History Main / TrappedinthePast

* In ''Literature/{{Dinoverse}}'', the four eighth-graders sent back in time and put into the bodies of various megafauna aren't stuck; they know that if they reach a certain place and are there at a certain time there's a chance that they can make it back. But one of them, Janine Farehouse, would rather ''be'' stuck, so she abandons the group to try and live as a [[PteroSoarer Quetzalcoatlus]]. A native Quetzalcoatlus hangs around her and she does fairly well for a few days, before the thought of never having anyone to talk to softens her resolve enough that one of the other kids can persuade her to help them find the place.

* In ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartIII'', Doc Brown resigns himself to the fate of living in TheWildWest -- and he's actually quite happy about it. He even goes as far as to give Marty instructions to not pick him up. Being an inventor, though, he does manage to invent some technology of the future. He doesn't share his inventions with anyone else, as he's mindful to not risk changing the future. At the end of the film, he does create another time machine out of a steam train. However, it's uncertain whether he chooses to live out the rest of his life in the past -- or move back to the future. [[Ride/BackToTheFutureTheRide The Ride]] and [[WesternAnimation/BackToTheFuture The Animated Series]], though, both have Doc ultimately moving back to the future.

** This has happened several times with ComicBook/DoctorDoom. The first time he was shunted back to the medieval age with ComicBook/IronMan (And kept calling him Lackey because he was [[SecretIdentity Tony Stark's]] bodyguard. It bothered Iron Man. ''A lot''); a second time happened with Iron Man '''and''' ComicBook/TheSentry, though they were sent into UsefulNotes/{{the Silver Age|of Comic Books}} and were desperately trying not to cause any ButterflyOfDoom effects. Another time Doctor Doom's so called "[[TheMentor Mentor]]" the Marquis of Death came by to fight the Fantastic Four and sent Doom, burnt alive, straight into prehistoric lands where he got eaten by a Megalodon. Naturally, Doom showed up a few issues later, boasting that he survived via ThePowerOfHate and took TheSlowPath back to the present. Though it was later retconed that the ComicBook/Thunderbolts unwittingly saved Doom during an unrelated time travel adventure, and he merely hijacked their time machine to get back to the present.

* In the seventh ''Animation/PleasantGoatAndBigBigWolf'' film, Weslie walks in on Paddi trying to capture Wolffy and messing with Mr. Slowy's time camera. The mishap causes them to all be transported by the aforementioned camera to prehistoric times, and Mr. Slowy and the goats have to go and find them. While there, Weslie, Paddi, and Wolffy all end up meeting the various goat inhabitants of a prehistoric village, and Wolffy in particular [[AccidentalProposal accidentally proposes to]] one of the prehistoric goats, named Miss Lotus.

* In the seventh ''Animation/PleasantGoatAndBigBigWolf'' film, Weslie walks in on Paddi trying to capture Wolffy and messing with Mr. Slowy's time camera. The mishap causes them to all be transported by the aforementioned camera to [[OneMillionBC prehistoric times]], and Mr. Slowy and the goats have to go and find them. While there, Weslie, Paddi, and Wolffy all end up meeting the various goat inhabitants of a prehistoric village, and Wolffy in particular [[AccidentalProposal accidentally proposes to]] one of the prehistoric goats, named Miss Lotus.

Once the initial excitement has faded, and they have resigned themself to the situation, there's nothing for it but to do the best they can in his new world, or die trying. How much the unwilling traveler can achieve depends on how far back they are swept, and how well prepared they are.

If a time traveler land in the recent past, they typically use their foreknowledge to try to gain a comfortable life. Interacting with their immediate ancestors is a great temptation and they can hope to [[TheSlowPath live until their original time]]. The really unlucky travelers end up in the path of war or disaster -- on the ''Titanic'', during the last days of Pompeii, in medieval England with the Black Death raging -- in which case, the plot will be about escaping the immediate peril.

A SubTrope of FishOutOfTemporalWater. Compare GetBackToTheFuture, TheSlowPath, TrappedInAnotherWorld, and [[SummonEverymanHero Summon Average Hero]].

Sometimes, the [[TimeTravel Time Traveller]] never intends to go anywhere. They're just minding their own business when AlienSpaceBats or some form of AppliedPhlebotinum sweeps them into the past, leaving them without any hope whatsoever of ever getting back home.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{WITCH}}'' fanfic ''Fanfic/{{Ripples}}'', Will ends up sent back in time to decades in Meridian's past, long before Phobos' rise to power, and on top of that is also [[FountainOfYouth regressed to childhood]] and [[BalefulPolymorph changed into some kind of hybrid]].

* ''The Last Day of Creation'' by Wolfgang Jeschke. The US government sends an expedition five millions years into the past to drill for oil in what will become the Middle East and ship it over to the Americas. A scientist protests that they have the technology to send things back in time, but not to retrieve them except via TheSlowPath, so it will be a one-way trip. The admiral in charge just waves this off, as surely they will invent a way sometime in the future. This never happens, not least because the timeline changes so much due to temporal meddling that the United States doesn't exist any more. At the end of the novel one man encounters a time traveler from an alternate timeline who raises the possibility of at least returning to his own future, but he decides [[IChooseToStay there's no point in doing so]].

A SubTrope of FishOutOfTemporalWater. Compare GetBackToTheFuture, TheSlowPath, TrappedInAnotherWorld, and [[SummonEverymanHero SummonAverageHero]].

Sometimes, the [[TimeTravel Time Traveller]] never intends to go anywhere. He's just minding his own business when AlienSpaceBats or some form of AppliedPhlebotinum sweeps him into the past, leaving him without any hope whatsoever of ever getting back home.

Once the initial excitement has faded, and he has resigned himself to the situation, there's nothing for it but to do the best he can in his new world, or die trying. How much the unwilling traveler can achieve depends on how far back they are swept, and how well prepared they are.

If time travelers land in the recent past, they typically use their foreknowledge to try to gain a comfortable life. Interacting with their immediate ancestors is a great temptation and they can hope to [[TheSlowPath live until their original time]]. The really unlucky travelers end up in the path of war or disaster -- on the ''Titanic'', during the last days of Pompeii, in medieval England with the Black Death raging -- in which case, the plot will be about escaping the immediate peril.

A SubTrope of FishOutOfTemporalWater. Compare GetBackToTheFuture, TheSlowPath, TrappedInAnotherWorld, and SummonEverymanHero.

* ''Literature/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'': Arthur and Ford find themselves trapped on prehistoric earth, the only skills between them the ability to live in a crapsack universe. They're unable to communicate with the aborigines, an odd aversion since their [[UniversalTranslator babel fish]] allow them to communicate with all the rest of the known universe, including the interplanetary immigrants they are marooned with.

* Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect end up stuck on prehistoric Earth with the idiotic Golgafrinchans at the end of ''Series/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy''. In the earlier radio series they were rescued when Arthur's towel become fossilized and picked up by the Infinite Improbability drive in the future. In the third book of the "trilogy", they are instead "rescued" by a sofa that was supposedly displaced in time. It brought them back to modern day Earth, a few days before its destruction.

* ''Anime/DoraemonNobitasDinosaur'' have Doraemon, Nobita and friends trapped in the Cretaceous era after having their time-machine malfunctioning. It was earlier on damaged during a chase against the Dinosaur Hunters, and with Nobita's friends, Gian, Suneo and Shizuka tagging along, the machine ends up overloading and crashes upon impact.

* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'': Later games in the mainline series have "Fallers", who are individuals who slip through cracks in space-time to other timelines/dimensions ([[VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire Anabel]] in ''[[VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon Sun And Moon]]'') or points in history (the player character and [[spoiler:[[VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite Ingo]]]] in ''VideoGame/PokemonLegendsArceus''), losing much of their memories in the process and being unable to return home.

* The mainline ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' games have "Fallers", who are individuals who "fall" through cracks in space-time to other timelines, dimensions, or points in history, and lose much of their memories in the process. Out of the "fallers" introduced so far, two fall under this trope; the player character and [[spoiler:Ingo, from [[VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite the Unova games]]]] in ''VideoGame/PokemonLegendsArceus''.

* The ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' series has "Fallers", who are individuals who "fall" through cracks in space-time to other timelines, dimensions, or points in history, and lose much of their memories in the process. Out of the "fallers" introduced so far, two fall under this trope; the player character and [[spoiler:Ingo, from [[VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite the Unova games]]]] in ''VideoGame/PokemonLegendsArceus''.

* The plot of ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'' revolves around Tidus being plucked out of the futuristic city of Zanarkand (while said city is [[DoomedHometown destroyed]]) and dropped in the world of Spira. He finds that Zanarkand was destroyed 1000 years ago and has no way of getting back, so he helps a summoner on her quest to destroy the local [[EldritchAbomination ancient city-destroying monster whale]]. Fully subverted when we find out [[spoiler:Tidus, along with his version of Zanarkand, is a dream of the Fayth, the last survivors of the ''actual'' Zanarkand]].
* ComicBook/EobardThawne, the Reverse Flash, in ''VideoGame/Injustice2'' can't return to his original timeline due to The Regime killing off one of his ancestors. Suffice it to say, he's [[OOCIsSeriousBusiness not too happy about it]].

* Overlapping with TrappedInAnotherWorld due to the nature of {{Alternate Timeline}}s in ''VisualNovel/AreaX'', this happens to Elcia when she loses her Dimensional Watch in the Middle Ages, meaning that she can't travel back to the Future. [[spoiler:It also happens to Rexus, who's trapped in the Present because Belph stole the needed item for Rexus to travel back to the Future.]]
* In ''Videogame/OriginalWar'', the time travel device used by all factions is a one-way door to 2 million years before the present. The Americans send in volunteers, the Soviets send in "[[ShameIfSomethingHappened volunteers]]", and the Arabs send in PrivateMilitaryContractors after tricking them into thinking that there is a way back.
* The ''VideoGame/CrashBandicoot'' series uses this trope as a bridge between two sequels.
** The true ending to ''VideoGame/CrashBandicoot3Warped'' sees [[BigBadEnsemble Doctor Cortex, N. Tropy, and Uka Uka]] banished to a seemingly prehistoric setting, the former two becoming infants in the process.
** ''VideoGame/CrashBandicoot4ItsAboutTime'' shows them escaping the past after [[TheSlowPath 22 years of attempts]]. Later it also [[spoiler:[[InvertedTrope inverts the trope]] by having the Quantum Masks banish Cortex to the end of the universe for all the trouble he's caused, trapping him in the future - not that he seems to mind]].

* Creator/JoeScieska's ''Literature/TimeWarpTrio'' book series follows the protagonists, Joe, Sam, and Fred, and their attempts to get back to their home time once The Book drops them in that story's relevant time period.

%%%* Jon Scieszka's ''Time Warp Trio'' series.

* ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice'': Bart Allen, the future grandson of Barry Allen, the second Flash, got hit with this at the end of "Bloodlines". [[spoiler: Then it's revealed that he knew it was a one-way trip, and he didn't care, because he didn't consider the BadFuture he lives in worth coming back to.]]

* In ''Series/Dark2017'', as TimeTravel is still a pretty new concept and hence unexplored, some of the characters who go to the past get stuck there due to various reasons.
** Mikkel, who disappears [[spoiler: from 2019, is stranded in 1986, and is unable to ever get back. He is adopted by Ines Kahnwald, is given the identity of 'Michael Kahnwald', and eventually marries Hannah and fathers Jonas]].
** As of the end of Season 1, [[spoiler: Mikkel's father Ulrich is trapped in 1953 - though in his case, it is not because he can't find his way back to 2019, but rather because he's been incarcerated as a murder suspect by the police of the era. In Season 2 we learn that Ulrich is still incarcerated in a psychiatric facility in 1987]].