Just replayed Ep1 Season 1, timeline discrepancies
How long was Lee unconscious in the back of that police cruiser? I was under the impression that he was out overnight. They crashed in full daylight, then there's a sequence where Lee is fading in and out of consciousness, which one of his fade ins is in partial light which I took to mean dusk, then he wakes up in full daylight again, so I presume he was out overnight.
Then we get to Clem's house and the messages on the machine seem to back that up. The first is left at 5:43 pm. The next is left at 11:19 pm. The last message is left at 6:51 am. That seems to back up the fact that Lee was unconscious all evening and night and woke up some time in the morning.
Then, that same day, we get to Hershel's farm and the next morning Katjaa talks about the things they had seen over the last 3 days. Her definition of 3 days is questionable, but if we count day 1 as the day of the crash, which seems reasonable, day 2 being the day we met Clem and got to the farm, then she must be counting day 3 as that morning we met her, Kenny, and Duck. However if she's not including that morning then Lee was unconscious for over a at least 36 hours.
That same day that we speak to Katjaa on Hershel's farm, we all leave for Macon, which would be a few hours away, so we arrive that same day. In the Pharmacy, talking with Kenny and Katjaa, Kenny asks if Lee told him Clem had spent days surviving on her own, which Lee confirmed. So wait. Days? How long WAS Lee out for? Additionally, in the pharmacy, Lee can inspect a news paper and notes that it's a week old, which indicates that he spent near a week in that police cruiser, unconscious. It would explain how everything got so fucked up so fast. It seemed like overnight, but it was actually several days.
So the discrepancies here is that Katjaa reports it as 3 days since all hell broke loose whereas everything else points to it having been 6 or 7 days. Anyone else notice this?
Comments
I think the apocalypse was already going on when Lee was going to the prison, meanwhile Clem was surviving on her own (Hence the "She survived days on her own").
I think he was unconscious for a few hours, he wakes up in the afternoon, gets to Clem's house then they get at Hershel's at night.
Katja mentioning "The past 3 days" might mean what I said earlier: The apocalypse was already going on but not at such a large scale to be noticed by everybody, some areas were more affected than others.
The only stretch I always had a hard time figuring out is how after only a few hours there were walkers everywhere. So Lee's going to prison, meanwhile you can hear some police codes about "Animal bites" or something like that and there are police cars and helicopters going the other way so yeah the apocalypse is started, things are getting out of control, the car crashes, Lee's unconscious for a few hours and everything's gone to hell, walkers everywhere, people shooting guns. Yeah you could say that it's spreading really fast but it's still a bit of a stretch.
Lee was definitely out at least one full night. Go watch any lets play on it if you need to verify but during the bit where he's fading in and out of consciousness right after the crash, it gets noticeably darker during one of his fuzzy waking moments then he wakes up and it's full daylight again. Unless there was a total solar eclipse he must have been unconscious for at least a single night. But then the day after Lee wakes up you get to the Pharmacy in Macon and the last newspaper is a week old, meaning it had been a week since the outbreak really took off. (Lee wakes up, meets Clem, and gets to Hershel's farm all on the same day. The next morning, Shawn dies and Lee, Kenny, Katjaa, and the kids leave for Macon, which wouldn't be more than a few hours away since it's less than 2 hours from Atlanta to Macon under normal circumstances). That means Lee must have spent near a week in the back of that cruiser unconscious. So perhaps it's that Katjaa, Kenny, and Duck were in an area where it took a few days for the dead to really take over. It had been a week since things started in the Atlanta area but where they were, in Tennessee, it wasn't as bad for the first few days.
This is no where near as bad as ANF's timeline issues. Episode 4 has the Kenny and Jane flashbacks, once they end Kenny's says 1 month later, and Jane's says 13 months later. The first issue is that ANF takes place about 2 years after S2, and seeing Jane's flashbacks are just a few days after season 2, the jump would have to be way longer than 13 months. The next big time issue is that after Kenny's flashback is says 1 month later. The issue with this is that means within 1 month Kenny dies, Clem is now on her own and meets Ava, Clem joins ANF and stays long enough to be branded, then gets kicked out of ANF, is then living by herself again, and then visited by Ava for news about Aj and told she should go to Prescott where she meets Javi on the road. Apparently this all happened in a month despite Clem seemingly been part of the new frontier for a while, not to mention her knowing Richmond use to be run by good people but thats never shown? Plus the flashback in episode 3 shows an early new frontier instead of the giant group that apparently has been running Richmond for a while now. If we want to talk time issues, this is the most glaring time issue in walking dead.
But to answer your question, the outbreak easily could have began a few days earlier. For example in the 400 days DLC we see that Walker at the Gas Station attacking Duck and Kenny gets him out of there. This was probably their first experience and they kept seeing more and more, explaining how they said theyve seen things these past few days. The day before Lee's crash was when the outbreak truly began, and this day is when Clems parents are on the phone, calling during that afternoon, that night when things began to get bad. The last phone call is the same day as the crash at around 7 AM, and this is the day the outbreak begins to truly break out. Lee is in the police car early morning, just like the phone call, the car crashes, hes knocked out until around sunset the same day. Meaning it has now been about 2 days, the next day comes and Kenny wakes us up and talks about the last 3 days, while this is now day 3. So no, there isnt a giant time issue with Season 1.
Edit: I saw you mentioned a news paper in season one episode 1. Do you have a picture of it? Im trying to find it online but cant
It's nothing you see. It's a comment Lee makes about one of the papers in the drug store, one that it seems like was for sale. If you look at it, Lee mentions it's a week old.
Do you have a link to a video of someone who examines it? I was trying to find a video and the only one I found was one that says "news paper clippings" but they didnt examine it, just hovered over.
Edit: Never mind, just found it. Its just 2 news papers on a counter with no sign that they are for sale, easily could just be an old newspaper that was being read, it shows no signs that it was the last one before the break out started.
The car crash was NOT on day 1. It was on day 2.
My reference for this is 400 Days where Vince's story takes place on day 2. As we can see, on day 2 there was still a sense of society and most people didn't know exactly what was happening yet. There was still traffic, people still performing their jobs, etc.
This places Lee's car crash on day 2 as well because the chaos is finally starting to hit. People were still doing their jobs, but like iin Vince's story the exponential growth of walkers finally got too much and society truly began collapsing.
So yes, this is my rant about the common misconception that s1e1 starts on day 1, when it in fact starts on day 2.
They're in a stack, on the counter. Being for sale is the only reasonable conclusion. Who reads old new papers? Who reads two old news papers and places them in a neat stack on a counter as if they were for sale?
Only 2 news papers just laying on a counter with no sign they are for sale on the side of a counter. Its a family own pharmacy, Lee's dad or someone was probably just reading a news paper and left it there. Not to mention say that this news paper is from the very last news paper ever. It would have been about 4 days now (also assuming this paper is probably from the day before the outbreak so 5 days), unless you always talk extremely specifically you'd probably call a 4/5 day news paper "a week old" instead of "this paper is exactly 5 days old!"
You're really stretching on trying to prove Lee was out in that cop car for over a day.