The Simpsons

Before you go getting all judgey about your favourite shows making mistakes, bear in mind that most continuity errors go unnoticed by most viewers. For example, how many times do you think you’ve seen the classic opening credit sequence of the Simpsons? The original opening was used for almost 20 seasons and contained a mistake you probably saw hundreds of times but never noticed. When Homer gets of his car and is almost run over by Marge, you can see a bunch of things in the back right corner of the garage, but when it cuts to the next shot, the bike, tools, rake and all the other clutter are replaced by a couple boxes.

Friends

Remember The One Where Rachel Wears a Vanishing Necklace? At the beginning of this scene Rachel can be seen wearing one of her typically fashionable accessories around her neck, but when Ross shows up with his new girlfriend, it disappears, then reappears briefly before vanishing completely. It was early in the series, when Rachel was still dabbling in the dark arts, nobody talked about it much.

Game of Thrones

Speaking of magic necklaces, anyone who saw the season 6 premier of Game of Thrones learned that Melisandre has a pretty special necklace herself. When she removes it, we see that it’s what provides the old witch with her beautiful facade. With no more books from George RR Martin to guide them, the show runners really seem to be laying down the track as they go, especially when you consider Melisandre was shown without a necklace while bathing in season 4, and she is clearly no crone.

Walking Dead

When you see promotional stills for movies or TV shows, they may look like they’re taken right from the footage but most of the time they’re actually taken by still photographers who are on set during filming. They’re often one step behind the real camera crew catching the scene, as you can see in this Walking Dead scene where the stills photographer doesn’t move in time, and his reflection is visible as he documents himself ruining the shot.

How I Met Your Mother

In Subway wars, the gang tests one another’s knowledge of New York City transit by seeing who can find the quickest route to a downtown restaurant. In the first scene, Ted uses Bing to bring up a map on his laptop. No the mistake isn’t that he’s using Bing, Microsoft clearly payed for that placement, the mistake is the location visible in the top right corner of the browser. The map may show New York City streets, where the show takes place, but Bing reveals that they’re actually in Los Angeles, California, where the show is filmed.

Breaking Bad

As far as famous pizzas go, it goes the cheese pizza Buzz eats in Home Alone, then the pie Spiccoli orders to class in Fast Times at Ridgemont high, followed closely by the extra large pepperoni Walter White roofs in Breaking Bad. Brian Cranston famously landed the pizza in the perfect place on the first take. It was such a funny image that they decided to leave it there for the remainder of the episode, though it moves around the roof a little depending on the shot, and even gains some extra pepperoni at one point. It’s presumably just out of frame when the cousins enter the house, but it should have been briefly seen as the axe is taken out of the trunk. People loved this gag so much the owners of the actual house have had issues with people throwing pizzas on their roof.

The Flash

Filmmakers and TV directors often use editing tricks that make scenes more dramatic but don’t really make sense if you think about them in real space and time. For example, in this scene from The Flash where Barry is in the crosshairs of Hot and Cold and Eddie saves his skin may look cool but let’s take a closer look. Shots of The Flash and the impending doom coming his way establish lots of clear space around them with police cruisers off in the distance, yet Eddie seems to come out of nowhere with the shield. Where did he come from? How did Hot and Cold not see him? Either the director hoped we’d be too into the moment to catch this altered geography, or Eddie has some secret powers we don’t know about.