History AnachronismStew / Archer

* In "Papal Chase", Cheryl mentions Bishop, the android from ''Film/{{Aliens}}'', which came out in 1986.

* This mention of a comedian:

* In "Bloody Ferlin", Archer mentions that whoever is in the armory could be "building a Franchise/{{Gundam}} suit with bazookas for hands." The [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam first Gundam series]] was created in 1979, but the franchise's American debut was with [[Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing]] in 2000.

* The Soviet soldiers in "White Nights" use (actual) AK-47s, with milled receivers. The AK-47 was replaced by the AKM, which has a cheaper stamped receiver around 1959, which was in turn replaced by the 5.45x39mm AK-74 beginning in 1974, though it wasn't in full service until the the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1980.

* In "Palace Intrigue", Lana asks Archer if he's ever seen ''Film/TheThomasCrownAffair''. Based on the context (the high value of fine art), it is clear she means the 1999 remake with Creator/PierceBrosnan (about art theft) and not the 1968 original with Creator/SteveMcQueenActor (about a bank robbery), though confusingly Lana implies that [=McQueen=] starred in the remake, or that the original was about art theft, not a bank robbery.

* In "Arrival/Departure", when Mallory is describing what's gonna happen now that the San Marcos government has officially collapsed, she claims she's "Witnessed coups from Angola to Zanzibar". The Angolan civil war started in 1967 and ended in 2002 while the Zanzibar revolution happened in 1978.

* in Arrival/Departure, when Mallory is describing what's gonna happen now that the San Marcos government has officially collapsed, she claims she's "Witnessed coups from Angola to Zanzibar". The Angolan civil war started in 1967 and ended in 2002 while the Zanzibar revolution happened in 1978.

* The season premiere of Dreamland gives a rare concrete date, namely Woodhouse's birth year and a possible current date. June 28th, 1894. Putting him in his mid 20's during the war. And though the last two numbers are blocked, his date of death is a 19XX.

* The season premiere of Dreamland gives a rare concrete date, namely Woodhouse's birth year and a possible current date. June 28th, 1894. Putting him in his mid 20's during the war. And though the last two numbers are blocked, his date of death is a 1900.

'''Archer''': I, uh-- yeah, exactly. ''[[BellisariosMaxim Good question.]]''

* In "Holdout," the cargo plane Archer drops from is a C-47/DC-3, which is still used in certain regions, but has the D-Day black-and-white friendly aircraft identifying stripes. This paint scheme would have long since been replaced in post-war years, especially given its use by a (real) CIA front used for agent delivery.

* In "The Wind Cries Mary," Archer uses a USB flash drive, which was invented in [[TheNineties 1999]].
* Practically all airliners seen in the series are Boeing [=707s=]. While the 707 was still in widespread passenger service as recently as the [[TheEighties early to mid Eighties]], the overwhelming predominance of [=707s=] heavily suggests TheSixties or [[TheSeventies early Seventies]]. In particular, "Pipeline Fever" shows a 707 (or possibly the 720 short-haul version) on a New York-New Orleans flight where by the mid Seventies a more fuel efficient short-haul type such as a Boeing 727 or 737 or a Douglas DC-9 would have been much more likely, while "The Papal Chase" shows a 707 on a New York-Rome flight where a higher-capacity widebody such as a Boeing 747, Douglas DC-10 or Lockheed L-1011 would have been more likely by the late Seventies.

* In "Swiss Miss," Anka is seen playing a hand-held videogame of some kind, suggesting the episode takes place at least as recently as TheEighties. Of course, the same episode features (presumably) Spanish terrorists heavily implied to be Communist-aligned as the main antagonists, which strongly suggests that the episode doesn't take place any ''later'' than TheEighties.

* The primary sidearm of the Soviet Union appears to be the Tokarev TT-33. The Tokarev was phased out of service and replaced by the Makarov PM in 1952. Russian production of the Tokarev ended in 1954, though is still in service (and production) with former republics and satellite states, such as North Korea.

** Also in pipeline fever, Lana doesn't face any apparent racism when she and Archer travels to [[DeepSouth Louisiana]].

* Malory mentions Archer wanting to meet Mr. Green Jeans (from ''Series/CaptainKangaroo'') as a child while Archer mentions ''Captain Kangaroo'' by name in a video conference with the Captain-Regent of San Marino in "The Rock". ''Captain Kangaroo'' aired between 1955 and 1984.

* Police cars are 1963 Ford Galaxies but have the modern "blue on white" livery that the NYPD has used since the early '80s, license plates are the current (April 2010-on) "Empire Gold" pattern -- black band and orange NEW YORK at the top, orange background and black letters in the middle and EMPIRE STATE at the bottom.

* The RCMP officers in "The Limited" ask the passengers to have their passports ready, and Sterling is stranded in Montréal because he burnt his passport in "Midnight Ron." Passport checks on the Canada-US border were required starting in 2008. The RCMP also use Webley Mk. IV revolvers in .38 S&W. The RCMP never issued Webley Mk IV revolvers, instead using Colt New Service revolvers [[note]]chambered in .45 Colt, .45 ACP and .455 Webley, depending on the region in which it was issued[[/note]] from its formation in 1920 from a merger of the Royal North-West Mounted Police and the Dominion Police, which were replaced in the 1950s with Smith and Wesson Model 10 revolvers, which were replaced by Sig Sauer 220 and 226 and Smith and Wesson 5946 semiautomatic pistols in the late '80s.

-->'''Archer:''' Karate?? The ''Dane Cook'' of martial arts?!

* The Soviet Union still exists, but the non-Russian republics are apparently independent and Germany is reunited (at least according to the map seen in the control room in season two), although Archer mentions the Stasi in season one. This means that the show occurs in an AlternateHistory or MultipleChoicePast[[note]]Germany reunited in October 1990 but the USSR became a multi-party state ruled by a President in March of that year, with satellite republics declaring independence from March 1990 to December 1991; the Soviet Union announced its own dissolution on Christmas day 1991[[/note]]. The [[http://pics.imcdb.org/12767/archerlubyanka.jpg Lubyanka]] has its [[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/14/Moscow-Lubyanka-Building-2003.jpg symmetrical post-1983 façade]] and is still KGB headquarters, and Leningrad is (again) referred to as St. Petersburg.

* Woodhouse and his squadron mates are UsefulNotes/WorldWarI veterans, which, today, would make them at least 115 - not impossible, but extremely unlikely - but seem to be in their 70s or 80s, while Malory is a UsefulNotes/WorldWarII veteran but is in her 50s or 60s.

* In the first season, Major General Jackov has a portrait of Josef Stalin on the wall behind his desk, which would indicate Stalin was still alive and premier, while "Movie Star" revolves around an assassination attempt against the new premier. Stalin died March 5, 1953, and was succeeded as premier by Nikita Khrushchev.

''Archer'', according to WordOfGod, is deliberately an AnachronismStew because they wanted a ''Series/MadMen'' feel, but also wanted cell phones so characters wouldn't have to find a payphone to call someone. The show subsequently contains cars from the '50s to the '70s; computers from the '80s that are capable of internet access, reel-to-reel mainframes and dot-matrix printers; décor, clothing and hairstyles from the '60s; and modern cell phones, pop culture references and racial and gender treatment. As far as some fans have managed to ascertain (based off Archer's stated birth date), the time period is, at its most coherent, a very strange alternate version of TheSeventies or TheEighties.

* Archer's age in the pilot is given as 35. His birth in Nazi-occupied Tangiers, Morocco, during an OSS operation just before the US entered UsefulNotes/WorldWarII and a statement that Archer was five when Malory returned from the war indicate that he was born in 1940 and the pilot takes place in 1975. However, he's also shown as being around ten or younger while being read a telegram from Malory about Operation Ajax, conducted in 1953, and is stated to be six when Malory was part of the Guatemalan coup d'etat in 1954, changing his birthdate to 1948. He's also shown as a teenager in a setting that can't be any later than the late 1940s, which could push his birthdate as far back as 1927. This leads into MultipleChoicePast, especially considering that in some episodes, Mallory is shown raising Wee Baby Seamus in the same way she raised Archer, and in other episodes, Malory was completely absent from Archer's life from when he was a few days old to around five.

* Cyril mentions being part of a ''Franchise/{{Warhammer}}'' guild while in San Marcos [[spoiler:as dictator, and he claims that this is part of the reason why he could make such a military turnaround for the San Marcan army]]. ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer}}'' first appeared in 1983, while its more popular science-fiction counterpart ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer40000}}'' (which might come to mind more quickly when one hears the word "Warhammer") came out in 1987.

* "Space Race" has a multinational crew on a space station; the International Space Station, which launched in 1998, is the only space station to date with multinational crews. The space station itself feels like something out of a science fiction novel and is more advanced than anything currently in orbit. Archer also jokes about Cyril destroying [[Film/ANewHope Alderaan]], indicating that the show is set sometime after 1977.

** Archer meets Kintaru Sato, a Japanese [[TheRemnant holdout]] in the season six premiere, and references a ''Series/TheSixMillionDollarMan'' episode, "The Last Kamikaze", that first aired in 1975. The last confirmed holdout was found in 1974, with rumors of more persisting for the next two decades. Like Malory and Ron, this would make Sato at least 90 years old today, despite appearing 70 at the most.

* In "Honeypot", Archer briefly talks about the Comicbook/IncredibleHulk, a character created in 1962.

* Rap music is already around and popular, as evidenced by the RunningGag featuring a song called "Mulatto Butt" and several references in "Midnight Ron".

* The RCMP officers in "The Limited" ask the passengers to have their passports ready, and Sterling is stranded in Montréal because he burnt his passport in "Midnight Ron". Passport checks on the Canada-US border were required starting in 2008. The RCMP also use Webley Mk. IV revolvers in .38 S&W. The RCMP never issued Webley Mk IV revolvers, instead using Colt New Service revolvers [[note]]chambered in .45 Colt, .45 ACP and .455 Webley, depending on the region in which it was issued[[/note]] from its formation in 1920 from a merger of the Royal North-West Mounted Police and the Dominion Police, which were replaced in the 1950s with Smith and Wesson Model 10 revolvers, which were replaced by Sig Sauer 220 and 226 and Smith and Wesson 5946 semiautomatic pistols in the late '80s.

* In "Midnight Ron," the Russian tricolor flag can be seen, which contradicts the repeated references to the Soviet Union still existing and general sense of a UsefulNotes/ColdWar setting, as well as multiple appearances of the Soviet hammer and sickle flag, but is consistent with the wall maps seen elsewhere in the series showing current international boundaries, yet in the following episode, "Viscous Coupling", Katya has a Soviet hammer and sickle flag on her office wall.

* In "Pipeline Fever", the alligator attack that Archer mentions as happening "two years ago" really occurred in 1989.
** Also in pipeline fever, Lana doesn't face any appearant racism when she and Archer travels to [[DeepSouth Louisiana]].
* In "Placebo Effect", Krieger is revealed to be one of the ''Literature/TheBoysFromBrazil''. The novelization was published in 1975, and the film released in 1978, though it's possible that in-universe the book is VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory, or a work of fiction and just used as a comparison by Pam.
* In "Double Trouble", we see Manhattan from Barry's traffic-jammed cab on the Brooklyn Bridge. We do not see the World Trade Center in the skyline, placing the time period either after 2001 or before completion or near completion of WTC 1 in 1970. On the other hand, the depiction of the Brooklyn Bridge is a somewhat poor representation of the real bridge.
* In "A Going Concern", Archer uses the phrase "drill, baby, drill". This phrase became popularized after its use by Michael Steele in the 2008 Republican Convention.
* In "Palace Intrigue Part II", Cyril is called "Michael Du-cockless", referencing [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Dukakis_tank_photograph Michael Dukakis' infamous tank photograph]] taken on September 13, 1988.

* In "Holdout", the cargo plane Archer drops from is a C-47/DC-3, which is still used in certain regions, but has the D-Day black-and-white friendly aircraft identifying stripes. This paint scheme would have long since been replaced in post-war years, especially given its use by a (real) CIA front used for agent delivery.

* An app on cellphones is mentioned, called Snacklesnap, "where you take artsy photos of your food and share it with people". It's an obvious parody of Instagram and/or Pinterest (though the name also seems to reference Snapchat), both of which launched in 2010, while Snapchat launched in 2011.

* In "Blood Test", Malory reveals Woodhouse shot Creator/WilliamSBurroughs' wife in Mexico. The flashback shows him holding a Colt Python. Burroughs' wife died in 1951, but Colt introduced the Python in 1955.

* In "Legs", Krieger claims the door to his lab was built from metal from the German "pocket battleship" (later heavy cruiser) ''Admiral Graf Spee'', scuttled off Uruguay in December 1939. Salvage operations on the ''Graf Spee'' began in 2004.

** Speaking Of New Orleans,Archer and Lana don't experience any harrasment due to Lana by being black, indicating that it can also be the modern era, or close to it.

* In "Swiss Miss" Anka is seen playing a hand-held videogame of some kind, suggesting the episode takes place at least as recently as TheEighties. Of course, the same episode features (presumably) Spanish terrorists heavily implied to be Communist-aligned as the main antagonists, which strongly suggests that the episode doesn't take place any ''later'' than TheEighties.

* In the first season, Major General Jackov has a portrait of Josef Stalin on the wall behind his desk, which would indicate Stalin was still alive and premier, while "Movie Star" revolves around an assassination attempt against the new premier. Stalin died March 5, 1953, and was succeeded as premier by Nikita Khruhshchev.

* In "Movie Star", Pam mentions a time she got distracted by Joe Frazier almost drowning on ''The Superstars'' and left porn in her VCR. The incident (in which the boxer tried to swim in an athletic competition despite not knowing how to swim) occurred in February 1973 (while devices which record video on cassettes were introduced in 1956, the Philips "VCR" format was introduced in 1972, making it possible to own a VCR when Joe Frazier nearly drowned).

* In ''Reignition Sequence'', Cheryl compares Lana to [[ComicBook/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy Groot]]. While Groot has been around since 1960, his entrance into the mainstream is fairly recent.

* While the ISIS staff can be decidedly offensive at times, chances are their behavior towards Lana would be a ''lot'' different in the actual '50's or '60's.