the groundhog day project

Watched six of the Time Loop TV episodes again today: Xena: Warrior Princess - "Been There, Done That" Haven - "Audrey Parker's Day Off" Eureka - "I Do Over" Supernatural - "Mystery Spot" Charmed - "Deja Vu All Over Again" Fringe - "White Tulip" I will not be writing about them specifically today. If you want to read about them, have a look at the original Time Loop TV Day entries: Day 25 – it’s like yesterday never happened Day 54 – another reason why today is especially exciting Day 144 – and we’re clear I also mostly finished my LEGO Gobbler's Knob today. Here's a blurry shot (I'll post clearer ones when it is done): It needs some more people, I think, to get a better crowded feel. I could get into a whole narrative on the building of that thing, but that might be boring. Today, for example, I took apart 193 collectible minifigures (to be sure I had the right parts available for the c...

Seven Days - “Come Again” ... again . I’ve been wanting to revisit some of the time loops of old. “See you yesterday, Mr. Parker.” That would make a good title. “Research show that people from small towns are much more likely to lead happy, productive lives.” Olga tells Parker this because he isn’t impressed by the old diner they go to. I note it because, hey, obvious, it’s the kind of thing Phil Connors might point out after his time in Punxsutawney. But, I also noticed—since I’m focusing on this episode right now—they weren’t in a small town, per se, but at a roadside diner. First backstep, Parker is already manipulating time to go after the girl (Olga). By the second go round (the time loop in effect), he’s given up on that already. In case you don’t know this series, Seven Days involves regular time travel. Parker pilots a machine that backsteps up to seven days to save some life or lives, or keep some horrible thing from happening. In this episode, a Dr. Axelrad has importan...

Subtitle this one: TV Time Loop Day Part Drei: This Time It’s Less Interesting . Seriously though, after two previous times doing this ( here and here ), the structure is rather obvious. You got your central plot with the protagonist and then various side bits put there just so they can solve other stuff (like Phil’s good deeds but less… important). For example… actually I’m not sure any of these episode involved solving other stuff, but there were things obviously there to prove the loop was happening; in Smallville , for example, Clark knows to whom the flowers are being delivered and tells Chloe to prove it—it’s a girl who works so hard Chloe says she can’t have had a date in years, so Clark isn’t just guessing. It is interesting in these episodes that characters have to deal with the deaths of people close to them, sometimes the deaths of several people, depending on what resumption they’re on. Phil deals with his own death, of course, and O’Reilly’s death, but some of these ep...

In their essay, “Terminators, Monkeys and Mass Culture," Dimitrakaki and Tsiantis give us a slightly different take on Phil’s experience than Daughton’s (1996) notion that “Phil’s situation… parallels that of the economically disenfranchised, the Other”; Dimitrakaki and Tsiantis tell us “what comes under attack” in the film “is a particular manifestation of cyclical temporality that actually exists in capitalist societies.” One essay’s take on the “cyclical temporality” implicit in Ralph’s line, “That about sums it up for me” matches up with another’s take on Phil’s trap linking to him the disenfranchised, which arguably includes Ralph. That “arguably” of mine is a key point where many might disagree, though. Usually, we would only use “economically disenfranchised” to describe people living, say, below the poverty line, people without many options in their lives, people stuck… well, see, I’m already blurring the definition just enough to be sure I can include the likes of Ralph,...

Yesterday was Time Loop Day Part Deux: This Time I Neglected to Announce it on Twitter . Once again, I watched seven TV episodes dealing in time loops. It’s all genre shows, so if you’re not into that… well, why are you reading a blog about Groundhog Day , one of the great, classic science fiction comedies? Anyway, the episodes were: The Twilight Zone – “Judgment Night” Early Edition – “Run, Gary, Run” Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman – “‘Twas the Night Before Mxymas” Charmed – “Déjà Vu All Over Again” Seven Days – “Come Again” Eureka – “I Do Over” Fringe – “And Those We’ve Left Behind” As Groundhog Day begins here on my iPad, I imagine that the time loop has a specific reason—Phil Connors, egocentric user of women is being punished. If that is the case, then The Twilight Zone ’s episode “Judgment Night” is structurally much the same. Of course, there’s only one resumption shown, but for a half-hour show, there wasn’t much time to be too creative about the loo...

Groundhog Day wasn’t the first exploration of the day-on-repeat phenomena, or its technical term per Star Trek : a temporal causality loop. Though, we shouldn’t confuse this with the causality loop of a “predestination paradox.” And, now that we’ve lost the non sci-fi fans, let’s discuss these loops as represented in a handful of relatively recent (one of these actually predates the release of, though not the writing of, Groundhog Day ) television shows. And, they are all genre shows. And, I watched all seven of these yesterday, declaring on Twitter that it was time loop day. Just to get the list out of the way (and there are more episodes like this left from other shows (and movies) so I may have to do this again sometime ), the seven episodes are: Buffy the Vampire Slayer - “Life Serial” Angel - “Time Bomb” Stargate SG-1 - “Window of Opportunity” Star Trek: The Next Generation - “Cause and Effect” The X-Files - “Monday” Supernatural - “Mystery Spot” Fringe - “White Tulip...