This is topic Who SHOULD the Time Trapper have been? in forum Long Live the Legion! at Legion World.


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Posted by LARDLAD on :
 
Okay, so I know a lot of us didn't buy Rokk as the Time Trapper, as was revealed toward the end of the preboot. As I recall, there were some rampant theories about whose face lay beneath the hood, though I somehow can't remember who those centered around. Certainly, the fact that his/her/its(?) face was always shrouded completely by the hood left the possibility open that we might have recognized the face if we'd seen it.

So who SHOULD have been the Time Trapper (assuming, of course, that it shouldn't have just been some shlub)? Or did Rokk being said villain really work for you?

<Personally, only one Legion character makes sense to me, but I'll leave that for later so as not to influence your ideas.>
 

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Posted by Eryk Davis Ester on :
 
Dynamo Boy. Banished to a future time that seemed surprisingly like the time period that the Time Trapper was shown coming from in the early days. It has to be him!
 

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Posted by DrakeB3003 on :
 
I'd rather the Time Trapper just be his own entity, but if it *had* to be someone we knew, the one that'd make some amount of sense is Rond Vidar -- he's the "time travel guy" and purple's his color (that's about the only reasons I can think of)
 

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Posted by Reep on :
 
As I mentioned a few times way back at DCMB, my view has been that the Trapper isn't any individual. "It" is the aggregate potentiality of all creatures, of all sentience, i.e. anyone and everyone is and becomes the entity the Legion calls The Time Trapper. It embodies time and transcends all possibilities of identity.

Or, put together, it can be said to be the the "entityness" of Hypertime: all possibilities manifested in one centripetal being.

The nature of its "motivation" and actions are generated with any given occurrence of spacetime. If it "needs" to a adversarial, for whatever reason, it is; if it needs to be protective, it is. Literally, whatever the situation dictates. But as it has no executive identity or cultural morality, it has no "grand plan."

Its "true goals" are not attainments, not closures. But openings, thresholds of spacetime evolution that lead to... ?

It has the name The Time Trapper, because all the beings that become it are trapped by spacetime until they become it. Its name is the gateway enlightenment experienced by all upon becoming it; it's not a job description. It's ironic, not iconic.

So all depictions of The Time Trapper - a renegade Controller, Rokk, possibly Glorith, any others - are accurate in so far as their non-exclusivity. Endless possibilities are the essential "nature" of it, not simply any one or few identities.

As a character, The Time Trapper could be DC's ticket to make Hypertime a viable variable "non-structure" of the DCU. But unlikely they'll open that door. Their metaphysical inquiries were always pretty tepid until Morrison threw a few icons on the fire.

So, overall, IMO when someone says The Time Trapper is this or that character, they're not wrong, they're just limiting The Time Trapper to a passing manifestation generated by the exigencies of a passing moment.

The Time Trapper is not trapped by Time, or by the other name for Time we call "identity."

It is the infinite totality of all possible futures manifested as an entity in the immediate here and now.

All right, settle down. Don't worry, I'll get back to the Uranus and fart jokes tomorrow!


 

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Posted by DrakeB3003 on :
 
Umm........ *huh?!?!?*
 

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Posted by Fat Cramer on :
 
Interesting, the Trapper as sort of a black hole of beings - more of a force than an entity. We're getting into god territory here, which matches Trapper's powers.

For story-telling, though, I'd find it easier to deal with a single entity. And I'd make Time Trapper its own entity rather than an existing character. Once someone "becomes" the Trapper, it's ball game over...you don't exactly go back and pick up your old life.

Still, thinking about it, the non-individualistic force is good - the whole concept is too big for my earth-bound mind, it's hard to put a "someone" in a position of that much power.

Could the Trapper ever really be defeated? Extinguished?
 

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Posted by Greybird on :
 
A Controller, I'd say, as they had it in C-55, the Garth/Imra Wedding special issue. (And then pretty much abandoned later.) That's enough outside the normal flow of the Legion-era DC universe to make some sense.

I can't agree with Reep's reifying of cosmic forces, as that's hard to hang a personality upon without sounding horribly pretentious. And Rokk's being drafted for it in End of an Era was absurd, almost beyond words. Fortunately, that extinguished itself pretty quickly.
 

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Posted by Blockade Boy on :
 
Something about the founders being a little bigger than life appeals to me, whether it was the Universe rovolving about LL's luck, Darksied's interaction with SG, or Cos' role as Time Trapper.

Like Superman's aura continues, I would say those three deserve a bigger than your average superhero role.
 

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Posted by Reep on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Greybird:
I can't agree with Reep's reifying of cosmic forces, as that's hard to hang a personality upon without sounding horribly pretentious.

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I agree, Grey. And Starlin unfortunately seems habituated to it over at Marvel. But one of my main points is that The Time Trapper has no central identity, no ongoing "temporal" personality. Those that arise are temporary and generated by "the demands of the moment," in response the conflicts of it's as of yet unassimilated constituent identities, which are all identities and beings.

Nor do I believe I am reifying cosmic forces. I've specified The Time Trapper as an "embodying" of Time, as its "entityness", as a form of being. It's not semantics. My position views Time as a being, not a thing. A big difference.



[ July 27, 2003, 04:20 PM: Message edited by: Reep ]
 

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Posted by Faraway Lad on :
 
I was one of those who had no problem with Rokk as the Trapper. As written it had a kind of warped sense, especially given Rokks fascination for history, love of the legion and desire to do right. As we saw with Jan, isolation over an eternity can affect the mind, so rokk going over the edge and becomming mad and the trapper is a posibility.

However,

I actually prefer the Trapper to be just that. A force of Entropy. Something that sits at the end of time, sending out avatars into the time steam if it needs something, but never moving itself. The Trapper is the end of time and its "job" is to take all of that force of entropy and channel it back in a huge loop to become the big bang that creates everything.
 

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Posted by Danny Blaine on :
 
You know, I really hated the reveal that Rokk was the Trapper at the Time. But as time goes on, I can see the symmetry.

I cant really think of any other viable candidates...
 

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Posted by He Who Wanders on :
 
I was comfortable with the idea of TT being a renegade Controller, but I now feel that is limiting TT in some ways. The Controllers, powerful though they were, never made a lasting impression in the DCU.

But I'm less happy about TT being the living embodiment of Entropy. As Grey said, it's difficult to hang a personality who represents some natural force. What does such a character want and why? Why should it concern itself with lesser beings like the Legion? I don't think there has been a satisfactory answer.

I'd rather TT be someone completely off the wall. (OK, Rokk was off the wall, but too far off it.) Who says TT has to be everything he says or pretends he is? Why not an imp from Zrrrf, playing tricks on the Legion? Why not Ra's al Ghul (who, presumably, will still be alive at the end of time)?
 

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Posted by Blockade Boy on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by He Who Wanders:
[QBWhat does such a character want and why? Why should it concern itself with lesser beings like the Legion[/QB]

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Would such an ephemereral TT even such as Reep's have urge, instinct, or conscious thought?

Time just marches on. If there is a survival instinct, then anything risking end or change to time would get its attention perhaps. If something in the embodiment of Legion risked time marching on (as planned?) time would try to correct.

Such a story would almost seem to waste time having Legion try to defeat TT or even to show an embodiment, better the story that investigates their realization of time.
 

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Posted by the boy with UltraPowers on :
 
i really liked GLORITH being the TIME TRAPPER !!!

i thought she was great stealing "his" role in issue #4 of LSH v4 !!!

my favourite scene when she "ate" the final part of him !!!

Matthew.
 

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Posted by Lightning Lad on :
 
If the Trapper can't be 'his' own being, then I'd say one of these two:

Brainiac 5 - He's just as logical choice as Rond or Rokk to me. And he's gone mad more than once. That 12th Level intelligence is just too unstable.

Superman - Why not? He's supposed to be long-lived and he can break the time barrier on his own (or use to be able to before Hypertime). And outliving his family and one true love could have made him a bit mad, mad enough to want to control time. Anyone remember the first Superman movie? A Time Trapper in the making.
 

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Posted by MLLASH on :
 
I like the Trapper as the "living embodiment of entropy". I guess I like my godlike beings to be as full of wacky personality as us mere norms (ala the Greek and Roman gods).

I personally DISLIKED the Rokk as Trapper revealation ***but*** I could actually see it happening too...
 

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Posted by Kid Prime on :
 
Except for the fact that the DC universe already has not one, but two embodiments of entropy. Destiny and Death of the Endless. I DEFINITELY would not want another "Oh, well the Trapper is Rokk" moment, but I think there are other options that would be interesting.

Nor would I want TT to be Lori Morning. Ugh.
 

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Posted by LARDLAD on :
 
Basically, the Legion character I didn't name in the initial post was Rond. Honestly while reading the Legion leading up to "the revelation", I never really gave any thought as to whom the Trapper might be.

But TMK seemed to set us up for the possibility when Glorith sacked him. And that "paid off" with Rokk being revealed as the one beneath the hood. But I never really thought about who it might be. At first I was okay with the reveal because it was consistent with where Rokk's mentality was going at the time. But in hindsight, it seems a little lame, especially without more background.

Rond, however, seems like a good candidate. If you factor in his affinity for time travel, his Green Lantern powers and his being Universo's son, you could really spin an origin around him logically. We saw in the old Adventure issue how much it hurt Rond to turn on his father. Well, what if some time down the line, Universo got killed with Rond somehow having been involved? It could really have unhinged him mentally and caused him to become obsessed with manipulating the forces of time. And the more he went over the edge, the more his perceived role grew until he lost all sense of self.

It's just an idea, really, and I'm not out to trash Rond to his fans. But mental illness, in this case megalomania, has been known to be inherited from parent to child, so it's as plausible a theory as any.

I guess Coz didn't work for me because I just don't see how he could have made the jump to being a master manipulator of time. I could buy in a way his motivtions, but I don't see the means.

But if the Time Trapper wasn't really a specific dude, I think Reep's explanation is really cool!

Finaly, was I wrong about there being rampant speculation among fan circles as to the Trapper's identity before it was ever revealed? Anyone know anything about that?
 

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Posted by Reep on :
 
I came across this old DCMB page I had saved. The topic was Possible Origins for the Time Trapper. It was created two years ago to the month.

First post is by Eryk Davis Ester, then one by He Who Wanders providing a list of candidates for TTT, and finally two posts by me (as poster The Time Trapper.)


Posted by Eryk Davis Ester - July 15, 2001 02:36 AM

Yeah, I know the whole Rokk Krinn/Infinite Library thing, but here are some other possible origins for the robed one that I thought up.

1. The Time Trapper is really Dynamo Boy. In the issue where DB is teleported to the far future, the wasteland surroundings look very similar to the contemporary depictions of the environment that the Trapper lived in. So maybe DB somehow became the Trapper?

2. The Time Trapper is Douglas Nolan (preboot). Okay, so he could defy the Time Beacon, the Time Beacon could thwart or at least stave off the Crisis, so it may follow that Doug could survive the Crisis, maybe gaining a mastery of Time. And it explains why the Trapper keeps his face shrouded. Anyone else want to find their favorite obscure character and turn them into the Trapper? 50 pts for anyone who argue that The Time Trapper is really Tusker.


Posted by He Who Wanders - July 16, 2001 12:54 AM

The Time Trapper is (take your pick):
... Anti-Lad. After setting history right by infiltrating the Legion, he attempts to return home to the 75th century only to be bumped "off course" by the Infinite Man. He ends up at the end of time, where his fascination with the Legion causes him to go insane.
... Ronn Karr. Everytime he flattens himself to paper-thinness, his mass goes somewhere -- but where? To the end of time, that's where, and it takes on a life of its own, grows, mutates, and voila!
... Mask Man. You didn't think banishing him to the Fifth Dimension was going to get rid of him forever, did you? And he killed the entire Legion the first time, so that proves he's powerful.
... Command Kid. Every Time Trapper appearance has been one big hallucination.
... Projectra. She is so disgusted at the Legion for inducting a snake, that, well ...
... Leland McCauley. Guess money really does buy EVERTHING.
... Calamity King. A rejected Legion applicant who could cause things to fall apart -- which fits in with the idea of entropy. As he matured, his powers grew and grew until ...

That pretty much exhausts my supply of obscure (and not so obscure)characters. Please donate my points to the Home for Comics Fans Who Need to Get a Life.


Posted by The Time Trapper - July 18, 2001 02:57 AM

I take a philosophic interpretation of The Time Trapper rather than an assignment of identity.

I have expressed it before, and I don't want to get into detail, but basically, to me, no single character becomes or is The Time Trapper, yet all characters may be or become The Time Trapper.

Nor do I subscribe to any specific personality, motivation, or cosmic function for The Time Trapper, in particular TTT's supposed embodiment of entrophy. The Time Trapper has been depicted "waiting at the end of time," but this is an antithetical notion, and as such demonstrates TTT's casual creation and slapdash evolution. (Just what archetype or combination is activated with TTT? Death? Shadow? Wisdom? Nothingness? No ready assignment of concept(s) quite holds up, IMO.)

TTT's "nature" is paradoxical to conceptuality and transcendent of conceivability. No origin story of The Time Trapper is wrong. No origin story is right. Such accuracy of identity is just another glorious trap of time. Perhaps its best to ignore the funny little ? on the other side of "The Iron Curtain of Time."


[Second post with some commentary on TTT's supposed nature as embodiment of "entrophy."]

Destruction and creation are just interpretations of change, which only become "embodied" thru a personal perspective. Could anything called "the destructive force of the universe" (entrophy) be other than a projection of our personal prejudices? The same applies to anything labeled "the creative force of the universe."

Our primal desires energize such angelic and demonic archetypes - metaphysical favoritism is a vestigal tribal component of human spirituality. It is the cosmetic preferencing of the unknown.

Some philosophers say the needs and fears of the preferencing mind create the perception labeled "time." Perhaps it's all we have Time for, the only reason it exists, to keep the unknown at arm's length with masks of angels or devils.

[I'll offer this 2003 addendum.]

If Time is a cosmetic illusion to avoid the "unknown," what does that make The Time Trapper? The aggregate of cosmetic illusion, of all identity itself?



[ July 28, 2003, 01:50 AM: Message edited by: Reep ]
 

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Posted by Fat Cramer on :
 
Some theorists claim that time is a human invention. It probably doesn't matter, since we're humans reading a comic book with a Time Trapper in it.

I like the concept of the character, but sometimes it spun a bit out of control for my tastes. All those alternate realities - it gets to be a lot of baggage for a comic book.

Just what are the Trapper's powers?

Glorith used time manipulation powers to slow things down; she made a kiss seem to last eternity.

Time Trappers send people back in time.

There's the old stand-by of aging and de-aging, which I personally don't care for.

The Rokk-Trapper created another Legion and had them co-exist (same time/space) as the original Legion, whichever was which I'm still not certain. That's the sort of thing I find, mentally, hard to deal with.

Kid Quantum can also "stop" time to some degree. Maybe there will be a Kid Q/Trapper face-off. Maybe she will be the Trapper (hope not).

I did like the Library at the End of Time, or the Eternal Library - whatever it was called. That's not an uncommon theme in literature, the desire of every bibliophile.

Is there reallly an end to time? Can the Trapper ever truly die? If extinguished, will the Trapper just re-emerge?
 

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Posted by DrakeB3003 on :
 
I like the idea of the Time Trapper being the embodiment of entropy, I would like it if we never even saw his face (actually, I prefer that he not even have one).

Rond as the Time Trapper would make that Mordruverse issue even more interesting, since Rond was the puppet master manipulating Glorith into the position to replace him. It also would've made their later confrontation where she eats him more interesting as well, not to mention the battle at the end of time since Rond as Green Lantern took part in that battle.

Btw, Kid Prime -- are you sure Death and Destiny are the embodiments of entropy?? It doesn't sound familiar to me and I wouldn't think two of the Endless would share that duty. I thought Destruction was more about Entropy (but then he quit, didn't he?)
 

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Posted by Faraway Lad on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by He Who Wanders:

But I'm less happy about TT being the living embodiment of Entropy. As Grey said, it's difficult to hang a personality who represents some natural force. What does such a character want and why? Why should it concern itself with lesser beings like the Legion? I don't think there has been a satisfactory answer.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Looks That Kill Lad:
I pretty much agree with Reep.

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You promised us you'd stay on your meds.


 

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Posted by Looks That Kill Lad on :
 
I think my body has built up a resistance to them, got anything stronger?


 

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Posted by Reep on :
 
Frunt. But watch your dosage.


 

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Posted by Reep on :
 
BTW, FYI everybody, the current issue of Scientific American has a interesting cover featured article about the current opinion among some physicists that we live in a holographic universe.

I mention it here because it begins with a brief discussion of two major theories of entrophy, thermodynamical and informational. I haven't read the full article (a slow go for a non-science major,) but it raises some interesting possibilities in general, and also is food for thought regarding the Time Trapper's supposed relationship to entrophy.


 

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Posted by mdm2995 on :
 
I believe early Legion scribe Edmond Hamilton created the Time Trapper; wonder who he thought was under the hood?
 

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Posted by Eryk Davis Ester on :
 
As I've mentioned before, there is an interesting resemblance between the war-ravaged future city that the Time Trapper calls home in the early Adventure issues and the future time to which Dynamo Boy is transported by the LSV. Connecting the two of them would have been a great opportunity...
 

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Posted by Portfolio Boy on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by mdm2995:
I believe early Legion scribe Edmond Hamilton created the Time Trapper; wonder who he thought was under the hood?

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In those early appearances, TT is only refered to as, paraphrasing, "a super-scientist crimnal mastermind who has created an iron curtain of time."

I doubt Hamilton imagined much more than that. It was really just a device to get Superboy & Mon-El off panel, on a mission to break through the curtain, so that the villain of the month would stand a chance.

This thread owes more to John Forte who, for whatever reason, chose to portray TT in a cloak & hood. Without that compelling visual, I doubt TT would ever have made it out of the Adventure era.
 

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Posted by jimgallagher on :
 
Proty



 

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Posted by icefire on :
 
I always thought that he could have been Chemical King!!!!
 

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