| An Unearthly Child: |
 | pilot - |
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As Barbara and Ian enter the classroom to offer Susan a lift home, Barbara's shoe gets stuck in the door, and she struggles for quite a while to free it. |
 | pilot - |
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While Ian and Barbara are driving in the car, a stagehand can be seen moving behind them. |
 | pilot - |
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Carole Ann Ford flubs a line when talking about "John Smith and the Common Men". She says that they have gone from "2 to 19" when she corrects herself and says "19 to 2 on the hit parade". |
 | pilot - |
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After Ian and Barbara enter the TARDIS, you can see a shadow moving along the TARDIS doors. |
 | pilot - |
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The TARDIS doors won't shut. |
 | pilot - |
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During a tracking shot of the TARDIS, the cameraman stumbles and a clatter is heard. |
 | pilot - |
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You can hear the PA calling the shots on some sections if you listen carefully (one example is when the Doctor is operating the TARDIS console, shortly before Ian is "zapped"). |
 | ep 1 - |
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When Ian and Barbara enter the TARDIS for the first time, Susan operates the door switch. Later on, when the Doctor electrocutes Ian, he uses the exact same switch! |
 | ep 1? - |
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While Ian and the Doctor are examining the clock in the TARDIS, both of them manage to interrupt each other. |
 | ep 1? - |
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Ian claims that the Doctor closed the TARDIS doors, though in fact it was Susan. |
 | ep 3 - |
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There's some delightful running on the spot with scrolling background as the TARDIS crew are escaping through the forest. |
 | ep ? - |
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At one point, a stagehand can be seen through a gap in one of the corners of the TARDIS (it's quite a big gap too, maybe 10-20 centimetres). |
| The Web Planet: |
 | ep 1-6 - |
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The backdrops in this story cause a great deal of credibility problems -- barely an episode goes by without a character walking past a "mountain range" and casting a shadow on it! (One example is in episode 2, when the Doctor and Ian walk past the mountains just after the Menoptera destroy Barbara's gold bracelet.) |
 | ep 1 - |
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Hartnell loses his lines and ruins an entire scene. After Ian's line, "How do we open the doors? We have no power?", the pain begins. The Doctor is supposed to explain the presence and purpose of an item he is holding, but he can't get his lines out. In fact, he appears to have forgotten the entire purpose of the scene. Ian has to look three times at the small object -- during the eternity of horrible and irrelevant improvisation -- before Hartnell spits out inexplicably: "This is not merely a decorative object". He then goes on to finish the scene as if it had all made perfect sense: a real trooper. |
 | ep 1 - |
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Outside the TARDIS, in the same scene where Ian's pen
vanishes, a boom mike shadow makes a brief but unmistakeable appearance on the front of Ian's coat. Look for it as he follows the Doctor off the set, a split second before he whirls around to see if he is being followed. |
 | ep 1 - |
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In the scene where Barbara goes in to see if Vicki has awakened from her aspirin-induced nap, she sits down in front of a very reflective wall (you can see her reflection at the end of the scene, when she gets up abruptly and leaves the room). The blooper comes soon after she first sits down, however: you can see a spotlight being moved in to shine on her, but it also reflects into the camera. In the next shot of Barbara it has been moved. |
 | ep 1 - |
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At the episode's climax, Hartnell returns to find the TARDIS missing, and has the line, "My TARDIS". It was dubbed over for some reason, and incredibly badly. His lips move almost a full second before any sound is heard. |
 | ep 2 - |
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In the scene immediately after the Menoptera destroy Barbara's gold bracelet, the Doctor and Ian walk onto the set. Some mountain ranges ring the background, but when Hartnell walks on, he casts his shadow on them -- making it all too obvious that they are four inches high and right next to him! |
 | ep 2 - |
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In the scene right after Vicki leaves the TARDIS and encounters the Zarbi, the Doctor and Ian are still being taken somewhere by their own group of ant creatures. They enter the set from directly in front of the camera, walking away from it with their backs to the lens. Look for another great shadow on Ian's coat just as they move away: the camera and the cameraman's head! |
 | ep 3 - |
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When Ian is running away from the Zarbi, there is a scene where two bloopers happen in rapid succession. First, a Menoptera flies down to land behind him and follow him; the rope on which he was lowered shows brightly against the black background. A half-second later, the "Larvae gun" (that short little Zarbi-owned monster that looks like it was constructed out of spare parts for a car-wash) is dragged onto the scene; the rope used to pull it can be seen on the floor. |
 | ep 3 - |
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A Zarbi is scuttling about when it manages to run straight into the camera with a loud CLUNK. The camera shakes for a second or two after that (and wouldn't you if you'd just been clunked by a Zarbi?) |
 | ep 4 - |
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At the episode's climax, the Menoptera spearhead flies in to do battle with the Zarbi. And there's not a single one of them without a hugely visible rope dangling them from the ceiling. |
 | ep 6 - |
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Just as the episode begins, the Animus dome descends to speak with the Doctor. "You attempted escape?", it asks. Says Hartnell: "We have been on a slight ... exploitation." Lines, lines, lines. It appears very possible that he misread his cue card because of the hazy plastic shield through which he was looking at the time. |
 | ep 6 - |
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At the end of that first scene, the Doctor and Vicki are led off, ostensibly to "the centre"; Hartnell is groaning and clutching his face. The camera cuts to Barbara, who is supposed to be on the other side of the planet -- yet we still hear Hartnell groaning pretty loudly! Obviously he didn't realise that his scene was over, and that the camera was long off him. Poor Jacqueline Hill just has to ignore him, and keep a straight face while saying, "The Doctor will have reached the control section by now". |
 | ep 6 - |
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The string from which the Animus itself is suspended is clearly visible in almost every scene. |
 | ep 6? - |
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Watch the mountains closely, and in some scenes you can see the wooden supports holding them up. |
 | ep 6 - |
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Just after the Animus is destroyed, a group of Zarbi proceeds to dig out water from the planet surface, and some Menoptera come over to join them. The weight of all the actors makes the wooden stage creak fearfully for a good long while. This is far from the dusty planet surface the designers were trying to create. |
 | ep 6 - |
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When the TARDIS finally takes off (thank God!), we see a side view of it. One of the window panels is broken and is leaning inward ridiculously. |
| The Chase: |
 | ep 1 - |
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As the Doctor, Ian, Barbara, and Vicki are watching the Time-Space Visualiser, Ian is seen singing along to the Beatles' "Ticket to Ride". What's amazing is that he knows the words, despite coming from Earth in 1963 (two years before the song was released). |
 | ep 1 - |
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Note that when Barbara goes back to the TARDIS to turn off the Visualiser, she walks on to the set where the Visualiser is from the wrong direction! She should have entered from the door on the left (where they all walked off when the Doctor announced "We're about to materialise!"), but instead she just walks on from nowhere. Not only that, but she yells from where she walked on to the Doctor to come quickly, which is followed by him entering from the same nowhere that she did! |
 | ep 1 - |
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When Ian yells "Hello!", his echo doesn't match. |
 | ep 1 - |
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When Vicki leaves in a huff, she leaves a screwdriver on the Time-Space Visualiser. It promptly falls off with a loud clatter that William Hartnell reacts to by groaning. |
 | ep 2 - |
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Look closely at the back of the Aridian's heads, as you can almost always see the actor's hair sticking out from under the mask. |
 | ep 2 - |
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When the Doc and co. are on Aridius, in the background you can see the sand dunes stretching off into the far distance, but when they walked across the screen they cast shadows on the dunes - rather giving away the fact that they were just cardboard cut-outs. |
 | ep 2 - |
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When the Doctor, and Barbara are being held by the Aridians, Vicki comes to find them. When she is rushing to meet them, she knocks an Aridian over. Keep your eye on him. After a few seconds, he gets up, looks confused for a second and then looks at someone behind the camera. He then "sneaks" off the set. |
 | ep 2 - |
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Why is it that the Daleks could get close enough to obtain a very clear picture of the Marie Celeste, but still were x minutes away? And besides, how can you have a "10 minute lead" in the Space/Time continuum? |
 | ep 2,4 - |
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The Doctor appears to leave his coat on Aridius, though he somehow has it back by the time they reach Mechanus. |
 | ep 2? - |
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The tour guide with the extremely fake Noo Yawk accent obviously failed Physics 101. If it really took 30 seconds to reach the ground if you jumped off the Empire State building, it would be over 4,000 metres tall! In fact, Manhattan's best-known landmark is 443 metres tall, and leaping from the top will turn you into sidewalk pizza in less than 10 seconds. |
 | ep 3 - |
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Watch out for the motionless and rather knackered-looking Daleks standing on either side of the ramp into the Dalek ship. These are actually 2 ex-movie Daleks which were returned to the BBC to be used in the show, but there wasn't enough time to replace the movie style large base and jam-jar dome lights... So these bits were simply removed in the hope no-one would notice. [This info comes from the instruction sheet for the Sevans Models Dalek kit.] |
 | ep 3 - |
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Just after the Doc & Co. escape from Aridius (when Barbara says that he wasn't bursting with enthusiasm), a boom shadow moves across the Time Rotor (or whatever you call that gadget thingy). |
 | ep 3 - |
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Just after the previous blooper, Ian, Barbara and Vicki all gather around the Doctor. Vicki puts her hands deep in her pockets and starts to wiggle her legs, move her hands (in the pockets) and shake her hips. Judging by the desperate (but hilarious) facial expressions (a silly embarrassed grin with a wide urgent look in her eyes), she had a need to visit the Ladies room... |
 | ep 3 - |
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This may or may not be a blooper: in one of the scenes in the TARDIS, Vicki starts pointing out that "Doctor! The rotor is slowing down!". To which he responds, "No, but I'm not ready!". The blooper is (I think) that Vicki seems to be pointing at those two strobe light circular thingies on the console, when the rotor (at least I thought it was) is in the central column. If the rotor is those two strobe thingies, then the blooper is the fact that from that point in the story on, whenever you see the TARDIS console (when the TARDIS is in flight), you never see those strobe things active. Someone either forgot to turn on the strobe things, or Maureen O'Brien doesn't know where to point... |
 | ep 4 - |
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Before the TARDIS materialises in the Haunted House, you hear the Dalek Time Machine materialisation sound for no reason whatsoever. Then you hear and see the TARDIS materialise. |
 | ep 4 - |
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As the TARDIS materialises in the haunted house, note the shadow of the person on the TARDIS door who quickly runs away when it has fully materialised. |
 | ep 4 - |
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The Doctor and Ian enter Frankenstein's lab in the haunted house. They see the Monster lying unanimated on a table. Behind the table is a large ventilation screen. Behind this screen is an empty Dalek - note that at this point in the story, the Daleks weren't supposed to have arrived yet. A later scene in this same room shows that Dalek in action, "exterminating" the Monster. |
 | ep 4 - |
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Listen for when William Hartnell says: "I say, I think we'd better go and check where Vicki and Barbara is!". It's shortly after he and Ian enter the haunted house. |
 | ep 4 - |
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When the Doctor and Ian escape from Frankenstein's monster and the monster lies down on its couch again, we hear Vicki's next line "What's that in aid of?" a few seconds before she actually says it in the next scene. (Apparently, Maureen O'Brien jumped her cue and said the line before the camera was actually on her.) |
 | ep 4 - |
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Immediately after the previous blooper, Barbara's next line, the quote about "Ask not for whom the bell tolls..." seems to suggest that we should have just heard a spooky-sounding bell go off about then. So where did it vanish to? |
 | ep 4 - |
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There's a clearly visible boom mike and operator standing in the shadows as Ian and the Doctor come down the stairs of the haunted house for the last time. |
 | ep 4 - |
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Frankenstein's Monster is credited as just "Frankenstein". |
 | ep 4 - |
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When the Daleks establish that the Doctor & co. are approaching the planet Mechanus, we see a rectangular screen in their time machine with a series of three-digit numbers underneath the main monitor, supposedly part of the machine. But when a Dalek moves in front of the screen, the numbers are partially superimposed on the Dalek! |
 | ep 4,5 - |
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The actor playing the Doctor's robot double (supposedly "indistinguishable from the original") looks so completely unlike William Hartnell it's not funny. |
 | ep 5? - |
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There's also a shot of the jungle on Mechanus where you can see a Dalek in the background before they're supposed to have arrived. |
 | ep 5 - |
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Watch the scene where Vicki finds the TARDIS for the first time (on Mechanus). Afterwards, you can see a boom in the background. And if you keep looking at the background you can see the operator's hand pick something up off the ground. |
 | ep 5 - |
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When Ian and the Doctor are carrying Vicki back to the cave, in the background is the Dalek ship, right outside the cave (instead of half-way across the jungle) - and they don't even notice it! |
 | ep 5 - |
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When the Daleks are massing to attack our heroes, they pass by the entrance to their cave and continue half-way across the jungle to the entrance again! |
 | ep 5 - |
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In one scene in the jungle on Mechanus, a BBC camera cruises through the background - you can see a large white '3' painted on its side. |
 | ep 6 - |
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As the Doctor and Ian come back down from the roof of the city, Steven walks over to talk to them. The camera "dramatically" follows Steven around the set until a certain point where the camera suddenly jerks, we hear a soft "thunk" and then a "oooh!" from the cameraman! Stubbed his toe, methinks. |
 | ep 6 - |
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There's a moment when the Doctor and co. have been first captured by the Mechanoids that the camera is jostled very obviously. |
 | ep 6 - |
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When the door to Steven's "cell" drops, it bounces a few times before it closes for good. |
 | ep 6? - |
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When asked to estimate the distance from the Mechanoid city roof to the ground (over 1500 feet as it turns out) Steven's first guess is a piddling 15 feet! |
 | ep 6 - |
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The rope that is supposed to be lowering everyone down almost a quarter of a mile is quite slack! |
 | ep 6 - |
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When Ian and Barbara are starting to climb down from the Mechanoid city roof, Barbara slips and falls head-first off the roof. Ian saves her... by grabbing her pants! He clings onto her belt for dear life and almost manages to pull her trousers off in the process of rescuing her. |
 | ep ? - |
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In one scene where the Daleks are entering their time machine, you can see one lifting itself up to get over the lip at the entrance. |
 | ep ? - |
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There's a scene where a Dalek is moving along on some sand, and you can see that it leaves footprints in the sand after it! |
 | ep ? - |
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In one scene in the Dalek craft, you can see someone running across the bottom right hand corner of the screen - quickly, but noticeably. |
 | ep 1-6 - |
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Then there's the entire interior design of the Dalek spacecraft, the bad dubs on the Robot Doctor, Barbara suddenly running over to that crumbling wall on Aridius just so that the Mire Beast can grab her, the visible wires on the bats, the misplaced sound effects, William Hartnell's ubiquitous messing up of his lines, the Visualiser that has names of Sol planets written on it although it's supposed to be able to tune anywhere, the bad accents in the Empire State Building -- I could go on forever... |