Marty not being immune to timeline changes is quite literally the core plot of the first film.
Oh yeah I know that but seems they changed those rules for the Almanac unless that changes as it travels
Stuff in movies you realized in retrospect was horrible
- Thread starter JirinPanthosa
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Oh yeah I know that but seems they changed those rules for the Almanac unless that changes as it travels
I think by far the more logical explanation for the almanac is that the BttF franchise simply does not subscribe to the butterfly effect anywhere near as much as most sci-fi fans have been conditioned to expect.
The almanac remains useful because changing the lives of small-town residents in california (It's california, right?) simply doesn't reach far enough to alter the outcome of most major sporting events.
Also, it should be remembered that the almanac doesn't have to remain equally useful forever. The more money Biff has, the more he can afford to occasionally take a bath on a bet. Eventually he reaches a point where the almanac is entirely unnecessary, because in American society money begets money.
The almanac remains useful because changing the lives of small-town residents in california (It's california, right?) simply doesn't reach far enough to alter the outcome of most major sporting events.
Also, it should be remembered that the almanac doesn't have to remain equally useful forever. The more money Biff has, the more he can afford to occasionally take a bath on a bet. Eventually he reaches a point where the almanac is entirely unnecessary, because in American society money begets money.
But that's mostly local stuff.^ True - but Part II shows multiple instances of newspapers changing to reflect the new history, so there's no reason at all to think the almanac wouldn't, also.
George doesn't get killed, stuff like that. Nothing about sports games, or presidents, or economies etc
You guys are speculating on a logical inconsistency where there is none. As far as we know, time-traveling documents are affected by changes in the timeline, we see that Biff made it big on the knowledge from the Almanac, therefore it is logical that, if Biff winning bets on the documented sports events changed the outcomes of later sports events, those changes would be documented in the Almanac.
How did that happen!! I am kind of shocked. It just seems weird to me that everyone hasn't see all the Back to the Future movies at this point. Especially if you have seen 1 and 2. The cliffhanger alone of part II would almost seem to tempting. Granted I was kind of blown away as well in "Mr Robot" when we found out in all these years since he was a kid Eliot or his sister never saw Back to the Future 2 and how him and his sister wanted to watch it the first time.
Jason
For me after 2 I just lost interest.
Not horrible, but rather annoying, as a kid watching TUD, I never realized how pretentious Valeris is to Chekov and Uhura, telling them the totally unrelated origin of the word 'sabotage', instead of, you know, just saying "Could have been sabotage".
Except that Valeris is not explaining to them that something "could have been sabotage."
She's obliquely suggesting that they create or make a claim that the Enterprise is malfunctioning, as an excuse not to follow a Starfleet order to return to base. She's trying to avoid taking part in an overt conspiracy to disobey a direct order, by simply dropping the word "sabotage" awkwardly into the conversation.
Dammit, you're right. I just remembered the speech without the proper context. You'd think this wouldn't happen with a movie you've seen dozens of times, but there you go.
BTTF1 - The photo of Marty with his brother and sister serves as a warning that if he doesn't set his parents up to kiss during the Enchantment Under The Sea dance, they'll never get together. This is a story beat established early and many times throughout the middle of the film. You can say it doesn't make sense, which is fine, but it's how the story was framed. Marty needs a countdown for the climax to work, this one and also the lightning bolt.
BTTF2 - The Almanac I've always felt the stats would be constantly changing inside the book as the butterfly effect would skew many future sports games' results. The film, I think, assumes 50 years of sports statistics remained unchanged from the moment 1955 Biff gets his hands on it (and replaces the dust jacket with Ohh-La-La! Briliant.)
BTTF3 - The photo of the tombstone I've always interpreted it as - Buford Tannen was going to shoot someone on that day (Sept 7, 1885?) and it switches back and forth from Marty and Doc... it ends up being Marty that he finally but not fatally "shoots". Again, maybe it doesn't make quantum sense - it's a story device, it's a countdown.
The BTTF series is about destiny (for George McFly: "Density"). Check out the final scene of the series where Jennifer shows Doc the blank fax page from 2015 and he says, "of course it's erased! Your future is whatever you make it." I hope Jennifer keeps the fax and looks at it every day to catch a glimpse of the future. Hahaha, fax machines in every room, including the bathroom. So 2015.
Not everybody loves a western, but it's worth mentioning that BTTF3 is Doc's story more than Marty's.
PS I can totally understand why Part 2 would be enough to turn a viewer off. I rented the VHS tape on my 14th birthday and had a few buddies over to watch it. I'll always remember turning the film off and half of us watching thought it was so awesome and the other half was totally confused. "I'm in the future, I'm in the past, I don't know where I am!"
Linda: Yeah, Mom, we know. You've told us this story a million times. You felt sorry for him, so you decided to go with him to the Fish Under the Sea dance.
Lorraine: No, no, it was the Enchantment Under the Sea dance. Our first date. I'll never forget it. It was the night of that terrible thunderstorm, remember, George? [George is intensely watching The Honeymooners] Your father kissed me for the very first time on that dance floor. And...and it was then that I realized...that I was going to spend the rest of my life with him.
Lorraine: No, no, it was the Enchantment Under the Sea dance. Our first date. I'll never forget it. It was the night of that terrible thunderstorm, remember, George? [George is intensely watching The Honeymooners] Your father kissed me for the very first time on that dance floor. And...and it was then that I realized...that I was going to spend the rest of my life with him.
BTTF2 - The Almanac I've always felt the stats would be constantly changing inside the book as the butterfly effect would skew many future sports games' results. The film, I think, assumes 50 years of sports statistics remained unchanged from the moment 1955 Biff gets his hands on it (and replaces the dust jacket with Ohh-La-La! Briliant.)
BTTF3 - The photo of the tombstone I've always interpreted it as - Buford Tannen was going to shoot someone on that day (Sept 7, 1885?) and it switches back and forth from Marty and Doc... it ends up being Marty that he finally but not fatally "shoots". Again, maybe it doesn't make quantum sense - it's a story device, it's a countdown.
The BTTF series is about destiny (for George McFly: "Density"). Check out the final scene of the series where Jennifer shows Doc the blank fax page from 2015 and he says, "of course it's erased! Your future is whatever you make it." I hope Jennifer keeps the fax and looks at it every day to catch a glimpse of the future. Hahaha, fax machines in every room, including the bathroom. So 2015.
Not everybody loves a western, but it's worth mentioning that BTTF3 is Doc's story more than Marty's.
PS I can totally understand why Part 2 would be enough to turn a viewer off. I rented the VHS tape on my 14th birthday and had a few buddies over to watch it. I'll always remember turning the film off and half of us watching thought it was so awesome and the other half was totally confused. "I'm in the future, I'm in the past, I don't know where I am!"
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Clearly you have not been involved in children's sports. The best interests of the child are rarely the important factor
For the many reasons Hill Valley's been radically changed when Marty and Doc return from 2015. Theclock tower is now a gaudy 20 floor casino, Biff is filthy rich, the school burned down, etc. Those are major changes that should affect lots of other smaller things. But they aren't key to the story so... we'll never know for sure.
We see the newspaper change headlines to signal to Doc that they are finished their task in 2015 and can leave without Marty's kids going to jail.
Even at the peewee level, when a town committee is making the decision? Do you have examples where someone without a vested interest in winning, or cost cutting incentive made those kinds of decisions?
And they do. Biff is shown clutching his heart when he returns to 2015, because, in the filmmakers' explanation, Lorraine eventually killed Biff in the dark timeline, meaning his old self was ceasing to exist:
(Biff's disappearance was cut from the movie, but not his initial symptoms.)
And there would doubtless be many other changes, but the suburb Doc and Marty were in ended up pretty much the same.
The movie is so much worse in terms of how the "heroes" subject Maj. Houlihan to constant degradation and humiliation for the mere offense of not immediately jumping into bed with them the way all of the other nurses did. And it kinda seems like they're harassing Maj. Burns for being a devout Christian, which is not okay. The TV series was a lot better in terms of both being somewhat more respectful of Maj. Houlihan and making Maj. Burns a petty tyrant who deserved every bit of comeuppance he got.
That was really funny. And yet, Back to the Future is something of a sacred franchise to me. Violating it in this way just seems wrong. Almost as wrong as... having a time travel orgy with your mom, I guess. God, I wish I could travel back in time to un-see that but I probably shouldn't. I have a bad feeling about this.
Actually, if you freeze frame and look at the side headlines in the alternate 1985 newspapers, one of them says, "Nixon to seek 5th term. Promises to end Vietnam War by 1985."
Given that the newspapers change when they change the timeline, there's no reason to believe that the Almanac wouldn't change too.
Check out the final scene of the series where Jennifer shows Doc the blank fax page from 2015 and he says, "of course it's erased! Your future is whatever you make it." I hope Jennifer keeps the fax and looks at it every day to catch a glimpse of the future. Hahaha, fax machines in every room, including the bathroom. So 2015.
Perhaps, thanks to everyone's lives not being derailed by the accident with the Rolls Royce, someone was able to work on developing e-mail and smartphones, thus eliminating the need in the future to have fax machines in every room. (Because otherwise, wouldn't that fax paper have been used for something else that would have shown up on it, like a Chinese restaurant menu or something?)
Trying to make sense of why Biff came back into the unchanged 2015 is a losing battle.
And why Doc and Marty have all their original memories, and how Biff could vanish but everything he did stays intact. And why he left the time machine where Doc could find it again.
And why Doc and Marty have all their original memories, and how Biff could vanish but everything he did stays intact. And why he left the time machine where Doc could find it again.