Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Time Travel (and Parallel Universe) Links

Mainly I wanted to share Timelinks, aetherco's big list of time-travel movie reviews. A related link is Andy's Anachronisms. Both review only movies and TV shows that feature Time Travel as a major plot point. What makes it cool is that the reviews have more to do with the consistency and logic of how time-travel functions in the setting of the films, than they do with the traditional film qualities most reviews focus on. At Timelinks, they list 700 films and shows, and score them from 1 to 12 (like the hours of a clock), though neither a 1 nor a 12 has ever been given, as a 1 would be too horrible to watch and a 12 would be actual video proof of time travel. Even the page on how their review system works is well worth a read.

To give you an example of what the sites are like, I offer their review of T3 - They ignore most of the films many mundane flaws to instead focus on how it deals with Time Travel, and how it muddles the rules of the first two films. The best part of the review is the supposition that maybe ALL the Terminators were sent by SkyNet, none by John Connor.
In fact, except for Kyle Reese, John's time-warped dad in the first movie, we have only the word of a bunch of Terminators about what the future holds. And even Reese could have been told to lie to Sarah Connor about the date of Judgment Day (originally August 29, 1997). After all, he memorized a speech to tell her.

There is even the grim possiblity that, since Terminators are programmed to lie constantly in pursuit of their goal, that ALL of the Terminators have been sent by Skynet. What better way to herd humans into desired events than by giving them a glimmer of hope?

I'd happily play in that Campaign.

(All this reminds me of Terminator: Salvation. That movie could be sweet. Fingers crossed.)

I just wish they'd get more reviews up, and more films rated. There's 700 time-travel films listed, but maybe half that many rated, and only a handful given full reviews.

...but while I'm providing links, here's a couple short scientific articles on parallel universes and how to make our own.

4 comments:

rbbergstrom said...

By the way, I could have swore I posted that link (and most of the post) on this blog months ago, but when I went looking for it today, I couldn't find it. Luckily, I knew the aetherco folks were involved with the review site, so I could google it.

Lunatyk said...

I just had to post the link to this blog post to Gone... I hope you don't mind...

rbbergstrom said...

I don't think I could ever mind someone directing extra traffic to my blog.

Couple quick questions:
1. Is "Gone" the Mr Gone I've seen at White Wolf's forums?
2. Have you (or Gone) ever played Continuum? (If you haven't: It's the best Time Travel RPG, and I hear there's a 2nd Edition coming out "soon". Definitely worth checking out.)

Lunatyk said...

1. The very same
2. I can only speak for myself: Nope, never heard of it...

http://forum.white-wolf.com/viewtopic.php?t=88383

just go to the 4th page...