The Butterfly Effect - Page 2

Touche.

So by your reasoning, he should have always had the scar on his stomach from his first jump? Yet it's shown on several different ocassions that the scar was new.

One more thing about him stabbing his hands on the spikes I didn't get. Basically the whole point of the movie is that when you change one thing, it changes so many other things that it can totally change your life. Something as drastic as jamming your hands on two spikes would do a lot more than just give you physical scars. He would have had to go to counseling, probably physical as well as mental since he could have damaged nerves in his hand. Not only that, doing something that bizarre in kindergarten or whatever grade that was would have made all the other kids see him as weird and either ignore him or tease him. That has to have some major impact on his life.

We are presented with that one main universe, call it universe A. Our grown up Kelso goes backwards in time on universe A and changes things, thus creating a new universe (B) where things are changed. But, in Kelso's mind he remembers both universes and thus gets those massive head traumas after changing things.

For him to move out of universe B he has to go back earlier when things haven't changed in universe B where they match universe A or at the change point, thus creating universe C. He then gets another massive head trauma after changing things remembering universe A, B, and what happened up to his present time in universe C.

Get it?

Yes, and we see that when he gets blasted and isn't able to write in journals any more.

I don't mean he'd wake up in prison with spikes in his hands. I mean he'd wake up after the original school blackout and the drawing would be on his desk and his hands would be on the spikes.

The drawing that he drew in the future was there in the past the first time around. It isn't something that young Ashton would've drawn, since for a 7 year old, it was way beyond his artistic skills and - more obviously - it depicts events that he never would've known about as a child. All that's moot anyway as we're shown that he drew it during a time-jump while occupying his younger body.

So Old Ashton jumps into Young Ashton's body, and carries out two actions:
1. Draws the picture.
2. Spikes his hands.

Now go back to after the original blackout. The picture Old Ashton drew is there. The spiked hands aren't.

He should've either -

A. Woke up in school with Old Ashton's drawing AND wounded hands,
or B. Woke up with the picture he would've drawn as a child.

All or nothing. It's like if Ashton jumped back in time, put two oranges on a desk, and when he woke up after the original blackout, there was only one orange and one had disappeared for no reason.

It's not my reasoning. It's what we're shown in the movie. Sometimes the aftermath of a time-jump is always there (His dad choking him, holding the knife in the kitchen), sometimes not.

But that happens in a different timeline. I think what Harry means is, in the Frat Boy Universe, Ashton ends up killing someone, being sent to prison. So he goes back in time, and as a child, spikes his hands.

Look at this from the point of view of the teacher - A seemingly normal child just drew a pretty fucked up picture then, while smiling and calling playfully to his teacher jams his hands on two metal spikes in the middle of class. He should've had major counselling, been pulled out of school, etc. that would have significantly altered the timeline. Yet he jumps back to prison and everything's identical, sans the scars. He still went to the same college, became a frat boy and went to prison.

****Spoilers****


I always say different things frighten different people in different ways.

I finally got around to watching this last week with my wife; figuring ok Hollywood popcorn movie I'll get to spend some couch time with the "just" mother of my daughter.

Well everything was going accordingly until the last 10 minutes of the film, when the Kutcher character watches his dad's home movie of himself being bourne then transports himself into the womb and commits suicide to save Amy Smart.

Well, being new parents this just disturbed my wife like all get out. So much for the romantic evening. I even felt bad as well for the whole ending is very unsettling for me under the circumstances.

Anyhoo.. I love this film. And the ending is Shakespearean.

Just watched this last night. A very disturbing but engaging film. I agree with the criticism above about the mumbling performance from "Kelso," but overall I thought it was a great flick. I also agree with the folks who wanted to throttle little Tommy. Guess the kid did his job well, huh? Still freaky to see someone so young be so vile.


Minor spoilers:


I definitely prefer the DC ending to the theatrical even though part of me was wanting him to turn around and run after her even though it would cheapen the whole movie (Note: he does go after her in one of the deleted scenes).

I wish I had time to watch all of the Infinifilm version since this might've been answered, but when his mother spoke of three stillbirths before his birth, were they other versions of him or were they siblings who shared the curse of his father and grandfather before him?


Minor spoilers over:


Oh, and MacGyver did travel in time (sorta, it was a dream) to King Arthur's court. It was the "very special two-parter" where they revealed his first name of Angus.

Another thing with the spikes. When Kelso travels in time to the future after stabbing his hands, the other prisoner shouldn't be amazed, as Kelso would have entered the prison WITH the scars. It's a new timeline. Thát's lazy storytelling.

Donnie Darko>The Butterfly Farts