Maybe that's season 2 or 3...
Spoilers Timeless: Season 1 on NBC
- Thread starter Aragorn
- Start date
Maybe that's season 2 or 3...
Part of my point was that it's the complexities of the real world that make black and white impossible. Bass's decision to accept the surrender of Jesse James was easy given what he knew, which was a simplified version of reality. Now, suppose that Bass new the full details involved with his choice.Yes, there are shades of grey...but some of those shades are pretty darn close to white or black...just try the fill-color option on an MS Office object (like the 10% or 90% options)
I think that such a man like Bass in Timeless has existed....just because someone with such qualities is rare, doesn't mean they don't exist. (ANd according to my Facebook feeds, the current President & his administration apparently are the other end..no shades of grey presented with them)
Should Bass except the surrender of Jesse James, which is the humane thing at that moment, but risk changing the future including the possibility of Jesse killing more people and then more people after that not being born who should've been?
Or, should Bass have agreed to killing Jesse James, which would not be the humane thing at that moment, but would help preserve history and prevent those future deaths and non-births?
Now, that is much more grey. Shades of grey are not just based on a person but the complexities of the world he interacts with and even the degree of knowledge about those complexities.
Finally, I'm not sure a black and white viewpoint is a good thing anyway. The world is often too complex to pigeonhole things like that. That's not to say that you can't point to certain actions in a certain circumstance as being wrong but it's harder to say that those actions are always wrong. For example, killing is almost always wrong. However, if you're killing in self-defense, most people would say it's justified.
Mr Awe
Well, old newsprint newspapers were blacj and white. Even the Photos with shades of grey were black and white pixels
Jesse doesn't just shoot random farmers (often).
He shoots people (generally) who shoot other people for a living.
If everyone Jessie James blows way was destined to have blown away 30 people, who was destined to have shot 30 people, who w... Allowing Jesse James to live, might have saved thousands of people in the immediate future, and generated millions of babies that were not supposed to have ever been born not long after that, in maybe a decade or two.
He shoots people (generally) who shoot other people for a living.
If everyone Jessie James blows way was destined to have blown away 30 people, who was destined to have shot 30 people, who w... Allowing Jesse James to live, might have saved thousands of people in the immediate future, and generated millions of babies that were not supposed to have ever been born not long after that, in maybe a decade or two.
You've been pretty, uh, confident in your statements to date regarding this one, even though I've been arguing another point from basically the same evidence. Given the summary of the next episode on my DVR list, looks like we're going to be able to settle this one way or the other pretty soon
Emma was the pilot of the Life Boat, before the Mothership was built.
She saw this in a flashback.
They only have one team, at a time, and she was walking around with the Life Boat berthed in the background.
She saw this in a flashback.
They only have one team, at a time, and she was walking around with the Life Boat berthed in the background.
You've been pretty, uh, confident in your statements to date regarding this one, even though I've been arguing another point from basically the same evidence. Given the summary of the next episode on my DVR list, looks like we're going to be able to settle this one way or the other pretty soon
The promo description on youtube seems to support the idea that the lifeboat can travel on its own:
We shall see.
Here is the promo for the next episode. Can't wait. It looks pretty great.
I can understand that missions have to be approved by a higher moral/legal authority... That's what the chain of command is about, but is Agent Christopher really reporting to any one?
No seriously?
Agent Christopher!?
Are her reports going up the line to eventually the president?
Wouldn't it be hilarious, if Agent Christopher is a bigwig at Rittenhouse, and her presence as government oversight is all smoke and mirrors?
Like in Die Hard 2, or when that fake watcher turned up to replace Giles in early season 3 Buffy.
No seriously?
Agent Christopher!?
Are her reports going up the line to eventually the president?
Wouldn't it be hilarious, if Agent Christopher is a bigwig at Rittenhouse, and her presence as government oversight is all smoke and mirrors?
Like in Die Hard 2, or when that fake watcher turned up to replace Giles in early season 3 Buffy.
That just means we're interpreting it differently. It doesn't mean either of us has an unreasonable bias, it just means that different observers can arrive at different conclusions from the same data. Which is why it's necessary to gather more data to test the respective interpretations. Which we will do by watching tomorrow's episode.
I don't recall exactly what point you've been arguing -- hard to keep all the conversations straight -- but if anything, I think perhaps the difference is that I'm less confident, not more. That is, I'm reluctant to speculate beyond the evidence, so I favor a cautious interpretation. I don't deny that it's conceivable that the lifeboat can travel on its own, but the only thing we've seen it do is follow the mothership, so I don't want to assume it can do otherwise unless it's made explicit that it can.
The Lifeboat is a prototype.
The Mother ship is the final product.
the names seem connected.
I wonder if the life boat was always called that, before the mother ship was constructed?
The Mother ship is the final product.
the names seem connected.
I wonder if the life boat was always called that, before the mother ship was constructed?
Yes, I noticed that too! I guess we'll find out tomorrow!You've been pretty, uh, confident in your statements to date regarding this one, even though I've been arguing another point from basically the same evidence. Given the summary of the next episode on my DVR list, looks like we're going to be able to settle this one way or the other pretty soon
Mr Awe
Jesse James is an outlaw and he's had no qualms about shooting law enforcement offices and shown in the episode. Allowing him to live could well mean more law enforcement deaths and the non-births of descendents--I wouldn't consider that saving people!
Mr Awe
I included Policemen/Lawmen, any of whom might have had a massive body counts larger than James' in my description: "who shoot other people for a living" of people James might have killed in a timeline that never happened.
Sheriffs killing nogoodnicks amounts to the same as Nongoodnicks shooting Sheriffs, and nogoodnicks shooting nogoodnicks.
This is not about virtue.
It's about zombies making babies, and no-show babies being missing from the timeline because their parents never ####ed.
The overall population on Earth could have increased because of Jesse James' almost certain killing spree, who are the might have been people Wyatt unmade, by snuffing out the baby faced outlaw.
Sheriffs killing nogoodnicks amounts to the same as Nongoodnicks shooting Sheriffs, and nogoodnicks shooting nogoodnicks.
This is not about virtue.
It's about zombies making babies, and no-show babies being missing from the timeline because their parents never ####ed.
The overall population on Earth could have increased because of Jesse James' almost certain killing spree, who are the might have been people Wyatt unmade, by snuffing out the baby faced outlaw.
Last edited:
He was already living past his time. Killing him when Wyatt did should not have any affect on the timeline EXCEPT... maybe Bass now changes how he operates because of this and he is not the basis of the Lone Ranger any longer, but a white Texas Ranger is.
He lived past his time but it's a matter of degree. He lived a little past his time, and that caused some damage to the timeline. But, that's not as bad as living well past when he should've died.
Also, as it's been discussed in this thread, Bass was not the basis for the Lone Ranger. That's an Internet myth.
Mr Awe
"Regarded" is an overstatement. Again, a biography of Bass Reeves merely said he was like the Lone Ranger. People mistook that statement of similarity for a statement of cause and effect, and the myth arose relatively recently from that.
So anyway, clearly the lifeboat can travel in time independently, which means this show makes even less sense than I thought it did. Part of the reason I thought the lifeboat could only follow the mothership was because it explained why they were always in temporal sync -- why the episodes always seemed to follow "San Dimas time" and give the team in the present time to go after Flynn in the past. I figured the two machines' time frames were in sync because they were linked. Well, I guess that could still be the case, since the mothership was in the present while the lifeboat was in the past. But I'm still confused -- if the lifeboat can be successfully piloted through time on its own, then why was it deemed a failure before? I think it had something to do with killing its pilots. Maybe that was just because of the pilot who faked her death and hid in the past? Argh, this show has done such a bad job defining its rules and background.
And the temporal logic is insane. If Lucy didn't go with Wyatt and Rufus, then she should be part of the changed timeline when they get back. If they erased the other two women's murders, then Lucy shouldn't have remembered them, and the information that they weren't murdered shouldn't have been so readily available in the info she handed to Rufus. Meanwhile, I've already explained why I think it's hypocritical to claim that deliberately trying to prevent someone from being born and thus eradicate his entire life from existence is not an act of violence. It's still murder, however humane the method may appear. And yet the episode didn't even acknowledge that as a topic for moral debate. That's simpleminded of it, though I shouldn't have expected more of this show. I think I've been applying far more thought and analysis to it than it deserves.
Also, if Flynn's been able to run roughshod over history so easily, why was it so much harder for Wyatt and Rufus to prevent a rather minor event from occurring? Were we supposed to believe that was "time wanting to happen" and resisting change, or was it just arbitrary bad luck to force the ending where Wyatt killed the guy?
You know, I was expecting it to turn out that the stewardess just slept with someone else that night (she did seem pretty promiscuous) and had a kid who still grew up to be a serial killer and killed those same three women. After all, why assume it was the father's genes that were responsible? Since it was a one-night stand, presumably the biological father had no involvement in the kid's upbringing, so even if she'd had a kid with a different biological father around the same time, the kid's life circumstances would've been pretty much the same. And whatever genetic factors may have contributed to his becoming a serial killer, if any, could've come from his mother's side.
But instead, it turns out that they saved the other two women but Wyatt's wife is still dead, because of course her death has to be part of some deep secret conspiracy just like everything else. I bet it'll turn out that Rittenhouse killed her, because of course the vast sweeping conspiracy is behind everything. Ugh.
See, told you; it's just bad writing They're not really sure what they're trying to SAY, just that they like history porn and having the characters dress up in various period garb, name-dropping anything neat they could find about the period. And they'll always be near the neatest thing that happened that year, never going to just be in Iowa in 1957 or whatever. I want the show to be more, it's just not so far.
Aren't these the same people behind the failed NBC show Revolution? Has a very similar visual motif, and similar problem wherein they've got a neat concept, but no idea what to do with it after that to tell a story.
I didn't get a chance to see last night's episode yet, will check out the details tonight...
They're not really sure what they're trying to SAY, just that they like history porn and having the characters dress up in various period garb, name-dropping anything neat they could find about the period. And they'll always be near the neatest thing that happened that year, never going to just be in Iowa in 1957 or whatever. I want the show to be more, it's just not so far. Aren't these the same people behind the failed NBC show Revolution? Has a very similar visual motif, and similar problem wherein they've got a neat concept, but no idea what to do with it after that to tell a story.
I didn't get a chance to see last night's episode yet, will check out the details tonight...
But isn't that exactly what they did here? They were in an airport bar in 1983. The most historic thing that happened there was an episode of Manimal showing on TV.
The most logical explanation is that Flynn lied to Wyatt about the identity of his wife's killer, or that he simply fed him the name of a probable suspect. Perhaps Flynn had a reason to want one of the killers other victims alive. Of course, Flynn simply could have killed one of the guys parents and would have had no qualms about doing so.
