Question: The dress Claire is wearing when Doug goes back to rescue her is not the same dress she is wearing at the autopsy. I don't understand this. Also when the terrorist calls Claire about her car, the truck he was using for the bomb had not yet been shot by Minudi. So he called her before he knew he would need her Bronco?
Answer: When Doug went back previously, he managed to save Claire and took her home. However he left her there instead of taking her with him to the ferry. The bomber would have suspected Claire had survived the explosion at the cabin and would have gone back to Claire's house in case she showed up there. Doug would have left her there thinking she would be safe. But after he left the bomber would show up, discover she had survived and killed her the exact way he was originally planning to. Only this time she would be killed in her dress. When Doug went back for the last time, he remembered seeing Claire at the morgue in her dress and knew then that she would only survive if he took her with him to the ferry, which he does. That one act is what saves everyone in the end because Claire ends up distracting the bomber long enough for Doug to kill him. That decision to take her with him finally closes the loop. Mission accomplished.
Nice answer. But then why is Claire's body ever discovered with a red dress and her fingers cut off? There is a weak argument that the first time Doug goes back he happens to make the trip a few seconds too late. Even then, with cut off fingers, you'd drop her off at the hospital, not at home, thus she wouldn't be killed and dumped in the river.
Question: In the initial (or present) timeline, Claire dies; the ferry blows up; Doug is recruited by the FBI and subsequently find himself at the terrorists' camp where an ambulance is sitting in the destroyed building. The presence of the ambulance suggests a future Doug had to come back in time, but then Claire would have been saved. What's up with that?
Answer: Another version of Doug tried to save her but he failed. He realised this and it was shown by his last second decision on the ferry.
Answer: Flawed theory. Doug would have to be recruited previously for that to happen. The time frame for look back most likely would not line up.
Doug from previous timeline failed to rescue Claire. We know what happened to Claire. But the question is where is that "previous" Doug? My guess: a human that was being eaten by croc that current Doug sees was the previous Doug.
That doesn't work. The hand in the alligator pit was white.
Previous Doug died while trying to disarm the bomb. He failed to disarm it in time and was killed when the bomb exploded. Remember at the beginning of the film when Doug arrives at the site, and he's looking at the bodies of the victims in the body bags? He hears a phone ringing and assumes it's his because it has the same ring tone as his. It's not his phone that's ringing but past Doug's phone. The one that went back, failed and died. Previous Doug is now in one of the body bags on the shore.
The other version of Doug died on the ferry in the beginning of the movie. He hears his own cell phone ringtone coming from one of the body bags and looks at his own phone because he thinks it's his.
Doug's phone didn't go back in time. There may be multiple copies of Doug, but there's only one phone.
Question: In the bonus feature extended scenes look carefully at the beginning of the movie and you'll see someone watching the explosion while wearing the goggle-rig. Can anyone explain why?
Answer: Not a definitive answer, just an "allowable" excuse for this... The time surveillance team is testing their equipment and rigs and it's merely a coincidence that they happened to be in this area at this time.
Question: I got a few questions regarding the 'time-equipment'. 1. what exactly was Doug doing with the red laser when he watched Claire? HOW did he do this? 2. When they observing Claire in her home, she thought somebody was watching her. Was it the bad guy standing outside the door, or was it the cops with the time-equipment?
Chosen answer: Doug was pointing the laser beam into the past. Since Claire got the feeling that she was being watched when in reality no one was there (besides the scientists watching from the future through the screen), it can be said that the "screen" itself is a gateway to the past, an access way to the wormhole, explaining how Claire saw the red laser beam and why she felt watched.
Question: Claire, with her head covered, is spared from getting her fingers cut off. But in the unaltered timeline, Doug does not appear, thus Claire would have her fingers cut off and burned and would later be found washed up on shore. So shouldn't Claire on the autopsy table be wearing the same dress as when Doug saves her, and not the dress she changes into after she is saved?
Answer: In the movie Doug time travelled only once but if you look closely Doug travelled more than once and failed. Also present Doug sees Claire fridge sign (U can save her) and travels again so it's like a loop. We don't know how many times he travels, it could be 5-6 or more than we could count, but this time Doug breaks the loop by saving Claire, because if she dies his former self will go to Claire's house and see fridge sign (U can save her) and the loop resets even though Doug died, but he succeeded in breaking the loop.
Question: What is the reference to the limo drivers at Clair's funeral about. Who is the extra person?
Answer: The guy who killed Claire was the fifth guy. If you go back and look, you'll see he was dressed as a driver at the funeral.
Why would he be present at the funeral?
Answer: Criminals are known to go and revisit their crime victims.
Question: If he dies in the truck when he goes back then how can he go back again in time and show up alive at the end?
Answer: That's not the same Doug. The Doug that dies is the Doug that came from the future. The one that shows up at the end is the present day Doug. When future Doug arrived, there were two Dougs in the same timeline.
Question: When Shanti draws the diagram from the past to future (along with the river explanation); does it have any relevance with the fact that there cannot be two Doug's? My mum has a theory that the two things relate but I am not too sure. Can anybody clear it up for me?
Answer: If there are multiple parallel timelines/universes, there should be one Doug for every timeline (ignoring the notion that in some parallel timelines he might have been hit by a bus and died early). Doug jumping from his own branch of the timeline to a "root" of that branch seems to make a new branch from the changes, but the fact that there are two Dougs existing in the same timeline (with the "present" Doug unaware) doesn't seem to cause any large problems. Note, though, that future Doug is trapped in the car and explodes (removing any evidence of his existence) before there could ever be a chance for him to run into his past-self. You could see this as time healing itself and preventing two versions of the same person ever occupying the same space.
Question: Near the end of the movie, the bad guy went to start his motorcycle but he suddenly went back to the boat, can somebody explain me why he did this?
Chosen answer: He saw the truck Doug drove away from the bait camp in. It was parked on the street from where Doug parked it as he and Claire arrived. This was Orestadt's truck, so he knew somebody was on to him and on the ferry to stop him.
Question: So I saw the movie and understood most of it but at the end the man that tried to stop the ferry from blowing up dies in the car. So this means that he duplicated himself. So if they use that machine, could they keep using it to duplicate people?
Chosen answer: He does not duplicate himself. He travels back in time to a point where his past self exists, so there are 2 of the same person. One simply has a few more hours of memories. Yes, in theory by traveling back in time this way, he could create a situation where there were many of him at one time.
Question: Why did Doug did not travel back to the night before his partner was killed? He could save his partner, the girl and the people on the ferry.
Answer: They only have a 4-day window to observe and intervene with the past events. Once Doug and everyone else observed his partner being murdered, the 4-day window for that event had lapsed.
In theory, he could go back (not far enough), then find the time travel scientist, convince him to believe his story, and travel back another 4 days, etc. A lot of ifs, but it could be possible?
Question: The timeline in the past is 4 days 7 hours (something like that) and only 1 version of themselves can exist at any time. So if Doug (present) went back and died in the explosion, Doug from the past came to meet Claire. Happy ending, right? So does this mean that due to Doug (present) ceasing to exist, Doug from the past has only 4 days 7 hours to live? I mean, this sacrifice of himself for saving 500+ people doesn't look bad.
Question: How would Doug leave the clues if Claire is already dead? The incident with Carroll happened before he went to her house to wash the blood off, which means she would have already been killed before he could've gone to her house and set all the clues.
Answer: This is just one of many examples of using the causal loop aspect of time travel. The clues aid Doug in his quest to catch the bomber and rescue Claire, but he is the one that puts the clues there. It's similar to "Terminator," in which Kyle Reese is sent back in time to protect Sarah Connor, and by extension, her future son John. but Kyle is the one who fathers John when he goes back in time.
Answer: The second part of your question: the bad guy needed a truck. He called Claire but they can't deal. SO he bought another truck. That truck shot by the policeman. Because he don't have enough time he must call Claire again to buy her truck.