Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

I grew up in the suburbs of Jersey. My mom – one of the PTA regulars – always helped run our school’s Fun Fair – an afternoon of silly games that awarded tickets you could redeem for prizes. It was a fundraiser for the school, and my friends and I all anxiously awaited it. Me more than them, as my mom’s position afforded me the chance to see all the cool toys we could win ahead of time.

When I was eight or nine, I got really sick a few days before the Fun Fair. It was one of those early disappointments in life that will always stick with you – nothing too big, but big enough to a young Matt that I was in a bad mood. Read more

Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

Finally. Finally we hit the final film of the prequel duology. After this, I will never watch them again. (Didn’t catch last week’s post on Episode II? Check it out here.) 

For this article, I could go into all of the plot holes left at the end of this film that create issues in the Original Trilogy. Why couldn’t Vader sense Luke on the same planet where he sensed his mother? What’s up with C-3PO’s memory? Can Jedi survive falls or not? What’s up with these Force ghosts? Etc…

But plenty of sites have discussed those.

Instead, let’s buy into the world for a minute. Palpatine had a plan, and it ended up working out. What logical fallacies did he induce in the Jedi to get away with it?

Well, there’s one main one. Read more

Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

A new millennium. A new Star Wars film. What could go wrong?

In short, so many things. Read more

Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

In a bid to become the most iconoclastic film reviewer on the internet, this week I’m going to tackle Citizen Kane! Read more

Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

Indiana Jones – an amazing series of two movies that unfortunately also had two other films with the same name to dilute the awesomeness. Read more

Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

Described on Wikipedia as a “neo-noir crime-thriller film”, with each of those terms hyperlinked to a relevant page, Gregory Hoblit’s 1996 film Primal Fear introduced the world to Ed Norton and made the world forget about Richard Gere’s turn as Lancelot in First Knight, among other things. Read more

Each week, we analyze a movie that illustrates a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who said Netflix can’t help you study? 🎥📖

Since we covered Gravity a few weeks ago, we figured we should also cover its sequel, The Martian. Read more

Every week we bring you a new movie that teaches us about a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who says Netflix can’t help you study? 

Originally scripted by Rod “I don’t have a nickname because you should know who I am” Serling, Planet of the Apes is the tale of when a group of astronauts stop being polite and start getting killed by walking, talking apes.

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Every week we bring you a new movie that contains a logical fallacy you’ll find on the LSAT. Who says Netflix can’t help you study? 

People didn’t know what to expect when J.J. Abrams was picked to helm the reboot of the Star Trek franchise in 2009. Would it be the gritty reboot of Batman? The campy reboot of Footloose? The angsty reboot of The Incredible Hulk? The Norton-y reboot of The Incredible Hulk?

Instead, we got an action-filled, heartfelt, somewhat confusing reboot of a beloved franchise. The movie made nearly $400 million dollars, and a sequel was all but assured. Four years later, we were treated to the second film in the series: Star Trek Into Darkness.

As is traditional in the sci-fi world (thanks, Empire), the sequel sees the crew of the Enterprise split up because of demotion (Kirk), reassignment (Spock), and arguments over weapons of mass destruction (Colin PowellScotty).

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Logical fallacies are present in our everyday lives. Sometimes, they’re tricking us into switching to Geico. Other times, they’re being used to argue against climate change or for doubling down on red. And they’re definitely used by the writers of the LSAT to create questions.

But they’re not only used for evil! They also appear in our favorite forms of entertainment. Writers of mysteries and suspense use logical fallacies all the time to misdirect the reader/viewer from the ending. Romantic comedies use them to ramp up the tension. Action and sci-fi movies often overuse them, leaving huge holes in their plots.

In our #MovieFailMondays blog series, we’ll take a look at movies that feature a logical fallacy and how we can use this knowledge to score better on the LSAT. You can also use it to smugly say, “Saw it coming!” at the end of the next M. Night Shyamalan movie. If anyone besides you goes to see it.

The Usual Suspects

Bryan Singer released The Usual Suspects in 1995. One of the movies that ushered in the modern era of the #SPOILERALERT, the movie had people discussing the twist ending incessantly. The movie, a story of five criminals (Kevin Spacey, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio del Toro, that other Baldwin – no, not that one, the other one – and that guy who was in that thing…uhm…Jackson Pollock?) who carry out a heist after meeting in a lineup, is framed by Kevin Spacey’s Verbal Kint telling the story to Agent Dave Kujan.

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