Best mystery TV mistakes of all time

Please vote as you browse around to help the best rise to the top.

Fortitude picture

Show generally

Factual error: A scene in a photographic darkroom shows Michael Gambon developing a colour print in a dish under safe lights. Not possible. Colour printing must be carried out in pitch dark usually inside a light tight print processor, as colour photographic paper is sensitive to all wavelengths of visible light.

More Fortitude mistakes
Wayward Pines picture

Time Will Tell - S2-E7

Character mistake: A shot shows Djimon Hounsou completing his year entry on a large chalk board. The entries are 20 years apart. The third entry on the second line is 2274, the next should be 2294, but instead it records 2394. The one after corrects the sequence with 2314. Considering there is an entry only every twenty years, you would think he'd be more careful. (00:20:15)

The24fretking

More Wayward Pines mistakes
Between picture

Us vs. Them - S2-E2

Factual error: We see Liam's driver's license. It says he's from Rhode Island, but the license looks nothing like RI's. It's issued by the State Motor Vehicle Commission, but RI does not have an MVC (only New Jersey does). And the expiration date is always the same as the holder's birthday, but here we see it's 2 days after his birthday.

Bishop73

More Between mistakes
Silent Witness picture

Show generally

Plot hole: When Nicky goes into prison in Mexico to give a criminal a shot of insulin, two errors are seen. 1) The needle and syringe are far too big for an insulin shot, which takes a one ml syringe and a small sub-cutaneous needle. 2) When we first see the syringe, there is a small amount of insulin in it, but it grows the more times we see it, until a large syringe is two-thirds full - insulin is enough in a one ml syringe.

kh1616

More Silent Witness mistakes
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency picture

Show generally

Revealing mistake: Mr Knight shoots Suzie Boreton - after the muzzle flashes and sounds stop the bolt of his MK14 EBR continues to move back and forth as if it's still firing. (00:30:30)

More Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency mistakes
Major Crimes picture

By Any Means: Part 4 - S6-E13

Continuity mistake: When Buzz and Provenza race out of the squad room to follow Rusty in the frantic search for Stroh, Buzz is in shirt sleeves with no tie. However when they arrive at their destination Buzz is wearing a coat and tie.

bnemirow

More Major Crimes mistakes
More Dragnet 1967 mistakes
Whitechapel picture

Episode #3.1 - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: DI Chandler calls a suspect "Daniel Wilkie." However when the interview is done he goes and talks to Ed, saying "you've just arrested Ben Wilkie."

More Whitechapel mistakes
More The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes mistakes
Absentia picture

Nobody's Innocent - S1-E6

Continuity mistake: Early in the episode as she is on a fire escape looking to hide somewhere, the window she opens from the outside has two half panes of glass, but on the inside it only has one pane of glass.

More Absentia mistakes
Line of Duty picture

Season 1 generally

Factual error: Chief Superintendent Hilton wears the ribbons of the General Service Medal (awarded for military service in a combat zone, most commonly in Northern Ireland) and the Police Long Service and Good Conduct Medal (awarded for twenty years' service), but not the Golden Jubilee Medal (awarded to all officers with five years' service in 2002), which he would also have. When he reappears in Series 4, he is wearing the Golden Jubilee Medal, Diamond Jubilee Medal (awarded in 2012) and Police Long Service and Good Conduct Medal, which would all be correct, but no longer has the General Service Medal.

Necrothesp

More Line of Duty mistakes
More The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance mistakes
FBI: Most Wanted picture

Predators - S1-E8

Character mistake: The FBI team responds to a murder crime scene. The victim is lying face down in the bed with blood everywhere. The team leader takes the victim's wrist with his bare ungloved hand. A trained FBI agent would never touch a murder victim without gloves - one to protect himself and two not to contaminate the crime scene. (00:10:00)

Snag.1

More FBI: Most Wanted mistakes
More Lupin the 3rd mistakes
Young Wallander picture

Episode 4 - S1-E4

Continuity mistake: Kurt is still recovering from the beating he took in the previous episode with bad cuts on his forehead, checks and temple area. They are red and impossible to miss while he is in the police station. The cuts have miraculously disappeared in the next scene when he goes to visit Mona.

bnemirow

More Young Wallander mistakes
Ratched picture

Show generally

Factual error: The show, which is set in California in 1947, mentions the gas chamber, lethal injection and the electric chair as methods of execution in the state. Two murderers are sentenced to death by lethal injection and one is depicted being instead executed in the electric chair, which the governor states has been brought out of retirement for the occasion. In fact, California adopted the gas chamber as its sole method of execution in 1937 (having previously used hanging). Lethal injection was not used in the United States at all until 1982 and not adopted in California until 1993 (becoming the prime method in 1996). California has never used the electric chair.

Necrothesp

More Ratched mistakes
More The Expanse mistakes
Broadchurch picture

Episode #1.4 - S1-E4

Revealing mistake: The tabloid story with the plight of the Latimers just came out, and various characters are looking at it. In the bit when David Tennant tosses on the desk his copy of the Herald, the second paragraph of the second column goes "Sitting in the family home, surrounded by pictures and mementos of Danny" etc. It is the same text that was at the very beginning of the article when the store owner was looking at it. The newspaper is a prop with the same text in a loop. (00:35:00 - 00:36:30)

Sammo

More Broadchurch mistakes
Ghostwriter picture

Who Burned Mr. Brinker's Store?: Part 1 - S1-E6

Other mistake: The arson investigators name Jamal as the main suspect in setting fire to the store, because the security camera caught him sliding something through the front door mail-slot. Any arson expert would immediately know that it wasn't Jamal that started the fire, as the fire's point of origin was in the back of store, and was also entirely contained there, and Jamal was not only nowhere near the back of the store, but was also outside.

Phaneron

More Ghostwriter mistakes
Professor T picture

Show generally

Other mistake: Danny Stevens, an undercover police officer, is killed. The police agree to investigate the murder of his undercover persona, Steve Daniels, thus allowing the investigation of his death without compromising their ongoing investigation into the activities of a drug kingpin. The officer investigating the murder visits the kingpin to ask about Steve's murder. She shows him a photo of the murdered man, but the name across the bottom is Danny Stevens - the policeman's real name.

James the maths teacher

More Professor T mistakes