Time Travel Is Dangerous!

Oh, hello there.

It's my absolute pleasure to welcome you

to the leafy North London suburb of Muswell Hill,

a pretty unremarkable place for the most part,

were it not for its curious inhabitants,

people of imagination and ingenuity

with a love of the past

and an unshakeable belief in the future.

But this little world was changed forever

by a sequence of extraordinary events.

And it all started six years ago

on a mews behind the high street

ah, yes, that one,

at this vintage shop,

run by best friends Ruth and Megan,

but I'll let them explain.

Uh, we sell vintage and, I, I don't really like

the word retro, but people like to say it.

But we just basically sell anything

that we can get our hands on, really, that's from the past.

There's no kind of particular period we stock and sell.

It's just anything that catches our eye.

So like, we'll put '50s, and '70s, and '80s together.

Business has really picked up lately.

Yeah, I think it was about, probably about a month ago.

-Yeah. -We found this thing outside.

It was literally by the bins.

We weren't sure whether to take it or not

'cause it just looked like some kind

of school project or something.

But we were just drawn to it, so we kind of dragged it in.

Yeah, and then I guess we were just messing about and...

And I went to 1945.

The machine enables us to go to that point in time.

So basically, to get from A, which is here, to go to B,

which is 1959, we put it in the machine,

and then it's like this vortex, this portal to--

It's undescribable, really.

Yeah.

-System? -Check.

And destination?

-Check. -And fuel cell one.

We're not kind of scientifically minded.

So I mean, I, I say it's a wormhole,

but I actually don't know what a wormhole is.

Maybe they've got some pewter.

- Oh. - People like pewter.

Since we found the machine,

we can pretty much get anything we want.

Wow.

Mm, the ceramics are quite good.

Ceramics.

Uh, and, uh, metalware always does quite well.

Uh, I mean, like, if somebody wanted, like,

a car from the '50s, that would be difficult.

We've never brought anything that big back.

But it's great for our business

because you know, we do clothing, homeware

You know, it, it's, it's portable stuff.

I don't think it's stealing.

I mean, because we don't stick around long enough

to know what happens afterwards,

I kind of, in my head, just imagine

that those things just reappear for those people.

Come on. Go, go, go.

The whole process has cut costs right down

because it's, it's a lot cheaper in the past.

Well it's free.

I mean, yeah, sometimes

we, we, we do take quite a lot of stuff.

We have got a storage issue now.

Yeah, upstairs is quite jam packed.

Mm.

We're, we're trying to get it sorted.

We just need to get more space.

It's just hard to sometimes hold back

because there's just so much good stuff.

Like, the other day, there was something at the back,

and I couldn't get it, so we just--

Went and got another one.

Went in the machine and just got it again.

We got a cat once, actually.

It sort of didn't stay in the machine,

which was really, it was quite sad.

Yeah, harrowing.

The machine's our secret, really.

Yeah, no one knows it's here.

Mm.

And no one knows we're using it.

Mm.

Apart from you guys, obviously.

Mm.

I think people just, uh,

they, they hanker for things they had,

and they, they have this nostalgia and--

You just can't put a price on nostalgia.

No. We, we do, though.

Yeah, we do.

- Pays the rent. - Yeah.

Uh, we, we sort of take care

of different sides of the business each.

So I guess you take care of all the customers, really.

They seem to really like Megan.

- Mm. - She's very good with people.

They just love me.

And I do like more the admin jobs,

like, um, paying bills, um--

Bookkeeping.

-Yeah, a bit of cleaning. -Yeah.

Could you, could you turn it off?

Yeah.

Yeah, so it's, um, it's measured by light years per year

at the precessing longitude of the progressive node.

Mm, and that's how you turn it on.

Uh, no, that's how you turn it on.

I know, I know, but that is, we do press that one.

That's, like, the seat adjustment.

Yeah, 'cause sometimes it's too,

it's a little bit low.

I do most of the driving.

Um--

You do all of the driving.

-I do all of the driving. -I'm fine with that.

I haven't got any problems with it.

I'm not even--

It's, Ruth gets quite anxious driving.

I'm quite anxious about a lot of things,

but mainly just the, all this is quite, like--

-Overwhelming. -Yeah.

Meegs, I don't think, I don't actually think

you should be doing this.

I think, fuck, fuck, fuck, it's on fire.

-Oh. -Meegs, it's on fire.

Uh, uh, spray then.

Can you just take that bit off, and then I can just do it?

'Cause it's equal.

It's still equal parts--

-Yeah, no, we all do-- -'Cause I do--

We all do our bit.

Uh, been friends for a long time.

Uh, I just don't really like the term best friend.

We're definitely best friends.

-Um-- -Definitely.

Found all these tapes with the time machine.

They're of this old science show, totally hooked now.

Hello there, I'm Dr. Ralph Sheldrake.

And I'm Botty.

And welcome to "The Future, Today."

Today.

With the rapid advancement in artificial intelligence,

what we really want to know is, will computers ever be able

to destroy humans...

...at chess?

Your move.

What?

I think that's checkmate, mate.

It seems Botty still has a long way to go.

Uh, so we've got, we've come to America.

- The Wild West. - We've never been before.

I think a lot of the stuff here is handmade.

-Yeah, it's just really-- -Oh, that's nice.

Oh, hello.

It's nice, but there is a bit of a weird vibe, though.

There's a lot of toxic--

-Yeah. -Masculinity, I'd say.

Yeah.

Not somewhere that I would wanna--

Oh, it's kicking off.

He just shot him.

That's weird. Is he all right?

Surely there's better ways to resolve conflict.

Wow.

Do we, do we, should tell someone or?

Look at this. It's actually been hand-stitched.

Beautiful.

Um, I mean, the thing is, in Muswell Hill,

you get a lot of vegans, so I don't know

if they're gonna be into the leather,

but we could try sell it to, to people in Wood Green?

Um, but yeah, I mean...

-Shit. -That's bad.

That's, oh--

What a waste of life.

Did, did he, did he get the hat?

I think we can just take that because that'll just get,

you could probably get that dry cleaned.

I don't think there's blood on it.

- So what do you reckon? - I don't know how it's gonna--

Shh, Ruth, I'm talking to Dave. Dave?

It's a bit small, mate.

It's not small. It's, it's compact. It's modern.

It's luxury.

Yeah, so, um, I've been in the property development game

for the past four years now.

And key thing, must have vision.

I mean, imagine what this place would look like

without all this shit in here.

- Ruth. - Mm-hmm.

Move your head. I'm taking pictures.

You're spoiling it. You need luxury flats.