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Posted By: Don Timeless, anyone watching? - Tue 17/01/17 22:07 UTC
Turns out to be the only new show I ended up watching this season, as I don't have HBO.

Anyone else watching.

Now that we are 10 episodes in (I haven't seen last nights new episode yet) I was wondering what people thought?
Posted By: Zeim Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Tue 17/01/17 23:02 UTC
Some good some less. I don't think they've answered the big questions for me:

- Why doesn't the antagonist just go back in time and sabotage the Lifeboat so they can't follow him?
- OR, once they stop him, why can't he go back and try the same thing again, and again, and again, endlessly?
- And how is it that there are so many different things that will all do whatever it is that needs to be done to history to stop the organization he wants to stop (I forget the name)

So, from a "show" perspective I understand the why of all those questions, but I'd like some internal consistency/logic.

Perhaps they explained all that and I missed it?
Posted By: Don Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Wed 18/01/17 03:25 UTC
Quote:
OR, once they stop him, why can't he go back and try the same thing again, and again, and again, endlessly?


They did answer this one. You can't go back to the same place twice because if you run into yourself Baaaam! and the shock waves would have catastrophic effects all up and down the timeline.

Quote:
Why doesn't the antagonist just go back in time and sabotage the Lifeboat so they can't follow him?


They bad guys tried in one episode. They tried to blow the lifeboat up and strand the good guys in the French and Indian War. But the heroes managed to get most pf explosives off and after much nashing of teeth were able to build a crude capacitor, and yes there was the mandatory joke about flux capacitors, repair the lifeboat and get back to the present.
Posted By: Mina Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Wed 18/01/17 03:27 UTC
Zeim,

They cleared up the why he doesn't go back in time and sabotage the lifeboat in the first episode. They said you cannot go back to any point in time where you already exist. Bad things happen.

Of course they then have Matt Frewer (Anthony Bruhl - inventor and the PILOT the rebels rely on) go back to 1962 AND 1969 so they stepped all over that explanation.

And why there are so many things that would stop the organization (I forget the name too)... I think at the beginning he was t rying to stop their more recent activities in order to save his family. He did not know when it really started, or who was involved, until fairly recently. Now I think he is going to go back and destroy the whole organization.


... I do *like* the show. I watch it. I do not mind plot issues (like once the bad guys go back in time how do people in the present remember the original timeline... but later it has all be changed and only the ones in the Lifeboat remember it. But once you set up your ground rules (like no going back to a time you already existed in) then it really does annoy me when they break them!

By far my favorite new Fall 2016 show was The Good Place. Silly, irreverent, and just good fun!
Posted By: Don Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Wed 18/01/17 03:27 UTC
Quote:
OR, once they stop him, why can't he go back and try the same thing again, and again, and again, endlessly?


They did answer this one. You can't go back to the same place twice because if you run into yourself Baaaam! and the shock waves would have catastrophic effects all up and down the timeline.

Quote:
Why doesn't the antagonist just go back in time and sabotage the Lifeboat so they can't follow him?


He axtually tried this once. The bad guys lutred the good guys back to the French and Indian War and attenpted to blow the lifeboat up. THe good guys got all but one oirce of explosive off and hade to jury rig a repair to get back to the present, The Techie managed to hobble together a crude capacitor and yes there was the mandatory joking mention of Flux capacitors.

Question here is why did bad guys use lots of little explosives instead of one big one nut we know the answer.

Quote:
OR, once they stop him, why can't he go back and try the same thing again, and again, and again, endlessly?


The plan for stopping him is to kill him.

Guess the question here is why has the Delta Commando failed to do so on 10 different occasions.

Posted By: Gypsy Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Wed 18/01/17 13:51 UTC
It was all too twee for me. Not gritty enough.. the 'realty' they created was not enough to keep me watching. And the complexity of changing results impacting onto the present seemed to be increasing. Looked like it was going to get too muddled. Watched 3 I think, then stopped.

We have a 'rule' we operate at home to limit the amount of TV we watch. We ask ourselves if the programme is good enough that we would stay in to watch if we couldn't record it. If the answer is no, we ditch. grin
Posted By: Zeim Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Wed 18/01/17 14:03 UTC
I do generally like the show as well, but there are some inconsistencies that nag at me (the one Mina pointed out about how they said you can't go back to a time in which you exist, and then they break it twice), and also the fact that technically when the antagonist goes back in time, whatever it is he tries to do or does has already happened in the present so the scenes of the heroes tracking him thru time and then going to stop him before he does what he is going to do seems silly. Sure, they could go back and stop him to reset the timeline, BUT it would be after his actions had already happened and the timeline had already been changed.
Posted By: Mina Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Wed 18/01/17 22:44 UTC
Zeim,

Exactly. They could have said "We have x-amount of time to send someone back to stop them before the events changed catch up with the present..."
Posted By: Don Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Thu 19/01/17 03:07 UTC
Quote:
the one Mina pointed out about how they said you can't go back to a time in which you exist, and then they break it twice

They never said this. At least not to the best of my ability to recollect.

What they said was you shouldn't go back to a time not where you exist, as a child or a younger adult, but as yourself (a time traveler) because if two time travelers meet and touch they will self annihilate, destroying each other and [or at least I have the general impression] a lot of other stuff as well.

So Matt Frewer can go back to year in which he existed but he can't or shouldn't go back to a day or hour that he has already visited. This is why the bad guys (or good guys for that matter) can't or don't just do re-dos until something works.

I also have the impression that you could probably go back to 1836 relatively safely, if you stuck to London or Paris, where the chances of running into your self who is at the Alamo are not very good.
Posted By: Mina Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Thu 19/01/17 03:55 UTC
Quote:
What they said was you shouldn't go back to a time not where you exist, as a child or a younger adult, but as yourself (a time traveler) because if two time travelers meet and touch they will self annihilate, destroying each other and [or at least I have the general impression] a lot of other stuff as well.


True, they said "or you might meet a double of yourself." But it is still the reason they give for not pulling in agents from elsewhere to be there when Flynn first stole the machine. In the latest episode it is the reason given at the end "You can't go back to a time where you exist..." as to why a main character cannot do something to change the present. Vague, but Spoilers, Sweetie.
Posted By: MikeD Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Thu 19/01/17 13:38 UTC
I find it ... interesting ... that there is so much discussion on this one 'detail' yet no one says anything when a 40 foot shark is able to leap from the water, completely into the air and dive back down into the water, swallowing a man and disappearing below the waves. Oh! Did I mention the man is standing in water that was knee deep? <shrug>
Posted By: Zeim Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Thu 19/01/17 14:32 UTC
Wait, you mean that can't happen? WTF!
Posted By: MikeD Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Thu 19/01/17 15:45 UTC
I know, right??? <chuckle>
Posted By: Mina Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Thu 27/12/18 03:46 UTC
Resurrecting this thread that Don started... the series finale was last week. Did anyone else watch? If so, what are your thoughts about it, and the show in general?
Posted By: nem Re: Timeless, anyone watching? - Fri 18/01/19 21:02 UTC
I watched season 1, but it's general time-travelling fuzziness and return to starting positions at the end annoyed me greatly. I also tried Travellers, but it was going nowhere fast so I stopped that at one season too.
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