The Adam Project

by Jonathan Tropper et al., directed by Shawn Levy

Release: 11 March 2022
Format: Feature Film
Genre: Science Fiction
Audience: YA and Up
Content: Definite Time Travel
Original Language: English

In 2050, time jet pilot Adam Reed steals a jet and heads back to 2018 to save his stranded wife, but he gets waylaid in 2022 where his 12-year-old self is the only hope to save the mission.

— Michael Main

Young Adam: I mean if this is happening to me, that means that it already happened to you—right?—unless it works more like a multiverse where each ripple creates an alternate timeline—
Middle-Age Adam: It isn’t a multiverse! My god, we watch too many movies.

DEBUT

The Adam Project (Netflix, worldwide, 11 March 2022).

VARIANTS

1 English variant

TRANSLATIONS

5 translations

TAGS(SPOILERS!)

Time Periods

Circa AD 2000 to 2099

Timeline Models

Branch-and-Return Timeline: Big Adam does not remember a childhood where he was visited by himself, which suggests that he has created a branching timeline. But he also says that when he returns to the future, he will merge with an Adam who does remember a childhood where he was visited. But who knows for sure? Overall, we take the story to have a narrative timeline.
Delayed Change to a Timeline: The two Adams stick around for a while after preventing time travel from ever happening.
Narrative Time
Pruned Timeline: If they do manage to stop time travel from ever being invented, it seems like the timeline where it had been invented will disappear entirely.

Time Travel Methods

Time Fliers: time jets
Time Portal: The time jet opens a controllable time portal (referred to as a wormhole in the movie).

Themes

Chases through Time: Sorian chases Adam
Free Will, Fate, and Determinism: Adam and Laura are fated to get back together even after all time travel is stopped.
Get Rich Quick through Time Travel: Sorian
Meeting or Viewing Ancestors or Descendants: Big Adam meets both his mother and his father.
Never Change the Past!: Anything you say or do could cause a divergence!
Retrocide: Sorian accidentally kills her younger self.
Save “Lois”!: Big Adam’s main motivation is to save his wife, Laura.
Self-Visitation: Adam and Sorian
Stop All Time Travel!
Stuck in Time: Laura
Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!: Adam: I need to tell you something! Dad: I can’t know the future!
Wisdom or Consolation to Your Younger Self

Fictional Tags

Dystopian World: The future that Sorian created.

TIME TRAVEL ITINERARY (SPOILERS!)

From miles above Earth, 2050 ⋙ to somewhere near Adam’s childhood home, 2022. Note: Big Adam steals a time jet and aims for 2018, but misses the mark by four years.
From miles above Earth, 2050 ⋙ to somewhere near Adam’s childhood home, 2022. Note: Sorian and her stormtroopers follow.
From miles above Earth, 2022 ⋙ to somewhere near Adam’s childhood home, 2018. Note: Big Adam and Little Adam head to 2018 to stop time travel from ever being invented.
From miles above Earth, 2022 ⋙ to somewhere near Adam’s childhood home, 2018. Note: Sorian and her stormtroopers follow.