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Time Out of Joint

 Time Out of Joint
type
TVTItem
 Time Out of Joint
label
Time Out of Joint
 Time Out of Joint
page
TimeOutOfJoint
 Time Out of Joint
comment
Ragle Gumm is a World War II veteran living with his sister, Margo, and her husband and son in an idyllic little town in The '50s. He makes his living as a newspaper puzzle champion, and spends his ample free time relaxing, enjoying his modest fame amongst the locals, and flirting with his neighbor's pretty wife.Now if only he could stop hallucinating.Ragle tries to buy a snack from a soft-drink stand, but the stand dissolves into thin air leaving behind a slip of paper that reads "SOFT-DRINK STAND." He rides on a bus, but sees the bus reduced to a mere framework and all the passengers disappear except for him and the driver. He digs around in some muddy ruins and finds a phone book full of disconnected numbers and a magazine featuring some movie star he's never heard of. When his brother-in-law has an unnerving episode of déjà vu in the bathroom, Ragle starts to wonder if the problem is not in his own head, but in the world around him.Time Out of Joint is a typical trip from Philip K. Dick containing many of his trademarks: conspiracies, paranoia, science fiction, nuclear war, and a protagonist who can never be sure if what he's experiencing is real or not.
 Time Out of Joint
fetched
2024-01-28T02:51:33Z
 Time Out of Joint
parsed
2024-01-28T02:51:33Z
 Time Out of Joint
isPartOf
DBTropes
 Time Out of Joint / int_259d5879
type
Anachronism Stew
 Time Out of Joint / int_259d5879
comment
Anachronism Stew: Intentional. Ragle's town is mash-up of pleasant memories from his childhood, regardless of whether they're period-accurate.
 Time Out of Joint / int_259d5879
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 Time Out of Joint / int_259d5879
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Time Out of Joint / int_259d5879
 Time Out of Joint / int_5a4aa505
type
Government Conspiracy
 Time Out of Joint / int_5a4aa505
comment
Government Conspiracy: The town was created and maintained by the military.
 Time Out of Joint / int_5a4aa505
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1.0
 Time Out of Joint / int_5a4aa505
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Time Out of Joint / int_5a4aa505
 Time Out of Joint / int_5ad71806
type
"Truman Show" Plot
 Time Out of Joint / int_5ad71806
comment
"Truman Show" Plot: A prototypical example. Ragle isn't a reality tv star, but he's still living in a fake suburban town, being perpetually watched by the people who put him there, and he starts to catch on in much the same way that Truman did.
 Time Out of Joint / int_5ad71806
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Time Out of Joint / int_5ad71806
 Time Out of Joint / int_8976acda
type
Civil War
 Time Out of Joint / int_8976acda
comment
Civil War: There's an unspecified war looming over the story. Turns out, it's actually an on-going Lunar Revolution, and both sides want Ragle's predictive talents for themselves. He's chosen to go to the Moon, but Earth authorities have snatched him, brainwashed him and stuck him in a recreation of his childhood.
 Time Out of Joint / int_8976acda
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Time Out of Joint / int_8976acda
 Time Out of Joint / int_a3df8e61
type
And You Thought It Was a Game
 Time Out of Joint / int_a3df8e61
comment
And You Thought It Was a Game: Every week, Ragle pours hours of work into solving the newspaper puzzle so that he can keep up his winning streak. In actuality, he's figuring out where the Lunar colonists' next missile will strike.
 Time Out of Joint / int_a3df8e61
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Time Out of Joint / int_a3df8e61
 Time Out of Joint / int_ccc0d531
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Settling the Frontier
 Time Out of Joint / int_ccc0d531
comment
Settling the Frontier: The lunatics are colonists on the Moon.
 Time Out of Joint / int_ccc0d531
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 Time Out of Joint / int_d93c5989
type
Stepford Suburbia
 Time Out of Joint / int_d93c5989
comment
Stepford Suburbia: Ragle's town, which turns out to be fake, created specifically for him, and surrounded by a somewhat postapocalyptic, and definitely war-torn world.
 Time Out of Joint / int_d93c5989
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 Time Out of Joint / int_dc579c91
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Contrived Coincidence
 Time Out of Joint / int_dc579c91
comment
Contrived Coincidence: When Ragle goes to the bus station and the Bar-B-Q, he ends up standing in lines that never progress forward. He suspects this is being orchestrated on purpose to stall him. He's right.
 Time Out of Joint / int_dc579c91
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 Time Out of Joint / int_e2a6ebc1
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Closed Circle
 Time Out of Joint / int_e2a6ebc1
comment
Closed Circle: The town. It takes Ragle two tries and help from his brother-in-law to escape.
 Time Out of Joint / int_e2a6ebc1
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 Time Out of Joint / int_e4fc9fbc
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A Glitch in the Matrix
 Time Out of Joint / int_e4fc9fbc
comment
A Glitch in the Matrix: Ragle keeps seeing random objects dissolve into slips of paper with their names on them. Vic also has that odd moment in the bathroom, where he tries to pull the cord to turn on the light, except there is no cord there.
 Time Out of Joint / int_e4fc9fbc
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 Time Out of Joint / int_e54563eb
type
NEET
 Time Out of Joint / int_e54563eb
comment
NEET: Ragle is somewhat older than the usual for this trope, but he lives in his (married) sister's house, is unemployed and makes his living by playing a game which is not really a game, making this a Subversion. He's having second thoughs about the aimlessness of his life, and gets more and more stressed with the game, as he feels pressurred to maintain the winning streak.
 Time Out of Joint / int_e54563eb
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 Time Out of Joint / int_f506d08c
type
Broken Masquerade
 Time Out of Joint / int_f506d08c
comment
Broken Masquerade: It starts crumbling when various objects melt away in front of Ragle, leaving behind slips of paper with their names, so he thinks he's having a mental breakdown. Then he finds the phone book and magazines, seemingly from a parallel reality (who is that Marilyn Monroe the magazine sings praises of?). Finally turns out it's a Fake World, with Fake Memories for part of the cast (Margo, Vic, Junie, but not Bill or the newspaper editor - they're in on it), created to keep Ragle working on the "puzzle".
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 Time Out of Joint / int_name
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Time Out of Joint / int_name
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Time Out of Joint

The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

 Time Out of Joint
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A Glitch in the Matrix / int_887f1bbf
 Time Out of Joint
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Platonic Cave / int_887f1bbf
 Time Out of Joint
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The '50s / int_887f1bbf
 Time Out Of Joint
seeAlso
Time Out of Joint