5. Halloween (1978) – Michael Myers Can Drive
Horror movies and logic are barely even passing acquaintances. Hulking killers with supernatural strength and resilience don’t exactly scream realism, but even so, the genre must be held to some standard of logic, or the stories simply fall apart at the seams. John Carpenter’s Halloween is a certified classic, so it’s actually somewhat painful to bring this one up, but there is one pretty large and irritating plot hole regarding Michael Myers.
In Halloween‘s story, six-year-old Michael Myers is taken to Smith’s Grove hospital – a mental health facility – after murdering his teenage sister with a kitchen knife. He resides there for 15 years before escaping, setting the events of Halloween into motion. During Michael’s escape, he steals a car and drives it home to his hometown of Haddonfield, except this doesn’t make any sense at all. As he was incarcerated from the age of six, where on Earth did Michael learn to drive a car?
Dr. Sam Loomis, the doctor responsible for Michael’s “treatment”, simply saw to it that the boy never saw the light of day. This makes the idea that he may have somehow learned to drive an practically impossibility, resulting in a glaring plot hole that undermines the story of a horror classic. Though the sequels reveal minor character Dr. Terence Wynn as the leader of a cult that worships Myers (potentially explaining who taught him to drive), this also doesn’t quite fit. It’s hard to believe that the hulking psychopath could have been taken for driving lessons without anyone noticing – besides, with the confusing state of the Halloween franchise’s canon, who even knows what to believe?