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Among fans of Western entertainment of the past, the most shameless examples of this phenomenon were noted in the ''[[Star Trek]]'' movie series, so much so that someone actually devised the "James T. Kirk Loophole" to explain the otherwise inexplicable occurrence of characters repeatedly being able to do things that ''the story itself'' had established them never being able to do.
 
Generally constrained to American animated shows, or to shows with that style of "cartoony" humor. Often employs [[Ping-Pong Naivete]] to allow the humour to work. Often gives the feeling of a ''very'' [[Unreliable Narrator]] (even if there isn't one to begin with). Not to be confused with [[Fanon Discontinuity]] or [[Canon Dis ContinuityDiscontinuity]].
 
One of the meta-causes of [[Alternate Universe]].
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* ''[[Urusei Yatsura]]'': Plotlines inevitably led down to anarchy, chaos, and [[Thundering Herd|lynch mobs running around]] by the end of each episode, but all injured characters and buildings would have undergone [[Snap Back]] by the next episode. [[Status Quo Is God]] indeed.
** A prime example is the Moroboshi fmaily's house. During the course of the series, it has been flooded, collapsed, burned down and blown to pieces (not to mention the abuse the interior has taken). Yet the next episode shows it standing proudly(?) with nary a tatami or zabuton askew... and Mr. Moroboshi still on the hook for the mortgage.
* Likewise with ''[[Ranma One Half½|Ranma 1/2]]''. Within individual arcs, a [[Game-Breaking Injury]] would be a serious matter, the Tendo home would be all but demolished and the characters would have to repair it, someone would get in deep financial trouble and stay that way through the end of the plot, or someone would land in the hospital with a full-body cast. All this damage will be undone by the next arc with nary a word from anyone. The only permanent change was the destruction of the Saotome home ([[Status Quo Is God|to force the family, Nodoka included, back into the Tendo household]].) This was even lampshaded once in the ''early anime'' when Genma tended to Ranma's neck injury and said it would take a week ([[Don't Explain the Joke|the time between episodes]]) to heal.
** Corollary: Should any specific fighting theory or technique come into play during a big fight (Ranma's shorter limbs in his female form being a disadvantage, using the opponent's aggression to create the Hiryushotenha, turning a boulder into gravel by poking it in just the right spot, etc.), said theory or technique will play a critical role in that fight, after which it'll be utterly irrelevant for the entire remainder of the series.
* The [[Anime]] ''[[Galaxy Angel (anime)|Galaxy Angel]]'' is ''made'' of [[Negative Continuity]]. The only times an episode counts is when they're introducing a new regular cast member, such as [[The Ditz|Milfeulle]], [[The Scrappy|Chitose]], [[Weasel Mascot|Normad]] and the Twin Star Force.
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* In his many failed attempts to become Caliph instead of the Caliph, ''[[Iznogoud]]'' has been petrified, turned into a dog, lost in a labyrinth, sent back in time, sold as a slave, put in orbit around the Earth, and worse. Nevertheless, everything is always back to normal for the next episode a few panels later.
** In a notable exception, the album ''Les Retours d'Iznogoud'' (''Iznogoud's Returns'') tries to explain how things returned to normal after some of the vizir's most infamous adventures. It does not always work, as many of those returns end with Iznogoud in an equally uncomfortable situation. That just raises further questions!
* The concept of "Hypertime" - outlined by Mark Waid and [[Grant Morrison]] as, basically, a way to remove the possibility of continuity errors in [[DC Comics]] while freeing writers from the need to remain consistent with the works of previous writers - could be described as "negative continuity through ''total'' continuity." The main points were (1) every story ever written did happen and is [[Canon]], even the stuff that [[Series Continuity Error|contradicts the other stuff]], however (2) every story takes place in its own [[Alternate Universe|discrete world]], and (3) the writer of any given story gets to decide which previously-written stories did and didn't happen in the "world" his or her story is taking place in, and therefore can just toss out anything they don't like and [[Hand Wave]] discrepancies with earlier stories by saying [[Canon Dis ContinuityDiscontinuity|"that never happened in my world."]] While the idea has its proponents, most tend to feel it causes more problems than it solves, not the least of which is the fact that the only people comfortable with its "anything goes" approach to continuity are the people who never minded continuity errors to begin with. It's now implied that Hypertime has ceased to exist because {{spoiler|in the future (a relative concept since he's already a time traveler), a more competent version of [[Booster Gold]] will [[Cosmic Retcon|deliberately eliminate it]]}}.
* Less obvious but almost as intrusive as Hypertime is DC's "Ten Year Rule" (closer to twelve years since the One Year Later issues), which in the late '90s-early '00s almost unambiguously stated that no matter when you're reading a given comic, Batman and Superman started their careers 10 years ago, and they were the first significant superheroes to debut since the Justice Society disbanded in the 50s. Other heroes began their careers within the following year and the Justice League was formed roughly at the beginning of the next year. Between this and the fact that some stories weren't [[Retcon|retconned]] out of existence by the [[Crisis on Infinite Earths]] (predominantly because none of the characters affected by the Crisis had a full, unambiguous reboot -- they just kept on going as they were but some miniseries -- "Superman: The Man of Steel" and "Batman: Year One" -- re-wrote the [[Backstory]] as needed) has made a mess of the continuity, requiring multiple mini-[[Crisis Crossover|Crisis Crossovers]] to shear off the dead weight.
* Marvel has a similar rule to the above, but they don't play quite so hard and fast by it; their flagship characters have aged about 15-20 years since their respective debuts in the 1960s.
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** The [[Galaxy Angel (video game)|Galaxy Angel]] gameverse also had a sequel series, ''Galaxy Angel II'', where elements from all the endings occurred (most obvious in Lily's character chapter, where her form of initiating Kazuya into the Rune Angel-tai includes re-enacting scenes from every Moon Angel's story).
* The first three ''[[Crash Bandicoot]]'' games do have a canon. It starts with Cortex making Crash, then he gets defeated on his blimp, finds the [[Green Rocks|crystal]] and sets the plot of Crash 2 into motion, where at the end his space station gets destroyed. Start of Crash 3 then shows this released [[The Man Behind the Man|Uka Uka]], and by the end N. Tropy, Uka Uka, and Neo Cortex are all trapped in time. This is where the [[Negative Continuity]] begins, as it's never explained quite how he recovered to [[Go-Karting with Bowser|race go-karts with Crash in time for CTR]]. After that, it sort of deteriorates with different developers messing around with the franchise, earning it an eventual [[Continuity Reboot]].
* ''[[Goemon (series)|Ganbare Goemon]] 2'' ended with the revelation that {{spoiler|Ebisumaru was actually a woman trapped in a man's body, a curse that was undone by the end of said game}}. [[Canon Dis ContinuityDiscontinuity|This was undone]] in future installments as if {{spoiler|Ebisumaru was always a man. This may have been done to prevent him from becoming a possible love interest of Goemon's, since Omitsu was established as a major character in the following game}}.
* In ''[[Mega Man Battle Network]]'', there ''is'' an overarching storyline across all six games with consistent characters and villains. However, Negative Continuity is rampant in the area designs: the internet and some recurring real world places (like Sci Lab in 1, 3 and 5; Netopia Castle in 2 and 4) are redesigned in every single game, and there is an almost completely different set of locations to visit in each game. ACDC Town and its houses had all the same design in the first three games, but were heavily redesigned after the graphical revamp of the fourth game. The only place that never got a redesign was the school in ACDC, which never appeared outside of cutscenes in the final three games.
** There's also some Negative Continuity with the characters too. Lan's father Yuichiro works for Sci Lab in every odd-numbered game, but otherwise: It's played straight in 2, where he's working at the Official Center (an "internet police" organization), justified in 4, where he's recruited by NAXA (a play on NASA and JAXA) due to a global emergency, and in 6 he's transferred to a different city to oversee the upcoming Expo. Also, in the third game, Lan's best friend Dex moves to Netopia (another country) in the 3rd game (and returns immediately "as a visit"), but in the following games he is back in ACDC.
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** This isn't entirely the case with the RPGs, however, where events in past games are occasionally referenced.
*** But this is because after ''[[Super Mario RPG]]'' and ''[[Paper Mario]]'', Miyamoto doesn't even touch the RPGs.
** While Princess Peach's castle looks more or less the same every time it appeared, its surrounding area or maybe even the interior changes with each appearance. In contrast, Bowser's own castle remains inconsistent in terms of design, though the ''[[Mario and Luigi|Mario & Luigi]]'' and ''[[New Super Mario Bros]].'' games have their own standardized designs for the outside view of the castle. The latter may be justified that his castle is shown getting destroyed in almost every game it appears in.
** So basically, story-wise, every Mario game reboots.
* In ''[[Drawn to Life]]: The Next Chapter'' for the DS, Galileo is nowhere to be found for some reason. It's not even said where he went to.
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