MovieChat Forums > Chrysalis (2014) Discussion > Plot holes and explanations

Plot holes and explanations


So there has been a few questions that have arisen in terms of why something happened in the story, and I thought I would just explain those here. A lot of the explanations are not clearly written out in the script because I didn't want it to be spelled out so plainly, so it's not like anyone was missing something as they watched. Spoilers obviously:

1. The infected follow Abira because she is infected, they are drawn to her as if they can smell her (talked about in the movie) They are drawn to each other by smell, and are also attracted to people by the same means. Abira smells like both, uninfected and infected, which would trigger in them a frenzy. If infected and uninfected are in the same place at the same time it means that it's time to feed. That's why they are drawn to her so strongly.

2. The infected don't attack Penelope and instead follow Abira to her death. This goes back to the smell, not only is her scent more appealing that Pen's but also Pen accidentally, but effectively masks her smell with the lighter fluid. She intends to set herself on fire, but essentially makes herself invisible to the infected. She chalks it up to being lucky, and a mini-miracle.

3. The infected do eat one another if blood is spilled, as shown when our survivors kill an infected trying to come into where they were staying that night. They are opportunistic and will go for the weak in their pack if they've been injured.

4. Why do Pen and Josh keep having sex? Because that's what people do, they are young, and in love and there's no such thing as birth control anymore. Them never having sex would be odder than them having sex with the possibility of a miscarriage. That's how I feel though.

5. Pen's inability to read, or difficulty with it comes straight from my own childhood. There was no reason I had trouble reading as a little kid...I just couldn't do it well. With some individualized attention from an expert I ended up doing great. These characters exist in a world where they are no schools, everyone is on the run, and children are sheltered, her parents had more important things to worry about than giving their kids a well rounded education. Other children like Josh were given better opportunities, I wrote a series of short stories from the world of Chrysalis such as this one: http://therestaredead.tumblr.com/post/83230257940/not-lusus-naturae-we-called-them-silents-no-one
It explains Josh's education as a child, one that Pen didn't receive. If you enjoyed that story and want to read more they are all on that Tumblr site. Pen hides her inability from people for the same reason people who can't read today hide it from the world. It's an embarrassment for them.

6. Pen having shaved arm-pits. You got us there, it was an oversight and a funny one at that.

7. Pen pregnant at the end, yes, it is physically impossible for her to be pregnant within a few weeks of her miscarriage, this was intentional, it's meant to be a miracle. Not immaculate, it's Josh's.

If there are other holes that people find that they might have a question about please feel free to ask me. Thank you to everyone who watched it. If you loved it, great! If you didn't then we hope to make a movie you'll like next time. As I said before none of these plot holes are explicitly explained. As the writer I don't like to write explanations into my scripts, but as I see that it bothers people I will be more careful next time. Thanks again for watching.

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SPOILERS in POST:

This movie didn't work because of the script. It wasn't the production team. The locations were fine. The infected were fine, although we could have used more of them. The acting was bad, and the script was too weak. The tacked on ending was a total failure.

First of all, you needed at least two to four more survivors in the group to really give a sense of danger or anything else. You would have needed a few of them picked off. Without that, most of the movie seemed like nothing was happening.

Having a main character even want to have a baby in a zombie apocalypse was insane. Not only was there no place safe to have it, the pregnancy would have slowed her down to get eaten. And one cry from a baby would bring zombies down on them. I get it that they probably wouldn't have birthcontrol, but you had this character acting like she wanted to have a baby. Plus, she seemed to be fertile as a rabbit. It didn't come off as realistic. Poor diet and poor living conditions, you'll have less fertility. It's not like third world countries, this was worse, all the food left would have been in poor shape. And that was part of the problem, too much time had passed, so even finding a chest full of food, most of it should have been bad by then, if not all of it.

The character they brought into their little group, she came off as knowing too much info. Too smart for the time they were in. Even with a doctor for a father, she seemed too smart.

The whole plot was weak and didn't really seem to go anywhere. There didn't seem to be a sense of urgency most of the time. They never seemed to be in enough danger from anything.

The big reveal came off as lackluster. This might have worked if more of their own group had died because of ZombieMagnet. But having just the couple with her for the whole movie, it went nowhere. Discovering her dead friends didn't work, it wasn't enough. Who cares about characters we never saw before and didn't get to know.

The ending felt like tacked on junk. You spent the entire movie screaming she couldn't read, which also means no writing. And here you have her suddenly able to do that? At least it seemed that way with how she was talking to her unborn baby. The pregnancy was unrealistic, it didn't come off as any miracle. And that she even survived on her own was ridiculous. And seemed to be in no danger at the end.

I know you said you wrote some short stories off this. This might have been better on paper, but it didn't translate well into film.

The only reason I bothered to post is because I can't stand seeing writers so puzzled as to why their weak scripts don't work. "As the writer I don't like to write explanations into my scripts". No, this doesn't work. It has never worked for anyone. That's why you see movies like Don't Blink getting low ratings even though they actually had some big name actors in there. Not explaining anything destroyed the movie. Your problem is, you didn't look at what you created from a viewer's point of view. You were too stuck in your own writing world to take ten steps back and see this for what it was. Far too many writers make that mistake. Stop looking at your work as a writer, look at it as a viewer.

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Thank you so much for the response. I appreciate your thoughts on the movie and am glad to hear what you thought. Thanks for watching, and sorry you didn't enjoy it more.

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I agree. The woman wanting to have a baby in a hellhole that the world had turned into was insane. Little food no medicine or power or hospitals to speak of. Sure our ancestors who lived in caves thousands of years ago didn't have any of those things either and managed but at least they didn't have flesh eating zombies roaming around either to worry about .

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The only reason I bothered to post is because I can't stand seeing writers so puzzled as to why their weak scripts don't work.


If writer has to make a thread explaining why things are not plot holes, that is a sign of something that is poorly written. Basically, if a filmmaker has to explain his/her film to people then he/she has failed.

First of all, you needed at least two to four more survivors in the group to really give a sense of danger or anything else. You would have needed a few of them picked off. Without that, most of the movie seemed like nothing was happening.

Having a main character even want to have a baby in a zombie apocalypse was insane.

You spent the entire movie screaming she couldn't read, which also means no writing. And here you have her suddenly able to do that?


I agree with all your points. And I couldn't help but notice that the writer didn't address your points and just thanked you for watching the film.

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I just finished watching this film, and I don't know if its just where I'm at in my life, but that ending tore me up inside. That is to say I loved it. I don't understand why people have a problem with Penelope wanting a child, its human nature on the most basic level, we wouldn't be here if our ancestors had worried about how hard it would be to raise children in horrible cicumstances.

My plot hole has to do with Abiras smell/ zombie pherimones. So any group she joins eventually gets wiped out, due to her attracting zeds.Why then did her group get wiped out after she left them? Shouldn't they have been able to survive a normal amount of zeds after Abira left and they regrouped? If they died from a normal amount of zed attacks I think that makes them look pretty ill prepared for surviving 25 years into the apocalypse.


Secondary questions:

Was her group already dead when she left them?

Did her group realize the zeds were following her, and try to ditch her?

Was there a nuclear winter happening, and was the end showing it finally let up after 25 years? Or was it just a regular winter.



Thanks in advance for any answers or clarification.

If you have a kickstarter for your next movie let me know I'll glady donate what I can.

deus initium insaniae

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