biff got into the car detailing business because in high school, his car kept getting filled with manure and he became an expert at scrubbing every inch of a car inside and out.
He paid to have it cleaned (at least the first time). Although, I guess you still could be right, b/c he gipped the detailer, so perhaps he was forced to clean it. Also, he's into cars, so it's a natural career opportunity (and requires little high functioning brain activity lol).
@@TheGuruStud if working on cars required little brain activity then why the hell isn’t it common for people to fix or at least know how to fix their cars, not only that but even just detailing cars is a lot more complex than one would think.
I don't buy the "Biff is clever" one. I think after George knocked him on his ass, everybody started standing up to him and his unjustified confidence never recovered. He had to adapt by being what he thought (as kind of a sociopath) nice was - just nonthreatening as hell. Meanwhile, his darkness never really went away, it was just hiding under the camouflage he had created to get by.
Yeah the rest are very plausible but theres lots of holes in the last one. This also doesnt mention anything about how Biff is still a bully in 1955 after the knockout by George, and you can see this in the clips they show from BttF2. There would be more dialogue from Old Biff if he was obsessing over Marty this whole time. He figures it out in 2015 when he sees the flying Delorian and remembers it disappearing in 1985.
Yeah I don't buy the last theory at all. If biff was so obsessed with Calvin Klein, why not tell young Biff about him by name. Instead he just says "a kid or an old man".
Not to mention being a funny comedian in real life. Look up his "Questions song", it's a hilarious take on all the repeated questions he constantly gets from fans in the years since starring in BTTF.
Yeah! very under used actor, he had/has skillz. As a 8 year old kid you don't realize these things, but casting directors from the 80's should be ashamed of not putting him in more shows. It pains me to think what crap we had to sit through that he would have made immensely better.
I have a theory that Marty's sudden personality change between 1 and 2 ("Nobody calls me Chicken!") is his personality reverting to the personality of the Alternate Marty; the one we see leaving the Lone Pine Mall parking lot at the end of 1. Alternate Marty grew up with confident parents, and because of this, he grew up with a bit more attitude and a more fiery temper. When Marty returns to 1985 for the first time he's the same guy, but after a short delay, the changes his alternate self makes in 1955 (mostly the same btw, as we see at the end of 2) the changes to the future ripple out and change our Original Marty into the Alternate Marty. One key clue to this is that Marty never acknowledges memories of his original 1985 parents after the final scene in 1. At some point after he sees his new truck for the first time, but before he travels to 2015, the ripple catches up to him, and his memories of his old life are erased. He still remembers Doc and time travel, because that Marty would as well. But from that point forwards, he only remembers his parents as Alternate Marty would remember them, despite having only seen them once for about a minute. When he meets his mother again in 1985A, he seems surprised to see that she's an alcoholic, even though this version of his mother is pretty much the same as what he grew up with, more or less. And he's shocked to believe that his mother would leave George. If he remembered his father as being a wimp for his entire life, maybe it wouldn't seem so shocking to Marty that his mother might go for the guy across town with his own skyscraper.
No no. Marty is the traveler. He retains all his original memories. Everything is changing around him. He travelled "outside" of time and therefore is unaffected. He always will be, not matter what time he goes to.
@@nothing-oj1sz Has that been established in the movies? Because not being born affected him, and I can't think of a third thing that would have changed him
I always thought that when Doc says “Never?” to hearing that George had never stood up to Biff he was thinking that the future could be drastically changed. Then he realized that Marty at least existed so it wasn’t as urgent as the more pressing matters to deal with right then.
@@theAstarrr Even after sending Marty back to 1985, he didn't get a rest. (In his timeline, BTTF is followed immediately by BTTF III.) Only after all of that could he sit down, relax, and figure out what he was going to do with Marty's letter. He might have thought that NOT reading the letter and following the instructions might itself lead to a paradox.
@@christopherheckman7957 Thats true, but from the perspective of 1955 Doc, he doesn't do all that much in BTTF 3. They get the time machine out of the mine and he sends Marty back to 1885, thats it. The rest of the movie deals with 1985 Doc. This does though raise the question, why wouldn't 1985 Doc know and therefore prevent himself being struck by lightening, having in 1955 gone through the process of seeing Marty turn up a second time and recover the time machine from the mine etc.
@@chrisjohn4605 Easy. Because if Doc isn't struck by lightning in 1955, he doesn't go back in time, and a paradox results. If anything, he would have been motivated to add a lightning rod to the Delorean, to guarantee that he does get struck by lighting and goes back in time.
This first theory about Doc realizing things is unnecessary. Doc had an idea that Marty was going to tell him how he died because he is a very smart man and he heard the things Marty kept saying to him. But when Marty came back afterwards telling him how Doc had ended up going back to the Old West, he would have realized that he did not die. He would also see that this Marty was not sad about anything. That would tell him that he didn't die and it was okay to read the letter and take whatever precautions would assure that. 1985 Doc must have had a lot of secrets though!
I'm kind of ashamed at myself for never thinking of it, as I had thought that after winning enough to have an economic effect on his timeline, then certainly the outcomes wouldn't match up. It's so obvious now that I see this.
This is technically where their is a paradox in time travelling in the films. The sports Alamanc should change based on the time travel rules of the original film, but the second film has slightly different time travel rules : for example: old Biff comes back to 2015 after giving himself the Almanac in 1955. He’s able to do this because in 1955 Marty and Doc have already got the Almanac back from Biff and corrected the timeline, but based on these rules, the photograph Marty has shouldn’t change in the first film, because Marty has already got his parents to meet and fall in love and correct the timeline .
@@TAKTAK_Toys Marty is the only one from the original timeline so I think he is the timeline now, if that makes sense. Being outside of time has made him the determinating factor for all the secondary actions of timetravel in this universe. It is like he is the only one that is actualy in synchronization so nothing is locked in place and time unless he is part of it now. The same is true of Doc being shot at the point of leaving the first movie. He never saw him die for certain so when he was wearing the vest it could be original but we are made to think it was an alteration Marty caused completely. The whole second movie is kinda nonsense in that it was all caused by Doc not learning the lesson about sending a person and not leaving a letter with intructions that he learned by getting shot like the letter said. They learned nothing till the end of the 2nd when letters are back in play.
@@GameOn71213 intelligent and people that are different are always called crazy. The ones that call intelligent/creative people are the real crazy ones.
I've actually always assumed the theory presented here about Lorraine was what was intended by the story, sadly. I didn't even realise this wasn't the obvious storyline.
When a movies script is written well, people can make plausible assumptions of things not in the script. That’s a sign that they built a very good world.
At one point in time there were 4 DeLoreans in 1955. 1. The one Marty went back in time with. 2. The one Marty and Doc went back in time with. 3. The one Biff went back in time with. 4. And finally the one in the cave.
Yeah but this didn’t happen in the movie because in Pt 2, the moment the DeLorean was struck by lightening, we lost 1 DeLorean and gained another in its place. So this happened “off screen.”
@@lookbovine Right, but I think what they’re trying to say is that the DeLorean from 1885 wasn’t buried under the mine UNTIL the flying DeLorean was struck by lightning, because it hadn’t been sent back in time to become the 1885 DeLorean yet. But the logic of that assumption is sorta sketchy, because changes to history seem only to occur as a result of meddling by time-travelers, and the DeLorean was sent back unintentionally by a lightning strike outside of their control. In other words, there was a point some period of time before the lightning strike at which the time-travelers’ actions no longer had any effect in changing the outcome of the DeLorean being struck by lightning and sent to the past, and at THAT moment, the 1885 DeLorean would’ve appeared buried in the mineshaft, and from that moment until the lightning strike, both instances of the DeLorean coexisted in the same part of the timeline. Assuming this period of time is long enough, then the other two DeLorean’s (2015 Biff’s DeLorean and Marty’s original 1985 DeLorean) could very well also exist alongside these ones, proving the theory correct. But we can never know because we don’t know what actions, if any, could’ve prevented the DeLorean from getting struck.
I disagree with the last theory. I think it is far more likely that Biff tried to keep his tough guy status after George knocked him out, but the rest of the school basically treated him as an outcast since he was beat up by the wimpiest guy in school. It turned the tables on the relationship between George and Biff, making Biff subservient to George. In 2015 when Biff saw the Delorean, he mused that he hadn't seen a flying Delorean in 30 years. It was only after he saw two Martys and then listened in on the conversation between Doc Brown and Marty that he put two and two together. His decision to travel back in time himself was spur of the moment. How awesome is it that a trilogy is still making us dissect every part over 30 years later? Not even Star Wars has this level of complexity.
We see that the punch did nothing to change Biff in BTTF 2. After he wakes up from being decked, he goes and finds Marty and kicks the living crap out of him. If anything, George's punch made Biff more dangerous. This is a plot hole I address in my "Real Mistakes of Back to the Future." Once they got that book away from Biff, Doc in 1955 was in immediate danger. We saw how Biff relentlessly pursued Calvin Klein for doing 300 bucks damage to his car. Imagine how he would have pursued Doc Brown once an Almanac that he knows can make him a fortune is stolen from him. How would Biff know to track down Doc? Well, he dragged Calvin Klein out of Doc Brown's car in the dance parking lot. It was, at that point, known that Calvin Klien is associated in some way with Doc Brown. In searching for the book after it was stolen from him, he would have remembered the warning from the old man who gave it to him, about a crazy scientist and a kid trying to take the book from him. Stealing the book from Biff would have created a whole new and far more terrifying timeline where Doc Brown would probably have to leave town in order to avoid attacks from Biff Tannen for stealing his futuristic Almanac from him.
Biff was a bully, once he was knocked down by George, it would have shattered his self image. We've all seen similar things happen in real life. So yes, I believe you are 100% correct.
I like to think that Biff found a girl who wouldn't put up with his shit. And it changed him for the better. He was happy. He apologizes for being a butthead to the McFlys and starts his own business. He had a kid (he is a grandpa after all) and life is good ...until Mrs. Biff dies. He is now a heart broken man angry at the world when we see him in 2015. He needed the love of a good woman to keep him sane. Lorraine (in any timeline) never loved him.
That's an interesting theory! Though if his wife really were that nice, and the couple presumably raised a decent kid, then how did Griff turn into such a jerk?
Griff was the grand kid. Would have been Marty's kids age, not Marty's. My grandparents could have been monsters, but my parents could have been good people, or vice versa!!! Many serial killers come from good homes!!!
The sports almanac makes so much more sense now. Cause I’ve always wondered… wouldn’t his first win, or maybe his first big win, wouldn’t that change the future. So this solves that. Brilliant
It's funny because ever since I was a kid watching these movies, I always thought that was a given. The trilogy makes it clear through changing photographs that any alterations to the timeline do change physical media documenting things that have already happened from the perspective of that media. Even though the movie never explicitly states this about the almanac it always felt like a natural consequence of the rules of that universe.
@@Astronomy_Live yeah, BTTF trilogy follows that butterfly effect where things like the photo can be changed in real time. That’s the type people wish time travel would be..
@@dylanhughes572 Except they are not actually changed in real time. Honestly, the more you look at the BTTF trilogy, how it treats items from the future is more like probability waves. In the movies with photos, the changes were visible but not definitive. The more it looked like his parent's were not going to get together the more of the photo faded away, but as soon as the key point happened and it was a lock that George and Loraine were going to get together, they came back quickly. So the Sports Almanac would likely go fuzzy or not show parts at times when Biff's or someone else's actions put the future in flux.
@@LainK1978 see that doesn’t fit though. If the almanac goes “blurry” or blank then it would, the second Biff won enough to get fame. Which he would by his third win. The Almanac must change in real time and regularly too as every win Biff gets could further change the future drastically.
@@dylanhughes572 it would go blurry at some parts and for some time, maybe minuets or hours, not completely blurry. basically, it would work exactly as the photos.
I don't know about Biff recognizing that Marty is Calvin Klein. How many of us remember a face that we saw 20 years ago? Also, shouldn't his parents have recognized him too, then? This also applies to him recognizing the DeLorean after all these years. He only saw a glimpse of it as it flew away so how could he recognize it so many years later?
There is another theory that his dad knows tbh. And if it was the face of someone memorable, then yeah you could remember it. I remember faces from 20 years ago I haven't seen in ages from my school. Marty did turn his life upside down so I'd think he would remember. As for the DeLorean...The DeLorean to this day is still an incredibly unique and niche design. (It's only popularity is ironically because it was the time machine in this movie) Now imagine a world where no BTTF came out, that means the DeLorean would be even more niche, so seeing a DeLorean do something incredibly and then seeing one pop up 30 years later would definitely get your gears grinding.
@@Tamamo-no-Bae I agree it is possible, but I think unlikely, to remember a face from 20 years ago. (I'm realizing that in the movie it was 30 years) However, there is no indication that his parents recognized him. In the end, though, none of this is a big deal to me. It was a great movie!
I remember hearing that in the "original" timeline, when George took Lorraine to the dance, Biff and his friends got drunk and skipped the dance. Biff was mostly at the dance to get revenge on "Calvin" for wrecking his car. So maybe Lorraine wasn't assaulted in the old timeline.
I think the same thing for why Buford showed up at the town party to shoot doc a few days early. Doc likely wasn't originally planning on going, but since he met Clara, he figured he'd go. So Buford found him and tried to shoot him earlier than in the original timeline. But then again, Doc wouldn't have originally found Clara and saved her if Marty hadn't been there, so, who knows.
Maybe not at the dance, but it still fits that Biff assaulted her around that time. He could have even done so later that night as he was drunk. George was already her boyfriend by then due to the kiss at the dance, so she stayed with him. Broken from Biff's assault, feeling safe and unworthy of anyone better than George.
@@_Ike Buford said at the dance that the last man he'd shot with that gun had taken 3 days to die, so it would have been true for Doc as well. He would have suffered for 3 days and then died on the date in the photograph. Also, Doc had originally agreed to meet Clara when she got off the train. He only skipped it because Marty showed up. Doc and Clara still would have met, and she never would have been in trouble in the timeline where Marty wasn't there.
@@_Ike actually, that isn't true because when Marty found Doc's gravestone, it had Clara's name, and when Marty did go back, the mayor told Doc to pick up the new school teacher at the train. So either way, Doc would have met Clara.
I like the idea that Marty goes back in time, preventing his mom from having to go through that trauma so in present day, she isnt having to self-med to deal w/ it; just the idea that you can go back and help undo something like that for someone else i bet is something many of us would do w/out hesitation.
IDK, I don't even think the scene in the car would happen in the original timeline. Most likely in that timeline Lorraine didn't even buy the sexy dress and didn't try and seduce George in the car, so they went straight into the dance and the rest follows how she depicted it at the start of the movie. I think Lorraine was more worn down over the years and seeing the guy she was stuck with being bullied and acting weak over and over didn't help.
I dreamed of going back in time and saving my mom from being murdered. After having my son I realized if I had, the events leading up to his birth would have never happened. I still mourn the loss of my mother, but am grateful for my son.
@@jasonl7651 Exactly. Lorraine was happier in the second 1985 timeline simply because the McFlys had a better life all the way around than what they had in the original timeline. Plus, if Biff had sexually assaulted Lorraine in the original 1955, so much so that she was still experiencing trauma 30 years later in 1985, I really don't think she would have allowed George to work under Biff or allowed Biff into their home in the original 1985. I believe she absolutely wore the pants in the original 1985, so I believe George would have did what she told him.
@@Marc-King777 thanks for reminding me of this, i re-watched the 3 movies a few months ago. you got me asking a key question - who in fact owned the car? The "assault" fan-theory falls apart with that, because it was Doc Brown's car, so George wouldn't have had it.
There was once a deleted scene from part 2, where after returning to 2015, Biff starts to be erased from existence, because in the altered timeline, Loraine kills Biff at some point before 2015, after having enough of his abuse while married to him.
@@rogerwalker2224 It was a deleted scene that was included in the 25th anniversary DVD set. If you notice in the theatrical cut, Biff is in great pain upon returning to 2015, and then cuts away from there. But the deleted scene shows his disappearing after Marty and Doc take off for 1985, unknowingly the alternate 1985.
She killed him? I don't think I ever heard that mentioned about that scene. I thought it was just a natural consequence of his new wealthy lifestyle - too much booze and too many smokes or something.
@@rogerwalker2224 If it follows the same logic as the first film, Biff started to fade out once Doc and Marty began to leave 2015... Biff was reaching the "point of no return" to alter his fate. Otherwise, Marty would've started to fade out the moment he was hit by his granddad's car... Marty only started to fade when he was reaching his own point of no return (George and Lorraine's kiss at the dance)
This is one of my favorite movies but I have always thought that the script missed the fact that since the alternate present is much better, Marty's family wouldn't be living in the same house as it is the same house when they weren't doing so well. Everyone now is a different person except Marty.
unless... George and/or Lorraine's parents bought the couple their home (as a newlywed present), and they kept it as a reminder of family. Since Lyon Estates was just being built in 1955, a new home in that area would have been rather cheap, so George and Lorraine would have been married after college (let's make it 1960, at the earliest), so either his parents or hers got enough money by that point to get a nice, modest home in the newly developed Lyon Estates, so that they could stay in Hill Valley, and each other's in-laws could come by.
I don't see any reason for them NOT to be in the same house. Marty had changes to his own parents but he only changed their behaviors and nothing beyond that to make a dramatic changed. He just made his dad have balls and he became the writer he wanted to be and thus Lorraine isn't a drunken mess due to hating her life. I don't see how either of that would of changed anything else. The same tones are set in place to buy the same house. It's not like Marty said they should leave the city and live somewhere else or set in motion an event that would cause that.
@@shonwynlewis8143 Perhaps he was writing for the local paper, or was submitting short stories for some science fiction publication, so that book was his first official novel.
His parents living in the same house wasn't as bad as his older siblings supposedly having good jobs, dressing well, but still living with their parents. Also, the alternate Marty that grew up with that better life also goes back to 1955 (as witnessed by "our" Marty). He's unlikely to make the same choices.
@@dougdirac That was evil Marty that Biff befriended at a young age, and manipulated to turn his dad back into a dork and create the initial timeline where Biff can total George's car and bully him about it.
Idc how many times I've seen this film, I still tear up each time George McFly takes Lorraine by the hand (after knocking Biff out) and asks if she's okay.😭💕
Except Biff couldn't have pulled it off if he returned in that DeLorean because... to pull it off would mean a change to the timeline... one he couldn't have very well then returned to. He would've returned to a different timeline, just as Marty did when he went back to 1985. The plot gave us a GIGANTIC hole and we all just went with it.
No...originally Biff was shown to disappear after he returns but then his cane should've disappeared too. Idk why the deleted the scene of him disappearing.
@@flightofthebumblebee9529 He wouldn't have been able to return at all. Disappearing isn't enough. The nanosecond that he handed over that almanac, that's it. He shouldn't have faded out at all because he was still Biff. He changed the timeline. Why would he actually cease to exist? It's not as if he killed himself in the past. He would have simply returned to a different timeline than the one he left that would have looked a lot different -- according to the rules of Back to the Future -- where Marty made changes, and his future was different -- he didn't fade away. This is why time travel is totally absurd. And his cane was still there. Why? If Biff faded away, shouldn't his cane have too? The DeLorean isn't inside a time bubble. It didn't have magical shields. No matter how you look at it, the inconsistency between what happens when one character alters the past and another one does makes no sense. The reason Marty and his siblings were fading was because he was making it so none of them were ever born! He wasn't changing their future... he was eliminating their past. That's not the same thing.
@@Salsuero Here's a thought: 2015 Biff handing 1955 Biff the sports almanac doesn't change the timeline at that moment because, at the moment that old Biff left 1955 to return to 2015, young Biff hadn't used the almanac yet. It was only after old Biff had returned to 2015 that young Biff's use of the almanac would cause old Biff to fade away. What I wanna know is why Jennifer, at the end of BTTF3, was asleep on the porch in 1985 (version 2) when Marty and Doc left her on the porch in the erased dystopian Biff World 1985.
@@Tuning_Spork That's not how time works... from 2015's perspective, Biff had already used the almanac for decades prior to 2015 existing. The moment that almanac was in his hands, the future was different because it was - the future. It doesn't "take time" for the future to be changed... because it's already the future - it's already taken time. It wouldn't matter if he returned a microsecond after or a decade after. The reason Jennifer was still there was presumably (not guaranteed) just because they took her back to 1985 and then she became integrated into the space-time continuum at that point, just like everyone else in that 1985... they simply "slid" over into whatever changed timeline resulted from their interactions with the past. She was apparently sleeping there because the changes they made "somehow" had her choosing to sleep there as a probable coincidence. Thing is... you have to come up with justifications for the inconsistencies of logic BECAUSE they are inconsistencies of logic. The likelihood that she'd be asleep on that porch is probably almost zero... but it's not zero. So you just have to go with it. The only way one can time travel into the past is if they first time traveled FROM the past in order to have a tether back to that moment IN the past. However, even if you do that, you have no way of changing anything prior to the moment marked by that tether. And you can't come back from the future to change anything either. It's an anchor... you go forward, you return back, everything you saw will happen because it already did happen. You won't do anything differently because you already did everything differently because you already saw the future in all other possible timelines anyways... you might think you're changing something, but you're not because you had that thought to change something each and every time you thought you changed your thoughts. The future you saw was always the future you saw. There's nothing to change. Everything you do you already did... even if you think you're doing something different. If you saw your own death... you will still die... in exactly the same way... because it already happened... no matter what you think you'll do differently. Everything you do "differently" will still result in that same future. It's not fate or destiny until you know and then it's the same as history - just future history. But, regardless of all that, time travel to ones past is almost certainly impossible unless it's a one-way trip (which is also probably impossible) and you would immediately be living in an alternate timeline indefinitely. There's no fixing anything. Once you do it, it's done.
The reason that the Cubs did not win in 2015 and won in 2016 was because that was an alternate timeline. Marty not getting in that car accident and breaking his hand made it so he went on to have a successful music career. Which somehow altered something else and ended up with the Cubs winning in 2016. And has led to where we are today.
So are you telling me that Marty not breaking his hand led to covid being as bad as it was cuz you know that alternate 2015 would have had it handled with like synthesizers or something scientific
I noticed that they didn't have the Cubs play an established American League team when they won the World Series. In "Major League", the Cleveland team could have moved to Miami if the team hadn't resisted the owner.
In Back to the Future 2, I always think about Marty jumping off the top of that building, not looking behind, but just taking a step backwards off the ledge to fall to his apparent death... only to be saved coincidentally at the last second by Doc with the time machine there to catch him. In my mind, what probably happened was Marty actually did die, and what we're seeing on the screen is Doc showing up to rewrite the event.
or at the end when he is in the tunnel Doc Shows up at the right time to pull Marty up and out of the way of biff's car. There is a Theory I seen about Marty Was Killed multiple times over the course of the movies, and Doc has been the one reversing time to safe him. I just love dark theories like that.
There's a video on TH-cam that explains how and why Emmit showed up when he did in the instances of Marty jumping off the roof and then biff almost running marty over with his car. I think it goes to say that he (Emmit) had seen it happen times before, and goes back in time to save him (marty). Look up 'how many times does marty die in back to the future', the title is slightly different from how I typed it.
I would say that you trivialize the event by describing it as Biff just getting laid _out_ for a little while. The fact is, that event changed the whole _dynamic_ between Biff, George and Lorraine. Being prepared to fight means _hoping_ to win but being prepared to lose. Bullying, on the other hand, means _not_ being prepared to lose. Prior to this event, Biff bullied George _constantly,_ because at every opportunity, he saw what his assessment of the situation gave the appearance of an overwhelming advantage that would discourage George from _any_ kind of opposition. This discouragement disappeared when George saw Biff taking advantage of _Lorraine._ You can see it in the movie. When Biff's treatment of Lorraine pushes her to a state of actual _distress,_ George stops thinking of _himself._ You can tell, he's _not_ thinking, "What's happening to _me_ is wrong. I've got to stand up for _myself."_ He's thinking, "What's happening to _her_ is wrong. I've got to stand up for _her."_ Then, of course, when he lays Biff out, that changes the whole dynamic. For the first time in his entire life, Biff has known _defeat._ For the first time in _his_ entire life, George has known _victory._ Then, when they kiss for the first time, on the dance floor, Lorraine knows she's gonna spend the rest of her life _not_ with a man Biff pushes around, as was the case the first time, but with a man who just discovered he can stand _up_ to Biff when Biff is wrong. That event _transformed_ each character. It showed Biff he _is_ capable of _losing,_ it showed George he _is_ capable of _winning_ and it showed Lorraine that her previous assessments of George were wrong. Each of these changes would have repercussions for the rest of their lives, so don't just call it Biff getting laid _out_ for a little while.
I totally agree with that assessment. To add to that, it wasn't just Biff Tannen getting laid out by George McFly. It was Biff Tannen getting laid out by George McFly, the "biggest loser at school." George wasn't just picked on and bullied by Biff, he was picked on and bullied by pretty much everyone. So for George to stand up for not so much for himself but for Lorraine and knock him out with one punch, it really dealt a blow to Biff's ego and reputation. It's like a boxer or an MMA fighter getting dominated in a fight and losing. It does something to them psychologically and they may never recover from it. If he tried to intimidate someone afterwards, all the supposed victim had to do was bring up George knocking his ass out and then laugh in his face. At the point, the feared lion becomes a pussycat. Onto George, when that one guy cuts into his and Lorraine's dance, he appears ready to give up and walk away. But then he remembers what happened outside and seeing Lorraine in distress once again. He realized that if he wasn't going to allow Biff to get away with that, he wasn't going to allow this clown to get away it either. It's as if he told himself, "I just laid out the biggest bully at our school. Why should I let this guy walk all over me?" This solidified that confidence from earlier and all of his classmates became aware of it. By knocking out Biff, he went from zero to hero. Lastly, it seems obvious that Lorraine only went out with George to the dance out of pity because her dad hit him with his car. She loved George in the original timeline, but I don't think she ever truly respected him. This is because he never stood up to Biff or anyone, even when the other person did him wrong. So just by going out with him and falling in love with him, George most likely worshipped the ground she walked on. She knew he would never cheat, neglect or abuse her, so he became a safe choice for her. But when he stood up for himself and her at the dance, she no longer felt pity for George. That newfound confidence helped him appear more attractive to her. But you're right. The dynamic from that point on changed for all three.
Another overlooked factor is that I think George standing up to Biff encouraged others at the school to do the same. Biff's bullying days were over. After everyone else saw Biff could lose, his power was done and no one was afraid of him anymore. That's why he ended up as a car detailer.
Plus Biff is so much more subservient around George because George has threatened to tell the town that he saw Biff trying to sexually assault Lorraine that night.
Here's a theory. The Marty taking on a new trait: Not wanting to be called chicken, was due to his own interference in the past, resulting in a father raising him to not take any shit from anyone.
He was a hot head even in the first movie. The chicken part was added in 2 and 3 to just make it more clear that this was the character development trait they were focusing on.
The first theory doesn't make sense. Doc rips up the letter AFTER Marty shows him the photo, so that can't be the moment when he changes his mind. The third theory ... well, sure? That's not even a point someone can argue against. The newspapers change with the events, so why wouldn't the book? The fourth thing is a silly fanfiction. Oh, so Biff is shocked because he sees a flying car that vanishes with fire trails? Who wouldn't be shocked? And many seem to forget that Marty was in 1955 for only a week, met most other people only a handful of times and there are no photographs of him left behind. Why would people 30 years later remember how he looked like, especially when they've seen Marty grow up in the 70s and early 80s? You wouldn't think "oh, that kid I've known for almost two decades now looks like a guy I've seen for a few days 30 years ago: it must be him!"
Here's one: At the beginning of BTTF Part 1, Doc was going to kill himself if the DeLorean didn't vanish. He'd had numerous failed experiments, lost his estate, and was in bad with the Libyans. The video Marty was taking wasn't just for posterity, but was also a suicide note. It's also theorized that when he was, "Hanging a clock," in the bathroom and "fell", he may have been trying to hang himself when the rope snapped and he hit his head.
@@SonOfMuta not anybody i know of, i believe doc hitting his head opened a time paradox, effect was allowed to predate causation. in 85 doc should of already known marty. which may be why they met. its never explained how the two met. i believe doc knew he had to complete the loop and send marty back. which is why he sought him out in the 80's to begin with. doc should if known everything upto the point at the mall when he was shot.
But Doc was hanging the clock in 1955, when he had his house and before any Libyans. The reason Marty went back in time was because Doc had put that date in to the DeLorean while talking about that story.
The "ever?" was just a bit of foreshadowing of how the relationship between Biff and George would be different going forward but looking at the picture and seeing that all three siblings re-appeared he thought it wouldn't affect things enough to change them.
I just love how the quality of the script and the attention to detail on screen allows for such a fun collection of interpretations and theories this many years later. I love it when creators clearly think through the world and characters beyond the script, which allows them to cram tons of extra information and details into every scene. Maybe some details will never be discovered.
After the segment about Lorraine's trauma and sexual assault by Biff, and the implications it suggests for the "prime" timeline, a really _really_ dark twist would have been to have one of the McFly kids completely disappear after George stands up to Biff - the obvious conclusion being that the missing kid's father wasn't George and leaving the audience to speculate how exactly that particular conception happened.
While I disagree with the theory that Lorraine was likely assaulted by Biff at the Enchantment Under The Sea Dance in the original 1955, I do think you have an interesting conception. I, for one, love the BTTF movies but I think more should have been changed in the altered 1985 after Marty got his parents back together. His interactions with George in 1955 had a drastic effect on his father's persona and life from that point forward. As a result, it would have been nice to see more dramatic changes to the McFlys or Marty's life when he returned to the altered 1985. The fact that they lived in the same house and his parents had the exact same kids is almost impossible. But I think your concept of having one of Marty's siblings disappear from the photo once Marty fixes things would certainly be a dramatic change worth exploring.
The Biff question is much easier to explain when you factor in that once a bully is put in his place by someone, everyone else tends to continue to keep him there. Not super complicated.
The theory is sound for the last one except for a few issues. First, "Johnny B. Goode", while written in 1955 (The same year Marty was there) was likely already playing it or people assumed it was taken up by another artist. In this cause, Marty has seen it and playing it. This was very common in the 50s as many different versions of the songs exited together. He released the song in 1958, although from what I read, Barry was already playing it at bars and small venues. The second issue, Calvin Klein, The real-life person was born in 1942, and a run of names at that time shows, while rare, there were multi people named this in 1955. So Biff would just assume it was a chance they were named the same. Lastly, it is true, that one person did know who Mary was? His father knew, and he was a Sci-Fi writer, it is likely Marty and him knowing what really happened caused him to become such a good writer. He didn't have to use his mind to write it, he just wrote true to life. EDIT: Skateboarding was becoming a fad by 1955 in California (I admit I had to look this up), so Biff likely knew of them by then. The exact date is uncertain, although one article I read claims it was even possible by the late 40s. Biff being what he was, likely knew of this. Sources: 1. "Written and sung by Berry in 1955, the song is about a semi-literate "country boy" from the New Orleans area, who plays a guitar "just like ringing a bell", and who might one day have his "name in lights". - Taylor, Timothy D. (2000). "Chapter 7 - His Name Was in Lights: Chuck Berry's 'Johnny B. Goode'" 2. Calvin Klein - Name lookup for 1955 in the USA and Hungary )He was born in NYC, father came from Hungary. 3 names matched in the USA and 7 in Hungary. 3. In the movie, where he hands Marty a book and it appears to be about a Time-Traveller. Although, I did not find a reference for this fact. 4. "Skateboarding, as it exists today, was probably born sometime in the late 1940s, or early 1950s, when surfers in California wanted something to do when the waves were flat." - Marcus, Ben; Grggi, Lucia (2011). The Skateboard: The Good, the Rad, and the Gnarly: An Illustrated History
It didn't have to be done quickly though. Biff stole the DeLorean, took it somewhere isolated and figured it out well enough to get it to bring up previous destination dates, could have taken days, weeks, months or longer for all we know, then brought it back to when Marty, Doc and Jennifer showed up and wait a few hours to return it to a minute or so after he stole it. Marty and Doc would have never known it was gone.
I used to think this too BUT I suppose it's like comparing giving a smart phone to an elderly person in 1990 or giving it to one in 2022. The Delorean in 2015 is a flying car that just so happens to have dates and times inside it - but all cars in old Biffs time are flying cars - so I dont think it was too difficult to operate - even if he had to refuel it as it's something of his own time. My only gripe is how accurate Biff was in returning the car to the same spot BUT this video has helped me to see that maybe Biff really did have time travelling in his mind for all those years.
Good video. I want to point out that Biff, at the end of Part I / beginning of Part II, ran outside when the Delorean was already airborne, and therefore didn't know who was inside of it. Instead, he saw what appeared to be Marty Jr. walking to a landed Delorean in 2015, and also overheard their conversation.
These theories are pretty interesting. As for the first one, the only flaw that I see in that theory is that Doc ripped up the note after he had seen Marty's picture restored and Marty's comment that his father had never stood up to Biff before in his life. If Doc had come to the realization that not all future changes are bad, then he would not have ripped up Marty's letter after he discovered it in his pocket. That said, this theory is still totally plausible. Ask for the last theory, I highly very much doubt that Biff is even remotely smart enough to figure that out. I just think that in the 2015 future he was in the right place at the right time.
it takes time for someone to change their beliefs after the initial spark comes to mind, so it's not really a flaw, like he said he eventually figured wot the hell
The 1955 Doc saw the video Marty have bring into the past, so he knew the Lybians where coming for him. Cause when Marty came back to the Doc house Young Doc look shock like he saw a ghost, so he mostly likely saw himself getting shot by the Lybians. Also Marty telling him about the time machine like 30 year earlier mostl likely have chnaged the timeline.
The flyoff at the end of part 1 reverted biff, which seemed to hold.till '15 The 2nd time back in time the almanac was.delt with but biff had more weird shit happen, Marty on the hoverboard. The flag rope escape...what biff didn't look up and see em fly away? I.cant even recall shows I saw last lul
I think he had a moment of realisation, he smiled and said "I haven't seen a flying DeLorean since.." and then just stared at it for a bit. He remembered when he saw a flying car in 1985 and probably could see that Marty and doc were there.
Great Scott! This is heavy man. That first theory makes so much sense. As for Biff figuring out that Marty is a time traveler...that doesn't happen until 2015, when he sees a flying Delorean, "I haven't seen one of those since"...wait a second how could there have been a flying Delorean in 1985?!?
What about Doc after Back to the Future seeing himself in the Old West when he was collecting all that cash from different time periods convincing himself that it was okay to remain there?
Below is my dark, but plausible, explanation/theory of old Biff’s distressing return to 2015 after giving young Biff the sports almanac. It's a bit long so I appreciate folks taking time to read through it and give their thoughts. There is a deleted scene where Biff returns to 2015, gets out of the Delorean, and proceeds to fade out of existence. If you’ve never seen this you should look up ‘Biff disappears’. I think the creators intended it to be part of the universe they had constructed for BTTF but decided it was too dark for movie goers enjoying a family film, and rightfully so. With that said, despite being ironically "deleted" we should take it to the bank that Biff indeed fades away even though it's not in the final cut. In the first film Marty + siblings fade away when Marty endangers their existence by interfering with George and Lorraine's courtship, so when Biff fades away upon his return to 2015 I believe it's because this same type of interference has occurred in the past with his own ancestors. It could be that when Doc & Marty go back to 1885, THEY are the one's who alter the path of Buford Tannen's life that originally would have resulted in Mad Dog impregnating whatever lucky lady would spawn Biff's ancestors. What we don't see in 1985 after Doc's time machine train disappears is Marty going home and asking his dad "when is Biff coming by to wax the truck" only to have George reply "who?" Marty would then pull out the photograph of Doc Brown’s grave stone, erased towards the end of BTTF 3, to discover it has been replaced with a gravestone for Buford Tannen. I believe Doc Brown, upon rescuing Clara and remaining in 1885, made it a priority to end the Tannen line with Buford regardless of the butterfly effect. Judging by what happens to old Biff upon his return to 2015 I would say that Doc was successful. Like with other instances in these beloved films we forgive some logic that doesn't calculate perfectly and results in an unresolvable paradox due to ripple effects, but given the other general rules (aka guidelines) of the BTTF universe it's plausible. When Biff returns to 2015 he immediately jeopardizes his own existence by #1 giving Doc and Marty a reason to alter his past after giving 1955 Biff the sports almanac and #2 providing Doc and Marty a way to travel into the past via returning the Delorean. The instant the Delorean departs from 2015 with Doc & Marty, Biff's fate is sealed and he disappears. I believe there is actual evidence that this may be at least in-part true. In BTTF 2 as old Biff is in the midst of being erased Doc Brown specifically alludes to his only regret with destroying the time machine being not traveling back to the old west. Interesting timing, no? Regardless of if Doc Brown viciously enacts vengeance, or if the mere event of Buford going to jail alters the future timeline it seems clear to me that Doc Brown & Marty are directly involved in Biff being erased from existence.
in the old VHS box set of the films there was a 4th video which was sort of a Q&A video of common questions about the films. one of the questions was what happens to biff when he comes back? you see him get out of the car in pain and then he disappears (offscreen). its explained that in the timeline where biff is rich, lorraine shoots him after he kills marty. some good points in your theory though
Well there were some comics that came put a couple years ago called Biff to the Future which takes place in the Biff timeline what he did with the sports almanac, and what he does to Hill Valley. It's a great read, it throws your theory out the window, I don't want to spoil it
I love the creativity of your theory. For me though, I've always viewed the timelines based on how doc draws them out on the chalkboard in BTTF II when explaining the issues Biff has created and the only way to fix them. Basically, each timeline is it's one dimension, so with that in mind, the 1885 timeline really only comes into effect when Marty arrives back home at the end of Part III, and then changed again when Doc arrives in the Train Time Machine. Prior to that though, what happened in the other timelines is their own individual thing. As others have mentioned about Biff's disappearance, if you look at the FAQs on the VHS or DVD of Part III, the writers pose several theories, one of which being Lorraine shooting Biff sometime in the past (of his own twisted timeline), and the Ripple Effect eventually catching up and causing Old Biff to disappear from existence. He could've also died from the shock of time travel itself and his age, although this is more of a boring theory to me. And finally, I think Old Biff had died by some other means in his own timeline, and so therefore cannot exist in his version of 2015. The most fun and plausible theory though is that Lorraine shot him at some point in his timeline, that makes the most sense to me
Omg!! That's it!! This is how you would bring back Back to the future "reboot" if you could even call it that. A spin off revolving around Biff, his life after George knocks him out and him investigating and becoming obsessed with Marty over time and how he puts the pieces together that Marty is a time traveler. Think a series in the same vein of Cobra Kai kind of or even a prequel, better call Saul type of deal. THAT'S how you ressurect back to the future without tainting the originals.
This is really cool to ponder on the continuing journeys of the characters beyond what's seen in the movies. What happened to Biff's life after Marty's first time travel is very compelling.
Maybe it wasn't intended to come out that way... but it has to be absolutely true. Marty wasn't there to stop it happening, it's so sad but it has to have been that way
@@marcwilliams9261 but would lorraine have even been seducing George in the car? Plus Biff was at the dance specifically for revenge on Marty. Also Lorraine recounts the dance in the present, and mentions dancing with George and coming to the sinking realization that they'd be together forever. THAT was her big memory of the night, not a rape scene.
Now that you talk about it, the photo should have changed a bit after changing the future. The new outfit of Marty's siblings in that photo should be different, as they have become different people.
Exactly. The clothes they wore when Marty got back should have been the clothes they were wearing when the picture was restored. It can be imagined that changes in your past don't really change you as much as you think. You still are mostly the same person. But that observation was brilliant
I have a theory about part 3 that has never came up. Did doc have help in the past from someone other than Marty? Doc mentioned in the letter to Marty that suitable parts to fix the delorean won't be invented till 1947 but yet he builds a time traveling train? Either it's a plot hole that's overlooked or a potential idea for for a part 4.
Enjoyed and actually agree with the 1st few theories but but Beth the car washer has everything to do with the fact that George no longer does his work for him without him doing his work maybe he didn't graduate high school and definitely didn't get the promotions
I don't think so. For start it wasn't really Marty who gave confidence to George, but him seeing Lorraine being abused is what made him to grow a pair. So if he see the love of his live, that he was taking to the prom dance, he would do the same as he did with Marty there. Second, Lorraine says how she kissed George for the first time at the dance, on the same night. If she was violated she would never kiss a guy (even a decent guy) at the same night.
@@Vanessinha91Pucca Yeah, Lorraine was quite clear when she outlined the events of that night. Without the Marty interference there probably was NO car scene, NO altercation with Biff (and I will bet ... no low-cut dress for Biff to be aroused over). So Lorraine and George headed straight into the dance.
As to the first theory, I have always thought that docs reaction to learning George never stood up to biff, was him discovering why Marty's older brother is so much taller than everyone else in the family....biff is pretty tall.
When Marty shows Doc the picture of him and his siblings for the first time trying to prove he was the future you can already see his brothers hair is disappearing
Biff would have to eventually place his bets thru front men because he is widely known as The Luckiest Man Alive any bet he places would radically change the odds. The bookies would be terrified of going broke on any bet Biff places knowing he Always Wins.
I have watched so many videos like this one, and I feel like I’m the only one who has noticed the obvious divine intervention at the end of the first one. If the delorean hadn’t stalled, the timing would have been all off. It’s as if the laws of physics were conspiring to make sure Marty made it back to 1985.
So many variations to consider regarding getting the Delorean up to 88mph and to strike the wire at the same time as the lightening strike, best to just let the engine stall, the obvious flooded engine and the fact that it burst into life when he headbutts the steering wheel, add even more movie magic suspense.
I always wondered why Doc didn't run a line from one end of the street to the other and let the Delorean maintain contact with the line, like a streetcar, while accelerating to 88 mph. Maybe he didn't have enough line? Or would it have taken too much time to run the line along the whole street?
I love this series but ive always found it weird when Biff goes back to 1955 in the first instance to give himself (young biff) the almanac wouldnt that just change the future then? After that Biff comes back to 2015, he would be going to an alternate 2015 not where doc and marty are present. In that instance wouldnt marty and doc be stuck in 2015 without the delorean?
something I've always wondered was why the Delorean wasn't totalled after it got struck by lightning. If that incident fried the flying circuits, wouldn't the time machine have crash landed from the sky?
Recovery parachute. They actually exist in the real world and come standard on some models of small aircraft. In BTTF part 2 flying cars exist in the future, it would be stupid if not suicidal for flying cars to lack some sort of recovery device in case of a mid air collision or if the vehicle were struck by lightning while flying in rough weather.
It doesn't explain how the Delorean still traveled in time because it was hovering when struck by lightning and every other time it had to be going 88 mph, if it could do that then why not have Mr. Fusion cause the overload instead of having the train push it up to 88 mph
@@ArgonTheAware The car, because it was hovering, spun on its axis up to the 88 miles per hour, and did so quickly due to both the lighting bolt and the fact it was airborne. That backwards 99 was supposed to signify that. It clearly was poorly done.
@@Reggie2000 The problem with that theory is that in order to get up to 88 MPH it would have to spin more than 250,000 RPM so Doc never would have survived the G-forces produced by it and would end up splattered against the inside of the car
The theory about the Almanac is the only one that sustains itself. The movie shows that information gets corrected when the past changes, like with the headline "Doc Brown committed/ commanded", the Clayton/Eastwood ravine or the Twin Pines/ Lone Pine Mall. The one about Biff is completely ludicrous. The Enchantment Under the Sea is their highschool graduation, meaning those people would move on with their lives and Bifff would have to face reality, that he is someone without skills, brain or money to succeed in life, so getting stuck in a car detailing job is just natural progression. The one about Lorraine ignores that Biff went to the parking lot after Marty (Calvin) for revenge, after all, he "wrecked" his car. Once there, he saw Lorraine and decided to attack her. There was no motivation for Biff to be there in the original timeline and attack Lorraine. The difference in Lorraine's personality is explained by the influence of whom she falls in love with: a loser in the original timeline and a winner in the altered one. George had the influence to drag her down or lift her up, not Biff. About Doc Brown's expression, he is just thinking "oh sh!t, Marty changed history". Doc Brown explicitly said to Marty not alter any past events as the changes could be catastrophic. When Marty proudly announces that his father changed himself, Doc Brown realizes that his attempt to not change the future failed.
There's actually a deleted scene from the second back to the Future movie that involves Biff getting out of the DeLorean when he brings it back from going from 1955 he brings it back to 2015 you notice when he gets out he's an incredible pain prior to accidentally breaking his Cane and hitting himself his stomach seems to be in great pain yeah it's because that the scene cuts off before you're shown that he actually fades out of existence because the fact that he changed the timeline he gave himself the almanac he becomes rich and yes in 1985 he is Rich however in the mid-90s this was a storyline they had a thought of doing in the movie but then they scrapped it for time the rain finds out that he killed her husband McFly and then shoots him so inadvertently he ended up causing his own death and he erased himself from the 2015 timeline that's actually why he's in such excruciating pain in that scene when he lands the DeLorean is he slowly being erased through Time it's deleted scene you can actually get it on a special edition DVD of the movie it's actually really cool if you watch it
there is a thing that puzzles me. when marty says goodbye to his parents after the ball, his mother mentions that marty was cool name and since marty wasnt their first born son, cool plot twist would be when he returned home and finds out his name is no longer marty because his big brother got the name. :)
One thing that always made me wonder is "What was the point of Back to the Future 2?" The premise of the movie was Doc went to the future then brought Marty there to do something about his kids. If Doc's plan went off without a hitch: Marty tells Griff "No", his son doesn't go to jail, and it doesn't ruin his family. They go back to the past. But, why? That future is now "reset" once he goes back to 1985. What was the point of going to the future anyway? Because of the events that happen once the plan goes awry, Jennifer finds out that Marty was in a wreck with a Rolls Royce that ruined his life, and losing his job because he let his temper get the better of him. The events of II and III lead Marty to realize he needs to stop being a hothead and getting goaded into trouble. The problem with this is, how would he come to this realization by just helping his son in the future? Was he supposed to learn this from that incident?
The intention of Doc helping Marty Jr in the future had nothing to do with Marty having a realisation about his own life, literally just that one favour for a friend. Doc had no family himself, so why not look into the family of Marty in the future? Heck, Marty even told him to look him up in the future before Doc drove away at the end of 1. Doc was trying to do the "bulletproof vest" approach. One small change to do a favour for his friend's family in the future. He says Marty turns out fine, which really he pretty much does, just okay but not awesome like he hoped. The change revolved around a Tanner, so something about that family just gets under the skin of Doc. A whole family of bullies. There was a great post pointing out that Marty changed between 1 and 2, because his parents were different. He grew up more hotheaded and sure of himself "nobody calls me chicken".
I see it as trying to give advice to someone who doesn't want it, like someone in love with someone that is bad for them. You can reason with them all you'd like, but they will never enact change until they see the reasoning as well. You can tell Marty all day not to race or be a hot-head, but it does little good if he doesn't see why it's a problem. By witnessing the effects of his behavior upon his friends and family, Marty is finally able to come to terms with what he needs to learn as an adult. Is that why they made II and III? Nope. Money is the reason, but if we are to TRY and rationalize the story, that's my theory on the point of these movies for the character of Marty.
That last one is stretching. What’s more likely is that in the original timeline he has always pushed George around to the point where George got him a job at his company, then Biff basically bullied information out of George in order to steal what career George may have got at that company (George is doing Biffs reports, and going by the way they are dressed it looks like Biff is his superior, a job that George would have if Biff wasn’t around). After George stands up to him in the alternate timeline, Biff no longer bullies George and doesn’t get the job, and like you said he has no real prospects in terms of education so ends up doing manual work for the rest of his life. He just happens to be washing the McFly’s cars at the end of the film purely to show what happened to him later in life. Why else would he have that look on his face and say “what is going on here” if he knew what was going on there? Also it’s clear he only figures it out in part 2 when he says “so.. doc Brown invented a time machine”. Where as he would say something like “so.. doc brown was the one who invented a time machine”.
I've always wondered about the mall sign at the end of the first movie. To the Marty we follow it reads "lone Pine" but what if the past Marty looks up at it from the parking lot, it would still read "twin pines". So the sign would be both versions at the same time, maybe there are infinite versions of it and what it reads depends on who is looking at it.
No, the other Marty was born in and grew up in the new timeline, so it would have always been Lone Pine to him. Marty is the only one who knows it used to be Twin Pines.
Look, I know in 2022 a person understanding time travel theories is available at any corner drug store, but in 1985, a person like that was a little hard to come by. Seriously, prior to the runaway surprise success and eventual fame of this little time travel flick from Zemeciks and Gale, in spite of a handful of decent and even excellent films, time travel was not a common discussion among corner store clerks or many frat parties, and no online forums existed for such things. I remember myx excitement that the girl down the street HAD Back to the Future on vhs, and we wore out the tape, acting it out at least once a week, with me jumping off her couch for the guitar solo. Biff would have had to engage in an interest in time travel exactly how I did… by being exposed to the idea, reading about the nature of time and time travel in encyclopedias (books), Popular Science in the school library, Stephen Hawking’s a History of Time, and consuming every fictional account in print or screen materials as it was available on broadcast TV or cable (no internet, only libraries, books stores. VCRs were super expensive for most homes until AFTER 1985, and video stores did not become common or well stocked until the 1990s.). The delay in releases of movies from box office to TV could be years, even when going to the ‘Home Box Office’ (HBO). I remember A New Hope being on cable being such a big deal the adults on my street went to the house with cable so everyone could see it, some for the first time. I was quite young, had not seen it, and the carnage at the Homestead scared me so I ran away to find toys. Exposure to time travel as a theory or concept was not really a given in society, outside of Gygax fans. Biff was no great brain. He had George do his homework for how long? He likely did not read anything for fun outside of the articles in magazines with centerfolds, and certainly never picked up anything by Herbert George Wells. He may have seen a few movies, but again, Biff’s no great brain, he’s not imaginative, and would likely flip to a sporting event if The Time Machine by Pal from the 1960s came on. He was cringey and subservient because once a classic bully is flattened in a big way by the suddenly confident nerd of the school, EVERYONE had his number and he was never top dog again. But, Hill Valley is a larger ‘small’ town, apparently. One high school even after 30 years pass tells us this. Even my small town in Texas had a mall in the 1980s (until the late 90s, to be honest). Biff never left his hometown, and did well enough in auto shop to build a detailing business. His clients would ALL be his peers from school who likewise never left, and George made it clear he’d not allow Biff to ‘con’ him. George likely would not brook his kids being bullied by Biff, either, hence the extreme people pleasing act with Marty. Needing business, and like most bullies in fact being a coward, he doesn’t want to risk a triple axle knock out punch again from George, or anyone else. So in spite of his true nature remaining nasty, his interactions with people were meant to keep him getting paid. Biff did not spend forever wondering about Calvin Klein. Marty made no efforts to hide going to Doc’s workshop. It was easy for Lorraine to follow him, but Biff was too uninspired or too dumb to think to do that. This alone, plus my knowledge of 1985 and how damnedably hard finding material about time travel when you were a super freak about it was, leads me to say Theory 4 is way off the mark. Theory 1 is good, theory 2 quite sad but not totally improbable, theory 3 is not a theory but someone explaining world building meta that should have been obvious to everyone, and theory 4 is applying today’s zillenial information age plus saturation of time travel as a casually accepted sci fi trope with how an actual Boomer born in the 1940s, characterized as a pretty cruel but overall cowardly bully would ponder a nemesis who appeared and just as quickly disappeared. Biff forgot Clavin. George was always there.
One other theory I have heard thrown around was that by the end of the 3rd film Biff has it figured out and while working on Marty's truck he messed with Marty's brakes in a way that would cause them to fail under hard braking causing him to crash into the Rolls-Royce and subsequently ruined his life
It is a good thought, but Doc had yet to consider taking Marty to the future to fix Marty's kids. So none of the BTTF2 antics can have an impact on BTTF yet.
@@LainK1978 I don't follow. In the final timeline, Doc sends Marty to the future and Marty shows up immediately after, my point is he could then think "yeah, I probably need to know whatever he tried to tell me." Also, it has been a while, but he *did* see the video with the Libyan attack, didn't he?
I just watched this video and thought “oh yeah… here we go.” Thinking no one know BTTF like me. I don’t give a sh*t what the comments say. Every time I thought I had you at a loophole, the subsequent dialogue disproved my thoughts. This video, in my opinion, is bang on the money!
The Lorraine's Past part had me almost crying. Rape is one of those things that can ruin a person. I've seen what it can do. Some can survive and move on. Most survive but carry the weight with them. Some... For some, they died when it happened. Though they still walk, they're not at all who they were; they're a living ghost of what was.
I need a theory to explain how and even why George originally got Lorraine to go to the dance with him. ??? It wasn't like he gave any hint that he wanted to. He was engrossed in his stories, and was perfectly aware of Biff's determined interest in Lorraine, which was a massive deterrent. Marty pestered him until he asked her to go. (Or, he was scared of what Lord Vader would do to him.) So Lorraine felt sorry for him after dad hit him with the car. That explains her interest in him (dubiously). It doesn't provide an explanation of why he asked her. So....hit me. Was it something she did when he came to in her bedroom?
Damn 6mths. Sorry for the necro of your comment but.....Lorraine's dad hit George instead of Marty with his car thus putting them in the situation for him to ask her. At least, that's what I've always thought and SWEAR I read somewhere.
Lorraine was already drinking before the assault thought. Marty even warns her that drinking could become a problem. But she swiped the booze from her parents liquor cabinet. Something she had clearly done before.
The almanac theory is solid, though it does bring up one question - why isn't the DeLorean effected the same way? Sure, its not filled with information the same way - but it would have been effected in design by changes to the timeline. Subtle things like a manufacturing law being slightly different (you can find plenty of examples of 'odd looking' cars designed around said laws regarding things like maximum height of headlights and the shape of front bumpers) or a designer not getting the same inspiration during concept creation.
I like another dark theory that I heard elsewhere, where Doc was depressed, had lost everything and this time machine was all he had left. If it didn’t work, there’d be no point in going on. So he and Marty stood in the way of the Delorian in a last ditch effort/suicide attempt. If the time machine didn’t work, the car would run them over. Doc also didn’t want to die alone, so he brought Marty there to record their time travel attempt/suicide. He was so surprised that it had actually worked, as he was used to a lifetime of failure.
Nah docs a trooper he was trapped in the Wild West with nothing and still stuck it out until the end of his days setting up the time machine in a cave and a letter to be sent to Marty way in the future knowing that he would die alone there in that timeline
Especially the last theory explains very much. It explains why Biff is the only looser in his family in the alternate timeline and why his attempt to change the time works so good.
It doesn't explain how the Delorean still traveled in time because it was hovering when struck by lightning and every other time it had to be going 88 mph, if it could do that then why not have Mr. Fusion cause the overload instead of having the train push it up to 88 mph?
Given that the Delorean was hovering it's conceivable that the resulting shock wave created by the lightning strike accelerated it to the prerequisite speed.
Hitting a nuke reactor with lightning isn't covered in most science books. Maybe it created enough power to negate the need for 88mph. It's like crossing the streams......
I agree with all the theories except the last one. Biff became timid because he was afraid of George cause George was the only one to ever stand up to him and fight back. To everyone else he was still a bossy jerk and a bully. Everyone except George. He’s scared of George cause he knows George will stand up to him and humiliate him.
Lorraine's past trauma, is completely wrong! First, the parking idea came from Marty and George would have been the one to drive her to the dance Biff would have not been looking for Marty over the matter of $300 damage done to his car so the sexual assault would have never happened, second Lorraine's drinking, she was drinking liqueur before in the first place.
What always bothered me. Clara Clayton. Clayton ravine. In the second move, we see the gravestone of Doc, with Clara and both Marty and Doc wonder who she might be. Then, in the third movie, Doc is being asked to pick Clara at the train station, but Marty interferes with this and they both go out to examine the unfinished rail track. It is there, and only with Marty interfering, that Doc actually saves Clara. Without Marty getting back in time, Clara would have never arrived at Hill Valley, as she would be dead in the ravine. So, the gravestone makes no sense, because Marty did not travel back in time yet. In the movie, it might have been simply resolved by Doc saying something like "Oh yes, that is a nice spot, I go there often, just get my head out of town now and then". This would give a reasonable possibility, that Doc would have been out there, saving Clara, even in case Marty never traveled back in time. As said, this detail always bothered me from the very first time I saw the third movie. I do not know if it was put there intentionally to mess with people, or it was a mistake.
I think its a ripple effect from Marty changing the original timeline in the first movie. Just as his parents changed everything changed slightly. At that point marty and doc exist in a new timeline with a working time machine and are part of a loop. Doc met Claira because it happend already in the post bttf1 timeline and marty causing him to meet her was already in motion. We never get to see what happens in the current 1985 and the ripple of marty saving doc as the movie ends just after he returns.
There are actually 3 different timelines in play that account for this. Timeline 1: Neither Marty nor Doc go back to 1885. No one is there to pick up Clara from the train station. She takes a carriage by herself and falls in the ravine. This is the scenario Marty remembers when he recalls the name of the ravine as Clayton Ravine. Had Marty visited the ravine after Doc traveled to 1885, he would have seen it called something else, but he just assumed it was the same. Scenario 2: Only Doc goes back to 1885. He still gets asked to pick up Clara from the train station, but not realizing her original fate or their future relationship, he does end up picking her up, preventing the events leading to her falling into the ravine from unfolding. They fall in love, which leads to her being mentioned on his gravestone after he gets killed by Buford Tannen. Scenario 3: both Marty and Doc travel back to 1885, which leads to the events seen in the movie. Even though Doc is still asked to pick up Clara from the train station, he becomes aware of their future relationship beforehand due to Marty showing him the photo of his gravestone. He decides to not pick her up at the train station to avoid meeting her, but does not realize he would still meet her and save her right before she falls in the ravine.
@@WilshireD The train station is displayed as being close to the city, practically in the center. Why should Clara take any carriage for the short trip? How did she come to be near the ravine, which is not that close to the station and certainly not in the direction from the station to the city? Geographically it makes no sense that she ended up there.
@@erikziak1249 I’d assume she took the carriage from the station to the house she was staying at (since that’s where Doc ends up taking her after he rescues her), but I can’t recall how close to the city that was. I don’t remember it being particularly close to any other buildings though. Maybe it was on the outskirts closer to the ravine?
@@erikziak1249 Moreover, even if it was a short distance, taking a carriage was still the most practical since she had all her luggage with her. She mentions a snake spooked the horses which caused them to bolt off toward the ravine. We don’t know how long she had been riding in the out-of-control carriage before Doc saved her.
The Biff theory has 1 big problem, Biff wasn't that smart. In fact he was basically an idiot & it was all his fault. He probably cheated his way through school. We see in the 1st diner scene he had George do hi homework. He probably had not only George, but several other kids do his work for him. He probably found smart kids he could intimidate to do his homework in various subjects. As an adult in the original timeline he did the same to George & his coworkers. This only worked because he could intimate his peers. However, this all changed after George laid him out easily with 1 punch not even breaking a sweat; made worse by the fact that George was literally at his mercy less than a second before. Remember George was literally the town wimp!! Once word got around town what happened nobody would be afraid of him anymore. This could easily turn him into the man we see at the end of the movie. I know he was the same in part 2, but it'd take time for the word to spread around the whole town. Finally, Biff can't be called a complete loser. After all he runs his own business which is still in operation to at least 2015. It takes some smarts to start & run a business even if it's barely staying a float. Also, seeing how 2015 Biff seems to be doing moderately well means he's doing well. Also, since he seems to have a habit of trying to short change people, but they still hire him must mean h does a pretty good job. My only problem is how in part 2 he was able to operate the DeLorean. I can accept him knowing how to drive it & Mr. Fusion, but how did he figure out the time controls. Finally, I know he went back to being a jerk in 2015, but something could of happened between 1985 & 2015, which we didn't see or we do see him only acting like that with Marty Jr., who acted like his Grandpa at that age, He could just be acting like a big shot bullying people who were weaker. After all hi attitude changes when Griff enters, before that there was literally just Marty Jr. & 2 little kids hanging around the staff weren't even on the floor.
You begin by saying he wasn't that smart, then you say he had to have some smarts to run a business that lasts at least to 2015. Perhaps intelligence would have nothing to do with him connecting the dots about Marty/Calvin Klein; Obsession trumps all!
I always assumed Biff assaulted Lorraine in the original timeline. Her entire character was dripping with the shame, horror and regret of having been assaulted, especially in a time period where no one would have listened to her about it or cared. Couple that with marrying the guy she feels safe with and Biff's horrible "say hi to your mom" comment, I just assumed that was the implication all along
Really good. Theory 2 wasn't hard to imagine and the first was really a gimme. The Almanac changing and Biff putting the pieces together, wishing up and even chasing it a bit was great!
1) I thought it was just assumed that Doc figured out that there was good changes that also occurre because he obviously said, "Well, I thought... what the hell?" after reading the letter and putting on a bullet proof vest and saving his life. 2) Again I thought it was assumed that Loraine was depressed and unhappy as per the evidence of her drinking. I do however find the irony fascinating. If Loraine isn't happy with a jerk, assertive person like Biff nor a wimp and soft person like George then it says like Loraine it's very hard to make a woman happy, yet it's sort of easy at the same time. You just have to be a confident, assertive and yet sensitive and caring person to hit the right spot in a woman's heart. Or better put by Troy in Blast from the Past, "You're a nice boy but what Eve needs is a nice man." 3) I think it's true the Almanac like books, media etc can change. However, I don't think this theory has to be given being how unrelevemt it is to the story we're dealing with. Marty wouldn't have ever thought of or need to sabotage any races. The only changes that might occur is a football game changing because George, Loraine, Biff, Marty or possibly a 3rd party effected by the charges being somewhere they shouldn't be and injuring or effecting one of the players unintentionally thus changing the game. But still very unlikely. 4) I highly doubt Biff knows anything, after all he's a "butthead". If he can't even notice the two different Marty's at the moment the door opens then he doesn't have the knowledge to catch anything more deep. Just saying. Plus Biff would obviously try to pass that job on to a P.I. like he does everyone else. So look out for the P.I. not Biff. Lol.
@@davidm4566 That's what I allude to. I think the evidence says it wasn't merely the event so much it was being with someone like old George who couldn't protect her. As I said, I'm more interested in the irony of the whole aspect of her being unhappy in both cases until George is set right.
I think doc killed Marty! When doc sees the photo of Marty’s siblings coming back. He had a choice to kill Marty or let him live out his days in the past because a new Marty exist in the future. But doc became fond of Marty so when Marty went back to the future. Marty saw his past self jump in the Delorian. But didn’t go back in time. I think the doc programmed the delorian to dissapear and self destruct so our main Marty can live in a new timeline where his parents are happy. Doc closed the loop or eles the universe will have an infinite Marty’s. Kinda scary to think about lol
6:25 - the problem here with that is George is now a new man, with confidence and, let's face it, probably more vitality and a much more active sex life with his wife. The fact that ALL three of his kids were created identically is just impossible - if the two had sex even a few minutes off when they did in the original timeline, or skipped it that day entirely, what are the odds that the exact sperm corresponding to Marty and his siblings respectively made it to the appropriate egg? The set of circumstances would have to be identical to create Marty et al.
Yup! And even if by some miracle all three kids were concieved at the exact same time as the original timeline, their upbringing would've been a lot different. Which means Marty would likely have a different personality, different friends, and may have never even met Doc. Which means he never would've went back in time in the first place...
@@Mike-fz4cj True for Marty but his siblings are very different people in the modified future. His brother now has an office job and his sister is implied to have a very active love life. Neither of these were the case in the original timeline. Perhaps Marty was just his own person and would end up the way he did regardless of his home environment.
Theory 3 would possibly mean that Biff eventually learned that lesson. As a teen, he would have started moving the odds and finally began to realize they had changed from what he originally thought when he first bet. Theory 4.... He details cars because after the incident, with George (plus others he bullied; it's like dominos) no longer being afraid of him, he had to fix and clean his car himself. His lackeys are gone when he's an adult so we can guess he did it all alone, and made it a career. If he actually had figured out about Marty, it would have been years ago when the kid started looking like "Calvin" and started hanging around the crazy inventor guy in town.
Man. I have seen this movie so many times, and I never would have linked up that theory about Lorraine and her trauma. But now that it's been mentioned, I'm not sure I'll ever unsee it. That's seriously deep. Makes the ending so much better with her being liberated from that past. If only Marty could have convinced Lorraine to knock him out instead, and made sure she had a nice wrench handy to do it with...
biff got into the car detailing business because in high school, his car kept getting filled with manure and he became an expert at scrubbing every inch of a car inside and out.
He paid to have it cleaned (at least the first time). Although, I guess you still could be right, b/c he gipped the detailer, so perhaps he was forced to clean it. Also, he's into cars, so it's a natural career opportunity (and requires little high functioning brain activity lol).
Maybe Biff couldn’t afford the $300 bill and was forced to work off his debt. Which later became a job and finally his career?
He just won't go near any cars the got covers in manure.
@@TheGuruStud if working on cars required little brain activity then why the hell isn’t it common for people to fix or at least know how to fix their cars, not only that but even just detailing cars is a lot more complex than one would think.
unlikely, he hated manure... :D :D
The Loraine theory makes total sense, and adds a heartbreaking layer to her character.
yeah
It is almost impossible NOT to the true.
Its something that's more obvious to people post 2017 and #metoo but invisible to most people watching the film in 1985.
@@DSAhmed Nah we knew about it back then too. History didn't start in 2017. That's only when you became mature enough to notice these things.
@@Mikhail-Tkachenko good point.
I don't buy the "Biff is clever" one. I think after George knocked him on his ass, everybody started standing up to him and his unjustified confidence never recovered. He had to adapt by being what he thought (as kind of a sociopath) nice was - just nonthreatening as hell. Meanwhile, his darkness never really went away, it was just hiding under the camouflage he had created to get by.
I was thinking the same thing. Every one heard that George McFly stood up to him so everyone began to stand up to him also.
Exactly
Yeah the rest are very plausible but theres lots of holes in the last one. This also doesnt mention anything about how Biff is still a bully in 1955 after the knockout by George, and you can see this in the clips they show from BttF2. There would be more dialogue from Old Biff if he was obsessing over Marty this whole time. He figures it out in 2015 when he sees the flying Delorian and remembers it disappearing in 1985.
He was working for the guy. He still didn’t like him but he was his boss so he had to behave.
Yeah I don't buy the last theory at all. If biff was so obsessed with Calvin Klein, why not tell young Biff about him by name. Instead he just says "a kid or an old man".
Thomas F. Wilson, who seems to be a total sweetheart irl, did an amazing job as Biff.
Not to mention being a funny comedian in real life. Look up his "Questions song", it's a hilarious take on all the repeated questions he constantly gets from fans in the years since starring in BTTF.
He was on the Meltdown with Jonah and Kumail and was absolutely hilarious.
Yeah! very under used actor, he had/has skillz. As a 8 year old kid you don't realize these things, but casting directors from the 80's should be ashamed of not putting him in more shows. It pains me to think what crap we had to sit through that he would have made immensely better.
He played the gym teacher on Freaks and Geeks too. Great show that sadly only lasted one season.
@@m00k61 Very sad indeed!
I have a theory that Marty's sudden personality change between 1 and 2 ("Nobody calls me Chicken!") is his personality reverting to the personality of the Alternate Marty; the one we see leaving the Lone Pine Mall parking lot at the end of 1. Alternate Marty grew up with confident parents, and because of this, he grew up with a bit more attitude and a more fiery temper. When Marty returns to 1985 for the first time he's the same guy, but after a short delay, the changes his alternate self makes in 1955 (mostly the same btw, as we see at the end of 2) the changes to the future ripple out and change our Original Marty into the Alternate Marty.
One key clue to this is that Marty never acknowledges memories of his original 1985 parents after the final scene in 1. At some point after he sees his new truck for the first time, but before he travels to 2015, the ripple catches up to him, and his memories of his old life are erased. He still remembers Doc and time travel, because that Marty would as well. But from that point forwards, he only remembers his parents as Alternate Marty would remember them, despite having only seen them once for about a minute. When he meets his mother again in 1985A, he seems surprised to see that she's an alcoholic, even though this version of his mother is pretty much the same as what he grew up with, more or less. And he's shocked to believe that his mother would leave George. If he remembered his father as being a wimp for his entire life, maybe it wouldn't seem so shocking to Marty that his mother might go for the guy across town with his own skyscraper.
This actually makes my brain hurt trying to think about it, but I see where you are coming from.
That is a really good theory.
No no. Marty is the traveler. He retains all his original memories. Everything is changing around him. He travelled "outside" of time and therefore is unaffected. He always will be, not matter what time he goes to.
@@nothing-oj1sz Has that been established in the movies? Because not being born affected him, and I can't think of a third thing that would have changed him
@@no.one.a113 You are right about that. Not being born did affect him. He was disappearing and that was incorrect. It should have no affected him.
I always thought that when Doc says “Never?” to hearing that George had never stood up to Biff he was thinking that the future could be drastically changed. Then he realized that Marty at least existed so it wasn’t as urgent as the more pressing matters to deal with right then.
That was my thought.
@@theAstarrr Even after sending Marty back to 1985, he didn't get a rest. (In his timeline, BTTF is followed immediately by BTTF III.) Only after all of that could he sit down, relax, and figure out what he was going to do with Marty's letter. He might have thought that NOT reading the letter and following the instructions might itself lead to a paradox.
@@christopherheckman7957 Thats true, but from the perspective of 1955 Doc, he doesn't do all that much in BTTF 3. They get the time machine out of the mine and he sends Marty back to 1885, thats it. The rest of the movie deals with 1985 Doc. This does though raise the question, why wouldn't 1985 Doc know and therefore prevent himself being struck by lightening, having in 1955 gone through the process of seeing Marty turn up a second time and recover the time machine from the mine etc.
@@chrisjohn4605 Easy. Because if Doc isn't struck by lightning in 1955, he doesn't go back in time, and a paradox results.
If anything, he would have been motivated to add a lightning rod to the Delorean, to guarantee that he does get struck by lighting and goes back in time.
This first theory about Doc realizing things is unnecessary. Doc had an idea that Marty was going to tell him how he died because he is a very smart man and he heard the things Marty kept saying to him. But when Marty came back afterwards telling him how Doc had ended up going back to the Old West, he would have realized that he did not die. He would also see that this Marty was not sad about anything. That would tell him that he didn't die and it was okay to read the letter and take whatever precautions would assure that. 1985 Doc must have had a lot of secrets though!
I like how the first movie started as a "50's nostalgia" movie and then sneakily shifted into an "80's nostalgia" movie
Never thought about the Almanac always being correct with changes in the timeline since it was a future artifact. Pretty cool.
I'm kind of ashamed at myself for never thinking of it, as I had thought that after winning enough to have an economic effect on his timeline, then certainly the outcomes wouldn't match up. It's so obvious now that I see this.
but what if someone went back and stopped the gray's company from ever publishing it?
It makes sense as we see it happen with the newspapers.
This is technically where their is a paradox in time travelling in the films. The sports Alamanc should change based on the time travel rules of the original film, but the second film has slightly different time travel rules : for example: old Biff comes back to 2015 after giving himself the Almanac in 1955. He’s able to do this because in 1955 Marty and Doc have already got the Almanac back from Biff and corrected the timeline, but based on these rules, the photograph Marty has shouldn’t change in the first film, because Marty has already got his parents to meet and fall in love and correct the timeline .
@@TAKTAK_Toys Marty is the only one from the original timeline so I think he is the timeline now, if that makes sense. Being outside of time has made him the determinating factor for all the secondary actions of timetravel in this universe. It is like he is the only one that is actualy in synchronization so nothing is locked in place and time unless he is part of it now. The same is true of Doc being shot at the point of leaving the first movie. He never saw him die for certain so when he was wearing the vest it could be original but we are made to think it was an alteration Marty caused completely.
The whole second movie is kinda nonsense in that it was all caused by Doc not learning the lesson about sending a person and not leaving a letter with intructions that he learned by getting shot like the letter said. They learned nothing till the end of the 2nd when letters are back in play.
Also the moment where Biff saw Marty coming out of the party and knocked out the other Marty. This adds up to his suspicion and curiosity.
Nice even I did not recall that
@@xenniealsentinel1800 During the nobody calls me chicken bit! 🤗🐔🤔👍
Wo good catch, I don't recall the narrator mentioning that 🤔
I always thought he just never recognized the Marty coming out because he went by so fast
Good idea, but I honestly don't think Biff was that smart.
Interesting points. I'm more convinced this was more of a life change for Lorraine than anyone else... and that makes me happy. Best movies ever.
It was Lorraine's plan all along - it was the reason she let her young teenage son hang out with a crazy old man.
@@salvatronprime9882 accept he wasn't crazy he was a genius.
@@GameOn71213 intelligent and people that are different are always called crazy. The ones that call intelligent/creative people are the real crazy ones.
I've actually always assumed the theory presented here about Lorraine was what was intended by the story, sadly. I didn't even realise this wasn't the obvious storyline.
@@antenant9294 Yeah same, I mean outside of my first viewing of part 1, it's pretty obvious that was the intention.
When a movies script is written well, people can make plausible assumptions of things not in the script. That’s a sign that they built a very good world.
At one point in time there were 4 DeLoreans in 1955.
1. The one Marty went back in time with.
2. The one Marty and Doc went back in time with.
3. The one Biff went back in time with.
4. And finally the one in the cave.
See game theory’s sonic time travel theory
If all 4 DeLoreans met…they would explode As well as the 2 Marty’s and Doc’s
Yeah but this didn’t happen in the movie because in Pt 2, the moment the DeLorean was struck by lightening, we lost 1 DeLorean and gained another in its place.
So this happened “off screen.”
@@geo5146 Getting struck by lightning didn’t destroy that car, it sent it speeding off (in a spiral) and sent Doc to 1885.
Just re-watched PT2 and thought this exactly, pretty cool tbh.
@@lookbovine Right, but I think what they’re trying to say is that the DeLorean from 1885 wasn’t buried under the mine UNTIL the flying DeLorean was struck by lightning, because it hadn’t been sent back in time to become the 1885 DeLorean yet. But the logic of that assumption is sorta sketchy, because changes to history seem only to occur as a result of meddling by time-travelers, and the DeLorean was sent back unintentionally by a lightning strike outside of their control. In other words, there was a point some period of time before the lightning strike at which the time-travelers’ actions no longer had any effect in changing the outcome of the DeLorean being struck by lightning and sent to the past, and at THAT moment, the 1885 DeLorean would’ve appeared buried in the mineshaft, and from that moment until the lightning strike, both instances of the DeLorean coexisted in the same part of the timeline. Assuming this period of time is long enough, then the other two DeLorean’s (2015 Biff’s DeLorean and Marty’s original 1985 DeLorean) could very well also exist alongside these ones, proving the theory correct. But we can never know because we don’t know what actions, if any, could’ve prevented the DeLorean from getting struck.
I disagree with the last theory. I think it is far more likely that Biff tried to keep his tough guy status after George knocked him out, but the rest of the school basically treated him as an outcast since he was beat up by the wimpiest guy in school. It turned the tables on the relationship between George and Biff, making Biff subservient to George.
In 2015 when Biff saw the Delorean, he mused that he hadn't seen a flying Delorean in 30 years. It was only after he saw two Martys and then listened in on the conversation between Doc Brown and Marty that he put two and two together. His decision to travel back in time himself was spur of the moment.
How awesome is it that a trilogy is still making us dissect every part over 30 years later? Not even Star Wars has this level of complexity.
We see that the punch did nothing to change Biff in BTTF 2. After he wakes up from being decked, he goes and finds Marty and kicks the living crap out of him. If anything, George's punch made Biff more dangerous. This is a plot hole I address in my "Real Mistakes of Back to the Future." Once they got that book away from Biff, Doc in 1955 was in immediate danger. We saw how Biff relentlessly pursued Calvin Klein for doing 300 bucks damage to his car. Imagine how he would have pursued Doc Brown once an Almanac that he knows can make him a fortune is stolen from him. How would Biff know to track down Doc? Well, he dragged Calvin Klein out of Doc Brown's car in the dance parking lot. It was, at that point, known that Calvin Klien is associated in some way with Doc Brown. In searching for the book after it was stolen from him, he would have remembered the warning from the old man who gave it to him, about a crazy scientist and a kid trying to take the book from him.
Stealing the book from Biff would have created a whole new and far more terrifying timeline where Doc Brown would probably have to leave town in order to avoid attacks from Biff Tannen for stealing his futuristic Almanac from him.
I think the best answer is that Biff doesn’t what bad times with George after that event. He’s still an terrible person like we see in 2015
Biff was a bully, once he was knocked down by George, it would have shattered his self image. We've all seen similar things happen in real life. So yes, I believe you are 100% correct.
I like to think that Biff found a girl who wouldn't put up with his shit. And it changed him for the better. He was happy. He apologizes for being a butthead to the McFlys and starts his own business. He had a kid (he is a grandpa after all) and life is good ...until Mrs. Biff dies. He is now a heart broken man angry at the world when we see him in 2015. He needed the love of a good woman to keep him sane. Lorraine (in any timeline) never loved him.
That's an interesting theory! Though if his wife really were that nice, and the couple presumably raised a decent kid, then how did Griff turn into such a jerk?
Griff was the grand kid. Would have been Marty's kids age, not Marty's. My grandparents could have been monsters, but my parents could have been good people, or vice versa!!! Many serial killers come from good homes!!!
@@jettqk1 Wasn't something said about his cybernetic implants?
@@productNine Oh, that's right!
When biff saw the jump in 85 he reverted to bully biff that instant, pig nosed rage face, rewatch
The sports almanac makes so much more sense now. Cause I’ve always wondered… wouldn’t his first win, or maybe his first big win, wouldn’t that change the future. So this solves that. Brilliant
It's funny because ever since I was a kid watching these movies, I always thought that was a given. The trilogy makes it clear through changing photographs that any alterations to the timeline do change physical media documenting things that have already happened from the perspective of that media. Even though the movie never explicitly states this about the almanac it always felt like a natural consequence of the rules of that universe.
@@Astronomy_Live yeah, BTTF trilogy follows that butterfly effect where things like the photo can be changed in real time. That’s the type people wish time travel would be..
@@dylanhughes572 Except they are not actually changed in real time. Honestly, the more you look at the BTTF trilogy, how it treats items from the future is more like probability waves. In the movies with photos, the changes were visible but not definitive. The more it looked like his parent's were not going to get together the more of the photo faded away, but as soon as the key point happened and it was a lock that George and Loraine were going to get together, they came back quickly. So the Sports Almanac would likely go fuzzy or not show parts at times when Biff's or someone else's actions put the future in flux.
@@LainK1978 see that doesn’t fit though. If the almanac goes “blurry” or blank then it would, the second Biff won enough to get fame. Which he would by his third win. The Almanac must change in real time and regularly too as every win Biff gets could further change the future drastically.
@@dylanhughes572 it would go blurry at some parts and for some time, maybe minuets or hours, not completely blurry. basically, it would work exactly as the photos.
I don't know about Biff recognizing that Marty is Calvin Klein. How many of us remember a face that we saw 20 years ago? Also, shouldn't his parents have recognized him too, then? This also applies to him recognizing the DeLorean after all these years. He only saw a glimpse of it as it flew away so how could he recognize it so many years later?
I was thinking the same thing.
There is another theory that his dad knows tbh.
And if it was the face of someone memorable, then yeah you could remember it. I remember faces from 20 years ago I haven't seen in ages from my school.
Marty did turn his life upside down so I'd think he would remember.
As for the DeLorean...The DeLorean to this day is still an incredibly unique and niche design. (It's only popularity is ironically because it was the time machine in this movie)
Now imagine a world where no BTTF came out, that means the DeLorean would be even more niche, so seeing a DeLorean do something incredibly and then seeing one pop up 30 years later would definitely get your gears grinding.
@@Tamamo-no-Bae I agree it is possible, but I think unlikely, to remember a face from 20 years ago. (I'm realizing that in the movie it was 30 years) However, there is no indication that his parents recognized him. In the end, though, none of this is a big deal to me. It was a great movie!
I think Biff is too stupid to connect the dots.
I saw "Nobody" (with Christopher Lloyd) and I didn't recognize Michael Ironside.
I like how the movies were written so well that they were able to loop back to other movies and include scenes that didn't feel out of place.
I remember hearing that in the "original" timeline, when George took Lorraine to the dance, Biff and his friends got drunk and skipped the dance. Biff was mostly at the dance to get revenge on "Calvin" for wrecking his car. So maybe Lorraine wasn't assaulted in the old timeline.
Also covered that
I think the same thing for why Buford showed up at the town party to shoot doc a few days early. Doc likely wasn't originally planning on going, but since he met Clara, he figured he'd go. So Buford found him and tried to shoot him earlier than in the original timeline.
But then again, Doc wouldn't have originally found Clara and saved her if Marty hadn't been there, so, who knows.
Maybe not at the dance, but it still fits that Biff assaulted her around that time. He could have even done so later that night as he was drunk. George was already her boyfriend by then due to the kiss at the dance, so she stayed with him. Broken from Biff's assault, feeling safe and unworthy of anyone better than George.
@@_Ike Buford said at the dance that the last man he'd shot with that gun had taken 3 days to die, so it would have been true for Doc as well. He would have suffered for 3 days and then died on the date in the photograph. Also, Doc had originally agreed to meet Clara when she got off the train. He only skipped it because Marty showed up. Doc and Clara still would have met, and she never would have been in trouble in the timeline where Marty wasn't there.
@@_Ike actually, that isn't true because when Marty found Doc's gravestone, it had Clara's name, and when Marty did go back, the mayor told Doc to pick up the new school teacher at the train. So either way, Doc would have met Clara.
I like the idea that Marty goes back in time, preventing his mom from having to go through that trauma so in present day, she isnt having to self-med to deal w/ it; just the idea that you can go back and help undo something like that for someone else i bet is something many of us would do w/out hesitation.
IDK, I don't even think the scene in the car would happen in the original timeline. Most likely in that timeline Lorraine didn't even buy the sexy dress and didn't try and seduce George in the car, so they went straight into the dance and the rest follows how she depicted it at the start of the movie. I think Lorraine was more worn down over the years and seeing the guy she was stuck with being bullied and acting weak over and over didn't help.
I dreamed of going back in time and saving my mom from being murdered. After having my son I realized if I had, the events leading up to his birth would have never happened. I still mourn the loss of my mother, but am grateful for my son.
@@jasonl7651 Exactly. Lorraine was happier in the second 1985 timeline simply because the McFlys had a better life all the way around than what they had in the original timeline. Plus, if Biff had sexually assaulted Lorraine in the original 1955, so much so that she was still experiencing trauma 30 years later in 1985, I really don't think she would have allowed George to work under Biff or allowed Biff into their home in the original 1985. I believe she absolutely wore the pants in the original 1985, so I believe George would have did what she told him.
@@Marc-King777 thanks for reminding me of this, i re-watched the 3 movies a few months ago. you got me asking a key question - who in fact owned the car? The "assault" fan-theory falls apart with that, because it was Doc Brown's car, so George wouldn't have had it.
@MrSpooner1985 - big problem wit the theory, it was Doc Brown's car, so George wouldn't have had it. We only ever see George riding a bicycle.
There was once a deleted scene from part 2, where after returning to 2015, Biff starts to be erased from existence, because in the altered timeline, Loraine kills Biff at some point before 2015, after having enough of his abuse while married to him.
Lol makes sense. But was the scene deleted? I remember seeing it and thinking he should have faded away the moment the deLorean re-entered 2015...
@@rogerwalker2224 It was a deleted scene that was included in the 25th anniversary DVD set. If you notice in the theatrical cut, Biff is in great pain upon returning to 2015, and then cuts away from there. But the deleted scene shows his disappearing after Marty and Doc take off for 1985, unknowingly the alternate 1985.
She killed him? I don't think I ever heard that mentioned about that scene. I thought it was just a natural consequence of his new wealthy lifestyle - too much booze and too many smokes or something.
@@rogerwalker2224 If it follows the same logic as the first film, Biff started to fade out once Doc and Marty began to leave 2015... Biff was reaching the "point of no return" to alter his fate. Otherwise, Marty would've started to fade out the moment he was hit by his granddad's car... Marty only started to fade when he was reaching his own point of no return (George and Lorraine's kiss at the dance)
@@ReelMeurik Nicely explained!
This is one of my favorite movies but I have always thought that the script missed the fact that since the alternate present is much better, Marty's family wouldn't be living in the same house as it is the same house when they weren't doing so well. Everyone now is a different person except Marty.
unless... George and/or Lorraine's parents bought the couple their home (as a newlywed present), and they kept it as a reminder of family. Since Lyon Estates was just being built in 1955, a new home in that area would have been rather cheap, so George and Lorraine would have been married after college (let's make it 1960, at the earliest), so either his parents or hers got enough money by that point to get a nice, modest home in the newly developed Lyon Estates, so that they could stay in Hill Valley, and each other's in-laws could come by.
I don't see any reason for them NOT to be in the same house. Marty had changes to his own parents but he only changed their behaviors and nothing beyond that to make a dramatic changed. He just made his dad have balls and he became the writer he wanted to be and thus Lorraine isn't a drunken mess due to hating her life. I don't see how either of that would of changed anything else. The same tones are set in place to buy the same house. It's not like Marty said they should leave the city and live somewhere else or set in motion an event that would cause that.
@@shonwynlewis8143 Perhaps he was writing for the local paper, or was submitting short stories for some science fiction publication, so that book was his first official novel.
His parents living in the same house wasn't as bad as his older siblings supposedly having good jobs, dressing well, but still living with their parents.
Also, the alternate Marty that grew up with that better life also goes back to 1955 (as witnessed by "our" Marty). He's unlikely to make the same choices.
@@dougdirac
That was evil Marty that Biff befriended at a young age, and manipulated to turn his dad back into a dork and create the initial timeline where Biff can total George's car and bully him about it.
Idc how many times I've seen this film, I still tear up each time George McFly takes Lorraine by the hand (after knocking Biff out) and asks if she's okay.😭💕
💯
This
Except Biff couldn't have pulled it off if he returned in that DeLorean because... to pull it off would mean a change to the timeline... one he couldn't have very well then returned to. He would've returned to a different timeline, just as Marty did when he went back to 1985. The plot gave us a GIGANTIC hole and we all just went with it.
No...originally Biff was shown to disappear after he returns but then his cane should've disappeared too. Idk why the deleted the scene of him disappearing.
@@flightofthebumblebee9529 He wouldn't have been able to return at all. Disappearing isn't enough. The nanosecond that he handed over that almanac, that's it. He shouldn't have faded out at all because he was still Biff. He changed the timeline. Why would he actually cease to exist? It's not as if he killed himself in the past. He would have simply returned to a different timeline than the one he left that would have looked a lot different -- according to the rules of Back to the Future -- where Marty made changes, and his future was different -- he didn't fade away. This is why time travel is totally absurd. And his cane was still there. Why? If Biff faded away, shouldn't his cane have too? The DeLorean isn't inside a time bubble. It didn't have magical shields. No matter how you look at it, the inconsistency between what happens when one character alters the past and another one does makes no sense. The reason Marty and his siblings were fading was because he was making it so none of them were ever born! He wasn't changing their future... he was eliminating their past. That's not the same thing.
@@Salsuero Yeah its a mindfuck.
@@Salsuero Here's a thought: 2015 Biff handing 1955 Biff the sports almanac doesn't change the timeline at that moment because, at the moment that old Biff left 1955 to return to 2015, young Biff hadn't used the almanac yet. It was only after old Biff had returned to 2015 that young Biff's use of the almanac would cause old Biff to fade away.
What I wanna know is why Jennifer, at the end of BTTF3, was asleep on the porch in 1985 (version 2) when Marty and Doc left her on the porch in the erased dystopian Biff World 1985.
@@Tuning_Spork That's not how time works... from 2015's perspective, Biff had already used the almanac for decades prior to 2015 existing. The moment that almanac was in his hands, the future was different because it was - the future. It doesn't "take time" for the future to be changed... because it's already the future - it's already taken time. It wouldn't matter if he returned a microsecond after or a decade after.
The reason Jennifer was still there was presumably (not guaranteed) just because they took her back to 1985 and then she became integrated into the space-time continuum at that point, just like everyone else in that 1985... they simply "slid" over into whatever changed timeline resulted from their interactions with the past. She was apparently sleeping there because the changes they made "somehow" had her choosing to sleep there as a probable coincidence. Thing is... you have to come up with justifications for the inconsistencies of logic BECAUSE they are inconsistencies of logic. The likelihood that she'd be asleep on that porch is probably almost zero... but it's not zero. So you just have to go with it.
The only way one can time travel into the past is if they first time traveled FROM the past in order to have a tether back to that moment IN the past. However, even if you do that, you have no way of changing anything prior to the moment marked by that tether. And you can't come back from the future to change anything either. It's an anchor... you go forward, you return back, everything you saw will happen because it already did happen. You won't do anything differently because you already did everything differently because you already saw the future in all other possible timelines anyways... you might think you're changing something, but you're not because you had that thought to change something each and every time you thought you changed your thoughts. The future you saw was always the future you saw. There's nothing to change. Everything you do you already did... even if you think you're doing something different. If you saw your own death... you will still die... in exactly the same way... because it already happened... no matter what you think you'll do differently. Everything you do "differently" will still result in that same future. It's not fate or destiny until you know and then it's the same as history - just future history. But, regardless of all that, time travel to ones past is almost certainly impossible unless it's a one-way trip (which is also probably impossible) and you would immediately be living in an alternate timeline indefinitely. There's no fixing anything. Once you do it, it's done.
The reason that the Cubs did not win in 2015 and won in 2016 was because that was an alternate timeline. Marty not getting in that car accident and breaking his hand made it so he went on to have a successful music career. Which somehow altered something else and ended up with the Cubs winning in 2016. And has led to where we are today.
Underrated comment here 👆
So are you telling me that Marty not breaking his hand led to covid being as bad as it was cuz you know that alternate 2015 would have had it handled with like synthesizers or something scientific
At least you don’t have to drop half a yard for a Pepsi. 😄
I noticed that they didn't have the Cubs play an established American League team when they won the World Series. In "Major League", the Cleveland team could have moved to Miami if the team hadn't resisted the owner.
In Back to the Future 2, I always think about Marty jumping off the top of that building, not looking behind, but just taking a step backwards off the ledge to fall to his apparent death... only to be saved coincidentally at the last second by Doc with the time machine there to catch him. In my mind, what probably happened was Marty actually did die, and what we're seeing on the screen is Doc showing up to rewrite the event.
I think he would have just heard the Delorean below him, but maybe.
I agree.
If you watch the scene again, Marty looks behind him and down right before stepping backwards. It is just a glance but it is there.
or at the end when he is in the tunnel Doc Shows up at the right time to pull Marty up and out of the way of biff's car. There is a Theory I seen about Marty Was Killed multiple times over the course of the movies, and Doc has been the one reversing time to safe him. I just love dark theories like that.
There's a video on TH-cam that explains how and why Emmit showed up when he did in the instances of Marty jumping off the roof and then biff almost running marty over with his car. I think it goes to say that he (Emmit) had seen it happen times before, and goes back in time to save him (marty). Look up 'how many times does marty die in back to the future', the title is slightly different from how I typed it.
I would say that you trivialize the event by describing it as Biff just getting laid _out_ for a little while. The fact is, that event changed the whole _dynamic_ between Biff, George and Lorraine.
Being prepared to fight means _hoping_ to win but being prepared to lose. Bullying, on the other hand, means _not_ being prepared to lose. Prior to this event, Biff bullied George _constantly,_ because at every opportunity, he saw what his assessment of the situation gave the appearance of an overwhelming advantage that would discourage George from _any_ kind of opposition.
This discouragement disappeared when George saw Biff taking advantage of _Lorraine._ You can see it in the movie. When Biff's treatment of Lorraine pushes her to a state of actual _distress,_ George stops thinking of _himself._ You can tell, he's _not_ thinking, "What's happening to _me_ is wrong. I've got to stand up for _myself."_ He's thinking, "What's happening to _her_ is wrong. I've got to stand up for _her."_
Then, of course, when he lays Biff out, that changes the whole dynamic. For the first time in his entire life, Biff has known _defeat._ For the first time in _his_ entire life, George has known _victory._
Then, when they kiss for the first time, on the dance floor, Lorraine knows she's gonna spend the rest of her life _not_ with a man Biff pushes around, as was the case the first time, but with a man who just discovered he can stand _up_ to Biff when Biff is wrong.
That event _transformed_ each character. It showed Biff he _is_ capable of _losing,_ it showed George he _is_ capable of _winning_ and it showed Lorraine that her previous assessments of George were wrong. Each of these changes would have repercussions for the rest of their lives, so don't just call it Biff getting laid _out_ for a little while.
I totally agree with that assessment. To add to that, it wasn't just Biff Tannen getting laid out by George McFly. It was Biff Tannen getting laid out by George McFly, the "biggest loser at school." George wasn't just picked on and bullied by Biff, he was picked on and bullied by pretty much everyone. So for George to stand up for not so much for himself but for Lorraine and knock him out with one punch, it really dealt a blow to Biff's ego and reputation. It's like a boxer or an MMA fighter getting dominated in a fight and losing. It does something to them psychologically and they may never recover from it. If he tried to intimidate someone afterwards, all the supposed victim had to do was bring up George knocking his ass out and then laugh in his face. At the point, the feared lion becomes a pussycat.
Onto George, when that one guy cuts into his and Lorraine's dance, he appears ready to give up and walk away. But then he remembers what happened outside and seeing Lorraine in distress once again. He realized that if he wasn't going to allow Biff to get away with that, he wasn't going to allow this clown to get away it either. It's as if he told himself, "I just laid out the biggest bully at our school. Why should I let this guy walk all over me?" This solidified that confidence from earlier and all of his classmates became aware of it. By knocking out Biff, he went from zero to hero.
Lastly, it seems obvious that Lorraine only went out with George to the dance out of pity because her dad hit him with his car. She loved George in the original timeline, but I don't think she ever truly respected him. This is because he never stood up to Biff or anyone, even when the other person did him wrong. So just by going out with him and falling in love with him, George most likely worshipped the ground she walked on. She knew he would never cheat, neglect or abuse her, so he became a safe choice for her. But when he stood up for himself and her at the dance, she no longer felt pity for George. That newfound confidence helped him appear more attractive to her.
But you're right. The dynamic from that point on changed for all three.
Another overlooked factor is that I think George standing up to Biff encouraged others at the school to do the same. Biff's bullying days were over. After everyone else saw Biff could lose, his power was done and no one was afraid of him anymore. That's why he ended up as a car detailer.
@@Partyboy22 not enough italics
Plus Biff is so much more subservient around George because George has threatened to tell the town that he saw Biff trying to sexually assault Lorraine that night.
Here's a theory. The Marty taking on a new trait: Not wanting to be called chicken, was due to his own interference in the past, resulting in a father raising him to not take any shit from anyone.
only problem with that is that he was acting like that before he went back to the future, unless the timeline is just one circular timeline
He was a hot head even in the first movie. The chicken part was added in 2 and 3 to just make it more clear that this was the character development trait they were focusing on.
The writers said it was nothing more than a plot device. They wish they’d put it in the first movie but didn’t write it with sequels in mind.
The first theory doesn't make sense. Doc rips up the letter AFTER Marty shows him the photo, so that can't be the moment when he changes his mind.
The third theory ... well, sure? That's not even a point someone can argue against. The newspapers change with the events, so why wouldn't the book?
The fourth thing is a silly fanfiction. Oh, so Biff is shocked because he sees a flying car that vanishes with fire trails? Who wouldn't be shocked? And many seem to forget that Marty was in 1955 for only a week, met most other people only a handful of times and there are no photographs of him left behind. Why would people 30 years later remember how he looked like, especially when they've seen Marty grow up in the 70s and early 80s? You wouldn't think "oh, that kid I've known for almost two decades now looks like a guy I've seen for a few days 30 years ago: it must be him!"
Here's one: At the beginning of BTTF Part 1, Doc was going to kill himself if the DeLorean didn't vanish. He'd had numerous failed experiments, lost his estate, and was in bad with the Libyans. The video Marty was taking wasn't just for posterity, but was also a suicide note. It's also theorized that when he was, "Hanging a clock," in the bathroom and "fell", he may have been trying to hang himself when the rope snapped and he hit his head.
That's solid, makes sense.
yes, i support this. i have always thought doc tried to kill himself never bought the hanging clock excuse
@@andrewbarnard3229 Who hangs a clock in their bathroom, anyway?
@@SonOfMuta not anybody i know of, i believe doc hitting his head opened a time paradox, effect was allowed to predate causation. in 85 doc should of already known marty. which may be why they met. its never explained how the two met. i believe doc knew he had to complete the loop and send marty back. which is why he sought him out in the 80's to begin with. doc should if known everything upto the point at the mall when he was shot.
But Doc was hanging the clock in 1955, when he had his house and before any Libyans. The reason Marty went back in time was because Doc had put that date in to the DeLorean while talking about that story.
The "ever?" was just a bit of foreshadowing of how the relationship between Biff and George would be different going forward but looking at the picture and seeing that all three siblings re-appeared he thought it wouldn't affect things enough to change them.
I just love how the quality of the script and the attention to detail on screen allows for such a fun collection of interpretations and theories this many years later. I love it when creators clearly think through the world and characters beyond the script, which allows them to cram tons of extra information and details into every scene. Maybe some details will never be discovered.
I miss this in New movies
@@Tina.Di.Napoli ditto 🙃
@@JackOusley 🙂 Glad to hear i'm not the only quality spoiled person
After the segment about Lorraine's trauma and sexual assault by Biff, and the implications it suggests for the "prime" timeline, a really _really_ dark twist would have been to have one of the McFly kids completely disappear after George stands up to Biff - the obvious conclusion being that the missing kid's father wasn't George and leaving the audience to speculate how exactly that particular conception happened.
Someone could do an edit that changes the photo scene and cuts out the shots after of the disappeared child.
While I disagree with the theory that Lorraine was likely assaulted by Biff at the Enchantment Under The Sea Dance in the original 1955, I do think you have an interesting conception. I, for one, love the BTTF movies but I think more should have been changed in the altered 1985 after Marty got his parents back together. His interactions with George in 1955 had a drastic effect on his father's persona and life from that point forward. As a result, it would have been nice to see more dramatic changes to the McFlys or Marty's life when he returned to the altered 1985. The fact that they lived in the same house and his parents had the exact same kids is almost impossible. But I think your concept of having one of Marty's siblings disappear from the photo once Marty fixes things would certainly be a dramatic change worth exploring.
The Biff question is much easier to explain when you factor in that once a bully is put in his place by someone, everyone else tends to continue to keep him there. Not super complicated.
Exactly, most bullies are cowards by nature
This video ONLY has 100k views? This is Earth shattering analysis on my favorite franchise I've never heard OR thought of! Great job bro! Subscribed!
The theory is sound for the last one except for a few issues. First, "Johnny B. Goode", while written in 1955 (The same year Marty was there) was likely already playing it or people assumed it was taken up by another artist. In this cause, Marty has seen it and playing it. This was very common in the 50s as many different versions of the songs exited together. He released the song in 1958, although from what I read, Barry was already playing it at bars and small venues.
The second issue, Calvin Klein, The real-life person was born in 1942, and a run of names at that time shows, while rare, there were multi people named this in 1955. So Biff would just assume it was a chance they were named the same.
Lastly, it is true, that one person did know who Mary was? His father knew, and he was a Sci-Fi writer, it is likely Marty and him knowing what really happened caused him to become such a good writer. He didn't have to use his mind to write it, he just wrote true to life.
EDIT: Skateboarding was becoming a fad by 1955 in California (I admit I had to look this up), so Biff likely knew of them by then. The exact date is uncertain, although one article I read claims it was even possible by the late 40s. Biff being what he was, likely knew of this.
Sources:
1. "Written and sung by Berry in 1955, the song is about a semi-literate "country boy" from the New Orleans area, who plays a guitar "just like ringing a bell", and who might one day have his "name in lights". - Taylor, Timothy D. (2000). "Chapter 7 - His Name Was in Lights: Chuck Berry's 'Johnny B. Goode'"
2. Calvin Klein - Name lookup for 1955 in the USA and Hungary )He was born in NYC, father came from Hungary. 3 names matched in the USA and 7 in Hungary.
3. In the movie, where he hands Marty a book and it appears to be about a Time-Traveller. Although, I did not find a reference for this fact.
4. "Skateboarding, as it exists today, was probably born sometime in the late 1940s, or early 1950s, when surfers in California wanted something to do when the waves were flat." - Marcus, Ben; Grggi, Lucia (2011). The Skateboard: The Good, the Rad, and the Gnarly: An Illustrated History
martys dads book had marty in the radiation suit on the cover diddnt it? from when they found him in the barn
Wasn't a depiction of the DeLorean in the ba kground aswell?
@@xenniealsentinel1800 yes
@@andrewbarnard3229 Marty wore the suit when he pretended to be "Darth Vader" and played the heavy metal music to torture George.
@@LainK1978 yes, you are correct.
Question is, how did Old Biff figure out how the program the time circuits and how to activate the time machine so quickly?
Doc probably left the manual in the glove box LOL
It didn't have to be done quickly though. Biff stole the DeLorean, took it somewhere isolated and figured it out well enough to get it to bring up previous destination dates, could have taken days, weeks, months or longer for all we know, then brought it back to when Marty, Doc and Jennifer showed up and wait a few hours to return it to a minute or so after he stole it. Marty and Doc would have never known it was gone.
@@Skyfire_The_Goth Well done!
I used to think this too BUT I suppose it's like comparing giving a smart phone to an elderly person in 1990 or giving it to one in 2022. The Delorean in 2015 is a flying car that just so happens to have dates and times inside it - but all cars in old Biffs time are flying cars - so I dont think it was too difficult to operate - even if he had to refuel it as it's something of his own time. My only gripe is how accurate Biff was in returning the car to the same spot BUT this video has helped me to see that maybe Biff really did have time travelling in his mind for all those years.
@@Skyfire_The_Goth I still wonder if he was having a heart attack or something when he returned. He seemed to be in considerable pain/distress.
Good video. I want to point out that Biff, at the end of Part I / beginning of Part II, ran outside when the Delorean was already airborne, and therefore didn't know who was inside of it. Instead, he saw what appeared to be Marty Jr. walking to a landed Delorean in 2015, and also overheard their conversation.
The tunnel scene tho
Biff had to take something from that too
That's why 85 triggered him back to bully, which lasted till 15
2:25 I have a theory! That guy on the bicycle in the background is actually Doc from 1985, from BTTF2
That’s what I said. Nobody believed me
These theories are pretty interesting. As for the first one, the only flaw that I see in that theory is that Doc ripped up the note after he had seen Marty's picture restored and Marty's comment that his father had never stood up to Biff before in his life. If Doc had come to the realization that not all future changes are bad, then he would not have ripped up Marty's letter after he discovered it in his pocket. That said, this theory is still totally plausible.
Ask for the last theory, I highly very much doubt that Biff is even remotely smart enough to figure that out. I just think that in the 2015 future he was in the right place at the right time.
it takes time for someone to change their beliefs after the initial spark comes to mind, so it's not really a flaw, like he said he eventually figured wot the hell
The 1955 Doc saw the video Marty have bring into the past, so he knew the Lybians where coming for him. Cause when Marty came back to the Doc house Young Doc look shock like he saw a ghost, so he mostly likely saw himself getting shot by the Lybians. Also Marty telling him about the time machine like 30 year earlier mostl likely have chnaged the timeline.
The flyoff at the end of part 1 reverted biff, which seemed to hold.till '15
The 2nd time back in time the almanac was.delt with but biff had more weird shit happen, Marty on the hoverboard. The flag rope escape...what biff didn't look up and see em fly away?
I.cant even recall shows I saw last lul
I think he had a moment of realisation, he smiled and said "I haven't seen a flying DeLorean since.." and then just stared at it for a bit. He remembered when he saw a flying car in 1985 and probably could see that Marty and doc were there.
Great Scott! This is heavy man.
That first theory makes so much sense.
As for Biff figuring out that Marty is a time traveler...that doesn't happen until 2015, when he sees a flying Delorean, "I haven't seen one of those since"...wait a second how could there have been a flying Delorean in 1985?!?
The last theory is a stretch. But it’s fun to pick apart a movie like BTTF. There are so many details in it & you can hypothesize all day.
What about Doc after Back to the Future seeing himself in the Old West when he was collecting all that cash from different time periods convincing himself that it was okay to remain there?
Theory 5: Biff is an early winner of Squid Game. Same track suit.
Below is my dark, but plausible, explanation/theory of old Biff’s distressing return to 2015 after giving young Biff the sports almanac. It's a bit long so I appreciate folks taking time to read through it and give their thoughts.
There is a deleted scene where Biff returns to 2015, gets out of the Delorean, and proceeds to fade out of existence. If you’ve never seen this you should look up ‘Biff disappears’. I think the creators intended it to be part of the universe they had constructed for BTTF but decided it was too dark for movie goers enjoying a family film, and rightfully so. With that said, despite being ironically "deleted" we should take it to the bank that Biff indeed fades away even though it's not in the final cut.
In the first film Marty + siblings fade away when Marty endangers their existence by interfering with George and Lorraine's courtship, so when Biff fades away upon his return to 2015 I believe it's because this same type of interference has occurred in the past with his own ancestors. It could be that when Doc & Marty go back to 1885, THEY are the one's who alter the path of Buford Tannen's life that originally would have resulted in Mad Dog impregnating whatever lucky lady would spawn Biff's ancestors.
What we don't see in 1985 after Doc's time machine train disappears is Marty going home and asking his dad "when is Biff coming by to wax the truck" only to have George reply "who?" Marty would then pull out the photograph of Doc Brown’s grave stone, erased towards the end of BTTF 3, to discover it has been replaced with a gravestone for Buford Tannen. I believe Doc Brown, upon rescuing Clara and remaining in 1885, made it a priority to end the Tannen line with Buford regardless of the butterfly effect. Judging by what happens to old Biff upon his return to 2015 I would say that Doc was successful.
Like with other instances in these beloved films we forgive some logic that doesn't calculate perfectly and results in an unresolvable paradox due to ripple effects, but given the other general rules (aka guidelines) of the BTTF universe it's plausible. When Biff returns to 2015 he immediately jeopardizes his own existence by #1 giving Doc and Marty a reason to alter his past after giving 1955 Biff the sports almanac and #2 providing Doc and Marty a way to travel into the past via returning the Delorean. The instant the Delorean departs from 2015 with Doc & Marty, Biff's fate is sealed and he disappears.
I believe there is actual evidence that this may be at least in-part true. In BTTF 2 as old Biff is in the midst of being erased Doc Brown specifically alludes to his only regret with destroying the time machine being not traveling back to the old west. Interesting timing, no? Regardless of if Doc Brown viciously enacts vengeance, or if the mere event of Buford going to jail alters the future timeline it seems clear to me that Doc Brown & Marty are directly involved in Biff being erased from existence.
in the old VHS box set of the films there was a 4th video which was sort of a Q&A video of common questions about the films. one of the questions was what happens to biff when he comes back? you see him get out of the car in pain and then he disappears (offscreen). its explained that in the timeline where biff is rich, lorraine shoots him after he kills marty. some good points in your theory though
Well there were some comics that came put a couple years ago called Biff to the Future which takes place in the Biff timeline what he did with the sports almanac, and what he does to Hill Valley. It's a great read, it throws your theory out the window, I don't want to spoil it
that actually makes sense.
that is really interesting, thank you!
I love the creativity of your theory. For me though, I've always viewed the timelines based on how doc draws them out on the chalkboard in BTTF II when explaining the issues Biff has created and the only way to fix them. Basically, each timeline is it's one dimension, so with that in mind, the 1885 timeline really only comes into effect when Marty arrives back home at the end of Part III, and then changed again when Doc arrives in the Train Time Machine. Prior to that though, what happened in the other timelines is their own individual thing.
As others have mentioned about Biff's disappearance, if you look at the FAQs on the VHS or DVD of Part III, the writers pose several theories, one of which being Lorraine shooting Biff sometime in the past (of his own twisted timeline), and the Ripple Effect eventually catching up and causing Old Biff to disappear from existence. He could've also died from the shock of time travel itself and his age, although this is more of a boring theory to me. And finally, I think Old Biff had died by some other means in his own timeline, and so therefore cannot exist in his version of 2015.
The most fun and plausible theory though is that Lorraine shot him at some point in his timeline, that makes the most sense to me
Omg!! That's it!! This is how you would bring back Back to the future "reboot" if you could even call it that. A spin off revolving around Biff, his life after George knocks him out and him investigating and becoming obsessed with Marty over time and how he puts the pieces together that Marty is a time traveler. Think a series in the same vein of Cobra Kai kind of or even a prequel, better call Saul type of deal. THAT'S how you ressurect back to the future without tainting the originals.
I was thinking the exact same thing! 😅
It would be good and get the writers from Cobra Kai, however the 2 Bobs would have to be convinced.
🤨 that's got potential.
This is really cool to ponder on the continuing journeys of the characters beyond what's seen in the movies. What happened to Biff's life after Marty's first time travel is very compelling.
That Lorraine trauma theory is sooooo good. I never thought about that! Dark, but amazing!
Maybe it wasn't intended to come out that way... but it has to be absolutely true. Marty wasn't there to stop it happening, it's so sad but it has to have been that way
@@marcwilliams9261 but would lorraine have even been seducing George in the car? Plus Biff was at the dance specifically for revenge on Marty. Also Lorraine recounts the dance in the present, and mentions dancing with George and coming to the sinking realization that they'd be together forever. THAT was her big memory of the night, not a rape scene.
Poor Loraine:(
Never put that description on it myself
@@jasonl7651 that was addressed, George because he wouldn't hurt her like biff, then repress and self medicate.
....I guess ;p
Damn, that Lorraine theory is DARK.
It makes sense, but it's DARK.
Now that you talk about it, the photo should have changed a bit after changing the future. The new outfit of Marty's siblings in that photo should be different, as they have become different people.
Exactly. The clothes they wore when Marty got back should have been the clothes they were wearing when the picture was restored. It can be imagined that changes in your past don't really change you as much as you think. You still are mostly the same person. But that observation was brilliant
@@o_LL_o I do believe that they were on a family vacation to Disney World in the trip, thus explaining their leisurely state of dress in the photo.
They look exactly the same as before because the audience shouldn't get an early hint about a changed timeline ^^
Well Dave's clothes at least makes sense as his other clothes he was wearing not in the picture where his Burger King King in office outfits
I have a theory about part 3 that has never came up. Did doc have help in the past from someone other than Marty? Doc mentioned in the letter to Marty that suitable parts to fix the delorean won't be invented till 1947 but yet he builds a time traveling train? Either it's a plot hole that's overlooked or a potential idea for for a part 4.
Enjoyed and actually agree with the 1st few theories but but Beth the car washer has everything to do with the fact that George no longer does his work for him without him doing his work maybe he didn't graduate high school and definitely didn't get the promotions
The theories about Lorraine and Biff -- they do make a lot of sense.
I don't think so.
For start it wasn't really Marty who gave confidence to George, but him seeing Lorraine being abused is what made him to grow a pair. So if he see the love of his live, that he was taking to the prom dance, he would do the same as he did with Marty there.
Second, Lorraine says how she kissed George for the first time at the dance, on the same night. If she was violated she would never kiss a guy (even a decent guy) at the same night.
@@Vanessinha91Pucca Yeah, Lorraine was quite clear when she outlined the events of that night. Without the Marty interference there probably was NO car scene, NO altercation with Biff (and I will bet ... no low-cut dress for Biff to be aroused over). So Lorraine and George headed straight into the dance.
As to the first theory, I have always thought that docs reaction to learning George never stood up to biff, was him discovering why Marty's older brother is so much taller than everyone else in the family....biff is pretty tall.
So is George. My parents were 5'8 and 5'5 and I am 6'2. My maternal grandfather was 6'4 and his brother was 6'8. So yes, it was the milkman!!! LOL
@@tmapes1989 i’m a foot taller than everyone in my family, i’m always saying I was the milkmans 😅
When Marty shows Doc the picture of him and his siblings for the first time trying to prove he was the future you can already see his brothers hair is disappearing
Biff would have to eventually place his bets thru front men because he is widely known as The Luckiest Man Alive any bet he places would radically change the odds. The bookies would be terrified of going broke on any bet Biff places knowing he Always Wins.
I have watched so many videos like this one, and I feel like I’m the only one who has noticed the obvious divine intervention at the end of the first one. If the delorean hadn’t stalled, the timing would have been all off. It’s as if the laws of physics were conspiring to make sure Marty made it back to 1985.
So many variations to consider regarding getting the Delorean up to 88mph and to strike the wire at the same time as the lightening strike, best to just let the engine stall, the obvious flooded engine and the fact that it burst into life when he headbutts the steering wheel, add even more movie magic suspense.
@@SODtv The premise of _Donnie Darko_ was thought up as an explanation for BTTF. FYI.
I always wondered why Doc didn't run a line from one end of the street to the other and let the Delorean maintain contact with the line, like a streetcar, while accelerating to 88 mph. Maybe he didn't have enough line? Or would it have taken too much time to run the line along the whole street?
Theory 2 definitely makes sense.
Makes too much sense not to be true.
I’m never going to watch these movies the same way again. And I love that! These are frickin awesome theories.
I love this series but ive always found it weird when Biff goes back to 1955 in the first instance to give himself (young biff) the almanac wouldnt that just change the future then? After that Biff comes back to 2015, he would be going to an alternate 2015 not where doc and marty are present. In that instance wouldnt marty and doc be stuck in 2015 without the delorean?
Wow, this is a very well thought out video. Every idea is explained so well and makes so much sense
something I've always wondered was why the Delorean wasn't totalled after it got struck by lightning. If that incident fried the flying circuits, wouldn't the time machine have crash landed from the sky?
Recovery parachute. They actually exist in the real world and come standard on some models of small aircraft.
In BTTF part 2 flying cars exist in the future, it would be stupid if not suicidal for flying cars to lack some sort of recovery device in case of a mid air collision or if the vehicle were struck by lightning while flying in rough weather.
It doesn't explain how the Delorean still traveled in time because it was hovering when struck by lightning and every other time it had to be going 88 mph, if it could do that then why not have Mr. Fusion cause the overload instead of having the train push it up to 88 mph
@@ArgonTheAware The car, because it was hovering, spun on its axis up to the 88 miles per hour, and did so quickly due to both the lighting bolt and the fact it was airborne. That backwards 99 was supposed to signify that. It clearly was poorly done.
@@Reggie2000 The problem with that theory is that in order to get up to 88 MPH it would have to spin more than 250,000 RPM so Doc never would have survived the G-forces produced by it and would end up splattered against the inside of the car
@@ArgonTheAware It's not my theory, it's in the novelization.
The theory about the Almanac is the only one that sustains itself. The movie shows that information gets corrected when the past changes, like with the headline "Doc Brown committed/ commanded", the Clayton/Eastwood ravine or the Twin Pines/ Lone Pine Mall.
The one about Biff is completely ludicrous. The Enchantment Under the Sea is their highschool graduation, meaning those people would move on with their lives and Bifff would have to face reality, that he is someone without skills, brain or money to succeed in life, so getting stuck in a car detailing job is just natural progression.
The one about Lorraine ignores that Biff went to the parking lot after Marty (Calvin) for revenge, after all, he "wrecked" his car. Once there, he saw Lorraine and decided to attack her. There was no motivation for Biff to be there in the original timeline and attack Lorraine. The difference in Lorraine's personality is explained by the influence of whom she falls in love with: a loser in the original timeline and a winner in the altered one. George had the influence to drag her down or lift her up, not Biff.
About Doc Brown's expression, he is just thinking "oh sh!t, Marty changed history". Doc Brown explicitly said to Marty not alter any past events as the changes could be catastrophic. When Marty proudly announces that his father changed himself, Doc Brown realizes that his attempt to not change the future failed.
There's actually a deleted scene from the second back to the Future movie that involves Biff getting out of the DeLorean when he brings it back from going from 1955 he brings it back to 2015 you notice when he gets out he's an incredible pain prior to accidentally breaking his Cane and hitting himself his stomach seems to be in great pain yeah it's because that the scene cuts off before you're shown that he actually fades out of existence because the fact that he changed the timeline he gave himself the almanac he becomes rich and yes in 1985 he is Rich however in the mid-90s this was a storyline they had a thought of doing in the movie but then they scrapped it for time the rain finds out that he killed her husband McFly and then shoots him so inadvertently he ended up causing his own death and he erased himself from the 2015 timeline that's actually why he's in such excruciating pain in that scene when he lands the DeLorean is he slowly being erased through Time it's deleted scene you can actually get it on a special edition DVD of the movie it's actually really cool if you watch it
I had always thought Biff was dying in that scene... even when I was a kid watching it. I didn't know about the deleted scene so that's cool!
2:38 I thought the reason was because Doc had that near death experience on the clock tower. After sliding down, he was a changed man.
there is a thing that puzzles me.
when marty says goodbye to his parents after the ball, his mother mentions that marty was cool name and since marty wasnt their first born son, cool plot twist would be when he returned home and finds out his name is no longer marty because his big brother got the name. :)
I always figured his older brother was named after either Loraine's father/grandfather or George's father/grandfather. Some kind of family tradition.
Damn, you took this to another level! Getting my sub for sure. Great job
One thing that always made me wonder is "What was the point of Back to the Future 2?" The premise of the movie was Doc went to the future then brought Marty there to do something about his kids. If Doc's plan went off without a hitch: Marty tells Griff "No", his son doesn't go to jail, and it doesn't ruin his family. They go back to the past. But, why? That future is now "reset" once he goes back to 1985. What was the point of going to the future anyway? Because of the events that happen once the plan goes awry, Jennifer finds out that Marty was in a wreck with a Rolls Royce that ruined his life, and losing his job because he let his temper get the better of him. The events of II and III lead Marty to realize he needs to stop being a hothead and getting goaded into trouble. The problem with this is, how would he come to this realization by just helping his son in the future? Was he supposed to learn this from that incident?
The intention of Doc helping Marty Jr in the future had nothing to do with Marty having a realisation about his own life, literally just that one favour for a friend. Doc had no family himself, so why not look into the family of Marty in the future? Heck, Marty even told him to look him up in the future before Doc drove away at the end of 1. Doc was trying to do the "bulletproof vest" approach. One small change to do a favour for his friend's family in the future. He says Marty turns out fine, which really he pretty much does, just okay but not awesome like he hoped. The change revolved around a Tanner, so something about that family just gets under the skin of Doc. A whole family of bullies. There was a great post pointing out that Marty changed between 1 and 2, because his parents were different. He grew up more hotheaded and sure of himself "nobody calls me chicken".
I see it as trying to give advice to someone who doesn't want it, like someone in love with someone that is bad for them. You can reason with them all you'd like, but they will never enact change until they see the reasoning as well. You can tell Marty all day not to race or be a hot-head, but it does little good if he doesn't see why it's a problem. By witnessing the effects of his behavior upon his friends and family, Marty is finally able to come to terms with what he needs to learn as an adult. Is that why they made II and III? Nope. Money is the reason, but if we are to TRY and rationalize the story, that's my theory on the point of these movies for the character of Marty.
Having never heard ANY of these theories, this is fascinating to me. They're also all very plausible. Thanks!
Tossing around a lot of plot theories here. Back to the Future from 1985 was a surprisingly original, well written, inventive, time travel comedy.
That last one is stretching. What’s more likely is that in the original timeline he has always pushed George around to the point where George got him a job at his company, then Biff basically bullied information out of George in order to steal what career George may have got at that company (George is doing Biffs reports, and going by the way they are dressed it looks like Biff is his superior, a job that George would have if Biff wasn’t around). After George stands up to him in the alternate timeline, Biff no longer bullies George and doesn’t get the job, and like you said he has no real prospects in terms of education so ends up doing manual work for the rest of his life. He just happens to be washing the McFly’s cars at the end of the film purely to show what happened to him later in life. Why else would he have that look on his face and say “what is going on here” if he knew what was going on there? Also it’s clear he only figures it out in part 2 when he says “so.. doc Brown invented a time machine”. Where as he would say something like “so.. doc brown was the one who invented a time machine”.
I've always wondered about the mall sign at the end of the first movie. To the Marty we follow it reads "lone Pine" but what if the past Marty looks up at it from the parking lot, it would still read "twin pines". So the sign would be both versions at the same time, maybe there are infinite versions of it and what it reads depends on who is looking at it.
No, the other Marty was born in and grew up in the new timeline, so it would have always been Lone Pine to him. Marty is the only one who knows it used to be Twin Pines.
Look, I know in 2022 a person understanding time travel theories is available at any corner drug store, but in 1985, a person like that was a little hard to come by.
Seriously, prior to the runaway surprise success and eventual fame of this little time travel flick from Zemeciks and Gale, in spite of a handful of decent and even excellent films, time travel was not a common discussion among corner store clerks or many frat parties, and no online forums existed for such things. I remember myx excitement that the girl down the street HAD Back to the Future on vhs, and we wore out the tape, acting it out at least once a week, with me jumping off her couch for the guitar solo.
Biff would have had to engage in an interest in time travel exactly how I did… by being exposed to the idea, reading about the nature of time and time travel in encyclopedias (books), Popular Science in the school library, Stephen Hawking’s a History of Time, and consuming every fictional account in print or screen materials as it was available on broadcast TV or cable (no internet, only libraries, books stores. VCRs were super expensive for most homes until AFTER 1985, and video stores did not become common or well stocked until the 1990s.). The delay in releases of movies from box office to TV could be years, even when going to the ‘Home Box Office’ (HBO). I remember A New Hope being on cable being such a big deal the adults on my street went to the house with cable so everyone could see it, some for the first time. I was quite young, had not seen it, and the carnage at the Homestead scared me so I ran away to find toys.
Exposure to time travel as a theory or concept was not really a given in society, outside of Gygax fans.
Biff was no great brain. He had George do his homework for how long? He likely did not read anything for fun outside of the articles in magazines with centerfolds, and certainly never picked up anything by Herbert George Wells. He may have seen a few movies, but again, Biff’s no great brain, he’s not imaginative, and would likely flip to a sporting event if The Time Machine by Pal from the 1960s came on.
He was cringey and subservient because once a classic bully is flattened in a big way by the suddenly confident nerd of the school, EVERYONE had his number and he was never top dog again. But, Hill Valley is a larger ‘small’ town, apparently. One high school even after 30 years pass tells us this. Even my small town in Texas had a mall in the 1980s (until the late 90s, to be honest).
Biff never left his hometown, and did well enough in auto shop to build a detailing business. His clients would ALL be his peers from school who likewise never left, and George made it clear he’d not allow Biff to ‘con’ him. George likely would not brook his kids being bullied by Biff, either, hence the extreme people pleasing act with Marty.
Needing business, and like most bullies in fact being a coward, he doesn’t want to risk a triple axle knock out punch again from George, or anyone else. So in spite of his true nature remaining nasty, his interactions with people were meant to keep him getting paid.
Biff did not spend forever wondering about Calvin Klein. Marty made no efforts to hide going to Doc’s workshop. It was easy for Lorraine to follow him, but Biff was too uninspired or too dumb to think to do that. This alone, plus my knowledge of 1985 and how damnedably hard finding material about time travel when you were a super freak about it was, leads me to say Theory 4 is way off the mark.
Theory 1 is good, theory 2 quite sad but not totally improbable, theory 3 is not a theory but someone explaining world building meta that should have been obvious to everyone, and theory 4 is applying today’s zillenial information age plus saturation of time travel as a casually accepted sci fi trope with how an actual Boomer born in the 1940s, characterized as a pretty cruel but overall cowardly bully would ponder a nemesis who appeared and just as quickly disappeared. Biff forgot Clavin. George was always there.
One other theory I have heard thrown around was that by the end of the 3rd film Biff has it figured out and while working on Marty's truck he messed with Marty's brakes in a way that would cause them to fail under hard braking causing him to crash into the Rolls-Royce and subsequently ruined his life
When the Mercedes pulls out, Marty has no where to go, as Needles has pulled around blocking Marty!!!
meanwhile biggest plothole was how old biff knew how to operate timemachine?
For point 1 there is an alternate argument that Marty returning (at the end of BTTF2) gives Doc a reason to fix the letter.
It is a good thought, but Doc had yet to consider taking Marty to the future to fix Marty's kids. So none of the BTTF2 antics can have an impact on BTTF yet.
@@LainK1978 I don't follow. In the final timeline, Doc sends Marty to the future and Marty shows up immediately after, my point is he could then think "yeah, I probably need to know whatever he tried to tell me." Also, it has been a while, but he *did* see the video with the Libyan attack, didn't he?
@@JuryRigged but he figures "what the hell" in a timeline that doesn't include Marty coming back from the future
I just watched this video and thought “oh yeah… here we go.” Thinking no one know BTTF like me. I don’t give a sh*t what the comments say. Every time I thought I had you at a loophole, the subsequent dialogue disproved my thoughts. This video, in my opinion, is bang on the money!
The Lorraine's Past part had me almost crying. Rape is one of those things that can ruin a person. I've seen what it can do. Some can survive and move on. Most survive but carry the weight with them. Some...
For some, they died when it happened. Though they still walk, they're not at all who they were; they're a living ghost of what was.
I need a theory to explain how and even why George originally got Lorraine to go to the dance with him. ???
It wasn't like he gave any hint that he wanted to. He was engrossed in his stories, and was perfectly aware of Biff's determined interest in Lorraine, which was a massive deterrent. Marty pestered him until he asked her to go. (Or, he was scared of what Lord Vader would do to him.) So Lorraine felt sorry for him after dad hit him with the car. That explains her interest in him (dubiously). It doesn't provide an explanation of why he asked her. So....hit me. Was it something she did when he came to in her bedroom?
Damn 6mths. Sorry for the necro of your comment but.....Lorraine's dad hit George instead of Marty with his car thus putting them in the situation for him to ask her. At least, that's what I've always thought and SWEAR I read somewhere.
Lorraine was already drinking before the assault thought. Marty even warns her that drinking could become a problem. But she swiped the booze from her parents liquor cabinet. Something she had clearly done before.
She found a new drink, in the lithe form of George McFly lol
I think it’s still possible that made her turn to drink rather than someone who just drank a bit
A lot of teenagers swipe booze from their parents. Most don’t become depressed alcoholics.
@@davechan8613 that's like says a lot of kids swipe snacks, but don't grow up to have eating disorders. Sure, but a lot still do.
Old man Biff never gives up. A true tale of perseverance. The real hero of the story who overcomes his lifelong tormentors.
Excellent points here.
The first screenplay was definitely the best. The other two were wonderful as well, but BTTF1 is simply unbeatable. 💪😎🤟
🐲✨🐲✨🐲✨
The almanac theory is solid, though it does bring up one question - why isn't the DeLorean effected the same way? Sure, its not filled with information the same way - but it would have been effected in design by changes to the timeline. Subtle things like a manufacturing law being slightly different (you can find plenty of examples of 'odd looking' cars designed around said laws regarding things like maximum height of headlights and the shape of front bumpers) or a designer not getting the same inspiration during concept creation.
I like another dark theory that I heard elsewhere, where Doc was depressed, had lost everything and this time machine was all he had left. If it didn’t work, there’d be no point in going on. So he and Marty stood in the way of the Delorian in a last ditch effort/suicide attempt. If the time machine didn’t work, the car would run them over. Doc also didn’t want to die alone, so he brought Marty there to record their time travel attempt/suicide. He was so surprised that it had actually worked, as he was used to a lifetime of failure.
Nah docs a trooper he was trapped in the Wild West with nothing and still stuck it out until the end of his days setting up the time machine in a cave and a letter to be sent to Marty way in the future knowing that he would die alone there in that timeline
Well doc did say "I finally invent something that works!" You can see how happy he was about it to.
Especially the last theory explains very much. It explains why Biff is the only looser in his family in the alternate timeline and why his attempt to change the time works so good.
It doesn't explain how the Delorean still traveled in time because it was hovering when struck by lightning and every other time it had to be going 88 mph, if it could do that then why not have Mr. Fusion cause the overload instead of having the train push it up to 88 mph?
Dammit. You're right :(
Given that the Delorean was hovering it's conceivable that the resulting shock wave created by the lightning strike accelerated it to the prerequisite speed.
Hitting a nuke reactor with lightning isn't covered in most science books. Maybe it created enough power to negate the need for 88mph. It's like crossing the streams......
so it was all about the 1.21 gigawatts all along!
Damn!! You just blew my mind 🚗 🔥
I agree with all the theories except the last one. Biff became timid because he was afraid of George cause George was the only one to ever stand up to him and fight back. To everyone else he was still a bossy jerk and a bully. Everyone except George. He’s scared of George cause he knows George will stand up to him and humiliate him.
Lorraine's past trauma, is completely wrong! First, the parking idea came from Marty and George would have been the one to drive her to the dance Biff would have not been looking for Marty over the matter of $300 damage done to his car so the sexual assault would have never happened, second Lorraine's drinking, she was drinking liqueur before in the first place.
What always bothered me. Clara Clayton. Clayton ravine. In the second move, we see the gravestone of Doc, with Clara and both Marty and Doc wonder who she might be. Then, in the third movie, Doc is being asked to pick Clara at the train station, but Marty interferes with this and they both go out to examine the unfinished rail track. It is there, and only with Marty interfering, that Doc actually saves Clara. Without Marty getting back in time, Clara would have never arrived at Hill Valley, as she would be dead in the ravine. So, the gravestone makes no sense, because Marty did not travel back in time yet. In the movie, it might have been simply resolved by Doc saying something like "Oh yes, that is a nice spot, I go there often, just get my head out of town now and then". This would give a reasonable possibility, that Doc would have been out there, saving Clara, even in case Marty never traveled back in time. As said, this detail always bothered me from the very first time I saw the third movie. I do not know if it was put there intentionally to mess with people, or it was a mistake.
I think its a ripple effect from Marty changing the original timeline in the first movie. Just as his parents changed everything changed slightly. At that point marty and doc exist in a new timeline with a working time machine and are part of a loop. Doc met Claira because it happend already in the post bttf1 timeline and marty causing him to meet her was already in motion. We never get to see what happens in the current 1985 and the ripple of marty saving doc as the movie ends just after he returns.
There are actually 3 different timelines in play that account for this.
Timeline 1: Neither Marty nor Doc go back to 1885. No one is there to pick up Clara from the train station. She takes a carriage by herself and falls in the ravine. This is the scenario Marty remembers when he recalls the name of the ravine as Clayton Ravine. Had Marty visited the ravine after Doc traveled to 1885, he would have seen it called something else, but he just assumed it was the same.
Scenario 2: Only Doc goes back to 1885. He still gets asked to pick up Clara from the train station, but not realizing her original fate or their future relationship, he does end up picking her up, preventing the events leading to her falling into the ravine from unfolding. They fall in love, which leads to her being mentioned on his gravestone after he gets killed by Buford Tannen.
Scenario 3: both Marty and Doc travel back to 1885, which leads to the events seen in the movie. Even though Doc is still asked to pick up Clara from the train station, he becomes aware of their future relationship beforehand due to Marty showing him the photo of his gravestone. He decides to not pick her up at the train station to avoid meeting her, but does not realize he would still meet her and save her right before she falls in the ravine.
@@WilshireD The train station is displayed as being close to the city, practically in the center. Why should Clara take any carriage for the short trip? How did she come to be near the ravine, which is not that close to the station and certainly not in the direction from the station to the city? Geographically it makes no sense that she ended up there.
@@erikziak1249 I’d assume she took the carriage from the station to the house she was staying at (since that’s where Doc ends up taking her after he rescues her), but I can’t recall how close to the city that was. I don’t remember it being particularly close to any other buildings though. Maybe it was on the outskirts closer to the ravine?
@@erikziak1249 Moreover, even if it was a short distance, taking a carriage was still the most practical since she had all her luggage with her. She mentions a snake spooked the horses which caused them to bolt off toward the ravine. We don’t know how long she had been riding in the out-of-control carriage before Doc saved her.
Awesome vid, keep up the great work!
The Biff theory has 1 big problem, Biff wasn't that smart. In fact he was basically an idiot & it was all his fault. He probably cheated his way through school. We see in the 1st diner scene he had George do hi homework. He probably had not only George, but several other kids do his work for him. He probably found smart kids he could intimidate to do his homework in various subjects. As an adult in the original timeline he did the same to George & his coworkers. This only worked because he could intimate his peers. However, this all changed after George laid him out easily with 1 punch not even breaking a sweat; made worse by the fact that George was literally at his mercy less than a second before. Remember George was literally the town wimp!! Once word got around town what happened nobody would be afraid of him anymore. This could easily turn him into the man we see at the end of the movie. I know he was the same in part 2, but it'd take time for the word to spread around the whole town. Finally,
Biff can't be called a complete loser. After all he runs his own business which is still in operation to at least 2015. It takes some smarts to start & run a business even if it's barely staying a float. Also, seeing how 2015 Biff seems to be doing moderately well means he's doing well. Also, since he seems to have a habit of trying to short change people, but they still hire him must mean h does a pretty good job. My only problem is how in part 2 he was able to operate the DeLorean. I can accept him knowing how to drive it & Mr. Fusion, but how did he figure out the time controls. Finally, I know he went back to being a jerk in 2015, but something could of happened between 1985 & 2015, which we didn't see or we do see him only acting like that with Marty Jr., who acted like his Grandpa at that age, He could just be acting like a big shot bullying people who were weaker. After all hi attitude changes when Griff enters, before that there was literally just Marty Jr. & 2 little kids hanging around the staff weren't even on the floor.
You begin by saying he wasn't that smart, then you say he had to have some smarts to run a business that lasts at least to 2015. Perhaps intelligence would have nothing to do with him connecting the dots about Marty/Calvin Klein; Obsession trumps all!
I always assumed Biff assaulted Lorraine in the original timeline. Her entire character was dripping with the shame, horror and regret of having been assaulted, especially in a time period where no one would have listened to her about it or cared. Couple that with marrying the guy she feels safe with and Biff's horrible "say hi to your mom" comment, I just assumed that was the implication all along
Please make more videos on bttf like this!
Really good. Theory 2 wasn't hard to imagine and the first was really a gimme. The Almanac changing and Biff putting the pieces together, wishing up and even chasing it a bit was great!
1) I thought it was just assumed that Doc figured out that there was good changes that also occurre because he obviously said, "Well, I thought... what the hell?" after reading the letter and putting on a bullet proof vest and saving his life.
2) Again I thought it was assumed that Loraine was depressed and unhappy as per the evidence of her drinking. I do however find the irony fascinating. If Loraine isn't happy with a jerk, assertive person like Biff nor a wimp and soft person like George then it says like Loraine it's very hard to make a woman happy, yet it's sort of easy at the same time. You just have to be a confident, assertive and yet sensitive and caring person to hit the right spot in a woman's heart. Or better put by Troy in Blast from the Past, "You're a nice boy but what Eve needs is a nice man."
3) I think it's true the Almanac like books, media etc can change. However, I don't think this theory has to be given being how unrelevemt it is to the story we're dealing with. Marty wouldn't have ever thought of or need to sabotage any races. The only changes that might occur is a football game changing because George, Loraine, Biff, Marty or possibly a 3rd party effected by the charges being somewhere they shouldn't be and injuring or effecting one of the players unintentionally thus changing the game. But still very unlikely.
4) I highly doubt Biff knows anything, after all he's a "butthead". If he can't even notice the two different Marty's at the moment the door opens then he doesn't have the knowledge to catch anything more deep. Just saying. Plus Biff would obviously try to pass that job on to a P.I. like he does everyone else. So look out for the P.I. not Biff. Lol.
If the theory is true, it was the sexual assault that led her to drink and be damaged. Having lame George as a husband probably made her sad, too.
@@davidm4566 That's what I allude to. I think the evidence says it wasn't merely the event so much it was being with someone like old George who couldn't protect her. As I said, I'm more interested in the irony of the whole aspect of her being unhappy in both cases until George is set right.
I think doc killed Marty!
When doc sees the photo of Marty’s siblings coming back. He had a choice to kill Marty or let him live out his days in the past because a new Marty exist in the future.
But doc became fond of Marty so when Marty went back to the future. Marty saw his past self jump in the Delorian. But didn’t go back in time. I think the doc programmed the delorian to dissapear and self destruct so our main Marty can live in a new timeline where his parents are happy.
Doc closed the loop or eles the universe will have an infinite Marty’s.
Kinda scary to think about lol
6:25 - the problem here with that is George is now a new man, with confidence and, let's face it, probably more vitality and a much more active sex life with his wife. The fact that ALL three of his kids were created identically is just impossible - if the two had sex even a few minutes off when they did in the original timeline, or skipped it that day entirely, what are the odds that the exact sperm corresponding to Marty and his siblings respectively made it to the appropriate egg? The set of circumstances would have to be identical to create Marty et al.
Yup! And even if by some miracle all three kids were concieved at the exact same time as the original timeline, their upbringing would've been a lot different. Which means Marty would likely have a different personality, different friends, and may have never even met Doc. Which means he never would've went back in time in the first place...
@@Mike-fz4cj True for Marty but his siblings are very different people in the modified future. His brother now has an office job and his sister is implied to have a very active love life. Neither of these were the case in the original timeline.
Perhaps Marty was just his own person and would end up the way he did regardless of his home environment.
Theory 3 would possibly mean that Biff eventually learned that lesson. As a teen, he would have started moving the odds and finally began to realize they had changed from what he originally thought when he first bet.
Theory 4.... He details cars because after the incident, with George (plus others he bullied; it's like dominos) no longer being afraid of him, he had to fix and clean his car himself. His lackeys are gone when he's an adult so we can guess he did it all alone, and made it a career. If he actually had figured out about Marty, it would have been years ago when the kid started looking like "Calvin" and started hanging around the crazy inventor guy in town.
So if the time machine was destroyed in back to the future 3 in 1985 does that still mean he technically traveled to 2015?
Man. I have seen this movie so many times, and I never would have linked up that theory about Lorraine and her trauma. But now that it's been mentioned, I'm not sure I'll ever unsee it. That's seriously deep. Makes the ending so much better with her being liberated from that past. If only Marty could have convinced Lorraine to knock him out instead, and made sure she had a nice wrench handy to do it with...