Doctor Who

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: When Martha is walking up to the hospital just before the motorcycle gear-clad slab bumps into her, her right hand goes from by her side to holding her purse strap between shots. (00:02:15)

skater49th

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: When Martha is talking to the Doctor, who is posing as a patient, about her encounter with him in the street earlier, which he doesn't remember, she takes her stethoscope off her neck. The camera cuts to the Doctor, then back to her, and she's taking it off again. (00:04:15)

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Audio problem: When Martha says "We're on the Moon. We're on the bloody Moon," her reflection is visible in the window in front of her. Her lips don't move. (00:07:35)

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Factual error: When the Royal Hope Hospital is transported to the Moon, the area it is in is dark, indicating they are on the side of the Moon not currently facing the Sun. However, in a wide shot of the hospital on the Moon, something that looks like the Sun is visible, something that the illumination of the landscape and the Earth shows cannot be visible. (00:07:40)

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: Martha reaches her right hand up to open the window, prompting Julia to panic and say "Don't! We'll lose all the air!" When the shot changes as Martha points out that the windows aren't exactly airtight, her right hand is suddenly lowered. (00:09:47)

skater49th

Doctor Who mistake picture

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: When the Doctor is looking out the window while asking Martha if there's a balcony on the floor of the hospital they're on, in close-ups of him only his right hand is visible, resting on the sill between two windowpanes, and his left arm is by his side. In a wide shot from outside looking in, his left arm is stretched out with his left hand gripping the divider between two windowpanes, in a spot where it should have been visible in the preceding shot. (00:10:05)

Doctor Who mistake picture

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: When the Doctor and Martha open the doors to the balcony, in a shot facing them, Martha lets go of the handle of her door and it swings completely open. In the next shot, from behind, Martha is still holding the doorknob. (00:10:35)

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: When the Doctor is telling Martha that he was just wandering and not looking for trouble, in the wide shot, he's rubbing his chin. In the close-up immediately afterward, his hand has jumped to his hair. (00:19:45)

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Factual error: A reflection of a full Moon is shown near the end. When Earth is viewed from the Moon earlier, over half of it is illuminated by the Sun. For it to be full Moon, the entire Earth would have to be dark. In addition, the place where the hospital was transported to was dark, and not sunlit. (00:37:45)

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

Suggested correction: When the reflection of the full Moon is viewed it is night time several hours after we saw the Earth from the Moon.

Peter Wallace

Yeah, no, the phases of the Moon don't work like that. New Moon and Full Moon are two weeks apart. Since the Moon appears to be, judging by the appearance of the Earth, between New and either First or Last Quarter, it is impossible for a Full Moon to be visible later that night.

Smith and Jones - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: When the Doctor puts his tie back on after returning from the morning, the collar of his shirt is noticeably askew as a result. Just moments later, when Martha enters the TARDIS for the first time, the collar is neat again, without him having done anything. (00:41:00)

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Audio problem: When the Doctor and Martha are watching Shakespeare in the Globe, Martha says "He's a bit different to his portraits". After she says this on the left of the screen the Doctor's head comes into shot and you can clearly see by his facial expressions he is saying something to Martha, yet no sound is heard. (00:06:10)

Professor Lazarus

Doctor Who mistake picture

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Continuity mistake: When the Doctor first enters Shakespeare's room at the inn, the collar of his coat is askew. The scene cuts to Shakespeare, and when it cuts back to the Doctor his collar is now flat, without him having moved his hands from his pockets. (00:09:20)

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Character mistake: After the Carrionites kill Lynley, the Master of the Revels, by using the doll to make him drown on dry land, the Doctor says, while examining the body, that he's never seen a death like it. In the Third Doctor serial "The Mind of Evil", involving a monster that could make people relive their worst fears, a character died in exactly that fashion. (00:13:10)

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Revealing mistake: When Lilith bespells Shakespeare to write the end of Love's Labour's Won the way the Carrionites want it, there are several shots where a white fleck of some kind is visible in the lower centre of the screen, stuck to the camera lens. (00:17:10)

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Continuity mistake: When Lilith has Shakespeare under her spell and is having him write an alternate ending to his play, there is one shot of his face where his quill can be seen in the corner, perfectly still, even though the next shot shows that he's writing. (00:18:25)

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Continuity mistake: When the Doctor, Martha and Shakespeare are in the Globe and they talk about the theatre's architecture, there is a wooden staircase in front of the stage, which Martha and Shakespeare use to descend from the stage when the three leave. Shortly after, at the beginning of the scene where the two actors from Shakespeare's company accidentally summon a Carrionite while practicing their lines, the staircase is gone. (00:22:10)

The Shakespeare Code - S3-E2

Factual error: The establishing shot of Bedlam Hospital shows it with 18th-century neoclassical architecture, in an episode set in 1599, in the Elizabethan era. (00:23:20)

The Satan Pit (2) - S2-E12

Doctor: So, that's the trap. Or the test or the final judgment, I don't know. But if I kill you, I kill her. Except that implies, in this big grand scheme of Gods and Devils, that she's just a victim. But I've seen a lot of this universe. I've seen fake gods and bad gods and demi-gods and would-be gods - out of all that - out of that whole pantheon - if I believe in one thing... Just one thing... I believe in her.

More quotes from Doctor Who

Season 2 generally

Trivia: "Torchwood" is an anagram for Doctor Who. Russell T Davies came up with it during the filming of Series 1 to label the tapes in order to prevent theft and potential leakage, and decided to use the name in the show proper.

More trivia for Doctor Who

Chosen answer: The Master knows that deep down, he deserves death for the crimes that he's committed throughout his life, and since he regards The Doctor as his arch-foe, he expects it to be at his hands. The fact that The Doctor is still willing to forgive him for all of his crimes hurts him more deeply than death would.

Captain Defenestrator

More questions & answers from Doctor Who

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.