Another thing to think about....

As for two Roxannes, both vampires...    When we travel back to 1840 and see Gerard, we don't think that it might be a different Gerard than the 1995 ghost, do we?  Strangely enough, he's probably Judah in the future, so he is a different person....

Sometimes an idea hangs so much on coincidence that it might end up being true, knowing DS, but it seems like cheating and doesn't feel satisfactory.    That's my feeling on the idea of someone other than Barnabas vampirizing Roxanne the "first time around".   

If it is one's fate to be a vampire, then a way will be found.

If it is one's fate to be a vampire, then a way will be found.

Very true.  In the DS world, one's true destiny is inescapable - particularly if that destiny is a tragic one.  I believe Roxanne's fate was sealed whether Barnabas was present or not.  We simply don't know how it happened in the original run of events.

I, myself, have always wondered about the conundrom that is B, J, and E returning to 1971 and having Liz act like they were there all along. The only explanation for it is that they must've returned to an alternate timeline, and therefore the three of them WERE there the entire time, having never gone back in time to right everything in 1840, since none of that ever happened.

I'm more with arashi these days though, because delving too deep into this stuff can really confuse you about what's going on with who and where.

And I've always thought that the two Roxanne's were one and the same. It makes total sense.

Back to the Future has a similar type pf time travel ending as 1840 did.  When Marty returns to the present time, everything has changed but he remembers the original timeline, yet there was a "changed" Marty that everyone was seeing up to that point.

I, myself, have always wondered about the conundrom that is B, J, and E returning to 1971 and having Liz act like they were there all along. The only explanation for it is that they must've returned to an alternate timeline, and therefore the three of them WERE there the entire time, having never gone back in time to right everything in 1840, since none of that ever happened.

I'm more with arashi these days though, because delving too deep into this stuff can really confuse you about what's going on with who and where.

And I've always thought that the two Roxanne's were one and the same. It makes total sense.

Speaking of Roxanne, when Barnabas and Julia returned from 1840 and changed the course of history. Roxanne
and Sebastian Shaw will not exist. Roxanne would not be a vampire, chained inside a coffin at the secret room. Shaw
would be living a different life.

Speaking of Roxanne, when Barnabas and Julia returned from 1840 and changed the course of history. Roxanne and Sebastian Shaw will not exist. Roxanne would not be a vampire, chained inside a coffin at the secret room. Shaw would be living a different life.

Not to mention that Maggie would never have been bitten by Roxanne, never taken to Windcliff and never would have set eyes on Sebastian Shaw.

Which sounds okey-dokey with me.

If Kathryn hadn't left DS would Maggie have winded up with Sebastian Shaw? I hope not, but we'll never know.

I, myself, have always wondered about the conundrom that is B, J, and E returning to 1971 and having Liz act like they were there all along. The only explanation for it is that they must've returned to an alternate timeline, and therefore the three of them WERE there the entire time, having never gone back in time to right everything in 1840, since none of that ever happened.

I'm more with arashi these days though, because delving too deep into this stuff can really confuse you about what's going on with who and where.

And I've always thought that the two Roxanne's were one and the same. It makes total sense.

Speaking of Roxanne, when Barnabas and Julia returned from 1840 and changed the course of history. Roxanne
and Sebastian Shaw will not exist. Roxanne would not be a vampire, chained inside a coffin at the secret room. Shaw
would be living a different life.

You're right of course, but then Barnabas wouldn't be in 1971 either.

Once they return to 1971 from 1840, BC, JH and TES would start to settle into and reacclimate to the new time line, remembering things that happened to them (and didn't) in the past of this new time-line.    They may or may not continue to remember the original time-line.   I think.

Well we could have Barnabas really be the cousin from England. Because if he was cured then he wouldn't
have come out of the coffin in 1967.  Or one of the children of Bramwell and Catherine come from PT to
RT and decided to go to England.  How about that?

Well we could have Barnabas really be the cousin from England. Because if he was cured then he wouldn't
have come out of the coffin in 1967.  Or one of the children of Bramwell and Catherine come from PT to
RT and decided to go to England.  How about that?

That "fate" idea... "fate" found another way to get a Barnabas there in the 1960s?    How weird, to pick up with always-mortal Barnabas in 1971 who used to be immortal-vampire Barnabas but no one knows it... and he remembers being vampire Barnabas even though it has now never happened... so Barnabas returns from 1840 to find that that all his lies are the truth!   I love it!   It's even a happy ending beyond any of their expectations!   That's my theory from now on!   Loril54, step up to the podium and accept your Nobel Prize for straightening out time-travel!

Okay, problem... I was thinking no PT Bramwell was needed, it could be a real RT Bramwell, but no one changed 1795/6, not so the curse was avoided.    We need to work something out involving the vampire whose bites we hear about moments before the end of the last episode.    RT Barnabas?   A PT Barnabas who was never talked about?    Hitherto-unknown vampire who makes Bramwell a vampire?  How does that help?   I'm not sure it does.   I thought Bramwell's going to RT was far-fetched, but even though they stop dealing with Ang's room in 1841PT, it's still there.... it's bound to intrude into their lives again, somehow.

Bramwell starts time-travelling, perhaps even as a vampire, providing that symmetrical sort of fate that I'm just learning to accept and work with?    Or Bramwell pops up in Collinwood in RT 1841... how would everyone react?

Perhaps in the original 1840 it was Roxanne, rather than Edith or Leticia, who was involved in Gerard/Judah's black magic. The vampire curse could have been the result of a ritual gone wrong. And, if she had found Quentin's staircase, she could have found her way into the present.

In a very perverse twist, perhaps the serene, unhaunted Collinwood that they found in 1971 was an illusion created by Gerard/Judah. If the time slip to 1840 had not been successful, they would have found an even angrier ghost/warlock/whatever waiting for them.