Mayberry Melonpool is the television-addicted, somewhat clumsy, not-all-that-intelligent Captain of the "Steel Duck." Oh yeah, and he's obsessed with getting a date. In short, he doesn't have a lot going for him.
Ralph Zinobop is the inventor of the "Steel Duck." He is eager to enter the next phase of his plan: to make money off his inventions to regain his rightful place as ruler of the Planet Zinobop — a planet that he was exiled from by his paranoid father several years ago. His other hobbies include wild get-get-rich schemes and drinking copious amounts of coffee. He also has a terrible temper.
Ralphie Zinobop is an "evil" clone of Ralph Zinobop. Since Ralph was already evil, Ralphie popped out warm, caring and generally the nicest guy you’ll ever meet — essentially, he’s everything that the original Ralph is not. In addition to his personality, Ralphie is left-handed (Ralph is a “righty”), his DNA winds the opposite direction and his fingerprints are reversed.
Okay sooo … if Old Ralphie managed to change the past, thus changing things in the present, then he wouldn’t have had to go to the past in the first place to change things, which would cause a paradox … so the only way this would work would be for him to create an alternate timeline, in which case the people in this timeline shouldn’t see any changes, correct? So why is it necessary to follow him back in time? I’m confused.
So, I’ve maybe erroneously made you guys think this was a story about time travel. It’s more about the people who are visited by time traveller.s. The original story was called “The other side of time travel” and Old Ralphie was going to create Ralphie to try to repair the timeline. When that didn’t work, he was going to leave to try to fix it other ways.
But then, as it often happens, the story kind of took on a life of its own. and Old Ralphie started kind of becoming a Walter White like character from Breaking Bad. I’ve always wanted to create a villain who wasn’t a villain, so this seemed like a way to set that up. Anyway, I reshuffled the story a bit so that Ralpie was created after Old Ralphie left to alter the past.
Mainly, I just wanted to bring back Ralphie in an inventive way, but we haven;t seen the last of Old Ralphie.
Regardless, I’m still happy to see Ralphie back for whatever reason. And I’ve seen Steve resolve massively convoluted plot-lines before when I thought there was no meaningful solution, so I will wait and see what happens.
• Old Ralphie appeared and told Mayberry and Sam about time travel.
• Old Ralphie told Mayberry that he was Ralph’s “Good” clone and that he invented a time machine.
• Old Ralphie built a new time machine and told Mayberry about his plans to reset the universe.
• Old Ralphie showed Mayberry the machine that created him in the first place.
• Old Ralphie disappeared and nothing changed. Mayberry wanted to follow him to see what happened, so he needed a new time machine.
• Mayberry zapped Ralph to create this universe’s Ralphie.
Does that not work?
I think part of the disconnect is that Mayberry’s not quite as dumb as he was in the original universe. He’s more obsessed and blinded to the reality of the situation. He’s more determined, and as a result, he makes a lot more uninformed mistakes, for what he believes are the right reasons.
Okay, am I the only one confused by Melonpool’s logic about all of this ?
Okay sooo … if Old Ralphie managed to change the past, thus changing things in the present, then he wouldn’t have had to go to the past in the first place to change things, which would cause a paradox … so the only way this would work would be for him to create an alternate timeline, in which case the people in this timeline shouldn’t see any changes, correct? So why is it necessary to follow him back in time? I’m confused.
Ok. I’ll buy cloning and tim travelling, but how do you explain Ralphie singing Huey Lewis & The News?
So, I’ve maybe erroneously made you guys think this was a story about time travel. It’s more about the people who are visited by time traveller.s. The original story was called “The other side of time travel” and Old Ralphie was going to create Ralphie to try to repair the timeline. When that didn’t work, he was going to leave to try to fix it other ways.
But then, as it often happens, the story kind of took on a life of its own. and Old Ralphie started kind of becoming a Walter White like character from Breaking Bad. I’ve always wanted to create a villain who wasn’t a villain, so this seemed like a way to set that up. Anyway, I reshuffled the story a bit so that Ralpie was created after Old Ralphie left to alter the past.
Mainly, I just wanted to bring back Ralphie in an inventive way, but we haven;t seen the last of Old Ralphie.
Regardless, I’m still happy to see Ralphie back for whatever reason. And I’ve seen Steve resolve massively convoluted plot-lines before when I thought there was no meaningful solution, so I will wait and see what happens.
I get Melonpool’s logic just fine.
What I don’t get is how MELONPOOL comes to this logic.
I think it was spelled out pretty conclusively —
• Old Ralphie appeared and told Mayberry and Sam about time travel.
• Old Ralphie told Mayberry that he was Ralph’s “Good” clone and that he invented a time machine.
• Old Ralphie built a new time machine and told Mayberry about his plans to reset the universe.
• Old Ralphie showed Mayberry the machine that created him in the first place.
• Old Ralphie disappeared and nothing changed. Mayberry wanted to follow him to see what happened, so he needed a new time machine.
• Mayberry zapped Ralph to create this universe’s Ralphie.
Does that not work?
I think part of the disconnect is that Mayberry’s not quite as dumb as he was in the original universe. He’s more obsessed and blinded to the reality of the situation. He’s more determined, and as a result, he makes a lot more uninformed mistakes, for what he believes are the right reasons.
So instead of asking “what would James T. Kirk do”, he tries to do what (he believes) a Starfleet Captain would do.
Hilarity (and Ralphie) ensues.
(…and of course James T. Kirk would…remember the proper bold-text closing tag to put after “do”.)
Ha!