Travelers - General Discussion

[zxy556575]

6 hours ago, snowwhyte said:

I thought this was interesting. The Quantum Leap method of time travel, inhabit someone else's body in the past, seems like one of the worst ways to time travel. I couldn't imagine trying to figure out fitting into someone else's life and pretending to be someone else while adjusting to living in the past. 

I couldn't imagine it, either, but I find it fun to watch other people try!

[snowwhyte]

It could theoretically be a bit easier since some people put their whole lives online so these travelers have a cheat sheet but obviously some people misrepresent themselves online as Marcy discovered.

[snowwhyte]

Just finished the entire series and really enjoyed it. I did however spend the entire time thinking that it was Dylan McDermott playing McLaren and wondering why I found him more appealing than usual. It was only after looking him up that I realised it was actually Will from Will and Grace. 

[bilgistic]

I wasn't blown away by this. I need to ruminate on the first episode a bit, I think. So many people! Apparently this is the new trend, eh, Netflix? (Glitch, The OA)

I can't remember the name if it, but there was a great show on Syfy/SciFi several years ago about several youngish (teen to 30s) people who had different "supernatural" abilities. They were led by a professor or scientist to solve crimes/right wrongs and there was a faction against them. It was, of course, cancelled without resolution or reason. It is, however, usually my yardstick against which I measure these kinds of "bunch of people save the world" type of shows.

[blueray]

6 minutes ago, bilgistic said:

I wasn't blown away by this. I need to ruminate on the first episode a bit, I think. So many people! Apparently this is the new trend, eh, Netflix? (Glitch, The OA)

I can't remember the name if it, but there was a great show on Syfy/SciFi several years ago about several youngish (teen to 30s) people who had different "supernatural" abilities. They were led by a professor or scientist to solve crimes/right wrongs and there was a faction against them. It was, of course, cancelled without resolution or reason. It is, however, usually my yardstick against which I measure these kinds of "bunch of people save the world" type of shows.

Was it "Alphas"? It was about a team that solved crimes supernatually or close to it. I just remember the one kid could see or hear radio frequencies.

Edited December 28, 2016 by blueray

[bilgistic]

Yes! Thank you!

[Madanthonywayne]

On 12/14/2016 at 6:51 AM, lordonia said:

Goodness, if the plane needed to crash for future reasons, why not just stop that Senator guy from getting on? Or if he needed to be on the plane to die, why did Marcy defibrillate him back to life in the first place?

Clearly they had to save him so he could then be taken over by a traveler.  He was apparently promoted due to the other traveler killing her husband (the guy she pushed off the bridge).   When you think about it, why didn't they just take over the husband's body rather than killing him?  This would have avoided the necessity of saving the other guy and the entire plane crash adventure could have been avoided.

 

Also, what was up with the "don't shoot to kill" orders when defending the antimatter powered laser?  Everyone in the immediate vicinity was going to die anyway, and they apparently didn't mind killing a bunch of people via an anti-matter explosion; so why was killing them with bullets forbidden?  Every single soldier they spared ended up dying anyway, plus an equal number of travelers who were forced to jump into the soldiers bodies to turn the key.  That was idiotic.

[DearEvette]

On 12/21/2016 at 10:32 AM, waving feather said:

I wish the focus is more on Philip and Trevor

So far I am on episode four and out of all their personal issues I am least interested in Phillip's.  Not at all interested in his woobiness, his guilt issues, his wanting to save everyone or his need to manage his addiction. 

I like Carly as she seems very mission focused and honestly, if you are going to assemble a team to go on a specific mission like this at least have people on it who stay focused, but am not at all interested in her child care issues.  I am intrigued by her difficulties with her domestic abuser police boyfriend though. 

Ditto Marcy.  She seems pragmatic and mission focused.  Her relationship with the social worker is a little weird, though.  She's using the poor sucker. 

I like Trevor's personal situation the best but only because him dealing with high school bullies and his bitchy girlfriend have much more entertainment potential than the rest. 

Grant's domestic issues are interestingly awkward given he doesn't know how to deal with his wife and his hist being married puts a spike in whatever romance his real self had Carly's real self.  But man does he not catch cues well.  LOL.

Overall I am liking it so far.

[blueray]

On 10/20/2016 at 10:30 PM, Canada said:

Even with the flaws, I already love this 100x more than Timeless, which I've now given up on.

Me too. This show while not perfect did leave me to care about what happens to the characters, where as Timeless a few episodes in I realized I just didn't care about what happened to them. The one episode where Marcy was reset made me cry :(. I think she generally did fall for the social worker. However, that relationship was really inappropriate on his end, and just wouldn't happened. That being said I liked her relationship with her teammates, and it was said to have it erased on her end.

Overall, I enjoyed this show and was glad it was added to Netflix. I'll watch a second season if it gets it (hopefully it does as it ended in a cliffhanger).

[Canada]

They just showed the Marcy reset episode on TV this week.  How many more episodes are there for this season?

I'm still really enjoying this.  The only things that's bothering me is that I wish they would show us what life is like for these travellers in the future that they came from.  They react very strongly to animals, greenery, and food, so I'm guessing the future pretty much sucks balls.  But it would be interesting to see what the world looks like and what these people really look like.

[blueray]

Quote

How many more episodes are there for this season?

There are 12, they are all on Netflix.

[TimetoShine]

I've seen them all now and I would say it's an ok binge watch show but kit one I'd need or want to see more than once. I think most of the characters were hard to root for and I was especially turned off by the Marcy/David relationship. My hackles were raised in the first episode when he said that he had spoken to original Marcy about his not being able to be her boyfriend. Maybe I'm wrong but he rubbed me the wrong way from the start. So I hope that relationship does not re-start for the third time.

 

In terms of the cliffhanger, it didn't really get me. I'm not itching to know what is next, which sucks for them.

[DearEvette]

5 hours ago, Canada said:

I'm still really enjoying this.  The only things that's bothering me is that I wish they would show us what life is like for these travellers in the future that they came from.  They react very strongly to animals, greenery, and food, so I'm guessing the future pretty much sucks balls.  But it would be interesting to see what the world looks like and what these people really look like

I am up to episode 9 and that is one thing I would have liked too, to a least get some flashbacks or an entire episode st in the future.   Especially now that we've met the Traveller who basically tries to "defect" from the future.  It was that bad apparently.

Also I would have liked a little more time to see the travelers acclimate to their  new bodies.  It is one thing for them to research the people they are traveling into, but once you are inside their bodies, then that becomes a whole other thing.  If you got into the body of of someone taller, shorter, fatter, thinner, different muscle mass etc. wouldn't you have to take some time to figure out how to move in that new body?  Wouldn't it feel alien to you?  We get a smallish glimpse of the real Carly who is white and looks to be taller and thinner than the 21st century body she is in.  They are so phenotypically different, why wouldn't we get a shot of her staring at herself in the mirror, touching her face, her hair, her lips?  It would have been nice to have an episode of them really dealing with their new reality before jumping right into the action.

[mjc570]

I finished watching, and thought it was not bad.  The acting was generally good, and while there were some strange writing choices (especially in the anti-matter explosion episode) that just are senseless, I enjoyed watching.  I especially like Grace 2.0 (best guidance counselor EVER) and hope that she sticks around somehow, and Ellis. I like looking at McClaren (because I think he is somewhat Agent Mulder-looking) but the rest of the characters are ok.  The whole baby Jeffrey subplot is ridiculous  - Carly is an unfit mother, to the extent she is the baby's mother at all, and I'm tired of watching her be her own worst enemy.  The "cliff hanger" - with some of them shot (Trevor and Grace), and the FBI bursting in was totally underwhelming.   The treason trial - with everyone there a traveler - was more interesting.

I'd like them to focus more on the future society, the Faction and the director, instead of  McClaren/Carly's affair or Carly's baby drama.   For a "tactician," Carly really sucks when it comes to dealing with her life.   Actually, I'd prefer to see them more mission-focused generally. I should note that after trying to watch shows like Timeless and Frequency, my standards are pretty low, so I am more than willing to provide some degree of fan-wanking. 

TL,DR:  Fairly interesting, will keep watching.

[Clanstarling]

On 12/28/2016 at 0:58 PM, Canada said:

They just showed the Marcy reset episode on TV this week.  How many more episodes are there for this season?

I'm still really enjoying this.  The only things that's bothering me is that I wish they would show us what life is like for these travellers in the future that they came from.  They react very strongly to animals, greenery, and food, so I'm guessing the future pretty much sucks balls.  But it would be interesting to see what the world looks like and what these people really look like.

We've had some glimpses, I think, at least of the way people look and the food during the episode with the hallucinations. People with closely cropped hair and greyish burlap like clothing, and whatever that white not-quite cream of wheat mush was (which Phillip saw before he saw the burger). But I agree it would be good to know more.

I have enjoyed watching this on Netflix, even binged (due to being sick). There are a lot of plot holes and things that don't make a lot of sense, but still, I like some of the basic rules they've made up. I forgive a lot for time travel shows. I'm still watching Timeless, but I don't engage with it as much as with this show. Frequency I dropped after one episode. I do think in general they tend to cram a little too much in each episode. Between the mission and "private" lives, I'm not sure if every member needs to be addressed each time.

I also thought it was a decent cliff hanger there in the end - the confusion about whether or not they were getting legit orders via text (my vote - no), the realization that the future had changed significantly for the time they all came from, and then the FBI team (or are they the faction) storming the place.

[sjohnson]

On 12/20/2016 at 0:04 AM, zibnchy said:

If so, why was Philip's little heroin addiction a surprise? And Marcy's seizures or whatever her deal is.

Philip's parents had testified he was a first time user. The historical record was false but misled the director. Similarly, the main information on Marcy was the practice Facebook page, which was fictionalized because it was just practice in using a computer, and the made up stuff was cooler. 

Sending a traveler's mind back kills the host. The congressman had to be in a situation where he was inevitably going to die before it would be ethical to kill him by placing a traveler's mind in the body. But, once the congressman's mind had died, just as history said, the traveler, aided by the reception team would prevent the physical death of the body, leaving it usable by the traveler's mind. 

The traveler team doesn't seem to be too superhuman (mostly,) and not too cool, but they work for me as people with feelings and actual goals that matter to them that they take more or less sensible steps to achieve. Makes them feel a little realer to me, therefore I care more. But...I have no idea how they could possibly expect to alter the past so they were never born to go back in time to alter the past, though. That's got to come back and bite them in the ass by the time they've plotted all this out, if they have more seasons. They've also pretty much committed to the Timeless proposition that the future is watching the past along with us, the present day audience, and isn't really aware of what's happening until they see it on screen the same time we do. Can't say that makes much sense, given there's not even any hokum about slaved computers like on Timeless. 

Still, couldn't stop watching this, but I couldn't force myself to watch Stranger Things. Plainly I do not watch TV like other people.

[Tarasme]

Thanks Netflix.

I'm a genre junkie, so this was good. I extra special love fun genre, like SG1, so having many members of that production team back together was nifty.

This show would actually benefit if it could find its way to more fun. That's a tough request, considering the main hook is death by body snatcher, but still.

The little sweet things, like Philip finding his way through an opportunistic lawyer, (drug of choice)A, and his adorable turtle adoption are great. Wholeheartedly agree with above that Jared Abrahamson's turn as Trevor is a highlight- such nice notes that he was going to watch golf with Gary then so bittersweet that he had to leave after pouring the chips. Tom Mcbreath and Jennifer Spence need their own Ellis & Grace show. Now. 

Unfortunately, Eric McCormack has almost no chemistry with anyone there. His quipping ability doesn't save him here. He has zero chemistry with Nesta Cooper's Carly- which- Wright and team should have fought for this casting to be exactly right because we're supposed to believe that MacLaren is willing to risk the survival of generations for a few bath time's alone with her. Things are slightly better with Kat, but it was plot- not chemistry magicks- that told us MacClaren was willing to risk everything to save her life.

Cool that the Director is more than a man (though I had my heart set on seeing Michael Shanks show up as the shadowy force of the future *g*). Cool that we weren't immediately fed the details about pervasive future changes including the destruction of Area 13, I mean, shelter 41. Cool that we don't really know if Grace (Ellis is 0014, Trevor's 0115, what Traveler is Grace again? 70 something?) is working for or against all of humanity- and really, I am totally in that they've obfuscated what force is fighting for humanity's best. It is so sad that they saved digging into that philosophical conundrum for the final two episodes of the season.

I really hope there's a season 2 because the end of season 1 was just about a great show- plot canyons and all.

[wanderingstar]

Seeing Ian Tracey makes me happy.

[Joimiaroxeu]

Only about a third of the way through but I really like this show. I think the characters are well-drawn despite not much being known about their "real" lives--yet, anyway. I also like the way they work as a team and support each other.

[GaT]

I missed what the note said, what happened to the baby?

[marieYOTZ]

Just binged it - i was barely paying attention to it the first few episodes, but got more interested around episode 6. When they transitioned to the travelers spending more time trying to integrate into their new identities i thought it really picked up. I'm just sorry there's not more to watch! Time to scour the listings for my next binge watch.

[wanderingstar]

I think I ended up liking this show. The most inttriguing aspect of it for me is the little glimpses of the future we get - especially the food-related ones (e.g., 3468 not being used to drinking cow's milk; another traveler mentioning he cried at the sight of bacon).

I don't love everything about watching the travelers adjusting to their new lives. For instance, if it wasn't for Ian Tracey's Ray, I wouldn't really care about Phillip's struggles. Carly's story was interesting but very repetitive. And nothing made me tune out faster than Carly and MacLaren's romance.

Trevor was probably my favorite of the characters.

One thing I thought was going to come back was MacLaren turning in Hall and Luca (the guy Marcy thought might have been her brother).

So it wasn't amazing, but I'm intrigued enough to want a second season.

Edited December 31, 2016 by Gillian Rosh

[zxy556575]

I'd watch another season if there was one but would prefer it become more of an ensemble. I could do with a lot less focus on boring and badly acted MacLaren.

[Arynm]

13 hours ago, GaT said:

I missed what the note said, what happened to the baby?

The father had him. Nothing happened as far as I saw after that

[GaT]

3 minutes ago, Arynm said:

The father had him. Nothing happened as far as I saw after that

Thanks, I saw episode 2 

Spoiler

and saw that woman (no idea who she is) bring it back looking safe, so at least we know it's OK

I got distracted by the baby on my previous post, so I forgot to comment on this. I don't understand how they know the exact second of someone's death, but have no clue as to they really are. A developmentally disabled woman, a guy with a bad drug addiction, a woman with a baby who is in an abusive relationship, & a kid still in high school are not good choices, they couldn't find some people who were going to die that didn't have all these problems? The only person who doesn't have a problem is Grant, & that's obviously because he has a romantic relationship with the woman (can't remember her name) in the future, but the FBI guy he jumped into has a good marriage, so now there can be CONFLICT because he loves 2 women. It just seems like the characters are a bit forced.

[Clanstarling]

I think part of the premise is how incomplete a picture our digital footprints leave. While hundreds (hundred?) of years in the future the death records can tell them exactly when a death occurs, social media and other data is rather spotty on the reality of their lives. In the case of the developmentally disabled woman, she had a fake facebook account that made her seem like a good candidate. The junkie's parents said it was the first time he'd taken drugs, and the abused woman's survivors (her baby's father) isn't likely to have been discovered as her killer, especially since he's a presumed upstanding member of the community. It is, however, a pretty large percentage of oopsies, I agree.

[rubyred]

2 minutes ago, Clanstarling said:

I think part of the premise is how incomplete a picture our digital footprints leave. While hundreds (hundred?) of years in the future the death records can tell them exactly when a death occurs, social media and other data is rather spotty on the reality of their lives. In the case of the developmentally disabled woman, she had a fake facebook account that made her seem like a good candidate. The junkie's parents said it was the first time he'd taken drugs, and the abused woman's survivors (her baby's father) isn't likely to have been discovered as her killer, especially since he's a presumed upstanding member of the community. It is, however, a pretty large percentage of oopsies, I agree.

Yeah, I agree. So far I'm handwaving it because something about the show is really pulling at me, it's so complicated and the situations so tense. On the flip side, the concept of making these mistakes because of mistaken social media profiles or news items constantly reminds me of the "historical documents" in Galaxy Quest, which undercuts the seriousness for me. But the abusive cop boyfriend has got to go, and the junkie with a conscience is way too much of a loose cannon.

Also, it's a little too convenient for the cop to be targeting Marcy -- because she reminds him of how Carly has "changed"? What is that about, why make that connection? 

[sjohnson]

The cop followed Carly to the meeting where the group welcomed "MacLaren" to the 21st century, after saving the physical body from death by falling down the elevator shaft. He got locked out onto the roof for most of the action but as I recall he was alerted to Marcy's connection to Carly. 

I think that's how that went.

Edited December 31, 2016 by sjohnson

[Clanstarling]

1 hour ago, rubyred said:

The concept of making these mistakes because of mistaken social media profiles or news items constantly reminds me of the "historical documents" in Galaxy Quest, which undercuts the seriousness for me.

That never occurred to me, but now that you say it - it's going to stick with me. LOL.

37 minutes ago, sjohnson said:

The cop followed Carly to the meeting where the group welcomed "MacLaren" to the 21st century, after saving the physical body from death by falling down the elevator shaft. He got locked out onto the roof for most of the action but as I recall he was alerted to Marcy's connection to Carly. 

I think that's how that went.

One of his cop buddies (?) gave him the CCTV video of Marcy's attack. I wasn't clear why, it seemed kind of weird the way he handed it off. But the cop was investigating sudden behavior changes in people before that. I don't recall though, how he pinged to Marcy - the building may have been it. I dislike him so much I have a tendency to put him out of my mind. Plus, they put so much into each episode that it's easy to miss something.

[zxy556575]

2 hours ago, GaT said:

A developmentally disabled woman, a guy with a bad drug addiction, a woman with a baby who is in an abusive relationship, & a kid still in high school are not good choices, they couldn't find some people who were going to die that didn't have all these problems?

The Director also has to find people who died within a certain time frame and in the same general vicinity, so the available pool isn't all that extensive.

As to why the deaths for an incoming team couldn't be a few weeks apart, who knows.

[GaT]

16 minutes ago, lordonia said:

The Director also has to find people who died within a certain time frame and in the same general vicinity, so the available pool isn't all that extensive.

 

There's really no reason they have to be in the same vicinity, people can get on a bus, or take a taxi, or drive, they can get to each other. Also, they knew the cop was going to have a heart attack & die, wouldn't a member of law enforcement who would have access to information & sources be a better choice than a kid in high school or a junkie? It doesn't make sense. 

[rubyred]

1 hour ago, GaT said:

There's really no reason they have to be in the same vicinity, people can get on a bus, or take a taxi, or drive, they can get to each other. Also, they knew the cop was going to have a heart attack & die, wouldn't a member of law enforcement who would have access to information & sources be a better choice than a kid in high school or a junkie? It doesn't make sense. 

Yeah, this is a problem. The selection process simply doesn't bear scrutiny. It would be one thing if the premise was that the team needed to be comprised of a junkie, single mom, high school jock and library cleaning lady in order to complete their missions with whatever junkie-fu, single mom-fu, jock-fu or cleaning lady-fu would be key to success, but it just hasn't been presented this way. From what's been doled out information-wise, the teen is actually a pretty old tech genius guy, the cleaning lady is a doctor, the junkie has some kind of eidetic memory and the single mom is....a soldier/agent? Surely the Director could have chosen more appropriate 21st century avatars for these guys? Although I guess the idea is that their present-day lives offer yet another challenge to the mission(s). To which I say, yawn.

I hope this is better explained in further episodes, because I actually have enjoyed the episodes I've watched. There has clearly been a lot of thought put into the concept and the eps are tightly plotted. But there are logic gaps that are not being addressed.

[sjohnson]

The engineer was sent back into a host with terminal cancer. But that was basically a suicide mission to stop the asteroid. The thing is, for travelers sent back to be permanent agents, instead of one-offs, the potential pool isn't just everybody who dies. It's everybody who dies in such a way that the deaths of their physical bodies can be prevented. MacLaren for example could literally be pulled back from the brink. If it was just a matter of an appropriate host they could simply project the traveler back into any body they chose. Aside from any ethical qualms about killing people who would otherwise live, though, if they did that the disappearance of the original host from history would make even more changes for the timeline. The dying people they choose aren't making any history, so that part gets simplified. 

The thing is, there really isn't that much of a pool. Most corpses they would get would be sick with things like cancer. Or like Gower, having a heart attack. I was a little surprised to hear he might be a candidate at all.

[palmaire]

I don't remember if this a spoiler for episode 1, but tagged it anyway.

Spoiler

The Travelers remain in the host bodies and continue with their lives and it wouldn't be efficient if the hosts lived more than an hour from each other, so proximity does seem to matter in the long run.

[GaT]

I just finished episode 5, & I still don't know what the mission is, just some vague idea that they're trying to fix something.

[rubyred]

Overall, this was a pretty entertaining way to ignore New Year's Eve. However.

The Carly character is a problem. The thing is that Traveler!Carly is a clearly competent tactician. But Present!Carly is the most isolated host, with the least resources. A single mom with an infant, no job, no HS Diploma, an abusive boyfriend and no apparent support system of any kind? All the other Travelers have lives that give them some cushioning - Marcy can manipulate David, Trevor has his helicopter parents plus he's a teen, MacLaren has his wife and FBI partner, even Philip has his sleazy lawyer, who may not be a friend but it's in his best interests to keep Philip alive and out of legal trouble. Carly has no one. (Oh, except Chekhov's Baby. When will writers learn that you can't introduce an infant in the first act and then not even just namecheck where the baby is for the rest of the episode? Oh and maybe show a little more of Carly bonding with Baby Jeff, so she doesn't come off as completely negligent and thoughtless.)

Now, this wouldn't have to be a problem if they showed how she uses her Traveler skills to deal with the asshole boyfriend. But instead we see her flail and fail constantly. The beatdowns were satisfying but everything else she did ran counter to any productive way of getting what she wanted. She's defensive and hostile and playing right into Bad Cop's hands, but she's supposed to be smarter than that. I think it could have been interesting if they showed her frustration at being forced to function at levels subpar to her capabilities. And if they weren't going to write it, I wish they had cast an actress who could bring those layers. IMO they casted Carly too young. She's fine on missions but as someone upthread mentioned, there's no chemistry there, particularly romantic chemistry, with MacLaren. And if they had casted someone with a little more life experience I wouldn't have been as confused by seeing him make out with some older white lady during his hallucinations. Someone here thankfully explained that the blonde lady was what "Carly" looked like before entering this host (guys, I was so confused by that scene). Which make sense. Except MacLaren still looked like Eric McCormack, even though he wouldn't. But I guess that would have been even more confusing to depict. Sorry, tangent.

It sort of felt like the last few episodes honed in on what the show could really be, but that was different from what it started out as. I'm interested to see more, and intrigued by the hints of what life is like in their future, although I doubt the budget will ever stretch to us actually seeing it. 

Random ?s:

• What was so compelling about MacLaren's argument that made that policewoman Traveler let him shoot her?
• How could our Travelers not know about the Faction, when Ellis and Grace were among the first Travelers (according to their serial numbers) and therefore the oldest and knew all about it? (Time travel is such a pain in the ass when it comes to who knows what when and why. Don't make me start a spreadsheet, people.)
• Why didn't MacLaren's wife die in the plane crash? WHY?
• It often felt like each Traveler only did the bare minimum to help each other outside of missions. I couldn't tell if it was because they didn't confide in each other or because they were all expected to sink or swim in these new lives (Protocol 5) even though they were dumped in wildly inequitable situations.
• The school bus of old folk travelers riding to their deaths was depressing. At least they got to see a dog/bear!

Edited January 1, 2017 by rubyred

[sjohnson]

MacLaren was real, which I think is why he still looked like Eric McCormack. His hallucination of his old girl friend while making love to his wife naturally looked like the original who's now hosted by Carly. It wasn't a memory but a distorted even in the present. I think. Eh, with time travel stories you can never be sure.

Carly's skills as a tactician (which seem to be shooting, fighting) don't seem relevant to dealing with custody issue to me, though. Also, the real problem I think is the expectation is that she basically fobs the kid off on Dad whenever convenient. And if that's permanently, so be it. They aren't directly pressuring her, though MacLaren did ask rhetorically once. I think they're not supporting her efforts to keep Jeff Jr. because they don't really support the goal. Trevor is the nicest personally, but he calls the man "Gary." And once he's legal, what relations he'll keep up is probably pretty minimal. Philip has kept relations with parents broken. What I was a little puzzled about was MacLaren wanting to keep up the marriage. Maybe a divorce from a radical personality change was deemed too risky, especially if it ended up in court documents?

[Clanstarling]

3 hours ago, rubyred said:

What was so compelling about MacLaren's argument that made that policewoman Traveler let him shoot her?

My guess, though it isn't really supported by what they seem to have established as rules, is that somehow her host's death will allow her consciousness to wake up in the future and perhaps she can send a message about what the heck's going on.

The only firm thing they've said about their apparent suicide mission (that I can recall) is that if they accomplish what they want, they are unlikely to be born in the future and would thus lose their lives. I think they've said a messed up download kills both the host and consciousness. But I don't believe they've said what happens if the host body dies.

Anyway, that's the only thing I could come up with for her to allow McLaren to shoot her, flawed as it is.

[sjohnson]

I

12 minutes ago, Clanstarling said:

My guess, though it isn't really supported by what they seem to have established as rules, is that somehow her host's death will allow her consciousness to wake up in the future and perhaps she can send a message about what the heck's going on.

The only firm thing they've said about their apparent suicide mission (that I can recall) is that if they accomplish what they want, they are unlikely to be born in the future and would thus lose their lives. I think they've said a messed up download kills both the host and consciousness. But I don't believe they've said what happens if the host body dies.

Anyway, that's the only thing I could come up with for her to allow McLaren to shoot her, flawed as it is.

 

4 hours ago, rubyred said:

What was so compelling about MacLaren's argument that made that policewoman Traveler let him shoot her?

It seemed to me that MacLaren shot her Kevlar vest so that she would have an acceptable reason for letting him go after she "missed" her first shot. As I understand it, even when the vest stops a bullet the impact can topple someone just like any hard blow, stun them with the shock. High powered guns at short range should actually be shown as penetrating vests (if my reading was reliable.)

Edited January 1, 2017 by sjohnson

[zxy556575]

It's all entertaining bollocks anyway, right?

If I were sent back two hundred years to be brick layer I wouldn't know how to do that, or how to act in those times. There was some lip service paid about the Travelers not knowing how to drive but there are hundreds of others things they'd be clueless about, especially how to be a freaking FBI agent. I suppose the team could have found old tech to practice on in their time, except the future as alluded to appears to be desolate and scarce.

The shock of possibly traveling into a different gender hasn't been addressed, either. Would MacLaren still have been in love if Carly was a male now?

Interesting about the Traveler ID numbers. Maybe there are those who administer the program but never jump themselves? The Director should have a process in place to track what changes have been made to the timeline, so it seemed to me that Grace would have realized that our team weren't aware of the Faction stuff.

I hope season 2 would give us more info on the team's lives in their time; who were they and what made them sign up for a suicide mission. It doesn't seem like anyone can return once they've traveled.

[snowwhyte]

There was quite a bit they didn't address. I guess since bodies are chosen in advance they won't put someone in the wrong sex body except for in an emergency or for drama purposes if they do another series. It would have been interesting to see them reacting more to their new bodies. Carly is significantly shorter and changed race. McLaren is now middle aged. Trevor was the only one really shown to be discovering and adapting to his new body. I would like to see what they looked like in the future. Also what were their names? If they trained together in the future and knew each other why don't they accidentally call one another by their old names?

One of the things that bugged me about Timeless was the historian who knew minute details about every time period. At least these guys knew what time period they were going to and prepared and studied for their mission as much as possible. There are always things that you can't learn though and its fun to watch them discover those.

[DearEvette]

So I finished and I must say I did like the later episodes and the series seemed to find a groove.

- I loved Marcy's reset.  Poor David though.  Poor guy.  Out of all the people they have encountered (minus the baby -- but more on that later) as part of their host lives, he is the most sympathetic to me.

- Honestly, Carly leaving asshole boyfriend to deal with a shooting of a teenage girl is a pretty damned elegant way of dealing with him.  I actually cackled and hoped she wouldn't turn around.  Agree that her situation is the most problematic.  My biggest issue with the show is how it is handling her motherhood.  There is no context for her to be so concerned with the baby.  It sounds heartless but she should have just let the kid go with asshole dad.  If the show were better written that is what would have happened, imo.  When she is away from baby mama drama (sorry, had to say it...) she's actually a good character.

- I like that they toned down Phillip's need to save people.  But again, I think the show relies so much on plot that the characters get short shrift.  We should have seen Phillip's struggle with heroin in a different way.  He isn't addicted to it, his host body is.  Phillip seemed to be simply portrayed as someone who is a heroine addict and dealing with addiction. Instead of someone who knows he isn't addicted but has to deal with the physiological & psychological affect is has on his host.  It is a small distinction, but an important one.  I mean they did the same thing with Marcy in a way.  Her host was developmentally disabled but Marcy wasn't.  She worked to compensate on the physical issues with the brain, but her consciousness overwrote the real Marcy's developmental issues.  Not sure why they couldn't have explored something similar with Phillip. But maybe I am asking too much. 

- Loved the arrival of Grace and Ellis.  It seems that with the last few episode the show found a glimmer of a sense of humor and those two, especially Grace were a breath of fresh air.

- Liked the dilemma in the end of now knowing what to believe and of course they completely fucked up the future.  Cuz of course they did.  LOL.

- Trevor is my favorite.  His whole spiel in the woods with Grace was perfectly played.

- Hated McLaren's feelings for his wife.  God I hate when shows do that.  She's annoying and boring. This is probably why I liked the Grace character so much.  She is on task!

Edited January 2, 2017 by DearEvette

[GaT]

I just finished watching the series and....I don't know. I can't decide if I like these people enough to come back or not. I'm still having problems accepting the whole "we know when people are going to die to the second, but can't figure out that someone is developmentally disabled or a junkie" thing. I also have a problem with picking a 17 years old kid to transfer into. Even though he was going to die, didn't they think he would have parents that could control his life? And I don't think I need to go into the whole baby thing. 

I'm glad they finally told us who kidnapped & tortured them, but it kind of seemed like a throwaway, "oh!, the faction did it!", and I'm glad to finally find out who the director is, but I HATE Grace. She just decides to reset the AI responsible for everyone's existence because she decided, all by herself, that it was for the greater good????? Wow, talk about hubris. She also decided for Marcy when Marcy specifically said she wanted to think about it. Grace is the kind of person who thinks she knows better than everyone, & I hate that kind of person.

[MisterGlass]

I watched this on Netflix and thought this was a decent little scifi show.  Perhaps it benefits from binge watch consumption - I could see it being slow for week by week viewing.

I thought the actors were fine and worked well together.  It's a nice ensemble with fairly grounded performances.  Actually, I was interested to see Eric McCormack as scifi FBI again.  Long, long ago he had a guest role on the Highlander TV series as an immortal FBI agent.  I'm not fond of baby Jeffrey's involvement, but it is logical that some of the hosts have families and have to deal with them.  Poppy the turtle had better be okay.  I'm quite fond of Clyde the tortoise on Elementary.

I wasn't a huge fan of the cliffhanger, but I'll tune in for the second season if there is one.  I'd love to see more of the usual scifi/fantasy actors come into the mix.

My understanding of the traveler system is that this is a one-way trip.  I think they die in the future when they come back to the past.  There was a comment about misfires (failure to link up with the host) occurring as much as 30% of the time in the early days, and everyone was very shocked in a way that made me think those 30% were casualties.  Trevor asks if they would still have volunteered if they knew the odds, and someone said yes, what options did they really have.  The future situation is so desperate that most of them would prefer to live in the past and attempt to make a difference, or die in the effort.  And Marcy clearly expects to die - really die - when her host body dies.  The medical team was sent back for one specific mission, but they are now stuck, and are filling in where assigned.

In the past, they operate as sleeper agents.  They are not supposed to have contact with each other that isn't mission related to avoid arousing suspicion among law enforcement authorities.  The main team's arrival and basic attempts at contact were enough to trigger FBI investigation.  They are supposed to blend in and live like ordinary people with only the resources available to the host except for mission related items.  Marcy has been an exception because her situation has been so different from what was anticipated.  These are long haul assignments.  Trevor will be on assignment for ... say sixty years, as long as his body lasts.  They cannot risk being flagged as secret agents in year one, and they have already made serious mistakes.  Every life saved is a risk of detection, so they are trying to act on big events only.  Also, the bigger events would have clearer ripples in the timeline.

As far as how a host is selected, it must be someone who died a preventable death during the time period that they are targeting.  Trevor said that they cannot send any traveler farther back in time than the arrival of the most recent traveler for quantum physics reasons.  So when they are sending a team back, they need to find a set of compatible bodies that die within the target timeframe and target location of the first mission.  On a worldwide scale, that is massively complex timing.  The ethical framework is interesting.  The engineer and the snipers came back on essentially a suicide mission - they were all likely to die in the explosion.  That may be why all of them went into older hosts.  The soldiers trying to stop the antimatter detonation could not be killed as long as they could theoretically reach minimum safe distance before the explosion.  Only after that point had passed could they be taken over.  My guess is that the original senator would not have died during the original timeline, so it was not ethical to take over his mind, but his wife would have died, so it was ethical for her to be taken over to kill him (yikes!). The second senator did have a death in the applicable time window, so taking him over was ethical.

[Guest]

Wait, did this used to be an all episodes thread or something?  I've only watched ep 1 and there's an awful lot in here that wasn't in ep 1, unless I missed a lot.  

Oh, I see now there are only 3 episode threads so people are probably just discussing anything wherever.  I'll check back to the 'all eps' thread when/if I finish the series.  

Edited January 5, 2017 by Guest

[roctavia]

Just finished the series after watching a couple episodes a night on Netflix... I actually really liked it, despite it's problems. It was sort of frustrating at the beginning to not have a clear idea as to what they were doing/why. I wish, as others have said, that the asteroid reveal was a little sooner in the series just to sort of know that there was a big event that altered the future so much... though did Ellis's mention of helios mean that the laser did work and the asteroid didn't hit? But the world still went to shit anyway.

I definitely would have liked to see a little more of the future, is there a training to become a traveler? How did Phillip memorize everything? or just more what is the future really like? I know we got glimpses of the food mush and the drab sack clothes and short hair... but why? Maybe they don't even have names in the future, or not everybody (the engineer had a name or a nickname at least) maybe they all are just numbers.

I do think they made an effort to explain how they made such mistakes in picking Phillip and Marcy as hosts- they weren't looking at a full record/ didn't find away to double check for accuracy. The director thought it was putting Philip in someone who died the first time they tried heroin, thought Marcy was a librarian with a normal life. Certainly the logistics of finding someone appropriate who is going to die and who has a death that can be prevented, and is in the right city/area may not be as easy as it seems?

As for the faction stuff, I am interested to know more about what is going on now in the future and what the faction is capable of. Is it really FBI that came into the barn or has Forbes now been taken over, too? And why? Even if the faction don't want the director making decisions, how is killing all of the travelers that helpful? I mean, unless the director is going to send it's people to kill faction people. Cliffhangers are a tough balance and in this case I don't think they got it quite right. It's one thing to leave some mysteries to pull us into S2, but it was sort of unsatisfying to get no answers or resolution to everything they'd been working towards all season.

Edited January 7, 2017 by roctavia

[zxy556575]

8 hours ago, roctavia said:

I definitely would have liked to see a little more of the future, is there a training to become a traveler? How did Phillip memorize everything? or just more what is the future really like? I know we got glimpses of the food mush and the drab sack clothes and short hair... but why? Maybe they don't even have names in the future, or not everybody (the engineer had a name or a nickname at least) maybe they all are just numbers.

Yes! I'd also like to see more interaction with other Traveler teams. If I'm remembering correctly, they're not supposed to discuss their missions with each other, right? Screw that. I like the police woman more than I do Marcy and Carly, is what it is. I agree that she was likely wearing a bulletproof vest when MacLaren shot her.

Shows like this with numerous interwoven and deliberately ambiguous storylines tend to benefit from bingeing. If there's a season two, I'll probably rewatch to sort things out a bit in my head (meaning, pay attention this time).

[waving feather]

One thing I really liked about this show is how it's shot. It's dynamic and the cinematography is good, to my untrained eye anyway. 

I adore Philip and wish they feature him more. For a guy who is in a drug addict's body, he's quite angst free (except for that one episode where he tried to save those abducted kids). And he's always there for his fellow teammates. Everyone tends to call him when they need help with their lives. It helps that he's alone by himself, of course. But I do wonder where are his parents. 

For next season, I'm still hoping they do away with the social worker. He doesn't fit into the plot and Marcy becomes unlikable for me whenever she's with him.

[Clanstarling]

1 hour ago, waving feather said:

For next season, I'm still hoping they do away with the social worker.

I really like him, and he's one of the few contemporaries we get to see in more than a "gee you're acting weird" way (of course he started out that way, but he's getting to be more than that). I feel like he represents our point of view more than the wife or the FBI partner, because he is more involved in general.

[waving feather]

1 hour ago, Clanstarling said:

I really like him, and he's one of the few contemporaries we get to see in more than a "gee you're acting weird" way (of course he started out that way, but he's getting to be more than that). I feel like he represents our point of view more than the wife or the FBI partner, because he is more involved in general.

I'm fine with him if that's all he does but I can't stand the romantic relationship that he has with Marcy. Still gross.

Edited January 7, 2017 by waving feather