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Will Sam Beckett Return Home? NBC Orders Quantum Leap Reboot Pilot

I always wonder - when they make these kinds of "simple" shows to attract the average viewer - is it ever a good decision? What I mean by that is how the details of the show don't really make sense (where is Ben's body? Why is the team always aware of the changes in the timeline? Why don't we care about the fate of the people Ben leaps into? etc...) Would the show actually be MORE popular if it had more attention to detail?

I mean the most popular shows of all time like GOT don't seem to simplify as much as these network shows that usually fail. (Final 2 season of GOT did simplify more than the rest of the show, but still not to the level of the generic network tv genre show)
 
Oleg Gnatovskiy said:
I always wonder - when they make these kinds of "simple" shows to attract the average viewer - is it ever a good decision? What I mean by that is how the details of the show don't really make sense (where is Ben's body? Why is the team always aware of the changes in the timeline? Why don't we care about the fate of the people Ben leaps into? etc...) Would the show actually be MORE popular if it had more attention to detail?
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I dunno, but it worked for the original show, which was always more about the character drama than the technical details of its gibberish time-travel theory. QL has never, ever made a shred of logical sense, and the original ran for five years.
 
Christopher said:
I dunno, but it worked for the original show, which was always more about the character drama than the technical details of its gibberish time-travel theory. QL has never, ever made a shred of logical sense, and the original ran for five years.
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They even contradicted a lot of what they established in the original series too, so why does it even matter?

I did like the ending of season 1 we saw people standing outside of the accelerator hoping Ben is returning.

In this show they treat the machine as a character as if it was alive. "are you on the accelerator's side" was a line used????
 
Oleg Gnatovskiy said:
Would the show actually be MORE popular if it had more attention to detail?
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No. You think people watching all the various crime shows on network TV care that they're watching a simplified take on how crimes are investigated? Or that legal dramas present a simplified version of how court cases are done? Or hospital shows depicting a simplified take of medical matters? Those compromise the majority of network TV's most popular scripted content, including some shows which have lasted twenty years. If people don't mind a simplified version of every day stuff like cops, lawyers or doctors, why would a simplified version of time travel bother them?
 
Oleg Gnatovskiy said:
I always wonder - when they make these kinds of "simple" shows to attract the average viewer - is it ever a good decision? What I mean by that is how the details of the show don't really make sense (where is Ben's body? Why is the team always aware of the changes in the timeline? Why don't we care about the fate of the people Ben leaps into? etc...) Would the show actually be MORE popular if it had more attention to detail?

I mean the most popular shows of all time like GOT don't seem to simplify as much as these network shows that usually fail. (Final 2 season of GOT did simplify more than the rest of the show, but still not to the level of the generic network tv genre show)
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What made the original show work so well was the chemistry between Al and Sam. I was a kid, so I didn't get all the storylines like I get them with the new show. But it was the banter between the two of them that kept me coming back for more. I miss that in the new show.
 
Unionized Elf said:
No. You think people watching all the various crime shows on network TV care that they're watching a simplified take on how crimes are investigated? Or that legal dramas present a simplified version of how court cases are done? Or hospital shows depicting a simplified take of medical matters? Those compromise the majority of network TV's most popular scripted content, including some shows which have lasted twenty years. If people don't mind a simplified version of every day stuff like cops, lawyers or doctors, why would a simplified version of time travel bother them?
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Well, I guess I used bad examples of what I meant by "simple". I don't think the crime shows are accurate of actual investigations, but they don't simplify their actual plots. This show seems to simplify everything, from time travel to human relationships, to its basic plots.
 
Oleg Gnatovskiy said:
Well, I guess I used bad examples of what I meant by "simple". I don't think the crime shows are accurate of actual investigations, but they don't simplify their actual plots. This show seems to simplify everything, from time travel to human relationships, to its basic plots.
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LOL with some shows it's as simple as "he looked at me" let's jump into bed, end scene
 
I'm watching Aphoria, new time travel movie with the delightful Judy Greer from Archer. :)

They have a broken time machine. They can't time travel, but they can make heads explode in the past. We don't actually see exploding heads, it's not that sort of movie. The movie is about the consequences of your choices, mostly guilt, if that choice is deciding who's head deserves to explode.

Point is... They hand waved "observer effect" to explain why Judy remembered her original timeline, and not the revised timelines full of headless corpses, which is what I was waffling on about a few days ago.
 
Guy Gardener said:
I'm watching Aphoria, new time travel movie with the delightful Judy Greer from Archer. :)

They have a broken time machine. They can't time travel, but they can make heads explode in the past. We don't actually see exploding heads, it's not that sort of movie. The movie is about the consequences of your choices, mostly guilt, if that choice is deciding who's head deserves to explode.

Point is... They hand waved "observer effect" to explain why Judy remembered her original timeline, and not the revised timelines full of headless corpses, which is what I was waffling on about a few days ago.
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That's the power of plot armor combined with hand vavium... A toxic substance when combined can make any story.. /s
 
Oleg Gnatovskiy said:
I mean the most popular shows of all time like GOT don't seem to simplify as much as these network shows that usually fail. (Final 2 season of GOT did simplify more than the rest of the show, but still not to the level of the generic network tv genre show)
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I think you need to recalibrate your definition of "popular." The red wedding was watched by roughly 5 million viewers. Each rating point is just under a million viewers (980,000), so the red wedding wouldn't have even cracked the top 25 network shows for that season. It pulled less than Once Upon a Time, Desperate Housewives, 2 Broke Girls, and CSI: Miami on the low end, and far less than NCIS, Dancing With the Stars, The Big Bang Theory, American Idol, and The Mentalist on the high end. So, if your question is does simplifying shows help them be popular? My answer would be 100% yes. It doesn't necessarily make them GOOD (or bad for that matter), but it certainly makes them popular.
 
EnderAKH said:
I think you need to recalibrate your definition of "popular." The red wedding was watched by roughly 5 million viewers. Each rating point is just under a million viewers (980,000), so the red wedding wouldn't have even cracked the top 25 network shows for that season. It pulled less than Once Upon a Time, Desperate Housewives, 2 Broke Girls, and CSI: Miami on the low end, and far less than NCIS, Dancing With the Stars, The Big Bang Theory, American Idol, and The Mentalist on the high end. So, if your question is does simplifying shows help them be popular? My answer would be 100% yes. It doesn't necessarily make them GOOD (or bad for that matter), but it certainly makes them popular.
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The 5 million number is less accurate for HBO than other networks. HBO had the show on repeat pretty much all week, and the people catching the later showings don't count. Also let's talk about share. Much fewer people had HBO than basic cable, and more people have networks that basic cable. Thus the GOT share, especially at it's peak (long after red wedding) was insanely high. How high would it have been if it was on network? (Hypothetical of course, the show would have been heavily censored on network)
 
EnderAKH said:
I think you need to recalibrate your definition of "popular." The red wedding was watched by roughly 5 million viewers. Each rating point is just under a million viewers (980,000), so the red wedding wouldn't have even cracked the top 25 network shows for that season. It pulled less than Once Upon a Time, Desperate Housewives, 2 Broke Girls, and CSI: Miami on the low end, and far less than NCIS, Dancing With the Stars, The Big Bang Theory, American Idol, and The Mentalist on the high end. So, if your question is does simplifying shows help them be popular? My answer would be 100% yes. It doesn't necessarily make them GOOD (or bad for that matter), but it certainly makes them popular.
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Neilson ratings are guesses. We have no idea if they are right. It's a make believe number that the Networks tell their advertisers, so that their sponsors will give them money.

HBO has exact data on how many customers they have, and what their customers watch, and then they make most of their money from subscriptions. They they cancel create and prolong TV depending on the data from every buggers decoder box hooked up to their TV.
 
This article popped up in my Google feed... seems REALLY low, no? Or am i so old that i am used to higher ratings? I recall even CW shows having higher ratings!

Across its first eight episodes, Quantum Leap Season 2 is averaging 3.9 million total viewers (with Live+7 playback), which is right on par with its freshman audience. In the demo, Season 2 is averaging a 0.5 rating, ranking third (behind freshman hits The Irrational and Found) amongst all dramas NBC has aired so far this TV
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This is fromhttps://tvline.com/news/quantum-leap-season-2-episode-9-return-date-nbc-1235112426/
 
That’s broadcast version overnight ratings, right? So it’s also on streaming, does that figure include those?
Blasted kids these days only watch YouTube and Tik Tok. The younger audience for broadcast TV is dwindling exponentially.
 
So does that mean there are only 5 episodes left? Well, I guess we got up to 8 before they stopped, and 13-episode seasons are common these days. Maybe they would've picked up the back nine if not for the strike.
 
Yes, that is the way I understood it.
First 3 episodes one a weekly basis, culminating in a 2 episode finale.

They continued filming season 2 after the wrapped up the 1st season and didn't do the regular "break between the seasons" in late spring/early summer.

Hope it gets renewed, but still wish they drastically reduce the present day/HQ stuff and not having Addison on "Hologram" again.
 
I don't mind spoilers so if anyone can tell me, and use spoiler tags please .. Did Ben arrive back at HQ because at the end of season 1 they were all just standing outside of the accelerator waiting for something.

Actually good question if he's leaping around what is going on inside the accelerator room?
 
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Sam's not in this series at all. So I assume you mean Ben?
In which case, no Ben did not return home in the S1 finale, and no they did not explains what happened in the accelerator in the final scene of the finale.
 
The Wormhole said:
Sam's not in this series at all. So I assume you mean Ben?
In which case, no Ben did not return home in the S1 finale, and no they did not explains what happened in the accelerator in the final scene of the finale.
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Ok that final scene made me think something was arriving
 
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