Continuity Errors

Opening title caption used in 2011.

Home And Away is one of the longest serving Australian TV serials and is the second longers running drama serial in Australia after its Melbourne based arch rival Neighbours.

As of December 2017, H&A has clocked up 6800 episodes since January 1988. Over those 30 years and with that many episodes, the show will have a number of continuity errors. With a long running drama serial there will always be confusion over characters ages and birthdays, and also backhistory. This is due to different writers or even deliberate to suit new plots.

Also in such shows, there is errors such as bad editing, a bowl full of cornflakes, then half empty, then full again in the next shot.

Home And Away has never had an archivist, a series historian who reminds scriptwriters of backhistory and birthdays and there has been a few hundred scriptwriters over the shows 30 years history so often the writers just go on memory or make up their own backhistory which can contradict other writers versions of the history.

Although the writers of the show do not rewrite history as much as Neighbours does. They tend to be more accurate when referring to past storylines and backhistories. UK soaps Emmerdale, Coronation Street and EastEnders also take this approach, usually.

Here is a list of continuity errors and I have even tried to make sense of a few, ie, two sides to very story. Enjoy, as Irene would say.

Continuity errors

• In January 1988, Celia Stewart said that Roo was her only niece as Roo was Celia's brother Alf's daughter. The true paternity of Bobby was not yet know but in 1989, Celia and Alf's sister Barbara had a teenage daughter Rebecca.
• In Episode 59 (7 April 1988), Alf Stewart says he is 45 years old, meaning he was born inbetween April 1942 and April 1943, and in a 1993 episode, when Shane Parrish was looking through police records for his work experience, Alf's DOB on his drink driving record was said to be 16 January 1943, which ties in with his 1988 age, but in Ep 4000 (8 Jul 2005), he has his 60th birthday, so born 8th July 1945, making him only 42 in April 1988. Also in 1988 he said he graduated from high school in 1958 later revising it to 1963.
• In 1988 Ailsa Stewart said she went to prison aged 18 and did 3 years and if you go by her 50th birthday in 2000, she was born in 1950 so she went to prison in about 1968 or 1969. Yet in 2000 she says she was raped while in prison and she said "That was 20 years ago". If she only did 3 years she would have been released in about 1972/1973. The worlds longest 3 and a half years lol.
• Tom Fletcher and Pippa Fletcher's year of marriage varies inbetween 1969, 1973 and 1975.
• Sally Fletcher's birthday was originally July 1979 but she later celebrated a birthday in February.
• Colleen Smart said she was a Capricorn in 1988 but in 2002 she had a birthday in May. She did act like she was royalty so maybe she had 2 birthdays.
• Alf Stewart's dad Gordon Stewart was still alive in 1988 and this was mentioned a few times that year, but in 2003 he was said to have died 16 years ago, putting a 1987 year of death for Gordon.
• Donald Fisher said he was an only child in 2001, despite his brother Clive Fisher being mentioned in 1988 and his sister Mary Croft appearing in 1992 and 1993. (Although Clive and Mary may have been step siblings)
• In 1989, Ailsa said Duncan Stewart was her first child, she was amazed she was a first time mother at almost 40 but in 1999, a long lost daughter Shauna Bradley, born about 1979, turned up. (Maybe Ailsa was lying about the fact she had a baby before, and due to the circumstances, did not want her dirty linen aired in public so left it at that).