The Fictional World of Archives TV Series Premiere: September 23, 1997, “A Rip in Time”
Based on the Jean Claude Van Damme 1994 movie of the same name, the theme of this futuristic police action show strongly resembles its predecessor TimeTrax. Set in the year 2007, time travel exists but is forbidden the masses -- “with history itself at risk” says the voiceover narrator in the opening credits -- and the timeline policed to ensure that the course of history is not changed accidentally or intentionally. The timecops' mission, the opening narration goes, is to “protect the past, preserve the future.”
One of the main characters is Easter (Kurt Fuller), the Chief Historian of the “top secret” Time Enforcement Commission (TEC). His first appearance is at the top of a circular staircase in his office, one wall of which is composed of 20 feet high bookshelves. The Chief Historian has every historical fact at his fingertips through books and computer data and works in concert with a female scientist, Hemmings (Cristi Conaway) of the TEC Science and Research Division, who also utilizes the historical record to pre-condition the timecops.
In the opening episode Logan must catch a future criminal who has taken the place of Jack the Ripper in 1888 London. During the course of the show we see examples of how a change in the past affects the historical record available to the Chief Historian through his computer database which includes full text images of tabloid newspapers, one of his favorite data sources.
Lead actors:
The Fictional World of Archives
Submitted by David Mattison, 1997.09.27. Updated 1997.09.27.