Spoilers Timeless: Season 1 on NBC

[Scout101]

Yep, think that was the disconnect that had me struggling so badly with your suggestion. it did force me to refine my thoughts on that, though. I like the idea that the lifeboat could only travel more vaguely, so say, +/- a year or so. that allows for successful test, but not great time machine. The mothership being the improved version, they can now dial it in to a week, or a day or even exact moment. The lifeboat can home in on the mothership, allowing it to get MUCH closer to exact, but still lagging slightly behind due to San Dimas time (can find the ship in time and go to that point, but only from the elapsed time, not arrival time).

this makes more sense perhaps with how they are using the devices, and allows for a more natural engineering stroke.

 

[JD]

Maybe the did some kind of animal tests with a remote pilot at first? If they started with some kind of insect or something with a life span of days or weeks it wouldn't have taken as long to figure out the whole only travel outside of you lifetime thing. It also would have been a lot less messy when they started testing.

 

[Christopher]

Okay, this episode helped clarify why the lifeboat needs a pilot. It's not to steer the capsule through time, it's to direct its arrival in space so that it lands on the ground instead of inside solid rock or a mile in the air or something.

The stuff with the "protocol" made little sense to me. How could they have a plan already in place for getting a message to the present but not already have a plan in place for how to retrieve the lifeboat if it couldn't get back on its own? And would Rufus really entrust his life and those of his friends to a message based on a Star Wars analogy instead of actually stating in technical detail how to do what he was suggesting? The language of science is math, not movie allusions.

And if Flynn needs Lucy to survive to write the journal, why try to strand her in the past?

Did Lucy say Native Americans didn't take prisoners? I don't know about this particular community, but for a lot of indigenous peoples in Eastern North America, taking prisoners was a routine practice, either as captives to be ritually tortured to death or as hostages to be adopted and assimilated into the community to replace lost members. If I recall right from college, this was a source of cultural conflict in early European contacts, because the Europeans considered it more honorable to kill or die in the heat of battle than in captivity, while the indigenous Americans saw it the other way around. So each side saw the other side's treatment of enemy combatants as immoral and dishonorable.

 

[sojourner]

Flynn may have read in the journal that he stranded them in the past and felt compelled to complete the causal loop.

 

[Degra1]

Some of the team camaraderie felt forced to me--not the least bit natural in my opinion

I also don't get why Flynn bothered telling anything to Lucy about writing a journal in the future. Runs risk of changing the fact that she wrote the journal in the first place. Then where would that leace Flynn and his mission

And there was nothing else mentioned about Flynn. They talked of sending forces to Mexico then heard nothing else

I'm hoping this show ends up being one of those series that starts out lacking but finds its rhythm and becomes a good consistent series because right now it's disappointing

 

[Guy Gardener]

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The judge looks familiar.

 

[Scout101]

I wouldn't think you'd want to tempt fate by screwing with the journal at all, lest you encourage Lucy NOT to write it, knowing that this is where Flynn is getting his info from.

Can do the Bill and Ted thing even more, have her just say "fine, I'm not going to write a journal" and watch it disappear from his hands

 

[Romulan_spy]

And would Rufus really entrust his life and those of his friends to a message based on a Star Wars analogy instead of actually stating in technical detail how to do what he was suggesting? The language of science is math, not movie allusions.

True but then we would not have had the tender moment between the two. The writers sacrificed plausibility in order to have a moment where the characters connect and share their feelings.

 

[LJones41]

True but then we would not have had the tender moment between the two. The writers sacrificed plausibility in order to have a moment where the characters connect and share their feelings.

I find this comment rather odd, considering that both Rufus and Lucy had spoken up to keep Wyatt on the team two or three episodes ago. Oh well.

 

[Romulan_spy]

I find this comment rather odd, considering that both Rufus and Lucy had spoken up to keep Wyatt on the team two or three episodes ago. Oh well.

You might have misunderstood my post. I was referring to the scene between Rufus and the computer girl, Jiya, at the end where they confess to caring for each other. Earlier in the episode, Jiya tells Mason about her first encounter with Rufus where they disagreed over star wars vs star trek. So having her figure out his star wars reference served to show that she understood him and gave the two characters something to bond over at the end. Not sure what that has to do with Rufus and Lucy defending Wyatt.

 

[JD]

This episode really just felt like filler. It might have been a nice bonding, coming together as a team episode if it had come earlier, but they've already been through a lot together and seem to be a pretty solid team.

 

[Marc]

This episode really just felt like filler. It might have been a nice bonding, coming together as a team episode if it had come earlier, but they've already been through a lot together and seem to be a pretty solid team.

I disagree.

They were a strong team, then the revelations from the trip back to Watergate destroyed the trust and they had to rebuild and also deal with various ramiications.

 

[Christopher]

True but then we would not have had the tender moment between the two. The writers sacrificed plausibility in order to have a moment where the characters connect and share their feelings.

That was obviously the intent, of course, but that doesn't mean it was executed well. Suspension of disbelief is earned, not mandatory. If a plot contrivance is too implausible or clumsy, if it pulls you out of the story, then it's fair game for criticism.

 

[Stephen Lee]

The stuff with the "protocol" made little sense to me. How could they have a plan already in place for getting a message to the present but not already have a plan in place for how to retrieve the lifeboat if it couldn't get back on its own?

Maybe they never finished hammering out all the possible things that could have happened? The protocols were based on the new machine and not the prototype. The prototype is a lifeboat, was probably never meant to go out every single trip. The prototype WAS the protocol to retrieve the Mothership if it never came back. As we know, this wasn't planned and everyone is learning as they go.

And would Rufus really entrust his life and those of his friends to a message based on a Star Wars analogy instead of actually stating in technical detail how to do what he was suggesting? The language of science is math, not movie allusions.

If Rufus explains it in math, it might take 30 pages to explain what he did with in one sentence.

And if Flynn needs Lucy to survive to write the journal, why try to strand her in the past?

Flynn found a log entry from Lucy stating "That piece of $hi7 Flynn stranded us back in Sept 15, 1754, we almost didn't make it back alive. Got captured twice but luck was on our side." a few pages latter is another log entry from Lucy stating "Got stranded again this time due to some mumbo jumbo, but Rufus was able to get his home. Thank god our Protocols were updated when we got stuck in 1754."

 

[Guy Gardener]

The journal shouldn't work like that.

Everything in the past from before they back step was put there by different time travellers, and the rest of reality that just muddlingly along.

That journal is from the past.

It's not the journal that this Lucy is going to write, because as soon as she starts writing her own journal, it's going to be different, and his journal written by a previous version of Lucy is not going to change.

The travellers always stay the same.

It's only the rest of the universe that changes, because of their actions.

I completely expect the Timeless to ignore their own rules and internal logic.

Eventually Lucy thinks she'll win by putting a bullet in her head before she writes the Journal.

All they need is a timeline where Lucy doesn't join the Time team pilot, and there will be two Lucy's rolling around, and if they send them both back in time...

If that happens then both Lucy's explode, or just one Lucy, and which Lucy is necessarily dominant?

Which is probably multiversally why the writers never track those timelines, although maybe that means that from time to time random (sorta) empty pods should be showing up full of exploded people?

If the pod has a resting birth that is always the same place, shouldn't they be worried about a second pod returning, overtop of the pod that is already parked in the base?

Which is I suppose why they need a pilot?

 

[Scout101]

Crappy protocol if they can't even seal a plastic bank container enough to avoid being destroyed over time. Plus seems kinda lucky it didn't get paved over, or dug up and thrown out, ruined when that house installs a sprinkler system, etc.

Shouldn't they have been more concerned that the lifeboat wasn't next to the message? I'd have thought they'd have expected both, unless protocol assumes the lifeboat is destroyed, or taken apart over time, or whatever and the message is all they have?

How do they communicate exactly where they land in the past, so they know where to dig? Didn't mention a beacon (with or without 300 year battery life), they've never said they could talk to the present while in the past. I guess Rufus can tell them physically where they plan to set down before they leave, but he can't really KNOW, can he? Can't know where every tree or rock wall in the past is, what's a swamp then that's a mini-mall now, so he's gotta have some level of ability to sorta fly this thing in. Even if he moves 50 feet over, they'll never find the message tube...

 

[Christopher]

Crappy protocol if they can't even seal a plastic bank container enough to avoid being destroyed over time. Plus seems kinda lucky it didn't get paved over, or dug up and thrown out, ruined when that house installs a sprinkler system, etc.

Well, that was the point, I thought -- that it was damaged by the construction of the residential area on top of it. There was a risk that it would be destroyed entirely, but instead it only got damaged. So they were only slightly lucky. Or rather, unlucky but not completely so.

Shouldn't they have been more concerned that the lifeboat wasn't next to the message? I'd have thought they'd have expected both, unless protocol assumes the lifeboat is destroyed, or taken apart over time, or whatever and the message is all they have?

If anything, the fact that the lifeboat's remains weren't there would be a good sign that they'd succeed in getting it back.

How do they communicate exactly where they land in the past, so they know where to dig? Didn't mention a beacon (with or without 300 year battery life), they've never said they could talk to the present while in the past.

They are able to track where the mothership goes in space and time, which is how they know how to outfit the travelers. Although it doesn't seem they should be able to track the lifeboat's arrival destination to the meter. Unless that's something they determine in advance before they even leave. We know now that Rufus's job is to pilot the lifeboat in space so that it lands safely on arrival, and since it doesn't actually "fly," just teleports/wormholes into position, it follows that the destination coordinates are programmed at the outset. Maybe there's a part we don't see where one of the background techs researches what the terrain was like in that place and time and computes the safest landing point.

 

[Scout101]

That's how you avoid a mountain, but not a tree. Teleporting into a tree would be 'not good'. Maybe the wormhole (or whatever) just bumps you a little to the side to avoid things like that, but I can't imagine they can pin the terrain down that precisely given that the potential landing place is the entire planet, for the entirety of time. (or at least several hundred years that we've seen). No way they've got it down that far; maybe you think it's a clear field but there was a sinkhole that spring that you missed. Something as simple as a fallen tree in the woods would be catastrophic when you appear partially inside it.

Dunno, they haven't gotten into the mechanics of it, but seems problematic. Easiest way would be for the machine to appear mid-air and be able to land itself safely, but nothing in the design or show itself would lend itself to that being the way it works. Having it pop back into place is ok as they know every micrometer of the facility, but pretty random going out in the world.

But they did wreck the landing facility a bit on the return, so there's at least some precedent for the time machine displacing whatever is in the way when it travels. It didn't replace the scaffolding, and it didn't merge with it, it pushed it out of the way/crushed it. Maybe it would just destroy the tree? What about a person walking in the woods? dunno if it would have the horsepower to displace, say, a solid enough object like a hill/dirt mound, mountainside, etc.

 

[Photoman15]

Crappy protocol if they can't even seal a plastic bank container enough to avoid being destroyed over time. Plus seems kinda lucky it didn't get paved over, or dug up and thrown out, ruined when that house installs a sprinkler system, etc.

Shouldn't they have been more concerned that the lifeboat wasn't next to the message? I'd have thought they'd have expected both, unless protocol assumes the lifeboat is destroyed, or taken apart over time, or whatever and the message is all they have?

How do they communicate exactly where they land in the past, so they know where to dig? Didn't mention a beacon (with or without 300 year battery life), they've never said they could talk to the present while in the past. I guess Rufus can tell them physically where they plan to set down before they leave, but he can't really KNOW, can he? Can't know where every tree or rock wall in the past is, what's a swamp then that's a mini-mall now, so he's gotta have some level of ability to sorta fly this thing in. Even if he moves 50 feet over, they'll never find the message tube...

Rufus specifically said to dig 2 meters in front of the Lifeboat. They either know the orientation of the lifeboat in the present or they search up to to the circumference of the lifeboat plus 2 meters.

 

[Scout101]

Right, just saying if the lifeboat gets bumped a couple feet because there's a tree where they plan to arrive, the location is off and they never find it. Maybe it should have had some sort of unique material that could be detected or something so they could search a wider area to allow for things like that...