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Post by Scott on Aug 5, 2006 21:35:05 GMT -5
In this oft-cited, oft reviewed episode, the Charmed Ones are sent to the future by the Elders to learn an important lesson about personal gain. Comment on this worthy episode here.
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Post by kat29 on Aug 28, 2006 12:13:07 GMT -5
It was interesting seeing Piper's freezing power increase in strength in the future especially as they never followed it up in the later seasons of the show.
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Post by vandergraafk on Aug 31, 2006 12:38:26 GMT -5
Well, her power was diverted to the extent that it became true particle manipulation: the slowing down and speeding up of submolecular particles. Freezing is a misleading shorthand for what her power is. In some of the pulp novels, it has been confused with freezing time. Piper does not ever freeze time. Nor can her power actually freeze time. Indeed, Nicholas counted (literally) on this fact in That 70s Episode when he delivered year in and year out the vase of flowers on Grams' birthday. His clumsiness masked his true intention: to smoke out the ability of one of the sisters to freeze motion whilst the chimes of the grandfather clock continued to count out to twelve.
Blowing up things became more important to Piper, as the demons grew ever more powerful. Worse: the power to slow down motion did not always have an effect against upper level demons who had ability enough to fight through her power. Her ability to accelerate motion was more useful. Upper level demons were less able to counteract the accelerating effect.
Given the isolated nature of most attacks, there was no need to freeze an entire plaza. However, it is interesting to speculate on what the effect would have been had Piper attempted to freeze the entire scene when Dr. Griffiths is publicly attacked by Shax when Piper and Prue try to hustle him out of the hospital. Concern with exposure might have suggested that Piper at least attempt such a massive freeze, if only to protect themselves from even more exposure. But, as Piper always pointed out, freezing motion in public was highly risky. She could never predict when a car would come around a corner, or a pedestrian might suddenly burst upon a frozen landscape. Indeed, this was the problem in Morality Bites, as eventually someone noticed the frozen plaza. Thus, whether or not she ever had the ability to freeze on such a massive scale, it is worth questioning whether Piper ever could effectively put such an ability to use.
Equally important, though, Morality Bites is meant to be a cautionary tale, perhaps an alternate reality designed by the Elders to teach a valuable lesson. In this alternative, projective reality, Piper indeed can freeze an entire plaza, just as Prue can apparently wreck the entire attic. That none of the events depicted in this alternative reality ever occurs. Prue certainly quits Bucklands before becoming an art house mogul. Piper does not give birth to a daughter, at least not as the first or second born. And, Phoebe does not kill the baseball player.
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Post by Xenith on Sept 12, 2006 9:39:32 GMT -5
Well there is a lot of specualation as to how much of the state government building Piper froze in S7's "Freaky Phoebe". We know she at least froze most of the main floor, though did she freeze the entire building? (After all if she didn't then it would be risky for someone to come out of their office and see all the frozen people in the lobby.) If she did infact freeze the entire building or at least the entire first floor (Which is a major advancement from Wendigo when she couldn't freeze outside of the Phonebooth she was in.) then I don't think it would be completely out of the question that with another 3 or so years that she could freeze a small city block. However since she likely stopped using her powers post "Ultimate Battle" that probably means that it won't happen.
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Post by Xenith on Sept 12, 2006 9:51:10 GMT -5
On a different note what does the future hold for Phoebe & Cal Green? He was not sent into the future that we know of. No one has taught him the error of his ways. So odds are he is still going to rape/kill that girl (Unless Piper or Phoebe remembers sometime before 2009, which I wouldn't hold my breath...).
So what really stops the Moralty Bites future from taking place? Unless it's the fact that Phoebe has no friends in the current timeline (other than Elise.)? Or that Phoebe just won't get caught without Pratt on the case? But suppose she does make friends with woman Cal kills? What do you think the current Phoebe would do? Does she remember the MB future and keep herself in check sitting back as the legal system lets him go free? Does she still go over the edge and kill Cal? Does she try and take revenge in a different way?
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Post by vandergraafk on Sept 12, 2006 13:25:35 GMT -5
Xenith: two posts, two excellent comments. First, I've thought about the freeze in Freaky Phoebe quite a lot. It's one of the last major freezes that Piper attempts. (That is not necessarily an indirect criticism of Season 8.) Yes, it does show an enormous progression from earlier seasons. Imagine if Piper had been able to freeze the location of second vanquish of Shax, although given that the TV cameras were rolling, exposure still would have occurred (again)! In three years, I can clearly imagine her being able to freeze an entire city square. Yet, the risks remain. What if an Innocent - or, in the case of Morality Bites a zealous witch-seeker, stumbles into a frozen scene? The stakes grow increasingly higher, the greater the scale of the freeze. As for point two, even if Phoebe might recall what had happened in Morality Bites, she may let her emotions get the better of her. How many times did Paige play with personal gain seemingly oblivious to the consequences? Almost immediately after Phoebe is stripped of her active powers in Crimes and Witch-Demeanors, Paige conjures a sex toy to ease the burden of being the "last witch standing". And, Phoebe herself, having warned Cole that it was not acceptable to kill humans, however criminal their behaviors, knowingly or unknowingly condemns Rick to death at the hands of the Scabbard demons only one year later. One would hope that the lesson would have been learnt, especially since Phoebe admonished Prue and Piper upon their return from the future for once again wishing to slide down that slippery slope by punishing Pratt. As the Scots say: Fool me once, shame on you! Fool me twice, shame on me!
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Post by kat29 on Sept 29, 2006 19:16:35 GMT -5
The Phoebe we saw in 'Forever Charmed' bore no resemblance to the Phoebe in ' Morality Bites'. Her future has changed completely.
I don't believe the future they went to was an alternate reality created by the Elders, I can't see them creating a future where Piper and Leo had married and had a child considering their position on that relationship at the time.
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Post by Scott on Oct 3, 2006 14:01:57 GMT -5
It depends on how we define alternate reality. Extrapolating from the present to a possible future state is one thing. Clearly, Morality Bites endeavors to do this. Of course, as the present changes, future states are altered. Prue's death definitely meant a change in the future depicted in Morality Bites. In this respect, it is helpful to keep quantum mechanics in mind, or at least Schroedinger's Kitten. Schroedinger's Kitten is an entity that is kept locked in a box. Whether the kitten is alive or dead depends on the quantum state in that moment. Unopening the box freezes a particular quantum state and thus decides life or death.
Contrast this with the alternate reality in Centennial Charmed. In that episode, Cole has chosen to create a different present reality by undoing an event in the past, namely, the ascension of Paige to Charmed status. That present differs quite a lot from the present Cole had come from. Here it is important to keep in mind the notion of a multiverse. That is, there may exist parallel universes that differ from each other in only the slightest of details. Of course, different universes may be just that: completely different with hardly a trace of commonality between them.
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Post by Scott on Oct 3, 2006 14:06:37 GMT -5
Xenith, as regards the issue of whether Piper froze the entire court house in Freaky Phoebe, I am inclined to the position that she did not. After all, the judge was not frozen when Piper and Amara/Phoebe entered his chambers. Thus, at great risk of exposure, Piper froze the immediate surroundings. At any moment, an unfrozen observer could have chanced upon this surreal scene. Of course, they would not know what to make of it. Unless they had direct evidence that Piper had done the "freezing". And, no such evidence existed. All Sheridan has was photographic evidence that Piper and Amara/Phoebe had visited the floor where a jurist had disappeared.
In Season 5, Piper exhibited the same prowess when freezing the entire floor while pregnant. Piper objected to everyone's interest in touching her belly! Paige had to rescue a later from failling after Piper unfroze the scene.
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Post by Xenith on Oct 3, 2006 14:22:43 GMT -5
Actually the reason the Councilman didn't freeze was because Piper employed one of her innocent only freezes (Like she used in the courtroom in the Honeymoon's Over).
Unfortunately I don't have the ep to get the actual episode, that's from the transcription though it sounds like it was messed up? I don't recall Piper's last line there being that awkward...dunno?
Anyways they were definitely using the freeze test to see if he was in fact a demon...
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Post by kat29 on Oct 3, 2006 17:38:20 GMT -5
Regarding alternate universes, there is a theory that for each decision we make there is an alternate universe where we took the other option. These universes could be quite similar to our own or completely different depending on the future decisions.
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Post by vandergraafk on Oct 5, 2006 17:09:21 GMT -5
I will check out the episode since I have it on tape. But some demons do freeze. Some freeze only temporarily. So, I don't buy the freeze test angle. Clearly, if he did not freeze, he was probably an upper level demon. Had he frozen, he still could have been a lower level demon (a grimlock perhaps).
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Post by Xenith on Oct 5, 2006 17:50:50 GMT -5
Again the idea came from Season 3's the Honeymoons Over
I mean I guess it should be technically possible, when Piper thinks innocent her power may be able to discriminate based on the aura omitted by a being?
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Post by Scott on Oct 10, 2006 15:40:47 GMT -5
Sure, why not? At this early stage, Piper was exploring lots of things. For example, could she successfully freeze a demon and selectively unfreeze part of it, the head, in order to interrogate the being? Yes, of course, she tried this and it worked. Remember: there was no instruction manual for particle deceleration. Nor, was there any technical explanation of the actual power itself. Initially, all we had was the shorthand that one of the witches would have the power to move objects, another to freeze and a third to have premonitions.
Well, freezing is not an accurate or complete description of Piper's power. Though it may be adequate shorthand in most instances, it can easily lead to confusion. Piper decelerates and accelerates motion. Time is unaffected by her powers. Thus, Nicholas is able to deduce that the Charmed Ones have received their powers by counting the chimes that he heard: only five. The other seven chimes sounded but went unheard by the "frozen" Nicholas.
The differentiation between telekinesis and teleportation that many fans have referred to helps clarify the different approaches to "the movement of objects" that Prue and Paige each took. True, it was the whitelighter in Paige that caused her to teleport, but such a subtle difference is obscured when simply referring to the power to move objects.
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Post by vandergraafk on Aug 19, 2009 22:11:55 GMT -5
Here's a quibble. When the Charmed Ones return to the present, they are uncertain to what point in time they have returned. Instinctively (perhaps), the TV is turned on and up pops the announcement about Cal Greene. The Charmed Ones now are certain that they returned approximately to the same point in time. But have they?
Unfortunately, in this attempt to establish time, the writers have reversed the sequence of events. Before the casting of the spell that took them to February 26, 2009, the Charmed Ones punish future district attorney Nathaniel Pratt BEFORE Phoebe takes what she regards a well-earned rest and switches on the TV to get her premonition when the story about Cal Greene appears. Oops! They did it again.
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