Boy On The Edge

I just saw Nowhere Boy, a film about John Lennon's teen years that's been flying under the radar.  It's well done, but since I knew the story so well already it didn't offer any surprises.  Not to me, anyway, though some in the audience gasped when John's mom Julia was hit by a car.

That got me thinking.  If I'd been back there on that day, I could have prevented the accident, and John would have been spared all that pain.  But then would The Beatles have happened as they did, or at all?  Knowing that, would I have interfered?

Then it occurred to me, this is the plot of "The City On The Edge Of Forever."

Which made me think further:  if you're ever lucky enough to go back in time, better make the first change a good one, because everything after that will be affected, and may not go as you expect.  Saving Lincoln?  That might work, though who knows what happens after, good or bad. Killing Hitler? A popular choice, but Hitler didn't exist in a vacuum, so it makes you wonder if something similar could have happened in Germany anyway.  Stopping 9/11?  Worth a shot, though I wonder if that wouldn't just give the terrorists another chance.

If, like Biff in Back To The Future Part II, you're given the results of a bunch of sporting events in the future, I'd suggest you keep a low profile; even betting on the games anonymously will change things, but if you become rich and famous for doing it, well, then all bets are off.