**'''Date unknown''': The [[De Lorean DMC-12|DeLorean]] motor car that Doc Brown ends up buying is first manufactured.
**'''Date unknown''': The [[De Lorean DMC-12|DeLorean]] motor car that Doc Brown ends up buying is first manufactured.
+
**'''Date unknown''': [[Biff Tannen Jr.]] is born to [[Biff Tannen]] and an unknown woman.
*'''[[1982]]'''
*'''[[1982]]'''
Revision as of 18:19, 27 June 2008
The Back to the Future film trilogy presents a detailed local history of the fictitious city of Hill Valley and the genealogies of its residents.
Each event described in this timeline is either depicted in the films (or on newspapers or other artifacts depicted in the films), in the novels, in screenplays to the films, or described in interviews by the Bobs (director/co-writer Robert Zemeckis and producer/co-writer Bob Gale). Additionally, a couple of dates (Verne's birthdate and Clara's birth year) are derived from episodes of the animated series, although whether or not that information is canon is subject to dispute by fans. Information from fan fiction is not included.
According to Doctor Emmett Brown in Back to the Future Part II, whenever a time-traveler alters key events occurring in the past, they effectively bring an alternate timeline into existence at their point-of-entry, and their original timeline is erased, even though its events are not forgotten by the time-traveler. Thus, every time travel jump into the past depicted in the Back to the Future saga "destroys" a current timeline and "creates" a new one, although Doc Brown often uses the phrase "erased from existence" to describe the deleterious effects of this process. Because of this, events from later timelines do not make their way backward into previous ones; for example, Bob Zemeckis has specifically denied the presence of a second Marty at Twin Pines Mall in Timeline 1.[1]
As a time-traveler acquires multiple recollections of these altered timelines, a fourth-dimensional latticework begins to emerge which can be expressed graphically, as Doc Brown actually does for Marty McFly (in a crude chalkboard drawing) in BTTF Part II. Doc further explains that the new timeline causes the world to "change around" the time traveler (e.g. Jennifer and Einstein in 1985A), leaving him or her unaffected unless the new timeline precludes the time traveler's existence (e.g. Old Biff, in a scene deleted because, according to Bob Gale, the audience likely would not understand the reasoning behind it).[1] Accordingly, there is no second version of the time traveler, as had been suggested by ImagineerBob Gordon in issue #108 of Starlog Magazine, years before the second film was released.[2]
Chart of alternate timelines
In the graphic below, the term Timeline 1 describes the original timeline. The blue stars represent the ensuing jumps by Doc’s DeLorean depicted in the trilogy. The resulting timelines, from 2 to 8, are represented by each successive horizontal arrow. Some Timelines, such as Timeline 5 in which the events of 1985A take place, are drastically different in terms of their respective events and effects. Accordingly, the events within each timeline are listed (chronologically) as they are understood to have occurred, but most often where they differ (often radically, or else subtly) from those of their “parent” timelines. For instance, permanently unaltered events in Timeline 1 during the 1960s are common to all BTTF timelines and are listed only once. Events that occur prior to a timeline split date are of course identical to those described in the lower-numbered timeline.
The multiple Back to the Future timelines.
Timeline 1
This is the original, unaltered timeline. In this timeline, Biff becomes George's boss and continues bullying him.
Date unknown: Eleven-year-old Clara comes down with diphtheria and is quarantined for three months. As a result, her father places a telescope next to her bed for her to use, which sparks her lifelong interest in astronomy and science.
Date unknown: Seamus McFly, his wife Maggie McFly and his brother Martin emigrate from Ireland to the United States. They take a few years to get to California, shortly setting in Virginia City, Nevada along the way. Martin starts a bar fight there after someone calls him "yellow," and is stabbed to death as a result
Date unknown: Buford "Mad Dog" Tannen shoots twelve men, not including Indians or Chinamen, before the end of this year according to a newspaper article. The article has no follow-ups because Tannen killed its editor.[6]
A snake spooks the horses pulling the wagon of Clara Clayton. They ride madly into Shonash Ravine, killing Miss Clayton instantly. The ravine where she died will be renamed in her memory, Clayton Ravine.[7]
The new courthouse clock is delivered to Hill Valley by train.[8]
Saturday, September 5th: As part of Hill Valley’s anniversary festivities, the new courthouse clock is started at exactly eight o’clock PM PST. Photographs with the clock are offered to townspeople wishing to pose with the new timepiece. The clock will remain in faithful service to Hill Valley for the next seven decades.
Date unknown Due to discrimination against German-Americans during World War I, Doc's father changes his family's name from "Von Braun" to "Brown".[10]
It is just another day at the Twin Pines Ranch, where old man Peabody has a hobby of breeding pine trees.
Wilbur and his wife drive past the future site of the Lyon Estates subdivision, without stopping.
Doc Brown slips off his toilet whilst hanging a clock and has a vision of the flux capacitor.[14]
Biff Tannen and his gang pick on George McFly at Lou's Cafe. Biff warns George never to go into Lou's Cafe again. Although Goldie Wilson urges George to stand up for himself, George ignores the advice.
While spying on a girl (Lorraine Baines) changing, visible through her window, George McFly slips and falls out of a tree into the street right in front of Sam Baines' car. Baines takes him in, and his daughter Lorraine takes care of George. The two fall in love.[15]
Doc Brown spends a quiet evening trying to read the thoughts of his dog, Copernicus.
Monday, November 7th: On the first day of school after George was hit by a car, Lorraine is infatuated with George as a result of the Florence Nightengale effect. With George recovering from an accident, Biff apparently leaves him (and Lorraine) alone for awhile. With his attentions focused on Lorraine, George stops writing science fiction stories and having missed Science Fiction Theatre on the 5th, apparently has no problem missing the show scheduled for Saturday the 12th.
Tuesday, November 8th: Biff and his gang stop by Lou's Cafe to make sure that George McFly isn't there, then drive off, perhaps commenting on a manure truck that is parked nearby.
Doc continues to think about the vision he had had a week earlier about the flux capacitor. If Doc is conducting an experiment, it is probably in his home rather than in Courthouse Square.
Biff and his gang spend the evening drinking, but avoid going to the high school dance.
Marvin Berry & the Starlighters play a music set, take a break at 9 o'clock, then resume playing music until the dance is over.
George takes Lorraine to the dance. There, they kiss for the first time. It is at that moment that Lorraine realizes that she is going to spend the rest of her life with George McFly.
At 10:04 p.m., lightning strikes the clocktower, damaging and stopping the seven-decade-old timepiece.
Date unknown: Thursday, March 15, is another day for George McFly, who receives no recognition, and whose writing skills are limited to reports for an unnamed company for whom he labors thanklessly. If not now, his supervisor will eventually be Biff Tannen.
Date unknown: Marty and Doc meet and become friends. According to the original Part I script, Doc shows up at Marty's house and hires Marty to sweep his garage in the year 1983. Doc gave Marty total access to his record collection, and they became friends.
Sunday, May 22nd: Ronald Reagan announces he will run for a second term in office. Although a newspaper headline, seen in Timeline 2, mentions that Doc Brown is commended and wins an award, it is unknown whether this happened in the original timeline; in 1985, Dr. Brown is described (by Mr. Strickland) as "a real nutcase".
Doc asks Marty to meet him at Twin Pines Mall at 1:15 a.m. next morning.
Marty fails his audition with his band, The Pinheads.
Marty admires a black Toyota4x4 on the bed of a truck at the Texaco gas station.
A woman asks Marty for a donation to preserve the non-functioning clock tower, handing him a flyer containing specific date and time details about the lightning strike to the clock. Marty puts the flyer in his pocket.
Lorraine's brother Joey fails to make parole again.
The DeLorean's time circuits as they appeared one minute after the first demonstration.
From about 1:18 a.m. to 1:35 a.m., in the parking lot of the Twin Pines Mall, Doc demonstrates his new time machine. His dog Einstein becomes the world's first time traveler at 1:20 a.m..
NB: This time jump does not create a new timeline - timelines are only created by going back in time. Einstein merely moves 1 minute forward on timeline 1. The Doc states this is the case with timelines in the Blackboard scene in BTTF 2
At 1:35 a.m., Marty flees from the Libyans in the DeLorean and accidentally departs 1985 for 1955 by accelerating to 88 mph. His arrival there brings Timeline 2 into existence, and Timeline 1 fades away.
Timeline 2
This is the timeline brought into existence by Marty's accidental time journey into 1955. It is the timeline that is current at the end of the first movie, before Doc takes Marty and Jennifer into 2015. In this timeline, George becomes an author and Biff becomes a car detailer.
Marty McFly arrives in 1955 from Timeline 1, on Old Man Peabody's farm, and knocks down one of Old Man Peabody's twin pine trees.
Marty interferes with the first meeting of George McFly and Lorraine Baines by pushing George out of the way of Sam Baines's car, getting hit instead of George.
Marty finds the young Doc Brown and shows him the time machine from thirty years in Doc’s future. Its plutonium is depleted, however, rendering it useless for time travel.
Marty discovers the flyer with the details of the clock tower lightning strike. Doc has said that only "a bolt of lightning" could provide the power to make the time machine function. The two devise a plan to channel the lightning exactly one week from this date.
Sunday, November 6th: Doc learns that Marty has interfered with his parents' first meeting and that he and his siblings will be “erased from existence” unless Marty can get them together.
Monday, November 7th: Marty, as "Calvin Klein", goes to Hill Valley High School to try and get George and Lorraine together, but she has developed a crush on Marty instead of George. Biff Tannen is not amused by this development.
Marty, in a radiation suit as "Darth Vader from the planet Vulcan", visits George to try and make him take Lorraine to the dance that Saturday.
George reports his weird alien experience to "Calvin," telling him that Darth Vader said he would melt his brain if he failed to ask out Lorraine. After George helps Marty open a Pepsi bottle, they go into the cafe, where George talks with Lorraine. The plan is successful at first, until Biff and his gang interfere. Biff and his gang chase Marty around Courthouse Square, and Marty improvises a skateboard to escape. Lorraine ignores George in favor of Marty, and asks Marty to the dance. Biff’s car has its first recorded encounter with a manure truck.
Wednesday, November 9th: George and Marty come up with a plan for Saturday night that will see George become a "fighter" for Lorraine Baines.
Biff, who is paying the bill on his tidied-up car, boasts to Lorraine that he will marry her someday. She has just picked up her outfit for the dance at the frock shop, and rebuffs his advances: "I wouldn’t marry you if you had a million dollars". Biff jumps into his car to go home to get ready for the evening. There is nobody with him.
Marty observes that Dave, and then Linda, have disappeared from his photograph from the future, indicating that the current timeline has already changed into a timeline in which they will never be born. He looks noticeably concerned.
Marty borrows Doc’s car to take Lorraine to the dance, but Biff steals her away. George arrives while Marty is suddenly absent. George punches Biff before he has his way with Lorraine, but she hasn’t fallen for him quite yet. George and Marty have more to do before Marty’s future is restored, and Marty’s photo proves it. Marty himself begins to be "erased from existence."
While George and Lorraine are finally beginning to enjoy themselves at the dance, Dixon cuts in. George nevertheless takes what is rightly his and the future Mr. & Mrs. McFly finally share their first kiss. The timeline in which George's and Lorraine's three children were never born has been averted, as Marty observes from his photo. Marty offers additional advice to his young parents in order to assure he will have a nice life back in '85.
At 10:04 p.m., lightning strikes the clocktower, and Marty travels back to 1985 in the time machine, via a complex utilization of the energy of the lightning strike itself devised by Doc Brown, and thanks to Marty McFly’s precise foreknowledge of this local historic event. There are noreportedimmediate witnesses to this event. Despite repeated attempts, the clock is never successfully repaired; in fact, some Hill Valley residents voice a desire for the clock’s preservation as is (along with the damaged ledge below it) to memorialize the unusual occurrence.
10:05 p.m.. The young Doc Brown returns home, unnoticed, having witnessed the earliest successful demonstration of time travel in human history. He is carrying a note Marty has handed him in lieu of verbal information about his own future, but is hesitant about reading it. While he has torn it up, he does not discard it. Doc must wait almost three decades before acquiring the technology required to build the device he has just seen with his own eyes, and is careful enough not to further interfere with McFly family events as they unfold over the next decades (see Timeline 1 above for these events, which are for the most part unaltered (although the McFly family is more affluent as a result of George being more assertive over the next 30 years); and will also occur as part of Timeline 7 below).
At 1:24 a.m., Marty arrives from 1955. The rematerializing DeLorean fails to stop and crashes into the front of the Town Theatre (now used for a Christian revival congregation). He then runs from the town square over to the LonePine Mall to witness the departure of his one-week-younger self, and finds out Doc survived because he was forewarned by the note Marty gave Doc just moments ago in 1955 about the Libyans (and that Doc finally had the courage to read in his long interim). (Doc and Marty drive the E. Brown Enterprises truck away from the parking lot at Lone Pine Mall before anyone comes to investigate the destruction of the Fotomat store by the Libyans' van). Doc retrieves the time machine from the Assembly of Christ building before any witnesses arrive downtown. No charges are lodged against driver or scientist.
Doc takes Marty back to his home, and then travels to 2015.
As the Doc travels forward 30 years along this timeline, the next 30 years of timeline 2 are revealed below.
(Saturday morning) Marty awakes from a badly-needed night’s rest to discover he has a much-improved family life and circumstances, including ownership of a black Toyota four-by-four. His father also seems to have become an author (see below).
Sunday, October 27th: Marty races Needles and crashes into a Rolls-Royce, causing his future to be rotten (see entries below).
October/November: George McFly's first novel, A Match Made in Space, is published. The cover alludes to young George, young Lorraine, and "Darth Vader" (Marty's anti-radiation suit, utilized as a costume in 1955).
Date unknown: The Hill Valley Telegraph closes or sells its printing and news-gathering operations to USA Today to create a local edition of the nationwide newspaper.
Marty Jr. is pushed by Griff to participate in a crime.
The 47-year-old Marty, dared by Needles, illegally lets Needles scan his card, and subsequently is fired by Ito Fujitsu in typical real-estate mogul fashion: “Read my fax!”
Thursday, October 22nd: Marty Jr. is tried, convicted and sentenced to 15 years in jail for a robbery.
Wednesday, October 28th: Marlene McFly attempts to break her brother out of prison. She is sentenced to 20 years in jail.
Dates unknown: Doc spends an unknown amount of time in 2015 and later. While he's there, he outfits the time machine with a Mr. Fusion and a hover conversion, undergoes personal rejuvenation surgery, and learns as much as he can about Marty Jr.'s meeting with Griff on the 21st. Eventually, Doc leaves for 1985 to fetch Marty and Jennifer. This creates Timeline 3 which begins at the Doc's entry point of 1985 and timeline 2 fades away.
Timeline 3
This is the timeline which Doc brings into existence by traveling to 1985 to seek Marty and Jennifer's help. In this timeline, the fate of the McFly children ought to have been greatly improved. Unfortunately, "Old" Biff's stealing the DeLorean and traveling back to 1955 retroactively changes the events of this timeline and bring Timeline 4 into existence instead. Biff quickly returns the DeLorean to 2015 undetected (before any past alterations have taken place), and Doc, Marty and Jennifer depart moments before it fades away.
Doc returns from 2015 and crashes the DeLorean into the garbage cans in the McFlys' driveway. Doc then informs Marty that "something has got to be done about (his) kids." Doc then proceeds to take Marty (and Jennifer by circumstance) forward along this new timeline to 2015.
Biff Tannen, whilst pausing from cleaning Marty's 4x4 Toyota for him, witnesses the DeLorean hovering briefly before taking off for the future.
Doc, Marty and Jennifer arrive in 2015 to save Marty Jr. from Griff. Marty poses as Marty Jr. and turns down Griff's proposal. After the hover board chase which ensues, only Griff and his gang are arrested for damaging the courthouse. At some point Marty acquires a Grays Sports Almanac with the intention of using it to his advantage once he returns to his own decade.
Old Biff, age 78, who has been waiting for this opportunity for three decades, steals the DeLorean and heads back to 1955 with Marty’s sports almanac, which Doc angrily threw into a convenient trash receptacle, bringing Timeline 4 into existence six decades in the past.
Biff returns the DeLorean to 2015 shortly thereafter without Doc and Marty immediately noticing. He is able to do this because his younger self is not immediately able to act on the knowledge contained in the almanac, so the past remains unchanged until 1958 arrives. However, Timeline 4 has been brought into existence between the time Biff leaves 1955 and returns to 2015, and he either collapses from fatigue or fades from existence after having been presumably murdered by Lorraine in 1996. (see below)
Doc, Marty and Jennifer depart for the "alternate 1985", bringing Timeline 5 into existence.
Timeline 4
This is the timeline Old Biff brings into existence in 1955 by arriving from 2015 in the stolen DeLorean, almanac in hand. It is replaced with a virtually identical Timeline 5 on October 26, 1985 when Doc, Marty and Jennifer arrive from 2015, and observe the damage Biff has accomplished.
The 78-year-old Biff Tannen arrives from 2015 sometime that morning with Gray’s Almanac. He hides the DeLorean in an undetermined location and sets out to find his younger self, who has just survived an automotive encounter with a manure truck, creating a lasting memory. Young Biff will have to pick up the car this morning downtown, as old Biff recalls correctly.
Young Biff boasts to Lorraine that he will marry her someday. She has just picked up her outfit for the dance at the frock shop nearby, and rebuffs his advances. Biff is about to jump into his car to go home to get ready for the evening, when he encounters an elderly stranger occupying the driver’s seat. The stranger soon informs him, "Today’s your lucky day."
Old Biff, entirely in secret, demonstrates the power of the almanac and convinces his younger self to hold on to it: "Keep it in a safe". He also informs him to kill anyone who asks about the almanac, specifically "some kid" or "a crazy, wild-eyed old man who claims to be a scientist" (referring to Marty and Doc, respectively). He departs 1955 at exactly 6:38 p.m. to return the DeLorean undetected, not realizing his younger self might eventually lose the almanac. Doc Brown will fail to notice Old Biff’s departure time on the time readouts in the DeLorean, having distracted himself with thoughts of women and the old West.
Wednesday, March 26th: Biff Tannen, now at the legal age of 21, wins his first million on a horse race using the sports almanac, which he has managed to hold on to successfully.[18]
Wednesday, October 14th: Biff Tannen wins another large sum of money at a sports event. He is seen smiling on the cover page of the next day's edition of the newspaper, with the almanac partially visible in his pocket.[24]
Date unknown: Biff Tannen wins again and again, gaining the nickname, "The Luckiest Man On Earth."[18]
Thursday, March 15th: George McFly is shot dead by Biff Tannen on his way to pick up his writing award. He was against BiffCo's policies.[24]
Date unknown: Biff Tannen marries Lorraine McFly and becomes stepfather to Dave, Linda and Marty McFly, shipping Marty off to boarding schools overseas. Match, Skinhead and 3-D are still Biff's cronies.
Sunday, May 22nd: Doc Brown is committed after being declared legally insane. Richard Nixon announces he will run for a fifth term in office, vowing to end the Vietnam War by 1985. BiffCo's representatives announce that the company is going to build a new dioxin plant in Hill Valley.[24]
Date unknown: Something causes Biff's death, but exact details are unknown. A theory suggested by the Bobs says that Lorraine found out Biff had killed George, and shot him out of revenge. This would seem to have the effect of erasing Old Biff from existence in 2015, as depicted in a scene deleted from BTTF Part II.
Timeline 5
This is the alternate timeline brought into existence when Marty, Doc and Jennifer return from 2015. This is referred to by Doc as 1985-A, which is depicted in BTTF Part II. The key difference between this timeline and Timeline 4 is the simultaneous presence of two Martys (his doppelganger overseas at boarding school), two Docs (his doppelganger committed to a mental institution) and the alternate Jennifer, who is still unconscious from what she has witnessed in 2015 (her 1985A doppelganger, if she has one, is never seen or mentioned).
Saturday, October 26th: Doc, Marty and Jennifer arrive back from 2015 at 9:00 p.m. and find out things have radically changed (see Timeline 4 above). Marty is caught by Match, Skinhead and 3-D, meets the radically alternate 1985 versions of his mother and Biff Tannen, and is a direct witness to Biff’s way with women.
Sunday, October 27th: Doc deduces what has happened in the past with Biff and the almanac from the evidence Biff has carelessly left behind, but he has no way of knowing when and where the transfer occurred. A courageous Marty confronts Biff about his secret document and easily extracts the needed information from the smug mogul. Biff, recalling the advice given by his future self, grabs his gun to kill Marty. A chase with Match, Skinhead and 3-D naturally ensues, and Marty escapes once again after learning it was Biff who murdered his father.
Doc and Marty head back to 1955 at 2:42 a.m. to put the history they remember back on track. Jennifer Parker is left behind, as Doc surmises that she will not be erased when 1985A is. At this point, Timeline 5 fades away, to be replaced by the nascent Timeline 6.
Timeline 6
This is the key timeline brought into existence when Doc and Marty arrive in 1955 to relieve Biff of his newly acquired almanac from the future, thus preventing Timeline 4 and Timeline 5 from coming into existence, but without disturbing Timeline 2 as Marty has previously accomplished. This is the timeline that is depicted in the "1955" part of Back to the Future Part II. For purposes of clarification, this timeline can be thought of as a "patched" version of Timeline 2, with double Docs and Martys. Note:this is the most volatile timeline of the trilogy, since it is tied to events depicted or alluded to in all three parts of Back to the Future. It also bears noting that at some point during this one-day period, three instances of Doc’s DeLorean are present in Hill Valley simultaneously.
At 6 a.m., Doc and Marty arrive from Timeline 5 in a DeLorean technologically improved than the one (with depleted plutonium) in which the younger Marty has already arrived (Timeline 2). They have left Jennifer Parker safely asleep at home in 1985-A, as Doc surmises that she will not be erased by any changes to the future that they will make. He also advises Marty that Biff’s initial acquisition of the almanac must not be interfered with, so that Old Biff will return the time machine to 2015 thinking he’s succeeded.
Morning: Old Biff arrives (in yet another instance of the DeLorean) to transfer the almanac to his younger self. He locates Biff downtown.
Young Biff Tannen boasts to Lorraine that he will marry her someday. She has just picked up her outfit for the dance at the frock shop, and rebuffs his advances. Biff is about to jump into his car to go home to get ready for the evening, when he encounters an elderly stranger occupying the driver’s seat. The stranger says he has a way for Biff to eventually get Lorraine to the altar. Young Biff fails to recognize his older self, even though he’s mysteriously able to start Biff’s car.
Marty McFly is an intimate witness to Old Biff’s demonstration of the power of the almanac, but he does not interfere, as Doc has advised. Young Biff tells his older self he’ll "...take a look at it."
6:38 p.m.: Thinking he’s done enough to change the future, and intending to escape detection, Old Biff departs in the DeLorean to the same moment he departed in 2015 (see Timeline 3).
Evening: A more mature and foreknowledgeable Marty fights off Match, Skinhead and 3-D and keeps them from jumping the naive Marty (from Timeline 2), allowing the events of that timeline to occur as they had before (i.e., as Marty recalls it from his point of view). Marty avoids any direct contact with his day younger self, as does Doc Brown with his younger counterpart.
Evening: After much wasted time and effort, Marty ultimately retrieves the almanac from Biff’s car and burns it, causing this timeline to fade back to (or revert to) Timeline 3. Marty and Doc are able to visually confirm the erasure of 1985A from items they’ve retrieved from that alternate future.
A few minutes before 10:00 p.m.: The hover-converted DeLorean from 2015 and 1985-A, with Doc on board, gets unexpectedly struck by lightning just outside Lyon Estates and sent back to January 1, 1885 due to an on-board malfunction Doc neglected to correct. This brings Timeline 7 into existence, seven decades further in the past.
Timeline 7
This is the timeline Doc and Marty exist in, separated by 7 decades of time, at the end of Back to the Future Part II and the beginning of Part III (i.e., before Marty’s trip back to 1885). It is a timeline in which Doc lives in 1885, without Marty, for only eight months and almost seven days. As it seems the careful Doc's presence has little impact on past history (until 1955 when his DeLorean is unearthed), this timeline is nearly identical to Timeline 2withTimeline 6.
Friday, September 4th: Doc picks up Clara Clayton. It is love at first sight. Unknowingly, Doc also prevents Clara's death that day, and Shonash Ravine is never renamed Clayton Ravine in her memory.
Saturday, September 5th: The Hill Valley Festival. A photographer takes a portrait of Doc posing next to the new courthouse clock (this photo is discovered by Marty and young Doc in 1955 at the library). While Doc dances with Clara, Buford Tannen shoots him in the back.
In this timeline there are now four instances of the DeLorean present simultaneously (the one Marty brought here to create Timeline 2, the one Biff brought here to create Timeline 4, the one Doc and Marty brought to create Timeline 6, and finally the one that Doc hid in the past after he created Timeline 7)
(arguably, there was no DeLorean in the Delgado Mine in 1955 until after Doc departed 1955 to 1885)
Shortly before 10 p.m., a vehicle driven by a Western Union agent arrives at the entrance to Lyon Estates. The agent delivers to Marty, on time at that specified location, in the pouring rain, the letter Doc dispatched in 1885.
At approximately 10:04 p.m., lightning having just struck the clocktower, Marty scares the young Doc by "returning" on foot seconds after Doc sent the younger Marty back to the future, in effect creating an unexpected closed loop (from the young Doc’s point of view). Doc utters "Great Scott!" and suddenly faints. Marty drives the unconscious Doc back to his house in Doc's car.
Young Doc reads the soggy old letter his 30-year-older self wrote seventy years in the past.
Monday, November 14th: Marty and Doc uncover the DeLorean with repair instructions and his walkie talkie from the Delgado Mine near Boot Hill Cemetery, where the older Doc Brown was buried in 1885. As fate would have it, they also find Doc's grave and learn about Buford Tannen. They elect to photograph the headstone, as it will serve as a "ripple-effect" indicator of Marty’s success in 1885.
Marty insists on going back to 1885 to rescue his friend.
Tuesday, November 15th: Doc repairs and "soups up" the unearthed DeLorean, using tubes as well as early transistors to provide time-travel capability. He also installs fresh oversized batteries on the walkie talkies.
Wednesday, November 16th: Marty leaves 1955 and heads back to 1885 to rescue Doc. This act initiates the ultimate timeline, Timeline 8. Young Doc is left behind in this timeline undisturbed to wait a few decades until the DeLorean is built, and avoids further contact with the McFlys until the 1980s as outlined above (Timeline 1 and Timeline 2).
Timeline 8
This timeline comes into existence when Marty arrives in 1885, to try to prevent the events that lead to Doc's death in Timeline 7 at the hands of Buford Tannen. It is this timeline in which Doc and Marty appear for most of Back to the Future Part III. It is also the final timeline depicted in the trilogy, as the DeLorean will no longer travel backwards in time. Since Marty chooses not to race Needles upon his return to 1985, the future is changed once again, and the alternate futures Doc and Marty have experienced in Timeline 2 and Timeline 3 are erased by this timeline. Note:Two DeLoreans exist in this timeline for five days in 1885, from September 2nd when Marty arrived, until September 7th when he departed for 1985.
Wednesday, September 2nd: Marty McFly arrives in 1885 to rescue Doc from impending doom. Native American Horseback-archers, who were on the run of the Federal Forces, shoot the fuel line in the time machine, leaving the DeLorean with no fuel at all. He later meets his ancestors Seamus, Maggie, and William McFly, and assumes the name "Clint Eastwood".
Thursday, September 3rd: Marty runs into Buford "Mad Dog" Tannen, great grandfather of Biff Tannen, and upsets him, causing Tannen to nearly hang Marty. Doc saves Marty in time. Marty informs Doc of his impending death involving Clara Clayton and Buford Tannen. Aware that he will fall in love with Clara Clayton and worried about changing his future, Doc decides not to pick her up, as he has already volunteered to do five days ago.
Friday, September 4th: Doc tries repairing the DeLorean, and accidentally saves the life of Clara Clayton anyway. It is love at first sight.
Saturday, September 5th: The Hill Valley Festival. Doc and Marty have a photograph taken, posing next to the new courthouse clock (this photo is given to Marty in 1985 by Doc at the spot where the DeLorean was destroyed by a locomotive near Eastwood Ravine). While Doc and Clara dance, Buford Tannen tries to shoot Doc, but Marty interferes and saves him.
Sunday, September 6th: After being confronted by Doc about the dangers of fighting Buford, Marty checks his photograph from 1955, and gets a shock. The future of timeline 8 in which Doc is killed is replaced by one in which Marty, aka "Clint Eastwood", is likely to be killed. Doc and Marty prepare to go back to the future. Doc says goodbye to Clara and tells her the truth, but she doesn't believe him. They part on poor terms.
Marty has a showdown scheduled with Tannen; Marty and Doc are ready to escape through the back door when Tannen calls Marty "yellow". Marty still decides not to face Tannen, showing an incredible amount of growth from a mere day earlier, and is about to walk away when Tannen's gang gets a hold of Doc and threatens to shoot him.
Marty then decides to face Tannen, and survives due to a trick learned from the Clint Eastwood movie A Fistful of Dollars (which was being watched by Biff in 1985A, in timeline 5). Again Marty checks the photo he has brought, and is relieved. The future of timeline 8 in which Marty is killed in replaced by one in which both Doc and Marty survive.
Meanwhile, Clara Clayton, on a train bound for San Francisco, overhears a passenger talking about the heartsick Doc Brown; her belief restored, she stops the train and jumps off to find Doc. She discovers clues at the blacksmith shop and rides on horseback towards the spur line Doc and Marty are using. She must reach Doc before he vanishes forever.
Doc and Marty are using a hijacked train's locomotive to push the DeLorean up to 88 mph toward Shonash Ravine so they may both go back to the future (1985). Marty succeeds in doing so, but Doc, who has gone to Clara's rescue on the accelerating locomotive, and Clara are forced to stay behind. Doc now has the hoverboard and one of the walkie talkies. Since "Clint" was observed stealing the engine, and is presumed to have gone down with it, he enters the town's folklore as the man who beat Mad Dog Tannen, and Shonash Ravine is renamed Eastwood Ravine.
Date unknown: Doc finishes building his second time machine, out of a steam locomotive, and he, Clara, Jules and Verne make a trek to the future (2015 or later), where he retrofits the time machine with a hover conversion and other necessary modifications.
Marty McFly returns from 1885 at 11 a.m., and the stopped DeLorean is almost immediately demolished head-on by a diesel locomotive approaching the Eastwood Ravine Bridge in the opposite direction. Marty escapes. He returns home to see everything is back to normal (as per Timeline 2). He then drives over to check on his sleeping sweetheart. She is just as Doc predicted.
In a virtuosic display of uncharacteristic self-restraint, Marty decides not to race Needles, and avoids crashing into a Rolls Royce, thus erasing the future experienced in Timeline 2. Jennifer surprises Marty with a fax she retrieved from 2015 in that very timeline, and as it "ripples" into a blank sheet of paper, she discovers the hidden truth about time travel, exclaiming: “It erased!” Marty takes her to see the remains of the DeLorean.
Doc, Clara and their sons arrive at Marty’s crash site in their time locomotive to briefly check up on Marty and Jennifer, and to retrieve Doc's dog, Einstein. Jennifer and Marty show Doc the blank fax, and he dispenses some sound advice about its significance. The Brown family departs for times and places unknown.
2010s
Date unknown: Doc, Clara and the kids hover convert their train time machine and make additional upgrades.
References
↑ 1.01.1Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale, Q&A, Back to the Future [DVD], recorded at the University of Southern CaliforniaCite error: Invalid <ref> tag; name "QandA" defined multiple times with different content
↑ 18.018.118.218.3Back to the Future Part II. Mentioned in the video presentation on the life of Biff in the Biff Tannen museum, in the alternate 1985.
↑ 19.019.1Back to the Future Part I. According to newspaper clippings framed on the wall of Doc's house.
↑Historical fact. See Tab (soft drink) for details.
