10 ways to time travel

Yeah, yeah, we are all time travelers in our personal journeys to the future, blah blah blah. Let’s forget about our aging process and think about the fantastic, shall we?

Time travel is my favorite trope ever! It can be so dynamic and gripping and simply fun. To prove this point, I compiled a list of ten creative mechanisms for time travel we often find in fictional stories. And I paired them with some neat recommendations for you.

So, buckle up! Let’s journey through time.

Before we continue, try to think of some entries and let me know how many of those you got right.

Ready?

ALERT: Mild spoilers ahead.

#1 Time Machines

There’s no way this list would start differently. Is there a more iconic way to time travel than using a machine? I don’t think so. Time machines can come in all sizes and shapes; be they phone booths or DeLoreans.

Of course, the top recommendation for this entry could be none other than The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells, the story that made the term “time machine” famous.

#2 Speed: time is relative

At this point, you are most likely familiar with Einstein’s theory of special relativity. It says that time and space can suffer a dilation (or contraction) depending on how fast you move. The best illustration of this fact is the so-called twin paradox. One twin sibling that goes off and back on a high-speed space journey will be younger than the sibling who remained on Earth when (if) they reunite.

This is to say that running with a velocity near the speed of light can be a neat way to travel to the future, although the journey would not be instant. Knowing this, we could ask ourselves, what would happen if we could run above the speed of light? Could we travel to the past? Well, fiction writers surely think so.

The best example of this trope is the famous scene of the 1978 movie Superman. The superhero speed flies around the Earth counter-rotationally to reverse time and save Louis. Wait, was it a spoiler? Oops.

#3 Wormholes

So here is another mechanism borrowed from the abstraction of theoretical astrophysics. A wormhole is, in theory, a shortcut to a distant point of the universe, and it drastically reduces the time needed to complete the journey. Thus, one could think of going through it as time traveling. Naturally, fiction can extrapolate this concept to view a wormhole as an effective time portal, with openings to the future and the past.

Recently, an over-the-top but entertaining movie used this structure to justify the time travel in the story. The Tomorrow War is a movie in which it is easier to build a wormhole to time travel to the past than to synthesize a toxin to kill an alien species. It’s super silly. I loved it!

Speaking of portals…

#4 Portals

Yes, portals are a great way to travel in time! It is a window to the past, present, or future, and usually, one can cross it without any trouble. Think of Dr. Strange’s magical portals or Rick’s plasma ones (no matter how taboo he thinks time-travel stuff is).

However, my recommendation for you today is the first short story in Ted Chiang’s second collection. The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate is fantastic! As are the other stories in Exhalation.

#5 It’s quantum!

The quantum explanation for intricate stuff is slowly becoming a tiring trope. If you don’t get it, pretend it’s quantum physics, and all is good. Bo-ring! says the one writing a story in which quantum theory explains time travel (I’m a physicist, leave me alone!). Of course, I still think it could be done well with the same probability that it has the potential to become a disaster. This is Schrödinger’s entry: quantum time travel is great and horrible at the same time. You have to read it to find out which one it is.

Or watch it. I thought Avengers Endgame used this mechanism reasonably well. I’ll say no more to avoid spoilers, but really? Haven’t you watched it yet?

#6 It’s magic!

Magic and quantum explanation can often be interchanged in most stories. The difference is that magic gives a more fantastical vibe to the story. It may be a good way to avoid all of the paradoxes science-based time travel creates.

One good story that has the protagonist magically jumping in time is Japanese animation The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. Our main character gains the ability to literally leap back and forth in her timeline and uses her power to tweak with some minor mishaps in her daily life, like being late for school. If you haven’t yet, give it a try!

#7 It’s genetic!

A race of time travelers: people with the power to travel through time because they were born with the right genes. One can make a good case by arguing that the alien species called Heptapods in Ted Chiang’s The Stories of Your Life (or the movie Arrival) is such a species, because they see through time. They are four-dimensional beings.

As for a proper recommendation, About Time is a super-heartwarming movie based on this premise. Its main character is from a family in which the male individuals have the power of time traveling. If you are into romance, I highly recommend this movie!

#8 Body exchange

Think Freaky Friday but in time. Two characters from different eras swapping bodies and living the lives of the other. It can spawn amusing situations since the characters are, technically, not themselves, nor in their timeline. To make things worse, another person is living their lives in their place.

Curiously, there’s a lot of K-dramas exploring this idea. But my recommendation for today is another Eastern production.

In Makoto Shinkai’s Your Name, the protagonists swap bodies and later in the movie we found out that they are not only in different cities; they are in different eras as well. Yes, this is a spoiler, but one that does not detract from your experience. So, go watch it.

#9 Mind transmission

In a sense, it is similar to the last entry but without the swapping part. A conscience is uploaded to a body from a different era. So it’s not your body that travels in time, but your mind. If you stretch this concept a little, you could think of The Matrix this way, although the “different era” in there was a simulation.

This “body” could be a younger version of the character, like it happens in X-Men: Days of Future Past, or to the body of a complete stranger, like in Source Code. This last one, I highly recommend!

#10 It fits the plot

Why bother explaining? If the story is compelling enough, then the mystery around the precise mechanism that allowed the time travel might be unnecessary. Don’t you believe me when I say it could be done well? Just read Octavia Butler’s Kindred, then, and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

That’s it for today, folks!

How many of those did you guess beforehand? Were there any mechanisms you thought that I did not include on this list? Let me know in the comments, and drop your recommendations for time-travel stories there as well. I want to read/watch them all.

See you next post,

Ra.

Carla Ra is a scientist by day, sci-fi writer by night.

You can check out her anthology ARTIFICIAL REBELLION here.