10 Controversial TV Show Retcons That Pissed Off Fans

This one is interesting because it involves a fake retcon. Despite her spontaneous entrance into the show after previous information given to the audience completely contradicted her existence, Dawn Summers was entirely intended by the writers to confuse fans by being nonsensical and unexplained. Then this "retcon" was explained to be a big, interesting plotline for the show... that still pissed fans off.

Dawn appears at the start of season 5 as Buffy's younger sister, despite the show very clearly establishing Buffy as an only child. This in itself is a huge retcon of Buffy's personal history, as for four episodes, Dawn exists in the Scooby gang's life as if nothing were amiss and that Buffy had always had a sister. Then this is retconned by revealing that Dawn was actually a mystical power known as "the key", and was transformed into a physical being and given to Buffy as a sister to protect. The main characters all have false memories of her existence implanted by the monks who created her, and the show continues on with Dawn as a main character despite these falsehoods.

Dawn - to put it lightly - is not a liked character in the Buffy universe. She was listed by Entertainment Weekly as one of the most annoying characters on TV, alongside loathed juggernauts such as Janice from Friends and Nikki and Paulo from LOST. She was generally whiny and irritating, and her false implanting into the show with fake memories never really sat right in fans' minds.

Dawn Summers is certainly one of the most infamous retcons in TV history just down to the sheer bravery of it. It didn't exactly pay off and fans continue to resent the character of Dawn to this day, but no one can deny that it was ballsy.