Stories about time travel are compelling because there is so much at stake. Can the time travelers return to their original timeline? Will they change the course of history? Can they prevent the impending apocalypse?

That's why so many people love watching time travel TV series. Someone on a popular internet forum asked other users for recommendations of “fun, light-hearted time travel shows.” Sci-fi lovers flooded the thread with these favorites.

When a team made up of a historian, a sergeant, and a computer engineer join forces to hunt down a time-traveling terrorist, they must make sure to be careful about what elements of the past they choose to alter to save the world and the future.

1. Timeless (2016-2018)

This exciting time travel show brings the quirky cast through many critical historical moments, like Nazi Germany and the Battle of the Alamo in Texas.

When one of his experiments goes sideways, a scientist finds himself trapped in the past, and his new predicament forces him to jump into different people's bodies.

2. Quantum Leap (1989-1993)

Of course, this puts the scientist in several sticky situations that he must use his sharp wits to make it through. At the same time, he alters fate as he makes decisions in historic people's bodies.

This classic British sci-fi show has made fans smile, gasp, and laugh for the past eighteen years. The show follows the Doctor, an alien who chooses a companion from Earth to accompany him on adventures through space and time in his telephone-booth-shaped TARDIS.

3. Doctor Who (2005-)

My favorite episode is when the Doctor and his companion Amy Pond (Karen Gillan), travel back in time to meet Vincent Van Gogh.

A young and unaccomplished man named Josh (Josh Hutchinson) spends most of his time playing video games. A strange phenomenon is unleashed when he beats a game no other person has ever completed.

4. Future Man (2017-2020)

Can Josh save the world from these nefarious visitors? First, he must gather a team to help him travel through time in the hopes of eventually ridding the world of this new evil force.

When Nadia (Natasha Lyonne) dies tragically one night after her best friend's party, she doesn't die but instead restarts the night of the party over again.

5. Russian Doll (2019-)

This cycle continues as Nadia dies and relives the night over and over again, and she soon tries her hardest to uncover what is going on and why she keeps getting sent back to relive the same night.

Superheroes and time travel? Sign me up! This DC show follows a rogue time traveler who realizes the world can only be saved if heroes and villains work together.

6. Legends of Tomorrow (2016-2022)

Soon, he creates a ragtag team of heroes and villains who go on missions through time to ensure supervillains don't destroy the fabric of time itself.

This creative and action-packed show is about superpowers, time travel, and childhood trauma. When a cold and cruel billionaire adopts seven children with strange powers, their new father forces them to work together to defeat villains in their city.

7. The Umbrella Academy (2019-)

But when the kids grow up, they must grapple with the implications of their powers. One of the siblings accidentally gets trapped in the future and eventually returns to the past to bring the team back together and prevent the apocalypse.

This show is complex and filled with interesting characters, making this a must-watch for any sci-fi lovers.

While this show tends to get darker and more serious than the others on the list, there are plenty of light and heartwarming moments.

8. Outlander (2014-)

When a young British World War II nurse visits some ruins on a trip to Scotland, she mysteriously travels back to 1743. There, she joins a Scottish family fighting for their freedom against the British. Will her attempts to return to her timeline come to fruition, or will she be stuck in the past forever?

This exciting show follows a group of people who slide between parallel universes using a futuristic portal device. However, when the device malfunctions, they become trapped in a cycle that they hope will one day lead them home to their home universe.

9. Sliders (1995-2000)

The group must hop through a portal into a new alternate universe every time the timer runs out, giving them a time limit on how long they can stay. They will be trapped in a strange world for decades if they don't make it.

When a police officer in 2006 gets hit by a car, he wakes up in 1973 to find that he is still a police officer but in a lower-ranking position.

10. Life on Mars (2006-2007)

As the policeman grapples with his newfound reality, viewers wonder whether he truly traveled back in time or if this is all a dream state induced by a coma.

This thread inspired this post.