History Main / AlternateHistory

* What if a particular presidential election had [[WhatCouldHaveBeen turned out differently]]?

* {{AlternateHistory/Other}}

-->-- ''Website/{{Cracked}}.com''

A type of SpeculativeFiction (sometimes called "Uchronia" or "{{Anachronism|Stew}}") set in a world where one or more historical events unfolded differently than they did in the real world. Often set some time after the event (called a "point of divergence", or [=PoD=], by fans of the genre), such stories typically describe a PresentDay world vastly changed by the difference, or follow another major historical event in light of the change. Sometimes linked with a TimeTravel story -- the point of divergence is often caused by travelers from "our" timeline (OTL in Alt-history parlance) seeking to effect a desired change. The protagonists may be original characters or actual historical figures. LampshadeHanging occurs often in these types of stories (an AllohistoricalAllusion); often, a character will stop to muse on what the world would be like if history had gone the way it did in the real world. Which, we suppose, is TruthInTelevision... after all, lampshading this trope is the entire point of alternate histories.

Often, the change's ultimate source is ForWantOfANail. If "historically unimportant" characters are involved, expect InSpiteOfANail.

For less drastic changeovers (such as slight differences between their world and ours), see NeverWasThisUniverse. Some settings will undo these changes with RubberBandHistory.

The plausibility and realism of Alternate History is measured on the SlidingScaleOfAlternateHistoryPlausibility, an analogue of the MohsScaleOfSciFiHardness. More examples are on the AlternateHistoryLiterature page. See Also the AlternateHistoryTropes index. If the differences are unintentional, see ArtisticLicenseHistory.

Closely related to AlternateUniverse. A lot of times, this can result in [[OriginalCharacter OCs]], if written as fanfiction. Supertrope to WeirdHistoricalWar and AlternateHistoryNaziVictory.

* AlternateHistory/{{Literature}}

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
* ''Anime/CodeGeass'' takes place in a timeline where things went really well for British imperialism; the Celts kicked Julius Caesar and the Romans off the island, Elizabeth I had male heirs, [[UsefulNotes/TheAmericanRevolution "Washington's Rebellion"]] failed... all with the cumulative effect of making "Britannia" the only superpower on the planet as of the early 21st century. They ''were'' defeated by Napoleon, though, forcing them to abandon Britain and relocate to what had been the colonies -- that is, North America, which is ''entirely'' under their control. Napoleon's Europe-spanning empire also laid the foundation for a faux-EU before he died (likely of poisoning by one of Queen Bessie's spies). It bears mentioning that there are certain factors present in the world of Anime/CodeGeass that indicated that perhaps it NeverWasThisUniverse. Such as Sakuradite and Geass itself.
* ''Anime/ThePlacePromisedInOurEarlyDays'' takes place in a timeline where Japan is divided after losing WWII, between the [[HammerAndSickleRemovedForYourProtection (Soviet?) "Union"]] and the US.
* ''LightNovel/FullMetalPanic'' follows a present day where the Cold War never ended (due to Mikhail Gorbachev having been assassinated, and thus, the political reforms which led to the breakup of USSR never came to pass) and the arms race led to [[HumongousMecha combat mechs on the battlefield]] -- aided along by Black Technology, which comes the Whispered, rare individuals gifted with latent PsychicPowers.
** By the end of the series, it's revealed that [[spoiler:the villains' plan is to ''undo'' the alternate history, changing key events to turn reality into a peaceful one more in line with our own. The source of the Black Technology was, in fact, echoes caused by the Whisperer using her powers to probe backwards in time to find which events needed to be changed.]]
* The finale of the manga version of ''Manga/ChronoCrusade'' reveals that it falls under this genre. [[spoiler:Demon's homeworld--a spaceship/fish/...thing called Pandaemonium--is called out of the depths of the Atlantic ocean by [[WellIntentionedExtremist Aion]], which causes a tidal wave that destroys UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity. [[TheLancer Chrono]] goes after Aion to try to stop him, and they end up fighting in Pandaemonium. At some point in the process, it blows up, creating a ring around the Earth that's visible in the sky even in the 1990s.]]
** The anime ending averts this by ''trying'' to stick to OTL. [[spoiler: It's implied that Aion shot John Paul II.]]
* ''Anime/KikisDeliveryService'' takes places in a Europe where WWII never happened.
* The ''Kerberos'' saga takes place in a world where Nazi Germany won in Stalingrad. It eventually leads to a total Axis victory... in Europe. Japan still falls in 1945. But it's the Germans who occupy and morph the country into a fascist dictatorship.
** ''Anime/JinRohTheWolfBrigade'' takes place further down that alternate timeline. Things [[CrapsackWorld didn't work out as great for Japan as you might think]].
* [[Anime/FullmetalAlchemist The 2003 anime version]] of ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' is set in [[spoiler:a version of our world where alchemy worked]]. This is revealed when [[spoiler:Edward ends up on the other side of the Gate, which is 1920s England]]. The manga however is a strict AlternateUniverse.
* ''Anime/ReadOrDie'' takes place in a British-dominant world, complete with hidden superpowers. By the sequel, however, the Empire had completely collapsed, leaving the world at the mercy of various secret organizations and the United States.
* In at least some early Universal Century timelines, it's implied that the circumstances leading up to the founding of the Earth Federation itself was due to an alternate outcome of the Cold War. This could also apply to ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing,'' given the show's rather AnachronismStew atmosphere and the After Colony calendar starting in the 1970s.
* ''Anime/StrikeWitches'' takes place in a world where aliens invaded in 1939 before World War 2 and forced the world to unite in order to stop them. Also the only way to stop them are by using magical imbued schoolgirls wielding rocket legs with characters like Winston Churchill and George S Patton making cameos. Officially the alternate history goes back further, with BC standing for Before Caeser, the German monarchy never losing power, and giving Japan a more active role in past events.
* ''Manga/{{Jin}}'' involves a Japanese neurosurgeon from 2000 being transported back to 1862. He introduces germ theory (nevermind that the germ theory was actually proposed by Girolamo Fracastoro [[OlderThanTheyThink as early as 1546]] and with the works of Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch ''already'' [[CriticalResearchFailure was pretty much the mainstream]] by 1862) and modern surgical techniques to Japan and the West, among other medical ideas. Butterflies abound from his actions. Among the results? [[spoiler: The Meiji Restoration doesn't take place and the Tokugawa Shogunate survives]].
* ''Franchise/DotHack'' diverges initially around 2002 with the founding of the UN's World Network Commission in the wake of mounting cybercrime. But the real changes happen when a virus called Pluto's Kiss is unleashed on December 24, 2005, crippling thousands of computer systems worldwide and effectively ''crashing the Internet.'' This provided the [[MegaCorp ALTIMIT Corporation]] virtual monopoly over rebuilding the net and helped set the stage for The World.
* ''Anime/ConcreteRevolutioChoujinGensou'' gives superpowers and giant mecha to everyone, and plonks them squarely after World War II. Political commentary and superpowered battles ensue.
* In ''Manga/TokyoGhoul'', the titular species has existed alongside humanity since at least the 19th century, although no one is sure where exactly they came from. The CCG, an organization created to investigate Ghouls, was founded in 1890.
* The Demon Wars of 1918 changes Japan's history in ''Anime/SakuraWarsTV''.
* ''Manga/{{Gintama}}'' takes place in a world where sufficiently advanced aliens made contact with Japan before the Black Ships did, causing the country to modernize much faster than they did in real life.
* In ''Manga/AstraLostInSpace'', we're led to believe that [[spoiler:its world history diverged from ours sometime in the 1960's, with the Cuban Missile Crisis resulting in WW3 and wiping out a big chunk of the world's population, leading to massive changes in the structure of the world.]] Though [[spoiler: later revelations seem to suggest that there's something up with that history, given that Lina's time frame would set Earth's destruction a mere ''six years'' before the plot kicks off.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Audio Plays]]
* In Creator/TheFiresignTheatre's ''AudioPlay/TheFurtherAdventuresOfNickDanger'', the presidential interruption at the end of the piece makes it clear that the show itself is taking place in an alternate universe where [[spoiler:the US surrendered to Japan after the attack on Pearl Harbor]].
* ''AudioPlay/BelowBoard'' is set in an alternate 1930s where there's a social-democratic (sort of) US government, and the Civil Rights movement is already in full swing.
* ''AudioPlay/TheCartographersHandbook'' is set in an alternate 1880s where the world was ravaged by a zombie plague shortly after the American Civil War.
** ''AudioPlay/ThePrincessThieves'' is set in the same alternate history, with this story focusing on Victorian Britain.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]
* UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar conquered Gaul (modern France), defeated Vercingetorix and annexed the territory to the Roman Empire. All of it? Yes. All of it. ''ComicBook/{{Asterix}}'' is based on an alternate history scenario: Caesar defeated only ''most'' of the gauls, with the exception of an UndefeatableLittleVillage that resists, then and ever, the invader. All the conventional Roman warfare is useless, because the village druid created a magic potion that gives SuperStrength. All Asterix stories are either about a futile attempt of Rome to conquer this village in some non-standard way, or Asterix and Obelix making a visit to some other ancient civilization (all of them, however, were just humoristic expies of modern countries, rather than realistic portrayals of their ancient counterparts).
* Back around 1994, the Epic Comics series ''Lawdog'' revolved around the idea of travel, sometimes accidental, between alternate histories and alternate worlds, and a square-jawed tough cop who patrols the roads between the worlds and tries to protect the more civilized and peaceful Earths from things like invasion by technologically advanced Nazis who won World War II in some timelines, or contamination by aggressive and dangerous lifeforms from an Earth where evolution took some very different turns one or two billion years back.
* Some of the comics that Creator/AlanMoore created for America's Best Comics and DC Comics lean toward Alternate History. ComicBook/TomStrong, for example, lives in a city designed by architect Creator/WinsorMcCay (in our world, the cartoonist creator of ''ComicStrip/LittleNemo''.)
** The existence of costumed vigilantes (and one actual superpowered being) in ''Comicbook/{{Watchmen}}'' caused several major differences from real-world history (e.g. the United States won the Vietnam War; UsefulNotes/RichardNixon is still President in 1985; the threat of the UsefulNotes/ColdWar going hot is all too real even in the late 80s; electric-powered cars became commonplace in the US).
** ''ComicBook/TheLeagueOfExtraordinaryGentlemen'' initially starts out as a steampunk crossover of characters of Victorian literature, but in following volumes all of fiction begins to intertwine with actual history. Half-fairie [[Literature/TheFaerieQueene Queen Gloriana]] rules instead of Elizabeth I, postwar Britain sees the rise and fall of the [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour Ingsoc regime]] and there's a war in [[Series/TheWestWing Qumar ]] in the Noughties.
* ''ComicBook/GiveMeLiberty'', by Dave Gibbons and Creator/FrankMiller, about the United States under the more and more authoritarian Republican president Erwin Rexall, which [[DividedStatesOfAmerica eventually fall apart]] after an assassination attempt leaves him in a coma.
* DC Comics' ''[[Creator/TangentComics Tangent]]'' books take place in a world where the Cuban Missile Crisis ends in Florida and Cuba nuking each other at roughly the same moment, turning the Cold War hot. The resulting world, compared to ours, is ahead of the times technologically (paper books are seen as antiquated and quaint) but behind the times culturally (the hippie movement has only recently begun). Despite being published by DC, this alternate reality was ''not'' a divergent DC universe; Amazons, the Justice Society, Gotham City, there's nary a concept from the DCU to be seen. This is due to the premise of the world, which takes DCU names and applies them to entirely different concepts.
* ''ComicBook/{{Arrowsmith}}'', by Creator/KurtBusiek and Carlos Pacheco, is a fantasy take on this trope. At the forging of the Peace of Charlemagne (the Pax Nicephori in the real world), the various hidden magical races of the world decided to make their existence openly known to humanity, also joining in the peace treaty. The United States of America is actually the United States of Columbia in this series, which takes place during this world's version of World War I. Dryads, trolls, dwarves, etc. live among humanity, magic co-exists side-by-side with technology. The Industrial Revolution is causing a magical revolution, as spells become mass-produced for the first time in human history.
* ''ComicBook/OmegaComplex'' is set in a world in which US president John F Kennedy wasn't assassinated; he ends the UsefulNotes/VietnamWar and gets elected for a second term, during which he sponsors research into the effects of radiation on humans.
* Vertigo's ''ComicBook/{{DMZ}}'' is a variant that alters recent American history, in that the reaction to 9/11 and the ensuing change in U.S. foreign policy, was a far more violent and self-destructive one anwhat's left of d led to the USA erupting into a second civil war. The end result is a [[CrapSackWorld less than perfect union]], with the resultant factions being the so-called Free States, the United States and the titular DMZ (formerly known as Manhattan).
* Samaritan from ''ComicBook/AstroCity'' prevents the Challenger disaster and destroys his own timeline. He apparently remains in existence because of his connection to the fundamental forces of the universe.
* Ian Edginton and D'Israreli's ''ComicBook/ScarletTraces'' and ''Scarlet Traces: The Great Game'' are unofficial sequels to ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds''. Both involve a Great Britain where it became an even greater world power through the reverse engineering of the failed Martian invasion technology, which later leads to a war on UsefulNotes/{{Mars}}. However, the setting is a CrapsackWorld, with many living in poverty, and a increasingly fascist state developing.
* ''ComicBook/JourJ'' has this has the premise of each volume. What if the Cuban Missile crisis had gone hot? [[spoiler: France and England become the world's only superpowers after the USSR is destroyed and what's left of the US falls apart.]] What if France had preemptively bombed Nazi Germany's military buildup? [[spoiler:France becomes a fascist regime and goes to war with England.]] What if Spain was still a Muslim kingdom when Christopher Columbus sets out? [[spoiler:The expedition is killed by the descendants of Viking settlers.]] What if the Titanic hadn't sunk on its maiden voyage? [[spoiler:It still sinks two decades later, taking Albert Einstein and Adolf Hitler with it.]] What if the Germans had taken Paris in World War 1? [[spoiler:The French send assassins to kill the Tsar before he can pull Russia out of the conflict, who end up killing the future Lenin and Stalin.]]
* ''ComicBook/MinistryOfSpace'' by Creator/WarrenEllis is an alternate history in which the UK captures all the WWII German rocket scientists before the US and USSR can. Thanks to this and the iron will of Space Ministry head John Dashwood (who funds research with stolen Nazi gold), the UK space program reaches the moon by 1960, and has colonies on Mars and the asteroid belt before the end of the 20th century, but equal rights for non-whites is unheard of.
* PatMills' ''[[ComicBook/{{Savage}} Invasion]]'', which ran in the 80s, was a straightforward story in which the USSR is conquered by the renegade Volgan republic which then launches an invasion of all Western Europe in the then [[TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture near future]] of 1990. When the series was resurrected in the 2000s and set in what had become modern times, it was simply declared an alternate history in which, during the 90s, Russian dissidents break away and form the Volgan republic, which then manages to conquer all of Russia, and thus the events of ''Invasion'' occur in the 90s. Each StoryArc of ''Savage'' opens with the words "Another Britain" to reinforce this.
* ''ComicBook/{{Block 109}}''. UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler is killed in 1941. UsefulNotes/NaziGermany wins the war against the Western Allies but is losing the war against USSR. Features Hitler's dreamed capital of Germania, some StupidJetpackHitler stuff such as Nazi nuclear weapons, futuristic aicrafts, futuristic soldiers in armors, mechas and even [[SyntheticPlague zombie-making virus]].
* ''{{ComicBook/Lilith}}'': The titular heroine gradually alters history. First in small ways, leaving an almost unnoticeable effect on history, and then in major ways. Like averting the assassination of [[spoiler: Emperor Commodus]], and reversing the outcome of the Battle of [[spoiler: Sekigahara]].
* ''ComicBook/TheBoys'' has a point of divergence in World War II, when a formula that can turn people into superhumans is invented and immediately, unsuccessfully weaponized. The ongoing attempts to turn superheroes into something that can be used in war instead results in the superheroes being the focus of a massive media empire. Most notably, an attempt by a powerful but completely untrained group of superheroes to board the plane that knocked down the World Trade Center causes the same plane to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge instead.
* The ''Patient Zero'' arc of ''{{ComicBook/Crossed}} Badlands'' (issues 50-56) confirms that UsefulNotes/GordonBrown was Britain's prime minister when the civilization-ending Crossed pandemic began, thereby making him (presumably) the last ever Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in that world.
* MiloManara's ''Borgia'' series is more or less faithful to history, but the last book goes off the rails: the King of France dies in the eruption of the Vesuvius, Savonarola is sodomized to death by the Pope on a bed of spikes, Cesar Borgia conquers cities with Creator/LeonardoDaVinci's working superweapons and flying machines, etc. Though the end sort of snaps back with the death of Cesar in Spain.
* The ''ComicBook/BlakeAndMortimer'' series obviously diverged from our history at some point before the 1940's : Tibet rose as a superpower (the Yellow Empire) at that time, accumulating enough super-weapons to conquer the world through a Blitzkrieg World War Three, before being defeated by a world Resistance movement led by the British Empire thanks to their superior super-weapons. Then, during the 1950's, the Soviet Union almost managed to conquer the West thanks to Soviet Super Science and even though its plan was foiled at the last moment, it's very likely it would have resulted in World War Four. However, the series has very little continuity and those wide technological and geopolitical divergences are not really taken into account in other episodes.
* In ''{{ComicBook/Uber}}'', the Nazis successfully create an army of near-unstoppable superhumans – but only in April 1945, when Germany was already an utter ruin. Thus, as one character describes it, it's not so much a story of "Germany winning" as one of "everybody losing". The course of World War 2 rapidly changes as the series progresses, with a new German offensive on the Eastern Front, the destruction of most of Paris, and the partial defeat of the US Navy by Japanese superhumans.
* ''Mini Comics Included'' features the Literary Commandos; in their world, just about every celebrated writer in history is, uh, ''not'' a writer (except for Charles Dickens, who is a OneBookAuthor and whose only book is crappy and long forgotten). No, instead they're either members of the elite Literary Commandos, who guard the timestream, or among the cadre of villains who threaten it. Members of the LC include the taciturn archer Marksman Twain, the cunning ranger Virginia Wolf, and the massive wrestler Thomas Pain.
* ''ComicBook/TheRoyalsMastersOfWar'', has the presence of super powered royalty though [[InSpiteOfANail much remains similar to real life history]]. Their intervention in the Second World War, however, makes more drastic deviations from our timeline. [[spoiler:With the war ending with the bombing of Hitler's bunker in Berlin by the RAF, guided by one of the British Royals.]]
* ''ComicBook/ExMachina'' is a minor example, where the main character managed to save one of the Twin Towers during the 9/11 attacks.
* ''ComicBook/LiberalityForAll'', made in 2005 and set in 2021, has Al Gore win the 2000 American presidential election instead of George Bush (WordOfGod says this is due to Ralph Nader dying in a car crash beforehand), which [[AuthorTract somehow]] results in a future where al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein still rule Afghanistan and Iraq, and American conservative pundits are fugitives.
* ''ComicBook/SecretEmpire'' runs on this trope: [[spoiler: [[ComicBook/CaptainAmerica Steve Rogers]] had his mind altered to not only be a ComicBook/{{HYDRA}} agent, but also believe that the Nazis were actually winning and the Allies created the Cosmic Cube to alter history and have it so that they won instead. When he takes over the United States, one of the changes he does in have the history books changed to have his view of history inserted.]]
* The graphic novel ''Rome West'' runs on this, as its premise is a Roman fleet being blown far off course by a storm and arriving in the future site of the real world NYC. From there, they strike alliances with the local tribes and create a new Roman Republic which comes to dominate North America, except for small colonial purchases by the British and Dutch (the Spanish being driven off after the Western Romans capture Columbus' crew and reverse engineer their guns). Among other things also demonstrated in the wider world, the Byzantine Empire lasts until the late 20th century, Spain and China fight a colonial war in Australia, and the Panama Canal gets dug by the Western Romans in the 16th century.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Fan Works]]
* ''FanFic/TheConversionBureauTheOtherSideOfTheSpectrum'' does this to one [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic Equestria]] (called the [[TheEmpire Solar Empire]] or [[MirrorUniverse TCB!Equestria]]). There are [[CrypticBackgroundReference often numerous differences mentioned between the]] (mostly) canon universe and the TCB one, such as [[TheGreatOffscreenWar genocidal purges of the Changelings and a war with the Crystal Empire]]. There's also the existence of totem-proles (a surveillance network similar to [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour telescreens]]) and the genocidal war against humanity. [[ForWantOfANail All of which came about]] because [[spoiler:TCB!Lyra Heartstrings decided to go off on a little scuba diving trip with her buddies and uncovered a little ArtifactOfDoom that turned Celestia into its BrainwashedAndCrazy puppet ([[PointOfDivergence Prime!Lyra on the other hoof denied the the invite to practice for the Canterlot Royal Orchestra tryouts]])]]. Whoops.
* In ''FanFic/AeonEntelechyEvangelion'' history starts to diverge in 1930, when the discovery of the Elder Thing City (which causes the USA to drop its Isolationist policy and join the League of Nations) and the prolonged World War II (The War ends in 1946 with the atomic bombing of Berlin by the western allies to deny the Russians).
* Many [[AfterActionReport AARs]] on the ''VideoGame/TotalWar'', ''VideoGame/{{Civilization}}'' and ''Paradox series inevitably result in alternate histories of varying types.
** Notable examples include ''LetsPlay/AScotsmanInEgypt'' and ''Fanfic/IAmSkantarios.''
** Similarly, although less commonly, games where you can have all sides played by an AI can be used as "random history generators". These tend to be less protagonist-based than [=AARs=] stemming from a player nation, but usually a lot wackier, because AIs are stupid.
* ''FanFic/KhanVictorious'' is a a Star Trek timeline that explores a universe where Khan Noonien Singh and the Augument’s were able to win the Eugenics Wars, through the use of a last ditch tactic which ensured their victory: engineering a genetic virus, known as the Ascension Flu, which results in any future children born infected with the virus to be born as Auguments. From there it explores the consequences of that change upon the Star Trek universe.
* The ''Fanfic/HogwartsExposedTimeline'' on Website/AlternateHistoryDotCom posits the impact of the events of the ''Literature/HarryPotter'' books happening in our world... and exposed to the public in the late 1990s.
* ''Webcomic/AxisPowersHetalia'' has a good deal of alternate histories and universes within its collective. One notable, though dark, example is ''FanFic/AllHeEverWanted''
** The ''Fanfic/NineteenEightyThreeDoomsdayStories'' is a BroadStrokes AlternateUniverse crossover series between ''Webcomic/AxisPowersHetalia'' and ''Literature/NineteenEightyThreeDoomsday,'' history diverging in 1983 when the UsefulNotes/ColdWar turned into a catastrophic nuclear hell. The stories are told entirely through the eyes of the Nations themselves, more specifically those around what had been Central Europe.
** ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5842533 This is Justice]]'', ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6547779 Blind Carbon Copy]]'', and ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5640188 Grey Skies Over London]]'' involve timelines where America lost the [[UsefulNotes/TheAmericanRevolution revolution]] against England. Most similarities end there though, as they each take completely different paths after that point.
** ''FanFic/ACastleOfSilenceAndBones'' takes place in world where the Axis Powers not only won UsefulNotes/WorldWarII but had also taken over much of the planet at gunpoint. [[CrapsackWorld Things get]] [[FromBadToWorse much worse]] from there.
** ''Fanfic/MonarchyOverTheDanube'' involves a timeline where the Habsburgs return to Austria in 1935, resulting in a reborn Austria-Hungary and a changed world.
* ''FanFic/BattlefieldGallia'' is essentially a UsefulNotes/WorldWarII story that imagines the world of ''VideoGame/ValkyriaChronicles'' existing alongside ours. For the Axis, Allies and Soviets, at least, things get weird ''very'' quickly.
* It's not the focus of the story, but there is a Watchmen fanfic where [[PhysicalGod Dr Manhattan]] is monologuing about various alternate incarnations of himself he is aware of, with one world having a noteable divergence in the past, where "It is Mithraism that becomes the driving force of western civilization, and the people of the city we know as New York wear golden bulls around their necks, and it is Christianity that lies forgotten in the dusts of history."
* ''FanFic/TheSonOfTheEmperor'' is basically what happens when you combine UsefulNotes/TheNapoleonicWars with ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic.'' Historical hijinks and world-changing events ensue.
* The {{Fanfic/Uplifted}} series are about what happens when the Quarians decide to uplift Humanity in order to bring an end to their exile and retake Rannoch. Unfortunately, Russia in 1942 might not have been the best place for first contact. In the second part of the story, the Quarians begin to collaborate with the Junkers in order to bring down Hitler's government. Also features a love story between a Quarian and an SS officer. It's rated M for a reason, the author is not shy about showing just how racist the average person was back then, or any of the other nastiness of that war.
* In ''FanFic/AllAmericanGirl'' and ''[[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL62BA69EAB6DBD807 Ed, Edd n' Eddy Z]]'', 9/11 never happened. In the former's case, al-Qaeda also never existed.
* In ''{{FanFic/Emperor}}'', a ''Literature/HarryPotter'' fanfic, history changes when Robert Schuman fails to convince the European governments to work on what would eventually become the European Union, leaving the continent divided, Britain militarized and the threat of war hanging over everyone's heads. [[spoiler:Turns out that the failure of [[AtomicHate Project Manhattan]] was an even earlier point of divergence.]]
* In FanFic/TheConversionBureauColdWar, a xenocidal Princess makes contact with humanity to announce how she plans to wipe them out... in [[UsefulNotes/ColdWar 1986]], to the leaders of [[BullyingADragon the world's most powerful nations]].
* ''FanFic/StrikeWitchesQuest'' has said witches exist in history with minor effects with major ones occuring as a Martian invasion hits at the same time as Pearl Harbor, resulting in the countries of the world uniting to fight back. One of the side effects of the invasion is most of the nefarious leaders/powers are removed either by the Martians or by others taking advantage of the situation.
* ''Fanfic/{{Pokeumans}}'' claims that the original Neanderthal humans lived alongside creatures that we would recognise today as Pokemon, until [[HumansAreBastards they started abusing their privilege and companions]]. This one [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou could have actually happened, though - eventually the Legendaries undid everything they taught humanity and all evidence of their existence before leaving for a different dimension.]] This then has repercussions in the modern day - BIG repercussions.
* In [[Fanfic/TheLastWarWorldWar3 The Last War by Jan Niemczyk]], the democracy movements east of the Iron Curtain are crushed by the USSR and loyalist forces. A renewed Cold War simmers on until April, 2005 when it finally boils over. There are no battlefield nukes any more, so [[WorldWarIII World War III]] does not go nuclear in the first hour after the bullets [[MoreDakka and pretty much everything else]] start flying.
* In ''FanFic/ImGivingYouANightCall'',[[spoiler: As a Post-Conqueror of Shamballa verse,]] this is to be expected. In that story the first Edward and Alphonse Elric were prominent figures in the Second World War and defused the tension of the Cold War and implied to have had a hand in the creation of their world’s Amestris.
* ''Fanfic/PacificWorldWarIIUsNavyShipgirls'' has UsefulNotes/TheKoreanWar begin and end differently, namely the US Seventh Fleet being wiped out at the beginning thanks to an AlienInvasion. Additionally, it has France secede from NATO in the 1960s, as well as a more militaristic (and less economically successful) Japan, and finally a less influential United States.
* The ''VideoGame/KantaiCollection'' fic ''FanFic/{{Eternity}}'' has a naval portion of WWII go a little differently:
** Directly inspired by ''Fanfic/IndestructibleSpirit'', due to politics the ship that was to become IJN Kongou stayed in England and became HMS Indestructible. Thus Hiei became a lead ship of her own class, and somewhere down the line the Japanese decided that they in fact did need a 4th battlecruiser, so they built it and named her Kongou. Something the [[ReplacementGoldfish shipgirl did]] [[StuckInTheirShadow not appreciate]].
** Hood was captured instead of sunk, which had driven Churchill into frenzy and directed many efforts to sink her despite the navy's resistance. Attempts to sink her failed, but the British got back at Germans by capturing Bismarck instead. Both survived the war, and after the brief return to their original countries' service they transfered to their "captors'" navies as symbols of European solidarity.
** And the main ForWantOfANail that sets the premise of the fic, is the USS Enterprise damaging IJN Yamato enough in the Kure Raid that she was unable to participate in operation Ten-Go, leading to her capture by the Americans. Years later when Admiral Halsey was unable to get support to retire Enterprise as a museum ship, he made a deal with the General [=MacArthur=]: He helps the general in convincing the government to refit Yamato and formally add her into US Navy, and in return the General will help him in convincing the Japanese to buy Enterprise as a precaution against the Communists. They succeed, and Yamato became USS Montana, while Enterprise became JDS Yonaga, whose long service with JMSDF earned the titular nicknane Eien, Eternity.
* ''Script/NeverAgain'' revolves around a future in which World War II and the Holocaust never happened... and succeeds in NOT using HitlersTimeTravelExemptionAct. How do they do this? [[spoiler: By redeeming all the Nazis, AND HITLER, in one ''heck'' of a HeelFaceTurn.]]
* ''Blog/ThePredespairKids,'' in addition to being an AlternateUniverse for ''VisualNovel/{{Danganronpa}}'', has quite a few historical deviations from our own. Hope's Peak Academy was founded back in 1937, Toranosuke Ishimaru severed as the 46th prime minister of Japan instead of Noboru Takeshita, and the Towa Group and Togami Corporation managed to save Japan from experiencing the economic downturn in the 1990's, leading to the country becoming a much more important player in world politics. However, some things remain consistent between worlds, such as Brexit and the 2016 U.S. Presidential Elections.
* ''Fanfic/HalloweenUnspectacular'' uses this trope for a lot of stories:
** "Legendaries" is set in a version of World War II where the Western Allies somehow come into possession of Legendary Franchise/{{Pokemon}}. This allows them to [[CurbStompBattle crush the Nazis]], invading Berlin by 1944.
** "Come the Revolution" takes place in a version of 1940s Los Angeles where robots known as Mechans are a sizable minority of the population. Oh, and Thomas Dewey is President.
** "Lady Liberty" is set in a world based on a game of ''VideoGame/{{Civilization}}'', and features the Mongols as Britain's great enemy in Asia. Also, the Statue of Liberty in this world is in Edinburgh, and is actually [[spoiler: a [[BalefulPolymorph transformed]] [[WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom Dani]]]].
** "The Catalyst" is centered around these, giving various different fictional characters the final choice the player has to make in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3''.
** "Hanging Tree" is set in a universe where the American Civil War wasn't fought over slavery, so it's still an active thing in the present.
** "The Great White Fleet" is set in America in 1902, but [[CoolAirship airship]] technology is advanced enough to make them flying fortresses used as standard by the military. Also, William [=McKinley=] is still alive and President, and Teddy Roosevelt is Secretary of the Navy.
** "The Trans-European Express" is set in a universe where the Bonaparte dynasty, the Kaiser, and the Tsar are all still in power. And transhumanism is a common, if repressed, social group.
** "Sea to Shining Sea" expands on the universe created in "The Trans-European Express". White Star line is still around, transcontinental train lines are still the main form of long distance mass transit in America, and John F Kennedy was an anti-liberal authoritarian (who wasn't assassinated but lost reelection) while Richard Nixon is beloved for being a champion of the Civil Rights movement.
* ''Fanfic/AThingOfVikings'' takes the first ''WesternAnimation/HowToTrainYourDragon'' film and drops it, anachronisms and all, into Real Life History in the AD 1040s as the point of Divergence, with the worldbuilding essentially being designed around dragons having existed [[InSpiteOfANail but not having an impact on world history]] until Hiccup tamed them and brought the dragons of the Green Death's nest into his tribe. Now, in 1041 AD, where the height of military technology on the planet is Greek Fire, a small Norse tribe in the British Isles has a fire-breathing ''air force''. Hijinks ensue.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
* While the exact setting is ambiguous, ''WesternAnimation/{{Nine}}'' takes place in an alternate version of the early 20th Century (according to brief shots of newspapers that apparently show a date in the 1930s) in which the Industrial Revolution never ended, resulting in advanced robotics and artificial intelligence occurring nearly a century ahead of schedule (unfortunately, it [[AIIsACrapshoot doesn't end well]]).
* The Creator/{{Pixar}} film ''WesternAnimation/TheGoodDinosaur'' takes in a world where the K-T extinction event never happened and Jurassic dinosaurs like ''Apatosaurus'' and ''Stegosaurus'' coexist with Cretaceous dinosaurs and animals that evolved after the K-T extinction like long-horned bison and human beings.
* Though it's never addressed onscreen, ''Disney/BigHero6'' has this trope in its backstory. The film's setting [[{{Americasia}} San Fransokyo]] is an AlternateUniverse San Francisco, which was rebuilt by Japanese immigrants using architectural concepts from their home country after the city was damaged during the 1906 Earthquake.
* According to commentary of director Creator/BradBird ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'' takes place in an alternate 50s-60s version of Earth.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
* ''Film/BramStokersDracula'' fuses the titular vampire character from ''Literature/{{Dracula}}'' with the historical Vlad III, where the infamous [[RoyalBlood voivode]] is condemned to vampirism after blaming God for the suicide of his wife, Elisabeta.
* ''Film/IndependenceDayResurgence'' takes place in an alternate 2016 where the events of the 21th century were drastically altered by the War of 1996 in the [[Film/IndependenceDay previous movie]]. For the last 20 years, humanity has enjoyed a prolonged period of peace and stability after uniting against a common foe, which means events like the War on Terror have been avoided. They also had a significant jump in technological advance after they learned how to reverse engineer the invader's tech, creating smartphones and drones sooner than their creation in our timeline and allowing the colonization of other planets.
* ''Film/ItHappenedHere'', a 1966 film positing a Nazi-occupied Britain.
* The 2004 film ''Film/CSATheConfederateStatesOfAmerica'' takes the notion of the South winning the UsefulNotes/TheAmericanCivilWar and plays it to the hilt. Though instead of forming its own country, the entire USA goes Confederate. The turning point comes when England and France aid the Confederacy and turn the tide at Gettysburg. All non-Christian religions are outlawed save for Judaism (Jews live in a reservation on Long Island). They advocate enslaving ''all'' non-whites, and TV ads catering to slave-owning middle class members are commonplace.
* ''Film/GoodByeLenin'' plays with this trope-- the protagonist's mother is a dedicated East German communist who is in a coma when the Berlin Wall falls. When she reawakens, he constructs an elaborate alternate history to avoid shocking her into another heart attack with the news that her beloved East Germany is no more.
* ''Film/{{District 9}}'' takes place in a world where an alien ship landed in South Africa in 1982, interrupting Apartheid in favor of something almost exactly the same as Apartheid...''with explosions''.
* ''Film/InglouriousBasterds'', and according to some fans by extension the entire universe of Creator/QuentinTarantino movies, [[spoiler: takes places in an alternate WWII era in which Hitler and his three biggest men. Goering, Goebbels and Borrmann are killed by the Basterds in June 1944.]] May have already been alternate history because Goebbels is referred to as Hitler's NumberTwo and his real right hand Himmler is never mentioned.
** If ''Film/TheHatefulEight'' and ''Film/DjangoUnchained'' are part of the same universe, then the divergence is much earlier as ''The Hateful Eight'' has a black man who took part in the Battle of Baton Rouge which happened months before the Union let blacks into the army and ''Django Unchained'' has the Civil War starting in 1860 instead of 1861.
* The backstory of the South Korean/Japanese action film ''Film/TwoThousandAndNineLostMemories'' has a time traveler prevent the assassination of Ito Hirobumi in 1909, which alters history in that Japan retains its imperial conquests (so Korea is still under Japanese rule in the present-day) and allies with the United States in World War II.
* ''Film/{{Fatherland}}'', the movie adaptation of Robert Harris' novel with Creator/RutgerHauer, features this with Nazi Germany winning UsefulNotes/WorldWarII and covering up the Holocaust. Better than it sounds.
* ''Film/TheRocketeer'' is revealed to be one of these. Howard Hughes has already invented a jetpack, the ''Hindenburg'' disaster never happened which means the Nazis are still using Zeppelins in 1938, and the Hollywoodland sign ends up losing the "-land" eleven years early.
* ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartII'': Biff Tannen created an alternate version of 1985 when he gave the TimelineAlteringMacGuffin to his younger self in 1955. As a result, he became "the luckiest man on Earth" by betting on everything from horse racing to boxing and always winning due to the answers in the almanac. He founded Biffco, a company that dealt with toxic waste reclamation. He bought out police departments, and altered the state of international history, by prolonging the Vietnam War and getting Richard Nixon elected to his fifth term.
* ''Film/TheManInTheIronMask'' is [[FridgeBrilliance implied in the end to take place in one]]. With the [[spoiler:real life Louis XIV]] basically ousted from power, his [[spoiler:twin brother]] proceeds to become the greatest monarch in French history and possibly prevent the circumstances leading to the UsefulNotes/FrenchRevolution in the process.
* ''Film/K20LegendOfTheMask'' is set in late 1940s Japan in an alternate timeline in which World War II never happened. As a result, the country is already a world leader in technology. Much of the technology was invented by Nikola Telsa, who received far more support and recognition in this timeline than he did in real life.
* ''Film/TheBluesBrothers'' is a somewhat more mundane example than most. Not long before the movie was made the Illinois state legislature had debated a law that would revoke the tax-exempt status of buildings owned by churches that weren't themselves used as houses of worship. In RealLife the law didn't pass but in the film it did, necessitating the boys take on their MissionFromGod to get money to pay the taxes on the Catholic orphanage they grew up in.
* In ''Film/CaptainBerlin'', Hitler's brain was saved by his personal physician Dr. Ilse Von Blitzen
* ''Film/XMenFilmSeries''
** The ending of ''Film/XMenFirstClass'' seems to imply that [[spoiler: the Americans and Soviets drop the Cold War to wage war against mutants]], but in ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'' {{Retcon}}, the government apparently covered up what happened to avoid alarming the public, thus [[spoiler: the Cold War proceeds as it did in real life]].
** ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'' takes it even further than ''First Class''. For starters, 1973 technology has advanced somewhat faster than the real world: the Sentinels were built, plastic weapons to counter Magneto have been developed, and mutant-gene scanners exist (when the mid-70s marked the period when genomics started to take off). There's also the bit where Magneto [[spoiler:drops a ''baseball stadium'' around Richard Nixon's head in front of international television]], or the little number where the mutants get into a full on brawl during [[spoiler:the Paris Peace Conference]], which drastically changes world events by bringing mutants to public attention.
* Subtle example in ''Film/Godzilla2014''. While the Pacific nuke tests being covert attempts to kill Godzilla falls under HistoricalInJoke, the 1999 collapse of the Janjira NPP and the subsequent quarantine of a sizable Japanese metropolitan area is a much bigger divergence.
* The 2014 documentary ''America'' asks what the world would look like if the United States never existed. [[SubvertedTrope Unfortunately]], [[AbortedArc the film never answers that question]], dropping that concept altogether. NeverTrustATrailer, indeed.
* ''Film/ThePhiladelphiaExperimentII''. A scientific experiment sends a stealth fighter carrying nuclear bombs back in time to 1943. The Nazis capture the jet and use it to bomb Washington D.C. and win UsefulNotes/WorldWarII.
* A minor example in ''Film/{{Ted}}''. In 1985, a child's wish to bring his teddy bear to life came true. News spread rapidly, making Ted into a celebrity. 27 years later, no one really notices the animate teddy bear anymore.
* The {{Mockumentary}} ''Punishment Park'' takes place in an alternate 1970. After the Vietnam War escalates, Richard Nixon implements the McCarran Internal Security Act, which authorizes federal authorities to detain persons deemed a risk to internal security without referring to congress. Anti-war protesters, civil rights activists, feminists, communists, and conscientious objectors are arrested and given a choice: either spend their convicted full-time in a federal prison or spend three days in the titular punishment park. There, they will have to travel across 53 miles of the hot California desert in three days, without water or food, while being chased by National Guardsmen and police as part of training. If they succeed and reach the American flag at the end of the course, they'll get to go free. If they fail and get "arrested", they'll be sent to prison anyway. The story is about a joint British-West German film crew following groups of these people during their excursion.
* ''Film/WonderWoman2017'' (and by extension the Franchise/DCExtendedUniverse) not only sees an Amazon warrior intervening in one of the most destructive conflicts in human history revealed to be [[spoiler:engineered by the God of War in his plot to destroy humanity]], but also takes several divergences from our history: [[spoiler:Erich Ludendorff, a real-life German general, kills the entire German High Command with poisonous gas for wanting to sign the peace treaty with the Allies and he gets killed by Wonder Woman, even though the real-life version would only die of cancer in 1937]].
* Most films in the ''Franchise/{{Godzilla}}'' franchise, including the AlternateContinuity happy Millennium series, kept Tokyo as Japan's captial after the events of ''Film/Godzilla1954''. The second film in the afromentioned Millennium series, ''Film/GodzillaVsMegaguirus'', not only changed the events things so Godzilla wasn't destroyed by the Oxygen Destroyer--but that Japan's capital was moved to Osaka as a result of the rampage.
* ''Film/HitlerDeadOrAlive'' turns out to be the point of divergence for this, since [[spoiler:Hitler is successfully assassinated.]]
* ''{{Film/Bright}}'' takes place in a universe where mankind coexisted with several mythical creatures since the dawn of time and significant events from 2000 years ago such as an EvilOverlord trying to take over the world still affect contemporary's society.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Music]]
* ''[[Music/{{Hero}} !Hero: The Rock Opera]]'' tells the story of Jesus in an Alternate History where Jesus wasn't born until the modern age, where the world is ruled by a OneWorldOrder named I.C.O.N. which has banned all religions except for Judaism.
* "The Night Chicago Died" tells of an event that never happened, a full scale, city wide battle between the Chicago police force and UsefulNotes/AlCapone's mob.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* Players in the card game ''TabletopGame/{{Chrononauts}}'' each represent a character from a different timeline altering crucial events in modern history in an attempt to set things back to what his or her own present. One character is a sentient cockroach whose presence requires starting World War III.
* ''TabletopGame/PsionicsTheNextStageInHumanEvolution'' takes place in a universe where Project MKUltra was successful.
* Alternate histories are a key element of the ''TabletopGame/FengShui'' TabletopRPG, with old timelines being erased and new ones being created as various factions gain or lose power in a conflict known as the Secret War. Most people don't notice when history changes, because their own histories have been rewritten to conform to the timeline alterations as well. However, Secret Warriors who have been to The Netherworld, an [[AnotherDimension alternate dimension]] that facilitates TimeTravel, retain memories of their former lives when these changes, known as "Critical Shifts," take place.
* The entire premise of the ''TabletopGame/{{GURPS}}: Infinite Worlds'' campaign is based on one version of Earth (ours, known as "Homeline") discovering the means of traveling to hundreds of other alternate dimensions as reliably and economically as domestic air-travel is today, and engaging in a trans-dimensional cold war with a different version of Earth ("Centrum") with similar technology. Homeline's biggest concern is [[TheMasquerade never, ever letting any other worlds figure out]] that travel between parallel universes is possible (let alone how to do it). Steve Jackson Games published two sourcebooks for the 3rd edition of the game, which detailed at least ten distinct worlds and offered seeds for dozens of variations.
** For bonus horror, in at least one timeline (codenamed Reich-5), the Nazis have ruled Earth for decades and are now starting to study parachronic travel, with techniques that include PoweredByAForsakenChild, DealWithTheDevil, and AndIMustScream.
* The tabletop and video game ''TabletopGame/CrimsonSkies'' exists in an alternate history where the United States broke up during the Depression ''and'' zeppelins actually succeeded as a transport product.
* The TabletopRPG ''TabletopGame/{{Traveller}}'' originally came out in the mid 1970s. The rather optimistic timeline of its official background universe, in which antigravity was invented in the 1980s and FTL travel in the 1990s, quickly became alternate history (and now seems to be officially accepted as AH, instead of trying to {{retcon}} it away).
* Similar to the above, ''Tabletop/{{Battletech}}'''s timeline originally began with the fall of the Soviet Union… [[TheGreatPoliticsMessUp in 2011]]. After several messy attempts to {{retcon}} it to the Russian Federation or a re-established USSR, the writers have just declared it official AH as well.
* ''TabletopGame/{{Timemaster}}''. Members of the Time Corps (based in AD 7192 Earth) try to prevent their opponents, an alien race called the Demoreans, from changing human history to make it more to their liking.
* ''TabletopGame/{{Deadlands}}'' starts by asking, "What if things that went bump in the night appeared in the middle of the American Civil War?" Their answer? Said war drags on for a decade longer than it "should," [[SchizoTech human technology springs forward in leaps and fits]], and humanity potentially [[spoiler: winds up dropping supernatural nuclear weaponry on itself]]. Better than it sounds.
* When ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'' originally began in the late '80s it wasn't alternate history. But since it passed 1999 when a Supreme Court decision gave corporations the right to their own militaries and 2001 when they gained extraterritoriality, effectively making them independent nations, it's become this. Nor did a dragon appear over Mount Fuji in 2011.
* ''TabletopGame/AcesAndEights'' has a very in-depth alternate reality, just so players can't go about hunting down political figures just to say that they changed history.
* ''TabletopGame/GearKrieg,'' a table-top game determined to answer the age old question "What would the world be like if [[StupidJetpackHitler Hitler had had a jetpack?]]"
* ''TabletopGame/{{Continuum}}'' is broadly about the players time-traveling to prevent this trope from occurring, since at best it usually has the effect of wiping out numerous time-travelers further Up the timeline.
* ''Tabletopgame/{{Microscope}}'': a WorldBuilding game in which this is a definite possibility when players don't want to create a completely new ConstructedWorld.
* In ''TabletopGame/RocketAge'' Rocket travel becomes a reality in 1931. As such, humanity expands out into the solar system.
* ''TabletopGame/ThroughTheAges'': Emphasised by the use of real-world names for wonders and leaders. Gandhi as president over a nation of scientists kept happy by BreadAndCircuses? UsefulNotes/IsaacNewton builds the Taj Mahal and discovers computers? Music/ElvisPresley conducts espionage, declares Holy War and builds the Kremlin? All are plausible occurrences and add significant amusement to the game.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Visual Novels]]
* In ''VisualNovel/RoseGunsDays'', Japan lost WWII not because of the bomb in 1945 but because of a natural disaster in 1944. Japan (or at least Tokyo) is flooded with American and Chinese government meddling, "helping" with reconstruction − and bringing millions of immigrants with them. Japanese traditions are cast aside, finding a job outside of mafia or prostitution without fluently speaking English or Chinese is nigh-impossible, and in 1947 pretty much everyone living in Tokyo already has a second Western name, in the way that Amakawa Jun took the name "Jeanne". By 2012 Tokyo is more of a bilingual country with English and Chinese, and speaking Japanese has become very rare.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]
* ''Webcomic/TwiceBlessed'' is set in an alternate version of our world, where history was changed drastically at some point when magic was discovered by "Archmage Plato".
* ''Radioactive Panda'' makes a throwaway joke about how Cretor/GeorgeLucas suffered a fatal heart attack in 1993; the characters lament that they "only" got to see Spielberg's vision of [[Franchise/StarWars the prequel trilogy]], which won 14 Oscars.
* Speaking of Creator/GeorgeLucas, ''WebComic/DarthsAndDroids'' takes place in an Alternate History where the ''Franchise/StarWars'' films were never made and instead the plot was used as an RPG campaign.
** ''Webcomic/DarthsAndDroids'' is part of a growing genre started by ''WebComic/DMOfTheRings'', which all have this trope as a basis. See CampaignComic.
** This trope is taken to extremes (and routinely extended) [[http://www.darthsanddroids.net/episodes/0050.html here]].[[note]]The complete list as follows:\\
[[Film/HarryPotter Wands & Warts]]\\
[[Theatre/TheSoundOfMusic Notes & Nazis]]\\
[[Film/XMenFilmSeries Mutants & Miscreants]]\\
[[Franchise/{{Alien}} Enlisted Men & Extraterrestrial Biological Entities]]\\
[[Film/TheWizardOfOz Magicians & Munchkins]]\\
[[Film/ThreeHundred Sandals & Spartans]]\\
[[Film/{{Avatar}} Avatars & Avifauna]]\\
[[Franchise/{{Terminator}} Terminators & Temporal Paradoxes]]\\
[[Film/{{Jaws}} Carcasses & Carcharadons]]\\
[[Film/{{Casablanca}} Trenchcoats & Turncoats]]\\
[[Film/TheMuppetMovie Amphibians & Anthropomorphisms]]\\
[[Film/{{Inception}} Heists & Hypnagogic Hallucinations]]\\
[[Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean Barnacles & Bilgewater]]\\
[[Franchise/BackToTheFuture Docs & DeLoreans]]\\
[[WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}} Hypnotoads & Hyperchickens]]\\
[[Film/WillyWonkaAndTheChocolateFactory Chocolates & Chumps]]\\
[[Film/ForbiddenPlanet Ids & Idiots]]\\
[[Franchise/{{Ghostbusters}} Egons & Ectoplasms]]\\
[[Film/JasonAndTheArgonauts Hellenes & Harryhausens]]\\
[[Series/{{Thunderbirds}} Misadventures & Marionettes]]\\
[[Franchise/IndianaJones Arks & Archaeologists]]\\
[[Franchise/JurassicPark Theme Parks & Theropods]]\\
[[Literature/BridgetJones Darcies & Diaries]]\\
[[Creator/DavidAttenborough Marmosets & Meerkats]]\\
[[Film/NationalLampoonsVacation Gags & Griswolds]]\\
[[Film/ETTheExtraTerrestrial Elliotts & Extraterrestrials]]\\
[[Film/Apollo13 Moonshots & Mishaps]]\\
[[VideoGame/PacMan Pac-Mans & Power Pellets]]\\
[[Film/ItsAMadMadMadMadWorld Drivers & Dubble-yas]][[/note]]
* In ''Roswell, Texas'' set in 1948 UsefulNotes/DavyCrockett survived the Alamo, assassinated Santa Anna and used his influence to keep Texas an independent nation. A running gag is historical figures with very different life stories. Just a couple of examples: [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meir_Kane Meir Kahane]], Malcolm Little (UsefulNotes/MalcolmX) and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Lincoln_Rockwell George Lincoln Rockwell]] are all Texas Rangers. Creator/WaltDisney is President For Life of California with Marion Michael Morrison (Creator/JohnWayne) as his Army Chief of Staff
* ''Webcomic/GirlGenius'' takes place in a world [[InSpiteOfANail more or less like our own]] in the 1800s or so, except for the presense of 'Sparks'- natural [[MadScientist mad scientists]] who are [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder compelled to build amazing technological wonders]] and pretty much rule the world- not very well mind you. There's at least one Spark who's noticed this and [[HunterOfHisOwnKind is trying to wipe out the rest]] (though he's understandably considered AxCrazy and not the hero). The storyline of the comic is [[WildMassGuessing theorised]] to be their world's equivalent of the Napoleonic Wars with MagnificentBastard Klaus Wulfenbach in the Napoleon role.
** Also it is hinted that the Queen of England is some kind of undead or at least immortal creature/machine, and that ''something'' happened in the Americas at some point in the past to make them effectively inaccessible.
* ''Webcomic/TemplarArizona'' takes place in, to quote the author, "a slightly irregular Arizona that fell off the back of a truck somewhere, and now all the power outlets are a weird shape and a couple of wars never happened." Specifically the titular town exists on what in our world is the Navaho Reservation, there is or was a guerilla war going on in Australia between the government and the natives and both [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Greco-Roman]] and Myth/EgyptianMythology have a bigger cultural background presence.
* ''Webcomic/RumorsOfWar'' takes place in a Bronze Age world [[NamesTheSame similar to our own]] where the Trojan War was not one, but three, separate known-world-spanning affairs the left a ScavengerWorld in its wake. AWizardDidIt.
* ''Webcomic/{{Collar 6}}'' was revealed to be this. The point of divergence was when [[spoiler: the Roman Empire discovered the ruins of Atlantis.]]
* ''Webcomic/LeastICouldDo'' Once had a storyline about Rayne writing an Alternate History book about Nazi Germany, though the main Alternate History thing about it was the SelfInsertFic part.
* ''Webcomic/{{Westward}}'' takes place in a universe where UsefulNotes/WorldWarII ended with the destruction of Berlin (and, incidentally, much of Europe) by a (''presumed'') Soviet superweapon. The UsefulNotes/ColdWar continues into the 21st century, a manned mission to Mars happened in 1974 with attempts to colonize it made by the 1980s, and FasterThanLightTravel is possible in 1999 (though [[BlackBox no-one entirely understands how it works]]). Because the webcomic's plot ultimately spreads to [[TheMultiverse other universes]], other Alternate Histories may be encountered as well.
* ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'' presents us with a glimpse into one, in which the Uryuoms made public contact with Earth as far back as the American Revolution. One character, who has memories of that timeline, remarks that she's utterly screwed in this world's history class because of it.
* WordOfGod in author notes for ''Webcomic/AndShineHeavenNow'' reveal that the [[Manga/{{Hellsing}} Millenium invasion]] caused this to happen, though she never worked out many of the details beyond UsefulNotes/BillClinton dying in office during the invasion, Gore taking office and winning in re-election, and increased security measures meant that 9/11 never happened. Oh, and vampires and zombies never became 'trends' cause so many people were affected by the invasion. So, on the bright side, no Literature/{{Twilight}}.
** She also notes that this is an alternate universe in the sense that [[Series/DoctorWho the Doctor]] has another planet as his favorite, as opposed to Earth in canon.
* WordOfGod is that ''Webcomic/QuestionableContent'' takes place in a worrld where the space program didn't go into the crapper after Apollo resulting in technology spinoffs including AI robots as a common part of society, cyborg limbs and a privately owned space station think tank.
* In ''Webcomic/TheRedStar'', a widow from an alternate Soviet Union recounts their defeat at the hands of an alternate Afghanstani. With {{Magitek}}.
* ''{{Webcomic/Hotblood}}'' is an alternate Earth where humans and centaurs live side-by-side. This trope comes in because some historical figures have been replaced with centaur equivalents.
* ''Webcomic/DreamingOfUtopia'' takes place in an alternate version of TheNineties where [[UsefulNotes/FurryFandom Furries]] are a Religion instead of a Fandom. They first appeared partly as a reaction to the First World War.
[[/folder]]


[[folder:Western Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'' featured a relatively conventional version of this in the three-part story "''The Savage Time''". The immortal Vandal Savage sending back a laptop computer with detailed notes on the history of the Second World War, the German Reich and on advanced 21st century technology. Past!Savage then uses this knowledge to invent powerful weapons that the Nazis use to repel the Allies on D-day, and presumably the oncoming Russian armies (though there's [[ArtisticLicenseHistory zero mention]] [[AmericaWonWorldWarII of that]]). He then proceeds to... get this: sent warplanes with an invading army ''to America'', probably because the situation at home was just that ''good''. In the end, it resulted in a world where at least America (but most likely all of it) is ruled by Savage with an iron fist.
** In that same episode, two high-ranking German officers groan that while UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler himself was a pain to deal with, he at least listened to his generals, unlike Savage. Anyone who knows anything about Hitler knows that he was famous for ignoring his strategists' advice and making impossible demands of them. This may have just been a [[ArtisticLicenseHistory flub]] on the writers' part, though.
** In another episode ("A Better World"), we're introduced to an alternate universe where ComicBook/LexLuthor became President of the United States; this, Franchise/TheFlash dying before the episode starts, and a speech from Luthor on how he and Superman need each other to be of any importance to the world, end up leading the remaining members of the Justice League to [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope become]] the [[KnightTemplar Justice Lords]].
* Much more lighthearted: ''WesternAnimation/{{Freakazoid}}'' found himself flung back in time a little before [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarII 07 December 1941]], and saw a few Japanese planes coming towards Hawaii. The end result after he interferes? [[spoiler: The Cubs win the World Series, world peace breaks out, cold fusion works, Euro Disney is a success, Sharon Stone becomes a good actress and [[WesternAnimation/PinkyAndTheBrain President Brain]] rules over the US.]]
* In ''WesternAnimation/EvilConCarne'', the League of Nations never disbanded, UsefulNotes/AbrahamLincoln is still alive and President and the world is fairly peaceful, save for the VillainProtagonist leading a terrorist group trying to TakeOverTheWorld. Since it pretty much shares canon with ''WesternAnimation/TheGrimAdventuresOfBillyAndMandy'', it seems that the Soviet Union [[TheGreatPoliticsMessUp never fell]] either.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'' has one of the screwed-up wishes of Timmy Turner result in England winning the Revolutionary War; the biggest changes in the present day are things like people drinking tea instead of coffee, flying the Union Jack, saying things like "Pip pip and cheerio," and society tending to Victorian dress, clothing, etc. The usual mayhem results as Timmy tries to set things right; naturally his parents don't notice any difference at all.
** When Jorgen banned Timmy and his fairies from ever returning to March of 1972, he said they'd still be allowed to visit other months of that year on the proviso they don't interfere with the election of ''President'' [[UsefulNotes/GeorgeMcGovern McGovern]]. However, nothing in the series has been described as being a consequence of UsefulNotes/RichardNixon losing that year's presidential election.
* There was a similar variation in ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' as Fry, Leela, Bender, etc try to restore things after scrambling the American Revolution in a vain attempt to "improve" the Fry family history.
** For some reason changing the Revolution often tends to be played for laughs, with the alternate outcome largely cosmetic.
* The ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' episode "Road to the Multiverse" had Stewie and Brian travel through multiple universes, some that fall under this. Stewie's ultra bred pig came from a universe where Christianity never existed, causing the world not to experience the Dark Ages and technology being more advanced.
** In the episode "Back to the Pilot" Brian and Stewie went back in time to January 31, 1999, the date that the series began. While they are there, Brian (against Stewie's wishes) warns his past self about 9/11, which allows Brian to prevent the Twin Towers from falling. As a result, however, UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush doesn't get re-elected because he was unable to use terrorist propaganda in his favor. Bush recreates the Confederacy in Texas and spreads it through eight states , which triggers the Second Civil War. In the future, because of the Second Civil War the world has been turned into a post-apocalyptic warzone due to nuclear war.
** In another episode, Peter asks Death to go back in time to the day he first asked Lois out. He ends up partying the entire day and messes up his chance. Peter and Brian go back to the present and find that things have radically changed for the better. Al Gore became president and turned American into a green paradise. Crime is virtually nonexistent, and technology has, apparently, reached the level of ''WesternAnimation/TheJetsons''. However, Lois is married to Quagmire. Brian begs Peter not to go back in time again, but Peter is determined to get Lois back. He ends up fixing things... [[CloseEnoughTimeline almost]]. [[WesternAnimation/AmericanDad Roger]] lives with them now.
* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'', though this wasn't made explicitly clear within the show itself until the latter half of the first season. Various differences include gem imagery on American currency, the existence of the state of "Delmarva"[[note]]located on the real-life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delmarva_Peninsula Delmarva Peninsula]][[/note]], and the fact that the Gems (Crystal or otherwise) and their artifacts have been on Earth for around 6,000 years.
** In the episode "Love Letters", it's revealed that the equivalent of UsefulNotes/{{Hollywood}} in the ''Steven Universe''...[[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment universe]] is in Kansas. [[https://twitter.com/ianjq/status/733448482917212161 Specifically, their version of Kansas City, rather than the state]] ("Kansas" is apparently not used as a state name, so the city never changed its name).
** It's revealed in "Keystone Motel" that Pennsylvania is instead called Keystone[[note]]one of the real-life state's actual nicknames[[/note]] in their world.
** It's been [[https://www.twitter.com/mcburnett/status/637119719703576576 confirmed]] that World War II never actually occurred, at least not in the way that we know it.
** There are also several geographic differences, implied by their general appearance as new channels of water on the map to be wounds on the landscape from the war 6000 years ago, which might also serve by the butterfly effect to explain some of the more unusual bits of alternate history.
*** The show consistently portrays Florida as being an island off the coast of Georgia rather than an attached peninsula.
*** Alarmingly, an enormous crater sea -- with a Gem facility right at its center -- has replaced about half of Russia's landmass.
*** A [[AllThereInTheManual made-with-creator-input graphic novel]] has a globe in the background reveal the fact that there's a massive channel between the Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean where the Nile Delta, Sinai, and Israel/Palestine should be, which has far more [[FridgeLogic alternate history implications]] than the show could ever possibly address (or be allowed to address).
*** And that's not even getting into the ''continents''! To start, Africa is missing a big chunk and South America has it, and that's ignoring the islands between the two. Iceland doesn't exist and the western part of Australia is further south and separated by a narrow sea. So, unless the Gems were responsible, the PointOfDivergence was probably sometime during the ''Triassic Period''.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'' episode "[[Recap/TheBoondocksS1E9ReturnOfTheKing Return of the King]]" involves a (non-canon) alternate history scenario, in which Huey Freeman imagines what would happen if UsefulNotes/MartinLutherKingJr had been put into a 32-year-long coma instead of dying from his attempted assassination in 1968. He wakes up in the year 2000 and experiences the social changes of [[TheWarOnTerror a post-9/11 America]], and is [[StopBeingStereotypical deeply mortified by the modern state of African-American culture]]. He finally snaps and launches into a huge [[NWordPrivileges N-word-laden]] [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech tirade]] about how all his sacrifices are being wasted by today's generation of black people, and [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere then goes into self-imposed exile in Canada]], where he dies of old age in 2020. But King's rant triggers a massive new social movement, Creator/OprahWinfrey being elected President of the USA, and the founders of {{Creator/BET}} [[TakeThat apologizing for its existence]].
-->'''Huey:''' "It's fun to dream."
* ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack'' is set in an alternate version of Earth that has been conquered by [[BigBad Aku]], a [[EldritchAbomination shapeshifting alien demon god]], since the ancient past up to the [[BadFuture far future]]. Under his tyrannical rule, the world has developed into an {{anachronis|mStew}}tic [[CrapsackWorld dystopia]] where [[MedievalStasis primitive, ancient societies]] somehow [[SchizoTech still coexist]] with [[{{Cyberpunk}} advanced, futuristic civilizations]]. After taking over all of Earth, Aku has been expanding his empire across countless other planets in space, which has introduced all kinds of extraterrestrial species to Earth.
* ''WesternAnimation/NeoYokio'': Aside from the history of demon slaying, the World Trade Center is still standing in "Neo Yokio" and everything south of 14th street seems to have been consumed by rising sea levels or sunken into the Atlantic (though people still live there in waterproofed townhouses accessible by bubble vehicles).
** The Soviet Union is still a nation, suggesting that either A.) the Soviet Union did not dissolve in 1991 like in our timeline or B.) technology was more advanced than our own timeline.
** Japan and Italy seem to have been combined into a single nation called "Giappone." The flag is a white field with a bifurcated red/ green circle in the center.
** Additionally, Neo Yokio itself appears to be a sort of independent city-state, with its own participant in the international races and no reference to influence from the U.S. government.
** There's evidently a place in the Southern US called North Cackalacka. Considering the implied politics of Neo Yokio, it's possible that it's an independent entity or that it's a U.S. state. (It might also be a region akin to UsefulNotes/{{Appalachia}}, if Sailor Pellegrino's twangy accent is anything to go by.)
*** Cackalacka is another way of saying Carolina, so she could be saying she's from North Carolina.

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Other]]
* Historical [[WarGaming wargaming]] is the TropeMaker for this trope. Both amongst the professionals (read: military) and hobbyists.
* In the 1970s, the Royal Military Academy of Sandhurst initiated a wargames reeanactment of UsefulNotes/WW2, if Operation ''Seelöwe'' (Sea Lion), the invasion of Britain by Nazi Germany, had taken place. The result was a complete disaster for the Germans. Although they would have managed to land and gain a foothold, they would have been bogged down first by the Home Guard, then bombed to submission by the RAF, and finally have their means of escape cut off by the Royal Navy. Their supply lines would have been cut, and on third day they already were starving and suffering for lack of ammunition and fuel. There simply was not enough harbour capacity in Southern England to supply the invading force. With that done, Germany would have lost quite a chunk of its army to the enemy, and would probably have never been able to initiate another such action against Britain for the rest of the entire war, provided the USSR would have still been in their way. One of the planners remarked that it was a pity they had never tried, as it could have shortened the war quite considerably.
** The commanders of the both sides were the actual generals who would have commanded the participating troops also in the RealLife.
** The Nazis never tried because their generals had had come to the essentially same conclusion: Operation Seelöwe hadn't even a snowball chance in Hell to succeed, especially after they've lost the aerial Battle of Britain, so the plan was quietly swept under the rug.
* Similar to the above, it's a common practice amongst military academies to wargame or speculate about what would have happened if General X had done Y instead of Z, partly because it helps show why Y was a better or worse choice than Z.
* The roadside attraction "[[http://io9.com/5084491/the-alternate-history-theme-park-where-dinosaurs-fought-in-the-civil-war Professor Cline's Dinosaur Kingdom]]" features an alternate version of the UsefulNotes/TheAmericanCivilWar where [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot the Union army was armed with]] [[EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs dinosaurs]].
* There are several usenet groups to discuss various alternate histories, like soc.history.what-if, though they don't get much traffic nowadays, with the decline of interest in newsgroups in general.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KyvlMJefR4 This promotional video]] by the Anti-Defamation League imagines how history might have changed had the likes of Martin Luther King or Anne Frank escaped their untimely demise, before challenging the viewers to stand up against the hatred that ultimately killed them.
* Website/YouTube series "What If" by WebVideo/AlternateHistoryHub, hypothesizes various historical situations with a few possibilities. Keeping in mind, of course, what happens is the result of numerous factors and cautioning that their scenario is just one of many. A few examples include "What if the Black Death Never Happened," "What if Napolean Never Rose to Power?" and "What If The South Won The Civil War?"
[[/folder]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'': Huey imagines what would happen if Martin Luther King had been put into coma instead of being assassinated. He wakes up in post-9/11 America, and is deeply mortified by modern black culture. He finally snaps and launches into a huge N-word-laden [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech tirade]] about how all his sacrifices are being wasted by today's generation, and [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere then goes into exile in Canada]]. His words trigger a massive social movement, Oprah Winfrey being elected president, and the Creators of BET apologizing for its existence.
--> '''Huey''': It's fun to dream.

* ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack'' takes place in a version of Earth that has been ruled by a shapeshifting alien demon at least since the medieval times. Under his rule, society has developed into an anachronistic dystopia where he enslaved countless civilizations and turned his attention to the stars conquering several other planets in the process, which worlds and attracted the presence of alien beings to Earth.

* What if Creator/GeneRoddenberry never conceived of ''StarTrek''?

* What if Creator/GeorgeLucas never created ''StarWars''?
* What if ''StarTrek'' never came into being?

*** And that's not even getting into the ''continents''! To start, Africa is missing a big chunk and South America has it, and that's ignoring the islands between the two. Iceland doesn't exist and the western part of Australia is further south and separated by a narrow sea. So, unless the Gems were responsible, the DivergencePoint was probably sometime during the ''Triassic Period''.

** When Jorgen banned Timmy and his fairies from ever returning to March of 1972, he said they'd still be allowed to visit other months of that year on the proviso they don't interfere with the election of ''President'' [[GeorgeMcGovern McGovern]]. However, nothing in the series has been described as being a consequence of UsefulNotes/RichardNixon losing that year's presidential election.

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'', though this wasn't made explicitly clear within the show itself until the latter half of the first season. Various differences include gem imagery on American currency, the existence of the state of "Delmarva"[[note]]located on the real-life [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delmarva_Peninsula Delmarva Peninsula]][[/note]], and the fact that [[spoiler:the Gems (Crystal or otherwise) and their artifacts have been on Earth for around 6,000 years]].
** In the episode "Love Letters", it's revealed that the equivalent of UsefulNotes/{{Hollywood}} in the ''Steven Universe''...[[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment universe]] is in Kansas.

** It's been [[https://mobile.twitter.com/mcburnett/status/637119719703576576 confirmed]] that World War II never actually occurred, at least not in the way that we know it.
** There are also several geographic differences, implied by their general appearance as new channels of water on the map to be wounds on the landscape from [[spoiler:the war 6000 years ago]], which might also serve by the butterfly effect to explain some of the more unusual bits of alternate history.

* ''Anime/MazingerZ'' spin-off ''Manga/NewMazinger'' was written in 1988, but the story happens several centuries after that World War III between America and Soviet Union left the planet devastated in the early 21st century. It is the early 21st century now, and not only nothing of it has happened, but also the Soviet Union collapsed shortly after the story's publishing.

* ''Anime/{{Macross}}'': The original ''Anime/SuperDimensionFortressMacross'' was broadcast in 1982 but featured an alternate history of humanity after 2009 when humans and aliens fight a devastating war over a transforming mecha battleship. It's beyond 2009 now, and we haven't even fought [[Anime/MacrossZero World War III]] and built mecha like they did in the series - we're behind schedule, in other words.

In real life, Counterfactual History is a real discipline, looking at reasonable conjectures. For example, historians have carefully examined the threat of invasion of Britain by Germany in 1940 and suggested that, though British defense was rushed and rudimentary at that point, so were German attack plans. Thus, Germany would almost certainly have established a beach head, but would not have succeeded in maintaining it. Unlike its literary equivalent, scholarly counter-factual history tends to focus on the short-term effects, as extrapolating long-term trends into the future has proven to be tricky even for what ''did'' happen.

** What if UsefulNotes/WorldWarII [[HitlersTimeTravelExemptionAct never happened]] ?

* What if [[GodwinsLawOfTimeTravel Germany had won]] UsefulNotes/WorldWarII? (Or, for more truly "alternate" and less "[[CrapsackWorld hellish]]" potentials, UsefulNotes/WorldWarI?)

Closely related to AlternateUniverse. A lot of times, this can result in [[OriginalCharacter OCs]], if written as fanfiction. Supertrope to WeirdHistoricalWar.

* ''ComicBook/SecretEmpire'' runs on this trope: [[spoiler: ComicBook/CaptainAmerica Steve Rogers had his mind altered to not only be a ComicBook/{{HYDRA}} agent, but also believe that the Nazis were actually winning and the Allies created the Cosmic Cube to alter history and have it so that they won instead. When he takes over the United States, one of the changes he does in have the history books changed to have his view of history inserted.]]

* What if [[UsefulNotes/AncientRome the Roman Empire]] (or [[UsefulNotes/TheBritishEmpire some]] [[UsefulNotes/GenghisKhan other]] [[UsefulNotes/KatanasOfTheRisingSun empire]]) never had fallen?

[[folder:Web Original]]
* The Website/YouTube channel ''WebVideo/AlternateHistoryHub'' is entirely dedicated to coming up with realistic, highly detailed and oftentimes amusing answers to questions like "what if Germany won UsefulNotes/WorldWarI" or "what if [[UsefulNotes/LeonTrotsky Trotsky]] rose to power instead of [[UsefulNotes/JosefStalin Stalin]]". The channel will also commonly use a similar formula to analyze fictional settings of popular works and try to figure out how such a scenario would play in real life. Think of it like a video version of ''Blog/WhatIf'', except it's for history instead of physics.
* In the original fiction[[https://www.fictionpress.com/s/3206139]] version of ''WebOriginal/KeitAi'', the girl's strange area code isn't the only thing that's different compared to the boy's universe. In the boy's timeline, the [[JapanTakesOverTheWorld Lost Decade of Japan]] never happened, the Creator/{{Nintendo}} Ultra CD exists, the {{Sony}} UsefulNotes/PlayStation and the UsefulNotes/VirtualBoy don't, and the Wrestling/{{WWE}} is still the [[Wrestling/AttitudeEra WWF]].
* Website/AlternateHistoryDotCom [[CaptainObvious of course]]
[[/folder]]

** In the episode "Back to the Pilot" Brian and Stewie went back in time to January 31, 1999, the date that the series began. While they are there, Brian, against Stewie's wishes, warnes his past self about 9/11, which allowed Brian to prevent the Twin Towers from falling. As a result, however, UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush never got re-elected because he was unable to use terrorist propaganda in his favor. Bush recreates the Confederacy in Texas and spreads it through eight unknown states which triggers the Second Civil War. In the future, because of the Second Civil War the world has been turned into a post-apocalyptic warzone due to nuclear war.

** In the episode "Back to the Pilot" Brian and Stewie went back in time to January 31st 1999. While they were there Brian successfully warned his past self about 911, which allowed Brian to prevent the Twin Towers from falling. As a result however UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush never got reelected because he was unable to use terrorist propaganda in his favor. As such he recreated the Confederacy in Texas and spread it through eight unknown states which triggered the Second Civil War. In the future because of the Second Civil War the world has been turned into a post-apocalyptic warzone due to nuclear war.

** If ''Film/TheHatefulEight'' and ''Film/DjangoUnchained are part of the same universe, then the divergence is much earlier as ''The Hateful Eight'' has a black man who took part in the Battle of Baton Rouge which happened months before the Union let blacks into the army and ''Django Unchained'' has the Civil War starting in 1860 instead of 1861.

* Vertigo's ''ComicBook/{{DMZ}}'' is a variant that alters recent American history, in that the reaction to 9/11 and the ensuing change in U.S. foreign policy, was a far more violent and self-destructive one and led to the USA erupting into a second civil war. The end result is a [[CrapSackWorld less than perfect union]], with the resultant factions being the so-called Free States, the United States and the titular DMZ (formerly known as Manhattan).

* ''ComicBook/JourJ'' has this has the premise of each voulme.
* ''ComicBook/MinistryOfSpace'' by Creator/WarrenEllis is an alternate history in which the UK captures all the WWII German rocket scientists before the US and USSR can. Thanks to this and the iron will of Space Ministry head John Dashwood (who funds research with stolen Nazi gold), the UK space program reaches the moon by 1960, and has colonies on Mars and the asteroid belt before the end of the 20th century.

* ''FanFic/KhanVictorious'' explores a Star Trek timeline where Khan Noonien Singh and the Augument’s won the Eugenics Wars through a last ditch tactic: engineering a genetic virus, known as the Ascension Flu, which results in any future children born infected with the virus to be born as Auguments.

** "The Great White Fleet" is set in America in 1902, but [[CoolAirship airship]] technology is advanced enough to make them flying fortresses used as standard by the military. Also, William McKinley is still alive and President, and Teddy Roosevelt is Secretary of the Navy.

* In the original fiction[[https://www.fictionpress.com/s/3206139]] version of ''WebOriginal/KeitAi'', the girl's strange area code isn't the only thing that's different compared to the boy's universe. In the boy's timeline, the [[JapanTakesOverTheWorld Lost Decade of Japan]] never happened, the Creator/{{Nintendo}} Ultra CD exists, the {{Sony}} {{PlayStation}} and the UsefulNotes/VirtualBoy don't, and the Wrestling/{{WWE}} is still the [[Wrestling/AttitudeEra WWF]].