back to the future

Headcanons and Worldbuilding

To place all of my headcanons directly on the sidebar of the primary page would take up WAY too much vertical space, so I felt it safer to move them all to a secondary page where they can be neatly divided and organized within the primary column. This page contains everything from thoughts and ideas that are wholly canon-compliant, to notions that feel entirely fanmade. They do not reflect what I think the actual intent of the creators was --- they're simply unspoken rules that build the framework of any of my own writing within the series.

It is worth noting that, just becuase these are my primary headcanons and soft rules for the mechanics of time travel within the series, it does not mean that all of my fanworks and associated creations are beholden to them. I may simply choose to ignore, create, or negate an existing listed headcanon if I feel doing so will enhance whatever I'm writing!

Time Travel

• Time is fluid in the Back to the Future universe. Rather than rigidly conforming to the events that unfold (whether they be past, present, or future), it will attempt to flow in such a way to acommodate everything contained within the time stream as best as is possible.
• If a paradox or a contradictory temporal event can be smoothed over rather than overwritten or erased, the flow of time will attempt to do so.
• The ripple effect primarily moves forward, barring exceptions. This is becuase, more often than not, for the ripple effect to flow backwards it would erase the very course of actions that led to the ripple in the first place.
• Exceptions will occur if an action is so severe that it causes someone or something to cease to exist. The ripple effect will consume/remove that person or object while attempting to do as little damage to surrounding people, places, and events as possible.
• The multiverse does exist. The Flux Capacitor was simply designed and calibrated for time travel within strictly its own universe and does not have the capacity to breach into others by default.
• In theory this means that changes made during time travel could occur without ever risking the safety or existence of those time traveling, but only if the time machine is equipped to "dimension hop".
• If a paradox becomes so great that the timeline struggles to resolve it in a way that wouldn't cause more harm to the stability of time than letting it remain, one timeline may split into two.
• If this happens to a time traveler using a method of time travel incapable of dimension hopping, they'll become marooned in this new branching timeline until such a point where they're able to achieve dimension hopping.
• Circumstances can arise that grant people, objects, or potentially entire regions an unusual response to the flow of time.
• Temporal Doubles exist when a moment in time contains so much temporal energy that an object is forcibly split into two possible versions of itself. This can result in two versions of the object being sent to different moments in time, or it may simply result in one entity splitting into two in that moment of time.
  An example of this would be the DeLorean from Back to the Future II. When struck by lightning in 1955, one DeLorean was sent back to 1885, while another was rocketed forwards to 2026
• A temporal double becomes disconnected from the time-stream of its original counterpart. If the 1955 DeLorean was destroyed its double would remain. HOWEVER, if the timeline of the temporal double is affected (see: any moment after its creation), it is still subject to the ripple effect.
• A Temporal Anomaly is an object that, for all intents and purposes, should not exist. This can refer to Temporal Doubles such as the 2025 DeLorean, however it can also refer to entities which have amassed enough Temporal Resistance as to make the ripple effect weaker or entirely impotent in regards to the entity.
• Temporal Resistance occurs when an object has moved throughout time or been exposed to enough temporal energy that it is no longer beholden to its place in time.
• Temporal Resistance can be gained and lost based on various factors such as instances of time travel, amount of time spent outside of one's expected time period, exposure or proximity to temporal events, etc.
• If an entity with high temporal resistance acts in such a way to negate its existence susbsequently loses its resistance, it will not disappear and is instead classified as a Temporal Anomaly. It will, however, become subject to the ripple effect from that moment onwards (or until such Temporal Resistance is gained to once again make that entity immune.)