Living in the Universe of Mr. Nobody.

By: Fernando Ramírez Vanegas

It was one of those days you just want to end quickly, there was nothing on the TV or the internet, and the worst part is that those who call themselves my friends went off to hit on girls without me, What the hell. What could be worse? The only thing left for me is to go to the movies and try to meet a cute girl in the theater. What a loser, right? I hope it’s worth it. I get to the cinema and see the name Mr. Nobody on the marquee, I buy my ticket and go into the theater. The movie starts rolling, I look around and most of the people are lonely guys like me. God, give me a break, after a while I get so caught up in the narrative of Mr. Nobody that in the first half hour I fall asleep. In the distance, I hear footsteps of people, slowly I start opening my eyes and find myself sitting in a chair in the middle of a train station, but it’s not just any station, the platforms seem to multiply before me, each one leading to a different destination. Where the hell am I? Is the universe mocking me or is this a joke? In this place, you hear the echo of trains coming and going and the air has that stench of metal and rain. There are no instructions, just the certainty that every step I take is like splitting my existence into a thousand versions of myself. The first thing that comes to mind is: What the hell am I doing inside the movie Mr. Nobody? Am I part of this universe? Is this a glitch in reality? Am I an intruder in Nemo’s story, or am I another piece of this puzzle? And the worst part is that I didn’t even see the whole movie.

Alright… I’m going to take a moment to recap things, maybe if I find Nemo, I might have a chance to figure out what’s going on and how I ended up here. I’ll go look for Nemo, the man who lives all possible lives. I quickly realize it’s not such a simple task. In this world, there’s no “main Nemo” to follow; from what I could understand, he is all the versions, all the choices, all the contradictions. Damn it all to hell! Just when I was about to give up, a teenage Nemo crosses my path. I saw him as my ticket out of this madness, I’m never stepping foot in a movie theater again. I stopped this version of Nemo, and he tells me he’s torn between staying with his mother or his father, he looks at me and keeps walking, then I look ahead and see an adult Nemo sitting, writing on a typewriter, lost in his own world. And so, I kept running into many versions of Nemo, each encounter I had was as strange and weird as the one before, it was like looking in a mirror: it made me reflect a lot through his decisions, on the times I myself hesitated between safe paths and risky ones in my own life. Follow a dream or settle? Risk it all for love or protect myself from pain? It’s here where those questions don’t have a single answer, and that terrifies me.

Prosper: Is it possible to master the multiverse?

My question is: Could I prosper in this world? Damn… Crazy life… I don’t know, and the worst part is that I didn’t even finish watching this shitty movie. The only thing I can do is try to understand this madness and try to navigate through the chaos like Nemo. But, being honest, I’m not sure I have his strength. I’m just a dumb nini, a wannabe Japanese hikikomori. I sit on the floor staring into the bottomless void and find myself with the strange memory of a reality where I’m a scientist working on a project to reverse the Big Bang, Damn! What a script! Don’t mess with me… I see memories of an elderly Nemo narrating his life from the year 2092. What the hell! The technology is too advanced, it feels like I slipped into another plane without even realizing it: holographic screens, data flowing like rivers of light. I try to adapt, learning from my supposed colleagues who surround me.

However, it seems that every technical decision I make generates a new reality where the experiment fails catastrophically or succeeds in ways I don’t understand. What is all this? Every action creates a new universe. Help! How do you prosper knowing that every success might be someone else’s failure in another place? I try to think logically and search for something in my mind to keep me sane. Then I see her, yes… it’s Anna, Nemo’s love, in a reality where she and I share a coffee in a city that feels like a dream. Now I’m really screwed… These jumps in reality are random and without warning, like a nightmare within another. Alright, as I was saying, we were talking about simple things: the taste of the coffee, the sound of the rain. Nonsense, really. For a moment, I thought it might be possible to build a life here. But then, I see lights everywhere, yes… the reality fractures: in another universe, Anna is married to another man, and I’m just a stranger. Swallow me, earth! Prospering in this place would mean I have no choice at all, I’m no longer sure about following Nemo’s path. Survive: The weight of indecision If I don’t prosper, can I at least survive? Life in this world is exhausting. Every day is a bombardment of possibilities. In one reality, I’m a family man, struggling to keep a crumbling marriage afloat. In another, I’m a professional swimmer, but an accident leaves me bedridden. Every version of me seems doomed to face a new challenge, and there’s no way to escape the consequences of my choices. I try to be cautious, make small decisions to avoid unleashing more chaos, but even that creates new worlds.

Survival becomes a game of mental endurance. I think this story will be my testament, Don’t go to the movies! I start writing a diary through this narration to keep a record of who I am in each reality, but the pages contradict each other: in one, I love Anna; in another, I don’t even know her. Indecision, which in my real life was just a nuisance of not having a girlfriend and being a virgin, here is a sentence. If I don’t choose, the multiverse chooses for me, and it’s not always kind. I wonder if Nemo, with his ability to live all lives, is a god or a prisoner. I, clearly, am the latter. Derailing the plot: The intruder who breaks the rules And then there’s the possibility that, in trying to find my place, I end up derailing the plot of Mr. Nobody. On an impulse, I decide to interrupt one of Nemo’s key choices: when, as a teenager, he must decide whether to follow his mother or his father at the train station, which I don’t even know when the hell happened. I approach him, a nine-year-old boy with eyes full of fear, and I say, “Don’t choose. Stay here. Create your own path.” For a moment, I feel like I’ve changed something fundamental. The universe trembles, the platforms vanish, and for a moment, I believe I’ve freed Nemo from his infinite cycle.

But the multiverse is like a wild bull, it doesn’t give up so easily. Instead of stopping the story, my story. Hey, yeah… I’m talking to you… Save me! Anyway, as I was saying, my intervention creates a new reality where Nemo doesn’t choose, but I become the center of the narrative. Now I’m the one living every possibility: a world where I’m a hero who saves Anna from an accident, another where I’m a villain who betrays her. The plot of Mr. Nobody doesn’t break; it expands, absorbing me. I try to break free, but it’s impossible, I’m just an insignificant human. I’ve derailed the story, but at a cost: now I’m part of the chaos, trapped in a cycle I don’t understand.

What does it mean to be human in a multiverse? Living in the world of Mr. Nobody forces me to confront an uncomfortable truth: that real life is already a multiverse, even if we don’t see it. Every decision we make or avoid creates a path we can’t undo. In my life, I’ve hesitated between following a passion or staying safe, between loving or protecting myself. Here, those doubts materialize, and the weight of seeing every “what if” is overwhelming. Prospering would require a courage I’m not sure I have: accepting that there’s no perfect life, only possible lives.

Surviving means dealing with constant regret. And derailing the crazy plot I never understood… well, that just proves the universe always finds a way to move forward, with or without us. In the end, I see myself sitting on a bench in one of the infinite train stations, with a notebook full of scribbles trying to make sense of my choices. I don’t know if I’m prospering, surviving, or just lost. But as I watch the trains go by, I realize that being human, even in a multiverse, is about keeping on choosing, even if you’re never sure where the next platform will take you. One last thing… Why the hell did I buy that ticket to see Mr. Nobody?