The Big Picture: Worlds Within Worlds

[beniki]

No...

Upon examination of the map, I find that the map only loops back on itself in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Mad About you. The Southern branches and Northern branches of the map are still two distinct entities, and I will not be satisfied until these two groups are connected, to complete the loop.

 

[Bujiraso]

Bob said he would blow my mind.
Bob delivered

 

[RA92]

I think I can only say "We need to go deeper."

That's what she said.

 

[Shirokurou]

My mind - not blown.
Counter-theory that immediately popped into my head:
Tommy just imagined the characters in his head, interacting with characters HE SAW ON TV.

So if I was asked as an editor to manage continuity, that's exactly what I'd say.

 

[TheIronDuke]

Seriously serious people, don't be so serious. Weren't you allowed to play with toys as a kid or something?

We've got many people on here saying "That's pretty fun to look at!", "I wonder if I can link (my favourite show) into it somehow!", "I can make Justin Beiber disappear!" and "Oh no! We're all imaginary! XD" . Then there's the rest with "There is insufficient evidence to support this hypothesis. You can't use this to prove that Star Trek isn't real!"

Party poopers, just relax. We all already know TV shows aren't real and reality is real(hopefully). It's just a fun experiment to look at, poking fun at the idea of shared continuity. It's not the beginning of a new philosophy about the meaning of life. It's just another version of 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon. No one is suggesting that that game is significant in any way.

No one applauds that you can poke holes in a joke, just as no one applauds the cranky old men who yell at kids who are playing and laughing. Except other cranky old men.


Now, when does the "Avengers"-style linked continuity movie begin production?

 

[DTWolfwood]

Here's a creepy thought: The Mythbusters did a cameo on an episode of CSI. Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman are real people. Ergo, we are also imaginary.

gj pointing out the logic behind things like this. i salute thee. lol

Fun to think about in passing. Kind of like the 7 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon. If you stretch any coincidence or fact far enough they will inevitably connect in some shape or form.

 

[omegawyrm]

So I just checked out this chart, and it has a link to Batman. This means this whole mess of TV continuity also connects to the messed up DC continuity. But wait! There was a whole big Marvel vs DC series that connects those two continuities. Now between Marvel vs Capcom and Mortal Kombat vs DC universe, we have links to video games as well.

In other news, there's a direct link between Doctor Who and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I am very interested in hearing about this one.

Ah, but what about all the different timelines of the DC continuity that have no direct interaction with each other (the BatNolan trilogy, for instance?).

Ah, the answer to this actually reveals the important "why?" of this entire exercise.

Hypertime. Hypertime was a concept introduced by Mark Waid and entertained by some of DC's more entertaining authors, like Grant Morrison, that postulated that every story ever told with a character in it was "in continuity" to a degree, crossovers and all.

---Also The Coyote Gospel links the DC Universe to Looney Tunes, which had Daleks in one of their movies, which links the cycle back around. Batman also once crossed over with Planetary, which was a series that contained an in-universe retelling of the history of comics in the 20th century acted out by stand-ins for most of the major comic characters from that history---

Hypertime is also extremely similar to the Blazing World from Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and both in-universe constructs contain several of the same characters. The Blazing World was created with the explicit thesis that all storytelling is worthwhile and has something to teach us about ourselves, that the conflicts that take place in the minds of people are just as important as the physical ones, and storytelling embodies these conflicts, and allowing stories to freely cross-pollinate enriches and strengthens the ideas they represent.

---LOEG: Black Dossier also makes explicit reference to including the Cthulhu Mythos which throws a TON of stuff on the pile, including most anime because of (off the top of my head) the Cthulhu based Haiyore Nyaruko-san which had a character reference Roger from Big O which leads into Super Robot Taisen, which goes everywhere. Cthulhu also ties in to Fate/Zero through Bluebeard, which incorporates the Nasuverse, [there's a rabbit hole if I've ever seen one] which also ties in slightly altered versions of all real-world mythology. Interestingly, the Nasuverse contains an idea called "The Throne of Heroic Spirits" that is very similar to Hypertime and the Blazing World, only slightly less explicitly metaphorical.---

So if you take the idea far enough Mcduffie's Westphall universe example really only SUPPORTS his original thesis. Let things crossover when it's fun or when it allows you to tell a good story, let them be on their own when they need it. When all fiction exists in a big Jungian blob of cross-references, it's no big deal when they crossover, and it's ok when they don't.

---Also, to anyone complaining that the central pillar is a show where "it was all a dream", you're missing the point. The center is arbitrary, the links are the important bit. And go rewatch Inception, sometimes "it was all a dream" is a good point to make. (it means that the catharsis of a good story is just as valid and meaningful as any other positive experience in life)---

 

[rayen020]

okay my question is this. If we use actors everything is connected. are these connections via actors or actors as particular characters? Using characters would make the game work, using actors wouldn't. Well i guess it would but it wouldn't be as fun.

 

[Discord]

Well this is defiantly the "BIGGEST" Picture I've seen a long time. Now I'm thinking about life and the plain of existence for some odd reason.

 

[blackrave]

That's one big head
But I bet Pokemon isn't part of this continuity

 

[BaseKing95]

Family Guy was featured in the episode of South Park Cartoon Wars along with the Simpsons, meaning that if Simpsons did not exist neither did South Park and Family Guy

 

[allyhewitt]

mind sadly not blown. if you were to look at the original article, it's actually degrees of separation not continuity. All those shows you mentioned would not take place in his mind but rather by like a fan fick.

 

[omegawyrm]

I'm not sure if I'm going to be ninja'd by asking this but if that whole thing with Frankie and the snowglobe and the whole Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends is part of her imagination, is that a spin off this? If you want to actually understand what I am making a foolish attempt at trying to tell you check the link here:

http://www.funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/1548465/Fosters/

I apologize for the massive amount of feels you will incur for viewing this link. )':

Yes, that comic was created as a reference to the ending of St. Elsewhere. I'm honestly kind of surprised that isn't widespread knowledge.

 

[IamLEAM1983]

So, the more interesting question would actually be: What ISN'T part of Tommy Westphall's conjured multi-slash-metaverse? This kind of exercise could technically go on forever, seeing as even citing an integrated show or other cultural product in passing makes you part of that construct.

McDuffie's point stands. People just need to chill over continuities and reboots. These are things that aren't motivated by a love of the medium, they're motivated by cold, hard cash and audience or readership numbers. Marvel and DC will keep piling up Infinite Crises and 52s for as long as they please, until they hit the *one* setup that basically prints money.

Then fast-forward sixty years or so if they're still around by that point, and they realize they've made another tangled clusterfuck out of their respective universes and, well, BOOM. Universe Reset. Again.

As for intertextuality in-between universes, that's not too surprising, usually. Entities like Yoyodyne, Wolfram & Hart or Weyland-Yutani are usually cited as quick, meaningless nods from one show's creator to another.

A games-related example would be id Software and their constant mention of the Mixom and Moxim corporations. They've been cited in virtually every id game ever. Going by the Tommy Westphall theory, this means everything put out by John Carmack's team is part of the same continuity, and everything that's ever shot off from the Doom and Quake standards of the nineties would also count. So on top of Commander Keen and Duke Nukem 3D, you'd have to add Hexen, Heretic *and* from there, shift over to literature because Hexen references Lewis Carrol's Vorpal blade, which is canonically used to kill the Jabberwock...

Then you have to repeat the entire procedure starting from Carrol and the Jabberwock, and we started with id and its fictitious companies!

So... Yeah. That's pretty much an exercise in futility.

 

[silverdragon9]

My only 2 questions (other than WHY?) is how did you jump from Alien/Predator to Firefly? And any of the direct cross overs in the Original 'St. Elsewhere' would be explainable if the kid had simply seen the shows on tv and put them in there, right?

several things (the aa turret at the begining comes to mind) in firefly are manufactured by Wayland yutani.

 

[TheSchaef]

Only problem is, those are not the SAME Barclay, Banacek, and Starbuck as their Star Trek, Banacek, and Battlestar Galactica counterparts. Same names...but technically different characters.

There is no evidence of this. They may have gone into film at the end of their illustrious space/detective careers. They certainly bear the same face, based on the origin of their names.

Anyway, if they can include oblique references to Yoyodyne, I don't think I've made the farthest stretch of anyone to get to this point.

 

[MB202]

You think Equestria or the Land of Ooo are all part of Tommy Westphall's imagination?

 

[lord.jeff]

Or you know Tommy just watched a bit of TV and added the characters into his imaginary world.

As for the world within worlds thing,it bugs me especially in the case of X men. Mutants live in a world with Captain America and the Fantastic Four well know and celebrated heroes, hell most non mutant heroes are loved in the Marvel-verse, so how is it that only mutants get this special hate treatment and why do non of them just lie about there origin and say they fell in toxic waste.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

There was a flash brighter than the sun as my mind burned out of existence when you said Doctor Who was imagined by an autistic kid in the 80's.

 

[UsefulPlayer 1]

I think you should have explained the connection to comic books alittle more. How they want to be in the same ironed out timeline.