If there’s one trope in science fiction that’s been used as
well as misused, it’s time travel. Heck, the Star Trek franchise has made time
travel into a fine art. I’ve always liked time travel stories whenever they
would show up in movies, TV, video games, and books. Sometimes, you’ll get the
usual plot where someone is sent back in time to right a wrong. I’ll call that
the “For the Future!!!” syndrome. Other times, someone messes up something that
changes the present time. Then, we have the awesome “I’m trapped in a loop and
I can’t get out!” plot. You get other ones along the way, but those are the
ones that I tend to notice.
So, here is my list of favorite time travel stories from
movies, TV, video games, and books. I thought about splitting this one up since
there are a lot of movies, but I’ll just make this a long one. Besides, I can
really only think of one game that really did time travel well. It’s not in any
order but I will put the best up at the top. Since I couldn’t stop listing Trek
episodes, they’re going on a separate list of their own. With all that said,
“Allons-y!”
1. Terminator 2: Judgement Day
The Terminator franchise is pretty much the standard for
good time travel stories… well, most of them. While the first movie is really
good, T2 stands above it as being the superior movie. It was also the one I saw
first since I didn’t see the first one until I was teen. T2 continues the story
of Skynet, an AI from a dystopian future, sending a more advanced Terminator
into the past to kill John Connor, the leader of the human resistance. This
time, the human resistance sends its own reprogrammed Terminator in order to
protect John and his mother, Sarah.
Everything about the movie is good. The story is great, the
action is awesome, and the characters are cool. This movie showed that Arnold Schwarzenegger
could actually emote. Ed Furlong was fun as John and Linda Hamilton rocked as
Sarah Conner. Robert Patrick was really cool as the T-1000. He was really
imposing villain. T2 did everything a sequel should do and more. If only they
stopped there, though.
