This week’s episode has us seeing double. Get ready for a big shock, because it’s time to take a look at CW’s The Flash.
BIXBY
Parallel worlds are just…really cool. I’ve always found the idea of a multiverse (not just in fiction, but for real) fascinating. And obviously, this idea has captivated comic writers. It’s hard to find a comic character who doesn’t have some parallel version in an alternate universe. It’s actually something of a common idea these days, though it was fairly new to pop culture when I first heard of it. (Back in the day, before cell phones and the internet, when dinosaurs still roamed the Earth…)
For example: the Berenstain Bears.
There’s this theory that those of us who remember Berenstain being spelled as Berenstein are (among other possibilities) from a parallel world, and we slipped into the Stain universe on accident or due to a glitch in the Matrix or because Mars is retrograde or something. Other notable theories include one which states this is an alternate timeline due to someone going back into the past and fucking with something (dammit, Barry!).
Now, in truth, these theories are most likely the result of confabulation on a wide scale (known in some circles as the Mandela Effect. It’s relatively common to have a confabulated memory which is specific to you (for example, for a few years I was convinced that my great-uncle, whom I knew as Uncle Leonard, was dead, and then I ran into him at a family thing. Awkward, lemme tell you), but it’s really an interesting phenomenon that we get them en masse like this. The universe is a weird and wonderful place, but it’s probably not evidence that some of us are from a parallel earth/alternate timeline.
Still, it’s fun to think about, no?
Anyway, spoilers under the cut.
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