In This Is Us season 5, episode 4, “Honestly,” Kate appears to take either a pregnancy or ovulation test as a teenager. The box that young Kate pulls from her nightstand drawer is clearly an ovulation test – it’s written in large letters on the box – but the positive test that Kate is holding in a later scene looks like a pregnancy test. Adult Kate also seems to hint that it was indeed a pregnancy test. However, several fans took notice of the ovulation test box and are somewhat divided on whether the ovulation test was a mistake or intentional.
The box and test both appear while Kate is telling Toby about a traumatic memory from her young adulthood – a memory that was triggered when she and Ellie, the pregnant woman who would like Kate and Toby to adopt her baby, were speaking earlier that day. The two women talked about baby names, childhood bullies, and – briefly – abortion. Kate later tells Toby that she has kept a secret from him, her mom, and her siblings. The implication is that Kate had a pregnancy that she hid from her family and then secretly had an abortion, but some fans have argued that this isn’t actually the case.
This Is Us fans across social media have argued that Kate did intend to take an ovulation test. If she did, it would mean that she was trying to become pregnant or possibly avoid pregnancy. Kate, who had broken up with her boyfriend, Marc, could have wanted to get pregnant in a misguided attempt to repair their relationship and an ovulation test would have let her know when she was likely to become pregnant. Regardless of the box, the actual test in Kate’s hand appears to be a pregnancy test. So, if Kate wanted to get pregnant, the scene with the box and the scene with the test could have occurred on different days.
On the other hand, if Kate thought she was pregnant, regardless of whether she wanted it, it would have made more sense to take a pregnancy test – the possible exception being that Kate had unprotected sex very recently and wanted to know how likely it was that she would become pregnant from it, but this doesn’t quite line up with Kate’s voiceover and the intense framing of the scene. Yet another explanation for the inconsistency is that Kate simply bought the wrong box (a common mistake), but the test appears to say “Pregnant” and “Not Pregnant,” likely ruling this theory out.
The remaining theory is that it was a prop mix-up. But unlike other infamous prop goofs, like the anachronistic Starbucks cup in Game of Thrones or more recent mouse in season 4 of The Crown, the intentions of the production team regarding Kate’s ovulation test box are a little more difficult to deduce. The problem is that it’s extremely noticeable and, even if was too late to reshoot the scene, it could have easily been fixed in post-production. Furthermore, This Is Us showrunners have not publicly acknowledged that it was a mistake, which means that the plot significance of Kate’s ovulation test box has not been ruled out.
Even after 5 seasons of This Is Us, the truth is that we still don’t know much about Kate’s young adulthood. And it’s still unclear how Kate’s teen pregnancy ended, but her fertility history likely would have factored into her IVF treatments that happened in season 3. If This Is Us ever decides to explain this unusual scene, it could be a while before fans get answers – the show has made its reputation on dropping hints, red herrings, and cliffhangers and season 5 has already proved to be no different.