'Cause and Effect' and 'Groundhog Day'...

[Roald]

With the latest DSC episode involving a time loop, I noticed on several sites that Groundhog Day is seen as the first usage of a time loop, and that all subsequent episodes (from ST to Xena, from SG-1 to X-Files) and films are seen as derived from it..
But isn't Cause and Effect the first defining use of the time loop? It was released in March 1992, Groundhog Day in february 1993... Does anyone know why a time loop is often referred to as the 'Groundhog Day loop' and not the 'Cause and Effect loop'?

 

[BigDaveX]

Simple; Groundhog Day's more well-known among general audiences than Cause and Effect is. One was a highly successful mainstream comedy film, the other was a fairly well-regarded episode of a cult (albeit more popular than most) sci-fi series.

And really, the concept of the time loop story has been around far longer than either of them. The Twilight Zone, for instance, had a time loop episode almost exactly thirty years before Cause and Effect was written, and I'd guess there's plenty of usages of it in sci-fi literature that predate even its use on that show.

 

[Captain of the USS Averof]

Movies take longer to make than television episodes. Perhaps Groundhog Day’s script (or its basic premise) circulated around long before Cause and Effect was written.

 

[ChasFink]

Groundhog Day may have influenced later stories and set a standard (like Night of the Living Dead did for what we now call zombies) but as has been pointed out it was not the first. Another example: Richard A. Lupoff's short story "12:01 P.M." which was published in late 1973, and adapted to film twice, in 1990 and again in 1993 after Groundhog Day.

 

[TheCrankyCardassian]

Doctor Who also dealt with this topic back in the Tom Baker era. Albeit on a much smaller scale.

 

[Leviathan]

They might have shown it first, but it lacked two things to make it name-worthy:

First: Bill Murray driving off a cliff with a kidnapped groundhog.

Second:

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[Butters]

Yeah, its just down to the popularity of the movie and the recognisability of the phrase. Bit like any surprisingly spacious interior being described as being like a tardis.

 

[Samuel]

Time loops have been a feature of science fiction as long as I can remember.