the.com/plothole
the moment a story asks you to un-notice what it already showed you.
means an internal inconsistency or unresolved gap in a narrative's logic, timeline, or cause-and-effect that undermines the story's own rules.
from the term surfaced in mid-20th-century screenwriting and pulp criticism as audiences began treating stories as engineered systems with load-bearing logic, not just sequences of events; the word literally frames narrative as terrain you can fall through.
not the same asunexplained mystery, which is intentional and gets resolved
studio termwriters call fixing them patching, like drywall
most common causelate rewrites changing rules earlier scenes already established
for instance
the dark knight rises — bruce wayne crosses continents with no money or passport, 2012
jurassic park — raptors learn to open doors despite having no opposable thumbs
home alone — a family forgets an entire child while flying to paris