What happened to the elevator in The Big Bang Theory?

The elevator in The Big Bang Theory is broken down throughout the series.

The Big Bang Theory is an American comedy sitcom that aired its first episode on September 24, 2007 and ended its journey on May 16, 2019. Created by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, the series has a total of 12 seasons aired under the CBS network, with a total of 279 episodes across all the seasons. The series follows a group of friends and scientists going by the names Sheldon, Leonard, Howard, and Rajesh who meet up with Penny, a struggling and aspiring actress who becomes a neighbor to Sheldon and Leonard.

The series stars Johnny Galecki, Jim Parsons, Kaley Cuoco, Simon Helberg, Kunal Nayyar, Sara Gilbert, Mayim Bialik, Melissa Rauch, Kevin Sussman, and Laura Spencer among many others. The series has received various awards and nominations in its 12-year journey. Among their various achievements, the show received the People's Choice Award in 2010 and 2019, along with the UK's National Television Awards in 2016.

What happened to the elevator in Big Bang Theory?

Throughout the 12 seasons of The Big Bang Theory, the elevator is shown as broken and non-functioning for the characters, making them use the stairs all the time. In the episode "The Staircase Implementation", Sheldon Cooper explained that the elevator was not functioning way before he moved into the building. But later in the series, it was informed that the lift was broken after one of Leonard’s experiments. At the time when the character was working on an experimental rocket fuel formula, things went out of control with the formula starting to burst.

To control the situation, Leonard took the formula outside by carrying it down through the elevator. Thinking on his feet, Sheldon pulled Leonard out of the elevator as it closed, before the formula blew up. It took 16 years for the elevator to get fixed, which was shown during the penultimate episode "The Change Constant", which became one of the memorable moments in the series.

How many times has the elevator been used in The Big Bang Theory?

Although the elevator was never used for traveling throughout the series considering that it wasn’t working, it has been used for various other reasons in the show. In the season 3 episode titled "The Jiminy Conjecture", Sheldon, Raj, and Howard search the elevator shaft for a cricket that they heard about in the building. While the trio did not find anything, the episode showed a funny moment when Sheldon got stuck in the shaft and his torch ran out of batteries. In the same season, we have another instance during the episode "The Lunar Excitation", when a drunk Leonard, on the fourth floor, slightly opens the elevator door and drops a wine bottle to calculate the height, concluding it to be 30 feet.

In the season 7 episode "The Scavenger Vortex" Leonard forces the elevator doors open while finding a clue in the scavenger hunt that Raj planned. The doors for the elevator were opened one last time during the final episode of the series titled "The Stockholm Syndrome", when the gang struggles to put all of their luggage and themselves into the elevator, now that it was repaired, as they headed to the airport. At this time Leonard comes up with the plan to send the luggage down through the elevator while they walk down the stairs like they always used to do.