Despite being a 96-year-old woman, Her Majesty the Queen’s death took many by surprise. She had been a monarch longer than many people have been alive and it’s hard to imagine the future of the British monarchy without her, regardless of what you think of the institution itself.
For Netflix, it’s apparently difficult to move on into a world without Queen Elizabeth II, as revealed in a subtitling faux pas in its new series, Kaleidoscope. The heist drama has a stacked cast, including The Mandalorian and Breaking Bad‘s Giancarlo Esposito and You‘s Tati Gabrielle. Each episode is named after a color and the show is unusual in that the episodes can be watched in any order, so long as you start with “Black” and end with “White”.
In “Yellow”, the royal family is referenced, with one actor: “Word is the King’s got her on speed dial.” While Netflix managed to change the voiceover to reflect the new head of the royal family, the subtitles were slower on the uptake, reading: “Word is the Queen’s got her on speed dial.”
It’s a relatively straightforward change to make in post-production, especially as it’s just a one-word change. As a Brit, it’s also jarring to hear the word ‘King’ thrown around now, having had a Queen my whole life. The first time I heard people sing ‘God save the King’, it threw me off massively.
Seeing as the show premiered on New Year’s Day, Netflix would have needed to do a rapid post-production edit in the three months or so since the Queen’s death. It’s understandable that a subtitle would have got missed—but doesn’t make it any less funny to see it play out.
Regardless of the blunder, Kaleidoscope is well worth a watch for the talented cast alone, following a group pulling off a $7 billion heist. All episodes are streaming now on Netflix.
(featured image: Netflix)
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