[[folder: Whatever happened to Drefyus after ''Strikes Again'' ?]]
Dreyfus seemingly got disintegrated by his ray at the end of ''The Pink Panther Strikes Again'', yet he's still alive in the next film. Since numerous evidences point that it is not a case of NegativeContinuity (the later installment ''Trail of the Pink Panthers'' including shout-outs to both ''Strikes Again'' and the movie that followed), [[{{Headscratchers/Headscratchers}} what happened ?]] Here are some of the Tropers's creative answers.

[[WMG:Dreyfus did not die at the end of ''Strikes Again''.]]
If he did die:
* Clouseau traveled back in time to save Dreyfus.
* Dreyfus is replaced by a doppelganger.
* ''Strikes Again'' is technically non-canon to the other films.
If not:
* It was AllJustADream from whoever's perspective it was.
* Dreyfus rematerialized in his cell in the insane asylum from which he escaped.
** I have a theory that when the machine was destroyed everything it had done was undone. I think the castle must have materialized again, only now it would be empty, Dreyfus must have appeared in the asylum (or not in the asylum, but either way he landed up there), and the UN building returned. I think nobody remembered Dreyfus blackmailing all those governments or destroying the building, only that he escaped from the asylum. How else (unless one of the first three is true) did he get his job back in ''Trail''?
** On the other hand, Clouseau meets Drummond and Quinlan from ''Strikes Again'' for the first time in ''Trail'', the same film where Dreyfus gets his job back, and also purchases his ''Strikes Again'' disguise in this film, meaning that they are ignoring ''Strikes Again'' (the reason for these scenes is that they are deleted scenes from the other film being recycled.)

[[WMG:Why Dreyfus isn't dead anymore after ''Strikes Again'']]
The series shows in fact [[AlternateUniverse two timelines]]. The fork is set after the events of ''Return of the Pink Panther'' (or perhaps of ''Inspector Clouseau'' if you count this one as canon). The first way events could have gone is ''Strikes Again''; the second way is ''Revenge'' and its follow-ups ''Trail'' and the "son" movies. Both are chronologically taking place at the same time, in two different continuity.

[[WMG:The ending of ''Strikes Again'' (temporarily) turned Dreyfus into the French version of Dr. Manhattan]]
Whereas most of the other things zapped by the DisintegratorRay just dissipated into an ever-expanding clouds of their component atoms, Dreyfus remained conscious and alive even in his disembodied state. He subsequently managed to reform himself into a being of god-like power, and revelled in now being able to finally destroy Clouseau. However, through his usual mishaps Clouseau continually managed to avoid being blown to bits. While this was happening, Sir Charles Litton accidentally catches one of the blasts and is reverted back to his original appearance, and his wife, no longer attracted to him, elopes with a handsome guy by the name of Scarlioni, leaving Sir Charles to hook up with Clouseau's ex. Eventually Dreyfus uses up his entire reserve of powers trying to kill the inspector, reverts back to his original form, and is dragged away to a criminal asylum, sobbing and ranting about still not being able to kill Clouseau.

[[WMG:The Disintegrator Ray wasn't a disintegrator to begin with]]

The only time the scientific principles behind Professor Fassbender's invention were described, it was by Dreyfus himself mentioning that he "was very interested in [the professor's] works on space/time relationships". This kind of researches doesn't naturally lead to disintegrator rays; it leads either to tele-transporting rays or time machines. Not that Dreyfus was necessarily aware of it, nor the professor, hence why he acts as though the objects he blasted with the ray were really gone; instead they were just transferred to some months in the future in random places. So was Dreyfus himself.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Other continuity issues]]

[[WMG:The 2006 reboot takes place in the same universe of that of the original films and the Clouseau played by Steve Martin is actually Jacques Gambrelli, Clouseau's son]]

* And the Dreyfus played Kevin Kline is actually the original Dreyfus' (Herbert Lom) nephew, who coincidently is also called Charles.
** Alternatively, he could be his son, jealous of his half-brother's attention.
* When the movie was first announced in 2001, press releases did say that Steve Martin would be portraying an older version of Clouseau's son.

[[WMG:Clouseau never underwent MagicPlasticSurgery]]
Either Clouseau was kidnapped or killed and the people responsible for it hired Creator/RogerMoore to make the audience believe Clouseau changed his face.

[[WMG:Sir Charles Litton underwent MagicPlasticSurgery]]

He had his body changed for the events of ''Return'' and reverted to his old one some time thereafter.

[[WMG:Sir Charles divorced Claudine after she went to prison...]]
...and he later got back together with Simone. This is an answer to the PlotHole entry on the main page. Notably, Claudine is never seen again after the events of ''Return''.

[[WMG:Each movie takes place in its own alternate reality]]

This could include all the movies, even the Creator/AlanArkin and Creator/SteveMartin (''Film/{{The Pink Panther|2006}}'') ones. This leaves us with only internal inconsistencies. From there we could re-imagine each movie as if it was in the other continuities. Although given that the earliest movies were created when continuity was not as big a concern…

[[WMG:Everything up to ''Revenge'' is "valid", but the order is slightly off]]

Following the original ''Pink Panther'', Clouseau could have simply been allowed to return to work once it was affirmed that he was framed for the Phantom's crimes, but demoted to deal with lower-level crimes until he was mistakenly assigned to the murder case at the start of ''Shot in the Dark''. After the deaths of all relevant suspects in that case, Dreyfus was able to regain control of himself after his mental breakdown and basically blame everything on Clouseau making mistakes. This led to Clouseau being demoted back to an officer so that he wouldn't have to worry about him any more until ''Return'' forced Dreyfus to have Clouseau restored to his detective rank due to the request that he investigate the latest theft of the Panther diamond.

After that, the events of ''Revenge'' took place as depicted, with Dreyfus being temporarily restored to his old rank after his mental recovery due to Clouseau's apparent death, until learning that Clouseau is still alive caused him to suffer a "relapse" and be sent back to the asylum. From there, ''Strikes Again'' saw Dreyfus's final "death" when the doomsday machine was turned against him.

''Trail'' begins with Dreyfus once again Chief Inspector and Clouseau a standard detective, which ''nobody'' would have allowed to happen after all of Clouseau's achievements and Dreyfus's crimes in ''Strikes Again''. The easiest way to reconcile it with the above is that ''Trail'' takes place in a completely alternate continuity from everything else, most likely an alternate chain of events diverging from a point just before ''Return''; after those events, Dreyfus's insanity became too great for anyone to excuse him.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Unsorted]]

[[WMG:Clouseau is God]]
Or at least God loves him that much, explaining why Clouseau survives the most deadly dangers in the world, everyday.

[[WMG:The Ballon mansion was cursed, and the curse could only be broken when only one person remained.]]
For every time Clouseau came close to solving the mystery, another body was found. The explosion at the end ended the curse forever as Maria Gambrelli was all who survived.

[[WMG:Pinky and Panky's mother in ''The Pink Panther and Sons'']]
The most likely candidate for the mother of the Pink Panther's two sons in ''The Pink Panther and Sons'' would have to be the female panther from the end of the Valentine TV special "Pink at First Sight".

[[WMG:The female panther in "Pink at First Sight" had been watching Pink Panther for a while and fell in love with him because of his [[NiceGuy good deeds]].]]
When you think about it, she really only shows up at the end to fulfill Pink Panther's wish, and doesn't have much personality. Although there's nothing in the cartoon to support this, it would be a cool way to make her a deeper character.

[[WMG:Alternatively, the female panther was Pink Panther's ex, and she wanted to [[DivorceIsTemporary get back together with him]].]]
That would explain not only why the Pink Panther was alone and depressed, but also why he had visions of a female panther that looked exactly like the real one. It would also explain why the female panther wanted to be his valentine immediately upon meeting him. You don't fall in love with someone you've just met (unless you're [[WesternAnimation/Frozen2013 Anna]].)

[[WMG:Pink Panther takes place in the Known Space universe and Jacques Clouseau has the Teela Brown gene]]
Clouseau is {{The Ditz}} who succeeds by the power of crazy good luck. Remember that scene where all the world's top assassins are trying to kill him, and they all end up failing and getting killed due to unlikely coincidences (two of them go into stalls in a bathroom on opposite sides of the one Clouseau is in and end up shooting each other when he bends down, for instance), while Clouseau never even realizes what's happening? Does that not remind you strongly of Teela Brown in ''Ringworld'', the woman who supposedly had genes that allowed her to somehow always have good luck? Clouseau having the Teela Brown gene would explain the things that happened in the movies very nicely. And ''Son of the Pink Panther'' makes this even more likely, as it indicates Clouseau was able to pass on his "style" genetically to his offspring. Of course, this would mean the Pink Panther series is probably set in the Known Space universe's past. Sure, it would have been before the Puppeteers started their breeding program for lucky humans, but the Teela Brown genes were presumably already in humanity before they started so it's not inconcievable that you could have had the occassional Teela Brown being born purely by accident.

[[WMG:Jacques Clouseau isn't really {{The Ditz}} we all think he is]]
He really is the competent, intelligent, badass detective that people who've never met him think he is in-universe. His ditzy persona is simply a ruse he maintains to cause his opponents to underestimate him. All the times it looked like he was saved by "good luck" he was actually perfectly aware of what was happening and what he was doing, and he was just careful to make it ''look'' as if he was oblivious and only survived by sheer luck. He's just so brilliant and badass he can outsmart and defeat world-class criminals and assassins while making it ''look'' as if he isn't even trying or is totally in over his head.

[[WMG:Jacques Clouseau is an {{Idiot Savant}}]]
Clouseau manages to do what he does because he's an idiot savant whose savant skill is dodging assassins. His lucky "accidental" escapes are actually his subconscious mind acting to save him. It spotted the sniper in the opposite building and made him sneeze the instant it saw the sniper get ready to pull the trigger, it knew those two guys were assassins so it made him go to the bathroom, lose the toilet paper, and duck to pick it up just as it sensed from the noises they were making that they were about to shoot, etc. Clouseau himself is not consciously aware of this, so he really does do things like defeat the world's top assassins without even realizing what's happening.

[[WMG:Steve Martin's Clouseau is an aged version of Alan Arkin's Clouseau.]]
Anyone who's seen the 1968 film "Inspector Clouseau", starring Alan Arkin, and Steve Martin's Clouseau in the recent reboot films knows their performances are very similar. If you want to pretend they all take place in a different reality than the Creator/PeterSellers[[=/=]]Creator/BlakeEdwards films than you could say that Arkin and Martin's Clouseau are one and the same.

[[WMG:Voodoo Man is an EldritchAbomination]]
In the 1993-1995 ContinuityReboot, there is a WitchDoctor called Voodoo Man. However, his face is ''never'' shown on-screen, hidden behind a huge yellow mask. On the one occasion it almost got shown in the ADayInTheLimelight episode
"Voodoo Man", the reaction from the policeman character was one of shock and horror, suggesting his face is some sort of EldritchAbomination. But this is an EpilepticTrees theory of course...
[[/folder]]