Weird post ahead.
Today I was watching 13 Going On 30 and it hit me: that movie is completely illogical. Now, before you go all OMG ITS A MOVIE ITS SUPPOSED TO BE FAKE! on me, I know that. But just work with me, and read on.
If you don't know the plot, here's a breakdown: 13-year-old Jenna Rink recieves magic wish-granting powder from her best bud Matty on her birthday, and then she wishes that she were 30 and BOOM! She's suddenly 30! But...with a 13-year-old's brain. And that's where I got confused.
I was thinking that the only explanation for this was that Jenna's 30 yr. old self and her 13 year old self switched places, but how did that happen? It just doesn't make any sense. I was thinking about it for a while, and here's what I came up with: the future, the past, and the present all exsist at the same time, just on different...planes of exsistence, if you will.
I'm going to explain this in terms of the Time Turner from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. I was thoroughly confused as to how Hermione got to all of those classes, so a reasonable explanation is that the past, present, and future are all happening at the same time but on different planes of existence. Example: Hermione goes to Ancient Runes. After Ancient Runes, she flips the Time Turner and her Present Self goes to Divination, and her Past Self goes to Ancient Runes. Assuming she doesn't flip the Time Turner again, her Future Self would be at, say, lunch. Does that make sense? It doesn't really make sense even to me...
But anyway. So now we have the issue of that whole rescue thing at the end of the book. There I got to thinking that maybe, since the Time Turner is magical and all, after you use it your Past Self just keeps repeating the actions like it's stuck on loop. For instance: Hermione and Harry use the Time Turner to go back to Hagrid's Hut, disappearing from the hospital wing. After the rescue of Buckbeak and Sirius, they go back to the hospital wing, where their Past Selves are just leaving from. Their Present Selves keep going forward in time, but their Past Selves keep repeating the Time Turner and the rescue over and over again, for all time.
And then there's another theory: say Hermione used the time turner after Ancient Runes, then used it again to go to Divination. Her Present Self would continue, but after the alloted class time her Ancient Runes Self would disappear into the ether.
Which brings me back to 13 Going On 30! I was thinking about what happened to Jenna's former 30 year old self once she returned to the past. I'm thinking that the only one of the theories for time travel I've stated above is the past present future all existing at the same time one, so I'll go with that. Assuming that 30 year old Jenna and 13 year old Jenna exist at the same time, where would 30 year old Jenna go once 13 year old Jenna returned to 1980-whatever? Not back to 2004, because then it would have been replaced by a different 30 year old Jenna because of all the good moral lessons she's learned. So, like the Time Turner theory, does the former bitch 30 year old Jenna just disappear into nothingness, or does she continue to exist in some other plane of existence? I don't know, really.
I guess there would be two 30 year old Jennas. One on a sort of Present Past plane of existence (the bitch Jenna) and one on the Present plane of existence (the new and improved Jenna). The bitch Jenna would continue to loop through the being a bitch then going back in time phase, while the new and improved Jenna would pick up and go forward, much like the second Time Turner theory. In the Past Past plane, the old 13 year old Jenna would continue to loop through the first twelve years of her life, while in the Past Present plane, the new 13 year old Jenna would, again, pick up and move forward.
THE END, because I think I've stopped making sense. Maybe more later?
It's 11:30 PM so I highly doubt that any of that made sense, especially since time travel is pretty much impossible. See what I've been through trying to sort through some of the illogicalities? It's impossible! I don't even want to think about it anymore! I can't believe I just wrote an essay's worth of theorizing over a chick flick and Harry Potter...but this was kind of fun. I may do another entry like this in the future.
If you actually read that, congrats to you!