RHYS BOWEN: I suppose when you are a writer you are more sensitive to mistakes other writers make. The most obvious ones are in the ways people get murdered in TV and film. It is very rare that you can stab someone and they'll drop to the ground, dead. You'd have to be extremely lucky and go straight into the heart, and even then the victim would have to bleed out.
Most deaths are messy in real life. The victim lies there in agony. They vomit and do other unmentionable things. I've seen people killed with arsenic on TV, eating a meal, collapsing and dying. In truth arsenic is a gentle poison, giving the person stomach troubles for days and probably needing several doses. I saw a TV play last night in which the victim dies instantly from Thalium in face powder. No... it's a slow and unpleasant death. Hair falls out. You are sick... Even cyanide, that favorite poison, doesn't work as instantly as on the screen. Not everyone dies instantly. There would be some writhing, not pleasant to watch.
Do you ever find yourself shouting at the screen when something really stupid happens?
Here are some of my favorite NOOOOOOO!!! s
1. LOVE ACTUALLY. : Colin Firth loses all the pages of his novel because he is stupid enough to type next to an open window with a lake right there and NOT MAKE COPIES OF WHAT HE IS WRITING! How many people do not make at least a carbon copy? I can't bear to watch that scene.
2. ENCHANTED APRIL : It's April, folks. I cringe when I watch the scenes of the characters swimming peacefully in the Mediterranean sea with looks of contentment on their faces. The sea is freezing cold in April. Also it's not really warm enough to sunbathe often, even in Italy.
3: THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB: A neighbor has been murdered. The killer is still on the loose. The heroine looks out of her window at night and sees a light on in the neighbor's house and GOES OVER TO INVESTIGATE ALONE, NOT TELLING ANYONE ELSE WHERE SHE IS GOING. Of course she gets hit on the head. In that same episode she puts herself as bait for the killer who comes in, points a gun at there, and then pauses to explain how and why he did it, thus giving the rest of the cast enough time to burst in and rescue her.
4: All those old Mission Impossible type of movies in which the hero arrives in Eastern Europe and convinces the natives that he is a Russian Colonel by talking with a funny accent. Do you know how long it takes to learn Russian. (I took one semester. Believe me, I can only say a few words and I don't sound like a native)
And a final pet peeve... mystery novels or films when the sleuth knows something we can't possibly know, which helps him to solve the case. Poirot; I happen to know that she was once the wardress of a prison.. we did not know that!! Cheating.
So what are your pet peeves?
Even with suspension of disbelief, there are times that it is difficult to accept the actions of a character . . . remember in "Jurassic Park" when Lexi got the flashlight and turned it on, capturing the dinosaur's attention and letting it know right where they were?
ReplyDeleteGrace called it TSTL which I love!
DeleteThat is absolutely perfect!
DeleteYour #3 drives me nuts, too, Rhys. Why, oh why, would an intelligent person, even one who is supposed to be impulsive, do idiotically dangerous things? Yes, I know it is supposed to increase tension for the reader, but it's more likely to make me stop reading the book. Unless it's during a battle in a war. In war soldiers do take unbelievably dangerous and heroic actions. But they shouldn't do it in mysteries without a very good reason.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with Kim. The heroine who has no combat training or special skills approaches a dangerous scene by herself and almost dies and then 100 pages later or in the next book, does the same thing. Why doesn't she learn some caution?
DeleteThe dreaded going down to the basement during a power cut with a serial killer on the loose !
DeleteAlso how often people go into darkened parking garages alone, even though they are already knee-deep in a situation for someone wants to do them harm. (also that the parking garages are completely deserted)
DeleteThe private eye, cop, amateur sleuth, and perhaps even the assistant deli manager at the local grocers who get continually beaned on the noggin and knocked out, week after week, episode after episode. After a couple of those hits, he should be a drooling idiot who would have to be fed pablum for the rest of his life -- but, nay, our hero goes on to save the day, and the day the next week, and the week after, ad naseum until network cancellation.
ReplyDeleteThat reminds me of the first time I saw my son play a skateboarding video game. The character had a spectacular jump fail and went splat, complete with blood. A second later, he popped up, fine, no blood, and kept on with his board! I was stunned. My son (14 at the time) wasn't fazed.
DeleteI think that’s why there is so much violence and inhumanity in the world now, Edith. Video games make killing easy.
DeleteNo one ever is tested for concussion!
DeleteYour number three for sure! Also scenes when funny noises at night (after a series of killings) makes a person go out in the dark to investigate. A variation of #3, I suppose.
ReplyDeleteRhys, I didn't have time to comment yesterday, but I loved your post and get how you can be completely drawn to something (like mountains), as if they are familiar. Glad you are able to be so close to them, too. I had a similar feeling about two locations: One, the first time we came to Galicia (that northwest region of Spain just above Portugal and with a similar culture to Portugal), I felt strangely at home - which I do in Portugal as well. The other was the first time I went to India and met my husband's family. India felt so comfortable, almost familiar. You mentioned DNA, but my husband is inclined to attribute it to past lives.
He may be right. Who knows?
DeleteAll of those! And when somebody does get hit, how do they not even have a bruise the next day, you know, those horrible purple ones that fade to a sickly green? Or a scab or a scar from the wound.
ReplyDeleteAlso, in the Marlow Murder Club (which I stopped watching), she swims over to the bad guy's house NAKED. Talk about making yourself vulnerable!
Agreed!
DeleteHow fun, Rhys! #3! Yes! My husband is driven crazy by scenes where our hero socks someone in the jaw, knocking him out, and does not break his hand or even damage it. He himself is a gentle soul but he worked briefly as a bouncer in college to pay tuition; he saw a lot of bar fights and what they really do to people.
ReplyDeleteMy own peeves, naturally, have to do with the realities of dealing with cold and snow (forget the coiffure, where is your HAT?) and most scenes involving livestock, which in general are ludicrous. I wanted to walk out of the Keira Knightley PRIDE AND PREJUDICE for many reasons, but I had to turn off my brain when the director (desiring, I suppose, to show that this middle-class family lived in the countryside?) decided to have A PIG wandering in the kitchen. Clearly he had no experience with real pigs, who in the spirit of playfulness might have pushed over the table and gnawed off a table leg. Speaking of pigs, the cute star of BABE was eternally four months old, thus had to be played by 46 piglets. Most people have no idea the true size of adult pigs. I've known them over 600 lbs. (Selden)
I did not like that version of P and P at all, with the pig. I felt they were a family like Jane Austen’s own and certainly wouldn’t have had livestock in the house, especially not a food driven animal among all the cooking ( even if it wasnt 600 pounds)
DeleteRhys, you're right. A barnyard pig would have destroyed that kitchen. In fact, long ago, when the English wanted to insult the Irish, they said the Irish kept pigs in the parlor. It was a way of saying they were poor and, by inference, shiftless. Of course the Bennett family was neither. (Selden)
DeleteI have to comment on the very poorly done (IMHO) "American version" of P and P! I myself
Deletebelieve there will never be a better "movie/Television" etc. adaption than the beautifully
done BBC series! I purchased the DVD years ago and have viewed it countless times
*(along with reading Jane Austin's fabulous novel over and over) and always marvel
at the incredible cast and beautiful English countryside!!
I agree with Jerry that hitting the same hero on the head over and over should have lasting consequences.
ReplyDeleteAnother one is getting the season wrong. You cannot swim in the Mediterranean in February or in April. Br-r-r!
The leaves are long gone from the trees in the Catskills in November and you'll be more likely to see snow on them after Thanksgiving. (In a recent romance, the author used the changing leaves for a beautiful passage. But I couldn't get past the fact that she missed the foliage display by two months.)
It is called this the Mannix trope
DeleteAh yes, #3's TSTL (Too Stupid To Live) actions by the amateur sleuth can be cringing, especially in a long-running series, Has the amateur sleuth not learned any lessons from the previous times he/she confronted the killer alone? Sheesh.
ReplyDeleteGRACE: TSTL is a major pet peeve of mine too!
DeleteI share all of these pet-peeves as well. So far, knock on wood, I have found the show, Murder in Provence, to have far fewer annoying mistakes in it. Low-to-no stupid scenes and the scenery is spectacular.
ReplyDeleteWhere do you watch that show, Stacia?
DeleteI love that show too Stacia, but hubby not so much. The acting is so good!
DeleteEdith, it's either on BritBox or Acorn. I just noticed it again last night when I was flipping around.
DeleteI loved Murder in Provence. Too bad the series was so short. I felt the filming was so good. Incidentally it was made by the people who are doing Spyness for TV
DeleteHow wonderful that you have such skilled people for Spyness, Rhys.
DeleteParking places. Always available to the protagonist even in an area with resident-only parking. And parking garages. Always empty, cue ominous music, except for the white panel van parked next to the protagonist's car.
ReplyDeleteSo true!
DeleteEvery episode of every cop drama where the perp flees in a car and the cops unload their bullets into everything EXCEPT THE TIRES!
ReplyDeleteWineries - you know there is a dead body in the vat - always. Who is going to drink that wine now - talk about a best-before-date!
ReplyDeleteHaha!
DeleteOh, these are making me laugh! The Marlow Murder Club was Nancy Drew all over the place. We kept watching in spite of ourselves.
ReplyDeleteLove this conversation, thanks for starting it Rhys! Now I must go back through the work in progress and check for stupidity...
ReplyDeleteSame!
DeleteBooks set in Britain after 1860 where the characters walk by the Thames, or worse swim in the water.
ReplyDeleteThe river at the time was so polluted it stank as much as a pig sty. My other or come on is when person A flies to location B in a commercial plane in less time than it actually takes; i.e New York to Buenos Aires in 6 hours with stops. Unless they were on the Concord this is not going to happen.
So true about the Thames. Even when I was a child you could not swim in it. They cleaned it up in the 60s snd now it’s full of fish
DeleteI join everyone in saying all of the above! My pet peeve has nothing to do with mysteries, it’s from the movie, Jerry Maguire. The football player’s wife makes the biggest decision in the movie, not Jerry. He’s frozen. But he gets all the credit for it. I almost lost my mind in the theater at this incomprehensible story point. He was a terrible agent!
ReplyDeleteYes! And he was a bully! I wanted to slap Renee Zellweger for being so dim.
DeleteThat scene in "Love, Actually" (a movie I really like, btw) makes me laugh every time for the exact same reason. Photocopiers were a thing back then, even if he didn't use carbon paper.
ReplyDeleteAnd #3 gets me every. single. time.
A very common "really stupid thing for a smart character to do"...is get up in the middle of the night and visit an abandoned building and not tell anyone-or something similar. This type of sleuthing seems to be a way for the author to have action and suspense.
ReplyDeleteMy husband reads a lot of navy novels based on actual wars. It is amazing how many authors get simple navy facts wrong.
All of the above. And in particular, I hate movies that portray archaeologists--except for Indiana Jones :-) Mostly, the writers get everything wrong. And I'm there to yell at the TV and let them know it! Indiana Jones was different--it was meant to be a swashbuckling throw-back, Saturday matinee kind of movie. (Flora)
ReplyDeleteAll these examples are as entertaining as encountering them is annoying. Marlow Murder Club is so full of inanities I had to quit watching. As Edith pointed out, swimming NAKED is ridiculous, for so many reasons. But the worst is having the police inspector telling them to butt out, and the next thing you know they're barging into the station to butt in, yet again. In real life they'd be cooling their heels in a cell.
ReplyDeleteI've been watching Pie in the Sky for months, and the very premise of that show is silly. Not allowing someone to retire because of blackmail by the chief inspector, and then dragging Henry out to investigate something, whenever, for years? The main actors are charming, though.
John’s favorite TV series. I can’t watch it. A for that premise and B because all the cops are crooked
DeleteYes! Everyone but Henry and whatshername, the driver.
DeleteSo incredibly funny! And so true. I am terrible to watch TV with, because I am always criticizing how reporters are portrayed, and how TV technology works. It is never ever ever ever correct. There was one movie in particular where they did a live broadcast from inside a nuclear power plant. With no wires. Back then, that would’ve been absolutely impossible. But even today, that’s probably not gonna happen. It was absolutely ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteOn another topic: I think when some character does some thing that we say is too stupid to live, that’s the authors fault – – because they have not provided sufficient and understandable motivation for the character . If the stakes are high enough, anyone will do anything. But if the reader doesn’t believe that, or understand that, then we roll our eyes.
If the reader even says: “I would never do that, but I understand why the character is doing that”, then you’re fine.
Good point.
DeleteHank, I learned early on that movies that portray real life jobs (like a reporter) never get it right. In the 70s when the Airport disaster movies came out, my dad, an airline navigator for multiple decades, couldn’t stop talking about how many things they got wrong. And when Absence of Malice came out, my brother-in-law’s law firm holiday party was all a-twitter with the mistakes in the film. — Pat S
DeleteOh, yes, I can imagine!!
DeleteHank, I feel the same way about deaf characters in movies doing things that I know NO deaf person would do. This gives false ideas. This happened more with hearing actors playing Deaf roles.
DeleteOhhhh I would love for you to tell us more about this!
DeleteSusan D here:
ReplyDeleteMany many many. But there's one I cringe every Christmas: having confronted a man who is clearly mentally ill, a man who then runs away down a crowded street, Bert the Cop pulls out his gun and fires off a volley of shots, somehow missing not only George Bailey, but all the innocent bystanders along the way.
That’s because the Cops were Ernie and Bert! Sesame Street gun!
DeleteOh, Rhys, I laughed out loud. Thank you for the lift in these grim times! (Selden)
DeleteI cringe watching shows and movies where no matter where in Texas it is supposed to be, there are canyons, mesas, and cacti. My husband is very critical about uniforms and firearms in historical shows, as in get it right! How many sleuths or police enter a dark house and turn on their flashlights without checking to see if the lights turn on. Flip that switch first. I agree heartily about TSTL people. If the light doesn't turn on in the basement, don't go down there.
ReplyDeletePat, when I would watch Psych (okay, not intended to be a serious show), I would get frustrated. The show was set in Santa Barbara, CA, but filmed in Vancouver, Canada. Slightly different terrain. They’d be running through a pine forest and I’d be yelling at the TV, “They don’t have forests in Santa Barbara!” — Pat S
DeleteOmigod, Pat, the CSI shows were ALL that way, trying to detect in completely dark houses. It's so silly.
DeleteOh yes, dark buildings. On TV and in movies, people are always creeping around in the dark with tiny flashlights instead of just turning on the lights!
DeleteThanks Rhys. I am really enjoying your musing and thoughts.
ReplyDeleteI am particularly annoyed when the protagonist makes obviously poor choices just to put the character in a situation to come to a conclusion. Often in mysteries and tv "who done it" shows the main character gets into a situation where the killer confronts them and threatens their life while conveniently telling how and why they committed the murder - and at the same time the police just happen to barge in for the rescue. But sometimes it's a set up which is ok. I like when the clues are left throughout the story and the main character fits them all together at the end to solve the case. The TV show Murder in Paradise (set in the Caribbean) does this very well.
I wholeheartedly agree about #3. Also, about all the people who never seem to suffer a concussion or fractured skull, despite all the terrible blows to the head. It also annoys me when the protagonist in a book or TV show, etc, refuses medical attention for what surely must be a life-threatening injury. Or they go to the hospital and then sign themselves out, or just sneak out when there’s no staff around!
ReplyDeleteDebRo
I loved that commercial from about a year or two ago where the four twenty-somethings are trying to get away from the bad guy and they debate which way/what they should do. After rejecting the obvious “get in the car and drive away” suggestion, they finally decide to hide behind the wall of chain saws! Even the murderer shakes his head in disbelief! It’s like the writers of the commercial read today’s blog! — Pat S
ReplyDeletePat S, was that commercial a satire?
DeleteOh definitely! It was for Geico or Progressive - one of those insurance companies that have funny ads.
DeleteOne more pet peeve: I have driven in Washington, DC, in Boston, in NYC and in LA. In the movies and on TV, where is the traffic? How do they just get to wherever they have to go so fast?
ReplyDeleteOH, SO many times I have watched a movie and said, like, "wait, I guess there are NO people in Venice today..."
DeleteYes! I noticed that too! No people?
DeleteSome of the tamer TV series seem to cycle through every even mildly possible villain - "he once stepped on my tomatoes" - before picking the one it had to be because you had no idea her twin sister yada yada...
ReplyDeleteNo one's mentioned cell phone reception! Suddenly, and for no apparent reason, when the hero or heroine is in dire straits, there is no phone service!
ReplyDeleteI can't remember which Dan Brown book this was in, but he had the main character jump out of a helicopter into a river, get quickly checked out by medical people, and go on to save the day. C'mon. Hitting water from that height would be like landing on concrete. Even if he survived he would have been in the hospital for weeks. This dumb scene has stuck in my mind for years! - Karen R
ReplyDeleteANGELS AND DEMONS! THE WORST!! I adore Dan Brown, but that was ridiculous. He jumps out of the helicopter holding a BLANKET for a parachute! And Dan even--I am also obsessed with this scene--foreshadows it at the beginning of the book with a riff on "draft" and "downdraft" and "parachutes" and how "lift" works. Like that would make it believable. That guy would have dropped like a rock.
DeleteThis is making me laugh even now. Thank you, Karen.
DeleteThis is the first time I've commented (because I usually don't sit down to read my emails until 10 at night), and Hank, I'm so excited that you replied back and felt the same way!
DeleteLove this! And I am so with you, Karen, you are so right!
DeleteAnd I love that chainsaw commercial, it makes me laugh every time. - Karen R
ReplyDeleteMy Dad helped build planes during WWII and used to say when we were watching Black Sheep Squadron that they went up in one plane and now were flying in another.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the explosions that everyone runs from, gets knocked down, and then just gets up and goes on with their day. And why do all the cars in crashes explode?
My aunt's relative went to confront a man about his son. talked to the guy in the upstairs apartment, went and got in his car, and the man shot him dead right through the car roof. So much for all the people sheltering behind cars. Also, how can the bad guys shoot tons of bullets and never hit anyone, but the good guy shoots his gun and takes the bad guy out? I guess we all say it's just fiction!
Oh, #3. I actually thought a LOT of Marlow Murders was , um, stretching believability quite a bit. Fun to watch BUT.... (I must have been desperate for some escapism)
ReplyDeleteTOTALLY.
DeleteTotally escapism!
DeleteI agree with Pat about not turning the lights on. It can't be they don't do it because it will give away the cops' presence. If you hear a bunch of footsteps coming through the house, wouldn't the criminal know people were there. And, like others have said, going to investigate something (usually on a dark, rainy night) and not telling anyone where you're going seems especially stupid to me. Also, if I knew someone was coming after me, I'd have more than one security system with cameras and a body guard. Never ever go into a dark basement/cellar with just a flashlight for light. Lock the door or barricade the door and wait until morning at least.
ReplyDeleteSo late commenting here today. Busy day! Yes, I share these pet peeves. I have too many pet peeves to mention here. There is One significant thing about crime drama or mysteries on TV when someone is hit on the head then gets up and walks away with no injuries. My dad and I were watching a tv show where that happened. He said that action could kill someone in real life.
ReplyDelete