History Series / Timeless

** The idea that Lincoln's death is all that prevented the post-Civil War South from turning into a racial paradise is, to put it charitably, quite naîve. However, in context, Lincoln's death did cause reprisals against the South which affected race relations. Also his death did slow down the advance of civil rights for African-Americans.

** Zigzagged with Creator/IanFleming's appearance: the official record says he only went on a single field mission which was at a different time, but the real truth of wartime espionage naturally remains mysterious - so who's to say there weren't more? He also says he's with [=MI6=], when in reality he was with the Royal Navy's Naval Intelligence Division. His brother Michael Fleming did die in 1940, but he wasn't killed by a V-2 attack; while serving as a captain in the BEF, he was severely wounded and captured during the fighting retreat to Dunkirk, and later died in a POW hospital.

* TemptingFate: Wyatt openly asks, "How can Flynn make the Alamo ''worse?''" The answer: by killing Colonel Travis before he writes the inspirational letter and then convincing Santa Anna to launch a full-scalle attack rather than a siege. Thus, instead of the epic stand that inspired Texas, the Alamo is a forgotten battle of history to keep the territory under Mexican control.

* TemptingFate: Wyatt openly asks, "How can Flynn make the Alamo ''worse?''" The answer: by killing Colonel Travis before he writes the inspirational letter, than convincing Santa Anna to launch a full attack rather than a siege. Thus, instead of the epic stand that inspired Texas, the Alamo is a forgotten battle of history to keep the state in Mexican control.

* TheKnightsWhoSaySquee: ''Constantly'' - in pretty much every episode, the team encounters a celebrity one of the team admires. Comes with the format of a series that involves TimeTravel and a hefty dose of InThePastEveryoneWillBeFamous.

** Time itself. The pilot episode ends with a big Wham moment that butterflies in the space time continuum have erased Lucy's Sister from History, but after this everything tends to end up as close enough despite a rising kill count across history. Season two even implies that history actively fights back against being changed, which also lessens the threat that Rittenhouse poses since the laws of nature themselves seem to be hindering them and aiding the heroes.

** Rittenhouse's founder and namesake, David Rittenhouse, believed that the common people have no ability to rule themselves efficiently, and that democracy is therefore too chaotic, but also that monarchy is too selfish in nature to serve as a proper alternative. Therefore, in the view of himself and his followers, the only way to truly rule is to use democracy as a facade to placate the masses, while a select few wield power from the shadows.

** Played with again in "The Capture of Benedict Arnold." After killing [[spoiler: David Rittenhouse]], Flynn is stalking 12-year old [[spoiler: John Rittenhouse]], but when he finds him, he can't work up the nerve to shoot a child, giving [[spoiler: Lucy]] a chance to intervene.

** Lucy, Wyatt and Rufus break into the Oakland State Penitentiary in 1941 [[spoiler:in order to hide escape materials for Flynn to break out with 77 years later.]]

** It's actually suggested that time works to prevent changes, meaning that this trope is actually a fundamental law of reality, if one that can be worked around if you work at it enough, as some minor changes have been made, even if history as a whole is relatively unchanged.

* InstantlyProvenWrong: After making Wyatt and Lucy, Ian Fleming pulls them away from the tavern full of German officers and begins berating them for sloppy infiltration. "I swear, you Americans! You couldn't stand out more if you tried!" Cue Rufus coming in with a gun, pointing it at Fleming, who, upon seeing a black man in Nazi Germany, just mutters, "I stand corrected."

** When they get back from their trip in the pilot episode, they find that history is recorded the way they witnessed it, instead of how it originally happened in the unaltered timeline. "Anarchists" (a.k.a the time travelers) bombed the ''Hindenburg,'' [[spoiler:Lucy's comatose mom is perfectly fine, Lucy is engaged to someone, and her sister never existed.]]

** The series finale "The Miracle of Christmas" [[spoiler: has Flynn creates yet another AlternateTimeline by killing Jessica in 2012. This rewrites the events of Season 2 - most notably, the absence of Jessica meant that Lucy and Wyatt became a couple after "Hollywoodland", and Jessica never kidnapped Jiah, meaning that the events that led to Rufus being killed in the Wild West never happened.]]

** The idea that Lincoln's death is all that prevented the post-Civil War South from turning into a racial paradise is, to put it charitably, quite naive. However, in context, Lincoln's death did cause reprisals against the South which affected race relations. Also his death did slow down the advance of civil rights for African-Americans.

** In "Karma Chameleon" Rufus is trying to strike up a conversation with a lady in the bar. He notices ''Series/{{Manimal}}'' playing on the bar's TV and mentions he's a fan, whereupon she mentions she likes the show too. Leaving aside the probability of Rufus even being ''aware'' of a show that was cancelled ''the month he was born'' after only 8 episodes[[note]]Rufus mentions he was born in December 1983 and thus would have been conceived sometime in March--hence his concern about travelling to that time period. Manimal is widely regarded as one of the worst TV shows ever and was not released on video until a limited DVD run in 2012.[[/note]] the episode takes place in March 1983. The show didn't even premiere until September 30. They're watching a show that ''doesn't even exist yet''.[[note]]What's even more amusing is that ''Manimal'', like this series, was also an NBC property--part of NBC's disastrous Fall 1983 lineup in which ''none'' of the nine new shows that premiered were renewed for a second season. The production staff if nobody else should have been aware of this.[[/note]] The lady is also a fan of ''Film/{{Flashdance}}'' and ''Staying Alive'', with both came out in 1983... on ''April 15'' and ''July 15'' respectively. (Not to mention the latter was (and is) nowhere near as popular than [[Film/SaturdayNightFever the movie it was a sequel]].) Not to mention that March 3, 1983 was a '''Saturday''' and ''Series/TheATeam'' aired first-run on Tuesdays... (and Rufus states the episode they see on TV is "The Beast from the Belly of a Boeing"... which first aired in May. Given that both ''The A-Team'' and ''Timeless'' were co-produced by Universal, you'd think someone would have noticed).
** Additionally from "Karma Chameleon", the characters are trapped in a hotel bar during a storm severe enough that the police have advised everyone to stay off the roads. [[https://weatherspark.com/history/31786/1983/Toledo-Ohio-United-States Weather records for the area in March 1983]] show no unusual weather patterns.

*** Which is {{lampshaded}} in the episode when Josaphine Baker confesses to Lucy she believes Hemingway 'stole it' from Stein.

** In "The Darlington 500" the team travels to 1955 to prevent the assassination of the heads of Ford, GM, and Chrysler by a sleeper Rittenhouse agent at the titular race. The head of Ford Motor Company at the time was Henry Ford II, the grandson of Henry Ford--established in "Last Ride of Bonnie and Clyde" as a Rittenhouse member himself. Given what we know about the organization, Henry Ford II is also a member of Rittenhouse. The conspiracy is trying to assassinate one of its own members. Additionally, Wendell Scott, the first sanctioned black NASCAR driver, is shown assisting the team. Scott would not race in NASCAR events until 1961. The race is also shown taking place on a dirt track. The actual race took place on a paved track.[[note]]Darlington also holds the distinction of being the world's first true "Superspeedway" with high banking in the turns which allowed cars to build up speed[[/note]] Also, the race was (and still is) [[BlandNameProduct called the "Southern 500", not the "Darlington 500"]].
** In "The Salem Witch Trials" William Stoughton is identified as the governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony. Although Stoughton was the chief magistrate in charge of the trials, he was in fact the lieutenant governor. The governor himself, William Phips, is credited with stopping the trials and executions.[[note]]Perhaps not coincidentally, Phips' own wife was among the accused.[[/note]]
** In "Mrs. Sherlock Holmes" the events of the episode result in the death of women's suffrage activist [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Paul Alice Paul]] while in police custody. Lucy notes upon their return to 2018 that she was completely erased from history. While Alice Paul's enormous achievements in her 92-year lifetime would not have come to pass (or would have been otherwise accomplished by others) it's important to note that as of 1919 she was a leading voice in the suffrage movement and had already endured a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Sentinels#Occoquan_Workhouse_and_the_Night_of_Terror five-week prison sentence during which Paul and others were beaten and tortured]]. While Paul may only be known to scholars of the movement in the new timeline it seems extremely unlikely she would have been forgotten about completely. If anything she would have become even ''more'' influential as an InspirationalMartyr for the cause, given the circumstances of her death. Also, the very premise of the episode (that Paul's arrest would stop her delivering a speech for suffrage that would persuade President Wilson to support it) is wrong. Wilson had already come out in favor of it a year before in his State of the Union address, after which his support succeeded in getting it passed through Congress. Her protests had already changed his mind.
* ArtisticLicenseMedicine: A young John F. Kennedy is admitted to the hospital in 2018 with a bout of colitis. He notes that he felt better almost immediately after treatment. Colitis is diagnosed by a colonoscopy and treatment can take several weeks, including steroid injections and a series of medications. In some cases an elimination diet is also necessary. It's unlikely that JFK would feel almost immediate relief from his symptoms (let alone from the colonoscopy).

** In "The Red Scare" Wyatt, a Delta Force member, discusses having to report back to Camp Pendleton once the project is over. Delta Force is an Army unit garrisoned at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Camp Pendleton is a Marine Corps facility in California. Except possibly as a staging area there's no reason for Wyatt to report to Pendleton in peacetime (especially since there are several Army bases in California as well).
** In "The Salem Witch Trials" Flynn is able to fire a musket four times in the space of two minutes with pinpoint accuracy, a remarkable accomplishment for someone who presumably does not use a musket regularly. While it's possible that Flynn may have been able to steal four muskets and have them prepared, carrying four loaded (and stolen) muskets in a small town like Salem isn't exactly inconspicuous.
* ArtisticLicenseNuclearPhysics: There's no way to accidentally "set off" a nuclear core with a sudden shock such as a car crash. Making the fusion chain reaction not only start, but fission enough to release a bomb's worth of energy before the detonation blows the core apart too far for the chain reaction to continue, requires incredibly sensitive explosives and triggering mechanisms that had to be invented by the Manhattan Project for that specific purpose. If the characters knew as much about atom bombs as they seem to, they would know this.

* BatmanGambit: [[spoiler: Mason plays along with Rittenhouse, until they're desperate enough to regain control of the time machines that they give him access to their SinisterSurveillance technology. He promptly uses it to gather information on them, to help take them down.]]
* BatmanGrabsAGun: Over the course of the series, every main character has shot and killed (or at the very least, wielded a gun) at least one person at some point, but while it's to be expected from Wyatt, Agent Christopher, and Flynn, who's jobs require it, the trope applies to Rufus, Lucy, Connor, and Jiya, all of whom use a gun and kill someone for the first time over the course of the series.

** In "The murder of Jesse James", Lucy shoots and kills Jesse James (despite Bass Reeves trying to convince Wyatt not to kill him throughout the whole episode and in that particular scene), presumably because she reluctantly believed that Wyatt was right; if Jesse James had been allowed to live and taken into custody, he eventually would have escaped and killed more people who weren't supposed to die.

** The missing 18 minutes from the Watergate scandal were about Rittenhouse, who Nixon was ''terrified'' of.

** The moon landing experiences a near catastrophe due to Flynn's interference, but its successful completion is credited to Katherine Johnson, who is claimed to have single-handedly fixed a computer error due to a "Communist attack" on NASA. She later becomes the first female flight director because of this.

** Wyatt decides to execute infamous serial killer H. H. Holmes, saving the lives of several of his future victims and denying Holmes from profiting off his fame as a murderer.

** Charles Lindbergh was a member of Rittenhouse, and all his famous anti-semitism and rabble rousing was just a distraction from the organization's plans.

** Rufus convinces Creator/HedyLamarr to not let the patent lapse on her frequency hopping technique which many other technologies like wi-fi have been built from. Thus, when the navy finally uses it in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, she's able to get her deserved profits from it and quits acting to become a full time inventor, and in the present is still the record holder for the wealthiest person in history.

* BrokenPedestal: In 1962, Rufus is stunned to discover that Anthony, a key scientist of the project who he had looked up to, hasn't been kidnapped at all but rather is working with Flynn willingly. This gets even worse in ''Space Race'' when Rufus sees just how far Anthony is willing to go in order to assist Flynn.

** Played for drama in "The Salem Witch Trials" when [[spoiler: Wyatt finds out his wife Jessica is alive in this timeline, but estranged from him]]. Also, Jiya attempts to warn Rufus about killing a man in 1692. Rufus does all he can to avoid killing the man [[spoiler: who dies in a random accident anyway, perhaps caused by his encounter with Rufus. This man, Judge Samuel Sewall, one of the few voices of moderation during the Salem Witch Trials and eventually Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court and one of the earliest advocates of abolition]].

** A teenage John F. Kennedy experiences the world of 2018 in "The Kennedy Curse" where he is astonished to learn that a multiracial group of male and female college students all attend the same school. In 1934 colleges were still segregated not only by race but by gender.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: Rufus thinks he's gotten the upper hand refusing to do Rittenhouse's dirty work as they need him to pilot the Lifeboat. He's honestly stunned when informed Jiya is being trained as his replacement and Mason mocks him on his "plan."

** A Christy pit cannot possibly be repurposed for use as a nuclear reactor, much less the implausibly tiny nuclear battery. Nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors are designed incompatibly different due to the way use their nuclear fuel, how said fuel is fed into the system, and even the ideal isotope types and alloys used as fuel. Leave aside the impossibility of deriving 300 years worth of useful energy from such a small pit.

What follows is the crew going to famous points in history, and foiling [[AncientConspiracy Rittenhouse's]] plans, and attempting to maintain the status quo of the pre-established timelines, in order to stop Rittenhouse shaping history to their will and taking over the world.

* EqualOpportunityEvil: During the Watergate episode, it is revealed that [[spoiler:a former Rittenhouse operative -- in the 1970s -- is an African-American woman who had been born into the conspiracy. Strangely enough, David Rittenhouse, the founder of the organization, was a staunch white supremacist and chauvinist. Presumably, his followers chose to take a different approach]].

''Timeless'' is a 2016 Creator/{{NBC}} series, created by Eric Kripke (''Series/{{Supernatural}}'', ''Series/{{Revolution}}'') and Shawn Ryan (''Series/TheShield''), about an unlikely trio of time-travellers. When criminals steal a time-machine, our heroes -- Dr. Lucy Preston (Abigail Spencer), a history professor, Sergeant 1st Class Wyatt Logan (Creator/MattLanter), a US Army Green Beret, and Rufus Carlin (Malcolm Barrett), a genius engineer who helped design the time machine -- must travel back in time to protect history as we know it.

Compare with ''Series/TheTimeTunnel,'' a 1960s series with a similar premise; ''Film/Rewind2013'', a {{Made For TV|Movie}} PilotMovie with a similar premise and cast; ''Series/TheMinistryOfTime'', a similar Spanish series; ''Literature/Timeline'' which has a similar title complete with time travel and [[Creator/DetectiveComics DC Comics']] ''Series/LegendsOfTomorrow'', which has a near-identical premise but with superheroes instead.

Compare with ''Series/TheTimeTunnel,'' a 1960s series with a similar premise; ''Film/Rewind2013'', a {{Made For TV|Movie}} PilotMovie with a similar premise and cast; ''Series/TheMinistryOfTime'', a similar Spanish series; and [[Creator/DetectiveComics DC Comics']] ''Series/LegendsOfTomorrow'', which has a near-identical premise but with superheroes instead.

* RunningGag: It's not that funny except in terms of BlackHumour, but Rufus keeps encountering racism because of his skin colour — or, in the case of Las Vegas, using it as an advantage to slip beneath notice. (And since a RunningGag gets stale after a while, his skin colour comes in extremely handy when the team is captured by Indians who set him free thinking he's an escaped slave, or has to enter the Black Panthers.)

* RunningGag: It's not that funny except in terms of BlackHumour, but Rufus keeps encountering racism because of his skin colour — or, in the case of Las Vegas, using it as an advantage to slip beneath notice.

Compare with ''Series/TheTimeTunnel,'' a 1960s series with a similar premise; ''Film/Rewind2013'', a {{Made For TV|Movie}} PilotMovie with a similar premise and cast; ''Series/TheMinistryOfTime'', a similar Spanish series; and ''Series/LegendsOfTomorrow'', which has a near-identical premise but with superheroes.

It was cancelled on May 10, 2017, then UnCanceled by Creator/{{NBC}} due to major fan backlash three days later. Season 2 premiered on March 11, 2018 in the US, and premiered on [[Creator/Channel4 E4]] on April 4th in the UK. The series was canceled again on June 22nd, 2018 but on July 31st, it was announced a special two-hour movie would wrap up its plot points in a huge finale. The finale in the US aired on December 20, 2018, with the UK airing it over a fortnight (instead of one big movie) in late April 2019; the first part aired on the 23rd April, then the second part aired on the 30th April.

* TheBigDamnKiss: In "Hollywoodland" [[spoiler: Lucy and Wyatt]] finally have one, though does not confirm Canon, as at the end of the episode, it is revealed that [[spoiler:Jessica, Wyatt's wife, is alive]]

** Zigzagged with Creator/IanFleming's appearance: the official record says he only went on a single field mission which was at a different time, but the real truth of wartime espionage naturally remains mysterious - so who's to say there weren't more? He also says he's with MI6, when in reality he was with the Royal Navy's Naval Intelligence Division. His brother Michael Fleming did die in 1940, but he wasn't killed by a V-2 attack; while serving as a captain in the BEF, he was severely wounded and captured during the fighting retreat to Dunkirk, and later died in a POW hospital.

** In "The Darlington 500" the team travels to 1955 to prevent the assassination of the heads of Ford, GM, and Chrysler by a sleeper Rittenhouse agent at the titular race. The head of Ford Motor Company at the time was Henry Ford II, the grandson of Henry Ford--established in "Last Ride of Bonnie and Clyde" as a Rittenhouse member himself. Given what we know about the organization, Henry Ford II is also a member of Rittenhouse. The conspiracy is trying to assassinate one of its own members. Additionally, Wendell Scott, the first sanctioned black NASCAR driver, is shown assisting the team. Scott would not race in NASCAR events until 1961. The race is also shown taking place on a dirt track. The actual race took place on a paved track.[[note]]Darlington also holds the distinction of being the world's first true "Superspeedway" with high banking in the turns which allowed cars to build up speed[[/note]] Also, the race was (and still is) called the "Southern 500", not the "Darlington 500".

** In the finale, the only reason Rittenhouse visits North Korea in the middle of the Korean War is so [[spoiler:they can lure Lucy and the others there in order to kill them]].

** In the finale, the only reason Rittenhouse visits Korea during the middle of the Korean War is so [[spoiler:they can lure Lucy and the others there in order to kill them]].

** In the finale, Lucy and Jiya, who are pretending to be war correspondents, meet a young Korean woman. Lucy starts to introduce herself as Creator/RachelMaddow but quickly realises how ridiculous this is and tells the woman her real name.

** In the finale, Lucy and Jiya meet a young Korean woman while pretending to be war correspondents. Lucy starts to introduce herself with a fake name but quickly realises how ridiculous this is and tells the woman her real name.

* BombThrowingAnarchists: Lucy pretends they are anarchists hijacking the ''Hindenburg'' to get it down before the bomb goes off (specifically the Anarchist Black Cross, an actual anarchist organization, though they're not terrorists, but only support imprisoned anarchists and other radicals). When the ''Hindenburg'' explodes anyway then, it's recorded as if that's what happened, and they're the suspects.

It was cancelled on May 10, 2017, then UnCanceled by Creator/{{NBC}} due to major fan backlash three days later. Season 2 premiered on March 11, 2018 in the US, and premiered on [[Creator/Channel4 E4]] on April 4th in the UK. The series was canceled again on June 22nd, 2018 but on July 31st, it was announced a special two-hour movie would wrap up its plot points in a huge finale. The finale in the US aired on December 20, 2018, with the UK airing it over a fortnight (instead of one big movie) in late April 2019; The first part aired on the 23rd April, then the second part aired on the 30th April.