Recess (1997) - 86 mistakes in entire show

Continuity: Across the show, the number of kids in a class/what kids are in which class varies. For example, in "The Great Can Drive", the Ashleys are in Ms. Furley's class. However, in almost every other episode besides this one, the Ashleys are all in Ms. Grotke's class, and the exception are a couple of episodes in which 2 Ashleys are in Ms. Grotke's class, and the other 2 Ashleys are in another class (which is not specified by name), making a serious consistency error.

Continuity: In the introduction, when TJ pulls the ball off Gus, Gus is covered in gum. When they are walking into the school, the gum has disappeared.

Continuity: Near the beginning, after King Bob declares Gus as the New Kid, the kids are cheering and TJ and friends have disappeared from the shot. Then Gus looks down in front of him and the guys are right there in front of him.

Other: At the start when the gang change the time on the clock in the classroom, it wouldn't control the main school clock, plus in every other episode the clock has been operated by the box on the side of the school, as shown in " The spy who came into the playground".

Continuity: In the beginning, as Gus' dad walks away, the A/C duct goes way down the hallway, and one side is halfway in one tile and the other side is halfway on another tile. When Gus is talking, the duct is much shorter, and the whole duct is contained in one tile.

Continuity: In the beginning, after the kids have gone to recess, Vince starts talking to TJ about Gus. The number of bricks between the windows on the wall behind them and the bricks' position changes four times.

Continuity: In the beginning, as Gus' dad walks away, there is a sign on the door to the right that says "Boys." I would assume this is a restroom. Then, two shots later, it shows Gus from his front and in place of that sign is a window.

Continuity: In the beginning, as Gus' dad walks away, the lights on the ceiling are 3 tiles apart. However, while Gus is describing his "personal journey," the lights are two tiles apart.

Continuity: When Spinelli says, "Roger already, let's get this show on the road", there's a puffy cloud under "Good" in "Good Morning Gus". When Gus is in the bus and notices the billboard, the cloud is pushed in on the upper left part of it.

Continuity: In the beginning, right as Mrs. Grotke asks for Gus to describe his "personal journey", there is a short kid with a white t-shirt and dirty blonde hair, with the globe behind his head. As the kid asks if they can go to recess now, the globe has moved way to the left.

Continuity: When Gus' dad introduces himself, he says he's in the USMC (US Marine Core). In the rest of the episodes, he's in the Army.

Continuity: In the beginning, Gus' dad steps aside to reveal Gus behind him. Then, he says, "Well, my duty here is done. Mrs. Grotke, boys and girls," and then salutes them and walks away. He has moved back behind Gus. He had no time to move to that position.

Continuity: When Vince's family is eating dinner, Chad's bow tie changes at least twice from red to black.

Factual error: Near the middle of this episode, Gretchen says hamsters don't hibernate. They do, it just depends on the time of year and if it's a wild hamster.

Other: When the gang go to visit vince in his house, it shows vince watching a video of a kickball game. but kids most definitely wouldn't be able to bring a video camera in to school, and it most probably would be confiscated by miss finster.

Other: In the episode, "the peanut butter kid", he is always eating his sandwich and it always seems like he only took a bite out of it and sometimes it went all the way back to the top. How could that be, he couldn't be chewing the entire time.

Audio problem: After "Peanut Butter Kid" retrieves the baseball Vince hit (presumably all the way to China) Spinelli screams rather loudly. However her lips don't move when she does.

Continuity: At the end of the episode, when the gang is caged, right after Vince gives TJ the baseball card, TJ's facepaint turns from blue to red, then back to blue.

Continuity: The kid who says "Dumb 4th graders..." IS a 4th grader. Watch the beginning of "The New Kid" and you can see him in Mrs. Grotke's class.

Continuity: When TJ is in The Box, he lays down and puts his head on his baseball glove. Then when he gets up, he doesn't pick it up, but it's nowhere to be seen. Then a couple of shots later, it's back, and it's on the other end.

Plot hole: Whenever Gretchin calls Mikey up to the stand to explain what he saw, he says that he had followed Spinelli and Randall to the wooden fence, where he Saw Randall on his knees in front of Spinelli, begging for forgiveness, then Mikey began running to the other side to stop Spinelli from pummeling Randall with the "rock" but didn't make it in time. We then later find out that Spinelli had actually rescued Ms. Finster's cat out of a tree and Randall hit himself with the rock out of spite. But it is impossible that Spinelli could have given up on hurting Randall, climbed up a tree, rescued a cat, climbed down, handed the cat back to Ms. Finster, gotten praise from Ms. Finster, then have Randall attempt to pick up a big rock, then get a smaller one and hit himself with it in under 3 seconds (the duration of how long Mikey ran before he heard Randall's scream).

Factual error: At the end when Ms. Finster tells Randall to give her the names of the kids involved with the ball incident, she says to list them in alphabetical order. The first name Randall says is "Dettweiler, T.J." But "Blumberg, Mikey" would actually come before that, and given what we know of Randall, this isn't the kind of mistake he is likely to make.

Plot hole: Near the end, at the assembly, the old lady sitting on stage can't even lift the turkey. But about 90 seconds later, she's running away from the can pyramid. What a miraculous recovery.

Revealing: Right after TJ and friends are looking at the "thermometers" of cans, the Ashleys have at least 4 crates of cans that they bring in on forklifts. However, the end result is 4,362 cans for the Ashleys. This may seem kind of picky, but I think there was more cans than 4,362.

Factual error: When TJ says that he and the rest of the gang met at old rusty, it shows you a flashback and the kindergartners are wild, but they only became wild when Gus arrives later (as said in All Growed Down).

Continuity: After Mrs. Finster has her show of strength and is pulling Gus away, he still has the chains from the wheel on his arm. When the shot changes, the chains are gone.

Continuity: When Mikey's music teacher gets engaged to the Spanish guy, her ring disappears between shots.

Revealing: In the areas where the kids change the tape, when Mikey slides and Spinelli is swinging, they are both holding cameras. Who's filming them?

Continuity: When Gretchen is playing with corn chip girl she puts down a card which is the orange cheetah. Yet after she has talked to TJ, it has suddenly changed to a completely different animal.

Continuity: In the episode "Nobody Don't Like T.J.", the kid who doesn't like T.J. is Gordy. In this episode, "Gordy" is referred to as "Freddy".

Factual error: When Stuart escapes and jumps out of the classroom the clock reads 9:00. but after Mikey runs out to go get him the bell rings immediately after. Recess wouldn't be that early.

Factual error: The history teacher who gives King Bob the idea about the pyramids says, "After over 4,000 years, we still know their names: Ramses...Amenhotep." But Amenhotep never built a pyramid, he built great complexes. No pyramids.

Factual error: When the kids are walking through the hallway, on the magician's poster, it says that he does Bar and Bat Mitzvahs. But the 'z' is missing, so it says Bar and Bat Mitzvahs.

Continuity: Before Spinelli calls out "Mama." Mrs. Grotke is stepping into the mud with her right foot. After she says it, she's stepping in with her left foot.

Factual error: In the beginning, when everything on the playground is swamped out, there is a see-saw in the front of the playground doors. It is never ever seen again in an episode of Recess. For example, in "The Great Jungle Gym Standoff", Ms. Finster comes out those doors and asks T.J. what he is doing.

Continuity: When TJ tells Vince to throw him a pepperoni pizza, Vince has two pizzas - one in his hand and one on his plate. In the next shot the pizza on the plate has vanished.

Factual error: In the actual play, T.J. is the Spirit of Hanaukkah, and he has 7 candles on his costume. However, there's 8 nights of Hanaukkah.

Continuity: When TJ is making the morning announcements, the Ashley who wears green is sitting behind Spinelli. When he says there will be dessert after lunch, the desk behind Spinelli is empty.

Continuity: When TJ makes the morning announcements, in the first scene of the classroom we see a boy in a blue hat sitting in the back row. After TJ says that the kids can refuse to answer a teacher, the same kid is suddenly sitting in the second row so he can slap hands with someone in the first row.

Continuity: When the gang is eating lunch, there is a girl in a pink shirt and some other people at the table behind them. When it cuts to behind Prickley and TJ, the kids at that table are different.

Continuity: After T.J. has become principle for a day, it shows him chewing out a kid for running in the halls. He throws down a manilla folder onto his desk in anger. However, when the shot changes, the folder has disappeared.

Continuity: When TJ comes to school in the morning and everyone starts cheering, we see two Ashleys clapping with everyone else. As the camera follows TJ as he walks to the entrance, we see the same two Ashleys a second later.

Continuity: When TJ announces that there will be no gum sharing, it shows Gretchen in the classroom. There is a kid sitting behind her. However, this is the same kid who is caught running in the hall, who Ms. Lemon says is a sixth grader. The gang is in fourth grade.

Continuity: when Randall and TJ are walking across the playground, Randall's hair has turned black and so has TJ's hat.

Continuity: In the beginning, the kids are outside the school, and Mikey says, "Last?" But the sign says the fourth graders are right after the 3rd graders, right where they should be.

Continuity: Near the end, Gus is standing between the two handball walls. He is looking back at TJ and Lawson, who are near the first wall. But as the camera pans out, TJ and Lawson have moved to the other handball wall.

Audio problem: When Tubby is about to win the race, Mikey shouts "Run Tubby run" in Spinelli's voice.

Continuity: When Menlo tells the crew about Randall's joke book, he loosens his tie, and it's still loose when he says "Indeed." But half-a-second later, as he walks away, his tie is back to normal.

Factual error: In the beginning, right before the class is noticing TJ's shiner, Ms. Grotke says, "Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President..." which is true, but on the poster behind her, it says "Abraham Lincoln, 14th President."

Factual error: When Lawson catches the ball in the end-zone, you realize he's NOT in the end-zone.

Continuity: When the Library Kid speaks for the first time, you see a shot of the gang, T.J's hat and hair colour are mixed up.

Continuity: when library kid sees her kindergarten class she's wearing a dress but when she runs into the library she's wearing a t-shirt and skirt.

Continuity: The Library Kid says her classmates were savages. This is all well and good, except the kindergartners shown are the present day kindergartners.

Continuity: When TJ's friends climb on on the jungle gym to try and take TJ's place, we see that Gretchen is the last one up and there is no one on the bars behind her. But in the next long shot, Mikey is right behind her. Then when it shows a close up of them, Mikey is gone again.

Plot hole: Why did Mikey jump to make the feathers fly if Vince said to abort? When TJ gets hit by the feathers, he's on the 'X marks the spot.' But when he got honeyed, he was nowhere near it. Before TJ gets feathered, He gets up onto his feet, like he had fallen down. But he was still standing when Mikey fired the feathers.

Continuity: In the time before King Bob tells his story about being the Prankster Prince, no one is on the jungle gym except TJ and his friends. But after Bob finishes, around 20 kids are on the jungle gym, plus TJ and co. There was not enough time for ALL those kids to get on top of the jungle gym from the time King Bob started his story to the time he finished.

Plot hole: Hustler kid tells Gus in this episode that hustlers never deal in things that could get a kid in trouble. In the episode where all the kids need to become Ashley's he has no problem in handing out plenty of fake IDs, and at the beginning of every show he is shown displaying dodgy merchandise to a kid inside his jacket.(the kid isn't inside the jacket...the merchandise is...).

Other: When the gang is showing stone their way into the school they go through a vent and all of them manage to squeeze through the small hole in the wall.

Continuity: After the part where Mikey gets double portions, the school clock shows it is half past one, but a couple of shots later shows the clock at half past ten, what kind of clock does that?

Continuity: When the superintendent arrives at the school, he looks towards Stone who gives him a thumbs up. When he does this, Stone and the group around him are on the steps right in front of the entrance to the school. A couple of shots later, the entire group has suddenly appeared in front of the window without time for all of them to have moved.

Continuity: When Agents Barnes and Noble are passing out the test, there is a boy in a green hat sitting in front of a girl with long hair. The next shot is of the same boy asking if he can use a pen, but now there is another boy with blond hair right behind him.

Continuity: At the very beginning, Gus drinks his entire carton of chocolate milk. Then in the wide shot, his carton is white. Back to a close up, and it's brown again.

Character mistake: Whenever the Hustler Kid delivers Randall's prize in the beginning, he says, "Grand prize delivery for Mr. Randall C. Weemes." But Randall's middle initial is J.

Factual error: When Gus walks in, all kinds of kids have their backpacks on, like they just got there. Then Jordan asks Gus when he got there, which was 7:58, just a couple of minutes ago. Then TJ says, "Who's up for some kickball?" But it is already after 8:00, meaning they would be late.

Continuity: In this episode, it shows Randall in Miss Grotke's class, but in every other episode, it's never shown him in there.

Continuity: When Randall's dad is talking to the gang about what Randall's been telling him about them (when they are outside, in front of the bouncy thing), his moustache disappears mid-sentence (in a close-up of him) and reappears in the next shot.

Factual error: When Gretchen is typing the pardon on Mrs. Lemon's typewriter, the paper that she is typing on doesn't go up and out of the typewriter gradually as it should. It goes up all at once when she's almost done typing.

Continuity: When Spinelli gets the ball to play in the field behind the trees, you can see lines that would indicate that the ball was a basketball. However, when the kids are playing kickball, it's obviously a kickball.

Continuity: When Jared is talking to the whole school about shunning him, his undershirt changes from white to blue to white again.

Other: In this episode when Spenilli passed the test,she busted out of the school, you can see the school clock has no 5. Whats up with that?

Continuity: Throughout the scene where Spinelli shows off her jump roping skills, the two Ashley's swinging the rope quite awkwardly and choppily go from a normal to a surprised expression every second or so.

Continuity: When Spinelli is challenging the hustler kid, she asks for Gretchen's bow (for a blindfold). In the shots after that, Spinelli is still blindfolded with Gretchen's bow, yet Gretchen is still wearing it.

Factual error: After Digger Dave and Digger Sam split up, they show that Sam was unfocused and was digging everywhere. Even through concrete?

Continuity: After it is explained that without Dave, Sam is unfocused, you see that he has dug holes just about everywhere. However, after that scene, all the holes disappear.

Audio problem: When Randall says, "Way to hop, man." his mouth doesn't move when he says 'man' until after he's finished saying it.

Factual error: When Menlo is hoppin' scotch, he lands on 10 with both feet, and 10 is a single square.

Revealing: When the hosepipe bursts and Spinelli's picture gets ruined, the water rises up a few inches off the ground, but the school has a chained fence so the water should run out.

Continuity: When the gang are sat at the table before Miss Grotke comes on, the table is empty, but when Miss Grotke comes on stage, they suddenly have drinks.

Plot hole: In the scene where T.J. and his pals are trying to find the password to the building, they are using a cup telephone. When the man talks, they can hear him, but when the kids talk, the men on the other side can't hear them.

Continuity: In the beginning, Gretchen says she's short on money, so she can't get a chocolate milk, just a white milk. But, when T.J. walks by with his food, Gretchen has a chocolate milk, such is evident from the brown carton.

Continuity: in the cafeteria, TJ is wearing a suit to welcome the customers. But when he and the rest of the guys go to the teacher's lounge he's back in his normal clothes.

Continuity: Gretchen starts talking to that man who doesn't talk, but later when Mikey is singing for the first time, you see that man booing him, then a minute later Gretchen is still talking to him.

Plot hole: They say in this episode that Menlo was always an organized freak. But in "Principal for a Day" it turns out that he was a hyper-major kid until he started working in the school office.

Other: Phil the Scout ties a rope to Mikey's see-saw end's handle to lower Gus down without hurting him. Couldn't Mikey just climb off and hold the see-saw down with his hands and lowered Gus's end down slowly?

Continuity: After Vince discovers that Mrs. Finster's new cactus is missing from the windowsill, we see that Swinger Girl has it with her, on top of the roof of the school. However, when the shot changes to the new group (With Lawson, Skeenz, Kurts, Menlow, and Randall) Swinger Girl is suddenly standing right next to them. There was not enough time for her to have climbed down from the roof.

Continuity: Near the end, Tyler T. and Tyler A. get their Tyler crests taken away. This stays as the camera follows them, but when the shot changes, all 4 Tyler crests are gone off the Tylers' jackets.