Factual error: Twice in the movie a Jumbo Jet (a Boeing 747) from Pan Am appears. The movie is set in 1969, when that plane had its maiden journey, but it wasn't flown commercially until 1970.
Factual error: Opening the blank envelope, Marta finds the fragment of the toxicology report. It is signed "Office of the chief medical examiner, Norfolk County, Massachusetts." But then it writes also the address of said office, which is in Marlborough. Marlborough is also the city when Marta resides, and where the lawyers' letters we see come from. But Marlborough is also a city in the Middlesex county, not Norfolk. (01:28:25)
Factual error: At the end of the movie, Effie comes out with two AA-12s. As she fires these guns, they have the sound, effects, and firing pattern of an assault rifle. These two guns are shotguns, not machine guns. (01:13:00)
Factual error: Tommy is wearing a Hulkamania shirt while the band is being assembled together. The band was formed in 1981. Hulkamania didn't start until 1984.
Factual error: The film is set in 1987 but most of the street lights seen throughout the movie are LED street lights and some high pressure sodium Philips lanterns (produced from the early 1990s to early 2000s), neither of which were around back then. Similarly many of the shots of the M1 motorway show modern cars and smart motorway/variable speed limits, which never existed at the time.
Factual error: The American soldier on the balcony is waving a 50 star flag. (01:30:06)
Factual error: When the teacher announces they are going to Prague, they basically walk around the corner to a waiting bus. This is impossible because the part of Venice they are in is inaccessible to motor vehicles.
Factual error: Dr. Fielding is dead inside the JPL building. His blood is dripping onto a telegraph key and it is sending perfectly comprehensive Morse Code. The blood drips are too random to do that. (01:13:25)
Suggested correction: It's clear he was alive at one point, and the way he has positioned shows he was probably already sending that. There was a break from him sending it, and it's clear the kids didn't understand the morse code, which could be the point his blood was dripping.
That could be. OK.
Factual error: With a number of flowers blooming, the movie appears take place in spring. There are many scenes of central park with flowering trees and shrubs in full bloom. However, the yellow blooming shrubs called forsythia do not bloom at the same time as the flowering cherry trees. Forsythias bloom about a month earlier than cherries and are usually the first items to bloom in spring.
Factual error: The USA map is inaccurate for the year it is set in. It shows all states but in 1886, many of the northwest states (e.g. Montana, Idaho, the Dakotas) weren't states until 1889+.
Factual error: In the courtroom scene, the seal behind the judge reads, "United States District Court for the Southern District of California." This is a mistake - the US District courts are federal courts, they have no jurisdiction to hear divorce cases. The proper venue for this case would be the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, which is the state court with jurisdiction to hear family law cases in Los Angeles, California. The seal should have the state court name, not the federal one. (01:30:34)
Factual error: Pope Benedict and Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio are hanging out in the room by the Sistine Chapel having a pizza and a drink together. The drink of choice is Fanta, apparently Joseph Ratzinger's favourite beverage. The scene is supposed to happen in 2012, but the label of the bottle is a more modern one, introduced in 2016. (01:34:20)
Factual error: The scenes set at Wrestlemania XXX (2014) were filmed at a RAW show in 2018 - fans are visible in the background wearing wrestling merchandise more recent than 2014.
Factual error: Parker is looking for the phone her mom hid. She is moving a box of cereals. The cereal ingredient label has a few joke entries you may Miss at first (goat hair, bitter almond paste, false eyelashes), but the nutrition facts tab is also incoherent in a way too subtle to be a deliberate joke; sub-categories of each macronutrients exceed the total. For instance, it has 5 g of Fat in total, but 25 g of Cholesterol and 56 g of Saturated fat (at most it could be mg). (01:00:25)
Factual error: The family supposedly left Ex-Yugoslavia (what part isn't made clear exactly) "because of the war", but the only conflict still going on there in 1999 (when the family is still there in the opening scene) was the NATO bombing of targets in Serbia in order to get the Serbs to lay off Kosovo, and that was long over by Christmas of that year.
Factual error: In the antique shop, Woody is at a point where he's at the center of a tug-o-war between two sides, with the "bad toys" pulling on his draw string for his voice box. The voice box can still be heard spouting its lines, despite the fact that the tension on the string is never released allowing it to draw the string back in, which is what makes the sound. It can't make it's sounds with the string continually out in the pulled position.
Factual error: Bobby's shotgun hit blasts a hole through the head of the first zombie entering the store, but the zombie directly behind it, as well as the barricade, are unscathed. The shells can hardly penetrate this much, wide and clean through the head and then disappear with no trace. (01:35:05)
Factual error: There is a modern digital electric meter in the record store - not what it would look like in the era of the movie.
Factual error: Drinking a juice box in 1977. They didn't appear in the US until 1980.
Factual error: Peg turned state's witness against other debt collectors (who were convicted thanks to her testimony) and her "deal" with the prosecutor cleared her of all debt-related charges. However, her destruction of evidence (52,437 debt sheets) could not be overlooked or forgiven and she had to serve time in confinement. Peg said, "Luckily, half my jury had their debt erased in the fire, so I got a lighter sentence." This would NOT happen in court! Potential jurors are questioned to make sure they are non-biased, know little if anything about the case, do not have a vested interest (they are neutral and detached) in the outcome, etc. Each side (prosecution and defense) is allowed a certain number of peremptory challenges (allowing them to dismiss a certain number of potential jurors). Screening questions to potential jurors in this case would include whether they currently have debt, which creates bias and would result in dismissal as a juror. Jurors also would NOT determine her sentence. (01:27:46)