YMMV / About Time

• Les Yay: When Tim's sister enthusiastically hugs her sister-in-law.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • Margot Robbie in a supporting role (even disappearing completely from the second half of the film) a few months before co-starring The Wolf of Wall Street and becoming famous.
  • Vanessa Kirby also has a supporting role as Mary's friend Joanna a few years before her breakout performance in The Crown (2016).
• Strangled by the Red String: When Tim talks to Kit Kat about her history of dating terrible men, he suggests she date someone nice. Despite Kit Kat not seeming that interested because she finds nice guys boring, Mary then points out a friend of Tim's has always had a crush on her. Even though Kit Kat remembers him as "the one who looks like a Muppet", she still kisses him when Tim goes back in time with her and apparently starts a relationship with him on the grounds and her brother and his wife told her to.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Charlotte, the first love of Tim before he met Mary, disappears in the second half of the film. The fact that she was played by Margot Robbie also increases the feeling that the character could have been better used.
  • Kit Kat, Tim's sister, doesn't really do much in the film despite Tim calling her the most fun and interesting person he knows, and even her history of troubled relationships gets somewhat glossed over. When Mary points out to Tim after the crash that even if they want to help Kit Kat, she has to want to get better herself, that just amounts to Tim admitting to her about his time-travel powers and trying to fix her problem anyway.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • In the middle of the film, Tim is dating Mary when he meets Charlotte again, his first love. This time, she is romantically interested in him and invites him to spend a night of love with her. A more ambitious screenwriter could have made Tim accept the invitation and then delete the event with his powers, creating ethical discussions about his actions: was it really betrayal if it never happened and only he remembers what happened on an alternative timeline? Instead, Tim realizes that he loves Mary and rejects Charlotte's invitation (it must also be admitted that it would be too cynical for such a sweet and optimistic film).
  • Also in the middle of the film, just after Tim's daughter is born, Tim's sister Kit Kat gets into a serious car accident. She's badly injured but will pull through, then she tells Tim she hasn't been happy in a long time, leading Tim to go back and change the night she met her (implied to be) abusive boyfriend. But when he goes back to the present, his original daughter is gone, replaced with a little boy. The film could have written an interesting moral dilemma instead by having Kit Kat die in the crash and leave Tim with a choice - save his sister and have his daughter wiped from the timeline, or let Kit Kat die and keep his original child? Again, this might not have fit the tone of the movie, but it does make the car crash seem kind of superfluous, except to make Tim realize he can't always prevent others' pain.

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