History Main / PlotHole

* It's telling that fans of ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure'' made an entire [[MemeticMutation meme]] out of this trope, HandWaving such points with the phrase 'Araki Forgot'.
** In ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventurePhantomBlood Phantom Blood]]'', a big part of the reason Dio is such a threatening antagonist is because of his [[AnIcePerson Vaporizing Freeze]] ability, which nullifies [[ThePowerOfTheSun Hamon attacks]]. In ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureBattleTendency Battle Tendency]]'', however, the main antagonist's army is supposedly made up of fully-fledged vampires, as SequelEscalation, but not a single one of them can use Vaporizing Freeze, so they crumble under an assault from any Hamon user. Even the part's StarterVillain, stated to be a significantly more skilled vampire than Dio was, never uses the Freeze despite having multiple opportunities to do so, and even being able to use Dio's EyeBeams from the beginning.
** An important detail in the final chapters of ''Phantom Blood'' is that Jonathan and Erina have no means of escaping the ship their on via boat, which thus means Erina is forced to use Dio's coffin to escape. Despite this, Dio's body [[spoiler:(or rather Dio's head on Jonathan's body)]] is pulled out of the ocean in what appears to be the exact same coffin, even though [[spoiler: Jonathan died nowhere near the coffin itself]]. The ''Over Heaven'' light novel attempts to explain this by stating that [[spoiler: Erina took Jonathan's body with her so that she could give it a proper burial]], but even Dio (who's narrating) admits that that explanation has a good number of problems to it, and may just be his own biases at work.
** The absolute biggest one is in ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureStardustCrusaders Stardust Crusaders]]'', which features a total of two scenes of villain DIO using Joseph's Stand, Hermit Purple. When we finally reach the climactic battle with DIO, he uses his own Stand, The World, and his use of the Hermit is never addressed. A non-canon light novel indicates that it was actually Jonathan Joestar's Stand, 'The Passion', and WordOfGod indicated that The World was originally intended to have the power to mimic the abilities of any stand, but this plan was changed midway through, author Hirohiko Araki having completely forgotten that he'd already alluded to it in published canon. A canon explanation for the phenomenon still doesn't exist.
** To a smaller degree, but still noticeable, the lifeforms created by Giorno Giovanna's Gold Experience in ''[[Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureGoldenWind Golden Wind]]'' are initially shown on multiple occasions to deflect any damage they take back to the attacker. After a few arcs, however, this is completely forgotten about; it's particularly noticeable after the Baby Face arc, in which Giorno learns that he can use Gold Experience to create partial duplicates of himself and his allies to heal wounds. After any significant amount of such healing, Bucciarati's Gang should become essentially immune to damage. [[AnyoneCanDie They do not.]]

* In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil7Biohazard'', the villain Lucas locks people in a ''Film/SawI''-esque trap he calls "Happy Birthday." [[spoiler:The puzzle requires you to light a candle and put it on a birthday cake with a bomb in it. However, the trap is that prior to that, you uncork a barrel full of fuel which soaks the room and catches fire when the cake explodes - locking the player into an inferno which kills them.]] The intended solution is [[spoiler: for the player to watch a video created by a previous victim of the trap, allowing them to bypass the need to open the fuel barrel, so the cake doesn't set the room on fire.]] The problems with that: [[spoiler:even though Ethan watches the video, he is still surprised when the cake explodes even though logically he should know it will. The room which has canonically already been set on fire (possibly multiple times) is made of wood which bears no marks of this. And the video itself was being shot on a head-mounted camera which should have been destroyed in the same fire that killed the character wearing it.]]

* ''Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay'' has a rather well-known one. In the [[Film/TheTerminator first film]], it's stated that only organisms with living tissue can travel through time, hence why the T-800 has to have a human skin covering. This film, however, shows the T-1000 traveling through time even though it's made entirely of liquid metal. Some people have argued that it might be able to ''imitate'' living tissue, but this is never stated in the film.

* In ''Film/SeeNoEvil2'', there is absolutely no explanation given as to how Jacob Goodnight managed to survive the original film. For one, although nigh-indestructible murderers are common in slashers, Jacob was very clearly portrayed in the first movie as a normal human being who just happened to be of hulking size - though he did live after getting shot in the head, there actually is a slim chance for a regular person to survive such an injury. Second, the end of the film practically goes out of its way to ensure the audience that he died, as he's not only stabbed in the eye, but he falls several stories and his heart is outright shown to have been punctured, which is completely guaranteed to kill anyone. One could say that a sequel was not anticipated at the time, but with the long gap between releases, it would've been easy to retcon Jacob as some sort of undead creature. Yet, the only line in the sequel alluding to his survival was that he "somehow faked his death", even though the original film blatantly showed this to not be the case, and given that it takes place right after the first, this makes even less sense.

*** The novelization ended up explaining this -- [=McCoy=] was ''not'' going to risk waking up that guy and go "Oh, hey, does your blood heal all wounds, too?" and risk having ''two'' superhuman psychopaths running around.

* In ''Film/ZackSnydersJusticeLeague'', it is established that Darkseid is the one who brought the three Mother Boxes to Earth in his first attempt to conquer it, and that Earth successfully repelled his invasion, being the only world to ever do so. Later on we learn that Earth hides the Anti-Life Equation, something Darkseid has desired since his first attempt to invade Earth, and that his first invasion was an attempt to acquire it. What the film doesn't even attempt to explain is how Darkseid somehow forgot where this world was. Steppenwolf, Dasaad and Darkeid are all surprised to learn that Earth was the world that resisted. Steppenwolf recognizes Atlanteans and Amazons, and also seems to be aware of the Old Gods Ares and Zeus, which makes sense because Apokolips fought against them on Earth previously, but somehow he does not recognize the planet itself? This could maybe be explained by Darkseid (either intentionally or unintentionally) not recording where he was defeated out of embarrassment...except for the simple fact that this world already has three Mother Boxes on it, and as previously explained, the only way those get onto a planet is Darkseid bringing them there. So the second Steppenwolf saw that there were Boxes on Earth, he should have realized where he was, because no other planet ever repelled Darkseid's invasion. No matter how you shake it, this detail does not make sense.

** The lack of explanation about the Marauders leads over into all the successive films, as in ''[[Film/HarryPotterAndTheGobletOfFire Goblet of Fire]]'' and ''[[Film/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix Order of the Phoenix]]'' Harry refers to Sirius as Padfoot for no apparent reason. The significance of his patronus being a stag and Lily and [[spoiler: Snape]]'s being a doe is left unexplained, which also causes Harry's insistence that it was James who saved him and Sirius from the dementors in [=PoA=] to look incredibly stupid.

* ''Franchise/Starcraft'':
** In the manual of ''Videogame/Starcraft'', it is setup a fiveway conflict between the Terrans, Zerg and Protoss. The Zerg want to assimilate the Protoss, but need an army of psychic supersoldiers or they will lose hard. The Terrans were fighting each other for independence. The Zerg invade with the intent of conscripting the Terrans into their army of psychic soldiers. The Protoss want to stop the Zerg from achieving parity, so they start killing Terrans before some Protoss rebel out of conscience. The Zerg ultimately succeeded and sent a psychic army of infested Terrans to defeat the Protoss. Then the Dark Templar show up with a means to defeat the Zerg, but the Khalai distrust them. Due to gameplay limitations and a condensed script, the game itself could never realize this epic conflict. This left us with the enormous plot hole that the Zerg's search for psionic powers ultimately proved superfluous to the game's plot, as they are never brought into the equation when the swarm aims for the Protoss homeworld. The plot twist of Infested Kerrigan not only offered no apparent benefit to the Zerg, since she was left on Char and provided no bonus during the invasion of Aiur, but her ego got Zasz killed. The Protoss' psychic might offered no advantage against the overwhelming numbers of the Zerg swarms.

*** [[spoiler:After the Allience is dragged into the Paths dimention and make one last attempt to talk Eren out of continuing the Rumbling, he flat out declared that he would not leave Paradis Island's fate to chance and would not stop]].

** An important detail in the final chapters of ''Phantom Blood'' is that Jonathan and Erina have no means of escaping the ship their on via boat, which thus means Erina is forced to use Dio's coffin to escape. Despite this, Dio's body [[spoiler:(or rather Dio's head on Jonathan's body)]] is pulled out of the ocean in what appears to be the exact same coffin, even though [[spoiler: Jonathan died nowhere near the coffin itself]]. The ''Outer Heaven'' light novel attempts to explain this by stating that [[spoiler: Erina took Jonathan's body with her so that she could give it a proper burial]], but even Dio (who's narrating) admits that that explanation has a good number of problems to it, and may just be his own biases at work.

* ''WesternAnimation/ToyStory2'' created one, thanks to fleshing out Woody's backstory from the [[WesternAnimation/ToyStory original film]]. Woody almost certainly had to have been owned by someone else besides Andy (due to the age of ''Woody's Roundup'', an obviously fifties puppet show Western), probably Andy's father, but Andy is the only owner Woody talks about. Unless Andy's dad shoved Woody in a box the day after he got him (unlikely for a child of the fifties with less entertainment options), that is. It was only years later revealed that WordOfGod had an ''extremely'' convoluted backstory to explain this, revealing that exactly such a thing did happen (in a way) and that Woody is a one-of-a-kind prototype. Of course, this is never at any point mentioned in the movies themselves.

** Let's not even get into the many contradicting side effects of dark echo.

Can overlap with {{Retcon}} and ContinuitySnarl. A CliffhangerCopout can ''create'' a Plot Hole if a HandWave is handled poorly. An attempt to resolve or remove a Plot Hole that introduces ''another'' Plot Hole is a VoodooShark. Contrast WhatHappenedToTheMouse for potential plots that get dropped, then [[ChekhovsBoomerang picked up]].

* ''Series/SonsOfAnarchy'': Towards the end of Season 1, the CowboyCop ATF Agent Stahl attempts to fracture the charter by setting up Opie to look like he's gone into witness protection. She then cuts Opie loose because she doesn't have enough to hold him, but bugs his phone and car on the chance that he says something incriminating. SAMCRO has every reason to believe that Opie's the snitch and of course they do believe this, which is confirmed in their minds when they find the bugs. Now at this point, the Cops and ATF know that A) either SAMCRO or Opie himself discovered the bugs and destroyed them- in either case they are not going to produce any evidence, B) SAMCRO is extremely likely to murder Opie as a result of their little trick, and C) in 24 hours, the US Attorney will reveal his case, charging Opie and proving that he is ''not'' the snitch. Hale, the FairCop, is torn up about what to do - reasoning that if he tells SAMCRO that Opie is not the snitch, he is leaking classified information. But all he needs to do is keep him safe for one night, and the answer should be staring him in the face: ''arrest Opie'' on a trumped-up charge (which is hardly as bad as the crap they pulled to get to this point) and keep him off the streets for 24 hours. The truth comes out the very next day. But he dithers so long that Opie's wife is murdered in a botched hit because he was AcquittedTooLate, setting off the events of Season 2.

** Another one, again acknowledged by Joss Whedon, is the nature of Angel's curse at the hands of gypsies. Angel's soul is restored, and his conscience along with it, forcing him to live the guilt of having murdered thousands of people. Great so far, but the clause about losing his soul again if he ever experiences a moment of happiness - with potentially centuries to millennia in which to happen upon such a moment - just ensured he'd eventually resume his body count. Not only that, but their contingency plan involved two gypsies who were nowhere near in Angel's league in terms of combat. This is actually addressed in the show when it's revealed that uncover gypsy Jenny Calendar is not fully sold on the idea, to which her uncle tells her that they don't make the rules and they worship vengeance as a concept that is arbitrary and inscrutible in nature. This has its own share of problems. For one, if this form of gypsy-ism is still an active religion, it's reasonable to assume it must have ceded enough ground to contemporary attitudes that the gypsies would use their magic to give Angel a ''better'' curse or at least do anything other than wait and see if he loses his soul, then try to re-curse him before he kills too many people. To not do so would be like the Christian Church still burning "witches" at the stake in the 21st century while in reality it has accepted evolution. And if the religion has all but died out, so would its ability to keep tabs on an immortal being over the course of nearly a century. Holtz lampshaded the problem in ''Series/{{Angel}}'': "Gypsies have a knack for creative vengeance, but where they fail is in the execution of justice."

** To a smaller degree, but still noticeable, the lifeforms created by Giorno Giovanna's Gold Experience in ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureVentoAureo Vento Aureo]]'' are initially shown on multiple occasions to deflect any damage they take back to the attacker. After a few arcs, however, this is completely forgotten about; it's particularly noticeable after the Baby Face arc, in which Giorno learns that he can use Gold Experience to create partial duplicates of himself and his allies to heal wounds. After any significant amount of such healing, Bucciarati's Gang should become essentially immune to damage. [[AnyoneCanDie They do not.]]

Can overlap with {{Retcon}} and ContinuitySnarl. A CliffhangerCopout can ''create'' a Plot Hole if a HandWave is handled poorly. An attempt to resolve or remove a Plot Hole that introduces another Plot Hole is a VoodooShark. Contrast WhatHappenedToTheMouse for potential plots that get dropped, then [[ChekhovsBoomerang picked up]].

** In [[VisualNovel/DanganronpaTriggerHappyHavoc the original]], there is a bloodstained classroom on the top floor which Monokuma says he did not alter. However, if [[spoiler:the students used the school as a shelter for about a year]], why did no one clean it up?

** At the end of ''Film/FantasticFourRiseOfTheSilverSurfer'' we learn that [[spoiler: The Silver Surfer has the power to destroy Galactus, and uses it on him.]] This creates the following problems:

* ''Film/WonderWoman2017'': The InUniverse tale Diana's mother tells her as a child. Diana's mother tells her a story of humanity's and the Amazons' origins. It goes from "The gods sent us to create love. Things were okay for a while. Then your mother led a revolt to take us out of slavery."

** ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'': During the events of ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'', we get a look at some of the advanced technology floating around in this universe including biometric scanners, retinal scanners and holographic meshes that can totally disguise Natasha's face. During the events of ''Civil War''... Zemo sneaks onto the ultra secure base where Bucky is being held, apparently using nothing more complex than a fake passport. When Tony learns the truth, we find out that all Zemo did was meet the psychiatrist at the airport, killed him in the hotel and then stole his ID. He didn't hack any computers to change files as Tony can immediately pull up the correct ones. This means that after catching Bucky and sending for the UN's best shrink, the CIA - did not arrange to meet the man at the airport, or at his hotel, didn't know what the real man looked like before he arrived, didn't check with anyone what the real man looked like before he arrived and when Zemo turned up... they let him in to speak with the most dangerous, wanted criminal in history without so much as checking his finger prints, or googling the real dude on Facebook to see if his pictures line up. There is NO good explanation how Zemo could get into that base without the use of advanced technology.

* The eponymous hacked game in ''Fanfic/PokemonStrangledRed'' completely redoes this part of the original Pokémon Red game to feature Miki's death and [[spoiler:Steven's fall from grace]].

* In he [[Recap/TitansS3E11TheCallIsComingFromInsideTheHouse Titans (2018) episode "The Call Is Coming From Inside The House,"]] Gotham City is under martial law, supplies are scarce, and the one shop that is shown to be open has raised their prices accordingly. Despite this, Scarecrow has no trouble ordering a pizza and having it delivered to Wayne Manor, because the story requires that he kidnap the delivery boy as a test subject.

* In [[Recap/TitansS3E11TheCallIsComingFromInsideTheHouse Titans(2018) episode "The Call Is Coming From Inside The House,"]] Gotham City is under martial law, supplies are scarce, and the one shop that is shown to be open has raised their prices accordingly. Despite this, Scarecrow has no trouble ordering a pizza and having it delivered to Wayne Manor, because the story requires that he kidnap the delivery boy as a test subject.