The beginning of the episode fills in the gap between seasons 2 and 3. Among the alternative events are the assassination of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at the 1984 Brighton Hotel Bombing (Thatcher actually survived the attack), the election of Democratic Senator Gary Hart as President of the United States instead of losing the 1984 primaries and the success of Mikhail Gorbachev's reform policies in the Soviet Union. Some others deal with pop culture, such as Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid starring a movie based on the life of Gordo and Tracy (possibly the alternate version of The Right Stuff (1983), a film on the same subject of space exploration), the Beatles being reunited as a band (as they briefly considered it after being teased by the hosts of Saturday Night Live) and Kurt Cobain remaining alive.