This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Gus: The assertion that 'ficcers "can't get published" is not quite on.
A short, off the top my head list of 'ficcers who went on to pretty successful writing careers:
- Lois McMasters Bujold
- Jane Espenson
- Mere Smith
- Looney Toons
- Cory Doctorow
Darksasami: Ah, but it's not an assertion that 'ficcers can't get published. It's an assertion that 'ficcers who use the phrase with a straight face can't get published. For a good and obvious reason.
Red Shoe: What he said. I think — but I wasn't sure enough to put it in the article — that "Meanwhile, in the future" is originally a Ratliff quote.
Looney Toons: Actually, I am the exception that thoroughly breaks the rule. I was professionally published and had a membership in SFWA some years before I ever turned my hand to fanfic.
Alex319: I think that one of the Austin Powers movies did in fact use a line "Meanwhile, back in 1947..." or something like that.
The Editor: It was 1969 but you're right.
Andrew Nagy: See also (link broken, but it was a page from Superman #162: The Amazing Story of Superman-Red and Superman-Blue). Though I understand the basic scenario comes up quite frequently in DC Comics.
Kizor: Whee!
Sikon: BTTF is not really a case. We never see parallel stories in different time periods developing simultaneously. In fact, Marty returns before he leaves in the first movie. I'm not sure what "ripple effect" the author of that entry was talking about.
HeartBurn Kid: I think he's referring to the way the newspapers change, and how Marty slowly fades from existence in the first movie because his parents never got together and he was thus never born (and of course, the much faster version of the same that happens to Old Biff once he returns to the future in BTTF II).
Morgan Wick: I just have to link to this. I was originally going to put it in the entry, but I'm not sure...
Eran of Arcadia: Who saw the Season 3 finale of Lost? I am trying to figure out if the "flash forward" qualifies.
Mister Six: I was a bit confused by some of the examples on first reading this. It seems that there are three different tropes here, so I'm splitting them into three different trope categories:
- The nonsensical use of time as a constantly moving factor in time-travel stories (eg. Bill and Ted) - San Dimas Time
- The justified use of a portal that links two periods in history that are X years apart; the portal moves forward at the same rate on either side, so that a day passing here corresponds to a day passing there (Mirror Mirror) - Portal to the Past
- A wholly different trope in which an episode jumps between the present and the future to show how one affects the other (the Dudley Moore/Eddie Murphy tank flick) - Meanwhile, in the Future…
Tim Stilson: How does one classify what happens in the 2nd Austin Powers movie when the theft of Austin's mojo suddenly affects Austin at a particular time in the present? Or is it tied to the time at which Dr Evil jumps back in time to initiate the theft?
arromdee: This needs a lot of work. There are too many examples (particularly video games) which are Portal to the Past.
Robert: Removed a couple of examples of clock roaches. In both instances, the narrative thread stays with one group throughout. There's no switching between timezones
Also, this comment:
- it takes ''time'' for the hounds to travel through time. They travel at a rate of 30 million years per day, or something like that. Rrrrright...
T Paradox: Trying to decide if the Star Trek Extended Universe novel Federation is an example of this trope. There's next to no interaction between the two time periods (though the interlacing builds the reader's understanding of what's going on), but the blurb writer actually used the phrase "Meanwhile, in the 24th Century..."
