The Long Road

04/04/2005 Archived Entry: "Time Travel in Science Fiction - Part 6: The Terminators"

The first terminator movie worked on the assumption that time was unchanging. John Connor sent a soldier back through time to protect his mother; the soldier would impregnate Sarah Connor who would eventually give birth to John. The evil supercomputer, Skynet, similarly sends a cyborg terminator to the past; the terminator is destroyed and its pieces used to build Skynet.

The second terminator movie presents that time can be changed. The terminator gives John and Sarah Connor a detailed history on the rise of Skynet; they then proceed to alter things in such a way that everything the terminator has told them is no longer true. However, unlike Marty in “Back to the Future”, the terminator is immune to the changes they have created in the timeline - he still exists and all his memories are intact.

The third terminator movie presents a more interesting model. It proposes that time is only mutable in the short term. “Terminator 3” proposes that Skynet will rise and take over the world no matter what is done. The only thing that anyone can do is delay its ascension.

A similar model exists in the 2002 movie adaptation of Wells’ “The Time Machine”. In the movie, the time traveler goes into the past to prevent his fiancée from being killed. He manages to avert her death only to have her killed in a different manner. Like “Terminator 3”, there was a short term change in the timeline; but unlike “Terminator 3”’s 10 year latency, the timeline adjusted itself within a matter of minutes.

This model suggests that time has some tolerance for minor changes as long as the desired outcome is eventually reached. It also requires that there exists some form of unknown force in the universe which knows what the future should be like and can manipulate events so that the outcome is as expected despite any time traveler’s interference. In both movies, the characters were unaffected by the time travel, they remembered what was supposed to have happened.

Replies: 3 comments

That kind of reminds me of the movie Final Destination. A kid has a vision that the plane he and his friends are on is going to crash. Because of his vision, he prevents himself and a handful of his friends from being abord the plane when it crashes. They survive, but death comes for them as they were suppose to die on the plane. Death is therefore fixing the timeline, which is kind of cool. I think i like the idea that the process leading to certain events can be altered, but the event itself is stationary. Like there are alot of different ways to get to the Beer Store, and how you get there has little effect on where you're going. Regardless of teh route...you will get drunk in the end.

Posted by Doug @ 04/05/2005 11:46 AM EST

I respect the beer analogy...:P. But I don't see how a stationary timeline is "cool"?!

I can't see time as an unalterable dimension. I agree with the theory of multiple timelines, which Thai grazed upon previously.

Posted by dAN @ 04/05/2005 01:53 PM EST

Very good, time could be like a guitar string. The ends are fixed but you can make the string vibrate in between. This theory would allow for many minor changes in events but the fixed outcome would always be reached.

Posted by OhGoOn @ 05/27/2005 06:01 AM EST