46 Massive TV Show Errors, Plot Holes, And Inconsistencies That I Don’t Understand How The Writers And Editors Didn’t Catch
Carrie had a sister named Sara in the early episodes of The King of Queens. She disappeared sometime in the first season and was never mentioned again.
We asked people of the BuzzFeed Community to tell us what mistakes they noticed on TV shows. Here are some of their eye-opening responses:
1. In Desperate Housewives, there are contradicting flashbacks in Season 2 and Season 8 about the timeline of Tom and Lynette moving onto Wisteria Lane. In Season 2’s flashback, Lynette is early in her first pregnancy on the day she and Tom move into their house. She’s not showing yet, and they’ve just learned they’re having twins. In Season 8’s flashback, which takes place BEFORE they move into the house, Lynette is obviously much further along in her pregnancy, and they already know they are having twins.
ABC
2. In the Gossip Girl pilot episode, Chuck said something about taking his mom’s pills, but later in the show it’s revealed that she died during childbirth.
The CW
3. Throughout the run of Boy Meets World, Topanga’s parents were played by five different actors.
ABC
4. Detective Daniels from Brooklyn Nine-Nine was introduced in the pilot along with Hitchcock and Scully but was never seen again.
NBC
5. Jessie had a stepbrother, Eric, on Saved by the Bell, who disappeared after a two-part episode called “Wicked Stepbrother.”
NBC
6. In Friends, when Monica was picking out her wedding dress, she tried on one dress, and then when she found it again on the rack, it was clearly a completely different dress.
NBC
7. Carrie had a sister named Sara in the early episodes of The King of Queens. She disappeared sometime in the first season and was never mentioned again.
CBS
“She was part of the main cast and lived in the house with them. It was also a double meaning for the show’s title, as Doug was the ‘king’ and Carrie and Sara were the ‘queens.'”
8. In Season 8 of Desperate Housewives, Detective Chuch Vance tells Gaby that her missing stepfather now has two other young stepdaughters. But when Susan meets the family a few episodes later, there only appears to be one daughter.
ABCABC
9. In the pilot episode of Riverdale, Betty tells Veronica that Riverdale High opened in 1941 and in the season finale, the town celebrates the 75th anniversary of its founding. This means the latest year it could be in Season 1 is 2016. Season 1 starts at the beginning of their sophomore year, which means they’d be in the graduating class of 2019.
The CW
But after all the characters graduate in Season 5, there’s a 7-year time jump that starts in 2021. This would mean that seasons 1–4 actually took place between the 2011–2014 school years, and that they graduated in 2014.
The CW
10. Family Matters, the youngest daughter Judy Winslow was last seen as the flower girl at her grandmother’s wedding in Season 4. For the rest of the show, the Winslows acted as if they only had ever had two children instead of three.
ABC / CBS
11. The story of how Susan found evidence of Karl cheating on Desperate Housewives changes briefly in Season 5. In multiple episodes, it’s stated that Susan discovered lipstick on Karl’s shirt. However, in the episode after Edie Britt’s death, Susan says that after Edie warned her about Karl’s infidelities, she found his secretary’s bra in his car.
ABC
12. Sabrina the Teenage Witch started when Sabrina turned 16, yet there are four seasons of her in high school, with each season having a Halloween, Christmas, and Valentine’s Day episode implying that another year had passed. She doesn’t start college until Season 5, which would mean she was in high school as a 20-year-old.
ABC / The WB
13. In Pretty Little Liars their senior year halloween episode was season three episode 13. Their senior year Thanksgiving episode where Mona died wasn’t until season five episode 12. So according to this timeline, all those episodes between season three and season five happened in four weeks.
Freeform
14. Rachel met Chandler three separate times on Friends and they never remembered each other. The first was when they met while Rachel was in high school and they kissed at a party…
NBC
… And then they met again in a bar during a flashback episode when Rachel is engaged to Barry…
NBC
…And they meet again in the pilot when Rachel runs into the cafe in her wedding dress.
NBC
15. In Desperate Housewives, Susan’s house was burned down at the end of Season 2 and then was rebuilt as the exact same house.
ABC
16. Also, years after that fire on Desperate Housewives, Susan points out a stick she used to measure Julie’s height as a kid, which realistically wouldn’t have survived the fire.
ABC
17. Even though Cheryl and Jason are twins, they’re in different grades. Cheryl is a sophomore but somehow Jason is in the same grade as Polly, Betty’s older sister.
The CW
18. In an episode of Pretty Little Liars, Aria answered her phone and it was clearly upside down.
Freeform
19. The main characters on The O.C. did their junior year of high school twice (seasons 1 and 2) and it was never acknowledged.
Fox
20. On That ’70s Show, Donna had a younger sister, Tina, that made an appearance once in the first season. Later in the show, Donna was referred to as an only child.
Fox
21. The timeline of That ’70s show is from May 17, 1976 to December 31, 1979. However, all eight seasons had a holiday episode which implied another year had passed.
Fox
Fox
22. On Golden Girls, Harold Gould played two different characters. In Season 1 he played Rose’s boyfriend, Arnie…
NBC
…And in Season 5 through the end of the show, he played Miles, a professor Rose dates.
NBC
23. In Riverdale. Polly’s twins, Juniper and Dagwood, were infants for, like, three years.
The CW
24. In Season 1, Episode 16 of Gilmore Girls, Lorelei and Rory were talking in the kitchen and a mic dropped into the screen right above the fridge.
The WB / The CW
25. In the last season of Jane the Virgin, Petra’s mother was in the hospital wearing a breathing mask in one shot and then it was gone in the next.
The CW
26. Toby Cavanaugh was played by a different actor after the Pretty Little Liars pilot.
Freeform
27. In Season 2 of Desperate Housewives, Susan meets her biological dad, who tells her that once his wife is okay with it, he and Susan can have a relationship. However, he is never seen or mentioned again.
ABC
28. In a few episodes of Sex and the City, microphones dropped into the shot from above.
HBO
29. During a fight scene between Weevil and Logan from Veronica Mars, a camera operator’s elbow can clearly be seen.
The UPN / The CW
30. Riverdale has an unclear timeline, but Season 3, Episode 15, where FP celebrates his 50th birthday, takes place at some point in the 2010s. But based on a flashback episode earlier that season, he was a high school junior in the early ’90s. So basically, it’s impossible for him to be 50 at any point in the 2010s.
The CW
31. In the Vitamin D episode of Glee, the girls from the New Directions had to compete through song against the boys. When the girls were getting the vitamins from Terri there were two extra girls standing with them who were not in the New Directions or in their performance.
Fox
32. In Season 4 of Glee, Joe and Sugar were inexplicably no longer members of glee club. They come back in the Season 4 finale to perform with them at Regionals, but then they are gone again in Season 5.
Fox
33. In The Office, Pam’s mom visited during the early seasons before Pam and Jim were together. However, later in the series, Pam’s mom was played by a different actor.
NBC
34. Topanga had a sister named Nebula in Season 1 of Boy Meets World, but she was never mentioned again, and later on Topanga was referred to as an only child.
ABC
35. When Brittany and Santana were talking by the lockers in Season 2, Episode 22 of Glee, Brittany’s bangs would constantly switch from being clipped back to flowing loose.
Fox
36. Blair Waldorf’s mom in Gossip Girl was played by a completely different actor in the pilot than in the rest of the series.
The CW
37. In Season 4 of Saved by the Bell, Jessie and Kelly were missing without explanation for half the season. During those episodes, a new character named Tori befriended the other characters and dated Zack. In the graduation episode, Jessie and Kelly returned, but Tori was gone.
NBC
38. In Season 1, Episode 7 of Riverdale, Fred and FP talk about being in a band together during their senior year of high school. However, in Season 3, Alice states that members of the Midnight Club were no longer friends after playing Gryphons and Gargoyles their junior year.
The CW
39. Also, in Season 1 of Riverdale, FP says that Fred started the band in senior year, but Alice also states in Season 3 that Fred gave up music in junior year after the events of the Midnight Club.
The CW
40. ALSO in Season 1 of Riverdale, Fred says that the band he started his Senior Year was called The Fred Heads, but in Season 3, we see that during Fred’s junior year, the Fred Heads had already been formed.
The CW
41. Carol was played by a different actor after her first appearance on Friends.
NBC
42. Jessica DiLaurentis, Alison’s mom on Pretty Little Liars, was played by a different actor after the pilot episode.
Freeform
43. In the Season 1 finale of Veronica Mars, there was a fire scene where two crew members were visible in the background shot of Keith.
UPN
44. Jason DiLaurentis, Alison’s brother on Pretty Little Liars, was also played by a different actor after Season 1.
Freeform
45. In Season 1, Episode 6 of The Good Place, there was a scene where Janet was visibly being handed a stack of papers by a crew member.
NBC
46. And finally, during a scene in Twin Peaks, Frank Silva, a set dresser, accidentally appeared in the mirror’s reflection. David Lynch decided to keep it in and casted Silva as the creepy Bob.
ABC
