For a certain generation of science fiction fans, our collective awareness about meeting a future or past version of ourselves probably comes exclusively from Back to the Future II. (And solely that movie. Believe it or not, neither of the other Back to the Future movies feature characters meeting themselves.) 1955 Biff is infamously given the Sports Almanac by 2015 Biff. 1985-ish Doc also speaks with 1955 Doc in this one (albeit with his back turned.) And Marty from the first film accidentally knocks out Marty from the second film with an ill-timed swinging door! Finally, 1985 Jennifer comes face to face with 2015 Jennifer and both promptly faint before simultaneously uttering, “I’m young!” and “I’m old!”
Harry Skips Over Learning How to Do a Patronus in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
How does Harry Potter learn to produce his patronus? By watching future Harry Potter produce his patronus. In the only instance of time travel in the Harry Potter universe, Harry uses Hermione’s time turner to go back in time and save himself from Dementors. Though Potter doesn’t technically meet himself, he does help himself out, even though the past version of Harry believed some weird version of his father had helped him. Like the massive slacker he is, Harry manages to skip learning how to do the Patronus Charm by simply ripping himself off in the future. The explanation? “I remembered watching myself do it.” Later in, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, all the time turners are conveniently destroyed during a big battle at the Ministry of Magic, presumably so other lazy students wouldn’t learn how to do complicated spells the easy way like Harry.
Janeway is a Paradox-Making Menace in Numerous Episodes of Star Trek: Voyager
Janeway loves time travel, but not in a good way. In fact, it brings out the very worst in her in the Star Trek: Voyager season finale, “Endgame.” Even in an earlier season, it’s revealed that the Starfleet of the future sees Janeway as a huge problem. She even drives one Starfleet timeship captain genuinely crazy! And after watching “Endgame,” you can see why. In this episode, Admiral Janeway travels back and meets Captain Janeway to try and convince her to blow up the Borg for good and use that annihilation to get home earlier. So she does. Time traveling Janeway must be stopped! (So she is.)
A Man/Woman is His Whole Family/The Entire Human Race in “—All You Zombies—” by Robert A. Heinlein
This short story is sort of the ultimate in ontological paradoxes. Featuring protagonists called Unmarried Mother and The Bartender, it details a creepily insane story which eventually reveals that both the characters are the same person, having changed their genders, time traveled, and succeeded at being nearly every single member of their own family, and basically everyone. At some point a song called “I’m My Own Grandfather” plays on the jukebox in the bar, which in this story, somehow manages to be an understatement. “—All You Zombies—” stands somewhat alone in its paradox-causing audacity. How many stories have you seen/read about someone causing the existence of everyone and themselves?
Sinclar Writes Himself a Letter/Becomes Space Jesus in Babylon 5's “War Without End”
<img alt=““I”m Young/I’m Old!” when=“” time=“” travelers=“” meet=“” themselves“=”“ class=”blog-pic-middle-align “ src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/Sinclair%20OLD.jpg“ _cke_saved_src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/Sinclair%20OLD.jpg“ title=”“I”m Young/I’m Old!“></em></strong></p> <p> Though Commander Sinclair doesn’t exactly meet himself in the events of “War Without End” he does send himself a letter from 1250 A.D., written in his own handwriting. The letter reveals to Sinclair that he is destined to travel back in time and become Valen, the Minbari version of Jesus/King Arthur/David Bowie/Perfection. A young and old version of a character interact in an interesting way here because it’s not often that you talk with your own future. Good thing Sinclair didn’t have the same drinking problem as <em>B5</em> security chief Michael Garibaldi.</p> <p> </p> <p> <strong>Molly O'Brien Helps Molly O'Brien Erase Molly O'Brien in <em>Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's </em>“Time's Orphan”</strong></p> <p> <img alt=”I’m Young! I’m Old! 5 Movie/TV Instances of SFF Characters Meeting Themselves“ class=”blog-pic-middle-align “ src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/timesorphan_657.jpg“ _cke_saved_src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/timesorphan_657.jpg“ title=”I’m Young! I’m Old! 5 Movie/TV Instances of SFF Characters Meeting Themselves“></p> <p> Miles and Keiko O’Brien’s daughter Molly accidentally plunges through a portal in time as a child and returns instantly as a savage and insane adolescent. Soon, the O'Briens come to realize this older, stranger, angrier Molly is as much their daughter as the 8-year old version they lost, but they still can’t cope with missing their daughter’s maturing years. They end up resolving to let this Molly go back to the planet and live as a wild child. Unexpectedly, older Molly meets her younger self as she goes back through the time portal and wordlessly sends her younger self back, effectively killing herself.</p> <p> This episode is also a little bit meta, insofar as the actual age of Molly O’Brien was always a little bit confusing. She was famously born on the <em>Enterprise</em> in the fifth season of <em>Star Trek: The Next Generation</em>, but could already walk and talk in the sixth season. She stays that age for several years, then is suddenly eight years old by the end of <em>Star Trek: Deep Space Nine</em>. Maybe there were other times Molly has met herself that we just never saw?</p> <p> </p> <p> <strong>Fry Learns He's the Timeline That Went Wrong in <em>Futurama</em></strong></p> <p style=”text-align: center;“> <img alt=”“ class=”blog-pic-middle-align “ src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/fry-and-lars.jpg“ _cke_saved_src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/fry-and-lars.jpg“></p> <p> <em>Futurama</em> resisted time travel for a while, but once it made that science fiction plunge it really committed. The first of the DVD movies, <em>Bender’s Big Score</em>, goes all out with this, marooning Fry back in his original era while in the future Leela dates some bald guy named Lars. It turns out that Lars is the end result of Fry living out his time in the past in accordance with events to come, i.e. Lars is Fry. This is unfortunate for Lars, though, because in the <em>Futurama</em> universe a duplicate from another time is doomed to die. Lars is no exception, dying in an explosion just after he and Leela are married. Fry then realizes the kind of person he has to become in order to win Leela's affection.</p> <p> Usually when someone learns about the actions of an alternate self, it's so they can avoid making the same mistakes/turning into a monster/etc. Here, we get that same struggle from the other perspective. Fry is already making those mistakes, though, and gets to see a version of himself that has wised up, letting him know that he's capable of the same.</p> <p> </p> <p> <strong>Spock Advises Spock in <em>Star Trek </em>2009 and “Yesteryear”</strong></p> <p style=”text-align: center;“> <strong><em><img alt=”“ class=”blog-pic-middle-align “ src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/Spock%20on%20Spock.jpg“ _cke_saved_src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/Spock%20on%20Spock.jpg“></em></strong></p> <p> What if you could go back in time just to give yourself some advice? Wouldn’t that be nice? Turns out maybe universes and timelines don’t have to be disrupted by a little bit of advice. Unless in doing so you and a madman slip back through time and your home planet ends up being collapsed into a black hole. In which case you’re going to have to give yourself a <em>ton</em> of advice.</p> <p> Spock also met his childhood self in the D.C. Fontana-written animated series episode “Yesteryear.“ However, adult Spock he didn’t reveal himself to young Spock and they were both cartoons. This episode is notable insofar as the bullying Spock gets from other Vulcans is closely paralled in the latest movie, something which was otherwise never depicted on screen.</p> <p> </p> <p> <strong><img alt=”“ class=”blog-pic-right-align “ src=”/images/stories/blogs/12_09/Milliways.jpg“ _cke_saved_src=”/images/stories/blogs/12_09/Milliways.jpg“ style=”height: 406px; width: 250px;“>Arthur Dent is Unable to Call Himself in <em>The Restaurant at the End of Universe </em>by Douglas Adams</strong></p> <p> In the sequel to <em>The Hitchhiker</em><em>’s Guide to the Galaxy </em>Ford Prefect informs Arthur Dent that the main problem with trying to telephone himself in the past and warn himself about the destruction of Earth is that it simply won’t work. Because the titular Restaurant at the End of the Universe is more of a time than a place, it guarantees you can never run into yourself “because of the embarrassment this usually causes.” Like most of the sci-fi mechanics of the Hitchhiker universe, this isn’t adequately explained, but like most Douglas Adams gems, it's designed more as a anti-logical punchline than anything else.</p> <p> </p> <p> <strong>Amy Pond Meets Herself Constantly on <em>Doctor Who </em></strong></p> <p style=”text-align: center; “> <img alt=”“ class=”blog-pic-middle-align “ src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/Amy%20Amy.jpg“ _cke_saved_src=”/images/stories/blogs/11_09/Amy%20Amy.jpg“ style=”width: 475px; height: 262px;“></p> <p> Oh<em> </em>Amy Pond! It seems like you're always meeting yourself via time travel. This soon-to-be departed companion of the Doctor has interacted with herself on three occasions thus far, which must be some kind of record. The first time was in <a href=”http://www.tor.com/blogs/2010/08/doctor-who-s5-finale-the-pandorica-opens-the-big-bang“ _cke_saved_href=”http://www.tor.com/blogs/2010/08/doctor-who-s5-finale-the-pandorica-opens-the-big-bang“ target=”_blank“>“The Big Bang,”</a> where little kid Amelia is living in the bizarro timeline created by all the stars exploding back in 102 A.D. Right at the start of this, twenty-something Amy Pond emerges from the Pandorica in the late 1996 and tells her 7-year-old self “this is where it gets complicated.” Though Amelia and Amy don’t get to hang out for very long, this sequence does allow for the Doctor to say, “Come along, Ponds!” and have it<i> not </i>be in reference to Amy and Rory. Then, in the minisodes<a href=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51JtuEa_OPc“ _cke_saved_href=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51JtuEa_OPc“ target=”_blank“> “Time” and “Space”</a> two Amy ponds help sort of the conundrum of the TARDIS materializing inside of itself. </p> <p> Tragically, the most recent instance of Amy meeting herself was in last season's <a href=”http://www.tor.com/blogs/2011/09/doctor-who-s6-ep-10-the-girl-who-waited“ _cke_saved_href=”http://www.tor.com/blogs/2011/09/doctor-who-s6-ep-10-the-girl-who-waited“ target=”_blank“>“The Girl Who Waited”</a> in which Rory is confronted with choosing between young and happy Amy and old and grumpy Amy. At some point the idea having both Amy's live on the TARDIS is floated with Rory asking the Doctor if it could work. “I don't know, it's your marriage!” the Doctor replies.</p> <p> Will Amy meet herself again before the Ponds bow out? She's only got one more chance!</p> <p> </p> <p> Okay, you're turn readers. Tell us all about your favorites examples of time-travel-meeting-yourself shenanigans! There's an intriguing one from <em>Red Dwarf</em> that we skipped, for instance....</p> <hr> <p class=”squib"> Stubby the Rocket is the voice and mascot of Tor.com and only met itself once. The results were super, super hot.</p><p></p>