Summary
- A Quiet Place presents a sci-fi horror world with an interesting concept that opens the door for some noticeable plot holes.
- There are aspects of the deadly Death Angels that make no sense, such as their motivations, their movements, and their inconsistent hearing.
- Humanity's role in these movies also raising some questions regarding their survival, their inability to fight back, and a questionable thriving newspaper industry.
With such a unique premise and distinct world in which the story takes place, it is not surprising that there are several A Quiet Place plot holes that fans have noticed. The first movie helped to launch a new horror franchise, one in which sound is the enemy of humanity with the world overrun by monsters who hunt through their acute hearing. The film was a critical and financial smash hit that spawned a sequel and now a prequel with A Quiet Place: Day One. However, as the franchise grows, there are things that still don't make sense.
A movie like A Quiet Place relies on the audience believing in this world the movie has built with its own rules and lore. With so little dialogue in the first movie, the world-building A Quiet Place was able to pull off is impressive. However, the particular monsters presented in the story, the backstory of the world, and some of the actions of the characters have taken some audiences out of the story with some noticeable plot holes.
10 Burning Questions A Quiet Place’s Prequel Movie Can Answer
There's still a lot audiences don't know about the world of A Quiet Place, and the prequel, A Quiet Place: Day One, could have answers.
15 What Do The Death Angels Eat?
Humans Are Not A Food Source
One of the most puzzling aspects about the creatures in the films (known as Death Angels from a newspaper clipping in the film) is how exactly they receive sustenance. Throughout the first movie, the Death Angles are shown to be vicious and remorseless killers who simply target anything that is making a noise. However, they are not shown to actually eat the victims. As the franchise continues, it further suggests that the victims are simply killed and not consumed.
While it made the aliens less generic flesh-eating monsters, the raised questions about their survival.
The detail seemed questionable in the first movie and its sequel as it suggested that these aliens came to a new planet and killed the majority of the population, but didn't seem to have a steady food supply. While it made the aliens less generic flesh-eating monsters, the raised questions about their survival. However, the prequel might have addressed this with A Quiet Place: Day One showing alien pouches that seem to be the food supply.
14 Why Do The Death Angels Kill In The First Place?
The Monsters Still Lack Motivation
While it might be that the question of the alien's food source was answered, if the A Quiet Place monsters don't eat humans, then there is a question of why they actually kill. A Quiet Place: Part II showed that the aliens wasted time slaughtering people as soon as they appeared and this is further shown in A Quiet Place: Day One. However, though more and more is revealed about the monsters, the motivations behind their attacks are still never clear.
However, the immediacy with how the monsters attacked when they first arrived seemed as though they were quickly intent on wiping out everyone which makes the lack of motivation this far into the franchise odd.
Perhaps humans are too noisy a lot for the Death Angels to endure, which is why they attack with such ferocity. They don't seem particularly bothered by the ive sounds of nature, which means this species might have identified humans as a threat. However, the immediacy with how the monsters attacked when they first arrived seemed as though they were quickly intent on wiping out everyone, which makes the lack of motivation this far into the franchise odd.
13 Why Do Some People Wear Shoes, While Others Do Not?
The Abbott Family's Precautions Become Meaningless
One of the best things about watching the A Quiet Place movies is seeing all the ways the survivors of humanity have to adapt to a world in which they cannot make any noise. However, some of these details prove to be inconsistent throughout the movies. In A Quiet Place, the Abbott family is shown to walk in bare feet to avoid making noise which seems like an obvious and clever solution.
However, in A Quiet Place Part II, the Abbotts' neighbor Emmett is shown to keep his shoes on the whole time. Emmett has survived just as long as the Abbotts and in the same area, so it is strange that he could wear shoes while they could not. It is even more notable considering the first movie made a point of using the bare feet as an issue with Evelyn stepping on a nail late in the movie.
12 Why Can't The Death Angels Swim?
The Added Weakness Feels Random In The Sequel
A Quiet Place Part 2 helped establish a few more truths about the Death Angels, beyond just their weakness to high-pitched sonic frequencies. During the scene when Emmett and Regan are threatened by a group of barbaric human survivors at the docks, the former manages to escape death by diving into the water. A Death Angel tries to pursue, but the creature cannot swim to save its life and ends up drowning.
Most animals have a natural built-in swimming instinct, but these creatures do not. According to franchise canon, the density of muscle and bone, plus built-in armor makes them too heavy to swim, which is a possible explanation, but that suggests a lack of water in their world, which is hard to swallow.
Similar to the famous plot hole in Signs, it also begs the question of why these aliens would come to a planet that is largely covered in water if they cannot swim and have no use for it. The fact that the aliens also show no caution around water further confuses it as a weakness.
11 Why Isn't The Water Weakness Used More?
This Is The Death Angels' Biggest Weakness
A Quiet Place and its sequel establish the weakness of the aliens' hearing which can be exploited to kill them. While that is a helpful tool in the fight against these monsters, there was a much better and more effective weakness that humanity should have already been using against them. The monster's inability to swim should have made humanity's victory, or at the very least their survival, much easier than what was depicted.
It was shown that a community was able to survive and thrive on a small island without the threat of the monsters attacking because they were surrounded by water. Indeed, almost every island and non-landlock location in the world should have been safe. The government seems to have recognized the weakness early on as A Quiet Place: Day One showed bridges being destroyed to prevent the spread of the monsters. With this knowledge, there could have been huge evacuation plans.
10 The Death Angels' Hearing Is Inconsistent
The Aliens Can Pick Up On The Smallest Sound And Also Not Hear Obvious Living Things In Front Of Them
The idea of monsters who hunt by sound creates an incredibly tense world for these movies to take place in. Scenes of the Death Angels lurking as the characters try to be as silent as possible are pulse-pounding sequences throughout the movies. However, the impact of these scenes is somewhat dampened by the inconsistency in how the aliens hear and just how much sound will draw their attention.
It was also confirmed that the A Quiet Place monsters can hear heartbeats if they are loud enough which further suggests most of the characters in the franchise should have been killed given the sound they make.
A Quiet Place shows the Abbott family communicating simply based on sign language, not risking whispering at all. However, when Evelyn is in labor later in the movie, she is whimpering in pain, trying to hold in her screams which the aliens don't pick up on even as they are lurking within the house. It was also confirmed that the monsters can hear heartbeats if they are loud enough which further suggests most of the characters in the franchise should have been killed given the sound they make.
9 What About Involuntary Bodily Noises?
Humans Cannot Totally Stay Silent
The movie makes it clear that the characters can't make a single loud noise, for fear of attracting the Death Angels. They go to great lengths to soften or mask any potential sounds. They even have to mask the sound of Monopoly pieces hitting the board, proving just how acute the hearing of the creatures truly is, and what they're capable of. This doesn't factor into involuntarily noises such as snoring, sneezing, coughing, or even stomach growls.
As careful as the Abbott family is, it is hard to believe that they never experienced a moment of unexpected bodily noises over the course of their survival period. Even if they were hypervigilant about this sort of thing in their daily life, they would have to be extremely lucky that no one in the family snores or talks in their sleep ever.
8 How Were There Newspapers?
Running A Newspaper Seems Unrealistic In The World Presented In The Movie
As is the case with most horror movies, A Quiet Place contains some newspapers with dreadful, apocalyptic headlines proclaiming the end of the world as we know it. The movie uses it as a brief bit of visual exposition about the alien invasion.
However, given the fact that newspaper printing is a rather noisy affair, it seems incomprehensible that anyone would have been able to make it through a news cycle. It also doesn't take into who delivered the newspapers, why those people weren't hunkering down for safety, and just how long the various news outlets managed to hang on. A
Quiet Place Part 2 makes it clear in the opening act that the Death Angel attacks are swift, sudden, and immediate, leaving little time for preparation. With there being enough time to circulate a newspaper with the assumption that there would be enough survivors to read it destroys a lot of the ideas about the state of the world in these movies.
7 The Death Angels Overcame The Authorities In Record Time
The Aliens Had Too Many Weaknesses To Defeat Humanity So Quickly
There have been plenty of alien invasion movies that have shown the short work extraterrestrial threats can make of human society with Independence Day and War of the Worlds showing how society crumbles in a manner of days. However, those movies featured aliens with advanced technology capable of leveling entire cities in a matter of moments. The Death Angles are aliens who travel on the ground, have no weaponry, and cannot swim yet were just as effective in their invasion.
If there was time for newspapers to be printed and circulated before the invasion truly took over, then there would have been enough time for the military and government to take certain steps to ensure there was some semblance of society still functioning. Underground bunkers, submarines, and battleships all would have allowed the authorities of the world to function amid the invasion.
6 The Government Could Not Figure Out How To Fight Them
The Sensitive Hearing Should Have Been An Early Target For Defense
At the end of A Quiet Place, viewers discover the new hearing device that Lee made for Regan gives off a high frequency that weakens the Death Angels and allows them to be killed. This is explored further in the sequel when Regan seeks to transmit the frequency over the radio, helping in the larger fight against the aliens.
While it is a triumphant moment for the heroes of this story, it is a little hard to believe that this weakness was stumbled upon accidentally by Lee and not something that was tried elsewhere. In a situation involving an alien invasion, there would be casualties on both sides. Military scientists would immediately begin researching the creatures to prepare for a counterattack.
Everyone knows that the monsters rely on hearing to get around and hunt their targets, and this information would undoubtedly get ed around rather fast. Military strategists would make it a number one priority to determine any and all weaknesses the Death Angels might possess, and coordinate their attacks.
