Clue (film)/Headscratchers

The Game:
"Professor Plum: I surmise that Miss Scarlet killed Mr. Boddy in the Ballroom with the Knife, since nobody saw anyone else in the ballroom, the knife is missing, and everyone else is accounted for... By the way, I know for a fact that I was not the one who killed him, and that he wasn't killed with the knife in the kitchen. I saw myself not killing him there all evening, see, I've got a card with my face on that proves it.
 * Seriously, whodunit?
 * The Butler Did It.
 * Whoever you're playing as. You just don't know it yet.
 * Just want to point out, on the boxart for the original board game, all the other guests are staring suspiciously at Mr. Green.
 * In Clue, you can not only not know you're the killer, or how you did it, or where, but also win by finding out that you are the killer and announcing your guilt. Why?
 * Memory Gambit
 * Of course, depending on who you're playing against, how you're playing and how melodramatic you / they are, this can be made all part of the fun with a vainglorious rant; "Haha, you fools! Little did you realize that the killer was amongst you all along!" Etc. And then you 'kill' all of their pieces and make a getaway. Or maybe that's just me.
 * I always assumed you knew you were the killer, but found the clues that would implicate you. When you discover them, you can dispose of them or clean them, and your announcing that you're the killer is actually informing them that the murder will never be solved.
 * That doesn't explain why you repeatedly sabotage any possibility of pinning the crime on one of the others.
 * To make it look like you're innocent of course, since all the others are doing the same thing. And with the evidence against you gone, it doesn't matter it can't be pinned on someone else; the case will remain unsolved.
 * The movie gives another possible explanation: having reconstructed the entire night, you're able to prove that the killing was justified, so your admission is just part of a long, triumphant summation.
 * Maybe you're not one of the suspects after all; you're one of a team of detectives, each of whom is following one of the murder suspects. In that case, revealing that the person you're trailing is in fact the murderer makes sense.
 * This is how it's played in one of the computer versions--and you can progress from something like "rookie" to "chief inspector" depending on how many games you've won.
 * There's also the question of why finding out the means and location of the crime are not only independent of figuring out who did it, but still equally important.
 * If you don't know where or how it was done, claiming to know who did it would ring kind of hollow.
 * Yeah, knowing the particulars can help to nail the killer. You need evidence, and the more you know about the details of the murder, the likelier you are to find it.
 * For that matter, how do you not know where it happened? Some of those weapons are blunt instruments, but a few are pretty messy. The large trail of blood between Mr. Boddy and the room where he died is a pretty big clue.
 * Bloodless Carnage strikes again. Also, didn't you see the movie? They were lucky if they could figure out when he died, much less where.
 * No, it was pretty easy to figure out who killed Mr. Boddy. Mr. Green, in the hall, with the revolver.
 * And then he went to sleep with his wife.
 * Flames. Flames on the side of my face...
 * For the location and the means of the murder, it's possible that the killer murdered Mr. Boddy in one location, but he was found somewhere else, and the various weapons are randomly scattered around the house. When you make a "suggestion" and somebody else proves it wrong, they are pointing out the flaw in your reasoning. For example: "I suggest it was Colonel Mustard in the Conservatory with the Lead Pipe." "Impossible. (shows the pipe) The Pipe has no blood on it!"
 * And for people, it's a matter of "Professor Plum couldn't have done it; he was with me at the time!"
 * Objection! How can you prove the pipe wasn't cleaned after the murder?
 * Maybe he explodes when something touches him.
 * Or when he's killed, he screeches angrily, writhes in agony, and fades away in a cloud of green smoke?
 * All the games of Cluedo I've played have indicated that Boddy was found on the staircase (in the centre of the board, where the mystery cards are usually placed) and murdered somewhere else. Presumably the unnamed killer ditched the weapon, and possibly made an effort to disguise the wounds (if there were any) on Boddy's, um, body.
 * Why are there no bathrooms in the Clue house?
 * Maybe they're in the underground tunnel.
 * They're probably all upstairs.
 * Thank you for clearing up something else for me. I never knew what the layout was in terms of 3-D space. The staircase is at the center of the board: does that mean everything above it is the upper floor? But of course, as you've said, it must mean that we're seeing only one floor, and for some odd reason the murder couldn't have occurred above. Maybe there was a door locked from the other side at the top of the stairs or something.
 * I know it's just a board game and it's all supposed to be abstract, but wouldn't it be really easy to at least narrow down the murder weapon by examining the late Mr. Boddy? Even a kindergartner should be able to tell (for instance) whether or not he had been stabbed, thus ruling the knife in or out.
 * Perhaps he was all of shot, strangled, bludgeoned etc to death and the object of the game is to find out which instrument dealt the fatal blow? (c.f. the Inspector Morse novel "Service of All The Dead" where.
 * Or perhaps he was bludgeoned; any of the weapons can be used as a blunt instrument, including the knife. Well, okay, maybe not the rope.
 * It's a moderately heavy rope (in some depictions), wrapped in a bundle and tied around the middle. You could probably bludgeon someone to death with that with a good run at it.
 * Or use it to trip Mr. Boddy, who falls and fatally hits his head on the floor. Nope, the rope is still under suspicion.
 * You'd allow a kindergartner to do that?
 * "Now Molly quit yer crying and tell the police how he died!"
 * They're all suspects so they might know better than to turn the body over and examine it for fear of leaving fingerprints or DNA.
 * It REALLY bugs me that some moron decided that Clue needed to be made hip and modern.
 * I like the new Clue game, played it earlier. It even includes the possibility of your character being murdered by the murderer... which brings up the odd possibility of your character being the murderer...
 * So your character kills the guy and then commits suicide, big deal...
 * What if the murderer commits suicide, then another character is killed by the murderer?
 * I don't mind the idea of updating the game (let's face it, it IS a bit dated), but a video game designer? A trophy? And the design of the game box? Is this a whodunnit in The Hills or something?
 * The problem with all that is that it's going to get dated very quickly. The original Clue's 1920s setting fits in well with early detective stories (the actual game was post-WW 2, so it didn't get outdated so much as the original wasn't even trying to be current). The modern day setting just isn't really known for being mystery-themed, and I'm afraid that, in ten years or so, it's going to come across as a lot more dated than the original. To put it simply, the original can get by on atmosphere, and I'm not sure the remake can do the same.
 * Bingo. The original was a classic. This modern version is tacky now and is going to be tackier later. Even if they did a modern version, it could have been done much better.
 * Planned Obsolescence
 * How does it work out that the last person not to be accounted for is decided to be the killer?

Mr. Green: But Miss Scarlet was with me in the library when the murder happened!

Professor Plum: She must have seduced him into being her accomplice! Lets lock them both up!"


 * Maybe its a board game designed to be process of elimination.

The Movie:

 * I'm curious how the movie would've been if they had played it as a more serious thriller or crime drama rather than as a comedy. Any guesses?
 * Well, if I had to guess, I'd say that if they'd played it as a more serious thriller or crime drama, rather than a comedy, then it would have been more like a serious thriller or crime drama, rather than a comedy.
 * I suspect that it would be hard to take seriously if played straight given the source material, so playing it for laughs seems reasonable.
 * In the movie version, Wadsworth takes a phone call from the FBI. This is perfectly fine for 2 of the endings, but in the third if he had known that the FBI were snooping around there's no way he would have done and revealed what he did at the end. But when the endings are stuck together that's the ending that we are told is what really happened.
 * But we've no proof that Wadsworth would have let them leave after revealing himself -- well, at least not Mr. Green. Remember, the FBI call in the third ending was for Green, but Wadsworth took the call. Even if the caller was careful in what he said, Wadsworth was obviously keen to Green's cover (Green: 'I was going to expose you." Wadsworth: "I know.") and could have shot Green on his way out, or more likely staged some other accident.
 * WMG: He was just that arrogant.
 * In the Third ending, Wadsworth turns out to be
 * Perhaps the butler was an actor before he was blackmailed, and Wadsworth
 * He certainly does have a lot of repressed rage and tries to get them to turn on Wadsworth. He also tries to escape. I suspect he'd stopped being the butler awhile ago and knew he was dead no matter what, so was acting without much in the realm of inhibitions.
 * You know, the great thing about having three alternate endings is that, if you don't like one of them, you still have two others to choose from.
 * Some of the logistics surrounding the informants escape me. First of all, how did the cop just happen to show up that night?  Secondly, who was the "they" Yvette was referring to right before   And who did she expect to be in the billiard room, since she seemed surprised to find   there? Thirdly, if
 * I was always bothered by the cop's presence myself. The only answer I can come up with (and it's rather lame) is that somehow arranged for him to be transferred temporarily from the Washington police force to one in New England so that he could be out driving that night to discover the motorist's car.  is The Chessmaster and so could have pulled that off, but it still seems incredibly contrived and unbelievable. But then this is after all just a zany screwball comedy. On point two, the "they" would likely be Colonel Mustard and whichever woman she wasn't talking to depending on the ending, since they both knew her (Miss Scarlet quite well), and she was expecting to meet Miss Scarlet.  Admittedly this makes more sense if she was talking to Mrs. White, since it would hardly seem the case (were she talking to Miss Scarlet) that Mrs. White would know every inch of her body. (Unless she'd caught Yvette with her husband and got an eyeful?) Third question is easiest to answer:
 * 1. The cop was invited. Wadsworth said that everyone had been invited there. He wore his uniform perhaps because he was uncertain what would happen and a uniform is really a cop's best (psychological) weapon. Really, who's to say? 2. "They" was the people who had seen the photo of Yvette as a prostitute, in flagrante delecto with Col. Mustard. 3. Whether there is a "real" ending depends on what version you watch, but in that particular ending Wadsworth obviously found it to his advantage not to be the actual killer of anyone, in case there was legal trouble.
 * For what it is worth, during his phone call just before he is killed, the cop does say he isn't on duty, so he wouldn't need to have been transferred from Washington. Perhaps the letter requested he wear his uniform and drive his squad car? This may have been to help identify him to the other guests so he could be more readily killed, to psychologically set him at ease so he wouldn't be suspicious, or simply to scare the guests.
 * When they locked the weapons in the cupboard, why did they leave the candlestick and the knife out? What, a weapon can only be used once and then it's no good? And there was really no point in locking up anything but the rope and the revolver. If someone wanted to bludgeon someone else to death, they wouldn't need the wrench or the lead pipe to do it, there were plenty of other things in the house they could use as a makeshift cudgel (there were other candlesticks on the mantle, Col. Mustard grabs a billiard cue at one point).
 * The knife was stuck in the cook's body the entire movie. Even when Col. Mustard tried to pull it out, he couldn't. Stuck good. No good reason for the candle stick. As for the rest of it, yes other stuff in the house can be lethal, but it's easier to kill someone with a gun than a pool cue. Just saying.
 * The candlestick was missing at that point. We see it on top of a door frame (why? how?), before it falls on Wadsworth. That's because (as we find out later) it had been used to kill Boddy for real.
 * In the third ending, how did Col. Mustard find the secret passage to kill the motorist? He "discovers" the secret passage after the murder (and in fact it's entrance is in a room he has never visited by that point), and unlike Wadsworth, Scarlet and Peacock he knows no one familiar enough with the house who could have informed him of the passage's existence.
 * This also applies to Mrs. Peacock in the second and third endings--how did she know of the passage from the study so she could kill the cook? It is stated that Yvette knew the house and all the passages in it to inform Miss Scarlet (and she in turn learned it from, no matter which ending), so she could have told Colonel Mustard, considering their close history. But Mrs. Peacock had no connection to the maid...
 * It's revealed in the second and third endings that, so it's possible that the cook told Mrs. Peacock about the kitchen/study passage.
 * You're not the only one to find plotholes with regards to the multiple endings:
 * And the answer comes:
 * That's what I always considered to be the answer too. However, there is one other point to consider, which could either support or undermine your case: While in the first two endings this makes sense, because Wadsworth may not have known all the secrets (being both a butler and an FBI agent) and Mr. Green really was gay in them, in the third ending  So either, or  The latter hardly seems in character, unless he's just that arrogant, so it must have been the former...
 * Is it not possible that Green really was gay, and really was blackmailed for it, and managed to organize the sting without exposing his gayness? Also, Boddy doesn't have to know who Green's boss is. He just has to let someone at the FBI know. Back then (see The Fifties and the Red Scare, which was also a Gay Scare -- see Julia And Juliet for an example), that sort of allegation wouldn't need to be delivered to the top dog; it would find its way up the chain quickly. Besides, he could always find out who to tell later when he needs to know. Of course, blackmail never actually involves carrying out the threat, just the fear that you will.
 * It could be, too, that the FBI got wind of this serial blackmailer, perhaps via Senator Peacock's people, and managed to hook Boddy with the "gay person at the state department" bait way before all of this, and paying the blackmail for a while, with the intent to follow the trail back to Boddy. Boddy would have had no idea that Green is FBI. After catching the Hoover call, he may have surmised *someone* was FBI, but not known who, which is why he looks so distraught afterwards. It could be, too, that the owners of the house were either friends with Hoover, or perhaps had reported people as suspected Communists (or homosexuals) -- and Hoover, realizing he wasn't talking to his agent, could have come up with a cover story like this.
 * Also, in all cases the murder of the cop makes no sense.
 * Not that we know for sure whether
 * Also, I would have to look again very closely to be sure but it is possible Wadsworth left the key in the library door--if not the first time, then when they split up to search again.
 * The second ending also has a pretty huge plot hole.
 * You're thinking of after the power was shut off--when the motorist was killed we didn't see anything of other than
 * And another thing:
 * The answer to all of these plot holes: small bombs. In all seriousness, though, Unreliable Narrator might fit a bit better for some of them.
 * This film is a rare example of plot holes not only being intentional but fully justified. If all the clues added up to one ending then there would be no point in there being two more as well. The film, if you scrutinize it carefully from start to finish, is a deliberate dead end of contradictory evidence, because only then can three different endings equally fit.
 * This may sound stupid, but in the beginning, why don't the guests know what the dinner party is all about? There are at least three instances where one of them (either Mrs. Peacock or Colonel Mustard) asks about what's going on, but it seems rather unnecessary since Wadsworth had written letters to them explaining why they had to come. Are the guests just playing dumb, is it for the audience's sake, or what? Also, why would Wadsworth give a letter to Mr. Boddy when they live in the same house?
 * The way the letter was written, as Wadsworth read it, the blackmail wasn't outright revealed--and unless each person assumed all the others were being blackmailed too, they wouldn't guess this could be the reason they were all invited, nor would they admit it aloud. As for Boddy's letter, two possible reasons--Wadsworth was trying to hide what he was doing from his employer so that he would be lured to the house and didn't realize what was going on until it was too late, so he mailed the letter anonymously; or it was designed to fool the guests into not knowing he was their blackmailer as opposed to another victim, because Wadsworth wanted them all in the study before that was revealed. A third option, for the third ending only, is that . This could also be true even in the first two endings, if Wadsworth only claimed there was a letter, Boddy went along with it to keep from revealing he was the blackmailer, and in actuality he'd just handed it to Boddy or verbally told him to come to the house.
 * Or an even simpler explanation: they didn't live in the same house any more. Wadsworth said his employment ended when his wife killed herself, since with her dead Boddy no longer had a hold on him. Since presumably this gave Wadsworth time to get all the evidence and make the arrangements for the party, he also would have been living elsewhere so could have mailed the letter to his old employer. As for the FBI agent ending, either Wadsworth faked having a wife who knew socialists so as to get into his employ (much as ), or the story about his wife was a lie, the FBI had found out what Boddy was up to on their own and directed Wadsworth to send the letters, so he never lived with Boddy. Which could explain why Boddy brought the weapons and acted so hostile toward Wadsworth--he didn't know him and suspected a sting.
 * Another thing: Who was the person who told Yvette to "shut the door" minutes before she was killed? The voice that asks, "Did anyone recognize you?" is obviously female (which would mean that that particular voice belongs to, depending on the ending), but the voice that says, "Shut the door," sounds male.
 * They didn't want to pin down the gender of the anonymous voice, so they made it inconsistent.
 * In the third ending, . Is this truly acceptable, considering that in the other two endings, the murderer is simply arrested? In all three situations, the murderer has the gun and makes it clear that no one else will get shot if they can simply leave. In fact, . It shouldn't have been because of the blackmail threat; if it was,.
 * If I'm not mistaken,
 * When pulls his gun to arrest them all,  points his gun at him and puts his finger on the trigger. Under those circumstances, it would be perfectly legal and acceptable for  to shoot him.
 * So, uh. Mr. Green couldn't be a kick-ass FBI agent and gay at the same time? Ahem.
 * The FBI under Hoover wasn't exactly known for it's acceptance of homosexuals. So sadly no.
 * Has less to do with the FBI and more to do with the makers of the film.
 * No, it really has to do with the FBI. At the time the film was set, being gay wasn't just socially unacceptable; in many states, it was a felony.
 * And Mr. Green's boast that he would sleep with his wife may have partly been because he really shared the attitude at the time about homosexuals, was disgusted with having had to portray one sympathetically (in the ruse within the movie), and wanted to distance himself from it as much as possible, even for the benefit of a bunch of un-American murderers.
 * Why did Wadsworth tell everyone to use an alias when he was planning to have them all confess to the police later that night?
 * Presumably so they would feel safe enough to come out into the open to the party. As was the case if they'd known the police would be coming ahead of time, knowing their real names would be used would likely have made them too afraid to show up.
 * When Wadsworth is revealing what Mr. Boddy is blackmailing each of the guests with, why does he accept Colonel Mustard's claim that he can afford to live above the means of a colonel's salary because he inherited money from his parents? He doesn't look like he believes Mustard, but he shuts his mouth and allows a change in subject. However, depending on which ending you watched, Wadsworth either gathered all the evidence against the guests together (including the evidence of Mustard's illegal income) into one envelope and invited the witness against Mustard to come to the house or . Either way, he knows the true source of Mustard's wealth and has the evidence to prove it sitting right in front of him, so why does he let Mustard's deception go unchallenged?
 * Two possibilities. In the first two endings, Wadsworth was trying to get the guests to confess to the blackmail so Mr. Boddy could be put away. Why he didn't do this for the other guests, I don't know, but he may have been waiting for the motorist to arrive before exposing Mustard's real crime, when he had a witness to testify to it and not just written documents. Perhaps it was because, as a military man, he thought Mustard would be more likely to go along with the "visiting a house of ill-fame jeopardizing his Pentagon post" accusation (which does after all suggest something about his manliness) than something which would reveal his lack of patriotism and completely undermine his military record (being a war profiteer). As for the third ending, . Considering the reaction the revelation got (Green suddenly linking Mustard and White through Yvette), he may also have held off on revealing it until it became necessary--either to theorize about why Mustard might have committed murder(s) (after they'd happened) or.
 * Wadsworth's reaction isn't one of disbelief at the veracity of Mustard's story, but at the fact that a grown man (and WWII veteran -- Colonel ranks ain't just handed out like candy) nonchalantly used the words "my mommy and daddy."
 * How the hell did the candlestick end up on top of the door frame? The doors are huge and no one is that tall to place it there without a chair. Why would you go through all that trouble to put a murder weapon out in the open in a place it doesn't remotely belong? And while we're at it, what could have supposedly caused it to fall when it did? At least the chandeliers only fall after being shot. It's the only forced prop movement in the film.
 * That's...a good question. What supposedly caused it to fall--I presume we're meant to believe the vibrations from Wadsworth shouting jostled it loose. As for the rest, presumably the killer put it up there to hide it (notice no one even seemed aware of it until it fell) so no one would know how Boddy was killed. But as for how it was put up there...I have no clue. In two of the endings it was a woman--Yvette (and how in the world could she have climbed up there in that skirt?) or Mrs. Peacock (also in a fairly tight dress), and in the third, I'm not sure Professor Plum was tall enough to have reached it. There were chairs in the hall, but on the other side near the library and billiard room, and moving them would have taken too much time and made too much noise. Hmmm...
 * So, how many husbands did Mrs. White have again? When asked, she says "five", but earlier, we hear she is being blackmailed because of the disappearance of "her husband" (heavily implied to be her most recent one) who is then revealed to be her *second*. But, I guess she had 3 since then that weren't worth blackmailing her for, for whatever reason?
 * She had 5, Wadsworth was only bringing up a few of them specifically to get the point across.
 * She had 5, Wadsworth was only bringing up a few of them specifically to get the point across.

The Books:

 * Why the heck does Boddy keep inviting all these crazy folks back to his place when they're alternately trying to rob him blind, off each other, scheme with each other to off someone else, or scheme to kill Boddy and rob him blind? There's been 18 books in the first run of the series; that's enough for each of them to have done in Boddy an average of three times each!
 * Because they always carefully explain to him how it was all a series of innocent misunderstandings and fluke accidents.
 * It seems to be a combination of Mr. Boddy's childish naivity when it comes to his friends (one story has him thrilled to have the company of several of his friends, and then some time later wonders why they broke in through the window in the middle of the night) and them having just enough Pet the Dog moments to be likable.
 * It's definitely naivete, which is even lampshaded by Boddy describing himself as a "big-hearted, thick-headed fellow". One story had him banning weapons from the mansion, and when one of the guests asks him how he's going to enforce it, he says that he's going to make them promise, scout's honor. The guests get around the ban by displaying the weapons in plain sight while giving ridiculous excuses for them (Miss Scarlet wears the Rope as a necklace, Colonel Mustard uses the Wrench to hold his monocle in place, etc.) Suffice it to say that Reginald Q. Boddy is Too Dumb to Live.
 * Or, perhaps he's far more Genre Savvy than he looks. Think about it- this is how his friends act when on good terms with him. Imagine how they'd react if he kicked them out and told them to never come back. They'd probably divvy up the weapons and storm the mansion by force.
 * Given the number of times the guests have failed to kill him, the real question is why haven't they given up already?