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My friends and I used to play a late-night game where we would hypothesize about the many things we would do if we had access to time travel. Usually, said game would come at the tail-end of the evening after many beers had been consumed and we had tired of talking about boring stuff like politics and world events. By that period of time, any members of the opposite sex were probably already gone for the evening (not that my pals and I ever had an abundance of female partygoers at our nerdy soirees to begin with) so it was full-speed ahead as we indulged in our geekdom. Of course in-between our fanciful revelries of going back to 1959 and attempting to stop Buddy Holly from ever boarding a doomed 1949 Beechcraft Bonanza, there inevitably came crashing into our little game of make believe a cold splash of water, usually by me and my overly-analytical gray matter. The time travel game-stopper which would always shut things down and have all of us making a beeline for the handy dandy bottle of Anacin was the oldest one on the book: “If you could go back in time and kill Adolf Hitler before he took power in Germany, would you do it?” On the outset, the answer to that query seems obvious enough: Of course I’d go back in time and put an end to Uncle Adolf before he could unleash the horrors of a second world war on all of us. Heck, as a bonus maybe I’d even shave off his mustache and return it to its original owner, Charlie Chaplin. But, stopping to consider the matter for just a moment, all sorts of time travel conundrums rear their ugly heads at the notion of such a thing. What if by snuffing out Hitler we inadvertently give rise to an even bigger monster (hard to believe, I know, but in a world where New Kids on the Block are routinely celebrated, all bets are off)? This phenomenon of creating an even larger problem by traveling back in time to “fix” a perceived wrong is commonly known as “the Butterfly Effect” and it’s had Grade-A nerds like me lose many-a night of sleep as we marvel over the potential hazards of altering the space time continuum.
Which leads us to today’s news from our Simon Morley admirers over at The Hollywood Reporter regarding the fate of a television series – The Time Traveler’s Wife – which very much plies its bread and butter in the wonky world of time travel. The series, which is based off of the Audrey Niffenegger novel of the same name and which has previously seen a big screen adaptation, received grim news from parent company HBO over the weekend that after one season it has been canceled, joining a slew of other recently canceled shows such as Duncanville, Tom Swift and Why Women Kill.
“Though HBO will not be moving forward with a second season of The Time Traveler’s Wife, it was our privilege to partner with master storytellers Steven Moffat and (director) David Nutter,” an unnamed HBO Big Wheel said in a statement. “We are so grateful for their passion, hard work and care for adapting this beloved book. We also thank Theo and Rose, and the rest of our brilliant cast for their heartfelt performances, which completely captivated audiences.”
Sadly, audiences did not seem captivated enough judging by the low viewership numbers (223,000 same day viewers throughout its six-week run). Word ‘round campfire has it, too, that there was no perceived chemistry between the two leads of the series, Rose Leslie and Theo James.
So a sad bon voyage to The Time Traveler’s Wife; perhaps an alternate timeline has an iteration of this series which has supplanted shows like Stranger Things to become the reigning king of television. Alas, in this reality it’s just another late night “what if” played out by nerds the world over. Thanks for a fun season, Steven Moffat and David Nutter!
