Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Continuity mistake: In Lucy's dream, when Carlota Romero comes to their apartment, Little Ricky is sitting in a highchair with a hat on his head. Although later in the scene, you see his hat fall off, the first close-up shot of Little Ricky shows him without the hat. Then immediately, when you see a wide-shot of the scene, his hat is back on his head again.
Continuity mistake: While Lucy is at Ethel's apartment nervous about leaving the baby with Ricky she's wearing v-strap pumps, then she heads back to her apartment to get her coat and bag, but when Lucy walks into her apartment she's wearing ankle strap pumps instead. (00:16:00)
Tennessee Ernie Visits - S3-E27
Continuity mistake: When Fred and Ethel leave to get the rollaway bed, note the two L-shape actor's marks on the carpet where Ernie had placed his small suitcase and then sat, earlier in the scene. (00:08:50)
Continuity mistake: When Martians Lucy and Ethel are sneaking up behind everyone on the Empire State Building, in the closeup Ethel has a toy gun tucked into her belt just as she climbs over the fence, but in the next wideshot her toy gun is already lying on the observation deck floor. (00:17:25)
Ricky's Hawaiian Vacation - S3-E21
Continuity mistake: When Ricky has five seconds left on Freddie Fillmore's show, in the wideshot Ricky starts singing "Let's have another piece of" and he's holding the paper with his right hand while snapping the fingers of his left, but it cuts to Ricky's closeup and the paper's now in his left hand while he's snapping the fingers of his right hand. (00:24:40)
Sentimental Anniversary - S3-E15
Continuity mistake: While Lucy's showing Little Ricky the pictures in the album, we see Lucy's fingernails are not polished, but in the closeup of her hand pointing to the photo the fingernails have dark polish on them. This happens again when Lucy's looking through the album with Ricky.
Continuity mistake: While Ethel's looking at the Baby Pictures we see her fingernails are short and not polished, but in the closeup of her hand holding one of the photos the fingernails are long with dark polish.
Continuity mistake: While Ricky's telling the bedtime story in Spanish to Little Ricky (worth watching just for this scene), in the closeups of the baby in the crib, the pillow bumper has an embroidered heart with stick figures, which flips in reverse. Actually, the last closeup of Little Ricky lying down is the normal shot, but all the closeups of the baby sitting up are the flipped shots. (This pillow bumper has stick figures of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, and can be seen in previous episodes). (00:06:40)
Continuity mistake: When Lucy and Ricky are sitting on the coffee table looking through photos of Little Ricky, just as Lucy quips, "What magazine, body beautiful?" in the closeup the baby's photo orientation is portrait, but in the wideshots when Lucy looks at it and hands it to Ricky the orientation is landscape. (00:01:50)
Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Continuity mistake: When Fred tells Ricky there's an article in the newspaper about Carlota Romero, there's a closeup of the newspaper's back page with Carlota's photo, but later when Lucy takes the newspaper (the same NY Gazette issue) from Ethel, before she turns it over we can see that the back page photo and layout are different. (00:08:30 - 00:10:20)
Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Continuity mistake: When Fred shows Ricky the newspaper article about Carlota Romero appearing at the Opal Room, the front page of the paper reads "New York Gazette", but in the closeup of the article on the back page the newspaper is called "The Daily Record." (00:08:35)
Continuity mistake: In season 2's episode "The Ricardos Change Apartments" their new apartment number is "3B", but in this episode when Lucy's at her audition she tells the casting agent that her apartment number is "3D" (deliberately done in order for the 3D joke to work), and it's in the next episode "The French Revue" that we see the new number "3D" on the door. (00:19:30)
Bonus Bucks - S3-E20
Continuity mistake: After Ricky takes out the extra expenses from the prize money, when starched-up Lucy walks into the office Fred's holding the last dollar bill, and in the closeup of Ethel's and Fred's shocked reactions to Lucy's appearance we see Lucy's hand holding the dollar, but in the next wideshot Lucy's open hand is empty so Fred gives her the dollar. (00:24:35)
The Million Dollar Idea - S3-E12
Continuity mistake: When Ethel says "He's never forgiven Ford for scooping him with the horseless carriage" Lucy is laughing. The shot changes, she is no longer laughing.
Answer: There is no reason. It's a just a silly plot device, typical of the era. Women characters were often portrayed as making uninformed assumptions or decisions.
raywest ★