Star Wars & Time Travel

[T J]

Ya know, I don't remember a time where time travel was used in the Star Wars universe. Never used in the movies, never read anything like that in any of the EU books.

So why is it that the Star Wars universe doesn't seem to lend itself to good time travel stories... if there is such a thing.

Wonder how it would go if someone went back in time and lets say killed Palps... or became Yoda's personal advisor and was able warn him about the imminent downfall?

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I am 100% in favor of Star Wars eschewing time travel now and forever. Time travel is more trouble than it's worth and rarely written well.

 

[Heeroyuy]

It actually is in the franchise. Sorta.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Time_travel


However it should be noted that most of these tales are of ambigious canon, although that could be said of all the Expanded Universe.


If you're looking for alternate reality/What if? Star Wars, the Infinities trilogy of comics is pretty decent. It basically has the trilogy (Although each chapter is self-contained) where different events happened-In ANH, Luke doesn't destroy the Death Star, In ESB Luke dies from the Wampa attack, and ROTJ the rescue attempt at Jabba's palace results in a delay of rescuing Han, with Han being permanently blinded (This is also the story where that image of "Vader the White" comes from).

 

[Gaith]

Time travel was wonky enough in HP3, but it was able to slide by because it was pretty low-key time travel.

Time travel in SW would be a disaster. It's just too science-y a concept. I mean, maybe some freak cosmological event could send a single ship or something forward or backward, but it would have to be a strictly non-reversible, one-time thing.

 

[Skywalker]

There's a form of time travel in the EU, but really it's just a very difficult Force technique called flow walking, where you're just supposed to be an unseen observer moving through the flow of time.

 

[Heeroyuy]

Some wacky science fiction concepts have ocassionally sneaked into the EU, apart from the examples from that Wiki....


There's a Boba Fett comic from the 90s where he is sent to catch a magician with a matter transporter (Which he uses to 'magically' vanish).


There is also the interdimensional being Waru from the much-maligned novel THE CRYSTAL STAR (Written by Vonda Mcintyre).


I think Hyperspace is often described as being another dimension too.

 

[blockaderunner]

I hope someone can help me out here, but I seem to recall reading about a short story in Dark Horse's anthology series Star Wars Tales in which Mace Windu stumbles into a cave abandoned centuries ago saw a series of glyphs on the wall. One of them an image of himself. Anyway, I can't remember the details, but it was one of those preordained things in which he went back in time to resolve some thing (once again, can't remember) which resulted in his image ending up on that cave wall. That's the closest thing to science fictiony type time travel I've known in Star Wars. Even though I like the Infinites and would like to see them examine some alternative EU speculations (What if Han didn't save Chewie and remained in the Empire, what if Darth Maul became a Jedi instead of a Sith, etc.), I agree that time travel, as a whole, should be verboten in SW.

 

[Heeroyuy]

That's "The mystery of Tet-Ami" or something like that. It's mentioned in the Wiki link.


Infinities was an intriquing concept, but sort of got ignored as the comics became more prequel-centric.

 

[Gojirob]

If there ever had been time-travel tech in the SW Universe, I think the Sith would have destroyed it. Too much possibility of treachery that they could not hope to control. Evil monsters, yes. But they tend toward practicality.

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

That's "The mystery of Tet-Ami" or something like that. It's mentioned in the Wiki link.


Infinities was an intriquing concept, but sort of got ignored as the comics became more prequel-centric.

I was really hoping they'd go for an Infinities series for the Prequel movies:

TPM - What if Darth Maul knocked Qui-Gon off the platform earlier in the Duel of the Fates instead of Obi-Wan and it was Qui-Gon who got isolated from Obi-Wan and Darth Maul by the energy fields, resulting in Obi-Wan getting ganked? A Qui-Gon-trained Anakin storyline would have been awesome. Does he fall faster, slower, not at all? Maybe Dooku doesn't fall himself or does and manages to turn Qui-Gon, or vice versa.

AOTC - What if Zam Wessel inadvertently succeeds in assassinating Padme on the landing platform after the bomb is placed on the opposite side of the Naboo cruiser, taking out the fighter she was hiding in? Anakin's fall to the Dark Side is disrupted. Maybe this time he doesn't fall or perhaps he grows too attached to Obi-Wan and Palps has to work with that. Investigation into the assassination takes a different path, no Battle of the Arena or larger Battle of Geonosis. What was Palps orginal plan to introduce the clone army? It certainly wasn't banking on Jango getting tracked back to Kamino.

ROTS - What if Grievous is alerted to what is transpiring in the observation tower of the Invisible Hand and rescues Dooku before Anakin can execute him? Dooku is still handless and betrayed by Palpatine, but he's in command of the Seperatists. Can he trigger an actual all-out civil war now that Palps can't play both sides to his own advantage? Does Dooku reveal Darth Sidious' true identity to the galaxy? Would that revelation splinter the mouldering Republic/fledgling Empire and allow for a Seperatist victory?

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

Also, there's time travel everytime the Jedi fight or farsee the future during meditation: knowledge of the future travels back into the past (present for those involved) allowing for super-fast Jedi reflexes through anticipation of opponents intentions, Jedi visions/prophecies, Yoda predictions, Palps' super-machiavellian plans. The info may not always be accurate, since always in motion the future is, but it's still time travel.

 

[Mr Light]

I'm very happy there's no time travel in the SW uni as it's usually an annoying pain in the ass. As I recall Jacen said flow-walking can't actually affect the past he was just lying to Tahiri about that as an excuse to tease and blackmail her with brief visitations. Thank gawd.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I know it was never even written (Technically speaking) but Alien Exodus has one mother of a time travel...

Spoiler: Alien Exodus

A refugee ship from Earth, fleeing the computer controlled society of THX 1138, is flung billions of years into the past, and the humans settle on a new world - Corellia - and become the direct ancestors of all the human races seen in Star Wars. Outline

 

[Crystalline Entity]

I was really hoping they'd go for an Infinities series for the Prequel movies:

TPM - What if Darth Maul knocked Qui-Gon off the platform earlier in the Duel of the Fates instead of Obi-Wan and it was Qui-Gon who got isolated from Obi-Wan and Darth Maul by the energy fields, resulting in Obi-Wan getting ganked? A Qui-Gon-trained Anakin storyline would have been awesome. Does he fall faster, slower, not at all? Maybe Dooku doesn't fall himself or does and manages to turn Qui-Gon, or vice versa.

AOTC - What if Zam Wessel inadvertently succeeds in assassinating Padme on the landing platform after the bomb is placed on the opposite side of the Naboo cruiser, taking out the fighter she was hiding in? Anakin's fall to the Dark Side is disrupted. Maybe this time he doesn't fall or perhaps he grows too attached to Obi-Wan and Palps has to work with that. Investigation into the assassination takes a different path, no Battle of the Arena or larger Battle of Geonosis. What was Palps orginal plan to introduce the clone army? It certainly wasn't banking on Jango getting tracked back to Kamino.

ROTS - What if Grievous is alerted to what is transpiring in the observation tower of the Invisible Hand and rescues Dooku before Anakin can execute him? Dooku is still handless and betrayed by Palpatine, but he's in command of the Seperatists. Can he trigger an actual all-out civil war now that Palps can't play both sides to his own advantage? Does Dooku reveal Darth Sidious' true identity to the galaxy? Would that revelation splinter the mouldering Republic/fledgling Empire and allow for a Seperatist victory?

Wow, I'd love to read stories like this! Send them into LucasArts ASAP!

 

[Lindley]

I'm very happy there's no time travel in the SW uni as it's usually an annoying pain in the ass. As I recall Jacen said flow-walking can't actually affect the past he was just lying to Tahiri about that as an excuse to tease and blackmail her with brief visitations. Thank gawd.

But flow-walking can fix the future, so that---at least at the point of imprint---it is no longer in motion. Leia forbade Jacen from flow-walking to the future after they realized that, and wonder of wonders, it seems he actually listened for once.

 

[Mr Light]

Well affecting the future I can buy, since anything we do affects the future. It's changing the pre-established past that pisses me off.

 

[nx1701g]

Well affecting the future I can buy, since anything we do affects the future. It's changing the pre-established past that pisses me off.

It was said in one of the novels that they cannot change the past by Flow Walking.

 

[Base_Delta_Zero]

I was really hoping they'd go for an Infinities series for the Prequel movies:

TPM - What if Darth Maul knocked Qui-Gon off the platform earlier in the Duel of the Fates instead of Obi-Wan and it was Qui-Gon who got isolated from Obi-Wan and Darth Maul by the energy fields, resulting in Obi-Wan getting ganked? A Qui-Gon-trained Anakin storyline would have been awesome. Does he fall faster, slower, not at all? Maybe Dooku doesn't fall himself or does and manages to turn Qui-Gon, or vice versa.

AOTC - What if Zam Wessel inadvertently succeeds in assassinating Padme on the landing platform after the bomb is placed on the opposite side of the Naboo cruiser, taking out the fighter she was hiding in? Anakin's fall to the Dark Side is disrupted. Maybe this time he doesn't fall or perhaps he grows too attached to Obi-Wan and Palps has to work with that. Investigation into the assassination takes a different path, no Battle of the Arena or larger Battle of Geonosis. What was Palps orginal plan to introduce the clone army? It certainly wasn't banking on Jango getting tracked back to Kamino.

ROTS - What if Grievous is alerted to what is transpiring in the observation tower of the Invisible Hand and rescues Dooku before Anakin can execute him? Dooku is still handless and betrayed by Palpatine, but he's in command of the Seperatists. Can he trigger an actual all-out civil war now that Palps can't play both sides to his own advantage? Does Dooku reveal Darth Sidious' true identity to the galaxy? Would that revelation splinter the mouldering Republic/fledgling Empire and allow for a Seperatist victory?

Wow, I'd love to read stories like this! Send them into LucasArts ASAP!

I'm on it!