Gun errors in books and movies

[Watchdog]

What really chaps my hide in movies, is seeing (and hearing) single action only guns such as 1911's, Glocks, AR's and various machine guns, keep clicking (like hammer strikes on a double action) after they run out of ammo.

Just recently, I re-watched and episode that showed a person firing a 1911 and after they fired the last shot in the magazine, the slide did not lock back and I heard about 3 or 4 additional clicks because they kept pulling the trigger.
In fact, the only thing the got right was the number of rounds it holds.

I think there was an episode of The Sopranos where Christopher was shooting someone with a semi-auto, and when he ran out of ammo, the slide didn't lock back and he kept clicking the trigger. I cringed when I saw that goof-up in an otherwise outstanding series.

 

[Chromedhearts]

No
He
Didn't.

First of all you don't keep a given weapon your entire career. You get issued a different weapon at every new duty station.

I have no idea what he told you or what was in his home but it was not a USMC issued weapon. And I won't even discuss ammunition which is accounted for To. The. Round. ( and people go to jail when they're caught with it)

You have no idea how closely "sensitive items" are monitored. Ft. Carson put the entire 2nd Brigade Combat Team on lockdown for a day and a half over a missing M9. (Berretta) No one from that entire unit (5000 people) was allowed to leave the post and most of them were confined to the barracks until that weapon was found.

Assuming that your late cousin was even allowed to leave post with an issue weapon his entire chain of command would be risking their careers by allowing him to keep that weapon in his quarters. If the weapon were stolen from his private quarters everyone from him up would have to explain how that weapon got out of the arms room.

Not if but when the IG showed up for a spot inventory the unit armorer and everyone from him up would have to explain why that weapon wasn't in the unit arms room. In either case careers would end. No unit armorer (or commander) would ever put their career on the line for that and no E9 would risk pissing his career away to keep an issue weapon at home.

Based on my actual military experience there is nothing you could tell me that would ever make me believe your story.

ETA I put the question to a friend of mine who retired as an E7 who was also in Supply and she said that in her entire career hell would freeze SOLID before what you're describing ever happened

In my limited time of military service; the only people that I was aware of keeping their issue arm with them in their private lives were General Officers, and I believe it was theirs to keep. I did know a few West Point men who carried a private property 1911a1, after the Army had transitioned to the M9.


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[Simson-Suhl]

I have a friend who is a serious WW2 buff and collector. If we go see a WW2 movie together more than once I had to tell him, "Richard, those are not real Germans, and that is not real blood, they are actors, this is a movie".

 

[sceva]

Just watch Mysteries at the Museum on the travel channel.

German WWII soldiers shooting M1 carbines and Flintlocks

In fact soldiers in almost any war are often shown with flintlocks

Removing a bullet in surgery and showing a complete cartridge held in the forceps.

 

[Smoke]

In my limited time of military service; the only people that I was aware of keeping their issue arm with them in their private lives were General Officers, and I believe it was theirs to keep. I did know a few West Point men who carried a private property 1911a1, after the Army had transitioned to the M9.

The military doesn't give weapons away. I've seen general officers carrying weapons that they owned but never keeping an issue weapon.

 

[shouldazagged]

Gunfire next to anyone's ears! It's a dumb cartoon, but the show Archer does pretty good with gun design and rounds fire, and has constant complaints about tinnitus caused by the gun happy agents...

Ïn "Copland", the only Stallone flick I've liked, his character is deaf in his right ear, which prevents him from being a big city cop. Late in the movie one of the bad guys deliberately fires a Glock inches from his good ear while he's down, temporarily deafening him completely. Interesting twist.

Margaret Truman Daniel--yes that Margaret Truman--wrote a number of spy novels. She invariably referred to semi-auto pistols as revolvers, and imagined one made entirely of translucent plastic to avoid detection. I assume the barrel, slide rails, springs and ammo were plastic as well. Kind of like Wonder Woman's invisible airplane.

 

[muddocktor]

.............

Now, I can't vouch for the practice of the Royal Navy, but the big guns used by US services burned black powder. My father left me a bunch of tech stuff he used in his work on military guns and I worked with guys who served on Navy gun crews in the 1970s and they were still using black powder. FWIW, the charge on 16" naval rifles was 850 lbs of black powder.........

Sorry to call you on this, but you are just wrong. The main charge on the battleship guns was not black powder for WWII era guns, but rather smokeless powder. They did use some black powder in them, but that was just an igniter charge to make sure the powder lit up properly. For one thing, black powder doesn't have the energy to shoot a 2700 lb AP round at 2500 ft/sec. So in a sense they did use black powder, but it was just an initiator charge, not the main propellant charge.

Here is a link to a page on the 16"/50 guns as used on the Iowa Class battleships if you are interested. <<<LINK>>>

 

[Smoke]

Sorry to call you on this, but you are just wrong. The main charge on the battleship guns was not black powder for WWII era guns, but rather smokeless powder. They did use some black powder in them, but that was just an igniter charge to make sure the powder lit up properly. For one thing, black powder doesn't have the energy to shoot a 2700 lb AP round at 2500 ft/sec. So in a sense they did use black powder, but it was just an initiator charge, not the main propellant charge.

Here is a link to a page on the 16"/50 guns as used on the Iowa Class battleships if you are interested. <<<LINK>>>

Can't speak for the Navy but I was a 13 Bravo in the army in the mid-to-late 80s we were shooting powder from the late 50s early 60s that was nitrocellulose

 

[Old Arkansawyer]

Watching the new Hawaii 5 0 it seems every bad guy on the island has
a machine gun which he can't hit dip with. What happened to that
states gun control?

 

[Chromedhearts]

Watching the new Hawaii 5 0 it seems every bad guy on the island has
a machine gun which he can't hit dip with. What happened to that
states gun control?

That just shows the old saying; When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns


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[lkabug]

Saw one the other night where they found a Claymore on some dude and everybody was uptight because They (claymores-c-4) were so "unstable."

We used to heat our C rations with C-4.

 

[Old cop]

My pet peeve is the unmistakable clicking/cocking sound that comes before the introduction of a gun into any scene, like the audience is so dumb we would not recognize a gun.

 

[Hamster65]

We used to heat our C rations with C-4.

Yeah, C-4 is great heat source. Just don't try to stomp it out.

 

[richardrobins93]

yep kinda like a staloin or swezanikker movie. 200 to 300 rounds at 20 feet, and zero hits,,

 

[Mark S.]

In the movie "Slumdog Millionaire" what appears to be a Python, or possibly a Diamondback, is referred to as a "Colt .45"

Just read a novel set in modern times wherein the author mentions several times that the local female deputy sheriff toted a Colt King Cobra in ".45 caliber".

 

[Smoke]

Saw one the other night where they found a Claymore on some dude and everybody was uptight because They (claymores-c-4) were so "unstable."

In all fairness, while C4 is very stable I remember being trained to insert the blasting cap into a Claymore Mine with my non-dominant hand.

The reason they told me to do it that way was in case the blasting cap blew up I'd still have my dominant hand.

IIRC that was actually printed in the SMCT.

So that may be where the writers got that idea of Claymores being "unstable"

 

[jimbo728]

Good sound military reason on which hand to use.
Jim

 

[Warren Sear]

Love seeing supressors on revolvers in movies...

...and in pictures from the Vietnam war.

 

[Muley Gil]

...and in pictures from the Vietnam war.

Looks like a Victory model. Y'all see the lanyard loop?

 

[Warren Sear]

How about the way they used to hold their pistols sideways in the movies for a while! I thought that was hilarious! How did that ever get started?