By 
The movie Sinners has been talked constantly since it came out. This conversation only continued after some notable wins at the Oscars at the weekend.
Some see it as the second coming of our lord and saviour. Others see it as a half-decent vampire movie, basically, a new version of From Dusk Till Dawn.
It had a record 16 nominations at this year’s Academy Awards, winning 4. One of the Oscars it did win was Best Original Screenplay. This irked me because, if a movie is going to win awards for screenplay, that screenplay better be perfect!
Now, I have only seen Sinners once, so I might be off base here, but I do remember gaping plot holes. I would like to share some of them with you. If you think I’m wrong, tell me; if I’m correct again, let me know. Also, did I miss anything?
Sunlight
We first meet Remmick (Jack O’Connell), who is running away from some Native American vampire hunters. He’s running towards a house in an open area. It’s sunset, the sun is still up, and there is no cover or shade or anything to keep him out of the sun.
Side note, I would have loved to have seen more about the Native American hunters, but this is an African American movie, so they need to focus on one.
Back to my issue. Remmick gets to the house and only seems to suffer mild burns. The setting sun doesn’t seem to kill him; however, at the end of the movie, when the sun rises, he instantly bursts into flames.
That’s sunlight hitting his arm, and it looked like he’d been running for a while.
On the one hand, he might be weak from fighting all night, and somehow, the morning sun is more deadly than the setting sun. On the other hand, Remmick had been feeding most of the night, so wouldn’t he be more resilient to sunlight?
To The Bar
When Smoke and Stack (Michael B. Jordan) turn up in the town, one of them shoots two men who try to steal his truck. Fine, he doesn’t kill them, but he shoots them, in broad daylight, in front of everyone in the town.
That same day, they opened a bar and invited everyone to come along and join the fun.
Sorry, but who in their right mind would go? Two twins, with a reputation and who are trigger-happy, open a bar, and people go?
“Do you want to go to that new bar tonight?”
“What, the one opened by the guy who shot two people today? No!”
I know of people in my area that I would avoid at all costs, they have a violent nature, deal drugs and are generally best avoided. Surely people would have heard of the reputation of Smoke and Stack and stayed well away.
Everyone has just run away and hid from the man with the gun
Cotton Picking Money
At one point in Sinners, in the bar, Smoke and Stack have a conversation about not making enough money, not with ‘cotton pickers’. As we have seen, most of the locals work in the cotton fields and live in shacks.
Somehow, though, they can all afford cars? Now, I don’t know much about the economy of 1930’s middle America, but can people who live in run-down shacks afford cars? Were cars that cheap to buy?
It doesn’t change the fact that at the club, most of the patrons turn up in cars, so they seem to have some money kicking about. However, Smoke and Stack don’t think they would make enough from these people.
Please, Come In
It’s a well-known twist on the lore of vampires that they can be powerless unless they are invited in. In Sinners, they follow the more pure lore that vampires can’t enter anywhere at all unless invited.
This raises two points.
First, how did Remmick survive so long? As we have established, Middle America is seemingly a lot of open ground. In vampire lore, they have to sleep in coffins, fully out of the sunlight.
Up until now, where did Remmick sleep if he couldn’t just go into a house and had to be invited? He’s made it to middle America. Did he get himself invited into a new house every night? He couldn’t just creep into the basement and hide; that’s not being invited in.
Car Doors
The other issue that was raised in Sinners was about car doors. Now, in the lore of Sinners, they cannot enter the house or the bar without being invited in. When everyone leaves the bar, they all drive off in cars. Cars have doors.
However, everyone ends up turning into a vampire. So how did they get turned? Did the vampires get invited into the car, then open the door? Or did they reach into the window?
Please don’t tell me that people could have avoided being turned into a vampire by rolling the windows up?
Just Shut Up
The other thing about ‘being invited in’ was the silly Asian lady who ends up inviting them in. As I recall, she gives a stirring speech about her husband dying, then throws a hissy fit and ends up inviting all the vampires in.
If they knew the vampires couldn’t get in without being invited, any sane person would have just sat down, had a few drinks, talked very quietly until morning; problem solved.
Fine, it’s not like people make good decisions in horror movies, and the plot has to happen.
It was also a bit disjointed to have the poor Asian lady make a big speech, only to be the one who gets everyone killed.
Weapons
No, not the infinitely better horror movie of 2025, but the end of the movie, the weapons in the truck.
At the beginning of Sinners, it’s set up that a key character is in the KKK. After the vampire attack, Smoke or Stack have to deal with these horrible white men again.
He then produces an arsenal of weapons from a truck. Firstly, why were they there? For the return of the KKK? They were throwing money around to get the bar set up, musicians, drinks, etc., but they also had the time and money to get enough weapons to defeat an army.
Again, I might be wrong here, but I never got the impression that they knew about the weapons on the truck throughout the vampire attack.
I know the vampires were going to kill them, but I can’t help but think that trying to get those weapons might have been pretty handy.
A pity none of these could have been used during a vampire attack
In fact, it would have been more interesting to see them use all the weapons on the vampires, only to then have the KKK turn up after that. It would have got Cooglar’s message over a lot better.
Don’t Play The Devil’s Music
Sammie (Miles Caton) accidentally plays the ‘devil’s music’, which summons others from the past, present and future. It also seems to call the vampires to the bar at the same time, that’s how I saw it.
Firstly, how come it was only PoC musicians? Was Coogler saying that only black people can summon the devil? I guess white people don’t do that sort of thing.
I say he ‘accidentally plays the devil’s music’, because that’s the impression I got. The song was about his father, wasn’t it? Please correct me if I’m wrong.
Secondly, he happened to play that music that caused those visions, just as Remmick was passing by?
In fact, if Remmick had died from the sunlight at the beginning of the movie (like he should have), Sammie’s music wouldn’t have called the vampires to them at all! Or were there other vampires just hanging around, waiting for the music to kick in?
Never Again
At the end of the movie, Smoke or Stack (I don’t care which) turns up at another bar where Sammie was playing. Sammie still has his original guitar and is still playing music.
The end was what, 50 years later? In that time, there is no mention that he accidentally played the ‘devil’s music’ again. He never wrote another song; he only did covers. And he never played any covers that ‘summoned the devil’? Again, I might be way off here. Please correct me if so.
This next song is called ‘All Hail Satan and Vampires Please Come In’
Overall
I got all this from one watch of Sinners. I’m just a humble reviewer. Yes, I do write my own little scripts for videos, but they are usually quoted from a source material, because the details have to be perfectly correct. Also, my videos are seen by a few hundred people, if I’m lucky.
Cooglar’s Sinners was seen by millions of people all over the world. To me, the script felt like a first draft and, if anyone did look over it, they were too scared to point out many of the seemingly gaping holes.
The fact that Sinners won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay is a seems to run contrary to this. Unless, of course, all of the plot holes above can be explained, and I’m an idiot. I completely understand that this might be the case.
If any of you Outposters did love the movie and have logical explanations for any of my complaints above, please correct me.
Or is there anything else? Were there any other plot details that just didn’t make sense?
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