lyn tricks Julie into handing her the Cosmic Key by disguising herself as Julie's dead mother. Not once does Julie question how her mother is alive, where her father could be, or why her mother would want the Cosmic Key.
** Somewhat understandable - grief can make people extremely irrational, and her mother had only recently died. She also felt somewhat responsible for her mother's death.

*** Then again, coming up with absolutely ludicrous plans seems to be Skeletor's entire thing, in both this movie and...well, pretty much everything else.

** In ''Film/TheLastJedi'''s backstory, Luke Skywalker detects dark thoughts in his nephew, whom he's known all his life. He decides... to creep into his bedroom in the night, armed, to spy on him.

** The sequel ''Film/TheLostWorldJurassicPark''. "Not into the long grass! Long grass!" Sage advice, the only problem being he was running into the long grass to tell them...
*** Also from the second film is Sarah, a scientist who disregards every piece of common sense in existence in regards to interacting with wildlife, and Nick, who sabotages the hunting party's every step regardless of the cost in lives. Both are responsible for every death on the island.

* ''Film/TheEnemyBelow''. Near the end of the film, the German U-boat captain makes several blatant mistakes (that no officer of his experience should have made) because the script needs him to do so.
** The German U-boat captain falls for one of the oldest tricks in the book - the American ship pretending that after being torpedoed, it's helpless and can't move or attack - and decides to surface. Under the laws of war, the American captain would have been completely justified in immediately opening fire on the U-boat with his deck guns and trying to ram it. The American captain even lampshades how stupid the U-boat captain's action is: "I'm half surprised he took the bait. That's the first foolish thing he's done."
** After warning the American ship that he would fire a second torpedo in ten minutes, the U-boat captain decides to wait ''on the surface'' for the entire ten minutes. Unfortunately, the American ship is still capable of movement and manages to ram the U-boat, leading to their mutual sinking. If the U-boat captain had just submerged after giving the American ship the warning and fired the torpedo while underwater, he could have avoided this.
** The U-boat captain had to know that other American warships were on the way. By sticking around, even for only ten minutes, he took the risk that American ships could arrive, detect him, and continue the attack upon his vessel. If he had to make sure of the American ship's sinking, he should have fired the second torpedo immediately. If he couldn't ethically do that, he could have just slipped away quietly and continued on his way.

*** The heroes get stranded on Tatooine by their hyperdrive failing due to battle damage escaping from Naboo. OK, fine, but they're utterly stymied by the locals not accepting Republic currency as payment for replacement parts. It never seems to occur to them to sell the queen's busted ship and just buy passage to Coruscant. Hell, they could just leave the ship and have Qui-Gon buy passage with the money he already has, which is implied to be significant. Anyone operating a ship that can go there certainly CAN use Republic currency, and would actually need some in order to refuel, resupply, and buy some cargo worth taking back to Tatooine once he got them there.

*** In light of events of the Prequel Trilogy, Emperor Palpatine's response to Luke's refusal to be turned to the Dark Side is truly idiotic: He proceeds to try to torture Luke to death, in front of his father, while Luke begs his father for help, despite the fact that ''offering Anakin the power to preserve the lives of his family was the key to getting him to turn to the Dark Side''. He may have hoped [[ThatManIsDead Anakin was dead]], but he didn't even think of the possibility! Palpatine's plan to sway Luke to the Dark Side to begin with was even more idiotic: simply put it "ha ha I've lured your friends into a death trap... so now you're my apprentice I guess! Go Team Dark Side!" At least with Anakin he actually offered the guy a desirable incentive to [[FaceHeelTurn turn bum on the Republic]]. Palpatine's actions are even more nonsensical, factoring in ''The Rise of Skywalker''; the novelization reveals that Palpatine apparently knew for certain that Darth Vader was beginning to turn to the light side, which makes the fact that he ''turned his back on him whilst torturing his son to death'' even more egregious.

** Most likely it's a sign that his guilt over killing his fellow crewmembers and his isolation from human contact is making him lose his reason. In fact, the former is one of the reasons he later [[spoiler: kills himself.]]

** In their defence, at the time Claire activated it, she assumed they'd only have to deal with ''one'' giant animal (they assumed George would die in a plane crash when the signal provoked him and they didn't know about the giant crocodile), but a giant wolf can still do a lot of damage.

* Several characters grab the Idiot Ball HARD in ''Film/{{Prometheus}}''. For example, taking off the masks in a possibly contaminated area, later keeping them off when, again, a possibly contagious decapitated organism is being found, operating on its head while it is outside of a sterilised box and constantly trying to touch almost anything that looks potentially hazardous (the liquid on the walls, the “sexy snake”, the “virus vessels” etc) can be counted as such. The most prominent examples possibly would be the biologist who decides to try and touch an alien organism in a very traditional attack stance and, later on, the opening of the exterior hatch when a scientist who had turned up missing suddenly appears, lying face-down in the dirt — the crewmen simply gape at the twisted remnants of the corpse of the scientist right up until it stands up and attacks them.

* In ''[[Film/HomeAlone Home Alone 2: Lost In New York]]'' the Concierge misses a ''golden'' opportunity to capture Kevin when the kid runs up to him begging for help because he was being chased by criminals. Had the man played along and offered to call the police claiming he wanted to ''protect'' Kevin, the kid would have happily sat there and munched a cookie while the cops arrived rather than running amok through the hotel thinking he's going to be arrested.

* In the second installment of ''Film/TheNeverendingStory'', Bastian seems to be clutching the idiot ball for dear life, for no other reason is how easily he's manipulated by the villain. You'd think he'd be less inclined to make wishes, particularly for such reasons, when the self-professed villain and her bird-boy lackey (who he should be able to notice is working for the villain) both keep insisting he make wishes. Not only that, he accepts magical (possibly boobytrapped) gifts from her and despite knowing and having far more reason to trust Atreyu than her, for some reason continues act like Atreyu is some kind of idiot when he insists the villain shouldn't be trusted. He clutches it even harder in the third sequel, where he barely does anything but be a coward.

*** The whole meeting with Khan. First, how the hell does 1st Officer Chekov, whose duty it is to notify the Captain when they are going into bad situations, completely forget that they are going into that star system where they left that mad tyrant and supergenius Khan Noonein Singh? Given that the man had been a major warlord (at the time in ST canon), had millions slaughtered, and nearly took over and destroyed the Enterprise, you would think that that would be something that he wouldn't forget easily. Second, do the Reliant's sensors not work? Do they not keep star charts or something? The idea that a whole planet could just explode and disappear, causing another planet to somehow take the first planet's identical orbit, and that the two planets were so similar that they fooled 23rd century sensors, and no one thought to question "oh, where's the missing planet that should be in sensor range?" requires a string of [[IdiotBall idiot balls]] that could be an offscreen IdiotPlot in itself. Chekov was not part of the command crew during "Space Seed". (For that matter, he wasn't on the ''show'' during "Space Seed", although it was later retconned in that he was a minor crewmember somewhere on board that Khan remembered the face of because Khan has total recall). It is entirely possible that Chekov didn't know what star system Khan was dropped off in; after all, Khan's location has to be kept at ''some'' level of security classification, or else any one of several groups that wanted to make trouble for the Federation would simply sail there and turn him loose. Also, even if Chekov ''had'' known, and ''had'' remembered well enough to make the connection, he has no reason to think that there's any connection to the present situation. If he knew the destination, he would also know that Kirk had left Khan without any working means of space travel, he'd know it's not the same planet, and he'd have no reason to suspect that that would have any bearing on the current mission.

* A very glaring one in ''Film/TerminatorSalvation'' where the Resistance's plot involves sending a stolen shutdown signal to all of Skynet's machines, from their mobile HQ, which needs to be continuous to work. Signals can be traced with current and even rudimentary technology, something anyone with even a feint understanding of signal broadcasting should have known, and pretty much anyone with common sense should have suspected was a possibility. Worse still when it's tested on an HK with a signal strong enough to be received but not strong enough to actually shut it down, the HK detects it and begins ''homing right in on them'' until they increase the power enough to shut it off. [[spoiler:Of course, nothing is made of this possibility, it turns out the signal was just a [[BatmanGambit Honeypot Trap]] by Skynet, and [[KillEmAll take a wild guess what happens to everyone on the sub]]]].