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From what I've read and heard, while Atwater has largely been credited with Bush's victory in both the Republican primary and general election in 1988, his relationship with Bush and the Bush family was sometimes strained during the late 1980's. I'm not sure how accurate that assessment is, but...

For a considerable time plans to make a Spider-Man film were stuck in development hell, with the production rights to the character being a kind of tangeled mess. Famously, there was a proposed James Cameron directed film that never happened for precisely this reason. As we've discussed on this...

Towards the end of his tenure as Bond, if I remember correctly, Connery was growing increasingly frustrated in the role. I don't know how plausible this is, but what if he had departed from the character earlier than he did? What if Connery refused to reprise the role after Thunderball? What...

Aside from Wallace, who else could conceivably have won the 1940 Vice-Presidential nomination? I will admit my ignorance where the dynamics of the 1940 convention and the Wallace nomination are concerned, I do not have any suggestions of my own for the moment. So I ask those who have more...

I realize that there have been discussions on this topic before, and I know I sometimes have difficulty with the search function. But since there have been a few Vietnam related threads active lately, my mind again returned to the subject of a Humphrey 1968 scenario. If Humphrey had triumphed...

Harrison Ford has always been ambivalent to hostile to the Han Solo role, and famously advocated the character's death in the second sequel to 1977's Star Wars. From what I have heard, the Carbonite plot point in 1979's The Empire Strikes Back was due to a fear that Ford wouldn't return. What if...

I realize that this a recent cultural divergence, the Dark Knight Rises came out last year, and the Dark Knight came out in 2008. It may be difficult as of yet to determine the overall effects of this. Christopher Nolan, if I remember things correctly, was reluctant to make a third sequel to...

Jake Gyllenhaal has twice come close to being cast as a superhero. First, he was nearly cast as a replacement for Tobey McGuire when it appeared that McGuire's health would not permit him to reprise the Peter Parker role for Spiderman 2, and then again he came very close, to playing Bruce Wayne...

Famously, in 1967, the Rolling Stones' Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were sentenced to spend three months and a year in prison respectively. On appeal Richards' conviction was overturned, and Jagger's sentence was suspended. What if the convictions stood? Would the Rolling Stones be able to...

Now when I say a better year, I do not mean in terms of the charts or their critical reputation. 1968 was the year where the band began to fall apart. Almost all the tensions that would eventually split the group apart, began in 1968, and the misery of 1969 was a natural extension of that year...

According Lorne Michaels, the closest Saturday Night Live came to cancellation was after the disasterous 1985-1986 season. Michaels convinced NBC to give him another chance, and the program survived, with much of the cast being fired in the process. What if NBC had not given Michaels that second...

I have a quick question for those more versed in the early history of the Soviet Union than I am. What would have been the outcome of the post Lenin struggle for succession in the absense of Stalin? My admittedly limited knowledge suggests that he was uniquely situated to appeal to the rest of...

I realize in the grand scheme of things this is a minor divergence in the band's history, and I also realize that by the time in question you could make the case that a split was an inevitable question of when and not if. But the band spent a long time trying to settle on a concert venue after...

I realize that the following contains a lot of preconditions. We have speculated on what the consequences of a successful assassination of Harry Truman would have been. One of the arguments presented in those discussions is that while Barkley's foreign policy would have largely resembled...

Henry II of France was famously killed in a freak jousting accident. I want to ask those one the board more familiar with French History than I, what would have been the implications of a longer reign for King Henri II? How much longer could he have lived and reigned had his accident never...

Lady Jane Grey was famously, briefly enthroned as the successor to King Edward VI, before quickly being deposed by Queen Mary. Now I do not know how genetically reasonable this is, but what if Jane had been born as a man? Assuming history up through the final days of King Edward VI occur more or...

In 1991 Director Oliver Stone made a movie entitled "JFK" based upon a skewed account of Garrison's 1960's persecution of New Orleans businessman Clay Shaw. While Stone endorsed almost every conspiracy there is regarding the sad event in November 1963 he was inspired to make the film after...

I am not sure precisely what divergence is needed here; I will leave that to those more informed than I on the subject. But is there any way Reagan's career in the entertainment industry could have continued? I know a little spare, but I am curious to see how this might be managed if it is even...

I know, I already did another thread about changing that particular franchise. But I was wondering about this recently. To convince Nicholson to play the Joker, Warner Brothers had to offer him a considerable amount, and even with such offers, it took Nicholson a long time to agree to play...

Sam Raimi was for some time on a short list of Directors to Direct Batman movies, reportedly he was the runner up to replace Burton for the third sequel, and he had lobbied hard for the job before the first film was released. So what if the studio had gone with Raimi to replace Burton? What...