# Sidequels **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 31, 2014, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489 "2014-07-31T14:43:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/21 "2014-08-01T04:23:10Z")
The \*Ender \*series of books by Orson Scott Card has many stories and novels that run concurrently, including the “Shadow Series” which started with _Ender’s Shadow_, telling the story of Bean–a character in the original _Ender’s Game_ novel. Scroll down to the chart: [Ender's Game (novel series) - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ender%27s_Game_(series)) ---
**Author:** ![Octarine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/22d042/32.png) [@Octarine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octarine)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/22 "2014-08-01T04:31:15Z")
While some Discworld books take place in the far past (like _Pyramids_), or come before or after another novel, lots of them are just generally jumbled together and could be treated as occurring simultaneously. Quite often main characters from one novel will appear briefly in a scene in another, giving all the books a nice sense of unity. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 10:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/23 "2014-08-01T10:42:14Z")
Well, does _Life of Brian_ count? ---
**Author:** ![Locrian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/locrian/32/14146_2.png) [@Locrian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Locrian)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 10:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/24 "2014-08-01T10:55:47Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Well, does _Life of Brian_ count? Only to the cheesemakers. 😃 Blessed are they. ---
**Author:** ![Bakhesh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@Bakhesh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bakhesh)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/25 "2014-08-01T12:45:26Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > The Avengers prequels all happen at about the same time, with the exception of Iron Man and Iron Man 2. Never realised that Thor was set during WWII before 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Flywheel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Flywheel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flywheel)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/26 "2014-08-01T13:27:46Z")
Alan Ayckbourn’s [House & Garden](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_%26_Garden_%28plays%29) are “sidequels” in the literal sense: > [@](#): > > They are designed to be staged simultaneously, with the same cast in adjacent auditoria… ---
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/27 "2014-08-01T14:31:43Z")
Most of Back to the Future II obviously is concurrent with the first movie. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/28 "2014-08-01T16:17:44Z")
> [@GrizzRich](#): > > My favorite is a sidequel from the movie The Incredibles. In which Elastigirl makes a call to her babysitter from her plane just before it’s hit by missiles. We get to see the phone call from the babysitter’s side of it. Pixar did it again with **Wall\*E** : on the DVD, there’s a little side story about “Burn\*E” the little robot who is repairing a ‘running light’ post outside the ship (if you blinked during the movie, you missed it). Pretty funny. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/29 "2014-08-01T16:34:28Z")
> [@GrizzRich](#): > > My favorite is a sidequel from the movie The Incredibles. In which Elastigirl makes a call to her babysitter from her plane just before it’s hit by missiles. We get to see the phone call from the babysitter’s side of it. _And_ what happened to the babysitter afterwards. Yes, that was _Jack-Jack Attack_, which is great: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack-Jack\_Attack ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/30 "2014-08-01T16:36:28Z")
> [@Bakhesh](#): > > Never realised that Thor was set during WWII before 😉 Arguably, Captain America takes place from 1940-something, when Steve is trying and failing to enlist, to 2012, when he’s thawed out by SHIELD. So it technically runs concurrently to all the other Marvel films up to that point. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/31 "2014-08-01T17:17:31Z")
In Michael Moorcock’s “Eternal Champion” cycle, every series is a sidequel to every other series. Two incarnations of the Champion, Elric and Corum, cross paths twice. _The Sailor on the Seas of Fate_ and _The Vanishing Tower_ show these encounters from Elric’s point of view, and _The King of the Swords_ shows them from Corum’s point of view. ---
**Author:** ![Clawdio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d07c76/32.png) [@Clawdio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clawdio)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/32 "2014-08-01T19:06:18Z")
IIRC, Interview with a Vampire & The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice. Also, this is common book to book in Steven Erickson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen Series. (Book 2 takes place at the same time as book 1, Book 4 takes place at the same time as book 3… etc) ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/33 "2014-08-01T20:32:03Z")
Philip Jose Farmer’s **Lord of the Trees** and **The Mad Goblin** , the two G-rated sequels to his x-rated **A Feast Unknown** , describe actions that take place simultaneously and converge at the end. The two books were sold originally as an Ace Double (if you flipped the book over, the other book, upside-down relative to the first, was on the other side. ) They were later reprinted in a more traditional format by Ace. Of course, since they have never 9to my knowledge) been published separately, you could as well regard them as one book split into two parts, and it loses al its interest and relevance for this thread (the same way that Ambrose Bierce deflated the significance of _Leonine verses_, which have a rhyme between the middle of a line and the end, by saying that they were “the result of someone discovering that a rhyming couplet could be run into a single line.” ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/34 "2014-08-01T20:39:04Z")
As an old-time DC guy, my first reaction to this idea is to suggest _every. Marvel. comic. EVER._ ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2014, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/35 "2014-08-01T22:15:43Z")
Alan Ackbourn’s three “The Norman Conquests” plays all take place at the same time in a garden party in the country, set in different rooms of the same house. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2014, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/36 "2014-08-02T02:21:45Z")
John Scalzi’s _Zoe’s Tale_ is a first-person retelling of his earlier sf novel _The Last Colony_ from the perspective of a teenage girl, adoptive daughter of the hero of _TLC_. Both are very good books IMHO and mesh well. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2014, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/37 "2014-08-02T03:50:22Z")
If we are including books, there is an Incarnations of Immortality book that is a Sidequel to all the others in the series. It retells all the other stories from the point of view of Satan, who was the antagonist of all the other books. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2014, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/38 "2014-08-03T12:51:26Z")
> [@Bakhesh](#): > > Never realised that Thor was set during WWII before 😉 Well, he was alive then… ---
**Author:** ![danhanegan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@danhanegan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/danhanegan)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2014, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/39 "2014-08-04T17:07:02Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > If we are including books, there is an Incarnations of Immortality book that is a Sidequel to all the others in the series. It retells all the other stories from the point of view of Satan, who was the antagonist of all the other books. It’s been a while since I read them, but it is my impression that this is pretty much the case with all the Incarnations books. You see the same events over and over, retold from different characters’ points of view. Not EXACTLY the same events, but there is considerable overlap. Some have criticized the series as lazy storytelling, essentially retelling the same story over and over. It is not. Taking the same events, finding fresh perspective on them with each new book, showing the different characters’ reactions and motivations, took enormous talent. Thanks for mentioning this series. It brings back a rush of nostalgia, and a bit of research has revealed my local public library has On a Pale Horse available as an e-book. Time to re-read. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2014, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489/40 "2014-08-04T19:52:57Z")
> [@danhanegan](#): > > It’s been a while since I read them, but it is my impression that this is pretty much the case with all the Incarnations books. You see the same events over and over, retold from different characters’ points of view. Not EXACTLY the same events, but there is considerable overlap. > > Some have criticized the series as lazy storytelling, essentially retelling the same story over and over. It is not. Taking the same events, finding fresh perspective on them with each new book, showing the different characters’ reactions and motivations, took enormous talent. > > Thanks for mentioning this series. It brings back a rush of nostalgia, and a bit of research has revealed my local public library has On a Pale Horse available as an e-book. Time to re-read. You’re welcome. I actually learned that a newer book in the series came out in 2007. I had no idea. I was actually introduced to this series in a Sci fi class I took in college but I haven’t read them in many years. Hope it holds up for you. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sidequels/694489.md?page=3)