At the end of the episode, everything ends up happily ever after for Parker, but presumably the guys who sent him back continue to live in a reality where all the bad stuff still happened. So why did they bother?
I only watched the two episodes so far so maybe they covered this though.
I think you're missing the point. They send him back to prevent the bad stuff from happening. When he succedes, he's the only one with knowlege of the previous timeline, save for what he tells Talmage, Donovan, ect.
shareFor all the people in his new reality (after travelling in the sphere) this is true, but as far as the guys who waved him goodbye at the other end are concerned, life carries on as before, surely?
shareThere are many different theories on how time travel would work if it were real and many different ways that it works in fiction. The creating a "parallel reality" is just one of them. Obviously the show uses a different theory while you act like it is the only one. In fact in your version there never would be a project back step because in all their tests they would have sent the time machine back and it would have just disappeared. As the act of sending it back would create a new universe rather than having it show up 7 days previously. They would have assumed that it (and thus anyone in it) was destroyed, rather than believing it went back in time.
To Love and win is the best thing. To Love and lose, the next best.share
I think he's referring to the concept of that by going back and fixing things, all he is doing is creating a new parallel universe...the original timeline exists in another world.
shareExactly. The people he left in the future don't get anything fixed for them. They just send a guy into the past, and then deal with the problem that still exists in their reality. Kind of pointless.
Again I only saw the pilot double episode so far, so maybe they explain this later, but I can't really see how.
The people who send him back don't have to deal with the problem. When they send him back to fix things, their reality once he gets sent back ceases to exist. Since the problem was corrected before it happened it no longer happens at all.
shareSo, after they wave byebye to Parker and the sphere vanishes, they and their world cease to exist? That's quite interesting. Are they saving themselves then? I guess they kind of are.
shareyes, after the sphere vanishes that reality ends too, and everything changes.
shareBut wait a minute -- when he goes back in time, wouldn't there be two Parker's in the past then. I mean, we see Parker and what he is doing at the start of each episode when the "incident" occurs. Then usually a few days later once the backstep has been approved, he gets into the sphere and goes back to that time. All the other characters are back there -- wouldn't the original Parker be there too?
sharelol, people and their time travel theories.
Here is basically the thing about time travel: All we have are theories, nobody knows what would really happen if time travel happened.
For the sake of the Seven Days TV show you can basically apply these principals:
1. The reality/universe stays the same and Parker just gets sent to it's past.
2. What gets sent back disappears from wherever it is in the past. IE. If Parker was asleep in bed (in the past) when he arrived via sphere, he would disappear from his bed and be in the sphere. Yes, it sounds kind of ridiculous, but for the purposes of the show that's how it is. This is proven in an episode when he has a tracker implanted in him by a terrorist, when he arrives in the past the tracker is still in him and when the terrorist opens his case one of the trackers has disappeared.
I agree with cpukiller, that is the basic premise you just have to go with. The only bad part is, they don't always stick to it. I am not sure how many times, but I remember one pretty clearly.
In the episode that the sphere leaves without anyone, except the duffel bag with Parker's stuff, and they have to seek the help of a psychic. Well, they sent a key back, which was the key to arm the weapon. However, based on the premise above, that key, when the sphere was sent back, should only have existed there. Yet, clearly the bad guys still had it too. The end scene is with the bad guy breaking the key so that no one could stop it, but Parker is able to take the same key, from the other time line, and use it to stop the weapon.
Oh well, was still a great series, wish they would have kept going with it.
Stevo
I don't think that was the same key. I think that the NSA gave him a key to operate the nuclear workstation. Those keys are all pretty much the same, not like a door key, but like a key for a harddrive lock.
sharecpukiller: If things would disappear it would mean, that NSA would know about the jump long before contact from Parker because of missing sphere.
shareYeah, it's one of the paradoxes of being a TV show. In some episodes it seems like they do know there was a jump and they are waiting for him to call in, sometimes it seems like a surprise to them that there was a jump. (Like they didn't have an alarm that went off if the sphere dissappeared or something)
shareSort of. There were some episodes where Frank jumped back and landed back in the hanger where the sphere resides and the hanger is empty. In this case, it seems like no one is watching the room and they may not know the sphere is gone.
Yes, this is bad management on thier part but it definantly explains the plot hole you are mentioning here.
You have to think of this show in terms that he "rewinds" time NOT as him jumping to a parallel or something to that effect. The more you watch the show the more things make sense. They still don't answer all the questions because if they did this show would be a reality.
Basically this, Franks and the sphere and everything in it are moving at a speed together that is moving in "reverse" of everything else. It's like when you toss something in the air while your driving your car in reverse. The item moves with you no matter how fast of slow you go while the world around the car is there chillin. In reality the item you tossed may have move 100ft. across the ground, but to you it has only gone vertical.
He "disappears" from one timeline and jumps to the other. So one person could be talking to him and all of the sudden *poof* he and the sphere disappear (with some occasional exceptions) and then the alarm sounds and they wait for their conundrum call.
If you're seriously going to try to find sound logic in time travel stories then you are going to give yourself a headache.
Chemists do it periodically on the table.share
I actually just saw an episode where Dr Ballard came out of the hangar and said "the sphere is gone, there must have been a backstep".
share[deleted]
Only thing I would have loved to see is him meeting up with his self before the jump, because when he goes back, they never explain what happens with his past self, in fact the only thing that I always found funny is, after the first time he should have been stuck in a continous loop of having to go back, because if he didnt go back,history wouldnt have been righted, yet he must have for history to go on corrected.
shareIt's the old paradox concerning time travel into the past. Does he create a new timeline upon his arrival 7 days earlier or just modifies the old one. I think no one can answer this question until the actual time travel is invented.
Other interestig thing is that when Parker arrives in the past he stays there and he coexists with his other self from that time. Implication is simple: every time he jumps back in time, there is one Parker and one Sphere more in the world. There are like 66 episodes of the show, wich means, that in the end there are over 60 Parkers and 60 Spheres. By that time, the NSA could send back an army of time travelers to stop whatever threat there may be. Or did I miss something?
Well if you believe in an infinite amount of universes, then you should believe that there are an infinite amount of Parker's changing an infinite amount of pasts. So if 1 Parker is Backstepping, there are prolly an infinite amount of Parkers doing the same thing, thus all the time limes or none of the time lines are changed. So potentially, the time lines that every Parker leaves, gets changed as well because theres another Parker back stepping to change that reality too.
shareif he succeeds than that timeline never happened
shareThere are 2 main movie/tv theories on timetravel:
1. Only one universe exists, if you travel backwards in time, you alter that timeline and could cause your own destruction (Back to the Future). This theory also allows the possibility of multiple versions of one self and objects to coexist within the same timeline.
2. There are multiple parallel universes all co-existing with our own. Our actions and their outcomes determine the shape of said universe. So in our universe where the Nazis were defeated in World War 2, the war could just as easily still be raging on in a parallel universe. Basically said as "Anything that can happen, does happen in other parallel universes." - Stargate/Star Trek timetravel theory.
I believe Seven Days can easily be categorized as option #1, with the modification being that, if you travel backward in time, you also replace any objects or people in that timeline. Thus explaining Parker's "sudden" disappearance from Hanson Island in the pilot episode, the disappearance of the sphere in another episode etc.
But in short; Nobody really knows what could happen if timetravel were a reality, since as far as I know, we haven't invented the technology to do so yet.
All of the "paradoxes" that you guys are all concerned with in this thread were addressed in the show.
The paradox of past selves: It is explained many times that when a backstep occurs, the past selves and past items disappear and reappear where the sphere lands.
The paradox of alternate realities: It is explained clearly in the alternate reality episode that when a reality is altered, all other realities cease to exist. In this episode, Frank travels to another reality and Howser explains to Frank that his reality is now gone. If he returns to his reality, the reality he is in will disappear.
Seven Days was very thorough in explaining away paradoxes and every paradox mentioned here was covered.
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I've always wondered why Parker is even involved in the action after a backstep at all. As the only viable chrononaut, they would obviously retrieve him as "precious cargo" and deliver him to the base and let a field team deal with the dangerous mission. after he's delivered the info chip and been debriefed, he's no more useful as a field agent than anyone else. you'd think they be a little more careful with their only successful spehere pilot.
shareIn the real world that's what would happen. Or they'd send an unmanned Sphere back with the intel needed. It's not like what they tell Parker can't be written on a piece of paper then zoomed back in Time. But that's less interesting as a TV show. The same applies to all other shows.
shareI've got another interesting question. Wasn't the sphere supposed to be extraterrestial in origin? If so, what happended to the aliens? Where are they now. Why haven't they come back to retrieve their tech?
shareThe sphere itself is man-made, but with alien tech and materials.
The aliens are dead, and as for the alien race, they are aware of it, based on one episode where they send the team a message and go on to say there will be no further contact in the team's lifetimes.
I laugh in the face of danger, then I hide until it goes away.