History Main / CloseEnoughTimeline

** At the end of ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartIII'', the only change is the name of the ravine to Eastwood Ravine.
** Done in the [[VideoGame/BackToTheFutureTheGame Telltale game]] as well, where the only known differences are [[spoiler:Doc stayed in 1986 part-time to take care of his father's estate (as Marty helped patch their relationship), he never got stuck in 1931 (because he knew who the speakeasy arsonist was in this timeline), and Edna married Kid Tannen.]]

* The ''Series/{{Angel}}'' fic "[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/1215322/1/Impact Impact]]" ends with Cordelia experiencing a positive version of this. After spending two days over two years in the past, Cordelia is sent back to the future unsure if she's managed to save Doyle, and Angel and Gunn's initial reactions lead her to believe that everything's the same as it was before, until a few more comments lead to her realising that in this new reality, Gunn's sister Alonna is still alive and Angel has become human and is once again dating Buffy, to say nothing of Doyle still being alive.
* The ''Franchise/PowerRangers'' crossover "[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13550638/1/Forever-Yellow Forever Yellow]]" features a team-up of Yellow Rangers from across the series attempting to stop a version of Venjix (''Series/PowerRangersRPM'') being created in the main universe. At one point, the threat of Venjix is so great that Katie Walker (''Series/PowerRangersTimeForce'') and Z Delgado (''Series/PowerRangersSPD'') receive messages from the future that confirm that their future has changed to a timeline where Venjix is in control. During their time in the past, Z also learns that she is the niece of Black [[Series/PowerRangersWildForce Wild Force]] Ranger Danny Delgado, who speculates that he lost touch with his brother/Z's father in her future. When [[spoiler:Z and Katie return to their times, Z learns that she now has a close friendship with Amelia Hammond- the daughter of Andros and Ashley Hammond (''Series/PowerRangersInSpace'')- and her cousin Katie, both of whom are Rangers themselves, and Katie Walker's check of Time Force's historical records reveals that Amelia was meant to die during Venjix's attempted takeover. Since the only changes to history are a better relationship between Z and her family and a little girl's life being saved, Z and Katie conclude that they aren't going to bother reporting this change to anyone else]].

** In ''Film/BackToTheFuture1'', after Marty returns to 1985 at the end of the film, everything is the same as when he left it -- except the mall has a different name, his family and Biff have different fortunes (though Biff's proves not to be so different after all in ''[[Film/BackToTheFuturePartII Part II]]''), and [[FlashbackWithTheOtherDarrin Jennifer looks different]]. His own family's "close enough" change stems from Marty working on [[GrewASpine his father's self-confidence and assertiveness in the past]], and inadvertently encouraging his mother to be more truthful with herself. As a result, George is now a published sci-fi author able to provide an upper middle class lifestyle to his family, and he and Lorraine are far more happily married (and fit!), George doesn't take any hijinks from a more amiable Biff, and Marty's older siblings, Dave and Linda, now have white collar jobs, with Linda in particular having an active social life. Compare to the original timeline, where George was a meek office peon under Biff, Lorraine was a frumpy LadyDrunk, [[BurgerFool Dave worked at the local burger joint]], and Linda was a socially-awkward ShrinkingViolet.

*** Discussed in the two-parter "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS4E8YearOfHell Year of Hell]]", wherein a Krenim scientist named Annorax created a weapon capable of [[RetGone erasing his people's enemies from history]], but ForWantOfANail ensured this often also did things like eliminating the sources of cures for plagues, ultimately hurting the Krenim. He's been trying to fix it all with more and more erasures for the past 200 years, and finally manages a 98% restoration of the Krenim as they were before he started. His subordinate asks if this is a Close Enough Timeline, but Annorax has become a KnightTemplar and insists it isn't. Somewhat understandably, this is because the 98% restoration still doesn't include Annorax's lost wife, who was wiped out with the very first erasure attempt. In the end, it turns out that the only way to fix everything is to erase the weapon itself, [[NoOntologicalInertia thus undoing all of the changes it ever made]].

* In the season 4 finale of ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice2010'', the Legionnaires (who are from about a thousand years in the future and are trapped in the 21st century) lament that they must have changed the timeline so much that their home doesn't exist anymore. Then their their teammate Brainiac-5 arrives in a time machine to bring them back to the future, informing them that their timeline has been restored with 99.84% accuracy. Fellow time-traveller Impulse tells them not to question the difference.

* Happens all the time on ''Series/{{Timeless}}'', as the heroes work to contain the damage caused by [[BigBad Flynn's]], and later, [[AncientConspiracy Rittenhouse's]], attempts to alter history to their own ends. As the [[TimeyWimeyBall mechanics of time travel]] on the show prevent them from simply jumping back even further to prevent the changes from happening, the most they can do is try and get events back on track as much as they can. Thus, when they return to the present, they always find changes of various levels of severity (such as once coming back to learn their latest mission alongside Creator/IanFleming inspired a new Franchise/JamesBond novel and film), but never to the point that reality is unrecognizable to them.
** An interesting variation occurs in the season 2 episode "The Kennedy Curse", where Rufus, one of the time travelers, chooses to change the timeline for the better by warning a young UsefulNotes/JohnFKennedy not to go to Dallas in 1963, hoping for Kennedy to get a second period as president. However, once back in the present Rufus is informed that Kennedy still got shot - this time in Austin instead of Dallas. The outcome stays the same and creates another close-enough timeline.
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'': In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E49BackThere Back There]]", a man suddenly finds himself back in April 14, 1864. He attempts to prevent the assassination of UsefulNotes/AbrahamLincoln, but is dismissed as a lunatic and arrested. John Wilkes Booth frees him, but drugs him to prevent him from interfering, and he wakes up after Lincoln had already been killed. He then finds himself back in the present. He is sad that he failed to change history, but discovers an attendant at the club he goes to is now a very rich member. The rich man says that his ancestor was a policeman who believed a warning of Lincoln's assassination and tried to prevent it, becoming very famous and respected in the process and allowing him to advance his career.
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1985'': In "Profile in Silver", Professor Joseph Fitzgerald creates an AlternateTimeline when he prevents UsefulNotes/JohnFKennedy's assassination. When it becomes clear that the new timeline isn't viable as the world will be destroyed within a century at most, he [[TimeTravelEscape sends JFK forward to 2172]] and allows himself to be killed in the President's place. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, JFK was assassinated in Dallas on November 22, 1963.

* The ''Series/{{Castle}}'' fic "[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9654165/1/Flashforward Flashforward]]" opens with Kate Beckett of 2012 being sent back to 2009 through a temporal anomaly, but her attempt to find her mother's killer using the leads she's learnt in the future causes her death and creates a timeline where America and China are on the brink of war. After another group of time travellers send the Richard Castle of the "new" 2012 back in time to warn Kate about the consequences of her actions, [[spoiler:Castle and Beckett are able to warn the 2009 Montgomery how best to mitigate the effects of their presence once their 2009 selves return. While this mostly restores the original timeline, after they wake up in 2012, Kate receives a call from Montgomery even though he originally died in 2011, the group able to find evidence of Bracken's actions that allows Montgomery to escape prosecution for his own role in events by taking a plea deal]].

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E11TurnLeft "Turn Left"]] has Donna go back from a BadPresent to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong by making herself take a specific turn on a seemingly ordinary day. In the original timeline, Donna stuck to her guns and went left to the job that would lead her into [[Recap/DoctorWho2006CSTheRunawayBride "The Runaway Bride"]], while in the altered timeline, changed by a time beetle mounted on her back, she turned right, the Doctor died in "The Runaway Bride", and every subsequent episode ended with catastrophe, [[CrapsackWorld ultimately devastating much of the planet]]. In the final version of the timeline, Donna still ''tries'' to turn right, but thanks to Alternate!Donna's HeroicSuicide by falling in front of a truck, there's a traffic jam, so she goes left rather than put up with it, putting the timeline back on track and killing the time beetle.

** This is how Megamorphs #3 ends, after the Animorphs [[spoiler:prevent Visser Four's host from being born, meaning he never found the Time Matrix, and none of the time travel happened]]. But it's unclear how much really changed, other than the Yeerk didn't find the Time Matrix.
* ''[[Literature/NightWatchDiscworld Night Watch]]'' (the Literature/{{Discworld}} novel) has Sam Vimes forced to become his own mentor when his original mentor, John Keel, is killed by the murderer Carcer (who was sent back in time ''with'' Vimes). Though told he has to keep the timeline intact, Vimes quickly decides to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong by trying to prevent the Watchmen who died in the revolution from dying. With Carcer trying to MakeWrongWhatOnceWentRight at the same time, things turn out mostly the same way and hardly anyone but Vimes, Carcer, and the History Monks know. Young Vetinari, however, was one of the few people who actually saw Vimes disappear and the marked difference between Vimes and the body of Keel put in to replace him, and gets Vimes to confess it by calling him "Sergeant" and [[YouJustToldMe awaiting the response]]. To make it even weirder both timelines still happened, running in parallel briefly before before being stitched together; Vimes has to mentor his younger self, but was himself mentored by the real Keel.
* In Greg Bear's ''Literature/{{Eon}}'', one of the main characters tries to get to one of these, after being unable to return to earth. [[spoiler:She lands in a world where apparently the Egyptian dynasties never fell.]]
* Played with in ''Literature/TheEyreAffair'' - the entire book takes place in an alternative 1980s in which literature is extremely popular, people clone dodos to have as pets, and the Crimean War never ended. ''Literature/JaneEyre'' also ends with Jane marrying her cousin and becoming a missionary to India. The time loops and jumps within books throughout the plot never lead to the 1980s as we know them being restored - but Thursday's adventures do lead to the ending of Jane Eyre changing from a disappointing ending where she marries her cousin to the one that we know and love - a change that most people accept is better than their original ending anyway.

* In the third book of the ''Literature/JohnnyMaxwellTrilogy'', ''Johnny and The Bomb'' Johnny and his friends manage to prevent Wobbler's GrandfatherParadox and rescue him from [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarII The Blitz.]] They note in the epilogue that things are mostly okay, but some little things are not quite right (like the decor at the local UsefulNotes/McDonalds analog being different from what they remember). It's also implied that [[spoiler: Old Wobbler, who was stuck in the past and came back via TheSlowPath as [[CompoundInterestTimeTravelGambit the world's richest man]], is still around.]]

* WesternAnimation/JohnnyTest:

* In ''ComicBook/PaperinikNewAdventures'', Paperinik, the ''protagonist'', is the one altering things, as he's forced to [[EnemyMine ally with the time pirate the Raider]] to try and [[spoiler:prevent the destruction of Duckburg [[NukeEm due an experiment with cold fusion going awry]]]], at which point a squad from the TimePolice shows up to try and make sure the events go as they're supposed to (and arrest the Raider now that they know is involved). In the end, after the Raider is caught, the Time Cops realize that making sure the timeline goes ''exactly'' as supposed would involve too many changes and be extremely difficult due Paperinik, so they settle to [[spoiler:make the experiment fail in a non-explosive way and discredit the scientist who had tried it]]. This has consequences in later volumes, as the Time Police's usual ability to track down displaced time travelers is disrupted for this time period and [[spoiler:they have no records of a large part of Duckburg that would have been destroyed in the explosion, allowing the Time Police to set up shop there for a while]].

*** The ending of the episode also reveals that the circumstances of Pete's death were slightly altered; at the start, Jackie said he died alone, whereas at the end she says a mysterious blonde woman held his hand until the end. Guess who?

* In the third book of the ''Literature/JohnnyMaxwellTrilogy'', ''Johnny and The Bomb'' Johnny and his friends manage to prevent Wobbler's GrandfatherParadox and rescue him from [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarII The Blitz.]] They note in the epilogue that things are mostly okay, but some little things are not quite right (like the decor at the local McDonald's analog being different from what they remember). It's also implied that [[spoiler: Old Wobbler, who was stuck in the past and came back via TheSlowPath as [[CompoundInterestTimeTravelGambit the world's richest man]], is still around.]]

* ''[[Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureStoneOcean JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean]]'' ends with [[spoiler:this as a result of reality being rewritten a second time after first being changed by the BigBad who killed all but one of the main characters in the process. The end result is a reality inhabited by AlternateSelf versions of the deceased cast living far happier lives than their original incarnations.]]

* The Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse fic "[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/44798801/chapters/112713489 When Universes Collide]]" opens with Peter Parker, Wanda Maximoff and Shuri being sent back from the future to the final battle with Thanos (although others are soon revealed to have been sent back also). The travellers express awareness of absolute points in the timeline that ''cannot'' be changed without attracting the attention of parties like the [=TVA=], and must adjust their plans to work around these points to find ways to save others. For example, Iron Man using the gauntlet to destroy Thanos's forces 'is'' an absolute point, but Tony Stark dying of his subsequent injuries ''isn't'', allowing Peter to share the burden so that Tony's injuries won't be as serious as Peter's enhanced healing allows him to better cope with the damage. Likewise, while Wanda has to confront Agatha Harkness, she is able to cast a more benevolent hex than she did in the original timeline; rather than trap everyone in her own sitcom fantasy, she creates a hex that basically allows everyone to live a new version of the last five years where nobody was lost.