Projections: Time Travel Moving Forward

[Lost Merlin]

First, This is not meant to upset anyone or start a argument.  (Yes, I know things that start with this sentence usually end in arguments any way) Secondly, I want honest answers of what we think Jim will do not necessarily your own pet theories that you wish would come true. 

Okay, My question/projection.  How much do you think Time Travel will play a role in the DV/DF moving forward? 

My Opinion is that it will not play a huge role.  I think that time travel will wrap up some lose ends in the time travel book and not really be heard or used much more then already has been done so (GateKeeper's "Suggestions", Attack in CD). 

Please let me know what you think and thanks for keeping it Civil. 

[WereElephant]

Known instances of time magic so far include Proven Guilty (the Gatekeeper's warning to Dresden) and Cold Days (the assault on Demonreach). I'm not up on the short stories like I should be, so if I'm missing something from them, please holler it out.

Depending on how Butcher decides to set up alternate universes in Mirror Mirror, Time Travel might be involved, but I think he'd keep them as separate plot mechanisms. Why use two good magical mechanics in a story when you can milk two stories out of them?

I think Harry will wind up time traveling. There's a law of magic against it, and Harry is oh so good at breaking things...

I don't think it will tie into the BAT unless it's used to correct a mistake that caused the apocalypse, and I hope that doesn't happen.

[raidem]

Honest Answer:
There is a time travel plot on a scale in which someone from the present goes back into the past to assume and become ourMab.  Harry will finally figure out who Mab is and of course the person who went back in time to become her.

Hint: Murphy. However, Ms. Duck argued it was Molly.

[Griffyn612]

This should be a poll.

I say one time travel story in one book that has no real impact on character origins but reveals some details of events during the series so far.

[Talby16]

Honestly, I also think it will only really come into play in the time travel book. IMO time travel is something that should only be used very sparingly.

My pet theory is that he will also time travel at some point in the BAT using what he learned in the TT book to correct a mistake or impart important knowledge to his past self. I'm guessing the grey council or white will figure out they have to break that law and in the course of discussing it they will discover that Harry already broke it.

[groinkick]

UNDOING CHANGES


lol.....  Time travel back to the time of Changes.

[raidem]

Hey, I had future Harry overlayed on Harry talking to Mrs spunklecrief in changes.  I also had a time plot in the background centered on the exact daggers used in the sacrifice at ci.  I think there were shenanigans involved in which dagger was used.

[Kindler]

I think that Time Travel will be restricted to the book in which it happens.
I think that the Time Travel will not be done by Harry's own power; he'll be sent to do a very specific thing, or set of things (Prevent someone else from messing with the timeline, et cetera).
I think that the Time Travel sequence, if it covers a whole book, will tie up most of the loose ends we have from Proven Guilty/Small Favor/Maybe Others I can't remember.
I also think that Time Travel will prove to be so difficult and unpractical that Harry will never try it again.

[Lost Merlin]

updated to add a poll.  Please let me know if there is any options to add or change the wording. 

[Rasins]

I think Harry will travel back in time.  I think it'll explain several things that happened.  What's more, I think he's going to get SHOT back in time and he'll "skip" a few times, setting up the ability for him to wrap up a few loose threads (like the little Chicago fix, and who hit him with a car)

[KurtinStGeorge]

A lot depends on the specific story being told.  For example; and I'm just making this up on the fly, it's not an idea or scenario that merits serious discussion, if at the end of the series we find that Harry = the original Merlin, and we find that Harry has learned new complex kinds of magic that Bob isn't familiar with, and he goes back in time to build Demonreach and do the other stuff Merlin did like start the White Council, then nothing has really changed except our perception of Harry, plus it's also how the story ends and how Harry leaves the stage.   

If Harry travels back to a previous story like Proven Guilty and nothing changes, or perhaps Harry prevents another time traveller from making changes to the timeline, there could still be a major impact on the rest of the series from what Harry learns from his time travel adventure.  It doesn't matter if Mab = Murphy or Molly, it could be something else of major import.

There is also a third possibility.  There's an episode of the old Twilight Zone where through some unexplained process a character goes back in time to the night when Abraham Lincoln was killed and he tries to prevent the assassination from occurring.  He fails of course, but does change one small detail in the timeline.  A police officer who believes the time traveller tries to warn his superiors that the President needs protection and even though he fails his diligence is remembered which leads to his promotion and eventually, we are told, he became Chief of Police and with his higher salary and probably with some advice from upper class contacts, he made some investments which made him a millionaire.  At the end of the story we see a character who was just a waiter serving a bunch of wealthy men discussing time travel at the beginning of the story, is now one of the wealthy men telling them how his family came into its fortune.  So Jim could do something similar.  He could send Harry back in time and have all the major events of the original story happen just the way they did before, but TT Harry has a conversation with someone, and through that conversation he alters the future in some subtle but important way.   

[groinkick]

Hey, I had future Harry overlayed on Harry talking to Mrs spunklecrief in changes.  I also had a time plot in the background centered on the exact daggers used in the sacrifice at ci.  I think there were shenanigans involved in which dagger was used.

Maybe there was someone who did a small alteration in the past that caused a butterfly effect in the future.  Harry will actually visit several points in the past trying to figure out where the alteration was made?

[Griffyn612]

updated to add a poll.  Please let me know if there is any options to add or change the wording.

The Serack format is to have "Other" listed as the first option.  Not that it really matters, but it apparently helps.

[khadgar4606]

I  think jim gonna use time travel diffrently then we think. not like amber or he pops to one or two years past to fix a non important tool in his arsenal. if i write the time travel part i make it so he goes way back to ether the original merlin times or ancient egypt to chase and stop big bad from crashing the timeline.
travel to Merlin era gives us much cleaner focus on knight of cross harry Dresden while going ancient Egypt gives us excuse to uncover the nicks past and maybe save lash way before she becomes the lashciel we know.
also time travel to fix little chicago feels cheap while ability to call Nicodemus by his oldest name works much better as end of book harry calling biggest denarian by his true name makes perfect note to signal the harry become the bigger power between them.

[Lost Merlin]

Added an other option. 

It feels like most people would like to see time travel happen, but want it limited to just one book. 

I like the idea that Harry goes back in time to well before Harry was born and has to assist with a problem.