Film Theory: Does Marty McFly Actually DIE In Back To The Future?

Firstly, after working out how Biff got rich, Marty goes to confront him in Trump Tower (SORRY in Biff Tannen’s Pleasure Paradise) to find out when he got the Sports Almanac. Naturally, Biff tries to kill him to shut him up, but Marty escapes to the roof where he seems to be trapped with no hope of escape. This is not part of his plan - hence his frustration (SHOW CLIP OF MARTY PUNCHING THE WALL IN ANGER), so there’s no way he could have pre-planned an escape route involving casually leaping off the roof.

And yet, Marty jumps off the roof on to the DeLorean, which has handily appeared just below him. “Amazing coincidence?” in Doc’s words, or is something else at work?

Then back in 1955, when Marty eventually gets his hands on the Almanac after Biff almost kills him in a dangerous car chase scene, there’s another incredible coincidence. Marty steals the Almanac, jumps safely away from Biff’s car and seems to be home free, only for Tannen to swing his car around and try to mow Marty down.

But just as it looks like he’s toast at the end of the tunnel, Doc miraculously appears with a rope of bunting to pull Marty to safety literally seconds before he goes under Biff’s wheels. Even accounting for Doc watching what’s happening, there is absolutely no way he’d know to appear at that precise moment without having experienced it once before.

As a logical scientist, he’d surely have gone to the other end of the tunnel? The only explanation that doesn’t rely on almighty coincidence is that Doc knew when to save Marty because he’d already witnessed him not being saved. In one timeline, Biff ran him over and killed him, only for Doc to cheat him again by jumping back in time and making sure he was there.

It’s grim, but it’s the only way to explain the perfect timing, and it fits with the fact that Marty did exactly the same thing for him in the first movie. Knowing he was going to be killed by the Libyans, Marty used the time machine to save Doc in a less direct way, seemingly foreshadowing Doc reciprocating in the sequels.

And it’s not just the first sequel in which it might have happened. Despite the fact that Doc Brown appears to be trapped in the past in Back To The Future III, there’s an argument to suggest that he actually used a secret time machine to once more save Marty from death.