The method of time travel used in this movie by the time policemen is very curious. They sit in rocket launchers on tracks and blast off until they have achieved the velocity which causes them to break the time barrier. Then both they and the rocket vehicle vanish just before impact with the end of the launch tunnel. The time traveller appears in a past time in a standing position, usually in the motion of walking, when they were seated in the launch vehicle. The launch vehicle does not travel into the past with them. When they return to the present, they are back in the launch vehicle again, and it is apparently headed in an opposite direction. What happens to the launch vehicle after it sends the person into the past?

Most of this movie follows a timeline that was changed due to interference. Max Walker's wife's death is the result of Senator McComb's hit men going back in time in an attempt to kill him. Walker is unable to go back and save his wife because everyone thinks this is how history is supposed to happen. How come the Time Commission's detection equipment, designed to monitor disruptions in time and which records other disruptions McComb causes, doesn't recognize the murder of Walker's wife as one?

This brings up a confusion of timelines. McComb is living in a timeline when Melissa Walker died. He decides to send his men back in time to when Walker was just an ordinary cop. Doesn't he know that his attempt already failed? In addition, the other temporal interference he engaged in to make himself rich isn't present in this timeline (since he's bankrupt and in need of campaign funds) but the one in which he caused Melissa's death is. This is all very convuluted. I'm going to have to try and work it out on paper.

Max's only memories of his dead wife come from a videotape he has of her building a bird house. How did this tape survive the explosion of his house?

One of the principles of this movie is that "the same matter can't occupy the same space at the same time." This would seem to be a true axiom, and it seems to be what causes McCombs' demise when Walker hurls him into a past version of himself. But coming into contact with and displacing another object of matter is not the same thing as occupying the same space as it. If I throw myself into someone else and knocked them aside, I'm not occupying the same space as them. I've displaced them. And how are the two McCombs "the same matter" if they're seperated by ten years? Doesn't the human body replenish and change nearly all its compounds every few years?

At the end of the movie, we are also faced with the problem of a Max Walker who apparently doesn't remember the ten years of his life after he destroyed McComb, including fathering and having a son. How is this possible?

And how is the house rebuilt again, in exact detail, even after it explodes in the timeline when Walker sets everything right?

Quite a few people have commented on changes between the movie and book. The basic reason for the omissions in the movie is time and money. The book is 399 pages long, with the way that Crichton wrote it would have been even longer on the screen. The only way to fit it all in would be a 2 or more probably 3 part TV mini series (ah la "Steven King's: The Storm of the Century"). The book spends so much time on the build up; there is the injured construction worker, the American Girl getting attacked, the guys at the CDC, Marty Guitierrez, and the extended tour of the facilities. All of which I loved but would turn off quite a few people (You'd have to devote at least 2 hours to everything th t happens before the big T-Rex encounter; I can just hear people now "what a rip off" I watched all of part one and haven't seen any dino bigger than a chicken yet) For all of the dino scenes, the battles at the visitor center, the river rafting you'd be talking about at least $100 million (even in 1993 dollars). Which is more than any network would spend on six hours of TV. The effects would be rather underwhelming on the small screen. I would love to see someone try to do a complete and unabridged version in this form but you know that it would never happen, at least until the price of special effects comes down.

As for "The Lost World". The movie was very diferent from the book but in the beginning it did show some promise. I think that it would have been better if they had concentrated on the relationships of the various characters stuck on the island. The raptors in the grass scene the guys died too fast, you've got guns use 'em. When the first couple of guys fall stop moving, get back to back, see anything that moves SHOOT IT. If the guys had put up a better struggle we could have had kind of an "Aliens" moment. 8 guys go in 2 come staggering out covered in blood. Could have been a good survival story if it had not been all about moving from one dino attack to the next. They could have developed the characters more and had the film end with the arrival of the rescue squad, none of that "Godzilla" style San Deago rampage.

As for "Congo" it could have been good had they had a better script, Crichton was even unpleased with that one. A director like Spielberg, or James Cameron could have made a much better film than Frank Marshall; an excellent produce but only so-so director.

Sorry guys I ran on for a bit longer than I had planned.

Note to the moderator I posted that message up there to the wrong board, it was ment for the Jurassic park page. Please remove it from the Time Cop page

During the introduction to this movie in which Melissa Walker (Mia Sara) is slain by Sen. Aaron McComb (Ron Silver) and his accomplices, it is quite obvious that this murder was conducted so as to eliminate the threat of Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) exposing the time-travel intentions of Sen. Aaron McComb (Ron Silver). And if this were to be true, then Sen. Aaron McComb's past counterpart ought to have already been opulent from successful investments advised by the future counterpart of Sen. Aaron McComb (Ron Silver), not to mention the fact that Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) would be hapless to alter the past. Thus, it would seem the movie is conforming to the Time Loop Theory. However, we find that Sen. Aaron McComb, ten years down the road, struggles to acquire access to the TEC (Time Enforcement Commission) program, while descending into the past to cause his past counterpart to be opulent enough to have purchased the TEC (Time Enforcement Commission) program all together. Not only that, but Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) seeks to alter his own past and, in the process, to alter Sen. Aaron McComb's efforts to toil with the past. To shed some light on this topic, the movie ought to have commenced with Sen. Aaron McComb (Ron Silver) being confronted by a Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) from the future, resulting in Sen. Aaron McComb's death and the prevention of the death of Melissa Walker (Mia Sara). Unless my theory of how Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) could have accomplished this with the alterability of time is true, then this would signify how inconsistent the creators/writers of this film and literary concept were regarding the implied time-travel notion (i.e., the Time Loop Theory). My theory indicates that Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) had prevented Sen. Aaron McComb (Ron Silver) from exploiting time-travel for his own avaricious endeavor but was killed in the line of duty. Sen. Aaron McComb (Ron Silver) and his accomplices then proceeded to descend through time and to attempt to sabotage Max Walker's past. Due to their disruption in Max Walker's past, Max Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) became more aware of what dangers lurk in the shadows and thus prevented his imminent death. By doing this, he also found himself descending into the past and altering the time line entirely. But then again, this is my theory.

As I have done here and in various other movie-oriented sub-sections, the thespians' legitimate identities are placed in parentheses beside the characters' names. Attempt to ignore these considerably redundant additions.

Have any of you ever acquired the comic book mini-series on which this film is based? If so, would you be willing to illustrate the scenario depicted in the comic book, how it may be contrary or resemblant to the movie, etc.? The TV series was certainly short-lived. Thank you.

There is also currently a series of original novels featuring the character Jake Lloyd from the TV series written by Dan Parkinson. To date these consist of Viper's Spawn, The Scavanger and Blood Ties.

Near the beginning of the film when the guy explains that time travel is now possible, one of the major limitations of the time travel model used in this film is that you cannot travel into the future because it hasn't happened yet.So, how can everyone return to what they would regard as the present but what is actually the future , since they can only be in the past?Elaboration and headaches follow..............
Ok.It makes sense that I cannot travel into the future.It hasn't happened yet, from my relative position.But, I can travel into the past.So, I travel ten years into the past.Now, from my relative postion, ten years ago is the present and the past ten years is the future.Any choices and effects I make in the "present" will alter the next ten years, which are my "future".But, the past ten years haven't happened yet from my point of view, so I cannot travel back to present day using the same methods.So, the time travel model I think makes the most sense, within the realms of sci-fi anyway would be :"There is nothing in front of me.It is all behind me."
Now, supposing I go back 17 years, and prevent my parents conceiving me.This would mean that 17 years later I cannot come back and do that because I will never have existed.BUT, since from my point of view 17 years ago, there is no future YET, the effects of my actions will not affect me.So, in theory I could prevent my own birth and still exist, as the effects of of the future are of the future which has not happened yet.But, if as I say, the effects of the future cannot run backwards in time, then time travel really cannot be possible at all since once you reach any point in the past , you are an effect of the future.
Now, I realise I went a bit off the topic , since this is the Timecop board, but this is a question I have been pondering for a while and this seemed as good a place as any to put it.

Upon re-watching this particular film, I have come to realize just how short it is and how ridiculous are some of these often overblown quagmires in that Max's bout with McComb and his goons at the DataLink factory.

D. Stuart. You had to REWATCH it to figure out it was ridiculous? TWO WORDS(or 3 or 4) JEAN CLAUDE VAN DAMME MOVIE!!!!!!!

At the beginning of the movie at the senators meeting, the chairman says that they have recovered a cache of gold stamped as property of the Confederate Army. He then says "We had it carbon-tested and it's authentic." You actually can't carbon-test gold, as it contains no carbon.

Well, you could carbon test the crates it was stored in, or the dirt it was buried in, anything with carbon that was clearly associated with it. But you're right, that's not at all what the people who wrote that thing were thinking about.

Also I believe it has to be at least 500 years old at the minimum (50,000 max).

This movie would give Captain Janeway a stroke.