Goofs

At the mission briefing, the marines are told the bombs will drop in 3 hours, at 19:30 (7:30pm). But SSgt Nantz's watch reads 15:21hrs (3:21pm), more than 4 hours before the bomb drop.

Towards the end of the movie in the FOB, when SSGT Nantz confronts Cpl. Lockett about his brother, Cpl. Lockett has some powder on his face during some of the close-ups but in other close-ups the powder is gone then reappears in the same scene.

When they exit the bus and the soldiers are repelling off the raised freeway they get fired upon and fall. The one not attached to the rope falls with his head towards the car on which the guy on the rope falls onto the bonnet. The next shot shows the first guy is laid the opposite way round, with a previously non existent car on its side behind him.

At the mission briefing, pictures taken by the Hubble telescope of the "meteors" falling to Earth are shown to the marines. Hubble is a deep space telescope, virtually useless for taking pictures of anything in Earth's atmosphere.

The Hubble telescope's focal length does not allow it to focus on near-Earth objects such as the "meteors" entering Earth's atmosphere.

Public transit buses don't require a key to start, so there is no need to "hot wire" one.

When the command and control center is destroyed, the Copperhead rounds are shown with an exhaust trail. Copperhead rounds are not self propelled as they use aerodynamic surfaces to glide to the target and do not have an exhaust trail.

At one point, a Marine drops a round into a mortar and yells, "Fire in the hole!" This is used only in demolition operations. If anything, he should have said, "Hang... shot out."

It was noted that a flight of A-10 "warthogs" were on the flight line at Camp Pendleton. The A-10 is a close support ground attack aircraft flown by the USAF in support of ground operations conducted by the Army and the Marines. They often conduct joint training so seeing Air Force craft at a Marine base is not uncommon.

In the early scenes set in Camp Pendleton, several A-10's are shown on the flight line. A-10's are flown exclusively by the U.S. Air Force, not the Marines. MCAS Camp Pendleton houses only helicopter squadrons, and fixed wing close air support aircraft such as F/A-18's and AV-8B Harriers would be launched from other nearby Marine bases such as Miramar.

When CPL Imlay fires the M-203 Grenade Launcher rounds down the hallway they leave a smoke trail. This is incorrect as the M-203 rounds are like large bullets and only leave a puff of smoke when fired. They are not rockets and therefore would not leave a smoke trail.

When Nantz uses a Thales PRC 148 MBTIR to attract the alien probe into a gas station, the radio's display is blank indicating it is either a dummy prop or not switched on.

The first utility vehicle SSGT Nantz fired the .50 cal from showed a close up of a spent cartridge which fell from the gun and it showed the crimp marks of a blank and not the perfect round shape of a spent .50 cal ball round.

At the beginning of the movie, after Nantz has had his morning workout and run on the beach, he drives up to the base guard and shows his military ID. The guard, a sergeant, starts to salute, but then stops himself. His arm only goes half way up. Sometimes real off duty, military personnel are used in movies, and perhaps this guard forgot Nantz's pretend rank, and did not know if he should salute or not. The guard would only need to salute a higher ranking officer after checking the ID, not another sergeant.

When the civilians to be repelled from the elevated freeway. About halfway down, one of the two soldiers drops to the ground. When he hits the ground, he is shown from above with his feet pointing to the right. However, when the camera leaves and returns, he is shown with his feet pointing to the left.

Numerous violations of Marine Corps protocol, military training and the UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice)

Between 25mins and 1hour-13mins into the movie, the main characters are operating west of Lincoln Blvd, where bombs are supposed to drop. There are time where they are in locations outside of Lincoln Blvd such as 10th street, as well as the I-10 exit ramp for Overland/ National, and the 405 interchange. At 1hr, 12 mins, 20 secs, they are inexplicably in Downtown Los Angeles, before reaching a said safe location east of Lincoln Blvd.

The I-10 freeway we see in the movie, in no way resembles the I-10 in Santa Monica. The main difference being that the real I-10 is more like a valley passing under the crosstreets until its outside of Santa Monica. The 405 interchange shown at the end of the freeway scenes is depicted in the film as having a nearby skyline of tall buildings. Not only are these buildings not located near this interchange, they aren't even located in Los Angeles.

Aliens that have the technology to travel to Earth will have the technology to conquer us the moment they arrive. Resistance is impossible and absurd.

It is said that there is nowhere in our known universe that there is liquid water on or near the surface but Saturn's moon Enceladus has liquid water just beneath the surface and so does Jupiter's moon Europa.

The necessity of water in its liquid state is specious anyway. It is reasonable to suppose that a race capable of interstellar travel would possess the technology to melt ice or condense water vapor.

Just before they are first attacked, the Lt. states that the police station is "one click northwest". But when they leave the pool, the subtitle states that they are 1.3 miles from the station - at least twice the distance.

Lt Col Ritchie says the air strike will take place at "1930 hours". Marines don't say "hours" after the time.

When the Gunnery Sgt. tricks the alien drone into following the radio signal to the gas station pumps, he runs about 10-15 yards from the pumps and then throws a grenade igniting them. The resulting explosion was large enough to reach him at the position where he was seeking , but it had no effect upon him or on the car he was hiding behind.

Several characters report that meteors have struck land. But if any part of a meteoroid survives the fall through the atmosphere and lands on Earth, it is called a meteorite.