Tony Newman & Doug Phillips.
Will Sam Beckett Return Home? NBC Orders Quantum Leap Reboot Pilot
- Thread starter Ryan Thomas Riddle
- Start date
Tony Newman & Doug Phillips.
I really thought when they were talking about Al being in alive in 2018 and Magic going to give him cigars that it would turn out Martinez leaped into Al. Which would be how he then had clearance to enter the facility and we'd see Al in the mirror as Martinez' reflection.
Gads, that would've been awesome and easily doable. And STILL doable, if you think about it. 
Few time travel shows stand up to any real logical scrutiny, and QL has always been one of those. Sure a "quantum bubble" could keep everyone in the spatio temporal causal nexus isolated from any deltas in the time stream during the leap (and I made a lot of that up), but then how would everyone know the changes to the timelines of everyone Ben affected, to heartwarmingly list all the good things he did at the end of a given episode?
And Martinez / Magic and Ben / Ben visibly disappeared within the accelerator during the climactic fight. Martinez and Ben end up back in 1954, but what happened to 2018 Ben and Magic? That timeline was cancelled out, but do they still exist as quantum duplicates lost in time, with no real idea of what happened?
And what does Addison remember after Ben leaps? That they skipped over the awkward phase of their relationship and went right to the hardcore stuff? Are they married now and with kids?
Decent writing can set up any number of new through-lines for the next season. I could see Ben returning, but getting yanked away before getting a homecoming smooch before being pulled away again. Or someone completely different popping in. They left it pretty open, and the quality of the writing on this show is good enough IMO to cover for whatever they want to set up. Some images of the second season filming have appeared and show Ben and Addison on a relatively modern street, Addison in her usual garb, so it seems she's still a hologram here.
Mark
Few time travel shows stand up to any real logical scrutiny, and QL has always been one of those. Sure a "quantum bubble" could keep everyone in the spatio temporal causal nexus isolated from any deltas in the time stream during the leap (and I made a lot of that up), but then how would everyone know the changes to the timelines of everyone Ben affected, to heartwarmingly list all the good things he did at the end of a given episode?
And Martinez / Magic and Ben / Ben visibly disappeared within the accelerator during the climactic fight. Martinez and Ben end up back in 1954, but what happened to 2018 Ben and Magic? That timeline was cancelled out, but do they still exist as quantum duplicates lost in time, with no real idea of what happened?
And what does Addison remember after Ben leaps? That they skipped over the awkward phase of their relationship and went right to the hardcore stuff? Are they married now and with kids?
Decent writing can set up any number of new through-lines for the next season. I could see Ben returning, but getting yanked away before getting a homecoming smooch before being pulled away again. Or someone completely different popping in. They left it pretty open, and the quality of the writing on this show is good enough IMO to cover for whatever they want to set up. Some images of the second season filming have appeared and show Ben and Addison on a relatively modern street, Addison in her usual garb, so it seems she's still a hologram here.
Mark
A
Amaris
Guest
This was a good way to end the first season. They clearly worked to tie up all the loose ends, just in case, but since we'll definitely get a second season I can't wait to see where they go from there.
Also, Ian is adorable in every timeline.
Also, Ian is adorable in every timeline.
In the opening shots of Ben in 2051, in the imaging chamber there's a futuristic chair with a flip-down restraint. I know I've seen it somewhere before but I can't place it. Here's the full screenshot followed by a brightened-up zoom in of the chair in question:
LINK HERE
I'm positive it's a rental from a Hollywood props warehouse and it's not meant to be seen - a leftover from some LA-based production that has since been used as set dressing on other shows like this one. Anyone have any ideas about where this chair could have been from originally?
Mark
LINK HERE
I'm positive it's a rental from a Hollywood props warehouse and it's not meant to be seen - a leftover from some LA-based production that has since been used as set dressing on other shows like this one. Anyone have any ideas about where this chair could have been from originally?
Mark
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Or Addison from assorted other instances where she's sitting down in the chamber. :P
Mark
Mark
Season 2 Teaser
One half-second of Addison in a thermal suit is all we need to see to know where they're going next season.
Mark
Mark
I hope this isn't an insensitive joke, but it occurred to me that Ian got to be both singular and plural "they" this week.
If they filmed a closing scene to use in the event of cancellation, I think they would've devoted more than ten seconds to giving the series a proper emotional finale. They would've just had to tighten up some of the earlier scenes to make room for it.
I guessed that Martinez would jump into Magic as soon as Addison called Magic to warn him about the time traveler leaping into Ben. Conspiracy Story Plotting 101 -- whatever authority figure gets contacted with a warning is bound to be part of the conspiracy.
Speaking of Magic, I expected him to get his turn as the hologram before the end of the season, but it's a bit clumsy that his only real reason for talking to Ben was to pass along Jenn's code word. Although he did provide the information about where he kept his pen, so I guess that kind of justifies it. Pretty weak excuse to get him face time with Ben, though.
But it's a really nice bit of character writing for Jenn that she plans so far ahead that she even gave herself a code word to send back to herself in the past just in case that ever happened.
As they said here, the quantum bubble only existed because they were messing with their own personal pasts. Magic specifically said that their memories (except Addison's in the chamber) update instantly upon a change in normal circumstances.
What I wondered was more fundamental: How was the accelerator even working back in 2018? If it was complete enough to be capable of sending people into the past that early in the course of the project, why did they wait until 2022 to send a leaper?
If they filmed a closing scene to use in the event of cancellation, I think they would've devoted more than ten seconds to giving the series a proper emotional finale. They would've just had to tighten up some of the earlier scenes to make room for it.
I guessed that Martinez would jump into Magic as soon as Addison called Magic to warn him about the time traveler leaping into Ben. Conspiracy Story Plotting 101 -- whatever authority figure gets contacted with a warning is bound to be part of the conspiracy.
Speaking of Magic, I expected him to get his turn as the hologram before the end of the season, but it's a bit clumsy that his only real reason for talking to Ben was to pass along Jenn's code word. Although he did provide the information about where he kept his pen, so I guess that kind of justifies it. Pretty weak excuse to get him face time with Ben, though.
But it's a really nice bit of character writing for Jenn that she plans so far ahead that she even gave herself a code word to send back to herself in the past just in case that ever happened.
As they said here, the quantum bubble only existed because they were messing with their own personal pasts. Magic specifically said that their memories (except Addison's in the chamber) update instantly upon a change in normal circumstances.
What I wondered was more fundamental: How was the accelerator even working back in 2018? If it was complete enough to be capable of sending people into the past that early in the course of the project, why did they wait until 2022 to send a leaper?
A
Amaris
Guest
I never connected more with Jenn than right then. I'm all about information security, privacy, and such, which makes me more than a bit paranoid. I have code words that certain people know if I'm ever worried someone is spoofing me, so good on Jenn.
Late in the episode, Martinez thrashes a bunch of sailors on the Montana (which I've learned WAS going to be the name of the follow-on to the Iowa-class battleships that never materialized - neat historical note there), and Ben notes, "Damn, they really ARE the Terminator". The "They" sorta jives with what's slowly becoming acceptable for people whose gender identity you don't know - you just call everyone "they/them" until they tell you or you learn otherwise. I think this permeates this episode in particular but is part of the tone of the show overall.
Mark
Mark
Um...
Perhaps they were running endless computer simulations until they found the one that had the best chance of retrieving Sam. Or, simply running endless simulations to ensure that the designated Leaper of this Project could be retrieved safely. And perhaps their Ziggy was playing a long game to lock everyone into a singular timeline where safe transport was assured, and the Project wasn't wiped from history.
It was freaking awesome to see the Accelerator firing and dynamically Leaping Ben and Martinez through time. Rapid fire Leaps were something I always wanted to see in the original series, and they were handled beautifully here. Martinez McFly never did get back to his Twin Pines Mall.
Nobody's mentioned the elephant in the room: The poor guy Martinez leapt into in the Old West just died, a random casualty of temporal weirdness.
In the original history, that poor guy prevented James Arness' parents from meeting...
If only Martinez had resisted the urge to gloat...
Right neighborly to tell Ben there won't be any more Terminators coming after him since he had his Accelerator destroyed. But we know there's always another Judgement Day come summer blockbuster season.
Right neighborly to tell Ben there won't be any more Terminators coming after him since he had his Accelerator destroyed. But we know there's always another Judgement Day come summer blockbuster season.
That's the part that bugged me the most in an otherwise decent finale - Martinez's death felt a little unearned, the equivalent of two people arguing before one of them wanders into the street and is hit by a random bus. It would have worked out better if their conflict had reached some form of personal or emotional resolution before Martinez was shot.
Mark
Mark
I guess the personal resolution is that Ben was saved by someone he'd befriended and helped in the original leap, but it's been so long since that episode that I don't remember the character at all, so it doesn't carry much weight.
Generally I'm all for characters reaching personal resolutions rather than just killing each other, but I'm not sure it would work here. After all, Martinez had no personal stake in any of this; he was just a soldier carrying out an assigned mission. So there wasn't really anything to resolve except whether he succeeded or failed in destroying the project.
Something I've been wondering about. Earlier in the season when Magic was talking about his experience when Sam leaped into him, he talks about feeling another presence trying to "step in" so to speak which he apparently consented to. Which at the time, it was pointed out that in the original show there were those Sam leaped into who weren't likely to have consented to have him occupy their bodies, like Lee Harvey Oswald. But, in this episode we have Martinez leap into Magic. Did Magic also consent to becoming Martinez's host? Even if we consider the various people throughout the shows can sense the benevolent intent of Sam or Ben, which motivates them to consent to the leap, Martinez almost certainly wouldn't have had that. Does Martinez just go ahead and forcefully leap into his hosts? Is the "consent" just some rationalization Magic came up with after his experience with Sam? Or is this just another of the many inconsistencies with leaping that pop up on both shows?