Nine Hollywood Tropes Moviegoers Loathe: Part Eight

Bad Science

While the nature of my inside knowledge on explosives will remain classified, nothing ruins a scene more than seeing completely erroneous science occur by way of explosives - a staple of action movies. Perhaps the average Joe doesn’t care if a simple pineapple grenade somehow destroys an entire building, but for anyone with an understanding of physics, such sloppy science draws immediate ire.

May I direct your attention to Deep Blue Sea, which - while not exactly Jaws and not exactly a film I’d watch twice - sealed the deal with the final weapon against the uber-intelligent shark fiend about to escape into open ocean. Thomas Jane’s character - cheesily-named Carter Blake - opens two flares and tells inevitable survivor LL Cool J that they contain enough explosive to simulate a stick and a half of dynamite.

I’m sorry, what? If two flares contained enough bang to simulate more than a stick of dynamite, they’d be called dynamite. The latter contains a magical little chemical called nitro glycerin, where flares are made of the mighty phosphorus. Which is...um…not explosive.

The Specialist features a few WTF moments regarding elementary chemistry and physics. Notably at the end, when fat mob boss guy opens a locked the size of my friggin' pinky nail , screams, and then the camera cuts to just outside his house, where you see the whole wing blow up.

Umm, yeah, turns out that even C-4 can only do so much, and causing an explosion akin to a 500-pounder being dropped on a house might be a stretch for even the most scientifically disinclined to buy into.

In a similar fashion, despite being a sweet movie, Eagle Eye presents the same concept with an explosive gem that can magically destroy an area the size of a football field. Outside of a sci-fi novel, earth is governed by weird, immutably laws of physics involving gravity, friction, and the constrains of outward velocity when it comes to explosives.

I don’t pretend to know how it all works, but I can tell you how it doesn’t: the way it works in Hollywood.