One of the most prevalent ideas in all of science based fiction is that of time travel. It just so happens that I have more than a slight fascination with the topic.
Time travel has been treated in many different ways by different shows throughout the years. In the BBC show
Doctor Who, it is used simply as a plot device to get the main characters to a time and place where an adventure can take place and a story can build. Thus, in most episodes of Doctor Who, the time machine is only used at the very beginning and end. By contrast, the American show
Heroes often uses time travel as a way to directly affect the plot. Often, the writers lean on Hiro Nakamura (the time traveler in the show) as a way to get information to places where it needs to be.
In
Journeyman and
Life on Mars, the protagonists find themselves having involuntarily traveled through time to a specific place, and must figure out their situation and their destiny. In
Quantum Leap, the protagonist jumps around to various points in time, as constricted by his own lifespan. In
Sliders, the characters travel to different dimensions that comprise the many different realities of Earth. And, of course, we must not forget the hit Cartoon Network animated program
Code Lyoko. In that one, the plucky kids use time travel at the end of every episode as a way to invalidate any progress that was made in the course of the narrative.
As a culture, we seem to keep coming back to this concept and reinventing it, rethinking it, deciding how it should work. Even though it rarely works out, (peruse
this wikipedia list of time travel programs and take a look at all the bombs) it still seems to fascinate and tantalize us when it's done right. Is this simply because it provides a wide range of possible stories? Do people just like history? Or perhaps it is because it feeds a deeper part of the human condition: the desire to go back and do something over again, to relive or rediscover something we once had but now is gone?
