Escalation is where the Terminator franchise went wrong. The writers kept enlarging their world until it became contradictory.
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To keep the story under control, the time machine itself should be a hard system even if the concept of time is soft and pliable.
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Time travel into the future is not as tricky as travel into the past because altering the future does not create so many complex story problems.
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Terminator 3 crossed into hard magic territory when it added the concept of fate to time travel, which means that specific rules began to matter.
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The writers of Time Travel 2002 merely use Wells’s story’s name and reputation to tell a less satisfying tale of their own making.
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The answer to the traveler’s dilemma is provided by an Uber-Morlock, unique to this version of the story and perhaps the most interesting character in the film.
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By making the Eloi more hearty and capable of surviving on their own, the writers destroy the seriousness of the threat the Morlocks represent.
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Over the last several months, I’ve talked about time travel. Originally, I’d planned to discuss the trope in more detail — when and how to use it, when and how not to use it, and whether it was better to rely on fate as a stabilizing force in the narrative. Or is it better to play around with various paradoxes? But then I realized that no in-depth discussion about the trope would be complete without reviewing the novel and subsequent movie that started it all. The Time Machine (1895) by H.G. Wells (1866–1946) can only be described as the most notable work on time travel. In fact, Wells is often thought of as the man who invented science fiction itself. Read More ›
A conundrum emerges: Even if they can reset the timeline, the time travelers will have no way of warning their future selves that this incident ever happened.
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We learn that the butterfly effect only alters the evolution of biological material and the weather, and the effects start with plants.
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I compliment the writers for constructing a scenario where it is actually conceivable for time travelers to enter the past without altering it.
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I think “A Sound of Thunder” has remained popular partially because the butterfly effect is a unique idea if nothing else.
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If writers make the old victories meaningless, the new victories will be meaningless as well, and no one will care about whatever new story appears.
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There are plenty of dumb errors in movies, but Dark Fate made the most obvious mistake I’ve ever seen.
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I have warned about the perils of using time travel in storytelling. This movie is a prime example of the problems I was talking about.
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While the film begins well, it eventually falls into the trap of spectacle over substance. But I recommend it for the music, the acting, and the visuals.
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Cooper says that the mysterious “They” have “evolved.” How in the world did natural selection select the fifth dimension?
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