Best drama TV character mistakes of all time

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Law & Order: Special Victims Unit picture

Lead - S10-E15

Character mistake: Elliot Stabler is interrogating a suspect and he says "Well maybe he got pissy because of the 2.2 you blew into the breathalyzer." He said two-point-two but he meant point-two-two because a 2.2 BAC is like 5 times the lethal limit, so a 0 .22 BAC makes more sense. (00:20:10)

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Smallville picture

Tomb - S5-E14

Character mistake: While Clark and Chloe are at Daily Planet, Clark asks her what is wrong with her mother. Chloe responds that her mother left when she was twelve years old. In the episode Lineage, Chloe and Clark are looking for Rachael Dunleavy and Chloe says her mother left when she was five.

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Fear the Walking Dead picture

Pilot - S1-E1

Character mistake: After Nick kills Calvin, and Travis arrives, Nick calls Travis "Nick" before correctly calling him Travis in his next line of dialogue.

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Suggested correction: Travis is the one who says "Nick".

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The Orville picture

Old Wounds - S1-E1

Character mistake: After Mercer's speech to the entire crew he dismisses everyone except for the senior staff but everyone, including the senior staff, starts walking away as if they were dismissed as well.

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Suggested correction: They were walking away, but not as if they were dismissed. The group of senior officers and Mercer are in a completely different part of the room (or possible an entirely different room). Notice the doorway where Mercer is standing. At the beginning, he's in the doorway and it has a white boarder and a 2nd set of doors. Then he's standing in front of a doorway with a blue boarder and no 2nd set of doors.

Bishop73

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Sons of Anarchy picture

Orca Shrugged - S5-E5

Character mistake: Tig gets bit on the right butt cheek. Tara tells Chibs to give him a local, which is a numbing injection so she can stitch him up. Problem is that Chibs does the injection in the left butt cheek. You are supposed to give the injection close to the wound to numb it before stitches.

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Gilmore Girls picture

Written in the Stars - S5-E3

Character mistake: This mistake happens in the town meeting scene. They are talking about the two business owners that dated, then moved when it ended badly. It hurt the town's economy. First it was said that Faye sold flowers and the guy sold candy. Then they said that Faye sold candy.

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Star Trek: Deep Space Nine picture

The Way of the Warrior (2) - S4-E2

Character mistake: During the Defiant's flight to save the Cardassian officials, Worf says something to the effect of, "I've never been aboard a Federation ship equipped with a cloak before". However, he was aboard the Enterprise during the Pegasus incident, where The Ship was temporarily equipped with a cloaking device.

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Degrassi: The Next Generation picture Video

With or Without You - S8-E6

Character mistake: When Sav asks Ali if she wants people to think she's not good enough for their family, Ali accidentally calls Sav "Ray" when she responds: "Yes, Ray, that's exactly what I want." Raymond "Ray" Ablack is the name of the actor who plays Sav. (00:17:31)

HappyAccidents

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Suggested correction: Actually she says: "Yes. Right, that's exactly what I want." Not "yes Ray."

I know the subtitle says "right", but I hear "Ray" as well. Plus, it fits better in the line for her to use someone's name. Usually when someone is sarcastically agreeing they'll say "yeah, right" or "yes, [person's name]."

Bishop73

Yeah, it doesn't really make sense for her to say, "Yes, right" like that, and neither the intonation of her voice nor movement of her mouth match it either. The subtitles most likely said "right" to cover up the mistake.

HappyAccidents

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The O.C. picture

Season 2 generally

Character mistake: Marissa said to Ryan (in episode "The Brothers Grim") that the last time she was in Chino, she "saved his ass". She was referring to Thanksgiving, but that's not the last time she was in Chino. The last time she was in Chino was in "The Nana" when she ran there after finding out about Luke and her mother's affair.

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Suggested correction: She saved his ass when she talked to Eddie about letting him stay. So her phrasing is correct.

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Star Trek: Picard picture

Remembrance - S1-E1

Character mistake: Picard and Data are playing poker at the beginning of the episode. Before the actual faces of the players are revealed, we are shown close-ups of their hands as they put down the chips for the bet. When Picard says his first line in the series it's "See", and it is literally true, because in the previous shot, Data put his 5 cards down on the table and face up. (00:00:50)

Sammo

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Death in Paradise picture

Murder from Above - S7-E1

Character mistake: A computer display of currency transactions shows the word "withdrawal" spelled as "withdrawl." (It is also spelled correctly higher up on the display). (00:25:05)

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Peaky Blinders picture

Season 5 generally

Character mistake: Several times Tommy addresses Sir Oswald Mosley as Mr Mosley instead of the correct Sir Oswald. Mosley never corrects him, which given his snobbishness portrayed throughout the series seems highly unlikely.

Necrothesp

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Law & Order picture

Remand - S6-E10

Character mistake: McCoy asks his witness, an expert geneticist, what the odds are that a DNA sample presented in evidence does not match that of the defendant. He answers "About one in two hundred." That is idiotic. If the DNA samples are identical the chances that the the sample presented in evidence does not come from the defendant is about one in two billion, not one in two hundred! A bright high school senior would know that, never mind an expert geneticist.

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Suggested correction: If the odds are 1 in 200, that means the accuracy of the DNA is 99.5%. If the odds are 1 in 2 billion, that means the accuracy of the DNA is 99.9999999995%, which simply isn't true.

Bishop73

In fact as any geneticist (i.e, anyone like me) will tell you the chances of two identical DNA "fingerprints" coming from two different and unrelated individuals are around one in two thousand million. Two billion. In fact the odds are much higher than that but we scientists don't like to make claims that sound unlikely or fantastic. The accuracy of DNA fingerprinting is, as you point out, 99.9999999995%. You correction is wrong and the posting is correct.

Except that's not what happened in the scene or what happens in real life. You simply don't understand what you're arguing. You're not a geneticist.

Bishop73

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