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| 3 | %% This page has been alphabetized. Please add new examples in the correct order. Thanks! |
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| 7 | [[quoteright:330:[[ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/superboy_prime_punch.png]]]] |
| 8 | [[caption-width-right:330:[[VideoGame/SuperSmashBros Retcon... PUUNNCHH!!!!!]]]] |
| 9 | |
| 10 | ->'''Frost:''' Crisis is over, we beat the bad guy, and you're still worried because...?\ |
| 11 | '''Cisco:''' Because an infinite number of Earths experienced a cosmic heat death from which only one Earth was rebuilt.\ |
| 12 | '''Frost:''' Mm-hmm.\ |
| 13 | '''Cisco:''' So now, not only do [[Series/Supergirl2015 Superman, Supergirl]], and [[Series/BlackLightning2018 Black Lightning]] live here, but now our entire timeline has been rewritten so that they've ''always'' lived here, '''and''' ''[opens his shirt to reveal a T-shirt with the House of El symbol on it]'' '''I DON'T REMEMBER OWNING THIS SHIRT!''' |
| 14 | -->-- ''Series/TheFlash2014'', "Marathon" |
| 15 | |
| 16 | An example of a {{Retcon}} caused by forces within the story itself, usually using TimeTravel of some sort to alter history. Rarely is it used purely as a dramatic device; the real function is to paper over [[PlotHole continuity gaps]] and [[AuthorsSavingThrow mistakes]]. |
| 17 | |
| 18 | For example, let's say that the author of a novel series was dissatisfied at the way she'd killed off a character in an earlier book. Instead of just having him show up and explain that he was OnlyMostlyDead, she has the other characters pulled back in time by an evil plan of the BigBad; in the process, they manage to prevent the events that lead to the death of the character, and when they get back, ta-da! There he is, good as new. |
| 19 | |
| 20 | Whether or not characters will [[RippleEffectProofMemory remember the pre-retconned state]] depends on the story. |
| 21 | |
| 22 | Often (especially lately), Cosmic Retconning is the go-to method for demolishing ContinuityLockOut and drawing in a younger audience. As a rule of thumb, superhero movies are the hottest way to increase readership; thus, the new canon should conform to whatever is playing in theaters or on television. See also RetCanon. |
| 23 | |
| 24 | A potential downside to this, of course, is that it can invoke a massive sense of ShootTheShaggyDog on previous stories in the franchise; and if the cosmic reset button gets hit ''repeatedly,'' it can become [[EightDeadlyWords hard for readers to get emotionally invested]] in a new version [[OpeningACanOfClones because they feel it will all just get eaten by a wall of antimatter or something again before long]]. Moreover, if the old versions of the characters ''see'' the end coming for their world and ''realize'' that, at best, they can only save the universe by drastically changing it [[RetGone (perhaps erasing countless people from existence]] and rewriting the personalities of the survivors), the results can be pure NightmareFuel — and also possibly a source of severe MoodWhiplash if either the outgoing or incoming universe is notably more "carefree and innocent" than the other. |
| 25 | |
| 26 | '''Note that this applies only to actual retcons'''; something like ''Franchise/BackToTheFuture'', where changing the past is part of the original plot, doesn't count. |
| 27 | |
| 28 | Compare InternalRetcon, which is far more mundane and relies on authority figures twisting or omitting the facts. {{Retconjuration}} is the ability of a character to do this, usually only found in the hands of {{Reality Warper}}s and their ilk. |
| 29 | |
| 30 | ---- |
| 31 | !!Examples: |
| 32 | |
| 33 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 34 | |
| 35 | [[folder:Anime & Manga]] |
| 36 | * ''Anime/CardfightVanguardVSeries'': |
| 37 | ** Downplayed example. The defeat of the Destiny Conductor means that Kourin, Suiko and Rekka lose their status as Called Walkers and their destiny will return to what it should have been, erasing them from their friends' memories and making it as though they never met them. However, it is later shown the consequences of the events that took place and led to the Conductor's defeat remain and some of the people affected have a feeling that something is missing. |
| 38 | ** Discussed in the Shinemon arc in regards to Gear Chronicle's time manipulation abilities and potential effects, but eventually it doesn't come to pass. |
| 39 | * ''Literature/DateALive'': At one point in the series, [[spoiler: Shido goes back in time using one of Kurumi's bullets to when Origami's parents were killed by a Spirit and manages to prevent their deaths. While this does change Origami's history and personality and she no longer has a vendetta against Spirits, [[YouCantFightFate her parents ended up dying anyway]], only in a traffic accident this time]]. |
| 40 | * The final arc of ''Manga/EdensZero'' begins with [[spoiler:the main crew using Etherion to travel back in time to Universe Zero, the origin point of the {{Multiverse}}, which [[MergedReality merges all universes into one]] and makes any further attempts at TimeTravel impossible. That said, they find history has been broadly improved: select {{Posthumous Character}}s have [[BackFromTheDead avoided their fates]], and some villains have turned out either [[TookALevelInKindness less]] or [[HeelFaceTurn not at all evil]] than last time; on the other hand, this also works in the BigBad's favor, granting him an even stronger CustomBuiltHost with technology that wasn't available to him before.]] |
| 41 | * Played for laughs in ''Anime/ExcelSaga'', where the Great Will of the Macrocosm has to reset the plot multiple times per episode. |
| 42 | * ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure'': The GrandFinale of the original continuity, ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureStoneOcean Stone Ocean]]'', ends with [[spoiler:Enrico Pucci recreating the universe, but before it can be completed, Emporio manages to kill him, resulting in a wholly new universe created in its place]]. The new universe is briefly seen at the end of the part, with counterparts to most of the main cast. The next story arc, ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureSteelBallRun Steel Ball Run]]'', is a ContinuityReboot that takes place in the same time period as the first story arc, ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventurePhantomBlood Phantom Blood]]'', with various counterparts to individual or multiple characters. Despite these two facts, and much fan confusion, the ''Steel Ball Run'' universe is '''not''' one that came as a result of ''Stone Ocean'', instead being another universe entirely with no stated connection to the first continuity aside from names and the existence of [[FightingSpirit Stands]]. |
| 43 | * At the very end of the ''Manga/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' manga, [[spoiler: Shinji rejects [[AssimilationPlot Instrumentality]] and causes the ResetButton to be hit. The final chapter takes place in the rebooted timeline, where the Earth is safe, Second Impact never occurred, and the Angels never appeared on Earth]]. |
| 44 | * ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'' |
| 45 | ** In the ''Anime/PokemonChronicles'' episode "Celebi and Joy", shortly after entering a big city, Ritchie is sent back 75 years in the past and prevents a boy from being killed in an accident. After Ritchie returns to the present, it's shown that the once-boy is now the mayor of the city, which is now an idyllic valley town. |
| 46 | ** Happens again in the anime proper in "Time Warp Heals All Wounds", where after learning about an old woman's husband who died in an accident after leaving town, May and Meowth are sent back into the past when said husband is still alive and prevent him from taking the train to the city where he would eventually die. As a result, the husband is still alive and is a Pokémon Egg Doctor in town [[spoiler: who assists May when her Egg hatches into an Eevee]]. |
| 47 | ** And it happens once more in ''Anime/PokemonArceusAndTheJewelOfLife'', where Ash, Brock, and Dawn are sent back thousands of years in time to prevent the event that made Arceus distrustful of humans and want to pass judgment on them. They succeed [[spoiler: [[RippleEffectProofMemory although they have to remind Arceus in the present what they did after returning there]]]]. It's also revealed that [[spoiler: there is now a ancient picture in the present depicting Ash and co. having helped save Arceus]]. |
| 48 | ** The Episode "Rotom's Wish" has Ash and co. arrive at a dilapidated hotel run by a {{Jerkass}} Trainer who makes guests battle his Krookodile and lost their Pokémon if they lose to him and that the bellboy was the original owner of the hotel who lost to him 10 years prior. A Rotom sends Ash and co. back in time and with said Rotom, they're able to defeat said Trainer's Krookodile. After returning to the present, the hotel is now in a much better state headed by the original owner and the {{Jerkass}} and his cronies are now loyal employees. |
| 49 | * In the final episode of ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica'', [[spoiler: Madoka wishes for the power to erase all Witches that have ever existed or could possibly exist before they're born, which results in her [[AscendedToAHigherPlaneOfExistence ascending]] to [[AbstractApotheosis become the embodiment of hope for all Magical Girls]]. Her wish ends up creating a new world where the Witches and Madoka Kaname herself [[{{Retgone}} never existed]], Mami and Kyoko are still alive, Magical Girls fight creatures called Wraiths, a "Law of Cycles" is in place that causes Magical Girls who cross the DespairEventHorizon to disappear, and Homura now uses a bow and arrow in honor of her best friend.]] |
| 50 | * ''Anime/SpaceDandy'': Half the episodes ends with the protagonist trio or some of them dead (including an Episode of the Dead where the whole universe is zombified), always beginning the next episode alive as if nothing happened. It's later revealed that [[spoiler:all the episodes really happened, since the narrator is God and reboots the universe at the end of every episode]]. |
| 51 | * In ''Literature/SSSClassSuicideHunter'', protagonist Kim Gongja kills himself 4090 times so he can go back to the past before his killer Yoo Soohan gains ResurrectiveImmortality and kill him. |
| 52 | * ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}'', of course, has one of its own: [[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Unicron_Singularity the Unicron Singularity]], which ripped and tore at the fabric of time and space in a way that essentially opens up a planet-sized plot hole just to make room for itself to fill it. |
| 53 | ** The Unicron Singularity didn't exist as this at first, and it was transformed into one by the club comic writers to account for some (admittedly minor) inconsistencies between ''Anime/TransformersEnergon'' and ''Anime/TransformersCybertron''. Mind you, these are only minor in comparison to the humongous plot holes that already populated the rest of the entire ''Transformers'' multiverse, which did not have such a black hole, though later media claims that its effects branch out to other universes as well, ergo it is both the cause of and solution to many errors in continuity (and even [[OffModel animation]]). |
| 54 | ** There actually exists a Transformer, Vector Prime, who was tasked by [[{{God}} Primus]] to protect the stability of the timeline - in other words, the number of plot holes in Transformers is ''so bad, it is actually an in-universe threat'', and there needs to be someone to keep the holes and inconsistencies from destroying everything. He does his best to fix things (usually retconning them from outside the timeline to cover inconsistencies, but coming in person for tremendous holes like the Singularity) so presumably any inconsistency we see was simply recorded before he got around to it, and our media are [[RippleEffectProofMemory ripple effect proof]]. |
| 55 | ** The concept of the [[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Multiversal_singularity multiversal singularity]] (that is, characters of which only one exists in the entire multiverse, such as Primus, Unicron and The Fallen) was nullified by this - while at first it was gradual, with [[AllThereInTheManual Ask Vector Prime]] claiming certain appearances of Unicron (such as the one in [[WesternAnimation/TheTransformers the original American cartoon continuity]]) were not part of the main singularity Unicron, the 2015 Fun Publications story "Another Light" had Nexus Prime solidify the walls between reality, limiting travel between dimensions and splintering all former singularities (such as Vector Prime and Nexus himself) into infinite selves across existence, as had been the case with many "regular" beings. |
| 56 | * In the final arc of ''Manga/TheWorldGodOnlyKnows'', we learn that Elsea is, in fact, [[spoiler:the Ultimate Weiss, the superweapon the {{Big Bad}}s have been after all along]]. As a result, Elsea is a great deal more powerful than anyone, even herself, realized and once the dust from the final battle settles, uses her power to allow herself to [[spoiler:be reborn as Eri Katsuragi, Keima's little sister]]. |
| 57 | * Done several times throughout the backstory of ''Manga/XxxHolic'' and ''Manga/TsubasaReservoirChronicle''. You'd need a diagram drawn by Creator/MCEscher in seven dimensions to figure out the order of which retcon came before which, though. Altogether, they produced several clones, eliminated the royalty of a kingdom as royalty while leaving their children the prince and princess in place (their ancestor from another dimension had to come in to act as a placeholder and keep causality intact), caused reality to not notice that someone had died for several hundred years, at which point it had ''always'' noticed (except for the aforementioned clones and friends), and both added and removed the main character's parents from existence (their existence in-story predated the retcon somehow, and the protagonist managed to survive his parents ceasing to have ever existed via a DealWithTheDevil). |
| 58 | * ''Anime/YokaiWatch'' ended in 2017 and was revived in 2019 with Nate owning a new Yo-kai Watch. In-series, it's stated that Nate's memory was wiped. |
| 59 | * ''Anime/YuGiOhArcV'' seemed to be a new series where everything has a fresh start, with each summoning methods belonging in their own dimensions (Standard, Fusion, Synchro, and XYZ), and there is a full-scale war initiated by the BigBad who seemingly wants to fuse all the dimensions together. That is ''not'' the case. AntiVillain Leo Akaba wanted to fuse the dimensions together because [[spoiler: he created four cards to deal with the BigBad, Zarc, who after becoming a duel champion, fused with his dragons (Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon, Dark Rebellion Xyz Dragon, Starve Venom Fusion Dragon, and Clear Wing Synchro Dragon), becoming an EldritchAbomination. His daughter Ray then snatched the four cards he created and uses them to defeat Zarc. The Original Dimension then split into four parts, as did Ray and Zarc, and he intitally didn't have any memories of the Original Dimension until he regained them. As a result of the retcon, Ray split into Yuzu, Serena, Ruri, and Rin and Zarc became [[TheHero Yuya]], [[TheStoic Yuto]], [[HotBlooded Yugo]], and [[TheSociopath Yuri]]. While three of the four pairs were close friends, Yuri and Serena did not have a special bond.]] |
| 60 | [[/folder]] |
| 61 | |
| 62 | [[folder:Audio Plays]] |
| 63 | * In ''AudioPlay/BigFinishDoctorWho'', Charlotte Pollard being saved by the Doctor causes her to become a [[ParadoxPerson living paradox]] meaning history starts breaking down, the CIA are around in 1937 before they should have been formed and Benjamin Franklin was a President. But after she saves the Web of Time the paradox and these events become part of the Web, therefore there is no paradox. TimeyWimeyBall indeed. |
| 64 | [[/folder]] |
| 65 | |
| 66 | [[folder:Comic Books]] |
| 67 | * ''ComicBook/AmethystPrincessOfGemworld'': The 2020 series establishes that Gemworld undergoes some sort of soft reboot (soft enough for enough people to remember old version and notice the changes) every time the main DC Universe has a multiversal Crisis Crossover, supposedly coming off the worse for wear from it every time. |
| 68 | * ''ComicBook/BlackHammer'': When the heroes finally leave the farm and return to the real world, it somehow alters reality to create a world where they never became superheroes and superheroes never existed. In this "rebooted" world, [[BadassNormal Abraham Slam]] is just a museum's night watchman, [[{{Martians}} Mark Markz]] never left Mars, [[HenshinHero Golden Gail]] is a senile old woman living in a retirement home, [[NonLinearCharacter Colonel Weird]] is a normal astronaut who went MIA in 1959, Madame Dragonfly is a soccer mom with two kids, and [[IntrepidReporter Lucy Weber]] is working at a pizza parlor. [[RidiculouslyHumanRobots Talky-Walky]] is the only one not affected by this reboot, and she tries to help the others regain their memories of the original timeline. |
| 69 | * ''Franchise/TheDCU'' has done this several times, starting with ''ComicBook/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths''. Usually, it's part of a larger effort to make the characters [[ContinuityLockout more accessible and marketable]]. Usually, [[ContinuitySnarl it fails]]. |
| 70 | ** ''ComicBook/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths'' did it to the entire DC Universe -- the destruction of TheMultiverse damaged the time-stream, changing the histories of many characters who lived on the only surviving Earth, thus removing their pre-Crisis backstories (and their campiest adventures). Several survivors of other Earths have been rewritten into the new history, such as the Justice Society: pre-Crisis, they were active in the 1940s (when their original stories were published) on Earth-Two, and their world's Justice League equivalent; post-Crisis, they were the merged Earth's first superhero team, but still active in the 1940s. |
| 71 | ** ''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'', the first sequel to ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'', was the second universe-wide retcon, caused by [[ComicBook/GreenLantern Hal Jordan]] and Hank Hall going mad and tampering with the timestream. It created the [[ComicBookTime sliding timescale]] that the DCU has used since and altered the backstories of several characters, most notably ComicBook/{{Hawkman}}, who was ''extremely'' streamlined to deal with his snarl (that partly resulted from ''Crisis'') and the ComicBook/LegionOfSuperHeroes, who got a complete ContinuityReboot. |
| 72 | ** In ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis'', [=CoIE's=] second sequel, a group of survivors from the pre-Crisis multiverse try to separate the numerous Earths yet again, leading to the multiverse's re-creation. It also featured a second, separate cosmic retcon; see below. (The third sequel, ''ComicBook/FinalCrisis'', did ''not'' radically alter continuity.) |
| 73 | ** The picture at the top of the page came from ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''. Many of the changes here were caused by Superboy-Prime pounding on the walls of reality, giving rise to the "Superboy Punch!" [[MemeticMutation meme]] as a way of [[HandWave hand-waving]] continuity errors. |
| 74 | ** In what looks almost like a parody, at the end of ''[[ComicBook/LegionOfSuperHeroes Legion of Three Worlds]]'', he's HoistByHisOwnPetard when he [[spoiler: retcons ''himself'' by punching the Time Trapper, who was his future self. The latter is RetGone outright]]. |
| 75 | ** ''ComicBook/{{Flashpoint|DCComics}}'', building off ''Franchise/TheFlash: Rebirth'' mentioned below, boils down to simply a time-traveller mucking things up and the heroes having to fix it. When Barry Allen makes the fixes, Pandora steps in and uses him to merge the Creator/VertigoComics and Creator/{{Wildstorm}} continuities with the main DCU to create a single timeline, saying the three had originally been one timeline splintered long ago. It seems to be this merging, not a case of incorrectly repairing history, that causes the retcons. The result is that superheroes have only been active for about 5 years at the start of the reboot, and there was no Golden Age of heroes and heroes are in general younger than they previously were. |
| 76 | ** ''ComicBook/{{Convergence}}'' causes [[spoiler:the events of ''ComicBook/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths'' to be rewritten, so the pre-Crisis multiverse comes back with the addition of the worlds added post-''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''. However, this doesn't rewrite any of the universes' continuities, and they keep going as they were beforehand]]. |
| 77 | ** In ''Franchise/TheFlash: Rebirth'', it is revealed that Barry Allen's mother is dead and his father, the only suspect, died in prison. For years Barry Allen was one of the few superheroes ''without'' [[DeathByOriginStory a traumatic origin]] and his parents grew old without complication; it turns out it is because Barry's archenemy, the Reverse-Flash, went back in time, killed his mom, and framed his dad. This in turn changed everyone's memories so that Barry's mother was ''always'' killed when he was a kid, and caused Barry to be an angstier person. |
| 78 | ** Creator/JMichaelStraczynski's revamp of ''Franchise/WonderWoman'' has Diana not as the first woman to leave Themyscira and make her way in man's world, but as a survivor of a Themyscira that was sacked when she was a child and who is just now coming into her Amazon heritage. Other characters in the DCU (such as Max Lord) are stunned to find out that few people seem to remember Wonder Woman as she was. Diana's goal is to try setting things right. This revamp [[spoiler: was a GambitPileup between the goddesses Nemesis and Clotho.]] Eventually Diana manages to set everything right, but her ordeal, likened to the ''Odyssea'', was meant to introduce new changes into the ''status quo'', like a [[http://www.geekosystem.com/new-wonder-woman-costume-600/ revised outfit]] and a harder, no-nonsense attitude for Diana, though this too seems to have be retconned by the end of ''Flashpoint'' and into her new series. Wonder Woman's pants (and lack thereof) [[http://www.comicsalliance.com/2011/07/21/dc-the-new-52-panel-comic-con/ were the cause of so much drama]] that for several months they were in limbo, though by the time September 2011 rolled around [[RuleOfSexy she was again pantsless]]. |
| 79 | ** ''ComicBook/SupermanReborn'': When [[spoiler: Pre-Flashpoint Superman and Lois fuse with the New 52 Superman and Lois]], it creates a new history for not only Superman and Lois, but also the DC Universe as a whole. In terms of Superman's backstory, basically it incorporates ''some'' of the New 52 stuff into the pre-Flashpoint stuff. Changes to their history include: |
| 80 | *** The pre-Flashpoint Superman's most recent origin, ''ComicBook/SupermanSecretOrigin'', being once again canon, with callbacks to the story presented in the "Aftermath" issues, including how Superman first saved Lois, the design of Metallo and a visual call back to what inspired Lex Luthor's hatred of Superman. Previously, Superman's new origin was told in ''ComicBook/ActionComicsNew52''. |
| 81 | *** Clark revealing his identity to Lois and the two being married, whereas the New 52 Clark never revealed his identity to Lois and was never even in a relationship with her. |
| 82 | *** Superman's romantic relationship with Wonder Woman in the New 52 is removed. Clark is established as having only ever dated Lois since becoming Superman. |
| 83 | *** Superman still died at the hands of Doomsday in ''ComicBook/TheDeathOfSuperman'', as he had before the New 52. The New 52 Superman's death in ''ComicBook/TheFinalDaysOfSuperman'' is also removed from continuity. |
| 84 | *** Notably, when Clark retells the rise of the Supermen that showed up after his death, [[ComicBook/{{Superboy}} Kon-El/Conner Kent]] and Matrix are missing. In fact, even though most of Superman 90's history is restored, all ComicBook/{{Supergirl}}s who had replaced Kara Zor-El remain retconned out of existence. |
| 85 | *** The events of ''ComicBook/{{Convergence}}: Superman'' are undone, as Lois gave birth in the Fortress of Solitude and not the ''Flashpoint'' Batcave, with Bruce Wayne involved instead of Thomas Wayne to drive things home. |
| 86 | *** An altered version of the ''ComicBook/SupermanLoisAndClark'' miniseries is worked into the characters history, with it being established that Clark and Lois ''did'' still live on a farm during that time, with Lois working as "Author X". However, their civilian friends knew they were away and had had a son, and Superman took a break from the Justice League and operated at night. The reason for this is because Lois' writing on Intergang resulted in her and Clark being targeted, and so they went into hiding. Before, the pre-Flashpoint Clark and Lois didn't ''have'' any friends, and New 52 Superman was still on the League and the pre-New 52 Superman operated in secret just because he didn't want to reveal the nature of the multiverse to the world, and later because he didn't trust the New 52's more cynical worldview. |
| 87 | *** The restoring of villains such as Imperiex and the Hank Henshaw Cyborg Superman and ''his'' history, whereas the only New 52 Superman was Zor-El who'd only ''just'' appeared by the time of modern stories, with it being established that Hank Henshaw ''didn't'' become Cyborg Superman in the New 52. |
| 88 | *** With Jon being born in the mainstream DCU, this also makes the "five year" time span of the New 52 moot. Previously, Jon was born in the ''Convergence'' story and world and was brought to the New 52 world as a newborn. He later showed up in modern times at an unspecified age. After ''Reborn'', Jon specifically states that he's 10, and Clark did quite a bit before he was born in the new timeline, all of which was public. Meaning there is no way the five year timeline can be intact. |
| 89 | *** Ma and Pa Kent ''did'' still die in a car crash, as they had in the New 52. Pre-Flashpoint, Pa Kent died of a heart attack long into Clark's Superman career, and Martha was still alive. |
| 90 | *** The story also removed the Trinity's New 52 meeting (they met when the Justice League formed while Darkseid was invading Earth). Instead, Superman met Batman at some unspecified point, and both met Wonder Woman a while later. |
| 91 | ** Over the course of its run, ''ComicBook/TheFlashRebirth'' revealed that Wallace "Wally" West (later going by "Ace"), the third Kid Flash, is actually the result of Barry Allen and Doctor Manhattan messing with the timeline in ''ComicBook/{{Flashpoint}}'', which somehow led to Ace's creation in the New 52, to take the place of the original Wallace "Wally" West. When the original Wally returned, reality was rewritten so that Ace is Wally's younger cousin, both being named after their great grandfather, with almost everyone's memories changing to accommodate. However, Eobard Thawne, who was protected from the events of ''Flashpoint'' and ''Rebirth'', tells Ace that he's "new" and "not even the real Wally West." |
| 92 | ** ''ComicBook/DoomsdayClock'' reveals how Doctor Manhattan altered the DCU's history and the butterfly effect it had: |
| 93 | *** By moving Alan Scott's Green Lantern battery out of his reach, Manhattan killed Alan and delayed the emergence of superheroes, as the Justice Society of America don't form. Because of this, the DCU has a more cynical worldview which is why Jonathan Kent discourages Clark from using his powers. This is why Clark began his career as Super''man'' rather than Super''boy'', and he wasn't confident enough to save his parents from their fatal car crash that was engineered by Manhattan to make Clark a more cynical figure. Because Superboy doesn't exist, the Legion of Super-Heroes don't get their inspiration and thus don't form in the future. |
| 94 | *** This is undone by putting the Lantern back within Alan's reach, with some unintended side-effects. With the Lantern, Alan Scott becomes Green Lantern and the JSA form -- incidentally, Wonder Woman is now active ''earlier'' than Superman and Batman, having fought alongside the JSA in the 1940s -- and their influence creates a more optimistic history for superheroes. As a result, Jonathan encourages Clark to use his powers and so Clark begins his career as Superboy and saves his parents from their car crash, and they are alive in the present day. Because Superboy was there to inspire people, the Legion of Super-Heroes forms in the future. |
| 95 | ** ''ComicBook/DarkNightsDeathMetal'' features one, as the culmination of the "unboot" storyline building since DC Rebirth. The Multiverse is collapsing and everyone is forced to rally to defeat the Batman Who Laughs as he tries to destroy everything. In the end, Wonder Woman defeats him, and "the Hands" recreate the multiverse, intending to make all prior continuity canon, no matter how hard it conflicts. The Justice League determine that everyone was brought back to how they were just prior to the Batman Who Laughs' attack, along with the resurrection of much of the dead from even prior to it, and characters will receive flashes of alternate futures and even alternates pasts as the multiverse settles. This essentially allows future writers to decide for themselves what histories they want to use. |
| 96 | ** ''ComicBook/LegionOfSuperHeroes'' has the Original Continuity, the Glorithverse Retcon (the Post-Crisis canon resulting from Mordru's wife Glortih altering continuity), Post-Zero Hour Reboot Legion (the Legion timeline after Parallax's efforts to remake the universe during the events of ''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime''), Threeboot Legion (an era started in a crossover with Creator/GeoffJohns' run on ''ComicBook/TeenTitans'' where the Legion's history was altered yet again by the energies released by destroying the Atomic Axe of numerous incarnations of the Fatal Five member Persuader), Retroboot Legion (Creator/GeoffJohns reinstating the original Silver Age canon to an extent after the events of ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''), and now the Bendisboot (where Creator/BrianMichaelBendis did [[ComicBook/LegionOfSuperHeroes2020 his own continuity]] resulting from Dr. Manhattan restoring the Legion to the DCU timeline after undoing his changes that resulted in the ''ComicBook/New52'' continuity at the end of ''ComicBook/DoomsdayClock''). When you have enough reboots and massive retcons that it names a whole era of the franchise, it's safe to say you've done it a lot. |
| 97 | * The creators of ''ComicBook/ElfQuest'' were forced to do this by ExecutiveMeddling: basically, they lost the rights over a large group of characters, the Wavedancers, created as a spin-off by someone RunningTheAsylum. Because they ''did'' want to keep the overall story, a new group of Wavedancers was created in their place, and the original group was handwaved as a dream brought on by BigBad Winnowill. |
| 98 | * ''Franchise/MarvelUniverse'' uses it less often, usually preferring the more "subtle" SlidingTimescale. This usually prevents the all-at-once changes of a Cosmic Retcon by feeding changes out gradually over decades. |
| 99 | ** Marvel had their own Superboy-Prime for a while in the form of Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch. When her powers shifted from "control of probability" to "able to reshape reality at will" and she went bugnuts crazy, "Wanda did it" became a very popular HandWave for a little while. |
| 100 | *** And before Wanda, they had young Franklin Richards from ''ComicBook/FantasticFour'', who used his own reality-altering powers to undo [[AudienceAlienatingEra certain unpopular changes]] to ComicBook/IronMan and ComicBook/TheWasp following ''ComicBook/HeroesReborn''. |
| 101 | ** One 2000s example of a Marvel Cosmic Retcon is the ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'' storyline ''ComicBook/OneMoreDay'', in which Peter Parker makes a DealWithTheDevil to erase his marriage with Mary Jane in exchange for saving his Aunt May's life, having no other options. |
| 102 | ** ''ComicBook/AvengersForever'' reveals that many events of the past have been staged by Immortus and Space Phantoms, cleaning up many {{Continuity Snarl}}s. |
| 103 | ** ComicBook/DoctorStrange has seen this happen a few times (being pals with Higher Beings will do this). In one storyline he saw the entire world destroyed and recreated except for himself, causing him some psychological distress as he wondered if the people he knew and loved were actually real. |
| 104 | ** In ''ComicBook/AllNewAllDifferentMarvel'', a sentient cosmic cube named Kobik restores the youth and super powers of the original ComicBook/CaptainAmerica, Steve Rogers. However ''ComicBook/CaptainAmericaSteveRogers'' reveal that, in a shocking twist, she has changed retroactively his story making Steve a member of [=HYDRA=] in the process (with things like Cap's mother had been convinced to join HYDRA before Steve's father died). This because, before, the Red Skull has manipulated her and she believed [=HYDRA=] to be perfection. And then it turned out that [[spoiler: she didn't just alter Steve's past, she ''created a whole new alternate timeline'', and brought ''that'' Steve into the main timeline, while the true, would-never-join-[=HYDRA=] Steve was trapped in a limbo created by Kobik. Eventually, good Steve was freed and beat evil Steve, and evil Steve was later gruesomely KilledOffForReal in a later comic run.]]. |
| 105 | ** The events of ''ComicBook/DaredevilCharlesSoule'' and ''ComicBook/Daredevil2019'' saw [[spoiler:Mike Murdock, an identity Matt created as part of a FakeTwinGambit to throw off people who were to close to figuring out he was Daredevil, become an actual person with his own life and history -- and still alive, as Matt ended the gambit by faking "Mike's" death. Said events also made Mike somewhat responsible for Matt's blindness and the death of their father, Jack.]] |
| 106 | ** Played with in ''[[ComicBook/TheUnbelievableGwenpool Gwenpool Strikes Back]]''. Following Gwen's desperate breakdown over her imminent trip to ComicBookLimbo and death, [[ComicBook/MsMarvel2014 Ms. Marvel]] tries to help Gwen by giving her thoughts on Gwen's origin: she's not [[TrappedInTVLand a real person trapped in a comic book world]], but a RealityWarper mutant. The shock of her powers manifesting made her subconsciously change her perception of reality and trick her into forgetting her true self in order to protect her from a power she couldn't fully comprehend. This ends up being the accepted backstory by the universe, and Gwen is retconned into being a mutant all along. Gwen herself knows it's a retcon and still believes in her true origin story, but for all intents and purposes, the universe now treats her as a mutant. |
| 107 | ** ''ComicBook/Eternals2006'' subjects the eponymous characters to this. It's revealed that some of their previous history and culture was a version rewritten with illusion and telepathic meddling, then reinforced by reality warping. |
| 108 | * When characters from Creator/MilestoneComics and Creator/ArchieComics' Red Circle imprint started to popping up in the Franchise/DCUniverse, WordOfGod said that their worlds had been fused with DC's due to the events of ''ComicBook/FinalCrisis''. |
| 109 | ** Creator/DwayneMcDuffie alluded to this event in his ''ComicBook/JusticeLeagueOfAmerica'' run and then eventually showed how the continuities were merged in ''Milestone Forever''. |
| 110 | * In ''ComicBook/TheSandman1989'', Delirium threatened at one point to turn Mazikeen into a "a demon half-face waitress night-club lady with a crush on your boss", and "make it so you've been that from the beginning of time to now and you'll never ever know if you were anything else and it will itch inside your head worse than little bugses". Given that Mazikeen ''already was'' a demon with only half a face working at a night-club, it's unclear if Delirium actually did make a Cosmic Retcon (with the original state never being seen by the reader), or if she was just being her usual {{Cloudcuckoolander}} self. |
| 111 | ** This is what happens if enough living creatures share the same dream. If a thousand cats were to dream of a world where they rule over humans then the universe would change so that it had always been that way. Luckily getting a thousand cats to agree to do the same thing is nigh impossible. [[spoiler: Also, this is how humans came to rule the world]]. |
| 112 | * ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics'': |
| 113 | ** This happens in the ''Mobius: X Years Later'' reality (which is separate from the main canon universe). Damage to the fabric of reality from previous adventures threatens to [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt completely destroy the timeline]], so Sonic goes back in time to fix it, which results in reality changing - before, Mobius was a {{Utopia}} ruled by King Sonic, where all the villains were either dead or at peace with the heroes. But after the changes, it becomes a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by [[KnightTemplar King Shadow]] and enforced by his SecretPolice. Fortunately, the heroes who [[RippleEffectProofMemory remember the way things are supposed to be]] come together and defeat him, returning things to the way they're supposed to be (albeit still with the alternate history). |
| 114 | ** There are also shades of this in Silver's stories; everytime he travels backwards in time, he causes small alterations to the timeline. Just not enough to [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong undo]] the BadFuture he lives in. |
| 115 | ** Dr. Eggman attempts to invoke this trope in the ''Sonic: Genesis'' storyline - hooking up a Chaos Emerald to the Death Egg II, he attempts to rewrite history so that Sonic never existed... and ends up creating the video game universe instead, though with the Freedom Fighters and Snively with them. Sonic is able to go Super and, in an attempt to [[spoiler:save Sally due to the fact that she was killed before the first Retcon]], resets the universe to its normal state. However, because of that one change, a number of things about Mobius itself is altered. |
| 116 | ** Happens again in the ''[[ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogMegaManWorldsCollide Worlds Collide]]'' crossover with ''ComicBook/MegaManArchieComics'', where Eggman and Dr. Wily recreate the Genesis Wave, this time affecting ''both'' their worlds. Though rather than trying to erase Sonic and Mega Man, they alter history so Mega Man is post-''VideoGame/MegaMan10'' (allowing the use of Bass, Proto Man and [[VideoGame/MegaMan8 Duo]]) and Sonic is in the modern video game setting rather than Archie's unique comic universe (for familiarity to non-''[[ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics Archie Sonic]]'' readers). |
| 117 | *** [[spoiler:In the final part of the story, Eggman screws up Sonic's Chaos Control, causing some major rewriting in his world that, so far, shuffles the current position of nearly everyone, integrates some game storylines into the Archie continuity, redesigns a number of characters, [[ExiledFromContinuity exiles]] characters created by writers who weren't working on the comic any longer, including Ken Penders's characters ([[ScrewedByTheLawyers who are entangled in a lawsuit]]), characters who were family members or love interests of game characters and [[AbortedArc abruptly aborts the King Naugus and Mecha-Sally arcs]]. Oh, and [[ApocalypseHow the entire multiverse collapses on itself]], leaving only a few alternate worlds and dimensions intact.]] |
| 118 | * Creator/AlanMoore's ''ComicBook/{{Supreme}}'' run starts with the main character finding out that he is not the only Supreme -- reality has been revisioned multiple times in history, and all his previous incarnations (be they alternate counterparts, imagined versions or "future" selves) together with all their supporting characters, end up in the Supremacy, a dimension which they turned into a utopia. [[spoiler:Later, we find out that his ArchEnemy Darius Dax has a similar thing - all his previous versions go to a dimension called the Daxia.]] |
| 119 | ** Much is made of the fact that Supreme (that is, the one starring in the book) ''survives'' the retcon in the first issue, though little of his history or characterization remains the same -- a LampshadeHanging of the fact that Moore's run is a {{retool}} or "soft reboot" of Rob Liefeld's material. |
| 120 | * ''ComicBook/YoungbloodJudgmentDay'' reveals that the Book of Hermes is capable of changing reality and [[spoiler: Sentinel]] used it to not only rewrite [[spoiler: his own life]] but also turn the whole world into one that [[spoiler: he]] liked. |
| 121 | [[/folder]] |
| 122 | |
| 123 | [[folder:Fan Works]] |
| 124 | * ''Fanfic/DigimonChildrenOfTime'': As revealed in the first chapter of ''Children of the Present'', after the events of ''Anime/DigimonAdventure02'', Gennai, insisting that TheMasquerade still has to be maintained for a little while longer, not only erased the memories of everyone who wasn't a [=DigiDestined=] or a family member of the [=DigiDestined=], but also somehow created the ''Digimon'' franchise as shown in ''Anime/DigimonTamers''. |
| 125 | * In Raven Child's ''Fanfic/TheSmurfetteVillage'' fanfiction series, the events that take place in the fourth story "A Home Through Time" retcon ''WesternAnimation/TheSmurfs1981''' ninth season (the time-traveling episodes) out of existence, setting things up for the events that take place in the story series proper. |
| 126 | * In the ''Fanfic/PonyPOVSeries'', |
| 127 | ** [[spoiler: the Shining Armor Arc ultimately reveals that [[BigBad General-Admiral Makarov]] is an [[HumanoidAbomination Equinoid Abomination]] called the Shadow of Chernobull, which has [[RealityWarper twisted reality]] in order to [[MakeWrongWhatOnceWentRight maintain the Hooviet Empire]], and set itself up to TakeOverTheWorld. When Shining ultimately defeats Makarov by feeding him to [[ClockRoaches the Blank Wolf]], all the changes to reality are [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong undone]], with the only ones remembering the DarkerAndEdgier timeline being Shining, Cadence, and Minuette (who, due to being ImmuneToFate, a [[AnthropomorphicPersonification Concept]], and a [[Series/DoctorWho Time Lord]], respectfully, have RippleEffectProofMemory).]] |
| 128 | ** [[spoiler:Apple Bloom hijacks [[RewritingReality Discord's endgame plan]] and briefly becomes TheOmnipotent to repair the damage he caused to reality. She took the opportunity to [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong undo a number of disasters]] and give them a better outcome than they did originally.]] |
| 129 | * In ''Fanfic/{{Drakonophobia}}'' [[spoiler: the White Dragon Sotrahkun]] is forced to do this when Alduin screw things up extremely badly. He'd created Tears through time that allowed him to summon alternate versions of himself but in the meanwhile breaking time as we know it. [[spoiler: The [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim Dragonborn, Petra]] is forced to sacrifice herself mend things in the end with the help of Brynjolf, sets the retcon in motion.]] as a result, only [[spoiler: Brynjolf]] remembers the old timeline as [[spoiler: Sotrahkun]] rewrites and actually merges timelines. But it's hinted that [[spoiler: Petra]] will eventually recall everything that happpened, albeit at a different pace. |
| 130 | * In ''Fanfic/Flashpoint2AdventSolaris'', the cosmic retcon at the end of ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueDarkApokolipsWar'' is both a major part of the plot (the entire reason it's happening, actually) and is also undone via another retcon right in the 16th chapter when the villain, [[spoiler:Mephiles the Dark]], transports most of the heroes to the part of the film right before the titular war started in the first place - it's unknown if them preventing the events from happening was intended on his part or not. |
| 131 | * In the ''Fanfic/InfinityCrisis'' spin-off story ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/14084245/1/Infinity-Crisis-Another-Side-of-the-Glimpses Another Side of the Glimpses]]'' by Yooly, [[spoiler:her AuthorAvatar, the Pighead, causes massive cosmic retcons throughout the Multiverse.]] [=L1701E=]'s spin-off stories ''Temporal Tete-A-Tete'', ''History Lesson-51'', and ''History Lesson-199999'' examined some of those effects, most notably revealing that [[spoiler: Earth-51 (The DC Extended Universe) and Earth-199999 (The Marvel Cinematic Universe) had their histories altered to be closer to their comic sources.]] |
| 132 | * This is part of the backstory of ''Fanfic/MarriageOfHeavenAndHell''. The Norse Goddess of Death, Halja, unleashed [[{{Gotterdammerung}} Ragnarok]] on [[RageAgainstTheHeavens Heaven itself]] with the power of the Red Dragon, [[{{Retconjuration}} retconning every Longinus user up to that point out of existence]] in the process, and planted herself as Heaven's new ruler. The only one she missed was Divine Dividing, currently wielded by Makoto Fujiwara, the son of the Seraph Gabriel and a human. |
| 133 | * The ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' fanfic ''[[http://www.fimfiction.net/story/12347/make-a-wish Make a Wish]]'' has a magic wishing star that grants ''every'' wish made on it. Many wishes are purely physical changes, but a few feature Cosmic Retcons on both large and small scale. |
| 134 | ** On the small scale, Rainbow Dash wishes for a chance to meets the Wonderbolts, and finds herself having won a contest she never remembered entering. Yet everypony else remembers her doing so and even remarks that she visited the contest's office on a weekly basis to find out if she'd won. |
| 135 | ** On the larger scale, Scootaloo makes the wish that she was Rainbow Dash's sister and wakes up the next day Rainbow's flesh-and-blood little sister. Like Rainbow and the contest, Scootaloo's the only one who remembers anything different in her case. The story focuses on her realizing what happened and dealing with the implications. |
| 136 | * A version of Gaster causes this in ''Blog/BloomingDreemurr'', quite simply after the blog got into a sort of state of chaos, reseting everything back to when the blog had begun, with Flowey underground. |
| 137 | * ''Fanfic/ThereWasOnceAnAvengerFromKrypton'': This is eventually explained in Chapter 34 of ''The Girl Who Could Knock Out the Hulk'' to be the cause of the series' MassiveMultiplayerCrossover nature. Specifically, [[spoiler: Doctor Doom and [[AlternateSelf his timeline's Reed Richards]] have been dragging people, species, and objects from other universes into Earth-199999 and then rebooting the timeline to [[MergedReality make them retroactively part of it]], [[WellIntentionedExtremist all for the purpose of making Earth strong enough to fight off Thanos and the Black Order]].]] |
| 138 | * ''Fanfic/RediscoveredFrontiers'': This story takes the Super Genesis Wave multiversal rewrite of ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics'' and in a twist makes the post-reboot world the ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogIDW'' universe. Much of the drama surrounds how survivors of the Super Genesis Wave have to deal with suddenly being thrust into a familiar yet unfamiliar world coming to terms with how their loved ones either don't exist anymore or have been "rebooted" to have no memory of or even contact with them, as well as those of this new reality coming to terms with the fact that an entire ''multiverse'' died so they could exist. [[spoiler:That's to say nothing of several characters on either side who either want to wipe out the "remnants of an obsolete universe" or who want to "deboot" the multiverse back to the way it was at the expense of everyone who didn't exist before it while viewing these "Genesis Births" as having less meaning than their own lives.]] |
| 139 | [[/folder]] |
| 140 | |
| 141 | [[folder:Films — Live-Action]] |
| 142 | * In ''Film/TheFlash2023'', [[spoiler: Barry's attempts to utilize the Speed Force have fundamentally transformed his universe. Wonder Woman and Aquaman aren’t around, Victor never became Cyborg (or at least hasn't become Cyborg yet), Bruce Wayne is now a completely different person, and Kara Zor-El landed on Earth instead of her cousin]]. |
| 143 | * ''Film/InTheMouthOfMadness'' has some particularely mind-bending ones. The crux of the story is that horror writer Sutter Cane has become so powerful that his creations have become reality, and the protagonist John Trent finds himself in the fictional setting of his stories. By the time he gets back to the "real world" [[spoiler:his partner Linda Styles has been written out by the writer (not even her boss, who sent them on their mission, can remember her), and Cane's reality-destroying novel was already delivered by Trent to the publishers and has been on the shelves for weeks]], even though Trent just emerged from Hobb's End. The Cane that Trent encountered might also be an AuthorAvatar of the real Cane, who is writing the entire story [[spoiler:of the movie ([[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou yes, the one you are watching]])]], Cane might have been influenced by a monolith of {{Eldritch Abomination}}s to change reality so they can transform it into something wholly alien, or [[ThroughTheEyesOfMadness Trent may be particularly insane]]. |
| 144 | * ''Film/MonsterAGoGo'' does this for a poorly executed GainaxEnding. At the end of the film the monster suddenly vanishes and everyone forgets the monster existed and the astronaut who became the monster is found alive and normal with no memory of how he ended up where he was found. There never was a monster and how this happened is not explained, though the narrator speculates that some cosmic force is responsible. |
| 145 | * ''Film/StarTrek2009'': [[BigBad Nero]] traveling back in time and doing lots of things, radically changing the timeline, creating a brand new continuity: |
| 146 | ** Killing [[spoiler:Kirk's father]]. |
| 147 | ** And [[spoiler: blowing up Vulcan, and killing Spock's mom.]] |
| 148 | ** Actually played with, since Creator/JJAbrams himself stated that his movies take place in a parallel AlternateTimeline [[spoiler: caused by events in the movie]] and that everything else in ''Franchise/StarTrek'' canon is still intact. |
| 149 | * Japanese time-travel movie ''Film/TimeSlipYankee'' shows what happens when you mess with your parents first meeting ''Film/BackToTheFuture1''-style. [[spoiler: The main character is snap-backed into a retconned timeline where his then girlfriend in now his mother after his parents fell for different people. Everything about his life is different, even his body.]] |
| 150 | * ''Film/XMenFilmSeries'' |
| 151 | ** ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'' and ''Film/XMenApocalypse''. The events of ''[=DoFP=]'' not only [[spoiler:fix the BadFuture]], but also [[spoiler:alter the events of ''Film/X2XMenUnited'' and ''Film/XMenTheLastStand'', preventing the death of Scott and Jean (who's still taken to wearing red). ''Film/XMenOriginsWolverine'' also gets discontinued, not just its ending, but by showing that William Stryker is different and Logan's flashbacks to his adamantium bonding are those of the first two movies - not to mention what happens with ''Film/{{Deadpool|2016}}'', who becomes the Merc with a Mouth instead of a zombified AllYourPowersCombined mutant controlled by Stryker.]] |
| 152 | ** [[spoiler:There is still a scene from ''Origins'' in ''[=DoFP=]'', and its events are alluded to. And Jean unleashes the Phoenix much earlier than she did in ''Last Stand'', and she controls it to do good this time. Charles seemingly got the info about the mess he caused by locking the Phoenix inside Jean's mind when he read Wolverine's mind, and did all he could to help Jean master it instead.]] |
| 153 | ** [[spoiler: It also becomes obvious that Weapon X plays out differently than originally.]] |
| 154 | ** BroadStrokes: [[spoiler:While ''Film/XMen1'' probably still happened more or less the same way it did in the original timeline (Rogue's got her white hair), the events of ''Film/X2XMenUnited'' must have been altered for Jean to be alive and one of the good guys, as well as Mystique no longer being a murderous terrorist or Magneto's [[TheDragon Dragon]]. Also, among the few things that remain from ''The Last Stand'' and ''Origins'' respectively are Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat being played by Elliot Page and Beast becoming Kelsey Grammer when older, and Wolverine having bone claws.]] |
| 155 | *** Apparently certain characters were born earlier due to events in ''[=DoFP=]'', such as Storm, Angel and Nightcrawler to name a few. |
| 156 | [[/folder]] |
| 157 | |
| 158 | [[folder:Literature]] |
| 159 | * Jake's death, and the subsequently epic time-and-space-altering events that bring him back from the dead in ''Franchise/TheDarkTower''. |
| 160 | * ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' |
| 161 | ** ''Literature/ThiefOfTime'': History was [[TimeCrash literally shattered]] by a "glass clock" that trapped the AnthropomorphicPersonification of Time, and then patched back together (albeit with some weird gaps and miscellaneous changes) by the History Monks; the plot of the book revolves around the History Monks stopping someone else from making a second clock. It's implied that this [[AWizardDidIt explains]] the prevalence of SchizoTech on the Discworld and some of the continuity gaps from earlier books. |
| 162 | ** ''Literature/{{Mort}}'': The Interface is the physical manifestation of the universe [[DelayedRippleEffect gradually]] retconning away Mort's 'mistake' in not taking Keli's life. More accurately, Mort changed [[YouCantFightFate how history is meant to go]], and the Interface represents the inertia of history Cosmic Retconning it back again. |
| 163 | * ''Franchise/DoctorWhoExpandedUniverse'': |
| 164 | ** Franchise/FactionParadox has a far more insidious form of this: the Paradox [[TheVirus Biodata Virus]]. It latches into the part of your biology linked to the Time Vortex... and makes it so you ''always'' have worked for them and ''always'' will. [[spoiler:The Eighth Doctor was infected, and his timeline nearly destroyed.]] |
| 165 | ** ''Literature/EighthDoctorAdventures'' book ''[[Recap/EighthDoctorAdventuresTheAncestorCell The Ancestor Cell]]'', based mainly around said Faction, features a huge and weird one [[spoiler:with the Doctor's destroyed TARDIS retconning it ''back'', after holding both timelines intact for quite some time, and blasting the sector of space that included Gallifrey into quarks]]. |
| 166 | * In the ''Dragonlance Legends'' books, much of the plot revolves around the efforts of various characters to Cosmic Retcon stuff they don't like in the past. Tasslehoff is central to this, because kender who travel through time can change the flow of events. First Tasslehoff tries to {{Retcon}} away the Cataclysm; Raistlin [[spoiler:tricks him into breaking the time-travel device instead]]. Then Raistlin tries to {{Retcon}} away the death of Fistandantilus (since he himself has taken Fistandantilus's place in history), and [[spoiler:succeeds, entering the Abyss instead of being blown to smithereens]]. Finally, Caramon and Tasslehoff [[spoiler:wind up in a future where Raistlin wins, and return to the present in order to {{Retcon}} everything back to normal]]. The plot of ''Legends'' will give you migraines if you think about it too much. |
| 167 | * ''Literature/InCryptid'': In ''That Ain't Witchcraft'', [[spoiler:Antimony's defeat of the [[EldritchAbomination Crossroads]]]] is explained by [[spoiler:the [[GeniusLoci Anima Mundi]]]] as this, since she [[spoiler:went back in time and killed them before they ever took the Anima Mundi's place]]. Somehow, this doesn't cause any temporal paradoxes, and everything [[spoiler:the Crossroads]] did (or "didn't do") still happened and everyone remembers it. It can be quite a MindScrew. |
| 168 | * The book ''Literature/StarbrightAndTheDreamEater'' has one, after Starbright manages to defeat the Dream Eater. She wakes up the next day and finds that every single reference to the "spindle sickness" that the Dream Eater created is instead replaced with a reference to a dangerous pesticide. Every person who got sick from spindle sickness got sick from the pesticide instead, and no-one except her remembers the Dream Eater even existed. |
| 169 | * ''Literature/{{Stardoc}}'': In ''Dream Called Time'', [[spoiler:Cherijo and Duncan]] end up in an alternate timeline where [[RetGone they never existed]] after [[spoiler:convincing the [[AbusivePrecursors Jxin]] ''not'' to [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence transcend]] (and inadvertently [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong make the universe]] a [[CrapsackWorld worse place]] in the process)]]. Fortunately, the only effects on them are that [[UnPerson they're entirely undocumented]] and that the only people who remember them are those with [[RippleEffectProofMemory ripple-effect-proof memories]]. [[spoiler:Including, somehow, their daughter.]] |
| 170 | * In ''Literature/StarTrekDepartmentOfTemporalInvestigations'', one of the characters is completely deleted from history by a particularly malicious "uptime" villain ("Future Guy" from ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise''). He proudly refers to it as the most satisfying achievement of his career. |
| 171 | * Used in the ''Literature/StarTrekStringTheory'' novels. When ''Voyager'' accidentally meddles with the "strings" underlying reality, space starts to unravel. The solution to the entire mess eventually involves rewriting thousands of years of history. An event which actually occurred within the current story (all photons within a certain range being drawn into Exosia, a realm of subspace) is now placed many millennia in the past. The starless Void from the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' Season Five opening episode is the result of this event. Its existence is therefore one big Cosmic Retcon, down to the species who developed there but technically didn't exist until a few weeks prior... |
| 172 | * Averted in ''Franchise/StarWarsLegends''. Jacen Solo's brother, Anakin, died. Jacen develops the power to use the Force to time travel. Jacen's Sith apprentice is Anakin's girlfriend. Jacen's time travel, however, can only alter the events in his memory, not in reality. |
| 173 | ** [[WordOfGod Apparently]], bringing Anakin back from the dead was seriously considered for the ending of ''Literature/LegacyOfTheForce'', but they figured that messing with time travel in the ''Star Wars'' universe could be pretty messy. |
| 174 | * In the ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'' universe, the book trilogy ''Literature/TheWarOfTheAncients'' {{RetCon}}s some parts of Azerothean history due to a few people going back in time (most notably the blue dragonflight going from extinct to having enough members to wage war against all other dragons and some mortals at the same time). |
| 175 | * The ''Literature/WellWorld'' series by Creator/JackChalker has this as a power granted by someone who has root access to the Well World's main computer. Nathan Brazil had rebooted the universe at least three times. |
| 176 | * In ''Literature/TheWheelOfTime'' this is a ''feature'' of its strongest magical attack, "balefire." Anything hit by balefire is erased from the past few seconds/minutes of time; anything living hit is DeaderThanDead, as the only known method of [[BackFromTheDead resurrecting someone]] without ''Reincarnation'' can only work if begun immediately after death. This not only stops [[BigBad the Dark One]] from bringing QuirkyMinibossSquad members BackFromTheDead, it can be used to un-die [[AnyoneCanDie main characters those villains had killed]]... but historically the spell was [[DangerousForbiddenTechnique outlawed]], after flagrant misuse caused {{Continuity Snarl}}s threatening to [[ApocalypseHow unravel creation itself]]. |
| 177 | * In ''Literature/{{Worm}}'', part of [[Creator/{{wildbow}} the author]]'s justification for his rewriting of [[http://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/buzz-7-9/ Chapter 7.9]] a day after it was posted was a power of one of the involved characters. [[spoiler:Coil, the boss of the protagonist's team, had the power to split the world into two timelines and then collapse whichever one he didn't like]]. |
| 178 | [[/folder]] |
| 179 | |
| 180 | [[folder:Live-Action TV]] |
| 181 | * The entire plot of ''Series/TwelveMonkeys'' is built around the heroes trying to bring one of these about by [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong changing history and preventing the global pandemic]]. They succeed in doing so at the start of Season 2, but due to the Army of the 12 Monkeys' persistence the plague is only delayed, so they just create a CloseEnoughTimeline, where things are mostly the same. [[spoiler: They finally succeed in the series finale, as Cole -- who has since come to realize that he's the lynchpin of the series' StableTimeLoop -- allows himself to be erased from time, breaking the loop and creating a new timeline where the plague, the 12 Monkeys, and [[BigBad the Witness]] never existed.]] |
| 182 | * The ''Franchise/{{Arrowverse}}'' has had a few of these: |
| 183 | ** The Flashpoint, triggered by Barry's actions in the season 2 finale of ''Series/{{The Flash|2014}}'', causes major changes to reality. Actually, there are two cosmic retcons: one after Barry saves his mother from being killed by Eobard Thawne and one after he undoes it, upon realizing that the new reality is bleaker because he is estranged from the West family. Despite having reversed the course of history, things don't exactly go back to the way they were. Though Barry is once again close with the West family, Iris still has a falling out with Joe. Cisco's brother, Dante, is dead, while Diggle and Lyla now have a son, J.J., instead of a daughter, Sara. There are also new metahumans, one of them being Ralph Dibny, who was a dead man pre-Flashpoint. |
| 184 | ** The [[Series/LegendsOfTomorrow Legends]] do this from time to time, simply because of their [[TimeTravel line of work]]. Martin Stein's daughter, Lily, is one such example; she didn't exist before he time traveled to meet with his younger self, advising himself to be closer to his wife which inadvertently lead to a child. |
| 185 | ** The Crisis, as shown in ''Series/{{Crisis on Infinite Earths|2019}}'' crossover event, is a far bigger retcon than Flashpoint. It basically merges all pre-Crisis Earths excluding those that serve as the setting for unrelated DC shows into a single reality called "Earth-Prime" (so Earth-38 from ''Series/{{Supergirl}}'' is merged, but Earth-9 from ''Series/{{Titans|2018}}'' isn't), therefore Barry and Kara can now interact without having to use Cisco's device. Pre-Crisis Earth-2 is erased, but the Laurel Lance from that Earth somehow still exists in addition to the Earth-1 Laurel who remains dead. Since Oliver is responsible for resetting the multiverse, he also brings back many of his dead loved ones, including Moira, Quentin, Tommy, and Emiko. Sara Diggle is brought back from nonexistence and allowed to exist with J.J., so now Diggle has two kids instead of one. Star City is made a city devoid of crime, erasing the pessimistic future from ''Series/{{Arrow}}'' season 7 in favor of the much happier and more positive future as shown in "Green Arrow and the Canaries". |
| 186 | * ''Franchise/{{Buffyverse}}'': |
| 187 | ** ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'': Dawn's existence. In order to hide a magic key to another dimension, an order of monks decided to give it the shape and flesh of a human girl and implant FalseMemories in Buffy and everyone in her life to make it seems like Dawn was always the youngest daughter of the family. |
| 188 | ** ''Series/{{Angel}}'': The title character makes a Faustian bargain to have his son retconned into having lived a happier childhood and not remembering his ''real'' life (in which he was raised by a psychopath in hell). As a consequence, everyone else forgot about the boy's existence; so in a sense, it's the exact opposite of the Dawn scenario. Network higher-ups requested the retcon due to the show's dense continuity, which ended up being dumped back into the plot anyway. |
| 189 | * ''Series/DoctorWho'' has loads, of course. (For Expanded Universe examples, see Literature and Radio.) |
| 190 | ** Between the old and new series there came an off-screen event called the Time War, removing the Time Lords and Daleks (though Creator/RussellTDavies was [[FirstLawOfResurrection rather reluctant to stick to that]]) and changing the Laws of Time. It's also a handy crutch for any inconsistencies. |
| 191 | ** In series 5, the cracks in the universe play a similar role. In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E5FleshAndStone "Flesh and Stone"]], the Doctor realizes they've erased the events of [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E12TheStolenEarth "The Stolen Earth"]]/[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E13JourneysEnd "Journey's End"]] (explaining why Amy [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E3VictoryOfTheDaleks didn't recognize the Daleks]]) and [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E14TheNextDoctor "The Next Doctor"]]. The cracks also ate [[spoiler:Amy's parents]], and end up erasing [[spoiler:Rory, and later the Doctor himself]] before things are fixed, although everyone eventually gets better. |
| 192 | ** In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS33E13TheNameOfTheDoctor "The Name of the Doctor"]], the Doctor's open timestream at his grave on Trenzalore provides the Great Intelligence with an opportunity to successfully retcon the Doctor's entire timeline, and Clara has to intervene throughout the Doctor's history to retcon the retcon. However, as of [[Recap/DoctorWho2013CSTheTimeOfTheDoctor "The Time of the Doctor"]], the Doctor no longer dies on Trenzalore, so the retcons may never have happened. |
| 193 | ** In a very trivial example, at the start of "[[Recap/DoctorWho60thASWildBlueYonder Wild Blue Yonder]]", the Doctor and Donna accidentally crash into the apple tree where Sir Isaac Newton discovered gravity. The scientists mishears their joke about "the gravity of the situation", resulting in history changing so that it's "mavity" instead of "gravity." |
| 194 | * The fourth season of ''Series/{{Fringe}}'' picks up in a timeline that's been cosmically retconned as a result of [[spoiler:Peter being [[RetGone erased from existence]]]] at the end of season 3. The differences are subtle -- the prime universe Fringe Division has a different lineup, Walter is a shut-in, some characters are now strangers -- but most of what happened in the previous seasons seems to have unfolded in the same way, or at least similarly. |
| 195 | * ''Series/KaizokuSentaiGokaiger'' has [[spoiler:the power of the Greatest Treasure of the Universe, which lets its discoverer rewrite the universe to suit their own desires. The Gokaiger ask if it could eliminate [[TheEmpire Zangyack]], and are told that it would be as if Zangyack never existed -- but that they would also erase all of the Franchise/SuperSentai from existence too. They end up rejecting the "wish", deciding to take on Zangyack themselves, because facing impossible odds is what Super Sentai members do, and because they don't want to lose everything that they've gained and become as a result of the hardships Zangyack inflicted upon their lives.]] |
| 196 | * ''Series/KamenRiderBuild'': [[spoiler:In the final arc of the series, the heroes enact a plan to defeat the BigBad Evolto by merging their Earth with one from an AlternateUniverse, using Evolto's seemingly limitless power to fuel the merger. They succeed, and the new world created is one where the events of the series -- from the Skywalls dividing Japan all the way up to the FinalBattle -- never happened. The cast all lived normal, ordinary lives...except for the protagonists Sento and Ryuga. Because Evolto essentially "created" both of them[[note]]Sento was the product of him taking one person's face, putting it on another man's body, and erasing his memories to use him as a puppet; Ryuga was infected with Evolto's DNA ''in vitro''[[/note]], they're basically walking anomalies, remembering everything that happened but being complete unknowns in the new world, even to their former friends. To make matters weirder, there's a second "peaceful world" version of Ryuga who never experienced the shows events, so he can't just take up his old life or find his (now living) girlfriend; the show doesn't say whether there's a second Sento, but we ''do'' see that Takumi Katsuragi (who became Sento) and Taro Satou (whose appearance was copied to the amnesiac Katsuragi to make "Sento" and who was killed to keep the secret) definitely are here, so presumably not. The series ends with them setting off to find a place in the world, and Sento [[IShouldWriteABookAboutThis planning to turn the adventures of Kamen Rider Build into a TV show]].]] |
| 197 | * The latter part of ''Series/{{Lost}}'' season 5 concerns the main characters, having traveled to 1977, attempting to prevent the plane crash which initially brought them to the island, thus undoing everything that has happened so far in the series. [[spoiler:It doesn't work, though it does create its own side-effects later on.]] |
| 198 | * Occurs near the end of ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers''. The villains turn back time to a period a decade or so before, and when the effect was canceled, anything that had changed during the reverse-time led to changes in the present day. Most notably, Aisha had moved to a small African village as a child, and Tanya's AdventurerArchaeologist parents had left her in America rather than the African village. |
| 199 | * ''Series/{{The Sandman|2022}}'', "[[Recap/TheSandman2022S01E11ADreamOfAThousandCatsCalliope A Dream of a Thousand Cats]]": The Prophet's message is that the nature of reality can be changed more easily than people realize -- if enough people, perhaps as few as a thousand, all dream the same thing at once, that will become reality. It's already happened once, creating the damaged and strife-torn world we inhabit; when the Cat of Dreams is explaining this to the character who will become the Prophet, he specifically states that the dream didn't just change the universe from its former state into its current state, but rewrote all of history so that the universe had always been the way it is now. |
| 200 | * In ''Series/StargateSG1'', a two-part episode in Season Eight involved the team time-traveling back 5,000 years into the past, screwing something up, and then their counterparts in the alternate timeline had to time travel back again to fix it. In the end, [[InSpiteOfANail the only visible difference]] was that [[CloseEnoughTimeline Jack's pond now had fish in it]]. |
| 201 | * ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'': The Krenim timeship from "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS4E8YearOfHell Year of Hell]]" is a weaponized form of this. Its main weapon erases its target from past, present and future, resulting in it never having existed except in the memory of the timeship crew, which is insulated by {{technobabble}}. Unfortunately using it on the Krenim Imperium's current enemy the Rilnar means that ancient [[NonHumanHumanoidHybrid interbreeding]] between them never happened, meaning that the Rilnar never contributed a crucial antibody to the Krenim genome, meaning billions of Krenim are now dead of a plague. Annorax, the captain, spends the next couple centuries trying to undo his mistake with more temporal incursions, which eventually brings him into conflict with ''Voyager''. [[spoiler:The two-parter ends with Janeway ramming the timeship, causing it to erase ''itself'', which pushes the ResetButton on the two-parter's entire plot. This, however, includes undoing the erasing of the Rilnar, thus solving the Krenim's problems too. However, the last scene is Annorax working on time equations, so we ''might'' have it all start again.]] |
| 202 | * In the ''Series/StarTrekStrangeNewWorlds'' episode "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow", it's discovered that the Eugenics War's start date, initially established as 1992 over in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "Space Seed", has been bumped up because of various time travelers trying to alter history. |
| 203 | * ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': |
| 204 | ** Balthazar attempts to do this by traveling back in time to save the Titanic: this has the effect of ruining Celine Dion's career, creating 50,000 new souls for Castiel, and preventing the deaths of Ellen and Jo Harvelle. Unfortunately for them, Castiel resinks it at the end of the episode after Fate herself [[WhatTheHellHero calls him out on it]]. The whole thing was on Castiel's orders, in order to create new souls for the civil war in Heaven that he's losing. |
| 205 | ** In "Lebanon", John Winchester inadvertently time travels past the time he would have died, which triggers ripple effects to reality, causing Dean to become a fugitive, Sam to become a motivational speaker, Castiel to remain a robotic servant of Heaven under Zachariah (who is still alive), and Mary to begin disappearing because the circumstances that would have led to her resurrection never happened. Deciding that he cannot sacrifice Mary for the world, John chooses to return back in time. |
| 206 | [[/folder]] |
| 207 | |
| 208 | [[folder:Tabletop Games]] |
| 209 | * ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' gets hit with one of these once in a while to explain the shifts between editions. |
| 210 | ** One of the last adventures for ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' 2nd Edition was ''Die Vecna Die!'', in which the titular evil god gains control of the city of Sigil, a CosmicKeystone that lets him restructure TheMultiverse to his whim. He fails, but the city's rightful ruler, the Lady of Pain, can't put everything back together perfectly. This was implicitly meant to explain away the differences between the cosmologies of 2nd and 3rd Editions. |
| 211 | ** ''TabletopGame/ForgottenRealms'' is especially infamous for this, having one for each edition. The Time of Trouble (in which the gods where forced to WanderTheEarth) and the shattering of the [[CosmicKeystone Tablets of Fate]] that it caused explains the shift to 2nd edition, the Spellplague caused by the death of the goddess of magic explains the shift to 4th edition, and the Second Sundering, caused by her resurrection and the reforging of the tablets, explains the shift to 5th edition. |
| 212 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'' manages to have its own equivalent of Crisis on Infinite Worlds during a First Age Historical Event called "The Time of Cascading Years". It was a rare foray into Temporal Mechanics for the series; Creation had split into 700 separate timelines, each one with only a single Celestial Exaltation in it. The timelines each reintegrated when that timeline's Exalt managed to save Creation in some massive way... which took longer for some than others. First Age historians basically ended up hand waving the calendar as 'skipping over' the Time of the Cascading Years in the year count, as some timelines were hundreds or thousands of years older than others. The writers primarily introduced it to allow Player Characters in the First Age to have Multiple Conflicting Continuities about "Who saved what from whom with how many chickens", who got to wield the Aidenweiss, and other sorts of badassery that would otherwise be exclusive to historical [=NPCs=]. |
| 213 | * In ''TabletopGame/{{GURPS}} Infinite Worlds'', a retcon is called an "ontoclysm" or "reality quake", described as a cosmic event that can change the past and even the natural laws of a given universe. The game even gives rules for attempting to ''trigger'' one! It has been mentioned that superhero worlds are especially susceptible to reality quakes, and that any world with magic or super-powers could be explained by "shards" of the previous reality existing in the new universe (which sounds much like the DCU's explanations about the various Crisis of Infinite Retcons). |
| 214 | * The ''TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening'' {{Sourcebook}} ''Imperial Mysteries'' introduced this as a big trick of archmasters. Via Imperium Rites, they can build off of changes they've already made in the world to alter fundamental truths of reality, retroactively introducing changes to history or cosmology. This is part of how one becomes an archmaster (rendering the facts of one's existence only vaguely remembered to mages and not at all to others), and is the most well understood path to [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence Ascension]]; you remake the world into one where your transcendence is and always was a fundamental property. RippleEffectProofMemory is possible, but only to archmasters and only while within their [[PocketDimension Golden Road]]. |
| 215 | ** This is also the threat posed by some of the greater Abyssal Intruders. The largest ones, otherwise known as Annunaki, represent realities that never were and never could be, but which try to establish a foothold on the Fallen/Phenomenal World whenever Paradox opens a large enough door. The most prominent one in the setting is the Prince of 100,000 Leaves, a Hyperborea-with-chainsaws-style timeline so abhorrent reality itself said "Nope" and aborted it. Due to mage screw-ups, it has established a cult in the Fallen World that tries to assemble its various scraps of alternate history (the Leaves of its title) so that it can rewrite history and make it so that this is how things always were. |
| 216 | * ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'' had the events of the ''Literature/TimeSpiralCycle'', which culminated in The Mending; multiple Planeswalkers uniting to stop the multiverse from unraveling itself. This caused all the involved Planeswalkers to die or lose their spark, and surviving Planeswalkers, as well as anyone that was born with a Planeswalker spark afterwards, were much less powerful; While they could still travel through the multiverse, they did not have the power to do so at a mere whim, nor were they immortal. This meant that new Planeswalkers could be printed on cards that didn't have to choose between representing their power, and being properly balanced. One of the formerly-god-like Planeswalkers, the Elder Dragon Nicol Bolas, was ''not'' happy about being depowered; he is now one of Magic's most prominent villains, with multiple sets centering around his attempts to undo the retcon and regain his former power level. |
| 217 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Nobilis}}'' has one of these in its BackStory. Something like 500 years of time were erased, but in an uneven way so that some events moved back the full five hundred years, some a portion of that and some not at all. The souls of all the people on the space colonies this erased are very upset, and seemingly still on the planet they used to live. |
| 218 | ** This is also the goal of the [[BigBad Excrucians]]; they attack aspects of reality, causing them never to have existed. |
| 219 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'': anything and everything can be easily fixed with liberal application of [[HordeOfAlienLocusts Tyranids]]. This is how the [[OldShame Squats faction]] was quietly removed from the product line. |
| 220 | [[/folder]] |
| 221 | |
| 222 | [[folder:Video Games]] |
| 223 | * The Mirror Realm in ''VideoGame/BlankDream'' supposedly has the ability to grant one's greatest desire. In Mishiro's case, she wants to make it so that [[CessationOfExistence she never existed]] at all. |
| 224 | * ''VideoGame/CityOfHeroes'' has the [=PsychoChronoMetron=], a device that allows psychics to alter the world. It was only used once; as something of an aversion, it caused a ContinuitySnarl as [[spoiler:the villainous inventor attempts to use it to turn a hero into an ally, without knowing anything about his history. The history of this hero was left... somewhat confused.]] |
| 225 | * The weapon of the Chrono Legionnaire in ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquerRedAlert2'' does this. The target is locked in a time bubble and slowly erased from existence. More 'complex' (i.e. expensive) units take longer to erase, presumably because every individual component must be written out of history. |
| 226 | * ''VideoGame/Drakengard3'' uses this trope as [[spoiler:a central plot device. Accord, a cyborg girl from the Old World who serves as the story's narrator, tries to find a branch where [[EldritchAbomination The Flower]] is sealed away and no Intoner survives. The way alternate timelines are handled has been compared to ''VisualNovel/SteinsGate''.]] |
| 227 | * In ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'' series, at many points in the series and in the backstory, these have resulted from "[[TimeCrash Dragon Breaks]]" and other timeline altering, [[RealityIsOutToLunch reality warping]] events. To note some of the more prominent examples: |
| 228 | ** In the first few games of the series, the province of Cyrodiil/"The Imperial Province" is noted to be an overgrown jungle, with the Imperial City at its center. Come ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion Oblivion]]'', Cyrodiil has transformed into a region comprised mostly of plains and variable climates. Various explanations have been given for this, both in-universe and [[WordOfGod out]][[note]]It ''was'' supposed to be a jungle in ''Oblivion'', but ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' convinced the devs to make it a more temperate and lush climate instead[[/note]], but in-universe, no one remembers when Cyrodiil wasn't a more temperate, cultivated province, not even older characters who have been around for millennia like [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim Serana]], despite at least one book exists calling Cyrodiil a jungle. |
| 229 | ** ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIDaggerfall Daggerfall]]'' has seven possible MultipleEndings, depending on what [[PlayerCharacter the Agent]] decides to do with the [[MacGuffin Mantella]]. Later games reveal that ''all'' of the endings happened at once due to an event known as the "Warp in the West", MergingTheBranches of the endings, though [[BroadStrokes none to the same extent they would have individually]]. For example, instead of one kingdom taking over the entire Iliac Bay, it is divided into four. Likewise, [[EvilSorcerer Mannimarco]] still ascends as a god, but in a rather minor station. |
| 230 | ** Following the posthumous [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence ascent]] of [[FounderOfTheKingdom Tiber Septim]] to godhood as the [[DeityOfHumanOrigin deity Talos]], he is said to have used his powers to cause several of these. To note: |
| 231 | *** [[MultipleChoicePast Was he really]] Talos of Atmora, a Nord who heroically rose to the position of Emperor, uniting all of Tamriel for the first time, as [[WrittenByTheWinners orthodox Imperial history]] states? Or was he Hjalti Early-Beard of High Rock, a shrewd Breton politician and [[ManipulativeBastard master manipulator]] who rode his many powerful friends to become Emperor and then backstabbed them the moment it became convenient? [[TakeAThirdOption One prominent theory]] states that the latter was true ''at first'', but following his apotheosis, he literally rewrote history to make the former true as well (or instead). (Lending credence to this theory, Vivec, the Dunmeri PhysicalGod, canonically did something similar upon his own ascent to godhood.) |
| 232 | *** Until the events of the Warp in the West, Cyrodiil was described as a dense tropical jungle. Following his apotheosis, Talos is said to have [[RealityWarper warped reality]] to turn Cyrodiil into a temperate forest instead as a reward for the [[BadassArmy Imperial Legions]] who served him so well as Emperor. As seen in ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsOnline Online]]'', which is a prequel to the main series taking place hundreds of years before Septim's rise, this change is apparently retroactive, making it so that Cyrodiil was always a temperate forest land. |
| 233 | * After defeating the BigBad of ''VideoGame/EternalEden'', the world disintegrates, and the hero wakes up to find himself [[BookEnds re-experiencing a similar sequence of events as the prologue]], but with all threats of conflict gone. [[spoiler:This is because the world we see at first is just a fake reality the protagonist dreamt up of to hide his misdeeds, and defeating the evil forces that he unleashed resets the world back to the way it was before]]. |
| 234 | * In ''VideoGame/FableII'', Lord Lucien originally intended to rebuild the Tattered Spire in order to bring back his deceased wife and daughter, but by the time the Hero of Bowerstone gets to him to rescue the other three Heroes who are trapped by him, Lucien decided that the world itself needed a Cosmic Retcon. [[spoiler:However, the Hero of Bowerstone prevents Lucien from accomplishing this and either kills him or lets Reaver shoot him after explaining himself. After this, Theresa gives the Hero the choice of one of three wishes, two of which are in themselves retcons of history.]] |
| 235 | * ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyCrystalChroniclesRingOfFates'' has this [[spoiler:as its ending. The Yuris and Chelinkas from every parallel world rewrite reality to prevent the tragic events of the game and resurrect their family. Yuri and Chelinka remember, but nobody else does.]] |
| 236 | * ''VideoGame/FlipDimensions'': [[spoiler:Lily has the ability to change the lore of each world, as shown when the worlds are rebooted without their original Dark Lords. This is because each world is created from her imagination as fiction. It's implied that the Kazuki of the first Theiweth was retconned into sharing the backstory and motivations of the Kazuki from the second Theiweth.]] |
| 237 | * The end result of ''VideoGame/GhostTrick'': [[spoiler:Sissel, Missile, Detective Jowd and Yomiel go back 10 years to prevent the latter's death via a meteorite fragment, thus preventing all of the events leading up to the game proper from ever taking place]]. |
| 238 | * ''VideoGame/HalfLifeAlyx'' was marketed as an interquel set between the first two major games in the ''VideoGame/HalfLife'' series, and for the most part that is the case in the final product. [[spoiler: That is until you reach the game's [[WhamEpisode ending]] where the rescued G-Man shows Alyx the future in ''VideoGame/HalfLife2'' where Eli dies. G-Man allows Alyx to save her father's life at the cost of having to be employed by the G-Man, who is dissatisfied with Gordon Freeman in the future. The post-credits scene shows Eli alive but Alyx has been plucked out of the timeline. Luckily, Eli is aware of this and swears revenge on the G-Man.]] |
| 239 | * The "Together, Forever" ending in ''VideoGame/{{Ib}}'' involves [[spoiler:Ib and [[LivingDrawing Mary]] escaping the gallery together. The world rewrites itself so that Mary is a human girl who has always been Ib's cheerful sister.]] |
| 240 | * The opening of ''VideoGame/MegadimensionNeptuniaVII'''s second act is one of these taking place, wiping the [=CPUs=] from collective memory and establishing Gold Third as leaders in their place. [[spoiler:It puts focus on the "retroactive" part of "retcon" too, the nations now appearing as though their Gold Third has been running them for years instead of days. Since none of them even wanted this in the first place, the world is falling apart. Thankfully the entire retcon is undone when Neptune, in her [[NextTierPowerUp NEXT form]], cuts through the whole thing with a SingleStrokeAttack.]] |
| 241 | * ''Franchise/MortalKombat'': |
| 242 | ** ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9 '' game has the Raiden from ''[[VideoGame/MortalKombatArmageddon Armageddon]]'' broadcasting a message ("He must win") to himself around the time of the tournament from [[VideoGame/MortalKombat1992 the first game]], right before the [[TheBadGuyWins freshly victorious Shao Kahn]], aglow with the power of Blaze and ready to go full-on MultiversalConqueror, can finish him off. The Raiden of the past is now imbued with knowledge of events to come and sets about changing them, hopefully for the better. However, [[MortonsFork things still end up bad at the end, just in a different way]]. Past!Raiden interprets "he" as Liu Kang, so he ensures that Liu Kang will win the tournament, but if you remember, this is also what happened in the original. It's only until [[TotalPartyKill the majority of the good guys get slaughtered]] that Raiden realizes "he" actually means Shao Kahn; if he lets Shao Kahn win, the latter will proceed to invade Earthrealm, which will lead the Elder Gods to call a time out and execute Shao Kahn for breaking the tournament's rule. This does prevent Armageddon, [[PyrrhicVictory but at a great cost]]. |
| 243 | ** ''VideoGame/MortalKombat11'' brings ''another'' set of combatants from the original game, both good and bad or alive and dead, to the rebooted timeline, causing many people to have a copy of themselves running around (except for Raiden, whose present self [[RetGone turns to ash]], since there can't be two identical gods). It is later revealed that this, as well as the above case, are engineered by Kronika, a [[AboveTheGods Titan]] who wants to create a perfect world and [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans doesn't care if it means she will have to commit omnicides one after another]]. The original and rebooted timelines are not only canonical, there are in fact ''thousands'' of other alternate timelines where things proceed slightly different. In the best ending, she partially succeeds rebooting the timeline back to the prehistoric age, but Liu Kang and Raiden manage to kill her before she can rewind it further. |
| 244 | ** ''VideoGame/MortalKombat1'' goes another step further, with the entire world reset following "[=MK11's Aftermath=]" DLC, multiple characters have their entire backstories changed; such as Raiden being born a simple farmer before he undergoes shaolin training and gains his powers, Mileena being born as Kitana's twin sister instead of being a clone, and Bi-Han remaining alive[[spoiler:, in exchange for his rival and the Scorpion of this world being his own blood brother and the other Sub-Zero of the previous Mortal Kombat, Kuai Liang]]. |
| 245 | * ''[[VideoGame/MysteryCaseFiles Mystery Case Files: The Dalimar Legacy]]'' undoes the entire Ravenhearst saga (the serie's most notorious arc which, mind you, spans ''9 games'') by having [[spoiler:the Master Detective inadvertantly go back in time in the flesh of his arch-nemesis Charles Dalimar and seize the opportunity to erase both the kidnapping of Emma Ravenhearst and the construction of the dreaded Ravenhearst manor from history while sending Charles straight to jail]]. While most of the aftereffects of this aren't properly displayed yet, this most likely prevented many very significant events from the series from happening, like [[spoiler: the deaths of Emma Ravenhearst and Madame Fate, the imprisonment of Rose Somerset or the birth of Charles' children. It also allows the existence of Emma's descendents, one of which the detective meets at the end of the game.]] |
| 246 | * The events of the first game of the ''VideoGame/PrinceOfPersiaTheSandsOfTime'' trilogy are retconned ''twice''. First within the game itself, when the Prince rewinds time at the end of the game and kills the Vizier that kicked off the events of the game, and then again at the end of ''[[VideoGame/PrinceOfPersiaWarriorWithin Warrior Within]]'', inadvertently retconning the Vizier's death, causing him to come back as the BigBad of ''[[VideoGame/PrinceOfPersiaTheTwoThrones Two Thrones]]''. By the time ''Two Thrones'' rolls around, the first game's story has ceased to exist in its entirety, and only the Prince remembers what happened. |
| 247 | * One of the endings of ''VideoGame/SaintsRowGatOutOfHell'' is [[spoiler:Johnny asking God to retcon the universe so that the Earth was never destroyed, creating an alternate timeline where the Saints don't exist and Johnny, Kinzie, and Matt are cops]]. The SpinOff game ''VideoGame/AgentsOfMayhem'' takes place in this timeline. |
| 248 | * ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2006'', in which [[spoiler:the ending writes the game out of continuity,]] though Sonic still [[spoiler:presumably still has memories of what happened]]. And then ''VideoGame/SonicGenerations'' happened, [[spoiler:reintroducing the game as an alternate timeline]]. |
| 249 | * ''VideoGame/SoulcaliburVI'' seems like a simple retelling and SoftReboot of the ''VideoGame/SoulSeries'', as it sticks closely to the timeline of the original ''Soulcalibur'' era with little deviation, and what little could be passed off as AdaptationExpansion. [[spoiler:But certain deviations, leading up to Zasalamel's [[WhamEpisode secret final chapter]] where Zasalamel receives visions from his future self, thus changing his plans from [[DeathSeeker seeking death]] to acquiring both Soul Calibur and Soul Edge to [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans lead humanity to a bright new future]], before even enacting the original plan to begin with, confirms that this is in fact a hard ContinuityReboot set in a different timeline from the first six games. Furthermore, a common idea is that these visions are being received from his future self in the ''[[RippleEffectProofMemory original]]'' timeline.]] |
| 250 | * ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasonsPioneersOfOliveTown'': The mechanic that allows the PlayerCharacter to "divorce" their spouse works like this trope in practice. Once the "divorce" is implemented, everything is the same, except that the PlayerCharacter never proposed to their spouse. If the pair had a child prior to the "divorce", the child is implied to be RetGone after it. |
| 251 | * This happens in ''VideoGame/SuikodenTierkreis'' whenever the world undergoes a radical change. [[spoiler:The cause of these events is worlds fusing together, the actual retcon part is an effect of the True Chronicle.]] |
| 252 | * ''VideoGame/SuperMarioGalaxy'' presents a not-as-easy to spot form of this, [[spoiler:with the universe suffering a reset at the end of the game, and Mario welcoming a new galaxy.]] If this were self-contained, it wouldn't be here, but given how ''VideoGame/SuperMarioGalaxy2'' follows the events of this [[spoiler:new universe]] and simplifies story beats to the degree of the ''VideoGame/NewSuperMarioBros'' games, which hadn't become an official franchise until 2 years after the original ''Galaxy'' game, this fits the bill of a Cosmic Retcon. |
| 253 | [[/folder]] |
| 254 | |
| 255 | [[folder:Visual Novels]] |
| 256 | * ''VisualNovel/TimeHollow'' involves the main character "fixing" Cosmic Retcons caused by the game's villain. |
| 257 | [[/folder]] |
| 258 | |
| 259 | [[folder:Web Animation]] |
| 260 | * ''WebAnimation/IfTheEmperorHadATextToSpeechDevice'': |
| 261 | ** Uriel Ventris suspects that ''something'' has been altering history to lessen or nullify the Ultramarines' failures and making them always succeed no matter how impossible the odds are. [[spoiler:It's hinted that Marneus Calgar made some sort of DealWithTheDevil that turned the Ultramarines into MarySues, and that whatever he did occurred during the Tyranid invasion of Ultramar]]. |
| 262 | ** The second Q&A episode reveals that retconned or DeaderThanDead characters get sent to a realm called "The Retconnian". So far, Malal, [[InsistentTerminology Fucking]] Horus and the Squats have been seen in there. |
| 263 | * ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'': A rare InUniverse example that doesn't result in a continuity reboot. After Ozma's death and Salem being [[BlessedWithSuck made immortal]], she rallies an army to exact revenge of the Gods of Light and Darkness under the pretense of infinite power, and this drives the two God Brothers over the edge. Their powers kill all life on Earth (minus the immortal Salem), including all innocent lifeforms, turning the world into what everyone now knows as Remnant. They do promise that if the new world manages to live in harmony once the four Relics are brought together, they won't destroy it this time, but they ''do'' intend to destroy the world for good if it hasn't learned anything from the last time. |
| 264 | -->'''Maria Calavera:''' Honestly, I'm still coming to terms with the fact that this is humanity's second time around. |
| 265 | [[/folder]] |
| 266 | |
| 267 | [[folder:Webcomics]] |
| 268 | * ''Webcomic/BloodIsMine'': The library is capable of altering past events. First it changed how Fuse found out about it, then it completely erased Jane, Caius, and Finch's visit to it (though they still have the memory of it and what they came for). |
| 269 | -->'''Caius''': So, uh, did that actually happen, or...?\ |
| 270 | '''Dr. Finch''': Technically speaking, I don't believe it did. We remember an event that never truly occurred. |
| 271 | * An explicit power of the BigBad in ''Webcomic/CaptainSNES''. So far, it seems she can only retcon things within the framework of existing backstory, fleshing things out in a way favorable to her... but its implied that at full power, she isn't so restricted. |
| 272 | * The non-canon ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'', EGS:NP storyline "Oblivious Wand Waving" features [[http://www.egscomics.com/egsnp/?date=2008-09-12 a wand that does this]] while seeming to do nothing from the perspective of both the user and everyone else around them. |
| 273 | * Deletionism...er, Retconjuration is the [[{{Whatevermancy}} school of magic]] that allows the Titans of ''{{Webcomic/Erfworld}}'' to do this. |
| 274 | * There are two such instances of this in ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}''. |
| 275 | ** The Scratch is an event that the Sburb game provides players should they find that their game is inherently unwinnable. By physically scratching a magical construct in the game, generally something that resembles a large music-playing device such as a record on a turntable or a music box cylinder, it unleashes a massive amount of energy that completely resets the universe to some unspecified time in the past. However, all the players are replaced by their genetic ancestors who are now their own genetic descendants. |
| 276 | ** Later in the comic, John and an entourage of trolls find [[spoiler:a supposed weapon that could be used to destroy the BigBad]]. It is intangible, however, and [[https://www.homestuck.com/story/6098 reaching into it]] causes John's arm to show up ''all over the comic's history''. To help sell the effect, the panels in question (and a few Flash animations) had the arms put in retroactively. It's later discovered that it allows John to [[spoiler: alter the Alpha timeline entirely without creating a doomed timeline as a result, giving him the power of {{Retconjuration}}]]. |
| 277 | ** A few hundred pages later, this is done again, but with less impact on the plot. [[spoiler:After John met his Denizen and completed his quest by getting rid of the oil on his planet by zapping it through existence using the power mentioned above]], smudges of oil "suddenly appeared" on a lot of old panels. |
| 278 | ** After the events of Game Over, Terezi [[spoiler:sends John on a mission]] to change subtle things in the timeline in hopes that it will fix everything that has gone wrong. A few things are changed during the trolls' session, but the most notable change is [[spoiler:stopping her from killing Vriska.]] His changes have some unforeseen side effects, such as [[spoiler:post-retcon John and Roxy dying and being replaced by their pre-retcon counterparts]], but overall, [[spoiler:the changes he brings about result in them having a fighting chance against the Condesce and the multiple iterations of Jack Noir that are threatening the session.]] |
| 279 | * In ''Webcomic/{{Narbonic}}'', Dave goes on a time-travel adventure. Afterward: |
| 280 | -->'''Dave:''' I guess this proves that time is a closed system, unalterable, our fates inescapable. I guess I'll have a cigarette and brood.\ |
| 281 | '''Mell:''' Since when do you smoke? |
| 282 | * In the WebComic Webcomic/ThogInfinitron, a [[http://www.drunkduck.com/Thog_Infinitron/5061318/ movie producer interested in optioning the comic for a live-action movie]] says his offer hinges on the creators making a change to [[http://www.drunkduck.com/Thog_Infinitron/4916009/ Thog's origin]]. The resulting retcon [[http://www.drunkduck.com/Thog_Infinitron/5064794/ sets off an alarm in a time travel watchdog agency]]. |
| 283 | * The original run of ''Webcomic/{{Zortic}}'' ended with a fight between two cosmic beings creating a big swirly NegativeSpaceWedgie, which the heroes all fell into. The comic went on hiatus for a short time, and then came back, starting over from the beginning. The original run of Zortic was based exclusively on parodying popular science fiction franchises; the two cosmic beings were arguing over the merit of this. The new version is intended to be more original and less parody-driven. |
| 284 | [[/folder]] |
| 285 | |
| 286 | [[folder:Web Original]] |
| 287 | * As the Nanny in ''Literature/TheNewNarnia'' slowly turns her victims into babies, not only do her victims lose any memory of being adults, the people around them forget too, the world conforming to their infantilized state with no memory of who they once were. |
| 288 | * The Website/SCPFoundation has [[https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-3413 SCP-3413]] ("[[ShoutOut Irwin Shrugged]]"), a Website/{{YouTube}} channel known as "Safari Dave's Wild World". The channel's typical format consists of the host, wilderness expert Safari Dave, providing information (some of which is incorrect) about different kinds of animals. Any false statements in Safari Dave's videos become true 30 minutes after being posted, with all relevant information being retroactively altered (even willing [[EskimosArentReal previously-nonexistent animals]], like "sun bears", into existence). [[RippleEffectProofMemory Only people who viewed the videos before the change will remember the original reality.]] |
| 289 | [[/folder]] |
| 290 | |
| 291 | [[folder:Web Videos]] |
| 292 | * The finale of ''WebVideo/DemoReel'' had the fictional version of Doug Walker retcon the series into a kind of Purgatory inside the plothole to justify canceling it and bringing the Critic back. Which is exactly what the real version was doing (Demo Reel didn't have enough viewers to maintain it). Even the characters in both shows thought this was stupid. |
| 293 | * In ''WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment'', Linkara punched the wall in order to bring back Spoony a la Superboy Prime, but only succeeded in changing Donna Troy's origin story ''again'' and turning [[GenderBender Dr. Insano into a man]]. |
| 294 | * ''WebVideo/ToBoldlyFlee'' works this way for the entire [[Website/ChannelAwesome Awesomeverse]], explaining any kind of continuity errors in previous stories as [[spoiler:the PlotHole retroactively screwing with reality, and any future mistakes being the result of the Plot Hole merging with the universe as a whole, effectively ''breaking'' reality]]. Best summed up by this exchange: |
| 295 | -->'''[[WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment Doctor Insano]]:''' [[spoiler:The PlotHole created havoc because we used to live in a universe that made sense, but now that the hole ''is'' the universe, there is no conflict]].\ |
| 296 | '''[[WebVideo/JesuOtaku JO]]:''' But that doesn't make sense.\ |
| 297 | '''[[WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment Doctor Insano]]:''' Nothing does! Isn't it great? Crazy's the new normal...\ |
| 298 | '''[[WebVideo/LukeMochrieAndTheInners Kinley]]:''' But I don't want to live in a giant mistake!\ |
| 299 | '''[[WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment Doctor Insano]]:''' Well tough shit, nothing's perfect kid. |
| 300 | [[/folder]] |
| 301 | |
| 302 | [[folder:Western Animation]] |
| 303 | * ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'': In "[[Recap/AdventureTimeS5E2JakeTheDog Jake the Dog]]", there was [[OffModel an animation error]] involving [[spoiler:Simon's crown still being on his person despite Farmworld Finn taking it.]] In "Crossover", this gets explained as [[spoiler:Prismo teleporting the crown onto Simon's body after Farmworld Finn threw it away. From there, the crown gets destroyed by a nuclear bomb's detonation.]] |
| 304 | * ''WesternAnimation/AquaTeenHungerForce'': Parodied in "One Hundred", the [[MonsterOfTheWeek Number One-Hundred]] destroys reality to claim the Aqua Teen's souls. The trio escaped by becoming Aqua Unit Patrol Squad, a ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo''-esque mystery solving team in a new show. Things returned to normal in the next episode, the only difference is that the following seasons have new introductions. |
| 305 | * In one of the early episodes of ''WesternAnimation/TheAvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'', ComicBook/CaptainAmerica's sidekick [[ComicBook/BuckyBarnes Bucky]] is violently killed during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. Then near the end of the first season, Cap accidentally touches the Cosmic Cube, which grants his greatest desire by [[spoiler: retroactively changing history so that Bucky survived the explosion]]. |
| 306 | * All the retcons in ''WesternAnimation/Ben10Omniverse'' are explained by the entire universe getting destroyed and then getting imperfectly recreated by Ben in Alien X form in the seventh [[note]] [[OutOfOrder technically fourth]] [[/note]] episode of the series. One of the main changes is that the [[GeniusLoci living planet]] Primus, which used to be a massive DNA storage for the Omnitrix and which played a major role in season 3 of ''[[WesternAnimation/Ben10AlienForce Alien Force]]'', no longer exists. Whether this means Eunice is also RetGone is unclear; she was ''on'' Primus, but her existence wasn't directly tied to it. WordOfGod is that she's "unlikely" to appear in ''Omniverse''. (Basically, complicating things here is that there are a lot of things from past series that the Omniverse writer considers non-canon. You will have a VERY different understanding of this world depending on whether it comes from the show or from WordOfGod. However, actual episodes don't seem to be ''written'' as if we're in a radically different world where only every third episode of the prior series happened. Even so, the things the head writer considers non-canon don't show up, either; the closest we get is a non-plot-relevant CallBack to a line from the Primus episode.) |
| 307 | ** This came up again in another episode shortly before the series ended, where Ben was put on trial for it. Ben's lawyer defends him by claiming these kinds of changes were previously done all the time by others of Alien X's species, using as evidence Azmuth's [[ArtEvolution appearance]] and/or [[TheOtherDarrin voice]] having completely changed at least three times. This basically means we can blame Celestialsapiens for ''all'' continuity problems and even changes in casting and art style that you wouldn't think mattered in-universe. |
| 308 | * In season 2 of ''WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom'', Danny accidentally gets his ghost powers removed by a LiteralGenie, leaving Sam to recreate the event that gave him his powers in the first place, except [[BroughtToYouByTheLetterS she puts a "DP" logo on his suit so that he'll have it in ghost form.]] When she decides it'd be easier to just wish everything back to how it was, she does so, but specifies that she wants his costume to keep that logo because she likes it. |
| 309 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' |
| 310 | ** Fry's travel back in time created his time-copy, which also allowed them to retcon the most [[TearJerker heartbreaking episode]] of the series. |
| 311 | ** In fact, the whole Bender's Big Score movie is just made of this trope. [[spoiler:It even leads to a giant rip in the universe by the end when Bender meets all of his past selves hidden in the caves under Planet Express with all of history's treasures and convinces them to all emerge at the same time instead of when they were supposed to, at which point Nibbler exclaims "Everyone out of the Universe!" and eats himself.]] |
| 312 | * PlayedForLaughs in ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'' with [[PunnyName Rhett Caan]], a nerd with MediumAwareness and RealityWarping abilities that let him perform this. |
| 313 | * ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDooMysteryIncorporated'' ends with one. [[spoiler:[[EldritchAbomination The Nibiru Entity]]]] is defeated when the [[spoiler:crystal sarcophagus]] it was using to draw power from another dimension is destroyed. This results in [[spoiler:the sarcophagus]] imploding into a black hole and erasing [[spoiler:the Entity]] from existence. As a result, everything is changed to be as if the Curse of Crystal Cove, the very curse that [[spoiler:the Entity ]]created, never existed at all. This makes for a literally and metaphorically much brighter world that's implicitly closer to the first Scooby-Doo cartoon. |
| 314 | [[/folder]] |
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