This Friends Plot Hole Completely Ruined the Iconic Thanksgiving Episode

When a show runs long enough, you can't avoid a few plot holes every now and then – that's just the industry standard.

While we have made peace with some of the Friends ones (like the fact that no one seems to know how old they are), this inconsistency is on a different level of selective amnesia.

In the final season episode, The One With the Late Thanksgiving, the guys are extremely late for Thanksgiving dinner, hosted by Monica and Chandler, but they try (and fail miserably) to come up with a suitable excuse.

The Bings are not impressed, and they lock the rest of the group out of the apartment. Serves them right!

Rachel then remembers that she just happens to have an "old key" lying around, supposedly from when she used to live there).

The key magically works, but the door chain is also on, which makes the unpunctual guys weasel their way headfirst through the door.

This seems like an obvious solution, sure.

What the writers didn't account for is the fact that Rachel's key should never have worked. Rachel moves out of Monica's apartment back in season 6, so she must have a key from before that.

However, two seasons later, the lock is changed, so any old key wouldn't have worked!

In the season 8 episode, The One Where Rachel Tells…, Chandler and Monica go away on their honeymoon and take the others' keys away (by the way, where is Ms. Green's old key then?).

The guys still want to get into the apartment, which leads them to tell Mr. Treeger that there might be a gas leak.

The superintendent breaks down the door, and that eventually means that the apartment will have to have a new door with a new lock. Oops!

While we have uncovered yet another major inconsistency in Friends, it doesn't make the show any less endearing.

Plot holes or no plot holes, this sitcom has captured our hearts for life (and maybe even beyond), and there is no lock that can keep it out.