Continuity mistake: When Kirk is being beamed aboard near the end, the crewman operating the transporter has a single lieutenant's stripe. But in the close-up of his hands on the controls, the stripe changes into the braid of a lieutenant commander. (00:46:40)
Continuity mistake: After Spock nerve pinches Chekov when he goes mad and he is taken to Sickbay, the Tholian ship appears and hails the Enterprise. When Spock says "on main viewer," the shot of Loskene is on the screen, but the back of Chekov's head can be seen when it should be in Sickbay.
Continuity mistake: When Checkov turns on the viewer in the transporter room, the Defiant is seen directly from the starboard side, when it should have been seen from the quarter profile port side, as it was drifting to the Enterprise's port side.
Continuity mistake: When Kirk, Bones, Chekov, and Spock go over to the Defiant, the suits they have on have a black support bar in the left side of the headpiece. When the camera looks down at the dead men and back to Kirk, you see the bar is on the right, and his hair is parted on the right. The very next look at Kirk, the bar and the part of his hair is back on the left.
Continuity mistake: The shards of the goblet Spock breaks change quantity and position on the table with the fruit bowl on it. (00:28:30 - 00:31:30)
Continuity mistake: Just before Parmen starts mind-controlling Kirk, McCoy and Spock, he presents them with three gifts. Kirk receives a large, gold Greek shield, which the captain holds with both hands, in front of him, as the lengthy scene continues. In the wide shot, Kirk is holding the shield high up on his chest, completely obscuring his Federation insignia. In subsequent close-ups, Kirk is holding the shield down low, around waist-level, fully exposing his chest and insignia. Every time the camera cuts back to wide-shot, Kirk is again holding the shield up high on his chest.
Continuity mistake: In the 40th Anniversary release of the complete original series, this episode opens with Scotty at the conn, making an extended log entry, wearing his third-season swept-back hairstyle, and it is very obvious that he is visually mouthing several completely different sentences than we hear in the audio. After the opening credits roll, we next see Scotty wearing his more typical relaxed hairstyle with slight bangs. It is apparent that, in remastering and editing this episode, they inserted footage of Scotty from another episode altogether. For whatever reason, it is a glaring mistake of both continuity and audio editing.
The Empath - S3-E12
Continuity mistake: In the opening scene inside the underground station, the bright blue mat under the viewer desk chair disappears. (00:00:55 - 00:02:30)
The Empath - S3-E12
Continuity mistake: The bruises on McCoy's face change configuration, color and texture between the time Kirk and Spock first find him and the scene where Gem heals him. (00:34:15 - 00:40:30)
The Empath - S3-E12
Continuity mistake: Gem's left hand is cupped around McCoy's right ear as she begins to heal him, but her hand keeps changing positions as the camera angles switch. (00:44:20)
The Empath - S3-E12
Continuity mistake: After partially healing him, Gem falls away from McCoy and lands, unconscious, perpendicular to the dais he's lying on. When Kirk and Spock rush over, however, she's suddenly moved several feet away and is now lying parallel to the dais. (00:44:50 - 00:45:35)
The Empath - S3-E12
Continuity mistake: During Kirk's torture scenes, the back shots have Kirk's arms stretched wide apart and yanked straight - the front shots have the chains going overhead and his arms are bent at the elbows.
Continuity mistake: When Elaan visits engineering, the close-up shots of Scotty show a security guard wearing a black utility belt standing in the background. But the man is missing in all the full shots. (00:13:15)
Continuity mistake: As Kirk wipes a tear from Elaan's face, both cheeks are wet. A second later, both cheeks are dry.
Continuity mistake: After Marta's dance, Kirk and Spock are sitting an inch apart behind the table, then a foot apart, then an inch again and so forth every time the shot changes. (00:16:25)
Continuity mistake: As Garth brings in the chair and orders the governor's torture, the pedestal fruit bowl on the table in front of Kirk keeps moving back and forth in relation to him and to the wine pitcher. (00:22:40)
Continuity mistake: When Garth forces Kirk to kneel at his feet, Kirk's hands are extended palms down, then palms up, then palms down again as the camera angles change. (00:34:20)
Continuity mistake: When Scott orders Sulu to fire phasers to punch through the force field, the two phaser beams are diverging when they leave the ship, but converging somehow (space mirrors?) when they strike the planet. (00:41:20)
Continuity mistake: After Garth attempts to convince Mr Scott that he is Captain Kirk and to beam him up, while he is banging his fists on the floor in anger he transforms back into himself and the fly like ring on his finger breaks and slides out of shot. It's quite hard to see but it does. The next time we see Garth's hand his ring is intact yet he has not transformed himself again to repair it.
Continuity mistake: When Scotty thwarts Garth, disguised as Kirk, attempts to beam to the Enterprise using the Queen-to-Queen level three code, Kirk throws a tantrum and accidentally loosens one of his controls during his rant right before he turns back to Garth.
Suggested correction: How is that a mistake?
