The Good And The Bad About Timeless

I love time travel fantasy.  I'm as big a fan of the genre as you'll find.  Despite knowing my luck with new shows getting canceled when I start to like them, I dove right in when NBC premiered Timeless last year.  It has been a fun ride so far.  The premise of the show is a company (Mason Industries) has created a time machine.  They are being funded by an elite, but secretive group called Rittenhouse. Unfortunately, one of their time machines has been stolen by a man named Garcia Flynn.

Flynn is out for revenge because people from Rittenhouse killed his wife and child.  Mason Industries puts a group of three together for the purposes of stopping Flynn before he damages history.  Rufus Carlin is the only person skilled enough to pilot the time machine.  Wyatt Logan is the agent assigned to stop Flynn.  A historian named Lucy Preston is brought on board because of her knowledge of history.  She is reluctantly following in her mother's footsteps in that career.  She might seem like an average person to bring into this mission except for the fact that Flynn has a book that he claims Lucy wrote in the future, and he further claims that she will help him take Rittenhouse down.

The show's opener packed a nice punch when they traveled back to the scene of the Hindenburg disaster.  Flynn went back to prevent the crash, but not because he wanted to save lives.  There were three people that some would say in our own timeline are members of an elite society, sometimes referred to as The Illuminati.  In the show, they are part of Rittenhouse, so Flynn wants them dead.  His purpose in traveling back in time is to destroy Rittenhouse.  He prevents the crash, because these three elite individuals were scheduled to be on the Hindenburg for it's next flight.  Ultimately, his attempt to destroy the next flight doesn't succeed, and many people who would have died now live.

Back in the present time, Lucy comes home to find that her life has changed.  Her once bed ridden mother is now doing just fine.  The sister she grew up with no longer exists and she is engaged to a man she doesn't even remember.  She finds out the man she knew as her father wasn't really her father, and I suspect a big reveal in the future when it comes to who that man really is.  Now, Lucy has the goal of somehow bringing her sister back into existence.  Fellow crew member Wyatt has a similar story as Flynn.  His wife has also been murdered, and he would like to find a way to bring her back somehow

Timeless has a lot of fun visiting historic moments like Houston's NASA base during the first moon landing, the Lincoln assassination and a very key episode when they revisit the time when Benedict Arnold betrayed George Washington.  Flynn has a specific plan to destroy Rittenhouse in the Benedict Arnold episode, but at a crucial moment, Lucy steps in and thwarts those plans.

The show plays with the facts just a bit, such as this most recent episode where they get help from a black sheriff who is said to be the man The Lone Ranger is based on.  However, that man is still a legitimate hero of history that people may not have even heard of until this episode.  Given the nature of Rittenhouse, it's interesting that they didn't play with the notion that Jesse James is either related to the Rockefeller family or John D. Rockefeller himself.  Flynn went back and specifically recruited James to escort him through native American territory, because he found the location of a woman who was a key figure in Mason Industries' success in time travel.

One of the criticisms I've heard, aside from historical facts veering slightly off of what we know, is the question of whether they really need to involve historical figures in every trip through time.  Was Jesse James needed?  Sure, Flynn had an ally the moment he prevented James from being shot in the back of the head, but couldn't he have gotten somebody else?  Or better yet, couldn't he have landed closer to his target spot?  Then again, the show's writers and fans wouldn't have a fun ride with James, who still met the same end.  Since Rittenhouse is basically the show's take on The Illuminati, the whole James-Rockefeller thing could have been fun to explore.

I have to agree with the people who point out that there have been no repercussion from their time travel trips since the first episode.  They've repeatedly killed people who otherwise would have lived and have even saved people who would have died.  So, nothing has changed?  Also, the Benedict Arnold episode had a major impact on Rittenhouse itself.  So, why has nothing been addressed regarding that?

The story line has moved slowly at times, where a bone should be thrown here and there to fans wanting to know a little more.  Also, there's enough intrigue involving present day things that they could easily have an episode in the current time that would move the story along more effectively.  I know it's a show with time travel, but it's okay to not travel once in a while if it advances the story.  Also, why no travel into the future?  It appears as if Flynn has done it at least once.

One could easily poke holes in this show based on theories of time travel.  Some will insist it is not possible, which we simply cannot know as a fact one way or the other today.  Others will ask the obvious question.  If Lucy's sister was wiped from existence when time was altered, how can she possibly remember her now?  We suspend our disbelief at times like this in the name of enjoying the ride.  The problem with the science fiction genre is that when you tell people to just go with it too many times, you start losing them.

I think Timelesss is an entertaining show.  Everybody in the cast is doing their part to make it good.  I have nothing but praise for their work here.  Abigail Spencer (Lucy), Matt Lanter (Wyatt), Malcolm Barrett (Rufus), Goran Visnjic (Flynn), Paterson Joseph (Connor Mason), Sakina Jaffrey (Denise Christopher) and Claudia Doumit (Jiya) handle their roles well.  The writing could be a little better.  They manage to be clever at times, but they should pay closer attention to history before writing historical moments and characters into the show.  They should also make an effort to show the effects of their time traveling, and they could also try move things along a little quicker sometimes.

That said, many shows don't come out of the gate hitting on all eight cylinders.  They may have an idea what they want to do, but they still learn as they go and get better at telling the story they are trying to tell us.  The good shows even go places they might not have planned, because the story called for it.  Timeless is a good show with lots of potential.  It is my hope that NBC remains supportive and allows it to continue next year and into the future.  The way they are going now, I will continue to enjoy the ride.  That's what good television is all about.