Alternative future  

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In science fiction stories involving time travel, an alternative future or alternate future is a possible future which never comes to pass, typically because someone travels back into the past and alters it so that the events of the alternative future cannot occur.

An alternative future differs from alternative history in that alternative history usually speculates on what might have happened in the past if some events in the past had occurred differently, while an alternative future usually speculates on what might happen in the future. Also, alternative histories commonly forgot time travel, while alternative futures do not.

An alternative future should not be confused with a possible future. Many science fiction stories are set in the future and treat it as if it were the only future within the context of the story; an alternative future story is specifically set in an alternative one, that is, one that, within the context of the story, does not come about to pass.

Examples in film

• Back to the Future Part II
• It's a Wonderful Life
• The Butterfly Effect
• A Sound of Thunder
• Frequency

Examples in television

• Samurai Jack
• Danny Phantom
• Dragon Ball Z
• Heroes
• Timeslip

Examples in comics

• In Marvel Comics:
  • The What If series of alternate futures
  • The Marvel Comics 2 imprint, based on a What If story
  • Days of Future Past and Days of Future Present
  • Age of Apocalypse
  • The future timeline of Cable and Clan Chosen
  • Earth Askani
  • Earth X
  • Earth-691, the 31st century of the Guardians of the Galaxy, Killraven, Cuchulain, and Cyberspace 3000
  • The Transformers' interaction with Marvel continuity
  • Deathlok's post-apocalyptic future
  • The Doomquest series of Iron Man comics
  • Earth-93112, where Adam Warlock conquered the universe
  • The End
  • The Here Comes Tomorrow storyline of the X-Men
  • Iron Man 2020
  • The Last Fantastic Four Story and The Last Avengers Story
  • The Marvel 2099 imprint
  • The 2211 timeline of Spider-Man 2211
  • The Old Man Logan storyline of Wolverine
  • Spider-Man: Reign
  • Daredevil: End of Days
• In DC Comics:
  • Many of the Elseworlds stories
  • The 30th century of the Legion of Super-Heroes
  • Batman Beyond
  • The Dark Knight Returns storyline of Batman
  • The 853rd century storyline of DC One Million
  • Hercules Unbound
  • Jonah Hex's post-apocalyptic future
  • Kamandi's post-apocalyptic future
  • OMAC's future
  • Kingdom Come
  • The "1988" of Tommy Tomorrow
  • The space future of Twilight
  • The never-completed Alan Moore series Twilight of the Superheroes
• In other comics:
  • Homestuck
  • Fray, a future slayer similar to Buffy the Vampire Slayer
  • Starstruck
  • Monica Teen, the teenage versions of the characters in Monica's Gang

See also

• Parallel universe (fiction)
• Future history