Dallas, Texas the 11th of November 1963 a presidential motorcade approaches Elm Street, the small numbers lining the streets include fans and critics of the 35th president of the united states, and a higher than usual congregation of time travelers and science fiction characters. On the 6th floor of The Texas School Book Depository bewildered scientist Sam Beckett, currently inhabiting the body of Lee Harvey Oswald from his lab in 1996 is moved from the 3rd to the 6th floor by accident prone time travelers Lister, Kryten, Cat and Rimmer who had previously accidentally killed (and thwarted) the assassin on the third floor whilst searching for curry (yes you read that right). Jake Epping is racing up the stairs of the depository to convince Oswald/Beckett not to pull the trigger.

On the Grassy Knoll witnesses claim to have heard an additional shot from behind the fence at the top of the knoll. Further investigation would conclude that the shooter was one of two of the Umbrella Academy’s Number 5, John F Kennedy himself and possibly Spock. Non time travellers partaking in alternate history making on or near the knoll include the Cigarette Smoking Man and The Comedian. Its surprising any of the shooters could find a space to take their spot.

On Elm Street we find the rest of the Umbrella Academy including their alien mentor Reginald Hargreaves and another alien, a Galifreyan, The Doctor. Time travelling descendent of JFK Dr Jo Fitgerald is baring witness to the assassination while alternate history meddler Magneto is nearby his powers of magnetism an elegant proof of Jim Garrison’s magic bullet theory.

In the stories of science fiction Mars seems to be the most trodden extra terrestrial environment, martian stories range from 50s invaders, an avatar for creepimg communism, to evidence of American manifest destiny in The Martian. The time travel and alternate histories surrounding the JFK assassination are acutely predicated on one moment in time, the pull of a trigger, the death of a president. The sheer number of stories surrounding the lead up to the event, and the consequences of it, are evidence of a fascination with the actual historical event, and its use as an examination of the potential and ethical consequences of time travel. This blog series will examine these stories individually and use them as a means of exploring the zeitgeist that produced them, and offer a theory of time travel itself that is as pertinent to the understanding of the assassination as it is to the current political climate.