Shields preventing enemy fire are often down in J.J. Abrams's "Star Trek," but the plot hole deflectors are always up. At point in the 2009 "Trek," Spock asks why a sage representative didn't beam aboard the Enterprise instead of Kirk, to relay crucial information that he could've explained more reliably than the young captain. The wise old man merely insists that Kirk and Spock need each other, and he could not "deprive you of the revelation of all you could accomplish together." During the sequel, which is "full "of plot-deflector-up moments, the team encounters a surprise attack on Klingon planet Kronos, though they (and we) had been repeatedly informed they're in an abandoned sector. When Kirk asks, Uhura can only suggest that it must be a random patrol.

The New York Times article "Save My Blockbuster!" confirms that this trend is more than coincidental. The writer Brooks Barnes asks a series of entertainment professionals to provide input on a pitch he concocted, hoping in the process to find out how such minds shape the most popular films of our time. Erik Feig, president of production at Lionsgate, is the only subject to insist that a plot hole be addressed within the movie itself. "The solution can be quite simple," he said. "As long as the people in the movie are asking the same questions that the biggest cynic in the audience is asking, you will be O.K. You don't have to supply the answer. But you do have to ask the question."

Some films adopt Feig's tactic, acknowledging that a particular question may be on the audience's mind, then politely declining to answer it. There's an example in summer's "The Lone Ranger": in one of the movie's bracketing scenes, a young boy asks an elderly Tonto how he managed to escape from jail at a crucial juncture. Tonto ignores the request.

Some very few times, the question-and-answer format works, deepening character and circumstance. "Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol"'s Ethan Hunt is able to distract some gunmen by planting a flare on a dead body; when his inexperienced colleague asks how he knew that would work, he brashly answers, "I assumed they were shooting at anything that moved. I just gave them a target." After a ridiculous car chase in "Fast & Furious 6," rescuee Letty, an amnesiac, asks her rescuer Dom, the lover she's forgotten, how he knew a car would be there to break their fall. He replies, "I didn't—Some things you just have to take on faith." The line strengthens one of the film's running themes. It also plays as a subtle joke on the sort of movie we're watching: an adventure film in which cars can serve pretty much any function.