I Hate Past Me / Live-Action TV

• In an episode of Charmed (1998), Paige goes back in time to when she was seventeen and is horrified to realize what a brat she was at that age.
• Doctor Who:
  • This is a recurring theme in multi-Doctor stories, which inevitably end up with the various incarnations of the Doctor bickering with each other, such as the Third and Second Doctors in "The Three Doctors" and the Sixth and Second Doctors in "The Two Doctors". In the former, it's suggested that the reason the Doctor seemingly can't stand himself is that he's actually more like his past/future selves than each self would care to admit.
  • The First Doctor is often a notable exception, especially in the Expanded Universe. Whenever a later incarnation interacts with him, they tend to see him as a voice of reason and hold him and his advice in high regard. He also has enough of a commanding presence to convince all of his later incarnations to put aside any differences they might have and focus on working together on the task at hand. In contrast, more straightforward cases of the trope occur in "Twice Upon a Time", with the Twelfth Doctor being mortified by his older self's old-fashioned, occasionally sexist behavior^note which the novelization explained as the First Doctor's expression of the traditional future-Doctor-disliking as intentional hamming-up of his behavior to get a rise out of Twelve, and the Big Finish audio "Daughter of the Gods", where the Second Doctor is frustrated by the First Doctor's relative youth and immaturity in his lack of cooperation to Set Right What Once Went Wrong in the story's events, particularly with it involving the life of their unfortunate companion Katarina.
  • In "The Five Doctors", after the past Doctors return to their respective timelines, the present Doctor (the fifth one) says "I am not the man I was... thank goodness." This implies that while he might not exactly hate his past selves, he considers them phases he's since outgrown.
  • In "The Twin Dilemma", Six states that he hated having been Five, telling Peri that "he had a feckless charm that was never really (him)." In "The 100 Days of the Doctor", he did, however, grudgingly admit he had truly enjoyed his time as Five and compared it to "a holiday. A very wonderful holiday," and confessed that his dislike of his time as Five was not really aimed at Five himself, but actually stemmed from the way the universe was treating him at the time.
  • Likewise, Seven was not too fond of Five either, remarking that he was "bland, and not even one of the good ones".
  • This is subverted in the short "Time Crash", where the Fifth and Tenth Doctors briefly meet. Five doesn't recognize his future self at first and is mostly annoyed that this baffling stranger has broken into his ship and is babbling on about hair and celery. Finally, he works it out, and the two of them share a touching moment. Ten reveals that Five was his favorite Doctor, and he loved being him.^note Which is more like David Tennant geeking out over Peter Davison, who by the way is also now Tennant's father-in-law Likewise, Five softens up and takes an immediate liking towards Ten, invested in becoming his future self one day. Unfortunately, Five doesn't learn the whole truth about Ten and goes about his merry way thinking Ten will be a happy chapter in his future, without discovering that the chapters that precede him will be very dark, such as the inevitable Time War that will eventually scar his future incarnations, and the menacing side of Ten's personality hiding beneath the surface.
  • However, in "Journey's End", the Tenth Doctor pretty much states that he thinks he's "a better man" than the Ninth and that his previous incarnation was more violent than him.
  • Conversely, Ten shows an evident dislike for the actions he took in the Last Great Time War. Whether this is regret for being forced into these actions or outright disgust that he made so many foolish decisions in the Time War was never made clear. This is likely due to Ten, by virtue of a Temporal Paradox, not remembering the events of "The Day of the Doctor", where he firsthand learns that neither the War nor Ninth Doctor is responsible for the destruction of Gallifrey, and still views them as abhorrent. It's shown that he forgives the War Doctor and hinted that he does the same with the Ninth by his Eleventh incarnation. Nine and Ten are shown to get along just fine, however, in the comic event "The Lost Dimension" when the two team up with the Twelfth Doctor. Nine even puts his arm around Ten's shoulders when offering to take his displaced incarnations and their companions back to their TARDISes.
  • The Eleventh seemingly has no problem with the Ninth, however, as in the audio "Night of the Whisper", he leaves a lighthearted jest of an apology for the Ninth's ears. This may be due to the Eleventh learning and remembering the War Doctor's role in the Time War and being aware that neither he nor the Ninth did what was once thought, finally forgiving them, unlike his Tenth incarnation who harboured a dislike for his predecessor.
  • The short "The Night of the Doctor" shows that the Eighth Doctor was actively avoiding getting involved in the war, but then decided to regenerate into "a warrior". The War Doctor is considered something of a traitor to the Doctor's legacy by subsequent regenerations, and when Eleven encountered him in "The Name of the Doctor", he expressed disgust.
  • A downplayed version comes with the War Doctor himself. In "Lighting the Flame", which takes place shortly after his regeneration, he expresses a genuine sense of nostalgia for his time as Eight, musing on how full of hope he was back then, but he also thinks that it was incredibly naive and foolish of Eight to think that he could just stay out of the Time War forever.
  • A strange version in "The Almost People". The Doctor has been duplicated, making a replica exactly like the original. However, while still stabilizing, this ganger has to cope with all his memories and starts being consumed by past regenerations. At one point he starts speaking with Ten's voice — before breaking out of it and shouting "We've moved on!" It doesn't necessarily mean that Eleven hates Ten, but considering the low point of the regeneration, there might be some hard feelings.
  • Given what Eleven has said about himself in general, not any one specific version, it may be the fact that every other Doctor's face is the face of actions the Doctor detested having had to take.
  • In the Big Finish Doctor Who audio drama "Excelis Dawns", the Fifth Doctor regards his past self as a careless freewheeler who thought he was invincible. His words strongly suggest that he was referring to the Fourth Doctor in particular. This is in response to Iris Wildthyme's remark that the Doctor isn't as fun as he used to be. The Doctor remarks that Adric's death came as a wake-up call. In the Doctor's personal timeline, Tegan's abrupt departure due to her disgust at the violence plaguing the Doctor's travels has yet to happen as of this story.
  • In the novel The Eight Doctors, the initially-amnesiac Eighth Doctor visits all of his seven predecessors, and while he criticises the First's morality while challenging him to be better, in general he is impressed with his previous incarnations as he regains his memories through telepathic contact with each incarnation. However, later audios in particular have emphasised how the Eighth doesn't particularly like the Seventh Doctor in particular, uncomfortable with his previous self's reputation as The Chessmaster, prone to making cold, calculating decisions that would sometimes cross into greyer morality lines.
  • In the Doctor Who New Adventures, Seven in turn had issues with Five and Six. In Timewyrm: Revelation, Five represented the Doctor's conscience in his mental world, and Seven sealed him away out of what he thought to be necessity, until Ace freed him, reintegrating him into the Doctor's mind. In Head Games, Six represented Seven's guilt over his morally dubious actions, with the implication that the corruption of Seven's memory of Six would lead to the memory of Six being used as the source for the future manifestation of the Valeyard; it took until The Room With No Doors for Seven to come to terms with himself on that score.
  • Subverted and played straight in "The Day of the Doctor". Ten and Eleven get along just fine most of the time, even moving in sync at times. However, they still can't stand their previous self, the War Doctor. This changes at the end, when they not only decide to join in on doing but also avert the thing that they hated him for. They then part on good terms with each other. The War Doctor starts off unimpressed with them, thinking they are nothing more than Man Children, and as soon as he figures out who they are (having assumed that they're future companions) demands to know if he's going through a midlife crisis. After seeing them in action, however, his opinion does a complete 180 and he considers them better than him, even to be great, remarking, "Great men are forged in fire. It is the privilege of lesser men to light the flame," with himself being the lesser man. That and their willingness to share the burden with him leads him to decide his future is in good hands. As for the Curator, he describes the Fourth Doctor as one of his favorites, and seems amicable with Eleven.
  • Played straight in the Doctor Who Magazine comic Hunters of the Burning Stone. Eleven states he has nothing but contempt for One, even going so far as to glare at a psychic projection of his past self several times. When Ian tries to point out all the good things he did in his first regeneration, Eleven counters that it was he and Barbara that kept him doing the right thing.
  • In the audio reconstruction of the Troughton story "The Power of the Daleks", narrated by the Fourth Doctor as if he's recounting a story from his life, he seems to regard his regeneration from the First Doctor into the Second Doctor as a significant downgrade, questioning his own decision to trade long white hair and cold dignity for hyperkinesis, scruffiness, and flamboyance. It should be observed that the Fourth Doctor's personality is much closer to the latter type, and he also succeeded a coldly dignified, white-haired Doctor... He also occasionally pauses the story to cringe about just how embarrassing his own actions are.
  • Averted with the Eleventh Doctor in the Fourth Doctor audio story in which he cameos ("Babblesphere"), where both of them seem to like each other an awful lot — and the Curator, a far future Doctor who has taken on the Fourth Doctor's form and personality, seems immediately fond of and affectionate towards the Eleventh in "The Day of the Doctor".
  • Also averted in the audio story "The Light at the End", where the Eighth Doctor is especially fond of the Fourth Doctor, with a lot of their personality quirks and tastes in common, and they get along easily. And subverted with the Eighth and the Sixth — the Eighth finds him somewhat obnoxious and his fashion sense embarrassing as expected, but at the same time has a great deal of respect for him, more so than any of the others do. He certainly prefers him to the Seventh.
  • "The Wrong Doctors" sees the Sixth Doctor teaming up with a younger version of himself. The older version of Six has by this point undergone quite a bit of a Character Arc and has mellowed considerably out as a result, and as such he finds his younger self's more unabashed and arrogant attitude absolutely intolerable.
  • On the promotional site for the revived series, "Who Is Doctor Who?", a sighting of the Ninth Doctor states that he was in a heated argument with a "little man holding an umbrella", an obvious reference to the Seventh. In general, it's stated that the Seventh isn't much liked by any of his other incarnations as they're uncomfortable with his manipulation of others in the name of the "greater good".
  • In "Time Heist", the Twelfth Doctor uses this trope to deduce both that the person who hired them to rob the bank was the future self of the bank's owner, who despises what her past self has done, and that the mysterious Architect who masterminded the heist is himself (prior to wiping his mind to prevent telepathic incursion) because nobody else could annoy him that much.
  • In the Titan Comics mini-series Four Doctors, Twelve and Ten don't get on — in large part because Ten is worried about just how he gets the extra incarnations to become Twelve, and Twelve is... well, series 8 Twelve, who's not the easiest person to get on with — so Eleven acts as mediator. However, Twelve averts this with Nine, who he describes as being nothing less than "fantastic".
  • In "Heralds of Destruction", a Titan Comics mini-series written by Paul Cornell, the Third Doctor meets his immediate predecessor and much bickering ensues, as it did when they first met. Ultimately averted in that it turns out to be would-be dictator Ramón Salamander impersonating the Second Doctor to steal TARDIS technology.
  • There is a series of three Big Finish stories featuring two incarnations of the Master, the decayed Geoffrey Beevers one and the bald Alex MacQueen one. They attempt to kill each other a few times (with the future Master having access to a device that would prevent killing his past self from also killing him) before they team up. But even when they do, they don't get along for reasons that are purely practical (as the Seventh Doctor points out, there can't be two Masters, it is in the name) as well as personal (twice Beevers!Master kills people before MacQueen can make a pun about their death, irritating him to no end). The MacQueen version states that if he has to be stuck with a past version of himself, he'd have preferred "the snake" (Eric Roberts), or "Mr. Velveteen" (the Ainley version) and talks about how fun it was when it was all 'pointy beards and Nehru jackets' (the original Delgado version).
  • Played with in the episodes "World Enough and Time" and "The Doctor Falls". Missy is indeed horrified at her previous incarnation's evil tendencies, but is still willing to be corrupted back into them; while Saxon!Master is disgusted that a future incarnation of his could potentially turn good.
• Dollhouse: Interestingly played with. One of Alpha”s first acts as a Rogue (after killing several people) was to destroy the wedge that held his murderous original personality. Could make him a Hypocrite,since he went on a silent killing spree of his own afterwards, hidden from the Dollhouse's prying eyes. An implied reason is that he hated Carl Craft because he went into his A God Am I perspective after the composite event, making him "better". Played straight(er), however, in “Epitaph Two”, since he was afraid of Carl Craft awakening after he helped liberate the other Dolls, prompting his exit.
  • Echo is similar. For most of the series she doesn't know much about "Caroline," but the hints that she gets makes her think that she doesn't like her.
• In The Flash (2014), Savitar, the Big Bad of Season 3, is revealed to be a psychotic future Time Remnant of Barry himself, resulting from a Stable Time Loop. It turns out that future Barry created a host of Time Remnants of himself to fight Savitar, who let one live to eventually turn into him. This Time Remnant was eventually driven insane after Team Flash rejected him for not being the "real" Barry Allen, ultimately taking up the mantle of Savitar to get revenge against Barry and the team.
• In Fringe, especially in season 5, Walter fears becoming the man he used to be before William Bell removed those pieces of himself. Those pieces had to be reinserted in Letters of Transit as Walter's brain had become damaged due to spending years in amber.
• In an episode of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, when Hercules and Autolycus get sent into the past, Autolycus gets annoyed by his rude past self and punches him out. Wouldn't be the first time Bruce Campbell hates someone who looks just like him.
• Game of Thrones: Although no time travel is involved, in Season 6 Sansa remarks to Jon that she hates how naive she used to be and regrets how she took her home and family for granted. She also feels bad for being "an ass" to Jon.
  Sansa to Jon: Don't you wish we could go back to the day we left? I want to scream to myself "Don't go, you idiot."
• Ted of How I Met Your Mother damns his and Marshall's past selves for not making a decision on the apartment.
• Legends of Tomorrow:
  • Dr. Martin Stein meets his young self from 1975 and instantly starts to dislike him, calling him arrogant and complaining about him smoking pot and eating fatty foods. When Jax confronts him about it, Stein admits that he knows he's complaining about himself but can't help it. He also doesn't like his past self having the hots for Sara Lance, especially on the day he's supposed to meet his future wife. In a later episode, he berates his younger self (who has deduced who the older Martin is since their original meeting) for ignoring his wife in pursuit of science. That bit of advice has unexpected consequences when Stein returns to the present and finds he suddenly has a daughter in her thirties.
  • Mick Rory also isn't very fond of his teenage self when he's brought into protective custody on the ship. He doesn't try to hide his hostility - or his approval when Sara's younger self slaps the kid for trying to rather creepily hit on her.
  • Inverted with Leonard Snart, who seems very fond of little Leo, still innocent before his father goes to prison and comes out bitter and abusive, forcing his son into a life of crime.
  • Played straight with Damien Darhk, who ends up facing off against his no-nonsense assassin self from The '60s.
    Damien Darhk: I am going to kick my ass!
• In the American version of Life on Mars, Sam is afraid of talking to himself as a child.
• Mystery Science Theater 3000. In one episode, Crow plays with the Timey-Wimey Ball to tell his past self of 30 minutes ago to not convince Mike to quit his temp job. It escalates into an argument, with Crow muttering about what a jerk he was 30 minutes ago.
• Once Upon a Time:
  • Prince Charming openly admits that he isn't a big fan of David Nolan, his curse self. He calls him "weak" and "confused" and says that David hurt the woman he loved. However, he also says that he wouldn't trade away his memories of David, because they remind him of who he wants to be.
  • Captain Hook also gets a dose of this when he and Emma are whisked back through a time portal to the Enchanted Forest of old, where they encounter past-Hook in all his drunken, roguish glory. After witnessing Emma distract past-Hook by flirting with him, Hook makes his dissatisfaction known by punching his past self right in the face - a clear message that Hook has changed from the man he was by Emma.
• The Orville: In the episode "Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow", a temporal accident causes Kelly's self from seven years earlier to appear on the ship. Present Kelly is soon annoyed by how her past self is judging her not by all she's done (like becoming first officer on a flagship) but by not having her own command by now as she always promised herself.
  Kelly: Every mature person has to make peace with the fact they used to be dumber. But they don't have to look that proof in the face.
• Thoroughly and completely averted in The Outer Limits (1995) episode "A Stitch in Time". After saving her 15-year-old self from the rapist who kidnapped her, Dr. Theresa Givens is delighted at having spared that version of herself the trauma that she experienced, allowing her to lead the normal life that she was denied.
• Red Dwarf:
  • In the episode "Timeslides", Lister goes back in time to visit his teenage self, who turns out to be an authority-hating punk who believes everything is 'crypto-fascist'.
  • In a later time-travel episode, "Give and Take", when the crew are taking a lift in the past, and the lift reports that Past-Rimmer is getting annoyed waiting for it, Present-Rimmer says "Ignore him, he's an idiot!" When Cat says "But he's you", Rimmer replies "He's past me. Present me is a lot smarter." They've travelled back three days.
• Often discussed on RuPaul's Drag Race in the Once a Season reunion episode (filmed after the season airs) or when queens return for All-Stars. Many queens have cringed at watching themselves on tv and seeing their antics in the third person, either acting out due to the stress of the competition, or trying way too hard to be memorable and instead coming off as fake and annoying.
• Samantha Who? was about a woman with amnesia, who as she put her life back together was appalled to discover what an awful person she had been.
• In the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World episode "Absolute Power", Summerlee is shown a vision of the time he was caring for his ill wife. He left her alone, unable to stand seeing her in this state, and she died before he got back. Summerlee angrily yells at his past self and calls him a fool, but he unfortunately cannot change anything.
• In the Smallville episode "Homecoming", Clark Kent gets sent to the future and meets his future self. His future self is a little annoyed by him for being naive and resistant to being a superhero but works with him since not even Superman can stop two disasters at once.
• Star Trek: The Next Generation:
  • In "Tapestry", Picard dies from his artificial heart failing him, and he encounters Q in what seems to be the afterlife. After much prodding by Q, Picard reveals that he regrets getting into a Bar Brawl against Nausicaans (mentioned in an earlier episode), suffering a near-fatal wound to his heart, which is how he wound up with his artificial heart. Picard hates his younger self for how hot-headed and arrogant he was going into the brawl. So he gets the opportunity by Q to go back to avert the brawl, but it makes Picard a lowly lieutenant in a "new" future who ultimately doesn't stand out in any sense. Q shows that if he hadn't been that arrogant young man, he'd never have become the kickass captain we know and love. Picard also expresses disgust for his skirt-chasing, two-timing ways.
    Q: You never told me you were such a ladies' man.
    Picard: I wasn't. I was a puerile adolescent who allowed himself to be led by his hormones instead of his head.
  • In "Second Chances", Riker discovers that a transporter accident duplicated him several years ago, he got out, the other him was stranded on a planet they were surveying, and despite all of this, both men are equally William T. Riker. Riker is annoyed by the youthful attitudes and social difficulties of the other.
  • In "Firstborn", Worf's son Alexander grew up rejecting the way of the warrior, but this caused him to be unable to save Worf from getting killed. He finds a way to travel back in time, then after passing himself off as a family friend named K'mtar, attempts to help Worf train Alexander to be a warrior. K'mtar becomes increasingly disgusted by Alexander's soft heart and weakness, then ultimately loses his temper and tries to kill him. Fortunately, Worf stops him, and after K'mtar explains who he is and what he was trying to do, Worf convinces him to return to his own time, as he had already changed history by going back, so Worf could survive. Even if he doesn't, Worf will always be proud of him.
• In the Star Trek: Voyager finale "Endgame", when Admiral Kathryn Janeway from the future (who has admittedly become an Insane Admiral as per Starfleet regulations) travels back to the past, it quickly becomes apparent that she simply cannot stand her younger self, and spends a fair amount of time chewing her out.
• The Twilight Zone (1985): In "The Girl I Married", Ira Richman is confronted with the spirit of The '60s version of his wife Valerie and spends several days with her. He later learns that Valerie has been doing the same thing with a younger version of him. As soon as all four of them are in the same room, the older Ira and Valerie realize that they find their hippie selves irritating. Ira tells them that they have no idea what real love is, saying that it is about commitment. He also finds his younger self's mellow attitude very grating. After they disappear, Valerie has a hard time believing that they were ever really that arrogant, naive, and pompous.

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