30 Things That Movies Got Wrong About the Real World

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30 Things That Movies Got Wrong About the Real World
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We felt like Neil deGrasse Tyson while working on this list. See, we’ve heard him pick apart the science in science-themed movies, and it got us thinking: How else are movies getting real-life situations wrong? 

There are some sweet science-based falsities on this list (as a tribute to Mr. deGrasse Tyson), but those inspired us to find a bunch of other ones too. For shame, movies! For shame!

Double Jeopardy

YOU DON'T GET TO KILL SOMEONE IF YOU WERE WRONGFULLY CONVICTED FOR THEIR DEATH. No, the double jeopardy clause doesn't apply. You (not) killing someone yesterday and you killing them tomorrow are separate events, and you can totally be tried for both. (Also, the state and federal governments can both prosecute you independently of each other.) CRACKED.COM

Electroshock Therapy

CRACKED.COM Electroshock doesn't zap you while you're awake. Electroconvulsive therapy passes small electric currents through your brain after giving you general anesthesia and muscle relaxants. This has been the case since the 1950s-1960s.

Brain Injuries

An injury won't make you forget who you are. A profound loss of identity has other causes, such a neurosurgery or infection. A brain injury is way more likely to cause anterograde amnesia - the inability to form new memories. CRACKED.COM

Love and Mental Illness

Love will not cure your mental illness. Yes, having love in your life has a positive effect and helps you cope with your illness better - but it's still an illness, and needs to be treated. You can't just love it away any more than you can love away infectious mono. CRACKED.COM

PTSD

Not just war veterans get PTSD. Post-traumatic stress disorder, as its name tells you, is caused by trauma - and war isn't the only traumatic thing you can live through. PTSD can also be caused by a natural disaster or a car accident, among other things. CRACKED.COM

Split Personality Disorders

GRAGKED.COM Your personality won't split just because your life sucks. Dissociative identity disorder is understood to be caused by repetitive childhood trauma (such as abuse). Tyler Durden won't come along to keep you company because you feel alienated by a consumerist society.

Taking Masks Off in Fighter Jets

CRACKED.COM IT'S REALLY NOT A GOOD IDEA TO TAKE OFF YOUR M MASK IN A FIGHTER JET. Fighter jets aren't pressurized like airliners are, and on top of that, high-G maneuvers can make it hard to breathe - so pilots need their oxygen masks on to, you know, not pass out and die.

The Plasma Rifle in The Terminator

Terminator demands a phased plasma rifle in 40-watt range. 40 watts is barely enough to power a common light bulb. Even imagining some crazy future efficiency doesn't help, because wattage still measures how much work a process does, and 40 joules per second is not much work at all. CRACKED.COM

Bad Math in The Social Network

The Social Network announces Facebook's ownership breakdown. Eduardo Saverin would own 34.4% of shares, Mark Zuckerberg would own 51%, Dustin Markowitz 6.81%, Sean Parker 6.47%, and Peter Thiel 7%. Total: 105.68%. C'mon. How did the writers come up with these numbers and not instinctively try adding them up? CRACKED.COM

The Star of David in Ben-Hur

In Ben-Hur, the title character wears a Star of David. It's pinned on him by chariot owner Sheik llderim, a fellow Semite, as a way of sticking it to the Romans. The Star of David didn't exist as a symbol for Judaism until the 11th century or later. That's more than a thousand years after Ben-Hur takes place. CRACKED.COM

Bad Advice in Batman Returns

Rub your chest, and the arms will take care of themselves. Hope there's some kind of cool symbolism in this advice from Ra's Al Ghul in Batman Begins. Because it's not a real survival tip at all. Christopher Nolan even joked that lost campers who saw the movie and followed this instruction would freeze to death. CRACKED.COM

Motley Crue Music in Hot Tub Time Machine

In Hot Tub Time Machine, Lou decides to stay in 1986, forming GRAGKED.COM Mötley Lüe and writing Home N M A I E Sweet Home. MOTLEY CRUE Quite the feat, since Mötley Crüe had been around since 1981, and released Home Sweet Home in 1985. TRENTRE OF Prex

Love Man in Dirty Dancing

30 Things That Movies Got Wrong About the Real World

The German Shepherd in Gladiator

30 Things That Movies Got Wrong About the Real World

Bad Science in Superman

Superman can't lift a continent or the Moon, no matter how strong he is. We're not questioning super strength. But he's still just the size of a man, so he'll be exerting enormous force on a tiny area. Не shouldn't be moving those things when he pushes them. Не should be boring into them like a nail driving into wood. CRACKED.COM

Bad Science in Waterworld

In Waterworld, melted ice caps have covered all land with water. If the ice caps melt totally, that'll mean sea levels will rise 216 feet. We'll lose many coastal areas, which hold some of the most important cities in the world. But the vast majority of land will remain comfortably above water. CRACKED.COM

Bad Science in The Rock

The Rock introduces us to VX gas, a deadly bright green nerve agent. As the film's writer David Weisber later put it, Unfortunately, chemical weapons are very boring because essentially they're a two-chamber cell with two odorless and colorless gases in each chamber ... There was no way to do that on the screen with any kind of excitement. CRACKED.COM

Electromagnetic Pulses

Ocean's Eleven gives us an EMP that wipes out all lights on a Vegas block. Any real electromagnetic pulse would radiate beyond the movie's tiny area of attack. But it would also do less damage. Even a huge one from a solar storm would just force us to tinker with stuff to restart it, not usher in a new Dark Age. CRACKED.COM

Bad Science in The Core

The Core has stopped rotating, leaving no magnetic field to shield us! Leaving aside how preposterous the basic idea is, Earth's magnetic field doesn't block solar radiation. The atmosphere does. The planet's magnetic field has weakened or reversed in the past without leading to any mass extinctions. CRACKED.COM

Bad Science in Pacific Rim

Pacific Rim detonates a nuclear reactor to destroy a portal. We don't care about the magic portal-we're fine with that. But nuclear reactors can't detonate. They don't even use the same fuel as nuclear bombs. Reactors and bombs are just totally different technologies. CRACKED.COM

Parents

Teens in movies and TV Moms want in on the haps of their teen's drama. Suze Howard of Euphoria and June George (Amy Poehler) come to mind, but Julie Cooper from The О.С. had an affair with Marissa's (teenaged) ex, and Stifler's mom... you know. There are cool moms, but most are too busy (and mature) to care about their teen's drama. CRACKED

That One Hot Girl

Teens in movies and TV Ooh, there goes the one hot girl in school. One alpha hot guy and one queen bee hot girl seem to be the objects of desire for all the underlings-like Mike Dexter and Amanda Beckett in Can't Hardly Wait, and Regina George & Aaron Samuels in Mean Girls. Teens usually find a bunch of other teens attractive. CRACKED

Caring About Your Future

Teens in movies and TV Only losers care about their futures. Jocks all get full scholarships, and rich kids work for their daddy's company, but nerds need books to succeed. Parodied in Booksmart, where the bookworms realize other kids partied and still got into good schools. CRACKED

Sporty or Artsy Kids

Teens in movies and TV Sporty or artsy? There can only be one! In She's All That and American Pie, it's ridiculous that jocks would cross into the worlds of choir or theater, and 10 Things I Hate About You was considered groundbreaking because Kat liked poetry and soccer. CRACKED

Stopping to Talk

Teens in movies and TV One minute, coach. My girlfriend needs me. Countless football fields seem to be crawling with friends and girlfriends who just need to chat with the QB while he runs drills. Real life fields are for players and coaches only. CRACKED

Cheerleaders

Teens in movies and TV Cheerleaders are treacherous alpha queens. Movies thrive on an underdog story, so cheerleaders are often villainized. For many real world teens, cheerleading is an extension of gymnastics, and does not equate to bullying or instant popularity. RCH RCH CRACKED

The New Kid

Teens in movies and TV Whoa, the new kid is so mysterious. A new kid is usually an outcast or a spicy addition to the small town school. Other students are so intrigued, but in reality a new kid probably moved there from lowa or Delaware because their dad got a new job. Everybody calm down. CRACKED

Bullying

Teens in movies and TV That frowning caveman must be the bully! Movies and shows like to portray a big, brooding dude who happens to be pissed off 24/7. In reality, you couldn't pick a bully out of a crowd. A small, sassy teen could zing you, and cyberbullying comes from all angles. CRACKED

The Plastics

Teens in movies and TV It can't all be plastic surgery. Movies and TV shows portray rich kids who also happen to be gorgeous. Rich, popular, and attractive is a rare combo, since in reality, popular, attractive kids can be lower middle class, and rich kids can be unattractive. A LITTLE BIT DRAMATIC CRACKED

Teen Boys

Teens in movies and TV Teen boys are chiseled with Gaston-like jawlines. Labor laws cause productions to cast adults as teens, and yes, guys in high school get stubble, but from Danny Zuko to Dylan McKay to Nate Jacobs in Euphoria, men in their 20s and even 30s often play teen boys. CRACKED

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