15 Inconsistencies in Sci-Fi Shows to Cheerfully Point Out If You Ever Need to Demonstrate You Have Wasted the Precious Gift of Life
Everyone likes a bit of sci-fi. It’s good TV, all goofy shots of miniature spaceships and alien species that are all around 5-foot-9 and pretty much look like normal hot people other than their mildly unusual foreheads. Sci-fi shows are a big important chunk of what TV does — the entire entertainment landscape would be a far duller place without warp speed and the truth being out there.
A lot of these shows take a little while to find their feet, though, which can lead to some frankly unforgivable inconsistencies, often in the earliest episodes before the canon of the show is firmly established and the cast and crew have got into the rhythm of things properly.
While obviously the grown-up, mature thing to do when rewatching a show and confronted by something like this is to accept that it is an inevitable part of the creative process, the other thing you can do is stick your foot through your TV, complain massively on the internet and send letters to the studios involved saying your childhood is ruined.
Click right here to get the best of Cracked sent to your inbox.
‘Battlestar Galactica’: Gods Damn It
In the Battlestar Galactica pilot several characters say “oh my god,” which is of course ridiculous because as everyone knows, the world of BSG is polytheistic.
‘Babylon 5’: Enough to Make You Feel Cycle-Pathic
The first-season Babylon 5 episode “Grail” mentions “cycles” as a unit of time, the only occasion such a unit is ever mentioned GODDAMN IT DO YOU EVEN WANT US TO BELIEVE THIS
‘Star Trek’: It’s Dead Inconsistent, Jim
In the first few episodes of Star Trek: The Original Series, the Enterprise is said to run on lithium crystals. Lithium. Not dilithium, as even the stupidest of idiots knows it runs on. Pathetic effort, Roddenberry.
‘Blake’s 7’: Gun Fever, Still Hot
A scene in the Liberator’s armory in the first season of Blake’s 7 sets up the idea that anyone taking a second gun will find it red-hot to the touch, something which never comes up again. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’: What a Boner, You Ashholes
From the third season of Buffy onwards, when vampires turn to ash, their skeletons are briefly seen. But none of the vampires staked in Seasons One and Two had skeletons. Hope someone got fired for that blunder!
‘The Next Generation’: Can’t Shan’t Won’t
The Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “Datalore” establishes that Data cannot use contractions (i.e., can’t, won’t, didn’t). But he used them a bunch before then. It really makes it hard to take the 24th-century space robot adventures seriously.
‘Charmed’: Absolute Lunar-cy
The Charmed pilot makes the Three Essentials of Magic clear — timing, feeling and the phases of the moon. The phases of the moon at no subsequent point have any bearing on any of the magic in the show. Assholes!
‘Doctor Who’: Two Farts, More Like
The Doctor in Doctor Who has his pulse taken in both the first and second seasons, and only has one heart, despite it being canon that he has two. What the goddamned HELL is wrong with people, JESUS CHRIST
‘Deep Space Nine’: Not Trill-iant
The Trill — an alien species featured on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine — are referred to with the same word for both singular and plural. Why, then, are there early references to “Trills” and even “the Trillian government”? What a shitshow.
‘Farscape’: Fartscape, More Like
The Farscape character Chiana flip-flops between accents in the first few episodes. Farscape is set in deep space, but she alternates between being from the Australian part of deep space and the American one. Nonsense, absolute bastards.
‘Stargate SG-1’: Not Star Great, SG No Fun
In early Stargate SG-1 episodes it is unambiguously explained that the zat’nik’tel alien weapon disintegrates anything that gets shot with it three times. Does that remain consistent throughout the show? DOES IT FUCK
‘Voyager’: Tuvok? More Like You Cock, You’re Wearing the Wrong Clothes
In the pilot episode of Star Trek: Voyager, Tuvok is a Lieutenant. We all know that. Everyone knows that. Why, then, is he wearing the uniform of a Lieutenant Commander?
‘The Walking Dead’: Dead Inconsistent
Does anyone who dies in the world of The Walking Dead return as a walker? Not in the Season Two premiere “What Lies Ahead”, which is such a vast inconsistency that viewers should be allowed to invoice Andrew Lincoln.
‘The X-Files’: The Truth About Furniture Is Out There
Does Special Agent Scully have a desk? She certainly does in the first season’s “E.B.E.,” yet by the fourth season’s “Never Again” she complains she doesn’t have one. Sounds like the show needed fewer ideas and more IKEAs.
‘Enterprise’: More Like Ain’t Surprised to Find Such Dumb Mistakes
In the pilot “Brown Bow,” the ship deploys a pulse weapon against the Suliban. It’s never seen again. Are we supposed to believe they chose to forego their pulse blaster in favor of the phase cannon and spatial torpedoes? Bullshit!