Yuri

Introduction

Not only did I annihilate my book budget for this month by buying all of Dead dead demon's dededede destruction, the ending now gives me an headache (and not really the good kind of headache-inducing endings)

While I can find some implied subtexts which could fit with the manga, the introduction of multiversal time travel kinda erased all stakes and was extremely mishandled (the manga still is great, but the last arc in particular feels EXTREMELY out of place).

Note: I didn't intend to make it an essay, just a reaaally long rant. But if someone has time to spare to read it, might as well make it easier for them. Also I don't think I'm like giving a brand-new take never heard before, it's just my opinion on a subject a lot of people talked about before me. Oh, and spoilers for the works I'm using as examples.

The problem

Please stop using multiverse (emphasize on alternate universes/timelines; not just having different worlds which is 100% fine and another subject entirely) and time travel everywhere, it rarely adds something of value besides overdone tropes with little to no change:

• "Oh no! Evil me from universe 972982 wants to kill all of us or end the world" (I don't mind the "evil/reverse counterpart" tropes, but it doesn't need to be a multiverse. Zettai Hero Project uses the "Earth on the other side of the Sun" one for the same purpose and it's much funnier!)

• It often removes stakes or is just a free "let's get this character back" card ("oh no, my brother died... but not in the past or in other universes!")

• Or even make some plot points dumb ("who could have done this??? Let's search who the culprit is instead of just going to the past to catch them red-handed").

It can also sometimes just be useless and not bring anything to the work it is in to the point where the scenario could be entirely rewritten without multiverse and not make a difference.

However, I know multiverse and time travel are just tropes and, as with any, can be done right.

Time Loops are a form of time travel done right.

The goal is to escape the loop, and it's pretty easy to set the stakes even in this context ("if you destroy the loop, you'll have to accept this awful truth/death") or at the opposite, the loop is mainly a consequence/tool of the character desperately trying to reach their goal ("Why can't I prevent the death of this person??" / basically any "set right what went wrong" reasons)

Some works which uses it well in my opinion are Twelve Minutes, her tears were my light, Steins Gates, The Empty Box And The Zeroth Maria, or Madoka Magica.

Dr. Strange uses of a loop in his movie also counts because it was really clever on a lot of points (though it would go beyond the scope of this post); even if the MCU as a whole just made nearly all the possible mistakes when it comes to time travel and multiverse

Jojo's Bizarre Adventure also features a time loop in part 4 and introduces the concept of Eternal Recurrence in part 6 with an interesting spin to it.

Though as a counter example, while The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask do make the stakes a non-issue; I don't mind it as much because it's pretty much the point. You can kill the thief guy if you want, doesn't matter. You can spend time seeing how people react to their impending doom, since you can always time travel anyway. It works here because the game isn't trying to sell you any meaningful death Link tragically couldn't prevent, it fully takes advantage of its premise without falling into its shortcomings.

As an excuse plot, Isekai or "fish out of water" story

This one might be a lot more debatable, because it could be considered to be part of the "overdone tropes that add little to no value" I talked about earlier.

Similarly, it's also often used just to kick the plot. Ya Boy Kongming's time travel's only purpose is to put Kongming in the modern world to kickstart the plot and nothing more; the same is often true for Isekai stories where the "multiverse" is a ridiculously easy (or lazy) way to put an everyday guy in a fantasy world.

Now it's true that the Isekai genre in general is considered to be pretty bad for a lot of reasons, but it's only referring to the specific "kickstart" aspect rather than their content.

While this is not a "great" use of time travel or the multiverse, the works using that don't really pretend to. It's not meant to explored nor to be relevant; and rarely will be elaborated on or shown to be usable ever again.

As far as excuse plots go, these aren't too bad (a similar excuse plot is used for crossovers and multiverses, but it's often different worlds entirely rather than timelines, so I'm just briefly mentioning it here).

The Multiverse as something alluded to but not something you travel across

This one is basically just a Discworld example, especially one scene from Jingo.

In Jingo Samuel Vimes swaps his dis-organizer (a personal organizer but with an imp inside) with one from an alternate timeline (physically he didn't travel anywhere, it's more that the imp just gets confused as to which timeline he is supposed to tell the events of).

What happens then is that while Vimes is running after making his choice, the imp starts telling the events of the other timeline in the middle of current action ("Things To Do Today: Die"). No traveling involved, and we never see this other timeline! It however adds huge emphasis on how Vimes made the right choice and the horrible consequences the other one would've had.

A variation of that would be a character showing to others (or seeing) what could happen, could've happened, or will happen if x isn't stopped. While these are more prophecies and the likes, some could see them as alluding to a possibility, therefore alluding to a possible alternate timeline.

Visual Novel and Games Endings/Routes as timelines

This one's limited to works with several endings or possible routes, usually in a game.

In such cases, those are often treated as different timelines, which can either end up relevant to the plot or just be an excuse for different endings being simultaneously canon (handwaving like "timelines meeting at that point" and the likes).

Pretty simple and overall only used to keep the part of the endings you want to stay canon for later installments.

Conclusion and Solution

Overall, the two main problems of time travel and alternate timelines are that you can't be too lax without creating huge plot holes or make but also can't go too deep into details without making it a bunch of pseudoscience lingo or driving yourself into corners, leading to incoherences.

The solution to me seems ultimately pretty simple based on all the previous elements: make your time travel or alternate universes have a purpose where their addition is either vital to your story or where they add something over other tropes leading to the same result.

Tropes are tools, and a tool doesn't become bad because it's often used; it only starts being a problem when it's mishandled. You won't bring a hammer to fix a car, so don't bring time travel and alternate universes in stories which do not benefit from them.

However if time travel and multiverses happen to fit your story and purposes, go ahead and deliver us a good story! Play it straight, subvert it, add your own spin; there's plenty to choose from beyond the cases I talked about here! (such as time travel where "your actions don't matter"/"are already taken into account")

This post isn't to deter anyone from using these, but a mere rant based on the ending of a manga that could have been perfect.

Do what you like, and have fun delivering stories to the world!