Comments on new idea please...

Interesting. But the problem with writing time travel is that it involves something as complex as time travel. Does he stop the murder of his parents, and then become the suspect of attempted murder? If he does stop the attack on his parents, him from the future wouldn't have had a reason to travel back in time, therefore either making him non-existant in the past timeline, OR because it branched him off into another timeline, if he went back to the future there would be another him.

But an interesting concept.

BustedStuff said:

Title: Whatever Will Be

Logline: An obsessed Astroyphysicist travels back in time to the days preceding the unsolved murder of his family to prevent the brutal attack, but unwittingly makes himself the prime suspect.

Any thoughts are much appreciated!

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Understandably you want to keep the nuts-n-bolts to yourself, but it is a very overdone concept. But, depending on your spin, it could be worth doing. Aside from the physics and twonkie paradoxes, the idea of going back to stop a murder/assassination/etc. of a loved one/family member/government official/etc. is not so new. Still, they make a lot of movies about it.

I say this because the idea is not what you need to focus on to set yours apart. After you finish it, be a bit more targeted in the logline. For example, assuming your story line is more specific:

An astrophysicist travels back in time as he attempts to piece together the events to prevent his parents' deaths. His knowledge makes him the prime suspect and may allow the killer to escape into his future.

That little twist at the end raises the stakes. It's a well-worn idea but it can still be marketable. Good luck.

The bit that I like is "but unwittingly makes himself the prime suspect."

Reminds me of the scene in The Terminator where Kyle Reese is stalking Sarah Connor through the streets of L.A. She's scared of him when actually he's the man who was sent back in time to save her life.

Neat concept. I like. If I think of anything worthy to add, I'll let you know.

It could be a pretty cool concept. Time travel never gets old, as long as there are new ideas on it. Everyone talks about how the person time traveling, will have their reasons for getting a time machine canceled out, once they have stopped the crime from happening, like in this case. Perhaps that idea should be explored for once?

harmonica44 said:

...Perhaps that idea should be explored for once?

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There's an episode from season 4 of "The X-Files", called Synchrony, that deals with a man travelling back in time to kill himself and his former co-workers, in order to prevent them (and himself) from discovering time-travel.



As for the concept, I like it. It could be something really good. I think you just need to write it. Complete the story, refine it, then look for ideas to improve it.

One possible idea though: His obsession has driven him mad (although we wouldn't know this until later in the film) and it was him that killed his family.

mad_hatter said:

One possible idea though: His obsession has driven him mad (although we wouldn't know this until later in the film) and it was him that killed his family.

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Oh, damn! That could be one hell of a twist. In order for it to be a twist, though, I think he'd have to be not all that mad. Just a little mad. And it shouldn't be murder, but manslaughter, or whatever accidental incident occurs as a result of him trying to prevent it. I love time-travel movies that have major paradoxes like that. Nice suggestion!

overdone or not, Im with CF ^^ Time travel seldom disappoints. If you can keep all the time travel within days..

chronology like this..

today the sciguy is on the verge of announcing his discovery, hes been sleeping at the lab for few days making this break through..
He goes home, finds wife murdered
drives back to the lab calls the police while driving to the lab
goes back to yesterday to "prevent" the murder
something goes wrong, he fails to save her and unwittingly leaves physical evidence pointing to him BEING at the scene of the crime at the time of the murder
he comes back to the present, drives home and finds the police on the scene
thats what he thinks anyway...

Here is what really happened..

Hes been sleeping at the lab becuase he found out that she is having an affair..
He goes home and kills her
has remorse and guilt
goes back in time to prevent the murder
As hes explaining to his wife..
the old self sneaks up on him and knocks out the future self, the old self then kills the wife.
the old self drags the future self back to the present (his future)
levees him sitting on the lab floor dazed
the future self drives home, gets arrested for murder..
The old self is alive living free

but wait theirs more..


the old self, is now in the present, goes back in time, before the murder, and the murder redux, brings the living OLD wife to the PRESET, together they get the insurance money, steel the time machine design, and live happily ever after. (shed been having an affair with the future version of her husband all along, together they planed the whole thing.. )


lol

Sounds like a really nice premise. Can't think of anything terribly similar.

I think it'd be fun to go full on Time Bandits and go back to the 19th Century to discover who killed one of your ancestors, but I realise that poses other problems.

Thanks for all the replies...

I agree, time travel is perhaps overused, but also think it is great when done correctly.

Wheatgrinder...i really like your suggestion of keeping the chronology short...that could be very cool...

on a side note, another possible title i'm considering: Only Time Will Tell

Anyone like that better?

In Futurama, Fry went back in time and unwittingly became his own grandpa.

Time-travel stories are incredibly difficult to get right without creating major consistancy and logic problems within your story. As such, you need to pick a "movie physics" model of time travel for your story and be sure you consider all the ramifications of how you have time travel work in your imaginary world you're constructing.


Universe Models:

1. The Immutable Universe: Nothing actually changes, and the events in the past already include the effects of a time traveler. A person traveling back in time is already a part of history and cannot actually alter events from how they have already happened. This model is self-consistent and non-contradictory. It avoids most of the problems that can crop up in time travel stories. The fallout of this model is that there is a definite "present" -- nothing past the present has happened yet and so time-travelers from beyond that point are impossible. A person can only travel from the real present to the already-happened past. If this is not followed, then the entire history of the universe is set in stone and free will is not possible.
2. The Self-Correcting Universe: Events will tend towards how they have always been after a time disturbance by a time-traveler, but minor deviations can be caused by them. For instance, a time-traveler may go back and kill Hitler as a teenager, but WWII and the German atrocities will still happen, just by the hands of different people and in a slightly different manner. This is the most troublesome timeline model since there is really no reason for the timeline to assume any particular "shape", so why would it return to a specific configuration after a disturbance? This model destroys the concept of free-will entirely.
3. The Modifiable Universe: A time-traveler can completely alter events. Free will still exists. This is your best bet since it avoids the consequences of the previous two models. Otherwise, pick the Immutable Past model with a definite Present.
4. The Multiple Timeline Universe: Going back in time causes a split at the point of arrival. When combined with the Self-Correcting Universe you get the "Back to the Future" style of time travel. Otherwise, this method of time travel is identical to the Modifiable Universe so there's really no reason to use this one. It also introduces the even-more-ridiculous-than-time-travel concept that an entire universe's amount of energy suddenly pops into existence when a time-travel event happens (since you now have two universes where you used to have one). This is a brain-bending amount of energy. Where does it come from?

Timeline Models:

1. The Future is Connected to the Past: Again, this is the "Back to the Future" model, where a time-traveler can make changes, but if they kill their parents they will vanish from the timeline because they will have never been born. This is my least favorite model because it induces oscillation: if you go back and kill your parents then you will cease to exist and never travel back in time to kill your parents so you are born and then later travel back in time and kill your parents etc, etc, etc.
2. Energy-Conserving Time Travel: We're all made of particles which are just energy vibrations in the fundamental physical fields (this is actually true), so you can view a time-traveler as someone who's energy/mass is taken out of the timeline and re-inserted into the past. They will continue to exist even if they kill their parents because the configuration of energy that is the matter that makes up that person has already been moved. No extra energy has been added to the universe, no time-oscillations happen, and everything remains self-consistent.

Another thing to watch out for: Stable Time Loops. When handled correctly, this can be awesome (as done in the wonderful fan-fiction "Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality"). Done wrong it's just flat-out stupid, so be careful. A stable-time loop is when one travels back in time in an "everything is connected" timeline model. It allows for things/information/occurrences to just pop out of nowhere: A man digs through an old archive of scientific papers which gives him an idea for how time travel could work. He travels back in time but the machine is destroyed so the man sets about re-deriving the math/technology but is in a car crash before he can finish. Decades later, that man is born, grows up, and then discovers the papers from his previous time-traveling self and finishes the work, inventing time travel and traveling back in time where he...

See where this is going? It's a loop that appears to have popped into existence from absolutely nowhere. Left in this state, it's totally unworkable and should be avoided. If you have to have a time loop, there must be an initial starting point: Say someone in the far-flung future travels back to the past. Decades later, the ruins of the time machine are discovered by our protagonist, who reverse-engineers it, travels back in time, and then is in that car crash. Decades later that man is born and later he discovers ruins of the time machine he built (instead of the one from the original time traveler). In this manner a workable "loop out of nowhere" is constructed because the loop had a starting point but then settled into a stable, self-consistent loop.

Wow.

I had no idea I was going to be writing a manifesto here. Use what you can.

escher said:

Wow. I had no idea I was going to be writing a manifesto here.

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It was a worthy read.

Woe Escher! What an amazing reply! Can't thank you enough! Given me so much to consider/think about.

1,000 thank you's!