Groundhog Day

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Tropes and genres
Synonym(s)Time Loop, Groundhog Day AU
Related tropes/genresFix-it, Dream Within a Dream
See alsoTime Travel, Time Turner
Related articles on Fanlore.
and here's an actual groundhog, art from the Beauty and the Beast (TV) zine, Love Songs #2 (1996), artist is Mickey Sayles

Groundhog Day is a trope where a character (usually only one character) is caught in a time loop, doomed to repeat a period of time (often exactly one day) over and over, until something is corrected. The trope is named for the film Groundhog Day, which established the trope in popular culture.

It's a niche fanfic trope, but exists in many fandoms. Sometimes, it is a light/fluffy kind of work inspired by events from canon, other times it is a grueling and difficult experience for the characters. If the period of the time loop is within canon, the trope is often used to allow for a fix-it for a certain episode or scene in a series in order to explore how it could have gone different (and as fans prefer). Groundhog Day works typically focus on characters or relationships and their grow, given that, by nature of the premise, the plot events are rather predictable.

Canon Examples

Film

Television

  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode "Life Serial", Buffy Summers suffered a time-loop due to Jonathan Levinson putting a spell on her. Buffy has to assists customers at the Magic shop and must satisfy the customer; if she fails, the events reset to when the customer walks into the store.
  • Legends of Tomorrow episode "Here I Go Again", Zari Tomaz replays the same hour on the Waverider which explodes at the end of an hour killing everyone on board. Zari repeats the hour, trying to figure out to stop the bomb and learning more about her teammates.
  • The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, the "Endless Eight" arc sees the main cast relive summer vacation over and over. This continues until Haruhi, unknowingly the source of the loops, is satisfied with her summer vacation.

Video Games

  • In Stars and Time, Siffrin repeats the party's final dungeon crawl over and over again.
  • I Was A Teenage Exocolonist, the main character relives their teenage years over and over due to a wormhole accident. Memories from past loops can be used to unlock new options and change events for the better in subsequent loops.

Fanwork Examples

The Avengers Movieverse:

Daredevil (TV Series):

  • Rocky Horror Pancake Show by ChuckleVoodoos: Set in an Alternate Universe in which everyone gets a "glitch" once in their lives which allows them to repeat a certain day up to five times in order to make it better, and then continue to live in one of the realities. Foggy gets his glitch on the day of the Hell's Kitchen bombings, and sets out to save the city.
  • When The Day Met The Night by goldstandard: This is your typical, average, Groundhog Day AU where Foggy has to re-live the day he discovers who the Devil of Hell's Kitchen really is.

Dracula:

  • A time-loop fic is a small genre inspired by Dracula Daily, when fans compared going through the second and third DD runs with characters gone through time-loops, which led to many memes and some fanworks.

Harry Potter:

Hawaii Five-0:

The Hobbit:

  • Hobbit Time Loops bookmark collection
  • Many Paths by flakedice Bilbo/Thorin - Bilbo wakes up in Dale. With the memory of a battle won but lives lost, he finds an army of Men and Elves readying to attack Erebor. Bilbo tries to save his dwarves. Again and again.
  • Round and Round Again by Antarctica_or_bust (various pairings) - Ori is cursed to relive their journey until the company succeeds; it takes a very long time.
  • The World Spins Madly On by thedisgruntledone (Bilbo & Thorin) Caught in a cycle that centers on just a few months - those spent traveling with the Company of Thorin Oakenshield, Bilbo has to figure out how to stop time from resetting, and maybe, if he's very, very lucky, manage to change a few things for the better along the way.

Les Miserables:

Merlin:

  • Quickening Days by Fahye, Merlin/Arthur, In which dragons & ghosts & prejudices are confronted, Merlin wears a hat (twice) and a dress (once), Arthur breaks some crockery (lots), there are more pranks than pillowfights but at least one of each, and many secrets are revealed.

Mob Psycho 100:

Multifandom:

One Direction:

Persona 5:

The Social Network:

Supernatural:

  • A general Meme on Tumblr generally appears on Tuesdays in light of the fact that it's the day Sam repeated hundreds of times. See the side gif for an example, for a few other examples, look here.

X-Men: First Class:

  • Been There, Done That by AsYouWish - Erik Lehnsherr is stuck re-living the same day over and over again -- a day that just so happens to be the day he and Charles Xavier took a handful of mutants to Cuba to stop a war. podfic by litrapod

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