After watching The Butterfly Effect, again, I could not help but recall the classic film trilogy Back to the Future. For this film, in particular, I related it to the sequel, which like The Butterfly Effect, dealt with alternate realities. This in turn, also reminded me of Man in the High Castle, which in itself was an alternate reality.
I’ve always been amused by alternate realities, the term alone is a bit of a conundrum. For cannot there only be one true reality? Is reality relative? Or is reality absolute? The first time I ran into an alternate reality was at a very young age, back when Doc and Marty returned to 1985, from their brief trip to 2015. What at first seemed like home and normalcy and Hill Valley, quickly proved to be something sinister and disgusting and Hell Valley. Circumstance had made Biff Tannen rich, powerful, and corrupt, and to everyone in the world, this was reality, but to the Doc and Marty this was not reality. So they return to 1955, so that they may set things back to the way they knew them.
There is an element of selfishness in this. They sacrifice Biff’s happiness for their own well being. Albeit Biff was an evil character, he has the right as much as anyone else to the pursuit of happiness. This reminded me of one of Evan’s final travels. He is in college, his friends are all happy, but he has no arms, and his mother is dying. He could have very well sacrificed his own happiness for others, but he did not do this. I suppose he was a flawed character.
But then again, perhaps no one really is flawed. Maybe it is reality that is continually flawed. It’s all a matter of perspective.
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