Best comedy TV stupidity of all time

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Hogan's Heroes picture

One in Every Crowd - S3-E10

Stupidity: A prisoner, Jack Williams, rats out Hogan and his team to the Germans, so they fake his death and smuggle him back to London for court-martial. What a stupid thing to do. They should just shoot him and be done with it. First, what if he escaped from captivity on the way through occupied Europe? Second, he has done nothing wrong. Being a grass isn't a crime. Third, Hogan and his men are the war criminals - they often engage in combat activities out of uniform. Williams is going to be acquitted.

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Suggested correction: Not true. The crime he committed was treason, a capital offence under both civil and military law at the time. Being a partisan is not an offence under the Geneva Convention, as these were mainly captured flyers, led by a small team of specialists. To execute a prisoner, as you suggest Hogan's men should do, is murder, also a capital offence at the time.

stiiggy

Nobody from Stalag 13 accompanies Williams back to London - so where is the evidence of his "crime"? Hogan and his men often take part in combat activities both out of uniform and even wearing German uniforms, which is itself a one way ticket to a firing squad.

The evidence is the information he gave to the Germans (actually, the spy disguised as a German major) and signed it.

More Hogan's Heroes stupidity
Monk picture

Mr. Monk and the Astronaut - S4-E14

Stupidity: Steve Wagner is shown expertly constructing an elaborate hanging machine, but he adds a superfluous complication by having it triggered by a garage door remote control that he posts to the address in question. Anything could (and does) go wrong! Why doesn't he simply have it triggered by a bog standard timing device that you can buy in a hardware store for a tenner? I am not sure I'd trust him with my space shuttle.

More Monk stupidity
More Batman stupidity
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Suggested correction: He was being blackmailed by Gary Roberts. He "reopened" the case as a ruse to kill Roberts.

Bishop73

More Murder, She Wrote stupidity
Pokemon picture

Friend and Foe Alike - S1-E79

Stupidity: After eventually arriving at the stadium, why didn't Ash tell anyone that he was late due to getting kidnapped by Team Rocket? He arrived with half of his Pokémon exhausted and subsequently lost his battle. If he informed everyone about his situation, his battle with Ritchie would likely have been postponed until tomorrow, giving him some much-needed time to rest, which would have given him a bigger chance to win.

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Santa Clarita Diet picture

The Farting Sex Tourist - S1-E4

Stupidity: Joel finds prints in Serbian and is stressed because they'll never find someone to translate Serbian in Santa Clarita, goes to great lengths to interact with the principal's Serbian grandmother, etc. Google translate can understand Serbian just fine, but this doesn't even occur to him.

Jon Sandys

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Suggested correction: Except the 16th century Serbian alphabet isn't available to most people to type into google translate. Plus the script used makes it difficult to distinguish which character is which sometimes even if you could find characters to cut and paste tediously into google translate.

Bishop73

More Santa Clarita Diet stupidity
Boy Meets World picture

City Slackers - S3-E11

Stupidity: After Cory and Shawn fish Mr. Feeny's watch from the septic tank, he suggests they jump into the lake to clean off. Cory protests, reasoning that it's only 20° outside, to which Feeny dismissively tells them to take a sweater. They then reluctantly abide. Someone of Feeny's education should know better than to allow them to jump into a freezing cold lake. They could both get hypothermia, and they're all currently isolated in the Pocono Mountains with no nearby medical facilities.

Phaneron

More Boy Meets World stupidity
Gilligan's Island picture

Nyet, Nyet, Not Yet - S2-E9

Stupidity: Considering he had a watch on in nearly every other episode, the Professor did not have his watch in this episode where they had a rescue deadline time (11:00) to be picked up along with the two Russians. Even if he forgot to put his watch on, he definitely would have paid attention to what time it was and got everyone to the location well before 11:00 to guarantee the rescue. Instead he relied on Gilligan to come up with the time which failed (an earlier submitted entry explains that part).

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Designing Women picture

Julia Gets Her Head Stuck in a Fence - S4-E8

Stupidity: Once he decided to finally saw into the banister, all Anthony had to do to get Julia's head out was to saw through one of the thin posts on either side of her head. Instead, he saws through an enormous section of the staircase, later causing the governor to accidentally fall through. If he didn't realise that, one of the other designers, all who were looking on, should have. It's a lot to presume they all would have been that careless just for the benefit of a sight gag.

Michael Albert

More Designing Women stupidity
The Office picture

Free Family Portrait Studio - S8-E24

Stupidity: Dwight is seen walking out of the bathroom with the diaper in the direction of the main part of the office in which Angela sits. If he was to try to stay hidden (which was obviously the whole point), he would have gone through the exit of the annex, waited until she was distracted/or hide it for later and Angela never would have seen. This was done because the plot required for Angela to notice but Dwight could have easily kept it hidden. (00:10:40)

Hemech Rostovsky

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South Park picture

The Succubus (a.k.a. Chef's Mama) - S3-E3

Stupidity: When Kenny and Cartman are sitting on the bench, Cartman can't start the tape as he has fallen asleep. Kenny then tries to wake him up, but wouldn't it have made far more sense for him to just start it himself, as he is sitting right next to it? Cartman's job was to push the play button. It was not like he had to rewind, fast forward or even eject the tape, so all Kenny had to do was just simply push the play button and tape would have started to play.

Shay

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The Dick Van Dyke Show picture

Long Night's Journey into Day - S5-E23

Stupidity: Rob tells Jerry "I haven't stopped sneezing long enough to take allergy pills" yet right after he says that, he doesn't sneeze anymore till he gives out his home address. He could have just taken his pills then. Someone behind the camera probably reminded him to continue sneezing. (00:16:52 - 00:18:00)

Liz Blue 1970

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: He's exaggerating, but a character not taking a pill in this situation doesn't constitute a stupidly mistake (minor plot hole). I've been in situations where I needed to take an allergy or pain pill and didn't, even though I had a chance, because my mind or focus was somewhere else.

Bishop73

More The Dick Van Dyke Show stupidity
More Good Times stupidity
More Ghosts (US) stupidity
The Brady Bunch picture

Snow White and the Seven Bradys - S5-E3

Stupidity: When the kids all pick the random-shuffled papers to choose which kid will be which dwarf, it NEVER occurred to them that with six kids and seven dwarfs they would be one short. This was only discovered once Peter (the last to pick one) was now up for a turn. How did nobody figure that out before the name-choosing even started?

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Family Guy picture

Turkey Guys - S13-E5

Stupidity: The whole episode revolves on the turkey that Peter ate. Lois sends him and Brian out to get another one. She stalls dinner the whole episode waiting for them to get back. Problem is the turkey is frozen! It will take at least 6 or 7 hours to cook and Lois acts like as soon as they return with it, it won't take long to to cook, so the stalling makes no sense. (00:12:45)

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The Big Bang Theory picture

The Clean Room Infiltration - S8-E11

Stupidity: On the way home from the university after wiping their names from the sign in sheet, Leonard, Howard, and Raj are all singing Jingle Bells. Leonard is driving and has his eyes closed all the way through singing the song, this makes no sense at all giving he should be looking where he's driving.

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Friends picture

The One With All The Rugby - S4-E15

Stupidity: Emily tries to help Ross inflict pain on the other rugby players and tells him about one player who doesn't wear a cup. No one who knows rugby would ever wear a cup, it is more hazardous than helpful to wear a cup in rugby as it involves a lot a grinding, and a simple slip or movement could cause serious damages to the male genitals. Especially if these guys are British and well versed in rugby which they are.

More Friends stupidity
More Bewitched stupidity
The Inbetweeners picture

First Day - S1-E1

Stupidity: In the bar, making the random man sit with them while they had their drinks was completely pointless, since the bartender believed Jay was an adult.

MikeH

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