In this fifth-season episode of The Flintstones, the Flintstones and Rubbles visit the World's Fair in Bedrock. One of the many attractions they visit while there is a Time Machine, which takes our quartet through various different places in time (including The Roman Empire, medieval times, the age of Christopher Columbus, colonial Philadelphia, and the 1964 World's Fair of New York). They must learn how to adapt to their new environments and survive the trip.
Tropes appearing in this episode:
- Been There, Shaped History: This cartoon establishes that Wilma discovered America first (but Christopher Columbus stole her credit) and provided Benjamin Franklin with his famous sayings.
- Disastrous Demonstration: Downplayed with regards to the actual time machine. It does do its job efficiently, but the experience that the group had while in the time machine was so bad that Fred berates the scientist for even coming up with the idea, leaving him to mutter about having to go back to the drawing board.
- Fed to the Beast: Fred and Barney almost end up as victims to the lions in Ancient Rome when they are mistaken for gladiators.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: As expected, the Flintstones and Rubbles struggle to adjust to the 20th century when they arrive there. Many of the concepts confuse them, including a mural on the wall that seemingly depicts their own world.
- Flat World: In a case of Artistic License – History, this subject comes up when the Flintstones and Rubbles are on Christopher Columbus's ship. His crewmates believe the earth is flat, and they believe so too. However, when Christopher Columbus argues it is round, they hastily change their mind and agree with him.
- Got Volunteered:
- When the Flintstones and Rubbles arrive in Ancient Rome and visit the Colosseum, someone there drags Fred and Barney to the entrance for gladiators.
- Fred ends up involved in a jousting tournament when he wears Lancelot's helmet and someone mistakes him for Lancelot. He manages to defeat the Black Knight through dumb luck, but that leads to the Sadistic Choice below.
- Harmless Electrocution: Fred gets electrified by lightning when he takes over for Benjamin Franklin during his famous kite experiment. Barney gets electrified trying to help Fred, as do Betty and Wilma when they try to help in turn. When they are sent to the next historical event, they are no worse for wear.
- Historical Hero Upgrade: This episode surprisingly averts it in regards to Christopher Columbus. While the mythical story of him trying to prove the world is round is kept, here he's portrayed as a Jerkass and a Mean Boss towards his crew (and the four members of the cast) who has to fend off an attempt at a mutiny while threatening the four cast members to help him. The mutiny is stopped when Wilma sees land... and he quickly takes credit for it. (Fortunately for the four protagonists, the Time Machine starts working again and whisks them to a new time period, but they only find more trouble there.)
- Literal-Minded: Fred runs afoul of a hamburger vendor in the 1964 New York World's Fair because he misinterprets the vendor's demand for clams as actual clams.
- The Mutiny: The Flintstones and Rubbles get caught in a mutiny between Christopher Columbus and his crew. Both sides stop when Wilma sees land, however.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: The Flintstones and the Rubbles' first stop is Imperial Rome, where the gladiatorial games in the Colosseum are stopped so that Emperor Nero can "entertain" the crowd on the violin. Nero's "baby blue" eyes, visibly receding hairline, terrible rendition of Rodolphe Kreutzer's Etude No.2, and indignant "Well!" when Betty asks him to stop playing are all references to Mel Blanc's friend and sometime employer Jack Benny.note
- Ripped from the Headlines: The real New York World's Fair of 1964 was happening right at the time this episode was recorded, so it naturally made sense for the Flintstones and Rubbles to arrive there as their final stop.
- Sadistic Choice: Fred ends up at this when he takes over for Lancelot and defeats the Black Knight. He turns down the princess's hand in marriage because he knows what trouble he'll get into with Wilma, but the penalty for turning down the princess's hand is execution. Fortunately, Fred and the others are warped to the next event before it can happen.
- "Test Your Strength" Game: One of these games appears at the Bedrock World's Fair. In an exaggerated fashion, Fred barely gets the button to move, while Bamm-Bamm uses his fist to knock the button into the bell, knocking the bell off the hook.
- Time Travel Episode: As you might expect, this episode primarily revolves around a time machine and the shenanigans that Fred, Wilma, Barney, and Betty wind up in while using it. Oddly, though they travel to events that seem to be from the future, these would be events that most viewers would recognize as from the past.
- Your Costume Needs Work: When the Flintstones and Rubbles end up in the 1964 World's Fair in New York, a few patrons see them, but do not react to them because they assume that the four are employees working at the caveman exhibit.
