History Main / AGlitchInTheMatrix

* One of the WebAnimation/DangerDolan videos parodies this trope when talking about strange Google Earth camera glitches.
* Season 16 of ''WebAnimation/RedVsBlue'' ends with a RealityBreakingParadox followed by what seems to be a recreation of the first two episodes of the series. For the viewer, something is wrong when a character has a different voice. For the characters, it's when they feel deja vu repeating a famous dialogue. The following season starts with further cases of familiarity and events not transcribing as they used to -- because the evil being that inspired the heroes to cause the TimeCrash can only be ultimately freed once some more paradoxes unravel reality further.

[[folder:Films — Live-Action]]

** This trope gets parodied in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E7AmysChoice Amy's Choice]]", where the Doctor and his companions are attacked by the mysterious "Dream Lord", who only has control over dreams. The TARDIS team are forced between two realities (Upper Leadworth, where Amy is pregnant and they're being attacked by Killer Old People, or a broken TARDIS where they're dying of hypothermia). The Doctor urges them to try and work out which reality "doesn't ring true". Rory then points out that he's currently in a time machine with a bowtie-wearing alien, so that might not work very well. [[spoiler:Played straight in the end, though. Once they've correctly chosen the TARDIS as the "reality", the Dream Lord turns the ship back on, saving the characters. Except that the Dream Lord has no physical body, so the Doctor realizes [[TakeAThirdOption they were]] ''[[TakeAThirdOption both]]'' [[TakeAThirdOption dreams]].]]
** In "[[Recap/DoctorWho2014CSLastChristmas Last Christmas]]", this is how the Doctor works out that they're all in a LotusEaterMachine created by the Dream Crabs. He gets the four crew members to flick to the same page of their manual — [[ReadTheFreakingManual which none of them have read]] — and read the first word aloud. The words are all different. They try again with a different page just to be sure, and this time they collectively read out "[[OhCrap We... are... all... dead]]". After waking up, they try it again, just to be sure that they are actually awake. This time they read out "very... very... very... [[spoiler:dead." They're [[DreamWithinADream still dreaming]]. After waking up a second time, the Doctor realizes they're ''still'' dreaming when he notices that none of them can answer how or why they're here, instead replying, "It's a long story".]]
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS35E8TheZygonInversion The Zygon Inversion]]": Clara wakes up in her flat and goes to brush her teeth — but the toothpaste is disgusting black goo in a tube stating [[ExpoLabel "This is Toothpaste"]]. She then discovers that the doors and windows are missing, and that the newspaper reads absolute gibberish. She's actually sleeping in a Zygon pod.
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E6Extremis Extremis]]": TomeOfEldritchLore ''The Veritas'' reveals [[spoiler:the world is a computer simulation created by the aliens known as the Prophets of Truth in preparation for their invasion of Earth. To prove it, readers are invited to think of a series of random numbers. Everybody will always come up with the same numbers, because computers aren't very good with coming up with a completely random sequence.]]

* ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' had three.
** "A Human Reaction": the aliens can only recreate people and environments that John Crichton has seen before. Once he realizes that everything and everyone in the LotusEaterMachine of the week is familiar to him, a trip to the ladies' room brings the illusion crashing down.
** "Won't Get Fooled Again": This time Crichton has wised up, and knows it's a hallucination, but the ladies bathroom trick doesn't work. He first realizes that Harvey, Scorpius's neural clone, isn't part of the illusion. Harvey alerts him to the fact that he is a prisoner of the Scarrans, whose intense body heat John can feel through the illusion. The hot flashes therefore function in this episode as "Matrix Glitches." Oddly enough the oddities and out-of-place elements that usually make up this trope are still present (and get more extreme over time), but instead of glitches they're a deliberate attempt to break his sanity and the entire point of the simulation.
** "John Quixote": Crichton makes the mistake of playing a buggy VR game based on his own memories; once he leaves, he finds that Scorpius has taken over Moya and is brainwashing the crew against him. However, Crichton eventually realises that he's still playing the game when he finds one of the game's hint vouchers in his pocket. Plus, because the memory copy was made over a year ago, Sikozu and Noranti are nowhere to be seen, and nobody knows anything about [[spoiler: Aeryn's pregnancy.]]

* Sam Tyler tries to invoke this this in the first episode of ''Series/{{Life on Mars|2006}}''. Suddenly dropped in 1973, and thinking he must be dreaming, he sets out to walk until his mind runs out of detail.

-->''"I was up at the front of the plane, and I said, 'Listen, I don't think this is a real plane crash, since I happen to notice that I'm not wearing any pants, [[NotWearingPantsDream and when I'm not wearing pants, it's probably a dream.]]'"''
* Referenced in ''Series/RedDwarf''. After realizing the crew are in an AR simulation, Kryten uses the fact that [[TheDitz Cat]] was able to solve a cryptic clue as proof of that.
-->'''Dave Lister:''' ''He'' got ''that''?! [[note]]Cat had just figured out that a button marked '''E-11-T''' meant "exit" due to 11 being XI in Roman numerals[[/note]]\\

** They also realise they're in a simulation when Rimmer, outside the program, attempts to crudely remove all references to him and a deal he made with Lister, resulting in brief, yet very noticeable time jumps for the crew, who immediately realise he's doing it.
* In a ''Series/{{Smallville}}'' episode Clark wakes up to realize he's in Belle Reve and that everything he's gone through over the past few years have been nothing but the hallucinations of a crazy person. But [[spoiler: Martian Manhunter]] goes into Belle Reeve to try to convince Clark ''this'' reality is fake. Clark then realizes it too by hearing Shelby's barking.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'': In the ep. "[[Recap/StarTrekS3E6SpectreOfTheGun Spectre Of The Gun]]" Spock realizes that the setting is not real when the knockout potion he made didn't work.

** "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E11ShipInABottle Ship in a Bottle]]". Data realizes that the ship is a holodeck program because Geordi is left-handed in the program, but right-handed in real life. [[HilariousInHindsight Humorously]], Barclay actually says "There must have been a glitch in the matrix [diodes]." when he first began investigating the Holmes holoprogram.
** "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS4E8FutureImperfect Future Imperfect]]". Commander Riker is trapped inside a LotusEaterMachine. First the problems are small, but as he begins to realize more and more things are out of place, he is moved to the "real" world, but the setting has simply changed to a new illusion. He quickly realizes something's still off.
** "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS7E10Parallels Parallels]]" employs a similar premise. Worf begins to notice that small details are off from how he remembered them -- the placement of decorations, the positions where people are standing, and crew members' clothing. As the episode progresses, the differences are magnified to the extent that [[spoiler:Picard was killed at Wolf-359, Riker is captain of the ''Enterprise'', and Worf has married Counselor Troi and had two children with her.]] Rather than being trapped in a LotusEaterMachine, it turns out that [[spoiler:Worf is shifting through increasingly divergent parallel universes.]]

* In the ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' episode "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS06E18Inquisition Inquisition]]", Dr. Bashir also realizes that he's in a hologram when "O'Brien" doesn't correctly know how he injured his arm. From this, he realizes that Sloan from Section 31 is playing tricks on him. In another episode, [[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS07E23ExtremeMeasures Extreme Measures]], he realizes that he hasn't left Sloan's mind after having entered it with O'Brien after noticing that a book he was reading cuts off at the point where he stopped; the simulation couldn't progress beyond the limits of Bashir's knowledge.
* ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'': "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS4E12WakingMoments Waking Moments]]" has the crew being put to sleep by a race that prefers to exist in a lucid dream-like state. However, since their bodies are vulnerable in this state, they attack any "waking" race they encounter. Chakotay, being a MagicalNativeAmerican, has plenty of experience with vision quests and has a device meant to put him into a controlled lucid dream. Before entering the lucid dream to meet the aliens, he conditions himself to see one such glitch, namely the image of Earth's Moon in place of any planet. Tapping a finger on his other hand three times is supposed to bring him out of this state. There are several examples in the episode when Chakotay thinks he's out of the dream... only to see the Moon again. The last time, the tapping trick doesn't work, as the aliens have adapted the dream.
** Played with in the episode "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS6E17SpiritFolk Spirit Folk]]". This trope would seem to be in effect from the point of view of the residents of Fair Haven. However, what the holograms were witnessing was, in fact, perfectly normal. The "glitch" in the system was that it was running for too long, overtaxing the algorithms that were designed to keep the holograms oblivious to anything that didn't fit into their ThemeParkVersion of {{Oireland}} world.

** In "Dreams for Sale", Jenny is having a lovely picnic in the country with her husband Paul and their twin daughters when she starts to notice unusual things happening. Paul opens the same bottle of champagne twice. After she takes a chicken out of the picnic basket, it suddenly reappears inside of it. Other events begin to repeat themselves such as Paul asking her if she is okay three times in the space of a few seconds. Jenny then wakes up to find herself connected to a Dreamatron, a fully interactive dream machine which had been running the "Country Picnic" simulation for her.
** In "Shadow Play", Adam Grant has had [[RecurringDreams the same nightmare about being executed]] many times so he knows that it is a dream but he notes the telltale signs to the district attorney Mark Ritchie. Most notably, he was sentenced and is due to be executed on the same day (a Sunday), which would not happen in reality. Although she is a character in the dream herself, Adam's defense attorney Erin Jacobs begins to notice them too. She points out to Ritchie that there were no press or spectators present in the court room during the sentencing even though it was a big murder trial. Later, she discovers that neither Ritchie nor his wife Carol have any idea how long they have been married and don't even remember getting married.

[[folder:TabletopGames]]

* ''VideoGame/TheMatrixPathOfNeo'' has a level where you're running around trying to find a way out of an abandoned hotel. The most obvious hallways are cut-off by a flickering of green code and you have to find a secondary route.

* Near the end of ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty'', following a virus upload, the part of the Patriots AI begins acting screwy. This leads to the player seeing codec messages from [[spoiler:the damaged, fake Colonel]] which includes nonsense like [[WordSaladHorror "I need scissors! 61!"]] and [[BodyHorror slight face melting.]]

Required to be impeccable on the surface, most false realities [[LotusEaterMachine are built to trap]] (or at least contain) their inhabitants. However, as [[TruthInTelevision real life shows]], coding and memory can be rife with conflicts and inconsistencies; as such, you can expect the protagonist is going to spot a few of them [[ForWantOfANail and draw some conclusions]]. Of course, don't be surprised if [[SpottingTheThread noting errors]] starts ''[[ShatteringTheIllusion unravelling reality.]]'' Depending on the tone, expect a scale marking of what [[RuleOfDrama they do]] or [[RuleOfFunny do not]] notice: Isn't Charlie [[OutOfCharacterAlert left handed]]? Wasn't there [[MindScrew a park here]]? ''When did my children [[RealityBreakingParadox stop having faces]]?''

* In ''Anime/{{Scryed}}'' Kazuma realizes he's being brainwashed after Unkei flubs characterization in the LotusEaterMachine he's trapped Kazuma in, by having the jerkass rival Ryuho [[DefeatEqualsFriendship act like they're friends after they fight and settle the score]]. He probably should have known better; Kazuma enjoys the challenge of fighting Ryuho but completely hates his guts for additional unrelated reasons and everyone knows what a dick Ryuho is. Unkei also exemplifies SmallNameBigEgo and is a total hack. His second attempt, on Ryuho this time, goes just about as well and is just as corny.

* The MandelaEffect can work this way. Technically speaking, it's when a group of people remember something incorrectly in exactly the same way (like that UsefulNotes/NelsonMandela died in prison in UsefulNotes/TheEighties rather than of natural causes in 2013), but many proponents of the concept frame the issue like it's a ParallelUniverse, and some go further than that and say it's the ''same'' universe but changed somehow, and the fact that several people are experiencing the same "glitch" proves it. If you wanted to be uncharitable, you could just say that people buy into [[CommonKnowledge popular misconceptions]] and when faced with evidence to the contrary will [[IRejectYourReality blame reality itself]] rather than [[NeverMyFault themselves]], but it does raise interesting points about human perception and the way it pieces together memories and experiences -- ''i.e.'' not always perfectly. So the Mandela Effect kind of ''is'' a real Glitch in the Matrix, but rather than in the fabric of reality, it's in the synapses of your brain. (But that's kind of what the Matrix technically is, isn't it?)

* The ''Series/{{Arrow}}'' episode of the Series/{{Arrowverse}} crossover event "Invasion!" sees the alien Dominators stick Oliver, Thea, Sara, Ray, and Diggle in a LotusEaterMachine, presenting them with a world where the ''Queen's Gambit'' never sank and Oliver never became a vigilante. Their normal memories are suppressed, but the machine is unable to lock them away totally, with the heroes having flashes every time they encounter someone or something they knew in the real world but shouldn't know in the illusionary world. Eventually, they remember everything, and find the portal that enables them to escape the illusion.

Required to be impeccable on the surface, most false realities [[LotusEaterMachine are built to trap]] (or at least contain) their inhabitants. However, as [[TruthInTelevision real life shows]], coding and memory can be rife with conflicts and inconsistencies; as such, you can expect the protagonist is going to spot a few of them [[ForWantOfANail and draw some conclusions]]. Of course, don't be surprised if [[SpottingTheThread noting errors]] starts ''[[PullTheThread unravelling reality.]]'' Depending on the tone, expect a scale marking of what [[RuleOfDrama they do]] or [[RuleOfFunny do not]] notice: Isn't Charlie [[OutOfCharacterAlert left handed]]? Wasn't there [[MindScrew a park here]]? ''When did my children [[RealityBreakingParadox stop having faces]]?''

** Ben frequently notices the Omnitrix erratically scrolling through the active list, but can't figure out what it means. It's left unclear if it's due to the attempts to removie it, or it's signalling to Ben that something is wrong.

* Fate in ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaAs'' realizes almost immediately that she's trapped in a LotusEaterMachine since her dream had her living happily with her older sister Alicia, a detail that simply couldn't be because [[spoiler:[[CloningBlues Fate is Alicia's clone]], specifically created by her mother as a ReplacementGoldfish [[{{Necromantic}} after Alicia died]]]].

** In ''TimeOutOfJoint'', the protagonist believes he lives in an idyllic American town in 1958, but strange incongruities begin to occur.

* Creator/PhilipKDick makes reality (and the breakdown thereof) a central theme in many of his works; his exploration of the subject provided inspiration for the TropeNamer and others.

* In ''Series/Dark2017'', déjà-vus indicate [[spoiler:the existence of time travel and alternate realities]]. Jonas refers to a déjà-vu he had as "a glitch in the matrix" in reference to the TropeNamer, and in Season 2, [[spoiler:his older self uses the same phrase to confirm his identity to Martha]]. In addition, Season 3 reveals that [[spoiler:Jonas himself and an alternate universe version of Martha are "glitches in the matrix" around which the time loop that connects their two universes revolves, and whose existence must be erased to restore reality to its natural state]].

* ''WesternAnimation/WhatsNewScoobyDoo'': In "E-Scream", the gang is attacked by robotic furry creatures. However, during the whole fiasco, Velma notices her friends doing things that they wouldn't normally do (Fred telling the gang to stay together, Daphne being willing to wear mismatched shoes, etc). Near the end, she figures out she's in a holographic video game made by a friend of hers when Shaggy doesn't spout his CatchPhrase right.

* ''Franchise/{{DCAU}}'':

* ''LightNovel/MagikaSwordsmanAndSummoner'': Miyabi puts Kazuki in a dreamworld and attempts to seduce him. He figures it out and breaks free because the sound was distorted and she censored her naughty bits out of embarrassment.

'''Trinity:''' A déjà vu is usually [[TropeNamers a glitch in the Matrix]]. It happens when they change something.

** ''ComicBook/TheWasp2023'': The BigBad tries trapping Janet and Nadia, and then Jarvis, inside a fake world designed to break their spirits, but it doesn't work. Plan B is trying to get Nadia to kill Janet, but both parties notice there's too many inconsistencies in their memories, and the whole thing falls apart.

* In ''LightNovel/GonnaBeTheTwinTail'', Souji figures out he's in a LotusEaterMachine when he sees Twoearle with her hair in twintails and he remembers the real Twoearle literally [[EquivalentExchange gave up her ability to wear her hair in twintails to give him his powers]].

'''Trinity:''' A déjà vu is usually a glitch in the Matrix. It happens when they change something.

Alice has everything she ever wanted; success, fortune, found love with Bob, and has even settled down in a nice neighborhood. Heading to the store on a nice evening, she decides to take an alley shortcut, only to stumble upon a strobing green cat, which meows [[VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty "I need scissors! 61!"]] before evaporating. Alice has stumbled on A Glitch in the Matrix.

-->Ben couldn’t help but smile at the sight. He never thought he would ever see them become friends again. This day was incredible. What were the chances that everything would come together so perfectly?
-->The smile slowly slid off his face. Really, what ''were'' the chances?