12 Monkeys "Atari" Review: We Need to Discuss the Time-Traveling Elephant in the Room

12 Monkeys S01E04: "Atari"

This is the day I feared, the day I didn't want to put my concerns into words. But here I am, looking up complicated theories on time travel on Wikipedia because 12 Monkeys is giving me a migraine. You know how Cole looks after time traveling?

That was my face during "Atari," the jumpiest episode of 12 Monkeys to date.

And before we move on, I want you to know that I am not an astrophysicist or a time traveler, so I openly admit that there may be some gaping holes in my story. If you are an astrophysicist or a time traveler, please feel free to correct me on Twitter.

I'd also like to preface this review by saying that I liked "Atari" a lot; I thought it was a really fun episode. And now that I've said that, here we go!

Eventually, TV shows about time travel always encounter the biggest problem facing TV shows about time travel: THE PARADOX. Time travel is full of paradoxes! Why? Because time travel doesn't exist and we have no way of testing the theories that pop into our heads when we're trying to wrap our noodles around the idea of a man hurtling through time and space to become his own grandfather (also, gross). If time travel was real, then we would've already met time travelers, right?

There's also the brainier and more relevant question of whether or not a time traveler who changes time creates a permanent loop in the same unchangeable instance, or whether he creates a new branch of time that splinters off into some multi-universe where free will still matters. This seems to be the main conundrum of time travel and TV shows about time travel. Yeah, you'd better go get some more Excedrin. I'll wait.

For example, in the first scenario, future me from Saturday morning could travel back in time and hand me a copy of this 12 Monkeys review, which present-day me could copy and paste into TV.com's publishing system, and the review would done (thanks, future me!). But when Saturday rolled around, I'd have to travel back in time to now (when I'm writing this) and hand myself the copy of this 12 Monkeys review all over again, because that's how it always was. But then how was the review ever written in the first place?

In the second scenario, Saturday-morning me could travel back in time and hand present-day me this 12 Monkeys review, which would create a new timeline where I received the review from future me and posted it in the past. And if present-day me was lazy (trust me, he would be) and decided not to travel back in time on Saturday morning when it was time to give the review to past me, another new timeline would be created. And that would not affect my present, just the future of the new timeline that was created (so past me would have to write the review).

In 2043, Jones wants Cole to travel to the past to stop the virus from decimating the future. But if different timelines are created each time Cole changes something, they'll never know whether they succeed, because their future is their future, and it can't be changed if the timeline is splintering before their present. Another splintered timeline will be bug-free and happy, but Jones and 2043 as we know it? They're permanently hosed. It's nice of them to try, though.

However, if we consider the permanent loop theory, then Cole never gets the job done because the virus doesn't exist in the first place, and therefore he never stopped it. Of course, he can't really try to stop it unless it happens at all. So that leaves even more cramps in your prefrontal cortex, and that's the paradox.

I bring this up now because "Atari" presented us with the first real evidence of a changing past. Most of the episode took place in the future, split between 2043, 2032, and 2035, but let's focus on the three days we spent in 2043. We officially met Deacon, the leader of a gang of scavengers called West VII (Cole once ran with them, as we saw in flashbacks to 2032 and 2035), and he wanted to pillage Jones' Center for Time Travel and Funny Accents. His band of jerks was only able to get into the facility because he'd somehow learned of a secret entrance into the building. They eventually surrounded Ramse, and over the radio, Cole heard gunfire and we all felt sad because we assumed that Ramse had died. To save both Cole and the mission, Jones put him in the time-travel chair and zapped him away before Deacon could kill him, and Jones lets Cole know that it would probably be the last time they'd see each other.

[TIME TRAVEL NOISE]

Cole was warped backward to two days before the assault, one thing led to another, and we found out it was Cole himself who'd leaked the intel about the secret passage; he'd told Max, his old flame from West VII, who'd then passed the info to Deacon. Oops! So it was all Cole's fault. Looking to fix the situation, Cole decided to anticipate Deacon's move (since he knew what would happen) and show up just in time to save Ramse by shooting all the people who were about to kill him. So that's what the gunfire over the radio was, right? While it's reasonable to argue that the gunfire Cole heard the first time was the sound of Ramse being pumped full of lead because Cole didn't save him in that instance (split timeline theory), 12 Monkeys actually provided some pretty strong proof that it's working on a repeating loop.

The first time we witnessed the assault on the facility, Cole heard someone call his name, but never figured out who it was. (Re-watch it again; I double checked.) When Cole returned to the scene after traveling through time, we learned that it was Max who'd called Cole's name, thereby reinforcing the idea that this whole thing is on a loop, because Cole from the first assault technically heard Max from the second assault. But if 12 Monkeys IS on a loop, then how did Deacon find out about the tunnels in the first place, if Cole was only sent back to the past because Deacon invaded the facility after Cole told Max about the tunnels?!?!? KABOOM! Series over! We have been paradoxed to death.

While TV shows about television are almost impossible to get logically correct because time travel and logic don't really get along, it can still be very entertaining, and "Atari" was indeed entertaining, even with paradoxes. We just have to deal with them. So let's set them aside for now and talk about what else happened.

First of all, "Atari" took place almost entirely in the future. Initially, I thought I wouldn't like that approach, but I ended up enjoying quite a bit. The future is almost irrelevant in the film version of 12 Monkeys, but the television show seems committed to establishing the future as a major element of the narrative. I don't know how much further the show can take the story of Jones and scavengers (there are wild bands of people out there!), but in "Atari," the future it proved to be a neat place to show off some time travel tricks in "Atari."

The future also provided some background on Cole, showing us he isn't the saintly savior we thought he might be. In fact, he was quite happy to beat people up as part of the West VII, because he was living better than he had since everyone got sick. And this was neatly connected to Cassie wanting to know more about him and their budding romance. Having been through all that, he listened to Ramse's advice and let his guard down with Cassie because he totally wants to have babies with her (and I don't blame him, because she looks like Naomi Watts and we've all seen Mulholland Drive). It was a nice piece of character building, with some fancy time travel in between. If that's what 12 Monkeys continues to be, then I think we have a winner on our hands. Maybe future me, who has seen the entire series, can confirm. I will be waiting for you to show up, future me. Please bring future beer.

NOT QUITE 12 NOTES

– Dude, Cole... a mini ponytail!?!? It's worth all the paradoxes in the world to go talk to your past self and tell him to fix his hair.

– At first I was scared that most of Season 1 would boil down to the search for the Night Room, but I'm ecstatic that Cassie found out where it is and we can move on with the story.

– Let's say Ramse is 50 years old in 2043, which he isn't, right? But let's say he is. That would mean he was playing Atari way after its debut. But he would've been too young to get into retro gaming. This is one of TV's greatest mysteries.

– So 12 Monkeys is now using time travel, flashbacks, and flashforwards. COOL.