Mission: Impossible

Mission: Impossible (1966)

9 mistakes in season 3 - chronological order

(2 votes)

The Heir Apparent - S3-E1

Continuity mistake: While Barbara Bain is opening the puzzle box, Martin Landau is removing pieces of his disguise. First, he has a handkerchief in his right hand. Next, the handkerchief is gone and he is peeling off his left leather pocket, and the left leather lapel is already gone. Next, he removes his mustache with a handkerchief. Then, while removing the left leather lapel, the left pocket is back in place. (00:39:45 - 00:41:25)

Movidiot

The Contenders (2) - S3-E3

Continuity mistake: Barney is on the floor unconscious when the scene fades out for a commercial break. When we fade back in, he's still unconscious, but his head is in a different position. (00:14:40)

Jean G

The Elixir - S3-E7

Continuity mistake: When Willie reassembles the electrical socket he puts it in with the ground on the top. Then they show Barney putting his socket together and switchback to Willie, but when the scene shows him putting in the plug it is on the bottom.

Dean Bourque

The System - S3-E15

Continuity mistake: Phelps takes the tape from the recorder's right-hand spindle. When he opens the acid vat, we can see the tape he just removed back on the recorder - but on the left spindle. The tape he then drops into the acid doesn't remotely resemble the one he pulled, and when he drops it, the recorder's left spindle, where the full tape was in the last shot and where the empty reel should be, now has nothing on it at all. (00:02:50)

Jean G

The Glass Cage - S3-E16

Continuity mistake: When the Major checks the prison log book, the box next to 27 where the time entry should be is blank. He closes the book and holds it under his arm while conversing with a subordinate, and when he opens it again to show it to the other man, the time box has, impossibly, been filled in. (00:43:30)

Jean G

Doomsday - S3-E17

Continuity mistake: During Phelps' mission briefing, the amount of tape on the left-hand reel, which should be diminishing as the assignment is read to him, increases instead. (00:01:45)

Jean G

Nicole - S3-E22

Continuity mistake: The shots of the tape recorder giving Phelps his assignment don't match. Each time the camera angle changes, the tape reels are spinning at different speeds and in opposite directions.

Jean G

Voice on Tape: Good morning Mister Phelps.

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The Psychic - S1-E28

Trivia: Watch the drive-in theater marquis when Briggs drives in to pick up his assignment. It reads "Geller and Solow / Spend the Money" - an in-joke reference to producer Bruce Geller and Desilu executive Herb Solow.

Jean G

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Show generally

Question: At the start of each episode of Mission Impossible Briggs or Phelps received details of the mission from a tape recording that was 'hidden in plain sight', say a telephone booth displaying a poster saying 'Telephone Out Of Order. Do Not Use'. So, what would happen if somebody went into the kiosk before Briggs or Phelps, picked up the telephone and got the secret message ahead of the Mission Impossible team?

Rob Halliday

Answer: We don't know what would happen because the show never addressed this issue. Any answer would be speculation. This is a TV show, and the plot is structured so that only IMF team will retrieve the secret message.

raywest

Answer: This is not really a serious question. When I posted this question I was fully aware that Mission Impossible is only a television programme. Like many espionage thrillers (Man From Uncle, The Avengers, James Bond) it is meant to entertain, it is never meant to be taken literally seriously. It was essential to the story that Briggs or Phelps received a secret message, which would give them a mission to accomplish. If they did not receive the message you would not have had the story. When I used to watch Mission Impossible it just used to amuse me to wonder what might have happened had somebody picked up the phone containing the secret message ahead of Briggs or Phelps. I even considered writing to a comedian and suggesting that they devise a comedy sketch in which this happened. My question was only meant to be a joke, that I posted to amuse people.

Rob Halliday

The Lucy Show or Here's Lucy did an episode of exactly this scenario.

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