73 replies to this topic

[JCRendle]

I admit I found Skyfall a fantastic Bond film, but reading through several posts it seems that Skyfall may be plot hole heavy - certainly nothing new for a Bond film - but I really didn't notice them when I was watching. I guess my mind either filled in the gaps or I just let them go.

What plot holes did you notice in the film? It'll be interesting to see, as one man's plot hole could be explained by another or we could find some plot holes that are just unexplainable.

[Guy Haines]

The analogy of "rats in a trap" is used by Silva when he is introduced to us. But really, he's playing a game of chess with MI6, anticpating that (1) when MI6 HQ gets blown up, the staff would migrate underground, (2) that MI6's computer staff would eventually track him down and bring him to London which means that (3) he'd be in the underground HQ, expecting Q & Co to try and break in to his computer and inadvertently release him from custody, allowing him to get to M. That said :-

(1) How did Silva know where M would be on the day? Did someone let slip she'd be appearing before that committee of inquiry?
(2) Where did the hired help come from? How did they know when to slip him the police uniform on the Underground?
(3) On the question of hired help, even reviewers who praised SF noted that Silva had a seemingly inexhaustable supply of goons to do the dirty work with him.

The chess analogy I've mentioned - I'm surprised it wasn't used. If nothing else, a link to FRWL, in a film with several subtle (and not so subtle) nods to the past.

[SecretAgentFan]

I would explain those with these answers:

(1) No secret can be withheld, especially in the days of the world wide web which Silva uses for manipulation again and again; as he mentions to Bond various possible plots he could conduct, it´s no problem for him at all.

(2) Silva obviously has lots of money. The henchmen on the island are only a fraction of those who help him. And since he definitely has planned to go back to London eventually he will have people hired to be there. And if they patrol the Underground the whole day - at some point they would have encountered him to slip him the uniform.

(3) Well, he has money. That´s how the mafia or any other criminal organization also can find people to an inexhaustable degree.

[JCRendle]

I think Silva has been behind the scenes more than we realise.

This is purely speculative mind:-

Silva is following MI6 closely, he knows M's calender to the point where he knows that she'll be perfectly placed to see the MI6 building blowing up. I'm guessing he uses Englands extensive CCTV against us.

He knew Patrice would their target, so he subtly sends the information to the Americans, who he knows will pass the information onto MI6 - who will send someone to catch him and get information.

This is why Patrice kills the art dealer from across the road and not in the room, he needs to give the MI6 agent a chance to get him alone.

This is why the casino chip is used as payment - there's only one place it can be cashed in. He has Sévérine be in the room with the art dealer so Bond can recognise her in the casino.

In the casino Sévérine makes the point that Bond's one chance of meeting her employer is joining her on the yacht. She makes a point of warning Bond that the goons are ordered to kill him, so he is prepared.

So far Silva has kept the time table pretty tight. If he has the power to hack into M's computer in MI6 he can hack Q branch and know that Bond will have the radio transmitter and is likely to use it.

This is how he knows how he will be captured, when he will be captured and the fact that he will be incarcerated during M's interrogation by the government committee.

[Simon]

I have only seen it once thus far but, the chances of the chase through the underground happening in precisely that direction with it halting at the precise moment for a quick chat about some radio guff at the precise moment a train happens along...

[Roebuck]

The hard-drive with the names of all the deep cover agents on it (a ridiculous concept to begin with) doesn’t serve much purpose other than to deliver a virus into the SIS computer. After that it pretty much fades from the scene. Since Silva’s captured and escape is all a bit of a pointless exercise there needed to be stronger motivation for his original theft of the hard-drive. After all, we’ve seen earlier in the movie that he’s already found a backdoor into the MI6 computers when he uses it damage the headquarters building. If his intention was to use the agent data to humiliate M then he’s already succeeded. She’s watching her people get executed on You Tube and about to get kicked out of her job (after which she’d become a more accessible target).

I’m sure solutions can be found for most of Skyfall’s plot holes, but that’s supposed to be the screenwriter’s job. Instead we’re asked to just accept that Silva is crazy and therefore nothing he does is required to make sense. I enjoyed the film but Id really like for more plausible cause and effect in the next one.

[Dustin]

Actually I have no problems with the points mentioned. Patrice is simply killing his target from across the street to give the people in the room deniability about the murder. There could be CCTV surveillance or they could simply be the prime suspects, so the killing was a rail shot.

Silva would actually not need to have his plan laid out in such detail, with Shanghai, Macao and all the jazz. He stole vital information, used the first bits of it and threatened to proceed. It doesn't take rocket science to know SIS would send people after him, all he had to do was sit and wait.

Knowing about SIS emergency protocols would come with being a top agent in the outfit himself, and one with computer and virtual warfare expertise. Timing things so splendidly that his main target was there on Vauxhall Bridge to see her palace blown to ashes would have been most unlikely but could come as a welcome bonus provided by sheer luck (and in the end for our benefit).

Not having any more resources at Skyfall, neither a strong force to help him and M would be explained with Bond, Q and Tanner assuming the entire communications to be compromised, so Bond would have to make a stand at Scotland on his own.

The one thing I have not found an explanation for is something different. Silva was captured by the Chinese, betrayed by M herself. He withstands torture until he can take no more, protecting the secrets of M and the SIS. Then he decides to opt out of his position by his cyanide capsule. And survives, sadly, magically. Now the question is, how then would Silva escape from his torturers? Any imminent information he could give would have been worthless by then. Actually he himself must have looked pretty worthless by that stage. So why did the Chinese bother at all to get him back? And how did Silva then manage to earn his freedom again? Did he at all? Was this maybe a very long shot of the Chinese services to get revenge on M?

Edited by Dustin, 03 November 2012 - 03:27 PM.

[Roebuck]

Knowing about SIS emergency protocols would come with being a top agent in the outfit himself

First chapter of TMWTGG appears to suggest a lot of these protocols would be known to M and Tanner but not generally disseminated to field officers.

‘’There was no reason why James Bond, who had always been on the operative side of the business, should know anything about the entrails of the service, any more than he should have understood the mysteries of the plumbing and electrical supply of his flat in Chelsea.’’

[Loomis]

I’m sure solutions can be found for most of Skyfall’s plot holes, but that’s supposed to be the screenwriter’s job. Instead we’re asked to just accept that Silva is crazy and therefore nothing he does is required to make sense. I enjoyed the film but Id really like for more plausible cause and effect in the next one.

Agreed. It shouldn't be down to the viewer to devise all manner of complicated theories and explanations in order to understand what's going on.

[Roebuck]

I’m sure solutions can be found for most of Skyfall’s plot holes, but that’s supposed to be the screenwriter’s job. Instead we’re asked to just accept that Silva is crazy and therefore nothing he does is required to make sense. I enjoyed the film but Id really like for more plausible cause and effect in the next one.

Agreed. It shouldn't be down to the viewer to devise all manner of complicated theories and explanations in order to understand what's going on.

I’m coming round to the idea that if revenge on M is the whole point of the film, it may have been simpler to adapt Colonel Sun rather than cherry pick from TMWTGG. There’s already a scene in CS that bears comparison with the Skyfall finale, M is a significant presence in the field and, as Dustin highlights, having Silva working for the Chinese intelligence services would explain away why they’d let him free.

[SecretAgentFan]

I’m sure solutions can be found for most of Skyfall’s plot holes, but that’s supposed to be the screenwriter’s job. Instead we’re asked to just accept that Silva is crazy and therefore nothing he does is required to make sense. I enjoyed the film but Id really like for more plausible cause and effect in the next one.

Agreed. It shouldn't be down to the viewer to devise all manner of complicated theories and explanations in order to understand what's going on.

Disagreed. First, one does not have to devise any complicated theory in order to understand what´s going on. Second, I like films in which not everything is tidied up with explanations. It leaves room to think about it.

Actually I have no problems with the points mentioned. Patrice is simply killing his target from across the street to give the people in the room deniability about the murder. There could be CCTV surveillance or they could simply be the prime suspects, so the killing was a rail shot.

Silva would actually not need to have his plan laid out in such detail, with Shanghai, Macao and all the jazz. He stole vital information, used the first bits of it and threatened to proceed. It doesn't take rocket science to know SIS would send people after him, all he had to do was sit and wait.

Knowing about SIS emergency protocols would come with being a top agent in the outfit himself, and one with computer and virtual warfare expertise. Timing things so splendidly that his main target was there on Vauxhall Bridge to see her palace blown to ashes would have been most unlikely but could come as a welcome bonus provided by sheer luck (and in the end for our benefit).

Not having any more resources at Skyfall, neither a strong force to help him and M would be explained with Bond, Q and Tanner assuming the entire communications to be compromised, so Bond would have to make a stand at Scotland on his own.

The one thing I have not found an explanation for is something different. Silva was captured by the Chinese, betrayed by M herself. He withstands torture until he can take no more, protecting the secrets of M and the SIS. Then he decides to opt out if his position by his cyanide capsule. And survives, sadly, magically. Now the question is, how then would Silva escape from his torturers? Any imminent information he could give would have been worthless by then. Actually he himself must have looked pretty worthless by that stage. So why did the Chinese bother at all to get him back? And how did Silva then manage to earn his freedom again? Did he at all? Was this maybe a very long shot of the Chinese services to get revenge on M?

Yes, agreed on all points. How did Silva get out? Well, maybe it was the long shot you´re mentioning, having a "turned" agent go free, knowing how much he hated being written off. Maybe Silva was such a physical wreck that they just dropped him somewhere. Or they considered him dying but he was still coming around.

[Dustin]

The thing is, if Silva is indeed working for the Chinese services now - turned, brainwashed, whatever - the TMWTGG source would have become even more apparent. I'm almost positive this was a main aim of the screenplay, keeping the profile on the most obvious influences as low as possible.

No, indeed a field agent for the Asia section of SIS working from Hong Kong would not have knowledge of emergency protocols for the headquarters. But someone in Silva's position and with his talents would probably know how to acquire that information.

[Loomis]

If Silva is now working for the Chinese secret service, it would certainly explain why he doesn't seem worried about operating out of Shanghai, Macau and places nearby that presumably fall within Chinese territory. Otherwise, it's hardly convincing that, having supposedly become Beijing's number one enemy circa 1997, he continues to be based in this part of the world.

Can anyone hazard a guess as to why Silva waits fifteen years to exact revenge on M?

[Dustin]

Perhaps it's taken him that long to work his way up inside the hierarchy of the State Security? I imagine they must have been close to just let him die and use his organs instead. Perhaps he managed to convince them he was now ready to use his entire talents for their benefit. Doubtlessly it would have taken many years to convince them to let him off the leash. Meanwhile he was probably working from a shed in a labour camp.

[Loomis]

Maybe Silva was beaten so badly in captivity that he succumbed to amnesia and forgot all about M for many years, only remembering her a few weeks before the events of SKYFALL, at which point he decided to take revenge against her.

[stromberg]

Perhaps it's taken him that long to work his way up inside the hierarchy of the State Security? I imagine they must have been close to just let him die and use his organs instead. Perhaps he managed to convince them he was now ready to use his entire talents for their benefit. Doubtlessly it would have taken many years to convince them to let him off the leash. Meanwhile he was probably working from a shed in a labour camp.

I guess he simply had to wait for an opportunity. Wait until he had the chance to get something into his hands that would cause some really really big problems for M. After fifteen years, he learned that he'd somehow get a chance to steal this hard drive in Istanbul. How did he learn about it? He hacked into MI6's system, even into M's computer, and that's also the reason why he knew about their backup plans.

[Digshot]

I did not like Skyfall because there were plot holes all over the place. Primarily,I thought Silva's plan for revenge was idiotic. If the ultimate objective is to walk up to M and shoot her in the face in front of a roomful of witnesses, then why didn't he just do that? What was preventing him from doing that before? What about his capture and escape gave him an opportunity? If anything, he endangered his plan by revealing who he was and what he wanted to do. Sure enough, he was unsuccessful because Bond was chasing him.

I thought the character was great and his motive and rationalization for becoming a bad guy was believable, but what the hell was he thinking? Absolutely terrible and not at all what I was expecting after such great reviews. The great fun with these kinds of movies is seeing the villain's scheme go into motion, but this was just uninspired.

[Loomis]

Perhaps this isn't actually a plot hole, but why do the police officers halt M's car on the bridge in London just before the bomb inside MI6 goes off? Or is it made clear that other things happened prior to the explosion to set off special security measures?

[Germanium]

When M and Kincade escape in Skyfall, why do they have a flashlight on? Surely M, the head of MI6, would realize that the flashlight would give away their position...

In the same time frame, Bond purposely breaks through the ice to avoid getting shot by Silva. Silva just laughs and walks towards the chapel. Considering that Silva is a mastermind, did he really think Bond, a trained professional, would not survive that? Why would he not wait for him to resurface and shoot him before going to kill M, who is obviously sitting in the chapel waiting for Bond and is going nowhere?

[Clements]

The Empire Skyfall Writers Spoiler Podcast Special with Purvis & Wade touches on a few of the plot "holes" discussed in this thread.
http://soundcloud.co...writers-spoiler

Briefly:

• They scripted more material that clarified Silva's scheme, but it was edited out
• It was not part of Silva's master plan that Bond would find and kill Patrice in Shanghai
• It's best not to think too hard about the details of the plot in a Bond movie

This bit comes near the end of the 45 minute podcast, but the whole thing is worth listening to. They even explain why we're confused about which DB5 that is in Skyfall.

[S K Y F A L L]

When M and Kincade escape in Skyfall, why do they have a flashlight on? Surely M, the head of MI6, would realize that the flashlight would give away their position...

In the same time frame, Bond purposely breaks through the ice to avoid getting shot by Silva. Silva just laughs and walks towards the chapel. Considering that Silva is a mastermind, did he really think Bond, a trained professional, would not survive that? Why would he not wait for him to resurface and shoot him before going to kill M, who is obviously sitting in the chapel waiting for Bond and is going nowhere?

The point you made about the flashlight is the first thing I thought of when I seen it, had they just walked in the dark they would have been fine.

Why didn't Silva just wait until M was in her office at MI6 and to blow her up?

[Vauxhall]

Why didn't Silva just wait until M was in her office at MI6 and to blow her up?

It seems he was intent on killing her face-to-face.

[SecretAgentFan]

When M and Kincade escape in Skyfall, why do they have a flashlight on? Surely M, the head of MI6, would realize that the flashlight would give away their position...

In the same time frame, Bond purposely breaks through the ice to avoid getting shot by Silva. Silva just laughs and walks towards the chapel. Considering that Silva is a mastermind, did he really think Bond, a trained professional, would not survive that? Why would he not wait for him to resurface and shoot him before going to kill M, who is obviously sitting in the chapel waiting for Bond and is going nowhere?

The point you made about the flashlight is the first thing I thought of when I seen it, had they just walked in the dark they would have been fine.

My two cents:

- I don´t think that these two old, exhausted and terrified people stumbling through the dark landscape would not use a light, if only to keep themselves from stumbling and falling, breaking bones or suffering more damage. You know, the older you get, you will not have full command of your eyesight anymore, your body will ache and get tired much sooner and so on. Also, I do believe that M and Kincaid hope that Bond will be able to hold off any bad guy. So the torchlight did never bother me.

- In similar fashion, Silva (IMO) probably thought that Bond would be finished off by the henchman. And let´s face it, having Bond escape from that ice-cold water is not extremely likely. Silva seemed even amused that Bond would try to get out of his predicament by choosing this "ice water grave". And one must always take into account that he admired Bond and maybe wanted to get caught by him. Also, he did not want to waste any time following M and Kincaid. Who knows, maybe there could have been a car behind the chapel? If they had driven away because Silva had waited for Bond to surface again it would have made things so much more difficult for Silva.

[DamnCoffee]

How did Bond know that M was retiring? He says in her house that they're both played out, and hears Eve say "I'm assisting Gareth Mallory in the transition period." and doesn't seem to be surprised. Also, when Bond says to M "Is there anything else you want to tell me?", I didn't really understand what he was on about then, either.

[MkB]

How did Bond know that M was retiring? He says in her house that they're both played out, and hears Eve say "I'm assisting Gareth Mallory in the transition period." and doesn't seem to be surprised.

I assume Bond was briefed by Tanner (who first mentions Mallory to him)
Although, this "transition period" is not quite clear to me. Do you think it means M's "retirement plan" is official? I thought the transition was from the previous head of the JISC to the new (Mallory), not from the current M to the future one.

Also, when Bond says to M "Is there anything else you want to tell me?", I didn't really understand what he was on about then, either.

Right, I didn't get this one either.

[SecretAgentFan]

Well, she has avoided to tell him many things. That she let him pass the tests although he was not performing as needed. And that she abandoned Silva. I thought that this is what he´s getting at. Before Silva is coming to get them, maybe M still has something that will help them?

[Dustin]

Also, when Bond says to M "Is there anything else you want to tell me?", I didn't really understand what he was on about then, either.

Right, I didn't get this one either.

Cutting room floor most likely.

[Vauxhall]

I assumed Bond was suspicious that M already knew who was targeting her and MI6 with the attacks, exemplified by something he says to Tanner ("and you believe her?"), and that was why he asked whether there was something she wasn't telling him.

[radio_wmn]

How did Bond know that M was retiring? He says in her house that they're both played out, and hears Eve say "I'm assisting Gareth Mallory in the transition period." and doesn't seem to be surprised.

I assume Bond was briefed by Tanner (who first mentions Mallory to him)
Although, this "transition period" is not quite clear to me. Do you think it means M's "retirement plan" is official? I thought the transition was from the previous head of the JISC to the new (Mallory), not from the current M to the future one.

Also, when Bond says to M "Is there anything else you want to tell me?", I didn't really understand what he was on about then, either.

Right, I didn't get this one either.

The impression I got was that M was being forced out, and possibly MI6 or at least the double-oh program, and that Mallory was gathering all the information he needed to close out her brief. The transition would then be that of retiring or reassigning the agents and support staff in the double-oh program.

[junkanoo]

When M and Kincade escape in Skyfall, why do they have a flashlight on? Surely M, the head of MI6, would realize that the flashlight would give away their position.

Agreed. So stupid a plot line ... it hurts to think about it.

In the same time frame, Bond purposely breaks through the ice to avoid getting shot by Silva. Silva just laughs and walks towards the chapel. Considering that Silva is a mastermind, did he really think Bond, a trained professional, would not survive that? Why would he not wait for him to resurface and shoot him before going to kill M, who is obviously sitting in the chapel waiting for Bond and is going nowhere?

That's not really a plot hole per se, but just the reality of this kind of series. Nobody just kills Bond or the series would be over. Best not to dwell on things too much or you'll find yourself realizing that if Bond can just waltz into M's apartment, so could mastermind Silva and he could have had his face-to-face revenge on the cheap. Thus the whole story (as presented) becomes beyond stupid.

Adding a new plot hole. It's one thing for MI6 to get rid of Bond's apartment - it's quite another thing for anyone to purchase his Scottish assets (house and gun collection). For a case of death in absentia, British law requires seven years before an estate can be sold.