One of the most outlandish Hollywood action films, relatively speaking, is The Final Countdown (1980), in which the nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier U.S.S. Nimitz is enveloped in a bizarre electrical storm in the Pacific and transported back in time to 1941, conveniently just before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour. The ship’s commander is played by Kirk Douglas, with Martin Sheen in the role of an enigmatic civilian who just happens to be on board. One memorable exchange between the two Hollywood heavyweights occurs just after the crew has realised that something strange has happened. Douglas muses that it could all be a Russian plot, perhaps involving parapsychology. ‘Excuse me, Captain,’ interjects Sheen with an impeccably straight face, ‘we also have to consider one alternative possibility: the possibility that what is happening here is real.’

If such issues can be measured, then John Birmingham’s Weapons of Choice: World War 2.1 is even more far-fetched than this Reagan/Rambo-era retrospective revenge fantasy. He also has US warships travelling back in time to World War II, but from the future rather than the present. Birmingham thus adds a layer of implausibility to an already incredible scenario. In doing so, he makes fellow techno-thriller writer Matthew Reilly appear a stubborn realist.