A Deadly State of Mind - S4-E6
Trivia: Unusually enough for a television show devoted to a homicide detective and the way he unravels the plans of cunning murderers, the fact is that Columbo has nothing to do in this episode. Doctor Collier is seriously assaulted by Carl Donner who then goes on to violently attack his wife. Use of deadly force to prevent such an attack is allowed in the United States. Collier does not commit murder; he doesn't even commit a crime. You'd think such a hightly educated man would know enough to keep his head, call the police and explain what had happened. He wouldn't even be charged.
Suggested correction: Collier would have lost his licence to practice medicine as a result of his having a sexual relationship with a patient, and his killing the woman's husband - justified or not - would have made this much worse. For a start, the lucrative book deal he is about to sign would certainly have been cancelled. He stands to lose everything. Of course he is going to try to cover it up by any means possible, including committing another murder.
Undercover - S12-E3
Factual error: At the crime scene, the landlady of the dead man is brought into the room in order to identify one of the dead men. This is never, ever done - she could contaminate the crime scene in a dozen different ways. She would be asked to identify the corpse at the morgue after the scene had been cleared by forensic examiners.
Suggested correction: Completely wrong. Immediate identification of a murder victim is vital to the continuing investigation. As long as the landlady was under escort (she was) and did not touch anything in the room (she did not), she would definitely be asked to identify the dead man. There are too many examples to list, but when actor Bob Crane was murdered in 1978, his theatre co-star Victoria Berry was escorted onto the crime scene to confirm the identity of the dead man - Crane.
Plot hole: In the last scene Columbo convicts Hanlon of murder by playing back the recording of Hanlon's final call to the victim Wagner (the phone-box call near the crime scene is Hanlon's alibi. He is pretending to be in his VIP-box in the football stadium, which is too far away at the time he murders Wagner). The point is that the recording is missing the loud clock chimes from a little clock inside the VIP-box, which means Hanlon's alibi is "destroyed", he was not in his VIP-box, he must be somewhere else at that moment. Problem is the missing clock chimes are not hard evidence. Hanlon could say the clock was not working that day or the battery was empty and so on. Beside that it would be much easier to catch Hanlon if Columbo would check the outgoing phone calls asking the telephone company.
Suggested correction: He very likely will. As we've seen, Columbo is very thorough. The missing clock chimes aren't meant to be definitive proof, just enough to warrant an arrest. Columbo will continue to work the case and gather evidence.
Columbo will continue to work the case and gather evidence? Well with that sentence they could stop every Columbo episode after 5 minutes. Hey guys, Columbo has nearly nothing against the murderer but he will continue to work the case outside this episode be sure.
It's the detective's job to investigate the crime and gather sufficient evidence to warrant an arrest and potential conviction. Yes, this would apply to every episode, and yes it applies to all detectives. Many of Columbo's investigations result in him using circumstantial evidence to arrest the killer. In one episode he arrests a man based on how the victim's shoes were tied. That wasn't his only evidence, however. In many cases a preponderance of circumstantial evidence is enough.
Deliberate mistake: Beth shoots Bryce three times in the chest, and he falls face down on the floor. She then drags his body across the floor, also face down, to in front of the sliding door, but there is no sign of blood anywhere.
Suggested correction: In the early Seventies, no television show used blood effects. They were too expensive and would severely restrict potential audiences as television channels were notoriously conservative in those days. This is a creative and technical decision, not a mistake.
Plot hole: When Columbo presents the flipped photograph to Dick Van Dyke in the final scene, Columbo insists it is correct and proves DVD guilty. But Columbo already showed him the rejected fireplace photo, which shows the room arranged correctly. It also shows the victim's wedding ring, which would be on the wrong hand according to Columbo.
Suggested correction: It's all part of Columbo's bluff: Galesko wants to get rid of Columbo as fast as possible and believes himself to be too smart, thus falls for it. Galesko might have forgotten about the fireplace photo or underestimated its importance. Even if Galesko points out the rejected photo: Columbo is already bluffing about the first photo, he can very well just claim the second photo never existed or is destroyed too, leaving Galesko in the same position as he is before he incriminates himself.
Character mistake: In the grocery store scene Robert Culp sits on a display of pumpkins but there are 2 signs that say watermelons.
Suggested correction: As a retail worker of 18 years, I know that POS (signage) mistakes happen in supermarkets, for example a product is moved and the correct POS is not replaced. This scene seems to be filmed in a real supermarket meaning this is not a mistake made by the show's producers, however if this was filmed in a studio, "Character Mistake" would be the wrong category as the mistake would have been made by the set designers.
While I've never seen mislabeled items I know mistakes can happen. But since the characters aren't real, every mistake they make is the fault of someone on the crew, whether it's the actor, writer, or set designer. For example, misspellings are considered character mistakes (unless intentional), even though it would have been made by the person who created it.
Character mistake: This episode opens with James Ferris typing the final chapter of a mystery novel. He is using all-capital letters, No professional writer would do that.
Suggested correction: It's not meant to be all capital letters, but block letters. Just look at the title card and credits in the opening - they're block letters too.
