Quantum Leap

[Nomaa Jedi Piarra]

Quantum Leap is being rebooted and is on NBC Monday's at 10 after the Voice this fall.  I loved the original series and will definitely give this a try.

[Metropolis]

Torn on this. I liked the original idea for a new jumper taking over to look for Sam Beckett. That might still happen, but what made the series was the chemistry between Sam and Al. I hope it can recapture the magic.

[Rogue 3]

Whoa! Really? Hadn’t read about this. Loved the original when it first came out - dip in every now and again as it’s on permanent cycle at the mo on a couple of channels in the UK.

Fingers crossed it’s ok. Tough act to follow Bakula & Stockwell for sure!

[Nomaa Jedi Piarra]

It will be interesting for sure.  Ernie Hudson is part of the cast and plays a character the Sam Beckett had jumped into and is working to figure how that happened and fill in the missing gaps when Sam was in his body.  I'll have to find the article I had initially read.

[CoLA]

From what I've read, it sounds more like a continuation of the original show. I've only seen a few episodes of the old series, but I love time travel stuff so I'll give it a whirl.

[Nomaa Jedi Piarra]

On 7/5/2022 at 9:46 AM, CoLA said:

From what I've read, it sounds more like a continuation of the original show. I've only seen a few episodes of the old series, but I love time travel stuff so I'll give it a whirl.

It's (the old series) currently airing on the ScyFy channel if you have that

[Jedigoat]

On 7/5/2022 at 9:46 AM, CoLA said:

From what I've read, it sounds more like a continuation of the original show. I've only seen a few episodes of the old series, but I love time travel stuff so I'll give it a whirl.

If it's a continuation, does that mean Sam Becket is out there leaping and the new leaper could cross paths with him?

[CoLA]

On 9/3/2022 at 4:23 PM, Jedigoat said:

If it's a continuation, does that mean Sam Becket is out there leaping and the new leaper could cross paths with him?

I hope so! Be neat to see what he has been up to all this time, I bet Bakula would be up for it.

[Jedigoat]

Maybe that's the show....sending a leaper to find Sam. 

[Rogue 3]

It’s being classed as a 6th season revival o. Wikipedia - not the fountain of all knowledge, but ties in with what I read that it’s 30 years since Sam disappeared.

First episode airs on the 19th Sep, so not long to wait! Hope it’s got a channel in the UK for it to be shown on!

https://www.syfy.com/syfy-wire/quantum-leap-nbc-new-sci-fi-series-everything-you-need-to-know?amp

[Jedigoat]

I saw a preview while watching the football game last night.  Cool teaser but the special effects were pretty bad.  I was laughing because the actor was acting confused while jumping out of a plane and it felt way too over the top and comedic.  But then again, Sam's reactions to his leaps were almost always comedic.  And it's a small sample size so I'm still optimistic.  Cautiously optimistic. 

[CoLA]

1 hour ago, Jedigoat said:

I saw a preview while watching the football game last night.  Cool teaser but the special effects were pretty bad.  I was laughing because the actor was acting confused while jumping out of a plane and it felt way too over the top and comedic.  But then again, Sam's reactions to his leaps were almost always comedic.  And it's a small sample size so I'm still optimistic.  Cautiously optimistic. 

I mean, the original had ones like this!

 

 

[Jedigoat]

That's a good episode!  Is there a jump cut there after he opens the door for the mirror reveal?  

[Nomaa Jedi Piarra]

On 9/9/2022 at 4:47 AM, Rogue 3 said:

It’s being classed as a 6th season revival o. Wikipedia - not the fountain of all knowledge, but ties in with what I read that it’s 30 years since Sam disappeared.

First episode airs on the 19th Sep, so not long to wait! Hope it’s got a channel in the UK for it to be shown on!

https://www.syfy.com/syfy-wire/quantum-leap-nbc-new-sci-fi-series-everything-you-need-to-know?amp

The newest TV guide list it as a "RETURNING SHOW" as well.  So I guess it is officially season 6 then

[CoLA]

On 9/10/2022 at 2:09 PM, Jedigoat said:

That's a good episode!  Is there a jump cut there after he opens the door for the mirror reveal?  

I forget! I watched the series about ten years ago on DVD so it's been a while.

[Rogue 3]

Ah - classic! And they revisited Jimmy and his brother in the 5th season where “the evil leaper” is trying to mess up what Sam originally put right.

Hope the new series finds a channel to air on here in the UK! Otherwise I will be absent from this chat for a bit!

[Nomaa Jedi Piarra]

Anyone watch yet?

[Darth Wicket]

I watched the first episode. It was good enough to keep me interested. I wonder how they will tie this show in with the older show. For example, why did Ben decide to suddenly leap without testing it more? Is he looking for Sam? What does he hope to find (and/or learn)? He left a message on Addison's phone but it did not explain anything. I understand they won't just give everything away in the first episode, but hopefully we will get more details before the end of the first season. I was also interested in why Al's daughter seems to be against the current quantum leap team.

[R.CAllen]

Saw it.

I think that the main guy and Ernie Hudson are doing great but everyone else suuuuuuuucks. Maybe it’s not the actors’ fault. Maybe it’s what they have to work with. Don’t like the new Al, don’t like either of those two doofus mcgoofuses, not sure if there’s anyone else ‘on’ the show to like or dislike. I do like the main guy a lot! If they decide that one of the ten Star Trek shows they’re doing takes place in or around the ENT era they should make him the captain! Or give him a two-episode arc on SNW where he’s a Jellico figure! Be the guy on Quantum Leap you get to captain an Enterprise! Just one of the perks of the job!

 

So, what are my complaints?

 

1. extremely bad dialogue! At one point there’s the following exchange between two characters -

 

TECH PERSON: The past five years we’ve been trying to figure out how to send someone to a single point in time and then bring them right back. To take the work of Sam Becket and make it work so that you don’t get stuck in the past.

THE NEW ‘AL’: Yeah, Ian, I know. I’ve been here since the beginning.

 

And then that person CONTINUES explaining stuff she already knows! They decided to justify the exposition by ... making the character who exposits annoyingly self-righteous!? This is just one example. It wasn’t even really the nadir of the episode. The whole episode was kind of chock full of dialogue of equivalent or worse quality.

 

2. it’s, like, real dumb!

 

• Dumb that it’s set in the present! Gotta set it a few years into the future! Or maybe decades in the past so they can go back earlier into the 20^th century while still having a relatively young protagonist? Or even go into his future but OUR past?

 

• Dumb that his ‘Al’ is his wife!

 

• Dumb that the bad guy in this looks like Adan Canto from Designated Surv Vor (‘16-’19), Sunspot from X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), but it’s not him!?!?

 

• Dumb that they’re not doing the thing where the guy who he leaps into gets leaped (leapt? lept?) into his own body; that could actually justify the amnesia thing they’re doing since on the old show the person he leaps into would experience that in Sam’s body

 

• Dumb that at one point the wife, no, the fiancée, the new Al lady, she directly addresses some guy in the past!?!?

 

• Dumb that at one point the guy, the main guy, Quantum Leap, new Quantum Leap man, Dr. Ben Song, he starts apologizing for things he doesn’t remember doing and were maybe even unalluded to in dialogue to him!?!?!?

 

• Dumb that he says that he wished he’d gone into teaching but he has amnesia and it’s not like she called him “Dr. Ben Song” to his face!? He doesn’t know that was an option! All he knows is that he speaks a lot of languages! His amnesia is a convenient plot device which is dispensed with whenever they please!

 

• There was something else that was real dumb but I forget what it was. Oh wait! Now I remember! Quantum physics! They shoved quantum physics in Quantum Leap and #$%^ed it up! That’s not how it works! That’s not how to best use it for dramatic effect! Go read Michael Frayn’s Copenhagen!

 

 

My complaints aren’t just “It should be like it was on the old show!” but more like “The way it was on the old show was a good way of doing things and they seem to have pointlessly replaced that status quo with a state of affairs which feels awkward and unnecessary and unfruitful for serialized sci-fi serio-comic drama!”.

 

The whole episode was so bad that it made me worried I was maybe seeing the original through rose coloured glasses. So I chose an episode at random and gave it a rewatch. It was one of the later ones where they broke their longstanding rule about not involving famous historical figures. The one where Bakula is Marilyn Monroe’s bodyguard! Only thing I remembered about it from watching it as a kid is Dean Stockwell leering at Marilyn Monroe skinny dipping.

 

Turns out : really great stuff! Stephen Root was in it! I found myself actively invested in trying to figure out who was going to be saved and how — is he going to save Marilyn? is he going to save the new assistant who loves Marilyn Monroe, the one whose favourite Marilyn Monroe picture is Bus Stop (1956), is he going to save Karina Longworth from taking her own life in despair after Marilyn commits suicide? is it going to somehow be about fixing the life of the guy he’s leapt into? — in a way that I just didn’t care at all about the guy doing the robbery or that guy’s cancerous wife or the undercover cop or whomever else was around in the new pilot.

 

And there’s a nuance to this old episode that I assume I just didn’t get when I watched it in syndication aged 8 or 9. When he rejects her advances and says, “It’s not that I don’t want to. I mean, every man on the planet wants you.” and she responds with, “They don’t want me. They want Marilyn. But I’m not her. She’s somebody that I put on like a cashmere sweater or a mink coat. Somehow, I think you’re the first man I’ve ever met who really understands that.” This alone justifies them breaking the formula and going with a big historical personage, y’know, they found a good reason to tell THIS story.

 

Oh, and something else! Al being from the future and being a rakish guy older than (and superior to!) Sam means that he’s often dressed bizarrely – oddly tailored/embroidered suits, weird bolo-esque ties, handkerchiefs – and with a cigar or drink in his hand. It automatically conveys to even an inattentive or new viewer that Al’s not a part of things, the state of affairs becomes known without a word of dialogue, even if you miss the opening credits you’re pretty close to being on the right page! Having that character be a romantic partner of the opposite sex who is the equal of the Sam Becket stand-in from our own contemporary year throws that all away. (About the one thing I liked that was new was the bit where it’s established that the plan was for them to be in each other’s roles.)

 

also, if they don’t have Dr. Ben Song’s body present in 2022 then they can’t do an episode where he leaps back into his past self and his fiancée is torn between her feelings for the man he is now and the man he was when they first met. Or whatever! My point is that the new element they’ve added combined with the old element they’ve subtracted adds up to an actively worse set of circumstances then if they’d done one or the other. On the old show they almost never addressed the Leapee in the complex with Ziggy and ... there was a professor guy, right!? who’d fix Ziggy!??? ... but I think it came up from time to time.

 

tldr = did not like it but am hopeful for next week, y’know?

[Rogue 3]

Anymore episodes watched? Still waiting for a channel for it to be aired on in the UK sadly…

[R.CAllen]

Yeah, I saw the 2^nd episode.

 

 

• Wait, if they’re leaping him back to the nineties then ... isn’t the original Quantum Leap program in operation at this time? It’s 1998. What’s to stop him from trying to rescue Dr. Sam Beckett the old fashioned way!?!? He can just go to the complex and tell Al all the details of what Dr. Sam Beckett needs to do to leap, right? No need for Ziggy to guesstimate things. His team back in the present day presumably still has the records. They feed that to him and he hands that off to Al then Al gives it to Dr. Sam Beckett. Speedrun it! Fool God and win big!

 

• Wait, he’s an immigrant? Okay, another bad thing about not keeping with the status quo where his body is still in the Quantum Leap complex is now they can’t do a thing where an evil Admiral/Senator/cabinet member thinks the project is some giant boondoggle (he assumes Ziggy is just generating the output, there is no time travel) and seizes Dr. Ben Song’s body under Patriot Act rules or whatever. Well, I assume they could’ve still done it regardless of whether Dr. Ben Song is a natural born U.S. citizen or not but the story has extra resonance if he isn’t.

 

• Oh, that’s Carly Pope!!!1! Young People $%#^&ing Carly Pope. Later season of 24 Carly Pope. That’s Carly Pope!

 

• Oh, and José Zúñiga! Most recently from this year’s season of Westworld, he’s the Vice President, Ed Harris delivers the “I’m what you call ‘neurodivergent’” line to him. But I think I recognized him from the JJ Abrams MI.

 

• Wait, Ben Raab is working on this show? Comics Ben Raab? Okay.

 

• Omigosh they brought back the same actress from the finale! Susan Diol! The Vidiian scientist lady from VOY! The one of Al’s many many ex-wives who Dr. Sam Beckett manages to retcon into his only wife? The one who didn’t wait for him when he was a P.O.W. in that one episode before the finale which I don’t remember? Oh well, I guess I know which episode I’m going to rewatch after this one.

 

• Half an hour in and the episode is already doing a better job at being a pilot than the first episode. Or maybe it’s better to say that it’s doing a really good job at being a second episode??? The status quo is being set up very well and the episode itself is about about how the very thing Dr. Ben Song brings to help those around him when he leaps is so crucial to the proper functioning of the team he left behind. Probably also helps that instead of it being, like, a generic CBS show like it was last week about an undercover cop foiling a heist it’s an astronaut show this week.

 

Okay, this time around for a chaser I watched the episode with Al’s ex-wife that wasn’t the series closer. It’s the Season 2 finale! It’s great! I don’t think it’s one I’d seen as a kid. Dr. Sam Beckett leaps into what at first he assumes to be the body of a woman (in an episode that will end up being all about the body of a woman!) but then quickly comes to understand it is actually the body of a partner, a man charged with a mission to heal the mind of another, and Al subverts him from that goal for his own purposes. Al not only wants to rejoin with his beloved but more crucially wants to bring meaning to his years of caged loneliness — his time as a P.O.W. in Vietnam were in some way his own leaping — and ends up only seething with jealousy at the tool he’s crafted of Dr. Sam Beckett. Al is so outraged at 25 years of longing that he almost cuckolds himself with his best friend! I don’t know. I found the episode very powerful! Dean Stockwell’s performance, the needle drops, it’s entirely possible Ghost (1990) ripped it off (or vice versa!?!?) it’s so good! There’s a running shtick of Dr. Sam Beckett wearing numerous disguises in his work as a policeman which dovetails so well with the series as a whole, y’know? This episode could’ve worked as a series finale if there hadn’t been a renewal, it’s that good, it’s sort of a definitive thesis statement for the show.

 

tldr = getting better! high hopes for episode 3!

[Metropolis]

I was thinking did Ben leap or did he enter the phantom zone.

[R.CAllen]

I’m all caught up on the first season. It’s not half bad! I watched the first few episodes all wrong. That’s on me. Once I started watching this show while cycling on my recumbent stationary bike and also idly reading or surfing the web it really improved. They make these shows as background noise for people on their phones or doing chores or whatever.

 

There’s a good sort of tripartite mix of three different flavours at work here. They’re doing the episodes that anybody who watched Quantum Leap (‘89-’93) wanted them to do on the old show — they leap back to cowboy times, they leap repeatedly into the same situation over and over again until he gets it right, they leap into the future — alongside the sort of meat’n’potatoes episodes that just come with the concept as well as episodes that tie into an ongoing arc involving the mystery of why they leapt in the first place. Sometimes you get all three of these flavours stuffed together uneasily into a single serving! Does it always work? Well, I was entertained!

 

I guess it helps that nearly every episode I see a favourite TV character actor or two. I also think watching Kevin Can Asterisk Himself (‘21-’22) gave me the push to keep going with the show when I initially dropped it after two episodes because seeing the guy who plays the new Sam Beckett on that show and noticing how good an actor he is — that show itself is pretty good! — made me give it another chance.

 

Oh, and they explain away the thing where the old show was set in a future 1990s that no longer exists by just insisting that Al had a really weird fashion sense. I liked that!

[Rogue 3]

Glad to hear it! For some reason, it still has no release date here in the UK. No idea why!!
Really keen to watch it as the original series was such a big thing when I was in my teens!