Terror Out of Time

by Jack Williamson

Until I started reading 1930s pulps, I didn’t realize how ubiquitous were the scientist with a beautiful daughter and her adventurous fiancé. This story has Dr. Audrin, his machine (to project the brain of a present-day man forty million years into the future and possibly bring another mind back), his beautiful daughter Eve, and her manly fiancé, Terry Webb. Manly Webb agrees to be the test subject for the machine, much to the dismay of beautiful Eve.

— Michael Main

I must have a subject. And there is a certain—risk. Not great, now, I’m sure. My apparatus is improved. But, in my first trial, my subject was—injured. I’ve been wondering, Mr. Webb, if you—

“Terror Out of Time” by Jack Williamson, Astounding, December 1933.

The Twonky

written and directed by Arch Oboler

Unlike in the original short story of “The Twonky,” the movie’s mad machine is a TV rather than a radio. Also, we never explicitly see the machine’s construction by a time traveler, but the professor’s discussions with the coach make it clear that they believe the machine is from the future, and that’s good enough for us. And finally, when you watch the wacky film, you’ll see that Arch Oboler devised a different fate for the Twonky than that of Kuttner and Moore’s original story.

— Michael Main

Kerry: Then it is from another world?
Coach Trout: No, from our world, centuries in the future.

The Twonky written and directed by Arch Oboler (at movie theaters, USA, 10 June 1953).

Journey into Mystery #35

Fallon’s Folly!

by unknown writers and Paul Reinman

Professor Fallon’s research into artificial suns may not be taken seriously today, but there are other times where it could be the very thing that’s needed.

— Michael Main

Research has to be along practical lines! The trustees demand it!

“Fallon’s Folly!” by unknown writers and Paul Reinman, in Journey into Mystery #35 (Atlas Comics, June 1956).

Journey into Mystery #35

The Long Journey

by unknown writers

College janitor Tad Sheen has discovered a chemical formula that he believes will take him through time.

— Michael Main

Tad was certain that if he mixed ammonia with a chemical he had brewed called Dyproxylin, then heated this mixture in a flask to boiling, chilled it suddenly, you could, by breathing the fumes, project yourself forward in time.

“The Long Journey!” by unknown writers, in Journey into Mystery #35 (Atlas Comics, June 1956).

Journey into Mystery #35

Turn Back the Clock!

by unknown writers and Jay Scott Pike

After turning back the hands on the campus clock tower, star athelete Ambrose McCallister finds himself at a stadium in ancient Greece with no memory of who he is.

— Michael Main

I saw this move somewhere . . . If I could just remember!

“Turn Back the Clock!” by unknown writers and Jay Scott Pike, in Journey into Mystery #35 (Atlas Comics, June 1956).

Journey into Mystery #36

I, the Pharaoh

by Carl Wessler and Joe Sinnott

This story could be a fantasy about Egyptologist Ted Craven, who studies Pharaoh Ras Hati-Ka so deeply that he eventually becomes the ancient Egyptian; but there are clues that the whole story is only a delusion in Craven’s overworked mind. Or perhaps it’s all a dream of the pharaoh himself.

— Michael Main

No . . . it’s all an illusion! I’ve been working too hard!

“I, the Pharaoh” by Carl Wessler and Joe Sinnott, in Journey into Mystery #36 (Atlas Comics, July 1956).

Journey into Mystery #36

Something Is Happening in There

by unknown writers and Carl Hubbell

Yes! They had sf nerds even back in the 1950s, but they called them “born fools.” In this case, the born fool is Ebenezer, who believes that a secretive new stranger is building a time machine.

— Michael Main

It’s just like this picture . . . of a time machine!

“Something Is Happening in There!” by unknown writers and Carl Hubbell, in Journey into Mystery #36 (Atlas Comics, July 1956).

Journey into Mystery #40

The Question That Can’t Be Answered!

by an unknown writer and John Forte

Reporter Ned Parker tries to expose a fraudulent hypnotist, but instead he ends up being hypnotized and sent into his look-alike descendant 500 years in the future.

— Michael Main

It was Ned who fell under the hypnotic trance. . . and Ned who responded to the commands of Jiminez!

“The Question That Can’t Be Answered!” by an unknown writer and John Forte, in Journey into Mystery #40 (Atlas Comics, November 1956).

Poor Little Warrior!

by Brian Aldiss

You are reading an artsy story, told in the second-person, about a time traveler from AD 2181 who hunts a brontosaurus.

Time for listening to the oracle is past; you’re beyond the stage for omens, you’re now headed in for the kill, yours or his; superstition has had its little day for today; from now on, only this windy nerve of yours, this shakey conglomeration of muscle entangled untraceably beneath the sweat-shiny carapice of skin, this bloody little urge to slay the dragon, is going to answer all your orisons.

“Poor Little Warrior!” by Brian Aldiss, Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April 1958.

Sailor Moon (s02e36)

未来への旅立ち!時空回廊の戦い

Mirai e no tabidachi! Jikū kairō no tatakai English release: Journey to the Future: Battle in the Space-Time Corridor Literal: Departure for the future! Battle of the space-time corridor

by Sumisawa Katsuyuki, directed by Kosaka Harume

Sailor Moon and the gang travel to the Door of Space and Time where they hope to head to the future and rescue Chibiusa’s mommy. Sailor Pluto opens the Space-Time Door for them, which takes them to Planet Crystal Tokyo and a slew of baddies. Their adventure in the future is continued in the next few episodes, but we haven’t yet indexed those.

— Michael Main

So this is the Space-Time Corridor.

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The Rift

by Don Handfield, Richard Rayner, and Leno Varvalho

The crash of a 1941 World War II plane in a 21st-century Kansas field sets off a chain of plots and subplots involving the pilot, a mother on the run, a precotious young boy, a government agency, and multiple jumps through a time rift.

— Michael Main

Smoke billows into a bright blue sky scarred by a rip in the heavens—what we’ll come to know as . . . The Rift

The Rift, 4 pts. by Don Handfield, Richard Rayner, and Leno Varvalho (Red 5 Comics, January–April 2017).

The Trouble with Time Travel

by Patrick Crossen

A time traveler explains what may not seem obvious.

— Michael Main

“And the year?”

“The Trouble with Time Travel” by Patrick Crossen, in Chronos: An Anthology of Time Drabbles, edited by Eric S. Fomley (Shacklebound Books, August 2018).

Amazing Stories (r2s01e05)

The Rift

by Don Handfield and Richard Rayner, directed by Mark Mylod

After a dogfight, a World War II plane flies through a time rift and into a 21st-century field near Dayton, where a single mom saves the pilot from the wreckage and her step-son saves the pilot from other dangers.

— Michael Main

Sir, I know it’s a doorway and all, and we gotta send everything back there, but in training they did not really tell us what happens if we don’t.

Amazing Stories (v2s01e05), “The Rift” by Don Handfield and Richard Rayner, directed by Mark Mylod (Apple TV, 3 April 2020).

Unredacted Reports from 1546

by Leah Cypess

An 18-year-old history student hopes to show that her research subject, 16th-century poet Lucia of Gonzaga, was a modern woman supressed by her time period, but as the traveling student sends messages back to her 21st-century mentor, she reveals more than just history as she’d hoped it would be.

— Michael Main

You were wrong about my age, though. In the sixteenth century, I’m an adult. I am physically mature and able to bear children, and that’s all that matters. No one cares about the completeness of my frontal lobe.

“Unredacted Reports from 1546” by Leah Cypess, Future Science Fiction Digest #11, June 2021 [e-zine · webzine].