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Groundhog Day Index

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There's something special about Groundhog Day, the fantasy movie starring Bill Murray as an irritating weatherman reliving a specific day repeatedly until he fixes his life. Most genre shows get around to a groundhog-esque episode at some point because the time loop is an irresistible plot device.

So to celebrate Groundhog Day (that's February 2, in case you're not a resident of the United States), we put together a list groundhog-esque movie and TV episode reviews here on Doux Reviews.

The Groundhog-esque in Television Episodes

Agents of SHIELD: As I Have Always Been

Angel: "Underneath." Lindsey time loops the same horrible day in which very bad things happen in the basement.

Angel: "Time Bomb." Angel attempts to solve the disruptions in time caused by Illyria's growing power, but can he do so before the force of her alterations has deadly consequences?

Arrow: "Reset." Oliver and Laurel keep trying to save someone, but that wasn't the point.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: "Life Serial." Buffy is trapped in a time loop as she tries to make a difficult sale at the Magic Shoppe. Fingers sold separately.

Cloak & Dagger: "Lotus Eaters." Ty and Tandy spend some time repeatedly reliving the oil rig explosion that gave them their powers with one of the scientists involved. On the plus side, he’s super chill about the whole thing.

Community: "Remedial Chaos Theory." Seven friends. One die. Endless Possibilities. Plus an evil troll.

Day Break. A cop (Taye Diggs) experiences a time loop of the worst day of his life.

The Dead Zone. The entire series is groundhog-esque, since the basic plot of most of the episodes is when psychic Johnny Smith touches someone or something, sees a future event that must be prevented, and makes several attempts to change it.

Doctor Who: "Meglos." A villainous cactus (yes, you read that correctly) traps the Doctor and Romana in a time loop so they won't foil his plans to take over the Universe.

Doctor Who: "Carnival of Monsters." The Doctor and Jo finds themselves on a boat in the Indian ocean reliving the same day over and over again. But all is not what it seems.

Doctor Who: "Eve of the Daleks."

Eureka: "I Do Over." ... in which Allison and Stark's wedding day turns into Groundhog Day for Carter.

Farscape: "Back and Back and Back to the Future." After Moya rescues two escapees from a sub-atomically disintegrating ship, D'Argo plays gracious host to the secretive new guests, while Crichton plays Billy Pilgrim in an increasingly disastrous series of future flashes.

The Flash: "Cause and XS." Nora West-Allen keeps rewinding an hour in which nearly every member of Team Flash dies. And "Wednesday Ever After," the ninth season premiere.

Fringe: "White Tulip." Mad scientist Dr. Peck (Peter Weller) creates numerous timelines as he attempts to re-do, and alter, his tragic past.

Haven: "Audrey Parker's Day Off." The central character of the show, Audrey, tries to help a man who has the power to reset time as he relives the same day over and over in an attempt to save his daughter.

Legends of Tomorrow: "Here I Go Again." Zari experiences the same hour over and over ending with the Waverider exploding and ends up with massive character development. Plus there's something about ABBA and Napoleon.

Loki: "Glorious Purpose." The second season finale, where Loki time loops trying to find a way to fix the Loom.

Lost Girl: "Groundhog Fae." Bo and Tamsin find themselves trapped in a time loop while the fae celebrate their version of Christmas.

The Magicians: "Oops... I Did it Again." Eliot and Margo do the time loop thing as they keep trying to stop the moon from exploding and destroying the earth.

Person of Interest: "If - Then - Else." The Machine constructs several different potential scenarios to get its operatives out of a tight spot while their likelihood of survival is rapidly decreasing.

Russian Doll. A Groundhog-esque Netflix series about a woman reliving her thirty-sixth birthday.

Stargate Universe: "Time." ... in which the Destiny's crew encounters a deadly parasite ... again and again and again ...

Star Trek: Discovery "Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad." Harry Mudd forces the Discovery to repeat the same thirty minutes until he can figure out how to sell their spore drive.

Star Trek: The Next Generation: "Cause and Effect." A serious time loop episode with a poker game, a falling glass, and wonderful bits of humor. And if you're playing the Star Trek drinking game, you're going to get very, very drunk.

Supernatural: "Mystery Spot." The Trickster forces Sam to experience Dean's death over and over again.

Travelers: "17 Minutes" (Here is Billie's review of season two.)

The Vampire Diaries: "Hell is Other People." Damon is trapped in the Phoenix Stone reliving an incident during the Civil War.

Westworld: This one might be a stretch, and I can't say more, because there are spoilers ahoy...

The X-Files: "Monday." A woman is forced to relive the same day over where her boyfriend robs a bank to a disastrous end, until she can compel Mulder to help her change its course.

The X-Files: "Redrum." Doggett's friend wakes up on the day he is going to die.

The Groundhog-esque in Movies

ARQ. About a dank future where two people are dealing with a time-loop-causing (or possibly jumbo-pasta-creating) machine in their basement.

Groundhog Day. In which an obnoxious weatherman relives his least favorite holiday until he gets it right.

Source Code. An American Army pilot repeatedly pops into another man's body and experiences eight minutes on a train before it blows up.

Honorable mention, but technically not "groundhog-esque":

Looper
Primer

Do you have a favorite Groundhog-esque show or movie that's not included? Something to say about this particular plot in entertainment? Add it in the comments!

21 comments:

  1. Honourable mention, though we don't review it, for SG-1's Window of Opportunity. I love Groundhog Day episodes!

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  2. No love for 'Day Break'?

    Awesome TV show... and an awesome TV show that I was GLAD didn't get a 2nd season. It was perfect as a 'one and done'.

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  3. I haven't seen all these episodes, so my comment can't be based on all of them. That being said, I love Mystery Spot (because I love Supernatural); I love Cause and Effect (because I love Star Trek: The Next Generation; but my favourite has to be White Tulip from Fringe. Not only was the episode fantastic, but they way they brought the idea back in the series finale was just so perfect.

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  4. Repeaters

    11 Minutes Ago

    Salvage

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  5. Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. And thanks, Dr. Fever, for reminding me about Day Break. I did a general review of it early in its run and completely forgot.

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  6. My first thought was Stargate SG-1's Window of Opportunity, but Juliette beat me to it. LOVE that episode.

    As for movies, I just watched last year's Edge of Tomorrow, or Live, Die, Repeat with Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. It was much better than I was expecting

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  7. I liked Edge of Tomorrow, too.

    So one of the groundhogs in Wisconsin bit the mayor today.

    http://www.kob.com/article/stories/s3695051.shtml#.VNA-JS4YNXt

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  8. Community's "Remedial Chaos Theory" appears to fit the theme as well as If-Then-Else.

    And mark me down as another vote for "Edge of Tomorrow" - it is excellent.

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  9. Thanks, KennethJohnKelly -- we added "Remedial Chaos Theory" to the post.

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  10. Day Break was an excellent mini-series

    Tru Calling, starring a pre-Dollhouse Eliza Dushku, who seems to suffer from twoseasonsmaximumitis, was a good series based around the time loop idea, the idea is understandably repetitive, but in it's two short seasons it managed to find ways around it, and was cut short in creating more of an arc for the show, I would recommend it to any genre fans though!

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  11. I don't think Remedial Chaos Theory fits. They don't go back and start over; events take place in different time lines... but only once in each. Granted, it might feel like a do over from the audience's perspective... but the characters aren't trying to re-write anything.

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  12. Heather1, you have a point -- but it does feel like they keep doing it until they get it right.

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  13. The Flash recently did an episode like this (Cause and XS) where Nora keeps traveling back in time and relives the same events to save different members of the team, while Cisco keeps going on the same date. Would probably fit on this list too :-)

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  14. Nastremo, thanks so much. I still have this episode stacked on my DVR, mostly because we don't have anyone reviewing The Flash right now, but I'll definitely add it to the index.

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  15. Happy Death Day and it’s sequel are Groundhog Day style horror movies.

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