TV series with a time travel theme?

[Steve Timko]

I was watching an especially laughable episode of "Voyagers!" last night (some Nazis had blow-dried hair; one Nazi had so much eye make up on to make him look evil he looked like a raccoon) and it dawned on me that time travel is actually a pretty good plot device. Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?
By the way, I'm surprised at "Voyargers!" 8.0 rating on IMDB.

[David Bruggeman]

Time Tunnel - Irwin Allen produced, James Darren was one of the stars.
time travel factored into some of The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.
the new series Terra Nova basically takes an Earth 2 setup and goes into the past, rather than another planet.

There are most likely others.

David

---

From: Steve Timko <steve...@gmail.com>
To: tvor...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sun, January 16, 2011 1:16:19 PM
Subject: [TV orNotTV] TV series with a time travel theme?

I was watching an especially laughable episode of "Voyagers!" last night (some Nazis had blow-dried hair; one Nazi had so much eye make up on to make him look evil he looked like a raccoon) and it dawned on me that time travel is actually a pretty good plot device. Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?
By the way, I'm surprised at "Voyargers!" 8.0 rating on IMDB.

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[Jim Ellwanger]

On Jan 16, 2011, at 10:16 AM, Steve Timko wrote:

> Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?

"Journeyman" comes to mind.

As well as several "Twilight Zone" episodes, but that probably goes without saying.

--
Jim Ellwanger <trai...@ellwanger.tv>
<http://www.ellwanger.tv/>

[Ben Scripps]

On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 1:35 PM, Jim Ellwanger <trai...@ellwanger.tv> wrote:

On Jan 16, 2011, at 10:16 AM, Steve Timko wrote:

> Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?

"Journeyman" comes to mind.

As well as several "Twilight Zone" episodes, but that probably goes without saying.

I seem to recall "Futurama" has done time travel once or twice...

--
--
Ben Scripps
bensc...@gmail.com

[Bob in Jersey]

Mother J was fond of the show "Seven Days" from the late, lamented
UPN...



--
BOB

[PGage]

On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 10:16 AM, Steve Timko <steve...@gmail.com> wrote:

I was watching an especially laughable episode of "Voyagers!" last night (some Nazis had blow-dried hair; one Nazi had so much eye make up on to make him look evil he looked like a raccoon) and it dawned on me that time travel is actually a pretty good plot device. Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?
By the way, I'm surprised at "Voyargers!" 8.0 rating on IMDB.

I guess "Flash Forward" was a time travel show. Also, "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" includes time travel as a device.  I used to love Time Tunnel (mentioned by another poster on this thread, all 30 episodes available on Hulu).

Time travel of course is a staple of science fiction in literature, films and television. In my experience talking to Sci Fi fans (I am only a dilettante in this world, I know there are more hard core Sci Fiers here) there are a lot who detest time travel devices, mostly on scientific and logical grounds, but also on dramatic and story-telling grounds (for example, in the Terminator universe, it is never really clear why anything ever matters, since either side can just keep going back to the past over and over to try again. T1 tried to close this door, and if they had left it there maybe it would have worked, but all later chapters in the series completely undermined that.

Personally, I am a sucker for time travel devices, and as long as they are done reasonably well, and set up their own rules and mostly follow them, I can ignore the other problems. I even like "Time Cop".

There are a couple of interesting books on the science of time travel, including: "Time Travel in Einstein's Universe: The Physical Possibilities of Travel Through Time" by Gott and "How to Build a Time Machine"  Davies

Paul Davies (Author)

› Visit Amazon's Paul Davies Page

Find all the books, read about the author, and more.

See search results for this author

Are you an author? Learn about Author Central

 (I have actually one read the first one of these myself).

[Steve Cooper]

Don’t forget Stewie’s tie machine n Family Guy!

 

Steve

 

From: tvor...@googlegroups.com [mailto:tvor...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of PGage
Sent: Sunday, January 16, 2011 3:13 PM
To: tvor...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [TV orNotTV] TV series with a time travel theme?

 

On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 10:16 AM, Steve Timko <steve...@gmail.com> wrote:

I was watching an especially laughable episode of "Voyagers!" last night (some Nazis had blow-dried hair; one Nazi had so much eye make up on to make him look evil he looked like a raccoon) and it dawned on me that time travel is actually a pretty good plot device. Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?
By the way, I'm surprised at "Voyargers!" 8.0 rating on IMDB.

I guess "Flash Forward" was a time travel show. Also, "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" includes time travel as a device.  I used to love Time Tunnel (mentioned by another poster on this thread, all 30 episodes available on Hulu).

Time travel of course is a staple of science fiction in literature, films and television. In my experience talking to Sci Fi fans (I am only a dilettante in this world, I know there are more hard core Sci Fiers here) there are a lot who detest time travel devices, mostly on scientific and logical grounds, but also on dramatic and story-telling grounds (for example, in the Terminator universe, it is never really clear why anything ever matters, since either side can just keep going back to the past over and over to try again. T1 tried to close this door, and if they had left it there maybe it would have worked, but all later chapters in the series completely undermined that.

Personally, I am a sucker for time travel devices, and as long as they are done reasonably well, and set up their own rules and mostly follow them, I can ignore the other problems. I even like "Time Cop".

There are a couple of interesting books on the science of time travel, including: "Time Travel in Einstein's Universe: The Physical Possibilities of Travel Through Time" by Gott and "How to Build a Time Machine"  Davies

Paul Davies (Author)

› Visit Amazon's Paul Davies Page

Find all the books, read about the author, and more.

See search results for this author

Are you an author? Learn about Author Central

 (I have actually one read the first one of these myself).

--

[PGage]

On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 1:35 PM, Steve Cooper <ste...@hotmail.com> wrote:

Don’t forget Stewie’s tie machine n Family Guy!

For that matter, the Flintstones traveled through time in "The Time Machine" episode (#18 from Season 5) (as per the wikis: "The Flintstones and the Rubbles visit the Bedrock World's Fair, where they visit a time machine exhibit, where they travel to various times of the "future" (a caricature of Jack Benny is used in the "Nero" sequence). Note: Officer Dibble from "Top Cat" makes a cameo appearance as a policeman from the future."

Weren't there also episodes with a little guy who traveled from the future? Or was he just a space alien?

And of course, the classic: "The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones is an animated TV movie, featuring the first meeting between the characters from The Flintstones and The Jetsons. Made by Hanna-Barbera, it first aired on November 9, 1987, as part of the Hanna-Barbera Superstars 10 series Elroy creates a time machine which accidentally results in the Jetsons being sent to prehistoric times."

[Bradford]

If you're thinking of "The Great Gazoo", according to Wikipedia he was just a space alien.

 

"The Great Gazoo is a tiny, green, floating alien who was exiled to Earth from his home planet Zetox as punishment for having invented a doomsday machine, a weapon of immense destructive power."

 

He was voiced by the pre-Carol Burnett Show Harvey Korman.

----- Original Message -----

From: PGage

To: tvor...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Sunday, January 16, 2011 3:55 PM

Subject: Re: [TV orNotTV] TV series with a time travel theme?

[Melissa Neal]

On Jan 16, 2011, at 12:30 PM, David Bruggeman wrote:

Time Tunnel - Irwin Allen produced, James Darren was one of the stars.
time travel factored into some of The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.
the new series Terra Nova basically takes an Earth 2 setup and goes into the past, rather than another planet.

I watched that when I little, and I loved a short-lived series called It's About Time, starring Joe E. Ross and Imogene Coca. It was originally about astronauts ending up in the past, but when the ratings went down, they sent the cavemen and women into the future. It didn't help the numbers.

Melissa N.

[PGage]

I mostly remember the theme song I think from that show, something like: "Its about time, its about space, its about men in the strangest place" and one of the characters named something like "Gronk"

[PGage]

Discussions with my son led to some googleing (the line is "about two men in the strangest place") - and the guy is named Gronk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1G-TsdNWGg

And yes, I was thinking of Gazoo.

[Ron Casalotti]

"Peabody, here..."

The 'Mr. Peabody and Sherman" featurette as part of "Rocky and his
Friends" and "The Bullwinkle Show" featured time travel in every
episode via the WABAC machine, a device named a la mode of the time
when UNIVAC ruled the tech world.

As an aside, and as an homage to the WABAC machine, the web site, The
Wayback Machine (http://www.archive.org/web/web.php) is an archive of
web pages of yesterday, so you can go back to see the early iterations
of current (and past) sites.

Ron Casalotti
Wayne, NJ

[Karen Owen]

Red Dwarf later in the series went back to a time before the

first episode when the rest of the original large ship's crew

was still alive.

 

[PGage]

Eureka has had a time travel element in its most recent season.

[Jay Lewis]

Stargates SG-1 and Atlantis have used this. SG-1 multiple times. (1969,
Window of Opportunity, Unending to name 3)

--
QWIZX.com - A little bit of everything

[M-D November]

Actually, Eureka's dabbled with the notion of time travel a few times, going back to their first season finale, where Henry screws with the time/space continuum to stop Kim from being killed by the Artifact, and Jack has to go back to stop him, risking his future with Allison.  More recently, the show used a trip back to the 1940s as a means to reset certain aspects of the show (and add James Callis).

[M-D November]

Not exactly.  While Red Dwarf has messed with the idea of time travel ("Timeslides" in particular), the reset you mentioned occurred at the beginning of series 8; the full (pre-disaster) crew was restored after the nanobots rebuilt the ship.  No time travel was involved.

[Ed Dravecky]

Steve Timko <steve...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Other than Voyagers!, "Doctor Who," "Quantum Leap" and the
> occasional "Star Trek" episode, what other TV series used time travel?

"Phineas and Ferb" have done several interesting time travel episodes.
There was a so-so BBC series in the late '90s called "Crime Traveller"
that used time travel to (wait for it) solve crimes. And I should
point out this resource...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Time_travel_television_series

--
Ed Dravecky III
http://www.fencon.org/

[PGage]

 And I should

point out this resource...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Time_travel_television_series

I quibble with some of their listings (I'm not sure "Carmen Sandiego" really fits into the spirit of our question here), and many I have never heard of. Others are time travel movies that I did not realize had been turned into TV shows (I missed the TV version of Timecop I guess). But I am irritated that I did not think of two obvious examples: Lost and Torchwood (though Steve's exclusion of Dr. Who may apply to the latter).

[Dave Sikula]

On Jan 17, 10:26 am, Ron Casalotti <roncasalo...@gmail.com> wrote:
> "Peabody, here..."
>
> The 'Mr. Peabody and Sherman" featurette as part of "Rocky and his
> Friends" and "The Bullwinkle Show" featured time travel in every
> episode via the WABAC machine, a device named a la mode of the time
> when UNIVAC ruled the tech world.

I mention parenthetically here that DreamWorks is planning a "Peabody
and Sherman" feature, with Mr. Peabody's voice to be supplied by
Robert Downey Jr.

Spielberg still hasn't met a bad idea he didn't want to rush onto the
screen.

--Dave Sikula

[David Risner]

About 5 or so years ago, there were two TV series, one on WB/CW and
the other, I think, on ABC that were the dude wakes up as a teenager
again. If I remember correctly, the ABC one bombed quickly and the
WB/CW one lasted for a season. I think the WB/CW one was a 1/2 hour
comedy while the ABC one was a 1 hour drama.

Isn't any show that uses the worst plot device in the world of
starting with the action sequence and then coming back after the
credits with "3 days earlier" really a time travel episode?

--
David Risner
Software Engineer
MERLOT, California State University

[Jay Lewis]

7 Days

[PGage]

On Tue, Jan 18, 2011 at 9:51 AM, David Risner <da...@risner.org> wrote:

Isn't any show that uses the worst plot device in the world of
starting with the action sequence and then coming back after the
credits with "3 days earlier" really a time travel episode?

 

I don't think so. That is more of a flashback device than a time travel device - in your example the audience travels in time (or perhaps better the narrative voice of the story is able to travel in time), but the characters themselves remain stuck in a linear, one-way time line that moves at a constant rate. 

[M-D November]

Assuming the series David is referring to is "7 Days", it was definitely time travel (albeit short range) and not a flashback.  The "Backstep" device was used to send a person back in time 1 week to prevent a catastrophic event.

[M-D November]

"Torchwood" doesn't really fit the definition, because as much as Captain Jack Harkness is a man out of time, time travel doesn't play a major role within the action of the series.  (All of Jack's time travel takes place within "Doctor Who".)  There was one episode in the first series ('Captain Jack Harkness') where Jack & Tosh get thrown back to WWII & the meet the man from whom Jack appropriated his name, but that was a one-off.

Yes, there's the 'rift', but that generally brings things TO present day Cardiff & doesn't take the team AWAY.

[David Risner]

Ah, the shows about guys returning to being teenagers I was thinking
of premiered in 2002: "Do Over" on The WB and "That Was Then" on ABC.

--
David Risner
Software Engineer
MERLOT, California State University

[Brad Beam]

----- Original Message -----
From: M-D November

>"Torchwood" doesn't really fit the definition, because as much as Captain
>Jack Harkness is a man out of time, time travel doesn't play a major role
>within the action of the series. (All of Jack's time travel takes place
>within "Doctor Who".) There was one episode in the first series ('Captain
>Jack Harkness') where Jack & Tosh get thrown back to WWII & the meet the
>man from whom Jack appropriated his name, but that was a one-off.

Actually, there was a non-flashback scene in the second series finale ("Exit
Wounds"), where Captain Jack was buried alive in 1st-century Cardiff by his
brother and an unwilling Spike-from-"Buffy", only to be literally unearthed
nearly 1.9 millennia later.

_ _
|_>|_> Brad Beam- Belle WV
|_>|_> http://www.facebook.com/74bmw

[PGage]

On Tue, Jan 18, 2011 at 11:02 AM, M-D November <mdnov...@gmail.com> wrote:

Assuming the series David is referring to is "7 Days", it was definitely time travel (albeit short range) and not a flashback.  The "Backstep" device was used to send a person back in time 1 week to prevent a catastrophic event.

We may be out of sync here, the post I was responding to from David specifically refers to "any show" that uses something like the "three days earlier" device (which the "The Good Guys" used to humorous effect).

[K.M. Richards]

7 Days was on UPN, not the WB. For whatever that's worth to the
discussion.

[Bob in Jersey]

If you read on the web, see post # 13.



--
BOB

[M-D November]

True enough - Captain John had a working Vortex Manipulator and took Jack back in time to bury him alive, but again, that was a one-off.

[David Risner]

Any show that does a version of "A Christmas Story" would be doing time travel.

--
David Risner
Software Engineer
MERLOT, California State University

On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 10:12 AM, M-D November <mdnov...@gmail.com> wrote:
> True enough - Captain John had a working Vortex Manipulator and took Jack
> back in time to bury him alive, but again, that was a one-off.
>

[David Bruggeman]

Christmas Story or Christmas Carol?

David

---

From: David Risner <da...@risner.org>

Subject: Re: [TV orNotTV] TV series with a time travel theme?

[David Risner]

Christmas Carol, sorry, my brain is currently low on caffeine at the moment...

--
David Risner
Software Engineer
MERLOT, California State University

[Melissa Neal]

On Jan 19, 2011, at 12:46 PM, David Risner wrote:

> Any show that does a version of "A Christmas Story" would be doing time travel.

I don't know. The spirits keep saying Scrooge is seeing visions of what happened in the past and what might happen in the future if he doesn't change his ways. Scrooge can't interact with anyone, nor can they see him.

I actually got around to reading the original Dickens story this year and discovered that his writing hasn't aged well. Thankfully there is the 1951 film, "Scrooge," starring Alastair Sim. It's a much better story.

Melissa N.

[Kevin M.]

I've not enjoyed a single variation on the Dickens "classic." I didn't
enjoy "It's A Wonderful Life," "Scrooged," or even the Muppet version.
Several actors consider Scrooge to be one of the best roles ever
created for a thespian. Maybe, but the story is bland.

--
Kevin M. (RPCV)

[Kevin M.]

On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 12:06 PM, Melissa Neal <drm...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>

I've not enjoyed a single variation on the Dickens "classic." I didn't

[PGage]

On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 12:06 PM, Melissa Neal <drm...@earthlink.net> wrote:

I am going to agree with A and disagree with B above. I don't think A Christmas Carol qualifies as time travel for the reasons Melissa notes - with the addition that part of the charm of the story is the possibility (even though Scrooge explicitly denies it) that the entire experience was a dream.

I re-read the story this year along with my 8th grade son, who was adapting it for his own script for a school project. I find it to be much more delightful read than I had remembered from high school, and I thought it held up very well. I also enjoy many (but not all) of the various film and television versions - including the recent Who.

[Melissa P]

I've been asked to do a blog for the Science and Entertainment Exchange on time travel as a plot device on TV and/or in movies.  This thread was great.

 

But since I'm not a fan of science fiction, and since I'm having trouble coming up with some kind of "hook," I thought I'd let the members of this group know about this assignment to see if anyone wants to offer any suggestions for what I should be writing about.  In other words, what would be particularly interesting about this subject?

 

Unfortunately, you won't get any credit -- I don't even get credit for coming up with ideas or writing blogs for the Exchange -- but you can always add comments once a blog is published.  

[Wesley McGee]

I really haven't thought about this so you are probably best ignoring everything I'm going to say, but often enough it seems that many use time travel plots to illuminate the frustrations of today and uncertainties of tomorrow by either going back to the supposed better times of yesterday, or to the either optimistic futopia or the dystopic tomorrow that results from the failures of today.

And to remember Dwayne McDuffie he had written a two part JLU episode to connect Jonah Hex into the DCAU as well as the Batman Beyond universe (with a guest appearance by his Milestone character Static).

And while I'm thinking of animated shows, there was only a few episodes with actual time travel (via the Phoenix Gate talisman) Gargoyles was very much a show where things occuring 500-1000 years ago had a deep lasting effect on the plot which nominally took place in present day New York City (though there had been plans for a spin-off specifically involving the Phoenix Gate).


And back to live action no one has mentioned Being Erica (though once someone posts a link to a Wikipedia list, I guess specific mentions of shows become needless). Being Erica is worth a look as it is less science fiction and fantasy (the only fantastic part is the mystery guy who allows Erica to relive days of her youth and potentially fix mistakes she's made).

--
Wesley McGee
http://www.ambivi.com
http://drawing-a-blank.tumblr.com