# Movies & TV Episodes with Obsolete Plot Points (multiple spoilers) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 13, 2014, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961 "2014-07-13T00:22:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/21 "2014-07-13T16:19:13Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > I saw a local production of the play a few years back, and spent some time thinking about how it could be updated. When I was a kid in the '80s/'90s our cordless phone sometimes picked up parts of our next-door neighbor’s phone conversations. I don’t know if that could still happen now or if cordless phone technology has improved, but I’ve seen sitcom episodes where a baby monitor allowed characters to listen in on other people’s phone calls. Wasn’t that kinda the whole point of CELLULAR, with Kim Basinger and Chris Evans? ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/22 "2014-07-13T16:44:07Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > I was watching an episode of _Vera_ last night, in which a woman was shot with a shotgun outside of a vacation cabin. A cop said that one neighbour heard the shot but thought it was a firework, and the neighbour’s father thought it was a car backfiring. I can’t remember the last time I heard a car backfire. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a modern car do it. The last time I heard a car backfire, it was around 1998, and the car was a 1961 Ford that I owned. The cause of the backfire turned out to be a spark plug with a too-wide gap-- almost twice as wide as it needed to be. It did sound like a handgun firing, though. It would be pretty unusual for a spark plug now to lose its gap, and depending on where you live, unusual for a vehicle to take spark plugs that didn’t come pre-gapped-- ie, vintage cars. One reason I can think of for a backfire is that someone has removed their catalytic converter. They are very expensive, and if it rusts out, some people cut them out, and replace them with a plain piece of pipe. It’s illegal, and you will get caught in any state that does yearly inspections, which I think is every state except Indiana. Where does _Vera_ take place? The thing about Indiana, is that if you live anywhere outside a city, you hear gunshots every so often, because people shoot at coyotes in their yards. If you are outside the city, and hear a gunshot, there is no reason to call the police, or think a person is being harmed. I don’t personally like it, but outside the city, on private property, it apparently isn’t illegal, and there are a lot of people who don’t have working farms, but keep a couple of animals, because they have chickens for eggs, or they have a kid in 4-H with goats, or they have a horse for riding, and for them, coyotes are a problem. Personally, I can’t tell a gunshot from a handgun at a distance, but people with more experience tell me they can. Instead of a backfire, the guy could have said “Yeah, I heard a gunshot, but why would I think someone was shooting a person, and not a coyote after his chickens?” ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/23 "2014-07-13T17:26:32Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > I can’t think of any specific examples, but the no-fault divorce made a lot of older murder mystery plots obsolete. It was pretty common for the victim to be murdered by a spouse who could not easily have gotten a divorce, or at least for the victim’s widow to be suspected of committing the murder for this reason. The more modern version of this is a killer who chooses murder over divorce to avoid having to fulfill the terms of their prenup, but this isn’t as flexible of a plot device. One Agatha Christie novel has a variation on the divorce theme. The murderess wants to ditch her husband and marry a wealthy British Duke, but the Duke is highly religious and won’t marry a divorced woman with a living ex-spouse. So she connives to murder her spouse so she can marry the duke. I suppose that could work nowadays just as well. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/24 "2014-07-13T18:37:40Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > **The Women**. A group of women living in Reno which is the only place where they can get an easy divorce after having lived there for a requisite period of time. There are a number of movies that turn on Nevada divorces and the “divorce residence industry.” Isn’t Marilyn’s character in _The Misfits_ a Nevada divorcee? ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/25 "2014-07-13T19:02:50Z")
> [@boozilu](#): > > My favorite is Presumed Innocent. One key point of evidence was that they could tell the killer had blood type A from the semen sample. Today it would be a DNA match… The entire premise of **My Two Dads** would be obsolete. Both men were awarded jointed custody because paternity couldn’t be excluded for either with the old blood group method. IIRC it the premise actually became obsolete during the show’s run because they did a DNA test, but the results were destroyed without being revealed to the audience or anyone but Judge Wilbur. > [@Greg\_Charles](#): > > Star Trek IV is an obvious example. Kirk tries to hide the use of his communicator from the 20th Century marine biologist. Now she’d just ask, “Where’d you get that antique phone? Does it really still work?” Granted even the TOS communicators were actually a lot more powerful than any modern day cellphone on the market. No need for cell towers or orbiting satellites and they can transmit tru solid rock. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/26 "2014-07-13T21:37:13Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#): > > Granted even the TOS communicators were actually a lot more powerful than any modern day cellphone on the market. No need for cell towers or orbiting satellites and they can transmit tru solid rock. Yeah, but _she_ wouldn’t know that. As far as she’d be able to tell, he’s just got a clunky mobile phone that of course works fine above ground in downtown San Francisco. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2014, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/27 "2014-07-13T21:52:21Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > There was an episode of _The Brady Bunch_ dealing with the hassle of nine people, one telephone, that Mike attempted to fix by installing a pay phone. Today he’d just buy a family plan and get a sackful of cell phones. > > And install a second bathroom, brilliant architect that he is. There were three bathrooms in the house, one for Alice, one for the parents and one for the six kids. ---
**Author:** ![Accidental\_Martyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2014, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/28 "2014-07-14T02:33:44Z")
Like others have said, I think the lack of cell phones are one of the most glaring examples in older movies. _Kiss the Girls_ (1997) was on TV the other night. In one scene Morgan Freeman’s pager gives off and the next scene shows him at a pay phone calling the number. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2014, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/29 "2014-07-14T02:40:10Z")
Sort of related: Heaven Can Wait (1978). Remade today (or soon if the rules aren’t quite in place) Warren Beatty hops into the body of his teammate who was killed…and gets to watch the rest of the Super Bowl from the sidelines due to concussion rules. Lots of old shorts show 7 year olds being sent to town to run lots of errands for their parents. Nowadays Child Services would be called in a heartbeat. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2014, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/30 "2014-07-14T14:07:31Z")
Christopher Reeve’s remake of Rear Window. His character has a eidetic memory, but he never read any report from his office of events that happened while he was recovering from his accident and found out that the artist doing the sculpture for the new office building was Julian Thorpe? ---
**Author:** ![Don\_Draper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Don\_Draper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_Draper)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/31 "2014-07-15T02:34:23Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > Heaven Can Wait (1978). Remade today (or soon if the rules aren’t quite in place) Warren Beatty hops into the body of his teammate who was killed…and gets to watch the rest of the Super Bowl from the sidelines due to concussion rules. You just made me think of a good one - **the Parallax View** starring Beatty. In this film, Beatty is an investigative reporter who stumbles onto a Watergate style conspiracy. During the course of the film, there is one long sequence in which he is on the trail of some shadowy, nefarious agents. He tails them to the airport and watches as they board a plane. He simply…_follows them on board the plane._ No need for a ticket, no security check, he simply strolls up to the gate and on. A Stewardess (no, not a flight attendant - a stew) asks him for a ticket. When he doesn’t have one, he simply _buys one right there in mid-flight._ When he hands her his money, she remarks "Out of seventy dollars…_I’ll be right back with your change (!) sir."_ While she brings goes to get change (!) for the price of his ticket (not even seventy dollars to fly on a plane!!!), Beatty goes right up _into the cockpit_ and warns the flight crew to turn the plane around - because a passenger has a bomb. Nobody asks who he is, or detains / questions as to HOW he knows that, they simply turn the plane around! The plane returns to the airport, and Beatty (not wanting to get involved in a police investigation) simply strolls away, blending into the crowd. The flight crew are left stymied as to what to tell the authorities of the mysterious stranger who told them about the bomb on board. * * * Similarly, there is David Mamet’s 1987 film **House of Games**. The final confrontation between two characters takes place in an airport. One is supposed to be a passenger on a flight, the other wants to hustle some stolen money back. They discreetly walk into the baggage handling area for a showdown. One character gets gunned down while the noise of jet taking off drowns out the gunshots. This of course couldn’t take place in this day and age, but to be fair I’ve always felt it was quite a stretch that this could take place even in 1987. I’m sure even then, there were security procedures to prevent just anyone from strolling into the baggage claims area. And someone ought to have been on duty, if even just to prevent folks from wandering in and stealing stuff. And certainly by 1987, there would be security video cameras at a high security area of an airport! ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/32 "2014-07-15T06:05:54Z")
I re-watched **The Breakfast Club** the other day, which I hadn’t watched since it first came out. 1. Most public schools would immediately expel anyone who brought a weapon to school nowadays. I suppose there could be some leeway, since it’s a flare gun, but I can’t imagine a public school risking it. AMH’s character would have probably been sitting in a jail cell rather than in detention. 2. Taping someone’s buns together could go either way. There are probably some schools that would expel or at least suspend for a violent attack, but EE’s character is a jock, so he might just get detention in a lot of schools. I’ll put this one as a maybe. 3. No public school would allow a bunch of kids to be unsupervised in the library all day. That’s too much of a potential liability. I suppose you could argue that the principal is a renegade and plays by his own rules, but, I think the whole scenario is pretty implausible nowadays. For another film, my friends and I were at a bar when **Night of the Living Dead** (original) came on the TV. The scene came on where Linda is trapped in the car just after her brother has been killed. We started cracking jokes: “OnStar. What is your emergency?” “I’M BEING ATTACKED BY ZOMBIES!!!” Well, since a lot of cars don’t have OnStar, it’s still a plausible scenario, but I’m gonna throw it out there anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/33 "2014-07-15T06:43:15Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > Naturally I can’t think of anything right now, but it seems like many movies that are more than 25-30 years old wouldn’t work now that most everyone has cell phones. Think about how many movies rely on someone not being able to warn another person that ‘The cops/Mark/dude is on his way over’. I just saw an episode of _Law & Order_ where part of the investigation was to find a liquor store the suspect had visited. The clerk said he gave the guy quarters, so the detectives checked the LUDs on the pay phone across the street. Of course, _L&O_ ran for so many years I saw episodes where pagers and cell phones were just as integral to the plot as that pay phone. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 8:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/34 "2014-07-15T08:23:19Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > I re-watched **The Breakfast Club** the other day, which I hadn’t watched since it first came out. > > _-snip-_ > > 1. No public school would allow a bunch of kids to be unsupervised in the library all day. That’s too much of a potential liability. I suppose you could argue that the principal is a renegade and plays by his own rules, but, I think the whole scenario is pretty implausible nowadays. They had a proctor, whom they ditched somehow, although I don’t remember how. Back then, I remember thinking “Way to be back next Saturday.” Now, he’d probably call the police. I haven’t seen the movie since it came out either, but didn’t they ditch him to get some weed one of the kids had in his locker? Hello, jail. > [@](#): > > For another film, my friends and I were at a bar when **Night of the Living Dead** (original) came on the TV. The scene came on where Linda is trapped in the car just after her brother has been killed. We started cracking jokes: > > “OnStar. What is your emergency?” > “I’M BEING ATTACKED BY ZOMBIES!!!” I have a 20-year-old car, so I don’t even have automatic headlight shut-off, but I do have a cell phone. Still, I think people born after 1990 would “get” _Night of the Living Dead_. A lot of them might be scratching their heads over _Breakfast Club_. Not to mention the one characters cigarette burns. Where is the mandatory reporting and CPS? about two years away. ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/35 "2014-07-15T08:37:01Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > One reason I can think of for a backfire is that someone has removed their catalytic converter. They are very expensive, and if it rusts out, some people cut them out, and replace them with a plain piece of pipe. It’s illegal, and you will get caught in any state that does yearly inspections, which I think is every state except Indiana. Where does _Vera_ take place? North East England – supposedly Tyneside and Northumberland, though the geography’s a little… fictionalised (enough to be occasionally baffling to those of us living here). I do hear quite a few backfires, due to the current fashion for after-market exhausts among boy racers hereabouts, but the actual exhaust noise is usually almost as loud – you wouldn’t be in any doubt as to its source. > [@](#): > > Instead of a backfire, the guy could have said “Yeah, I heard a gunshot, but why would I think someone was shooting a person, and not a coyote after his chickens?” Not many coyotes in rural Northumberland, but foxes or badgers, yeah. Though how often you’d hear a gunshot is going to vary with location – in one place they might be fairly commonplace, but ten miles away you could live for years and never hear one. For a towny in a holiday rental cabin, I can see it not being their first assumption. ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/36 "2014-07-15T10:47:34Z")
My favorite example of this is from a book, rather than a movie or TV show, but DEAL! In the original book of The Bourne Identity, Bourne at one point desperately needs to speak to someone in America. He’s in Europe, so he has to go to the phone company office to get them to place an intercontinental call for him. But he’s hiding and can’t be seen, so it turns into this elaborate scheme in which the woman he’s with goes in and arranges for the call, and then Bourne has to use distraction and general Bourneyness to get himself into the booth where the call gets connected without anyone seeing him. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/37 "2014-07-15T15:01:36Z")
It’s just a joke, but the scene in **Airplane** where the reporters run to the pay phones and knock them over is badly dated. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/38 "2014-07-15T15:22:34Z")
Yeah-- I love the TV show _Lou Grant_, and I can think of only one episode where the plot actually pivots on something badly dated, but all the typewriters and reporters using payphones probably look silly to anyone born after 1985. There was one episode where the newsroom is switching to desktop computers over typewriters (they all have yellow and green monitors and keyboards, and appear to be hooked up to one large mainframe), a couple of people are enthusiastic, most are skeptical, and one or two outright refuse. Of course, there is a power outage, and work comes to an abrupt halt-- except for one guy who pulls out a portable manual typewriter. And there’s one reporter who loses an entire story because everything got wiped out when the power went out-- they guy had his notes on the computer as well, because he “trusted management” who told him to rely on the computer for everything. Somehow, I guess, the power outage wiped out the mainframe’s memory, and there was no capacity for people to keep backup disks, or the guy who lost everything had been entering data for days without saving. Also, from about 1969-1981, there seemed to be some requirement that every sitcom have an episode where a computer screwed something up, and a manager refused to override it, because “the computer can’t be wrong.” Usually it had to do with someone receiving a bill with a misplaced decimal, so they were being billed hundreds of dollars, when they really owed forty or fifty. Those episodes are laughable now, and not for the intended reasons. ---
**Author:** ![Kimballkid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b5a626/32.png) [@Kimballkid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimballkid)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/39 "2014-07-15T16:03:36Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > It’s illegal, and you will get caught in any state that does yearly inspections, which I think is every state except Indiana. South Dakota doesn’t do yearly vehicle inspections anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2014, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961/40 "2014-07-15T16:12:56Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > It’s illegal, and you will get caught in any state that does yearly inspections, which I think is every state except Indiana. Where does _Vera_ take place? > > The thing about Indiana, is that if you live anywhere outside a city, you hear gunshots every so often, because people shoot at coyotes in their yards. If you are outside the city, and hear a gunshot, there is no reason to call the police, or think a person is being harmed. I don’t personally like it, but outside the city, on private property, it apparently isn’t illegal, and there are a lot of people who don’t have working farms, but keep a couple of animals, because they have chickens for eggs, or they have a kid in 4-H with goats, or they have a horse for riding, and for them, coyotes are a problem. _Waves_ Hi, neighbor! I’m an Indiana boy, born and raised. And Kentucky doesn’t do yearly inspections, either. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-episodes-with-obsolete-plot-points-multiple-spoilers/692961.md?page=3)