But the film’s treatment of time travel is annoyingly inconsistent at best.
Let’s look at the memorable actions that Marty undertakes that have potential ramifications for his (and our) future.
Firstly let’s look at the events that are self-consistent. That is events where something Marty does seems to have an effect on the future but the effect is something which has actually been a part of history all along.
Let me give an example.
Marty plays Jonny B Goode on stage. Marvin Berry gets on the phone to his brother Chuck and who hears the song and is thus inspired to write the song. Marty’s action has influenced the events of history but presumably this must have been what happened all along. We assume that many years before Marty McFly was born Chuck Berry received a phone call from his cousin which inspired him to write the song. Only by us seeing Marty travel back in time did the pieces all fall together.
This brings up a chicken and egg situation. If Marty in 1985 learned to play Jonny B Goode from hearing the Chuck Berry song, and then in 1955 he inspired the young
It is like a circular reference in Excel.
It simply exists.
But that is for another discussion – my point is that an action Marty takes in 1955 doesn’t change anything about his 1985 world. He didn’t leave a world with no Jonny B Goode only to return to a world with Jonny B Goode.
The same thing applies when the women who would go to be his mother comments what a nice name Marty is. This is a clever little nod to the audience implying that by travelling back in time and meeting his parents Marty has inspired his parents to name their third born child in 15 years after him.
Marty left a world where he is called Marty and when he returns to 1985 he is still called Marty – nothing has changed – his actions in 1955 must have always been a part of history. His actions had effect but nothing that hadn’t already happened in his 1985 many years before.
In this situation there is only one time line. Marty travels back to 1955 and anything he does there is what is meant to be and must have already happened in the past. In this situation if and when Marty goes Back to the Future he will travel back along the one time line to a 1985 exactly the same as the one he left.
This all works well and good until we look at the situation with Marty endangering is own existence by causing is parents not to meet. If the above situation holds Marty would have not been able to change anything that would affect his 1985. Remember anything he does must have had always happened. If the causal loop above holds then if he makes his parents not meet in the way they described to him at the start of the film, then maybe the way the described it to him in 1985 was misremembered by them, or was a lie. Anything that happens in 1955 must have already happened in his own parents past. He is changing nothing.
He could have done anything and it wouldn’t matter what he did because it had already happened. He has come from the future that was produced as a result of it. This is the same future where Chuck Berry sang Jonny B Goode and his parents called him Marty.
All the running around trying to get his parents to meet and fall in love should have been unnecessary.
But, and this is a big problem with the film, when his parents do eventually meet and fall in love, under different circumstances to how they described, this does change Marty’s 1985. We learn this when Marty eventually does get Back to the Future and his dad is a successful author and Biff is waxing his car.
The only explanation for this different 1985 is that another timeline was created at the point Biff was knocked out by George McFly, creating a whole new thirty years leading to a new 1985. Now when Marty travels forward he travels forward along the new timeline to the New 1985.
What I don’t understand is why some events that happen as a result of Marty’s visit to 1955 cause a new timeline to be made, and some don’t.
Explain that to me, Robert Zemeckis.
Where is the consistency?
Maybe Bob Gale would know.
My favourite film of all time, though.
These are my own personal views and not those of the BBC.If any offence is taken to the above I assure you that the offending comments are ironic.
The Doctor Who explanation for this sort of thing is that one of the fundamental things about how time works is that some events are, for whatever reason they just have to happen, unchangeable and fixed in time while others are subject to change by way of time travel. It's not the cleanest explanation but as a way of rationalising it more or less works. Inventing rock and roll and influencing his own name were fixed and had to happen (insert sciencey sounding reason here), but the parental situation and Biff's shenanigans in part 2 were more fluid.
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