25 Things That Prove the Mandela Effect Exists

You don’t need a channel like ours to tell you who Neil Armstrong is. He was famously the first man to step onto the lunar surface back in 1969. Here’s a question for you though… Do you know when Neil Armstrong died? He left this planet, so to speak, in 2012.

However, the news bypassed a bunch of people, who actually believe he died later on. Armstrong may have gone to the Moon, but these days he’s caught in the gravitational pull of the Mandela Effect. There is positive news, in that he got his own movie biopic in 2018 starring Ryan Gosling. You’ve got to be pleased with that piece of casting! And it could only have led to more people finding out about his extraordinary life, not to mention when he passed away.

If one name is associated with the milk of human kindness and the power of doing good deeds then it’s surely Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Working tirelessly until her passing in 1997, she devoted her life to the poorest in society, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

You’d think someone like this would reach the level of sainthood quite quickly. Yet when it comes to her canonisation – in other words the time she was officially made a saint – the truth is not very well known at all.

According to those who suffer from the Mandela Effect, Mother Teresa was canonized in line with Roman Catholic tradition during the 1990s. They’d be surprised to hear the honor wasn’t finally bestowed until nearly twenty years after her death in 2016! 

A particularly striking example of the Mandela Effect is the “How to see into a parallel dimension” series on TikTok, made by a user called “thethoughtpolice”. He uses an old-school mobile device, with a recommended date of pre-2008, to shoot footage of things like food packaging, movie clips and more to reveal a supposedly hidden truth.

With these highly watchable videos, it appears as if he’s shifting us into another reality, or jumping into another time. He’s certainly caught the imaginations of many fellow social media users, like this YouTuber who is astonished by revelations about Spongebob Squarepants.

On another undersea note, let’s take a deep dive into the Mandela Effect. There’s nothing more likely to get people’s attention than food, am I right? Keep watching for a tasty story…

Just saying the word “Oreos” makes me hungry. Double Stuffed Oreos especially, because you get more of that creamy goodness. That said, there is a secret about this type of Oreo that will blow your mind. It’s a secret hiding in plain sight. All you need to do is pick up a packet and look.

You may be wondering what I’m talking about, but pay real close attention to the packet, and the logo. It says “Double Stuff”, not “Stuffed”. Plus things get weirder with the fact that “Stuf” only has one F! So what gives? Analysis has shown that, in order for the name to make sense to your brain, it should read “Double Stuffed” instead of “Stuff”, so that’s the way you read it.

As for the spelling “Stuf”, well, that isn’t clear. But it got the company out of a jam when a lawsuit was brought, accusing them of misleading customers. This case was based on the product not containing double the amount . The makers of Oreos argued that “Stuf”, S-T-U-F was an invented word referring to double the pleasure rather than any strict measurement. Interesting move there guys! I’m not going to stop eating Oreos though. 

The Mandela Effect and games overlap quite often. There’s the Monopoly Man, who everyone thought had a monocle but doesn’t. Then, on the video game side of things, you have Pikachu’s tail which I’ll get to later.

Meanwhile, in the world of Overwatch, another story developed. Gamers were on the edge of their seats with the news that a secret connection existed between the characters Mercy and Reaper. This excitement came through an exchange of dialogue, where it sounded like Mercy had been involved in Reaper’s backstory. Sadly for fans, this turned out to be a group delusion and the scene hadn’t happened. They might be interested in the Mandela Effect card game though.

In case you’re not aware, Fruit of the Loom is a clothing brand, not a food company. It’s a well known name, but you don’t necessarily think of hoodies and sweatpants when you hear it. The company logo is similarly an image of fruit, though you should bear in mind the word “Loom” too of course. You make clothes using a loom, so what you’re doing is wearing the fruits produced by it.

Anyway, adding to the potential confusion is the idea that a cornucopia was also part of the iconic logo. What’s a cornucopia? This is a basket shaped like a horn, and sufferers of the Mandela Effect state it’s actually a prominent part of the design. The remembrance was so deeply ingrained that the company themselves took to social media to try and clarify the situation.

So how did the cornucopia enter the conversation in the first place? The fact that a large number of people recall the logo this way is testament to the power of the Mandela Effect. That reminds me, I need to buy a basket. I won’t be buying it from Fruit of the Loom of course, they don’t make them.

Staying on the topic of juicy produce, we’re talking about Froot Loops. This product has a definite connection to actual fruit, though in cereal form. It’s a staple part of breakfast tables everywhere. But do you know how to spell it? The answer is loopier than you think.

You probably believe, as I did, that Kellogg’s went for the standard F-R-U-I-T. Well, it transpires we’ve been wrong-footed by the Mandela Effect. The two word title is linked with a double “o”. Kinda like James Bond, only with milk instead of Martinis! It’s incredible that we can be incorrect about something when it’s been on a box in big letters in front of our very eyes for years.

I love a savory snack. Salty chips, or something with a stronger flavor, such as Cheez-Its. Hmm, now is that spelled with an “s” or a “z” at the end? Actually, you know what, there wasn’t an “s” or a “z” at all. The name of the product is “Cheez-It”. This is another example of group thinking gone awry.

How many times have you heard someone say “Cheez-Its” in movies or on TV? The company is adamant however that it has always been “Cheez-It” and that things have been this way since the early twentieth century. I reckon what happened is that people pluralized the name, otherwise, it would sound silly. “Do you want a bowl of Cheez-It?” just doesn’t seem right to me. TikTok user “thethoughtpolice”, who I mentioned earlier, made a video revealing the cheesy truth, using the camera on his out-of-date mobile device.

The results are convincing for sure, though some commentators believe this is a well-put-together piece of trickery by a skilled magician. 

In 1987, a cult sci-fi film was released called Batteries Not Included. With creative involvement from Steven Spielberg, the story focused on a group of people trying to prevent their block from being demolished by money-hungry villains. They are helped in their efforts by a group of strange little robots from outer space. It was a charming movie, the tenants won the day and everything seemed pretty neatly wrapped up.

But wait. Did they decide to give this crazy bunch of characters a sequel? Many people believe there was a second chapter titled Batteries Still Not Included. This is very strange because this movie simply isn’t a thing. It does not exist. However, online commentators talk about it as if they watched it.

The exploits of British TV cartoon character Captain Pugwash are legendary. Partly due to the fact he sailed the seven seas and got into all kinds of adventures. And also due to some rather… um, interesting, names for his crewmates. There was much amusement at some of the pirate handles, such as Roger the Cabin Boy and Seaman Staines. What kind of warped mind would include these names in a children’s TV show? The answer is… no-one. This is another example of the Mandela Effect in action. The fantasy was so powerful it even made it into print.

John Ryan, who created the series, decided to hoist the mainsail and go into battle with the press, following stories that the BBC had pulled the plug on Pugwash as a result of the salty double entendres.

Sex and the City is still a big hit with viewers, whether they’re watching the classic series or the revived version with the characters as older women. What could the Mandela Effect possibly have to do with their X-rated antics?

The clue is in the name. Sex and the City has been branded Sex in the City, with TikTok trickery to match. The confusion was great enough for press publications to refer to the show by this erroneous title. Whether it’s happening in the city or otherwise, it keeps the conversation about Sarah Jessica Parker and her sassy friends in the public eye.

Tails play a large part in the narrative of the Mandela Effect. A beloved character like Pikachu is familiar to millions of fans. Though what exactly is going on with Pikachu’s back end? There’s a question I never thought I’d be asking in one of these videos.

You see, there are Pokemon addicts out there who are convinced the little hero has a tail with a black tip. I should say there is reportedly very little evidence that suggests this to be the case. It appears to be one of those ideas that a lot of folks have in their minds for some reason. Fans would also draw the character with this different tail, showing how widespread the false image became.

The first Jaws movie is well known in Mandela Effect circles, with one of its classic lines often misquoted. “We’re going to need a bigger boat” is actually “You’re going to need a bigger boat.” But I can go one better than that, courtesy of the film’s sequel. Jaws 2 is one of those rare things, a follow up that some enjoy as much as the first flick.

The storyline involves teens on boats caught up in toothsome terror, as another Great White Shark preys on the stricken beach community of Amity. One character in particular, Marge, suffers a gruesome fate. Unable to climb out of the water and up to safety in time, she is grabbed by the shark. We watch her disappear behind the head of the beast as it rears out of the water for this tasty morsel.

Thankfully we don’t see it anymore, that image is nightmarish enough. Of course, a legend is doing the rounds saying there’s a sequence where poor Marge is shown in the teeth of Jaws. That never happened. I’m not sure why people think that. Maybe they’re getting mixed up with the famous scene toward the end of the first film, where crazy fisherman Quint gets his just desserts.

Gandalf the Grey, aka Sir Ian McKellen, has some of the best dialogue in the Lord Of The Rings franchise. “You shall not pass!” is probably the most famous, though there’s another one that has proved misleading. Now there’s a bit of a spoiler alert here, in case you’re one of the small handful of people who’s never watched the movies before.

Before the shocking moment Gandalf lets go of a cliff edge before plunging to certain death, he manages to gasp: “Run your fools!” Sound advice, because his friends are in a whole lot of trouble. Speaking of advice, there’s a problem here. In another case of the Mandela Effect, that’s not what the wizard actually said. Maybe some audience members were so swept up in the excitement that they misheard the line because the accurate version is: “Fly you fools.” Last I checked, Hobbits don’t have wings. Great call Gandalf! 

No impersonation of Hannibal Lecter is complete without the line “Hello Clarice”. Trouble is, does the cannibal doctor say these words? Jim Carrey certainly did, when taking off Lecter in his movie The Cable Guy. As for the man himself, played by Sir Anthony Hopkins, he sadly failed to greet Jodie Foster’s heroine in this way. He must have had other things on his mind, like planning a grisly escape from incarceration, before tracking down his former captor and eating him.

It took until 2001, and the follow-up film titled Hannibal, for Dr Lecter to finally say hello to Clarice Starling.

Tom Hanks’ Big is a tear-jerking, heartwarming story about a boy who makes a wish and becomes an adult in his sleep. As you probably recall, the movie ends with the grown-up Hanks changing back into a child again. At least, that’s how some of you remember it.

The Mandela Effect has led a bunch of fans to believe things panned out a little differently. The Hanks character still goes back to being a kid. In their minds, however, so does the lovely lady he meets during the course of the movie. She manages to become a little person too, presumably so romance can blossom. Firstly, wow. That is a fairly warped conclusion if ever I heard one. Secondly, it’s not true.

The memory really can play tricks, and the Mandela Effect only makes things worse…

You must remember this. But, are you remembering it the right way? “Play it again Sam,” is the defining line of Casablanca, starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman. How accurate is this? Not very.

Yes, this classic dialogue is subject to some confusion. Sam, as played by Dooley Wilson, is called upon numerous times to play music. That’s no surprise, he’s a pianist at Rick’s bar after all. Yet Bogart, believed to be the deliverer of the line, never said “Play it again Sam”. The error was reinforced with Woody Allen’s script Play It Again Sam, from the 1970s.

Now, celebrities are often mixed up in stories about the Mandela Effect, as this next bunch of entries demonstrates. Pop stars, Kings, and secret agents… they’re all here!

Britney is becoming well known for posing naked on social media. When it comes to wearing things, however, you’ll often see her sporting a headset. There’s so much dancing around during her live performances that it isn’t feasible to carry a microphone while you’re doing it. I’m not an iconic pop princess myself as you may have noticed, so I’m speculating, but you can see why she uses them. And by this point you’ve no doubt guessed that Britney is subject to the Mandela Effect, just like everything else! The video for her early hit Oops!… I Did It Again shows her in a red catsuit and, according to some fans, a headset.

Oops! You got it wrong guys! Bearing in mind it’s one of the star’s most famous looks, the fact she isn’t wearing a headset at all makes this example all the more remarkable. Maybe it was this doll with a headset as an accessory that planted the idea in people’s minds…

From shaking your moneymaker on stage to ruling England with an iron fist. While we think of the Mandela Effect as a recent phenomenon, that doesn’t mean it can’t be applied to figures from yesteryear.

Henry VIII is often presented as a rather generous fellow. Generous in proportions that is. An image has taken hold of a bloated King who liked nothing more than tucking into a turkey leg. A well-known painting of Henry from the Renaissance period shows him holding a scabbard. And some appear to have looked at this regal item and thought it was a piece of poultry. Aside from the fact this ruler spent most of his life with a trim figure, it’s been pointed out that the turkey wasn’t introduced in England until 3 years after the King passed away.

Now it isn’t like we in the twenty-first century can have a solid recollection of Henry VIII, the man lived hundreds of years ago. Even so, the Mandela Effect has most definitely impacted our perception of him.

When he’s not leaping out of helicopters and jumping over gulleys on a motorbike, Tom Cruise leads a mysterious, celebrity lifestyle. I’m not saying he’s strange or anything, just that he has the kind of life most of us on the planet have no idea about, and can only dream of. So it makes sense that he too has fallen victim to the Mandela Effect in some people’s eyes.

Early in his career, he starred in a movie called Risky Business, the perfectly normal tale of a young man who decides to run a bordello from his parent’s house. Ah, things were so much more innocent back then! One memorable scene showed Cruise dancing in his shirt, underwear, and socks, sliding across the floor, and generally giving his fans something to gawp at. Many believe he’s wearing shades in the sequence, providing an extra touch of cool. In actual fact, he isn’t. That figures, cos it would make the place a little dark, and he’d probably crash into something and break it.

A fun side fact for you now – Cruise was wanted for the Keanu Reeves role in The Matrix. The classic sci-fi flick is often referred to when discussing the Mandela Effect. This is due to its plot, where the world as we know it is an illusion, and our true purpose is to function as batteries for our robot overlords. 

What are the big ideas behind the Mandela Effect? Time for the science part, as we boggle your mind with some key concepts…

There are cases of the Mandela Effect everywhere, and our look at movie-based stories continues with the multiverse. This concept has been presented to us in the big comic book franchises. Not only do they give viewers an intriguing sideways look at classic characters in other dimensions, but multiverses also come in handy for bringing people back from the dead and rebooting story ideas everyone’s sick of.

The Mandela Effect thrives on alternate realities, where things can either be slightly different or the total opposite of our day-to-day lives. How does a multiverse actually work? Alan Guth, a physicist, is behind one of the key ideas, namely cosmic inflation theory. In summary, a universe can be inflated like a balloon, getting bigger and bigger and expanding outwards. As this happens, more and more universes are created, with parallel realities falling away like apples from a tree.

Our own expansion apparently stopped billions of years ago, though experts believe other universes expanded much more, or are still expanding. The expansion idea is a hypothetical one, though if it’s true it could lend the Mandela Effect a lot of credibility.

You’ve probably heard of the scientific organization CERN in the news. Based on the Franco-Swiss border, they’re the ones who built the Large Hadron Collider, a particle accelerator that smashes proton beams together with dramatic results. CERN stands for the European Council for Nuclear Research. Because of the Large Hadron Collider, we now know about the Higgs boson particle, which gives mass to other particles in our universe. This is also called the “God particle”. But there’s far more to CERN than particles and how to collide them.

The organization was established in the 1950s and has a long and, in some people’s eyes, dangerous history. Playing God isn’t a good look, and naturally, this has led to CERN being linked to the Mandela Effect. Messing around with the fabric of the universe could potentially have resulted in different realities being created. This sounds like the plot of a movie, and I don’t think it’s unfair to put this in the box marked “conspiracy theory”. That said, the nature of CERN’s work is by its very nature mysterious.

Who knows what after-effects we’re experiencing, thanks to those crazy experiments going on in the snowy mountains…

The image of a lone protestor standing in front of a tank at Tiananmen Square in China is one of the most shocking and recognizable pictures of the late twentieth century. But what was the fate of this individual, whose stand against authority was seen as truly brave and life-threatening? Some believe the man was run over by the tank back in 1989. Just as there are people who thought Nelson Mandela died in prison, so sufferers of the Mandela Effect believe that “Tank Man” paid the price for challenging the might of the People’s Liberation Army.

Student Wang Weilin is reportedly the person captured on camera. You can see the tank swerving to get past him, only for the young man to reposition himself to block it. It’s shocking to watch. What ultimately happened? While he wasn’t killed by the tank, some state he was dragged out of the way, and to this day people don’t know his whereabouts. The fact that events at Tiananmen Square were violent and bloody adds to the impression that the student died under a tank during this turbulent time. 

Do you remember earlier that I mentioned CERN, a scientific organization that’s been accused of interfering with Mother Nature and blurring the line between different realities? Turns out they may be responsible for one of the most controversial political figures in American history. President Donald Trump took us through some crazy times when he occupied the White House.

However things seemed so out of kilter for certain people, they began to think we’d entered another dimension. One where Trump had become Leader of the Free World in a kind of bizarro situation. Fingers pointed at CERN as the cause of the mind-blowing development. The team had to issue a statement debunking the idea, and clarifying that they had nothing to do with the election.

Is the Mandela Effect the only plausible reason why Trump managed to win back in 2016? Either way, the history books have been written.

Now you may be looking at this section and thinking: “52 states? I thought America only had 50.” And you’d be right to get confused. To reassure you, you haven’t missed anything. Officially, America has fifty states. Having said that, the Mandela Effect plays havoc with people’s perceptions. Some think there are a couple more states out there, bringing the grand total to fifty-two.

What are these stragglers? One is Washington DC, which is in fact a district. The other is Puerto Rico. That falls under the tricky title of an unincorporated territory. It’s also not a state. Whilst you can usually have a good chuckle at people who are misunderstanding the world around them via the Mandela Effect, it’s more understandable in this particular case I’d say. If you’re ever in doubt, count the stars on the flag!

Enjoyed this list? Check out 25 Mind-Blowing Mandela Effect Instances That Will BLOW Your Mind.