Idiot Plots

[Judge Dredd]

An "idiot plot" is where the story of a piece of media only works because the characters are doing something stupid. I put this in the media board, but anything, films, games, TV, books, it's all good.

I thought about this today when my parents had Midsummer Murders on. The killer walks up a woman in a sun lounger, puts one hand over her mouth, then injects her with poison. She just lies there and lets it happen. What's more, there's a guy standing about 30-40 feet away, and doesn't hear her scream because he's talking into his dictaphone. Also, the killer was careful to make sure there were no air bubbles in the syringe because you can't risk hurting someone when injecting them with poison.

This got me wondering about other examples like Spec Ops The Line and Last of Us 2, though I've not played any of those personally. Fallout 4 also counts.


Specs Ops The Line has a plot twist that the main character is crazy and all the things that happened were hallucinations. The problem? It's a squad game, but no one in the squad second guesses or confronts the main character on why he's shooting random hanging corpses or talking to nobody on a broken radio.

The Last of Us 2 has an obvious one. The lead character from the previous game gets killed by a troon because he blindly trusts random strangers in a world full of raiders.

In Fallout 4, you're frozen in a nuclear bunker. You're unfrozen many years (about 200 iirc) in the future, your baby stolen, your wife killed, and then you're RE-FROZEN. Then you're thawed out some unknown amount of time later and go looking to rescue your baby. I put that part in block caps because my assumption was that any amount of time could've past, from a minute to centuries. The so called "twist" is that it's been 60 years or so since your baby was kidnaped, and he's an old man now. However, the game never gives you that line of questioning. The game always treats it as if it's a baby that was kidnapped recently.

What are some of the biggest idiot plots you can think of?

 

[Maniacal Foreigner]

The Last of Us 2 has an obvious one. The lead character from the previous game gets killed by a troon because he blindly trusts random strangers in a world full of raiders.

She's not a troon, just inexplicably well fed and roided up in a fucking zombie apocalypse.

 

[Gorillion others]

Most of the Gundam anime.

 

[Cat tit bingo]

The other cast aways really should have just eaten gilligan

 

[DeadwastePrime]

She's not a troon, just inexplicably well fed and roided up in a fucking zombie apocalypse.

i mean they had the resources to pull it off apparently.

 

[KateHikes14]

Probably my least favorite trope because of how rampant it is, and basically all of TV shows require idiot plots because of how incredibly lazy and shitty the writers are, but to offer a very mild defense of spec ops the line's writing issues, the squad isn't a democracy, he's in charge of it and they are written to be similarly but not as totally deranged as him. Once they massacre the platoon, they are both complicit and affected by it, similar to gangs requiring a crime of varying depravity to enter. I think the issues there are kinda fridge logic, kinda real issues.

 

[GhaeicSD]

This got me wondering about other examples like Spec Ops The Line and Last of Us 2, though I've not played any of those personally.

I'm not going to bat for TLOU2, but I will absolutely say that The Line is a game that completely relies on the player entering the game blind and experiencing it themselves, without any outside influence. It's one of those games that lives and dies on how invested the player gets in the characters and plot and takes advantage of that investment by fucking with the player in ways movies or TV shows can't; by treating the player as a character. Undertale is another example of that kind of game, but I think The Line pulled it off better personally. There are several in-game reasons for the inconsistencies as well, but I'm not gonna 'tism out about it here because ultimately it's small potatoes compared that the previous point.

If you're looking for an idiot plot, YIIK is a quintessential idiot plot, especially the old version. Quite literally every single major story beat is retarded and it makes absolutely no sense start to finish. The devs have been trying to fix it, and kudos to them for that, but I personally think it's a total lost cause because of how fatally flawed it is to the core.

 

[Judge Dredd]

Probably my least favorite trope because of how rampant it is, and basically all of TV shows require idiot plots because of how incredibly lazy and shitty the writers are

One I heard of (I don't know the show) had the main characters searching for a terrorist with a nuke. They turn to some random drug dealer for information, because the show was normally a cop show, and that's what cop shows do.

the squad isn't a democracy, he's in charge of it and they are written to be similarly but not as totally deranged as him. Once they massacre the platoon, they are both complicit and affected by it, similar to gangs requiring a crime of varying depravity to enter. I think the issues there are kinda fridge logic, kinda real issues.

Having not played it myself, I don't know the order of events. I'm also not a military man. Still, the guy being that insane should at least make them question it, right?

Related to that, the game also forces your hand then tries to guilt trip the player.

YIIK is a quintessential idiot plot, especially the old version.

There's more than one?

I personally think it's a total lost cause because of how fatally flawed it is to the core.

I feel the same about various games like Saints Row Reboot where people said it could be fixed in patches. I've never seen a patch completely rewrite a story before. The closest was the ending of Mass Effect 3.

She's not a troon, just inexplicably well fed and roided up in a fucking zombie apocalypse.

Even so, it's still relies of Joel being dumb to advance the story.


Might as well mention Spoony's review of Final Fantasy 13. The villain's plot is to have the heroes kill him to bring about the end of the world. All the heroes have to do to win is nothing, but they try to kill him repeatedly. I've been told by an internet friend that Spoony gets it wrong and oversimplifies it a bit.

 

[KateHikes14]

Having not played it myself, I don't know the order of events. I'm also not a military man. Still, the guy being that insane should at least make them question it, right?

It's kinda hard to give an answer on that, gunning down a couple dozen of your own people that you know are your own people is kindof an unthinkable scenario, that in context of the moment makes sense, but would immediately compromise the sanity of everyone involved irreparably the second the last shot was fired. I would say it doesn't hold up at the fridge, but it holds up very well at the screen.

 

[GhaeicSD]

There's more than one?

Kind of, they're remaking the game from the ground up with a new battle system and rewriting some of the scenes to be less awful. I wouldn't dare touch the game after what I saw of it for any amount of money, but they released a demo of the new stuff to try for free a couple months ago so I gave it a try. It's definitely an improvement over the old game, but the new battle system just seems weird for the sake of being weird, and the actual plot hasn't changed, just the presentation.

Related to that, the game also forces your hand then tries to guilt trip the player.

That is the one point against The Line that is undeniably shitty to everyone, including the devs themselves. They originally wanted a branching path at that point, but ran out of time to implement a totally separate story based on the player's choice at that scene because of how much is affected by that decision. At the very least, they did everything they could to provide the illusion of choice to a first-time player and I'd say it hits 90% of the time (again, the game relies on the player knowing nothing), and it's still the most iconic scene in the game, but it's still a massive flaw that can totally break the game for keen-eyed people.

 

[Dysnomia]

Resident Evil 3. When Jill just stands there like an idiot while Nemesis kills Brad. She doesn't even try to help.

Another good RE one is the "missed turntable" cutscene in Outbreak. You have to go out of your way to trigger it and it's only necessary if you want 100% of cutscenes. Your character will miss the lift to escape the Umbrella lab and just be left staring into the shaft like an idiot. It doesn't matter if you are armed to the teeth. A Hunter will appear and you will stare stupidly shocked at it for a couple of seconds before it knocks you down the shaft. I was armed to the teeth and it didn't matter. Because the cutscene decided that no matter what you were gonna be too stupid to defend yourself.

I've seen this called "cutscene stupidity syndrome". Your character, regardless of how well they are armed, is struck retarded by the cutscene gods and unable to act in a logical manner.

Might as well mention Spoony's review of Final Fantasy 13. The villain's plot is to have the heroes kill him to bring about the end of the world. All the heroes have to do to win is nothing, but they try to kill him repeatedly. I've been told by an internet friend that Spoony gets it wrong and oversimplifies it a bit.

Sounds like Magic Knight Rayearth. Although the villain's plot isn't coming from evil intentions. But when you think about it, it sounds really selfish despite how unbelievably unfair the situation was to the people involved.

 

[TruffleSpark]

Idiot plots can work if the writers are in on it. Coen Brothers movies are mostly idiot plots and they are good. The problem is when the characters are stupid, but the writers don't seem to be aware that the characters are acting stupid. Which is usually because the writers are stupid and it's hard for a character to be smarter than the writers.

 

[Double Taps]

Resident Evil 3. When Jill just stands there like an idiot while Nemesis kills Brad. She doesn't even try to help.

To be absolutely fair, Brad looked like he was on his way out anyway. I do agree with the sentiment of RE characters just letting shit happen when they could have been more proactive in moments leading up.

 

[Preacher ✝]

Specs Ops The Line has a plot twist that [redacted]

No shit? Man I'm glad I never invested time in that game. For years I've heard people praise it and there have been times when I considered playing it. Someone even gifted it to me on steam at one point, but I never installed it. That twist is fucking retarded. The game sounded at least somewhat compelling otherwise but that ruins it.

Anyway, I think the bulk of modern wokified media falls into the category. The most blatant example that comes to mind is Rings of Power but that's probably just because I'm more familiar with it than the others after watching Random Film Talk's videos and some of the EFAP stuff about it. Speaking of EFAP that Agatha show they were talking about sounded dumb as shit too.

Oh and speaking of Fallout that moment in Fallout 3 was so fucking stupid they released DLC just to retcon it. You know the one I'm talking about, when the main character is shoe horned into sacrificing himself in a radiation chamber instead of sending in the super mutant, ghoul, or robot followers that could have done it with literally zero repercussions. The retcon doesn't make it less retarded of a decision either, it just negates the consequences.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Problem with idiot plot as a trope is that it is usually based on the idea that the characters are calm, intelligent and knows the genre of film they are in. People being stressed out in life or death situation can do massively idiotic things without realising it. Also the examples in OP are more narrative convenience tropes than outright idiot plot.

I'll go with the classic TLJ. Who has THREE concurrent idiot plots.
1. Ray coming to Luke in the hopes he has a magical solution to the New Order despite being at most, a strong jedi without any political clout or unique technology.
2. Nigger and fat Chinese looking for a person to infiltrate a space ship and disable the hyperdrive tracker, having virtually no leads and doing as much damage as possible instead of focusing on the current issue.
3. Purple haired bitch not telling her staff her plans and just assuming that they'll trust her not doing anything, despite the fact that there is no way for an info leak anyways.

 

[God of Nothing]

Game of Thrones or ASoIaF if you want to be autistic about it has a giant one with Ned telling the psycho bitch who spitefully had his daughter's pet big dog killed he knows she's fucking her brother.
then the rest of the series happened

Fate/Stay Night's Heaven's Feel route/movies has Archer just letting the old evil magic man live instead of carpet bombing the mansion he lives in after his first attempt to kill him fails. Fault can be placed with Rin not blowing it the fuck up too since she outright raids the place halfway through. Or the most egregious example in that entire fucking franchise: Sakura's retarded fat wormslut ass going to the man she knows she's utterly defenseless against in hopes of killing him without her servant or assistance. Fuck me that route was a slog.

Spider-Man's One More Day had reality-altering sorcerers somehow unable to save an old woman from a bullet wound, so Peter decides to make a deal with the literal fucking devil.

Are there examples of the opposite? Characters doing things that make things worse because they rationally think of how to avoid a situation, completely unaware other people are also trying to fix or avoid it? The consequences of which resulting in an even bigger fuckup than if either was stupid?

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

Sounds like Magic Knight Rayearth. Although the villain's plot isn't coming from evil intentions. But when you think about it, it sounds really selfish despite how unbelievably unfair the situation was to the people involved.

that's an impressive job of explaining MKR without giving up anything

 

[Judge Dredd]

The retcon doesn't make it less retarded of a decision either, it just negates the consequences.

They even scold you for making the logical, correct choice.

. They originally wanted a branching path at that point, but ran out of time to implement a totally separate story based on the player's choice at that scene because of how much is affected by that decision.

Didn't the devs also say the good ending was turning off the game?

Are there examples of the opposite? Characters doing things that make things worse because they rationally think of how to avoid a situation, completely unaware other people are also trying to fix or avoid it? The consequences of which resulting in an even bigger fuckup than if either was stupid?

I've heard Monkey Island is basically that, but I never played it.

Idiot plots can work if the writers are in on it. Coen Brothers movies are mostly idiot plots and they are good. The problem is when the characters are stupid, but the writers don't seem to be aware that the characters are acting stupid. Which is usually because the writers are stupid and it's hard for a character to be smarter than the writers.

That's why I don't include stuff like Dumb and Dumber. It's like this copy-pasta about dumb writers.

Why does nobody like Sherlock? Because it has smart characters written stupidly.

Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men is a smartly written smart character. When Chigurh kills a hotel room full of three people he books to room next door so he can examine it, finding which walls he can shoot through, where the light switch is, what sort of cover is there etc. This is a smart thing to do because Chigurh is a smart person who is written by another smart person who understands how smart people think.

Were Sherlock Holmes to kill a hotel room full of three people. He'd enter using a secret door in the hotel that he read about in a book ten years ago. He'd throw peanuts at one guy causing him to go into anaphylactic shock, as he had deduced from a dartboard with a picture of George Washington carver on it pinned to the wall that the man had a severe peanut allergy. The second man would then kill himself just according to plan as Sherlock had earlier deduced that him and the first man were homosexual lovers who couldn't live without eachother due to a faint scent of penis on each man's breath and a slight dilation of their pupils whenever they looked at each other. As for the third man, why Sherlock doesn't kill him at all. The third man removes his sunglasses and wig to reveal he actually WAS Sherlock the entire time. But Sherlock just entered through the Secret door and killed two people, how can there be two of him? The first Sherlock removes his mask to reveal he's actually Moriarty attempting to frame Sherlock for two murders. Sherlock however anticipated this, the two dead men stand up, they're undercover police officers, it was all a ruse. "But Sherlock!" Moriarty cries "That police officer blew his own head off, look at it, there's skull fragments on the wall, how is he fine now? How did you fake that?". Sherlock just winks at the screen, the end.

This is retarded because Sherlock is a smart person written by a stupid person to whom smart people are indistinguishable from wizards.

Problem with idiot plot as a trope is that it is usually based on the idea that the characters are calm, intelligent and knows the genre of film they are in. People being stressed out in life or death situation can do massively idiotic things without realising it. Also the examples in OP are more narrative convenience tropes than outright idiot plot.

It depends. I'm more forgiving of things like the Resident Evil 3 example for the reasons you said, but other times it's feels dumb.

Like in Resident Evil 4. The villains plan was to infect the presidents daughter with plagas (already done when the game starts) and have return to the US so she can infect the president. When Leon comes to rescue her, all they had to do was put up token resistance and let her be rescued. Instead they do everything they can to stop you. It's a plot where the villains could win by literally doing nothing. This shouldn't be a spur of the moment sub-optimal decision, this was their plan from the start. Still a good game.

 

[Checkerboard Hero]

The second final destination movie is the textbook definition for your thread, the first movie was passable because it's not something people would probably catch on before it's too late but the second movie is absolutely retarded. You're telling me that on an open freeway with high visibility that people either don't have breaks, can't swerve out of the way, or can't see far enough away to completely avoid the disaster? I've never seen the other movies in the series because this one was when I called it but I imagine if by the second movie they can't make a believable disaster then the others have to be worse.

If you've never seen the second movie, here's the entire scene in particular:

But I recommend watching it in the way the director intended:

 

[TenMilesWide]

Are there examples of the opposite? Characters doing things that make things worse because they rationally think of how to avoid a situation, completely unaware other people are also trying to fix or avoid it? The consequences of which resulting in an even bigger fuckup than if either was stupid?

This was my favorite part of Star Wars Andor.
After his first rebel job raiding the imperial payroll vault Andor takes his money and runs, deciding to lay low somewhere tropical and wait for the heat to die down. The rebels decide that's a bad look and send an assassin to head off any chance of imperial interrogation, but he's in the wind. The empire rolled out mass incarceration in response to the raid and sentenced Andor (under alias) to 6 months on a jumped up loitering charge, unaware of his previous crimes. Conditions in the prison quickly turn him from shiftless crook to hardened rebel agitator, inspiring him to start a massive breakout.
Meanwhile the rebel assassin watches as the increased imperial presence (because they don't know they already caught their guy) turns Andor's hometown from a 'keep your head down' corporate colony into an outright anti-imp stronghold, with Andor's mother's funeral sparking an all out riot.