Time travel in the DC Omniverse: Christopher Reeve Superman an exception?

[Buried Alien]

Throughout the multimedia DC Omniverse, time travel and manipulating the past seems to be a huge stumbling block. Certainly, no version of the Flash/Barry Allen since FLASHPOINT (comics, TV, animation, and probably film) has been able to pull it off without causing a cascading series of problems.

The Christopher Reeve Superman, however, seems to be the exception. In his 1978 movie (and the Donner Cut of SUPERMAN II), the Reeve Superman was able to time travel and manipulate the past with impunity. I wonder why it worked for him when it never worked for anyone else.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[manwhohaseverything]

Actually, silverage superman used to time travel back to krypton very easily. But, the problem was he would get depowered the minute he gets there so he couldn't save it.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Pre-Crisis time travel was a much, much easier task.

[Güicho]

The Christopher Reeve Superman, however, seems to be the exception. In his 1978 movie (and the Donner Cut of SUPERMAN II), the Reeve Superman was able to time travel and manipulate the past with impunity. I wonder why it worked for him when it never worked for anyone else.

Or rather they just never told that story. Or focused on it,
But his father did put the warning out there, that is not how you help.
That warning was there for a reason.

My son, It is forbidden for you to interfere with human history, rather, let your leadership stir others to.

So we do know as per that story and continuity there could be repercussions, impunity was not a given.
And Superman went against his father, knowing that. Potential repercussions are a given part of the narrative.
Did it happen with absolute impunity? Only as far as we know.
If that was the main ongoing comic u, probably a half dozen writers would have explored those potential tangential repercussions.
That universe and actions allowed for them.

Certainly, no version of the Flash/Barry Allen since FLASHPOINT (comics, TV, animation, and probably film) has been able to pull it off without causing a cascading series of problems.

IMHO One of the best aspects added to the Flash

[Adekis]

Pre-Crisis Superman actually had a pretty lenient set of hard-and-fast time travel rules, and it always bothered me that Donner's Superman didn't follow them. I don't know how many other DC characters followed those same rules, but I know there's a series of Atom time travel stories, which include Superman Rules in an issue of "DC Comics Presents".

Basically, Superman can time travel because he's fast enough to "break the time barrier". Other methods exist, like the "ice fishing hole" from the Atom, or the Legion's time spheres.

Anyway, when time traveling, a time traveler can muck around with history however they want. It seems to work by "Harry Potter" rules in that effect is allowed to precede cause, and therefore time cannot actually be "changed," except to be how it already was - I think. It wouldn't surprise me if there were contradictions on this point across multiple stories, but I think it's the obvious conclusion of the time Superman went back in time to Krypton and helped his parents get out of a jam where they were accused of being spies for a terrorist group - and they got married because of that meeting with their son. Obviously, Jor-El and Lara were always married before that point, nor had they ever been jailed for terrorism, so it makes sense that Superman had already done what he did to help them - long before he was whisked back on that particular time trip.

However, if Superman, or another time traveler, arrived in an era where they already exist, either because it's during their lifetime or they had previously time traveled to this era - or sometimes if they would time travel there in the future - then they become a transparent ghost, incapable of changing anything during that era, but still able to observe anything that happens.

This power has obvious munchkinry potential, and I'd love to see a fan fiction or something where Superman uses it to learn things he doesn't know about the past - to the best of my knowledge, that only happened once, when a man hated Superman because he thought that super-baby was adopted instead of him as a child. Superman took him back and showed him that conveniently, no, the couple he wanted to adopt him was a totally different one from the one who adopted super-baby.

In any case, I don't know if pre-Crisis Flash comics followed their own sets of time travel rules, or if the ghost thing came up there too, but it strikes me as a good way for time traveling super-heroes to be unable to change their own past - or history as a whole.

Which is why Donner's Superman time travel bugs me so much of course. It creates the problem of a hero who can change history pretty much whenever they want.

[manwhohaseverything]

Well, in donner movies superman did fly around the earth pretty fast. Nothing suggests he didn't break the time barrier. All the similar effects is used for both donner time travel and pre crisis time travel. The circular ring formation.


The difference is the effect is on earth instead of superman.I am not saying donner meant it. Its just a coincidence.

[witchboy]

Superman's return to Krypton was a great, powerful story.
It's hopelessness is undercut by frequent returns though. He learns he can come and go via a Time Bubble. So why didn't he use that method to return for Lyla? Her fate once he left her was unknown to him. While Jor-El and Lara couldn't leave because they had to be there to send him to Krypton, it seems strange to me that he didn't attempt to go back for Lyla, beyond just that the plot didn't want it to happen.

[DrNewGod]

Or rather they just never told that story. Or focused on it,
But his father did put the warning out there, that is not how you help.
That warning was there for a reason...

Pretty much </thread>

[Jim Kelly]

I just assume that Superman went so fast around the Earth that he broke the time barrier and went back in time a few minutes. Rewinding the film is the way movies represent that. It's left so vague that you can make up any rule you want for what actually happened. I don't know why people are so insistent that this makes no sense--it's deliberately not making sense so the viewer can believe whatever they want to believe about what happened.

Whenever Superman went back in time in the pre-Crisis comics, to before his own existence, whatever action he took ultimately turned out to be part of the timeline. That was part of history--as when he went back to 1920s Chicago and helped young Perry White win his first story, in "Superman Meets Al Capone." That was already a part of history before Clark even went back in time--he just didn't realize the part he played until after he returned to his own time.

If the Man of Tomorrow tried to prevent something from happening, it always ended up that his action actually made history happen as it should. The exception to this was "Superman's Greatest Feats," when he found that he could change the timeline and upon realizing this he changed a lot of history--only to find out he had actually travelled to a parallel universe, one where he could change history. So Superman was like a Deus ex Machina in that other universe, creating huge changes in their timeline. He leaves that universe, to whatever fate he imposed on them, and returns back to the Earth-One universe with its Weisinger rules of time travel.

In "Time Signs a Death-Warrant for the Justice League," Superman trades places with himself in the Secret Sanctuary, so the Superman from the past appears in the present and the Superman from the present is trapped in the past--I assume that the phantom rule doesn't apply in that story, because there aren't two Supermen existing at the same time, so one doesn't become a phantom.

Of course, the Legion of Super-Heroes travelled into the past all the time. But whatever they did in the past must have been part of their timeline all along, or else they would have changed their own future.

[Mr.B]

Used to be also the paradox rule. The universe resets to back to the way it should be, but also can't be mucked around again the same way.

[CaptCleghorn]

Looking at this problem seriously (and yeah, that's a stretch), the laws of physics would seem to dictate a set of rules that apply to time travel. IRL, we have no idea what they are. In fiction, different writers may have different ideas what those rules are. Even within the same franchise we get differing contradicting rules. As for Christopher Reeve saving Margot Kidder in Superman 1, that's not a unique occurance. Booster Gold trying to save Batgirl seems to dictate some thing can't be changed, but Batman remembering seeing him during an attempt was a change to the timeline.

I put this into one of tweo categories. The first is that the rules are so complex, we are incapable of understanding them complete;y. but only small pieces, like a dog understanding some words from its human. The second option is that writers wiill do whatever the %#*k they want and a consistancy ain't ever gonna happen.

[Doctor Bifrost]

\
But his father did put the warning out there, that is not how you help.
That warning was there for a reason.

I haven't seen the movies in a long time. But I have a vague memory - either from the movie and Superman II, or discussions that followed them - that the release of the Phantom Zone criminals in Superman II was a consequence of Superman going into the past in the proceeding movie. On Wikipedia it just says "the Phantom Zone is shattered near Earth by the shockwave of a hydrogen bomb, thrown from Earth by Superman. The three criminals are freed..." Was that at all related to the first movie, or just some random hydrogen bomb that he threw into space?

Also, when Superman turns back time and rescues Lois from death, does he also save everyone else Lex Luthor killed with his scheme? Or does he just not go that far...?

The "rules" for time travel in the DCU, even within a given continuity/reboot-era/whatever, are a mass of conveniently contradictory, vaguely expressed concepts that the writers can use for hand-waving without, in my opinion, actually following through. Mainly it seems that villains can do whatever they want without suffering consequences, but the heroes always get into trouble. Or maybe it's just that the villains don't care about the chaos that follows changing history, and the heroes do.

[Toreador]

I haven't seen the movies in a long time. But I have a vague memory - either from the movie and Superman II, or discussions that followed them - that the release of the Phantom Zone criminals in Superman II was a consequence of Superman going into the past in the proceeding movie. On Wikipedia it just says "the Phantom Zone is shattered near Earth by the shockwave of a hydrogen bomb, thrown from Earth by Superman. The three criminals are freed..." Was that at all related to the first movie, or just some random hydrogen bomb that he threw into space?

Also, when Superman turns back time and rescues Lois from death, does he also save everyone else Lex Luthor killed with his scheme? Or does he just not go that far...?

The "rules" for time travel in the DCU, even within a given continuity/reboot-era/whatever, are a mass of conveniently contradictory, vaguely expressed concepts that the writers can use for hand-waving without, in my opinion, actually following through. Mainly it seems that villains can do whatever they want without suffering consequences, but the heroes always get into trouble. Or maybe it's just that the villains don't care about the chaos that follows changing history, and the heroes do.

IIR the bomb was the one attached to the Eiffel Tower elevator that was accidentally activated when the Paris police attempted to capture terrorists that overtook the Tower.

There have been other time travelers (such as Rip Hunter) who traveled back it time and made little changes with no dire effects. It's just been with speedsters that things go out of whack (probably due to the Speed Force in some way).

[Bored at 3:00AM]

In the Lester cut, Zod, Ursa & Non are freed by the Paris bomb. In the Donner Cut, they are freed by the first missile, which Superman pushes into space. Superman's trip back in time was to save Lois, who was seemingly the only person he failed to save from the detonation of the 2nd bomb.

The only consequence to Superman saving Lois is that he later gives up his powers for her, thereby allowing Zod to take over the Earth, which presumably involved lots of deaths.

It would have been really interesting to see what Donner & company had come up with to end Superman II, which was originally going to end with the death of Lois Lane and Superman reversing time to save her and prevent the escape of the Phantom Zone criminals. The amnesia kiss from Lester's cut works well enough, even if it makes no sense given Superman's powers. The half-finished Donner cut was stuck with repeating the reverse time stunt because that was the only thing they had footage of.

[Jim Kelly]

In my head, I remember it as the consequences of what happened in the first movie that released the villains from the Phantom Zone in the second movie. I know that's not supposed to be the case in the Lester version. But I think I always knew this was how it was supposed to happen and made that edit in my mind. At the time, I was reading so many articles in magazines and newspapers about the two movies, behind the scenes stuff, deleted scenes, that this became what I thought it should be.

The whole apotheosis of Superman, from Mario Puzo's original story, is that he does some god-like act that is what he was put on this Earth to do (echoing Jonathan Kent's lines to Clark), but his sky father warns him that such acts have consequences.