The Weird Gossip Girl Mistake That Has TikTok In Absolute Meltdown
In the television show "Gossip Girl," the character of "Gossip Girl" sees everything that goes down in the high society circles of New York's Upper East Side. But when it came to making the CW's beloved drama, it would appear production may have overlooked a few key details. An eagle-eyed TikTok user named @janicesworld spotted a production whoops in "Gossip Girl" Season 5, Episode 3, entitled "The Jewel of Denial." At the Jenny Packham fashion show, one of the extras in attendance is only wearing one shoe. Was this an eccentric fashion choice or an on-set mistake? That's one secret the show's production staff will never tell.
@janicesworld The editors did not give af 😭 #gossipgirlhere #blairwaldorf #gossipgirltiktok #gossipgirledit #xoxogossipgirl
As far as notable TV bloopers are concerned, the "Gossip Girl" shoe scandal hasn't generated quite the same uproar as the rogue coffee cup spotted in the last season of "Game of Thrones." Still, Janice's post has collected over half a million likes and thousands of comments and shares. In her original post, which went up on September 1, 2023, Janice wrote, "The editors did not give af." But a separate TikTok posted by a professional editor suggests that the blame for the faux pas may lie elsewhere.
Shoe done it? An editor weighs in
The day after @janicesworld posted about the "Gossip Girl" shoe blooper, another TikTok user named @womeninfilm stitched her video and pushed back on the idea that the show's editors were responsible. In the follow-up video, @womeninfilm argued that editors spend hours looking at the footage they're assigned to edit and would never have missed a mistake like this. Instead, she said the blame lies not with the post-production staff, but with the producers and directors who approved the cut.
She explained, "I notice everything, everything. And I will say, 'Hey, I don't think we have the shot.' Or, 'Hey, this shot has something weird in it.' And without fail, I will hear 'The audience won't notice. The audience won't know.'"
@Womeninfilm went on to say that seasoned editors are trained to zoom in on everything and think about every detail when working. She says she knows that the mistakes the producers and directors make are going to be noticed and called out by audiences.
Placing the blame where it belongs
At least as far as this particular error is concerned, it's worth noting that the "Gossip Girl" producers couldn't have foreseen the way social media would develop into a monster that can make a minor misstep into a mainstream story.
When "Gossip Girl" premiered on the CW on September 19, 2007, Twitter had only launched a year prior. When the show's finale aired on December 17, 2012, Instagram had only been active for two years, and TikTok wouldn't become popular in the United States for another five. TV executives could never have predicted the ways that social sites would allow audiences to capture and share these mistakes, nor how streaming platforms like Max — where all six seasons of "Gossip Girl" are currently available to binge — would allow viewers to revisit these moments at their convenience.
Still, there's a reason why producers, showrunners, directors, and executives get paid the big bucks — and the downside of those financial rewards is that the buck stops with them. So as @womeninfilm argued, when you see mistakes like these, don't blame the editors: blame the people in charge.