Anachronistic Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Creatures

Tag Area: Time Travel Trope
Short Film

Prehistoric Peeps

  • [writer unknown], directed by Lewin Fitzhamon
  • (at movie theaters, UK, August 1905)

After falling asleep, Professor Chump finds himself being chased by dinosaurs and curvaceous cavewomen. Intended as a dream, I suppose. In any case, this is one of a series of live-action films based on E. T. Reed’s cartoons from Punch. I ran into several websites, including Palaeontology Online, that blamed this one movie for cementing the juxtaposition of dinosaurs and men in the cinema forevermore. According to IMDb trivia, the dinosaur special effects were accomplished with simple costumes. —Michael Main
Dinosaurs and cavemen romp through the countryside.
  • Comedy
  • Debatable Time Travel
Novella

The Atom-Smasher


We've got the evil Professor Tode (who modifies an atom-smasher into a time machine that travels to the Palaeolithic and to Atlantis), a fatherly older professor, his beautiful young daughter (menaced by evil Tode), casually written racist pronouncements (by Rousseau), and our hero scientist, the dashing Jim Dent. But my favorite sentence was the brief description of quantum mechanics, which I didn’t expect in a 1930 science fiction tale. —Michael Main
The Planck-Bohr quantum theory that the energy of a body cannot vary continuously, but only by a certain finite amount, or exact multiples of this amount, had been the key that unlocked the door.
Black and white drawing of a young man, a young woman, and an old man staring
                into a brightly lit crevice.
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Short Story

Journey into Mystery #8

Time Reversal


A blackmailer demonstrates his ability to send an entire city back to prehistoric times. —Michael Main
We received a note telling us that unless we paid the sum of three million dollars this great city would be taken back to prehistoric days.
No image currently available.
  • Weird Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Debatable Time Travel
Feature Film

Journey to the Center of Time

  • written and directed by David L. Hewitt
  • (at movie theaters, USA, a forgettable day in 1967)

The writer, David L. Hewitt, took chunks of plot and script from The Time Travelers (1964), swapped the blonde for a brunette, swapped the accidental time gate for an accidental time rift that drags the whole lab through time as if it were a time ship, added a anachronistic dinosaur, and ended up with an unwatchable movie.

Like the 1964 version, this version has a brief mention that it’s impossible to change events that have already happened, but unlike the original, the montage at the end of the film is mere chaos that no longer reinforces the idea of a single deterministic, nonbranching timeline. Despite that, I enjoyed the consequences of the villainous character running into himself, but at the same time, I dismayed at the discussion of how meeting yourself could instantly cause a disastrous explosion or implosion or maybe something-or-other (the audio was unintelligible at 1:12) would cease to exist. (I pray that the space-time continuum wasn’t in peril). —Michael Main
Well, isn’t it obvious, Manning? The war did happen. We didn’t get back with our warning.
Alien death rays, a T-rex, and multiple copies of Scott Brady and Gigi Perreau
                () hugging.
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Cartoon

Horrid Henry [s01e16]

Horrid Henry’s Time Machine


In the cartoon version of the short story, Henry imagines that his time machine is an elaborate time ship, at least until his perfect little brother brings him out of his daydream and back to the real world of cardboard. —Michael Main
Peter: “I'm going to the future. I want to see it for myself!”
  • Mainstream
  • Audience: Children
  • Time Phenomena
Picture Book

The Treehouse #5

The 65-Storey Treehouse

  • by Andy Griffiths (story) and Terry Denton (art)
  • (Macmillan Australia, August 2015)

Each installment of Andy and Terry’s Treehouse series sees the house grow upward, but what if the house never had a proper building permit? No problem, if you’ve got a time machine in a wheelie trash bin! Caution: Important detours along the way may be necessary to save antkind and The Time Machine. —Michael Main
“Don’t you see?” says Terry. “We’ll just travel back in time and get a permit for the treehouse.”
A Giant cartoon tree with a spiral staircase winding around it and dozens of
                entrances and crazy happenings.
  • Comedy
  • Audience: Families
  • Definite Time Travel