Copyright Screen Rant
Back to the Future is a beloved sci-fi franchise, even with several plot holes, thanks to its time-travel gimmick. The movie stars Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly, a teenager who is sent back in time in a DeLorean by the brilliant scientist Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd). The sequels ended up with more time travel and more plot questions. While the Back to the Future movies featured several technological predictions that came true, fans had several questions about time travel and the time paradoxes the films created. When looking at the Back to the Future timelines, director Robert Zemeckis and producer Bob Gale had answers that explained several plot holes. Back To The Future Director Says 'Time Travel Is Fantasy' On the official Back to the Future website, there is a section called "FAQS," where director Robert Zemeckis and co-writer/producer Bob Gale answer questions fans have about the classic sci-fi movie. According to the two, they get questions that are perceptive, naive, and dumb, and they want to answer the most-asked questions. According to the filmmakers, many of the questions are based on the "mysteries of the space-time continuum." That is where the two had the biggest answer of all, which could actually answer almost all the complaints and questions about time travel. When answering a question about the time travel issues, they said: "Let's face it, time travel is fantasy, so there's no way to "prove" anything. As filmmakers, we try to create a set of rule for our stories and stick by them, and stay consistent within the little "universe" that we've created." However, while the two men made it clear that the scientific explanations of the time-travel rules don't matter to the story, they did say they made sure to follow their own rules. This included the idea of creating different Earths, something fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe have learned a lot about in recent years. Back To The Future Created Different Earths When Marty McFly went back in time in the first movie, he had the chance to possibly wipe out his existence if he caused his parents never to meet. This was seen in a photograph from his main timeline, which began erasing him from existence. Marty ended up changing his timeline anyway, but for the better. In the sequels, Doc Brown made comments about 1985-A and revealed that new Earths were being created whenever anything in time travel changed the timeline. This was seen in a deleted scene when Biff was wiped out of existence when he returned to 2015, thanks to giving his younger self the Sports Almanac. It could have happened to Marty. Doc also said they couldn't return to 1985-A because it was the "wrong future." Marty and Doc helped Jennifer get away before Biff could change their past. It's complicated, but it's why Zemeckis and Gale let the fans interpret it on their own, so it didn't slow the story down. They said it was better than a "definitive explanation." The Back To The Future Time Paradox Explained The site also wanted to explain the Time Paradox concept from the movies. According to the FAQ, a time paradox "is a situation in which the effect of an incident contradicts or eliminates the cause of that same incident." The explanation even sets up an example of what a time paradox really looks like. The example mentioned is of what would happen if a 40-year-old man went back in time and murdered his 10-year-old self. If this happened, there is no way that the 10-year-old boy could grow up to become a 40-year-old man, so there is no way that he could have killed himself, since the murderer never existed. This brings up the Back to the Future movie itself. What would've happened if Jennifer saw herself travel back in time, then shockingly fainted, hitting her head, and suffering brain damage or dying? If this had happened, she wouldn't have grown up to marry Marty and have kids, so Doc would've never needed to bring them to the future. The idea is that most scientists believe time travel can never exist because it would always create a paradox. In this movie, they created a "self-preservation" mechanism to prevent the paradox from occurring, which included both Jennifers fainting. There Was One Time Paradox That Created A Plot Hole That all said, not everything worked out, and there was one significant paradox that created a Back to the Future plot hole. Zemeckis and Gale admitted to as much in the FAQ on the official movie website. When Doc Brown took Marty and Jennifer to the future, their disappearance should have erased them from the future. "This is, in fact, the ultimate paradox of Back to the Future Part II. We really thought about this one for a long time." The filmmakers almost didn't want to tell this story, but they had already teased it in the first movie. They said fans would feel cheated if they reached the future and the kids didn't exist because of the time paradox. They said they solved the paradox by assuming Marty and Jennifer would make it back to 1985. However, this remains a time paradox, since Doc Brown says explicitly in the movie that the future hasn't been written, so why would this future with Marty, Jennifer, and their kids be the exception to that rule? According to the filmmakers, they assume the future a person travels to is always based on what will happen in their timeline. Even with that said, Doc Brown also said, "Your future is whatever you make it," so this is a time paradox that created a plot hole that could never be explained. Despite this, it brings back their earlier quote that "time travel is fantasy." If watched for entertainment, Back to the Future remains one of the best in the genre.
