AHC: Imagine the worst possible timeline for your favourite franchise, similar to 'Man in the High Castle.'

[Deleted member 163801]

Basically, imagine a timeline in a franchise where everything that can go wrong, does go wrong, the heroes are completely defeated and the villains are not only victorious, but able to spread their goal across the planet/universe/multiverse. You are free to take as many creative liberties as you want as long as it isn't flat out ASB

 

[PobreCesar]

I suppose one could imagine an alternate Darkest Europe, where the Sultanate of Delhi conquered India, Iran and Iraq fought to the point of mutual revolution and civil war, and thus balkanized into Delhian client states, held down by superior population. Cambodia becomes another Delhian puppet state and pulverizes Vietnam and Thailand. (It was never a super-realistic novel to begin with, and it's a bit preachy, but I found it intriguing all the same)

That's not anywhere near my favorite franchise though, just the easiest thing to give the MITHC treatment to that's not a super-obvious choice.

My favorite franchise is Lord of the Rings. I guess Sauron and Saruman conquer Middle Earth and divide it between them. Paying homage to MITHC, I guess Sauron is contemplating conquering Isengard and one of the characters is involved with a scheme to prevent that from happening. But that's not alternate history per se.

 

[mspence]

Star Trek, the Federation loses the Dominion War...

Doctor Who, following the events of "Turn Left," where the Doctor never returns to Earth.

The Walking Dead, Rick goes full Rictatorship or Negan wins.

 

[sampleswift]

Canon/Semi-Canon: DC's Dark Multiverse/Dark Nights Metal (wait that already exists)
Marvel Ruins also exists (and Days of Future Past, and Future Imperfect, etc.)

Non-canon: I have a ton of Star Wars Dark Multiverse ideas, but most of them are rather weak
"What if Palpatine was a more effective Emperor" obviously leads to the Rebels crushed for good, but is relatively boring.
"What if the Sith Empire (SWTOR) won" is similarly ineffective.
Abeloth scenarios are Cthulhu, but lame.

Dragon Ball Z
"What if Cell could use Kaioken" has him use it to obliterate Gohan and then everyone else
"What if Dr. Gero knew about Super Saiyan" has the androids too powerful to stop.
Both of these are plausible (Cell, via DNA, should have known all of Goku's techniques, along with Piccolo special beam cannon, Frieza death beam, etc.)
Dr. Gero could have recorded the Future Trunks vs. King Cold and Mecha Frieza fight when the drones collected King Cold's and Frieza's DNA, but didn't (?) (The drone was destroyed?)

 

[Resurgam]

An even worse Star Trek TL than a Dominion victory is one we glimpsed in "Twilight," with the Xindi superweapon successfully destroying Earth, humanity all but extinct, and the Federation negated before it even began.

 

[sampleswift]

An even worse Star Trek TL than a Dominion victory is one we glimpsed in "Twilight," with the Xindi superweapon successfully destroying Earth, humanity all but extinct, and the Federation negated before it even began.

Could a hypothetical Borg win be worse? Most of the cultures of the galaxy are now assimilated, not just Earth?
IIRC Borg(s) lost because of underestimating their opponents/They could have won had they not underestimated their opposition?

Game of Thrones: Night King doesn't fall for the bait at Winterfell and continues marching south. He destroys everyone in his way. Admittedly very boring and worse than the ending we got.

 

[RySenkari]

24, just remove Jack Bauer from the equation. Bauer gets shot during an early season 1 firefight and dies.

Palmer gets assassinated in season 1, LA gets nuked in season 2, the guy who's president instead of Palmer handles it horribly and nukes a bunch of countries, Saunders releases the Cordilla virus in season 3 which decimates the United States, then on top of that, Habib Marwan (assuming he's still alive after the events of Dark Season 2, but let's assume his cell was already embedded in the United States at that point, so him and all his guys survived) gets the nuclear football in season 4 and blows up tons of cities... World War III probably starts at that point, so yeah.

24 without Jack Bauer is just this:

 

[Light Jammings]

Mother 3: Masked Man pulls the final needle, everybody dies
Earthbound: Ness and friends are never able to travel back in the past, or fail to do so and Gigyas takes over the Universe in the future
The Expanse: Eros hits Earth, billions die and the Solar System or at leas the belt starves itself

 

[Jedi Dragon]

Star Wars: The Separatists win somehow, maybe Palpatine dies during the Clone Wars somehow and isn't hamstringing them. The Republic is a broken, poor, angry remnant a la the Neutral Zone. The rest of the Galaxy is divided among the different megacorporations that make up the CIS, who exploit the people and resources of their territories for every last scrap of profit. The jockeying for power of the Separatist factions threatens to cause another galactic war, with the surviving Jedi forming a resistance in the background.

 

[Baron Bizarre]

Worst possible Doctor Who scenarios:

1)Sutekh defeats the Fourth Doctor and sets forth to kill everything else in the universe.

2)Davros successfully detonates the Reality Bomb.

3)Rassilon's plan to destroy time itself succeeds.


Worst Possible MST3K scenario: The Mother Pod defeats Bobo and the Zucchini Throw Pillows take over the Galaxy.

 

[jack_donaghy_is_the_shado]

Hesiei Godzilla: Godzilla melts down, the JSDF is unable to obliterate Destoroyah, Junior stays dead and Tokyo remains extremely irradiated for centuries, Mothra doesn't stop the asteroid or is killed by Destoroyah or a second Space Godzilla, Evil futurians take over 21st century Japan with no Godzilla or Mothra, Destoroyah or another menace kills off humanity.

Lethal Weapon: Riggs dies at the end of 2, Murtaugh is fired due to the diplomatic fall out and lives out his days as a broken man, Leo eventually annoys the wrong person and is killed and has a closed casket funeral.

MCU: Thanos is inevitable and no one else will ever have that opportunity.

Indiana Jones: The fridge doesn't survive/ the effect of the Grail has worn off.

Monsterverse: either King Ghidorah is undefeated or MechaGodzilla/ Kevin kills Godzilla and Kong then mankind.

Rocky: Rocky 5, but Rocky is sued by the Don King expy and Paulie hires a coke fiend/ Lionel Hutz to represent them.

Jericho: the ASA wins the civil war and the Hudson River virus mutates and kills everyone in the Americas. Only widespread nuclear bombings prevent it from destroying humanity.

28 days later: Copy/ paste above but for Europe

 

[Lurker01]

The Nanny: CC successfully wins over Maxwell and marries him.
Dark Shadows: Barnabas fails against Gerard and the Collins family gets wiped out.
Dark Shadows: Barnabas never turns face and helps Jeb Hawkes come to power bringing the anti-christ to rule over the Earth.
Dark Shadows: The Phoenix gets her son on the first attempt.
Dark Shadows: The Phoenix gets her children defeating Barnabas, Angelique, and Quentin.
Dark Shadows: Reverend Trask recognizes Angelique as the real threat and turns face helping the Collins defeat her.
Black Sheep Squadron: Boyington and crew keep fighting a losing battle against IJA with the series ending with a massive air battle over San Fransisco.
Combat!: Anthology series about how the U.S. lost WW 2.
World of Warcraft: The Lich King - Arthas rules over a undead world with Sylvarus' rebels trying to unseat him.
Dracula: Well just read the Kim Newman books.
The Monolith Monsters: Growing crystals take over the world.
Alien: The Nostromo crew helps the Queen expand her brood.
Aliens: The colonial marines helps the Queen expand her brood(except Burke. She knows pure evil when she sees it.)
Alien 3: The prisoners help the young Queen create her new colony.
Alien 4: Earth become the new home for the Queen.
Alien 5: The Queen becomes the new moderator for the AlternateHistory forum.

Sorry went ASB for some of these.

 

[sampleswift]

Star Wars: The Separatists win somehow, maybe Palpatine dies during the Clone Wars somehow and isn't hamstringing them. The Republic is a broken, poor, angry remnant al la the Neutral Zone. The rest of the Galaxy is divided among the different megacorporations that make up the CIS, who exploit the people and resources of their territories for every last scrap of profit. The jockeying for power of the Separatist factions threatens to cause another galactic war, with the surviving Jedi forming a resistance in the background.

That's not even the worst case scenario for Star Wars
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II has Darth Nihilus, who could have consumed the entire galaxy. SWTOR Valkorion could also have done this via ritual. In those scenarios no one else would have been left alive.
Those are truly hopeless scenarios. At least the CIS wins one had people who could fight against them in the background.

 

[USS_Ward]

How about a Harry Potter one? Voldemort wins in the final battle since Neville was killed by Bellatrix Lestrange, thus Nagini wasn't killed and Voldemort gained the upper hand over Potter. Almost all surviving members of the Order of Phoenix/Dumbledore's army have fled, or have been executed , including the "golden trio" and the Weasleys who have all either fled or killed for their support of Potter. Voldemort reigns supreme, having the Ministry of Magic, and most recently MACUSA under his control. Thus the magical world falls into a new dark age with attacks against muggle-borns and muggles worldwide as the two largest magical communities in the world begin a purge and genocide of unknown levels in the magical world.

 

[Analytical Engine]

Garth Nix's Old Kingdom series- Lirael and co.'s attempts to bind Orannis fail, and are slain. Orannis lives up to its nickname of the "Destroyer", and continues its quest to wipe out all life.

Star Trek TNG - from All Good Things - Jean-Luc Picard fails to stop the spatial anomaly from spreading further and further back through time, retroactively erasing everything (assuming Q doesn't just snap his multidimensional fingers and fix everything).

Star Trek (2009) - Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise fail to stop Nero from destroying Earth. Nero proceeds to blow up Federation worlds one after another, eventually leading to the region being dominated by the Romulans, boosted by future technology.

Star Trek First Contact - the Enterprise crew fail to stop the Borg from assimilating pre-First Contact Earth. The Borg then use the planet as a springboard to assimilate the entire Alpha and Beta quadrant, as the Vulcans, Andorians, Klingons etc of the mid to late 21st century are nowhere nearly advanced enough to stop them.

Star Trek The Motion Picture - the Enterprise crew fail to get through to V'Ger, who ends up digitising Earth and everything else in the galaxy.

Star Trek The Voyage Home - the Cetacean Probe's influence causes worldwide devastation, because SAVE THE WHALES(TM) or something.

Star Trek The Undiscovered Country - the Khitomer Accords never get signed. The Federation and Klingons probably end up going to war again. The environment of Qo'nos gets progressively worse after Praxis blew up (totally not a reference to Chernobyl AT ALL), leading to the Klingon Empire either falling apart, or at least having to evacuate their homeworld.

Star Trek Enterprise - after the Xindi blow up Earth, the Sphere Builders keep building their spheres, turning the galaxy increasingly uninhabitable to other species.

Star Trek Enterprise again - the Temporal Cold War ends up getting won by some other Very Unpleasant(TM) faction, such as the Alien Space Nazis*.

Star Trek Enterprise again again - the Borg decide to hang around after defrosting, assimilating 22nd century Earth, progressing to assimilate the Alpha and Beta quadrant, eventually reuniting with their 22nd century counterparts.

Star Trek Voyager - the Borg assimilate One, gaining 29th century tech, becoming even more dangerous.


*Yes, I know that doesn't really narrow things down.

 

[Jedi Dragon]

That's not even the worst case scenario for Star Wars
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II has Darth Nihilus, who could have consumed the entire galaxy. SWTOR Valkorion could also have done this via ritual. In those scenarios no one else would have been left alive.
Those are truly hopeless scenarios. At least the CIS wins one had people who could fight against them in the background.

True, the CIS one was just the first thing that came to mind.
Speaking of dark Star Wars TLs, if Palpatine achieved immortality, then he would have gone on to conquer the universe, maybe even expanding into the multiverse.

 

[Aluma]

The Star Wars Legends is indeed a paradise for dark TLs

-If the Rakata Empire wasnt destroyed by the literal force gods you'd have the entire galaxy being enslaved and tortured by sadistic space cockroaches

-If the Sith Emperor achieved his goal he would have absorbed the life energy of every single living being, wiping out the Force in a galaxy scale, forever trapping their suffering souls inside him while he lives on for all eternity
Same result if Darth Nihilus was left unchecked

-if the Shawken Device was actived and worked you'd see not only the galaxy being wiped out but the entire universe being blown up, because that's what he wanted

-The Mnggal-Mnggal are pretty much The Flood from Halo, except it loves causing pain and distress to anything it assimilates and it could have easily spread through the galaxy
Almost the same result with Ssi-Ruu and their "entechment" where their whole civilisation is based on technology made through trapping the souls of the dead(from enemies or of their own) in a state of perpetual torture so that they can do tasks that would normally be done by AIs.

-The probably worst one: if Palpatine became a god
He loved corruption of others, he embraced hatred and enjoyed causing pain physical and emotional
He's SW satan according to George Lucas himself and as cosmic entity he would turn everything into hell to please his own sadistic desires
...and it almost happened too many times.
In Legends when he wanted to transfer his soul into Luke's body in order to assimilate him and his potential (which, for being comparable to Anakin's, is universal)
In Rebels when he almost got the means for time travel and access to the "world between worlds"(aka the center of the multiverse) thanks to Ezra
In Clone Wars if The Son escaped without Anakin, since he most likely would need a vessel in the physical world and Palps is perfect for that
In the Disney interpretation of movies as being killed by either Vader or Luke while they're using the dark side would have resulted in his essence possessing them and having access to their godly potential
If he and Plagues succeeded at taking over the Force in their grand ritual rather than it backfiring creating Anakin
If he hadnt killed Plagueis which would result in him also becoming immortal and eventually succeding in becoming a deity through trial and error

 

[Jedi Dragon]

The Star Wars Legends is indeed a paradise for dark TLs

-If the Rakata Empire wasnt destroyed by the literal force gods you'd have the entire galaxy being enslaved and tortured by sadistic space cockroaches

-If the Sith Emperor achieved his goal he would have absorbed the life energy of every single living being, wiping out the Force in a galaxy scale, forever trapping their suffering souls inside him while he lives on for all eternity
Same result if Darth Nihilus was left unchecked

-if the Shawken Device was actived and worked you'd see not only the galaxy being wiped out but the entire universe being blown up, because that's what he wanted

-The Mnggal-Mnggal are pretty much The Flood from Halo, except it loves causing pain and distress to anything it assimilates and it could have easily spread through the galaxy
Almost the same result with Ssi-Ruu and their "entechment" where their whole civilisation is based on technology made through trapping the souls of the dead(from enemies or of their own) in a state of perpetual torture so that they can do tasks that would normally be done by AIs.

-The probably worst one: if Palpatine became a god
He loved corruption of others, he embraced hatred and enjoyed causing pain physical and emotional
He's SW satan according to George Lucas himself and as cosmic entity he would turn everything into hell to please his own sadistic desires
...and it almost happened too many times.
In Legends when he wanted to transfer his soul into Luke's body in order to assimilate him and his potential (which, for being comparable to Anakin's, is universal)
In Rebels when he almost got the means for time travel and access to the "world between worlds"(aka the center of the multiverse) thanks to Ezra
In Clone Wars if The Son escaped without Anakin, since he most likely would need a vessel in the physical world and Palps is perfect for that
In the Disney interpretation of movies as being killed by either Vader or Luke while they're using the dark side would have resulted in his essence possessing them and having access to their godly potential
If he and Plagues succeeded at taking over the Force in their grand ritual rather than it backfiring creating Anakin
If he hadnt killed Plagueis which would result in him also becoming immortal and eventually succeding in becoming a deity through trial and error

Legends is actually pretty horrifying at times. It does make the universe feel a lot bigger to have all these threats, though.

 

[Aluma]

Pokemon has many possible dark TLs, mainly from the movies.
Be universal destruction caused by Arceus or the dragon trio.
Be planetary destruction caused by Mewtwo, the legendary birds, the Unown(arguably universal destruction if left unchecked) and the virus Groudon(likely the worst of these as he wanted to assimilate everything into his nighmarish body mass).
But I think the worst one is a rather simplye scenario:
The masked rocket dude from movie 4 keeps Dark Celebi.
This means he has total access to time travel and can build a army of alternate versions of himself with their own celebis to take over the entirety of space-time(so long Arceus and the creation trio dont erase him, then again he only needs to hit them once with his dark balls to win, that thing is more effective than the master ball) ensuring that all pokemons are turned into sociopathic versions of themselves that are permanently in pain and blindly obedient to him while humanity is not much better off being turned into slaves 1984-style by some mafia guy that can time travel as he pleases thanks to his personal mind-broken fairy that embodies nature itself which he is using to, guess what, destroy nature! Only to satisfy his control freak personality that would make Stalin jealous.

And arguably worse than that...there's The games.
I know the first thought that would cross people's heads is Cyrus or Lysandre winning, I mean one wanted to erase the universe to create a emotionless one and the other wanted to exterminate both pokemon & humans alike to leave only his handpicked people as immortals, what could be worse than that?
Well, Ghetsis.
And no, I'm not talking about his two plans to take over Unova where one involved backstabbing his own adopted son and the other freezing the whole region, no.
I mean the fact that his shadow triad ninja-bodyguards had the creation trio orbs with them. That means if he won, if ruled Unova, that might not have been enough to satisfy him and he would have went after the gods of the verse with his new dragon, having as much of a chance of getting them under his control as Cyrus if not more so due to his legendary.
If anyone here played Black/White 1&2 you know how much of a hellish nightmare the universe would be if Ghetsis had Dialga and Palkia in his dirty hands.

 

[GeorgeUK]

The Railway Series: The NWR is absorbed by the LMS in the 1923 grouping. Thomas, Henry and Gordon are sent back to the Southern and London and North Eastern Railway respectively.

Thomas spends the rest of his life at Southampton Docks before withdrawal and scrapping in 1960.
Edward is the first to go, being withdrawn from Whitehaven MPD in 1930 and subsequently scrapped.
Henry lasts until 1936 in his original shape, after which Sir Nigel Gresley has him rebuilt as a V2 2-6-2. He enjoys much more success as 4770 and later 60984 before withdrawal and scrapping in 1965.
Gordon, as 4470 (later 60200), spends his 40 years between Top Shed, Doncaster and Copley Hill, with brief stints at Heaton and Gateshead. As the pioneer of his class, he is preserved upon withdrawal and ends up in the National Railway Museum, being joined by his brother in 2004. He has worked on the main line, and is due to be mainline certified by the end of 2021.
James never leaves the territory of the former Lancashire and Yorkshire, working goods and local passenger services out of Bolton, Newton Heath and Huddersfield Hillhouse. He would never have much patience with express engines and was scrapped in 1960.
As an industrial engine, Percy would be shunted from factory to foundry. He currently resides at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, on long-term loan from the Middleton Railway in Leeds.
Toby was withdrawn and scrapped in 1953.
Duck spent his entire GWR and BR career at Old Oak Common before being purchased by London Transport in 1959. He was sent to the London Transport Museum in 1973 before joining the Dean Forest Railway in 1998.
Donald and Douglas were withdrawn and scrapped in 1962.
Oliver was sent to Woodham's Yard upon withdrawal, where he waited for the end. An end which would never come, as the workers discovered that wagons were much easier to cut up. He was purchased by the Dean Forest Railway in 1988 and "adopted" by Cinderford Town FC as an unofficial mascot for the Dean Forest's Cinderford extension.
Daisy resides at the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway.
Boco and Bear were deemed nonstandard by British Rail in the late 1960s. Boco was withdrawn and scrapped in 1967, while Bear was purchased by the Severn Valley Railway in 1976.

Steam on Sodor lasted until 1968. The service to Tidmouth is currently served by Arriva Rail North.