Quantum Leap questions

[CorporalCaptain]

No, Christopher, I totally got your point. It's just wrong.

Frankly, I think that following your suggestions would have killed the show. Everyone I know who liked it was perfectly happy with it the way it was. Making everything consistent and even hinting that things had been thought through by someone seriously conversant in science fiction would have changed the dynamic that clicked with the audience. I don't think that most of the people who liked the show read a lot of Analog. They certainly didn't in my circle of friends.

Besides, consistency in art is overrated, period. I wouldn't change anything in films like Blazing Saddles or Airplane! The idea that consistency is necessary in comedy or present in films like that is, well, curious. That actually goes for any genre, though, admittedly, the less consistency, the more daring the production. The only consistency needed for a successful production is a connection with the audience. If an artist (and, let's face it, Bellisario really knows what he's doing) can pull off success while "breaking some rules," then that's really a tribute to the artist.

If, at the end of the day, the show really doesn't conform to your expectations of how a show should be, then the problem might just be that you're not in the target audience. Again, that's especially worth considering, since we're not sitting here wondering why Quantum Leap flopped.

 

[Christopher]

No, Christopher, I totally got your point. It's just wrong.

You know, the polite way to say that is "I just disagree." If you were willing to cast it as a difference of opinion, I'd be willing to continue. But I won't waste my time trying to reason with someone who refuses even to listen to alternative perspectives. Goodbye.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

No, Christopher, I totally got your point. It's just wrong.

You know, the polite way to say that is "I just disagree." If you were willing to cast it as a difference of opinion, I'd be willing to continue. But I won't waste my time trying to reason with someone who refuses even to listen to alternative perspectives. Goodbye.

Oh, good grief!

You know, that was in reply to your telling me that I was "still not getting [your] point," despite having actually read and thought about everything that you, and everyone, had said in this thread.

I think it's safe to say that QL itself is Exhibit A that that's false. If we were trying to figure out how QL failed miserably, then such a prescription might be worth considering. To insinuate that QL succeeded despite its technobabble is to overlook the much more obvious possibility that having a wacky aspect helped it succeed. The show was serious enough at other times.

You're still not getting my point.

In fact, I've underlined where I'd already as much as said, "I just disagree." Was it really so inconceivable that I meant what I said, which was that I thought that what you said was false, and that I'd made that conclusion knowing full well what it had been? Was it so inconceivable that, instead of me not getting your point, it was really the other way around? Accusing someone of still not getting your point is a rather presumptuous thing to say, is it not?

 

[sidious618]

Consistent, realistic, and sensible world building would sure kill David Lynch's career. Considering he's my favorite director, "realism" isn't something I worry about. As a matter of fact, I find realism to be overrated in general and have less and less patience for it.

 

[Tosk]

Was Quantum Leap truly inconsistent, or did it just evolve?

 

[MacLeod]

I think it's safe to say that QL itself is Exhibit A that that's false. If we were trying to figure out how QL failed miserably, then such a prescription might be worth considering. To insinuate that QL succeeded despite its technobabble is to overlook the much more obvious possibility that having a wacky aspect helped it succeed. The show was serious enough at other times.

You're still not getting my point. It's not about whether a fictional universe is plausible in real-world terms or whether it's serious. Even if it's pure fantasy, even if it's a zany comedy, it should still remain consistent with whatever ground rules it applies. Indeed, the more fanciful or bizarre the universe, the more important self-consistency is to give it a sense of reality, of being a world that holds together on its own terms rather than just a bunch of random stuff.

And yes, QL succeeded despite the conceptual flaws, but that doesn't mean the flaws didn't exist. It means that reality is not about simple black-and-white dualities. It's not as if the only options are complete perfection and utter failure. As with everything in life, there's plenty of middle ground. A show can be good in a lot of ways but still have imperfections. You can like most of the things a show does but still find something about it that frustrates you. It can do a lot of things well yet do one thing poorly. For instance, a show may be very well-written, well-acted, and well-produced, but have lousy music. Or a show may have five terrific lead actors and one mediocre lead actor.

And sometimes -- indeed, all too often -- a show may have terrific character writing and drama and emotion yet be lazy in its worldbuilding. I once read an editorial by Analog editor Stanley Schmidt saying that this was a widespread practice, a belief among many storytellers for prose and screen that as long as the characters and the emotions were plausible, it didn't matter if the world made any sense. And Stanley argued that it did matter, that the world itself is a character in its own right, whose rules affect and shape the characters' actions and experiences just as other characters do. A lot of drama comes from the constraints and challenges faced by the characters, and those can come from the environment or the rules and limitations of the world as much as they can come from other people. So a writer who cares about making characters and their problems and relationships believable and consistent would be well-served by making the world they interact with believable and consistent as well. (And I mean "believable" in the context of willing suspension of disbelief about a work of fiction, rather than belief that it could really exist. A complete fantasy world can be believable as long as it has a coherent internal logic.)

No, it's not impossible to tell satisfying stories in a world whose rules are sloppily conceived or inconsistent. But that doesn't mean you can't tell better stories in a world that is well thought out. Just because you can succeed without being perfect, that doesn't mean you can't do even better.

I have to agree with this, even a fictional universe has rules, it doesn't really matter what those rules are so long as they are consistant.

 

[JoeZhang]

I don't see where it's much worth the trouble to endlessly pick it apart like some uptight college professor or something like that.

As your actual college professor I'd note that I find that in our off-hours, we are too busy telling knob-gags and smoking blow to do such a thing - I tend to find it's pseudo-academics who get uptight about such things.

 

[Stevil2001]

"Neurons and mesons" has a nice sound to it.

 

[USS Triumphant]

It was a good, enjoyable series, and it is long over, and I will be surprised if it returns in any form aside from reruns. If it ever does, it will probably be a reboot, anyway.

Point is, no one kvetching is going to FIX it NOW (assuming it needs fixing), are they?

I thought it was inconsistent, but not in a way that ever bothered me much. Like someone said, it was Highway to Heaven with a pseudo-sci-fi gimmick, and if I never let being an atheist at the time deter me from enjoying that show....

 

[Christopher]

"Neurons and mesons" has a nice sound to it.

In the same way that "Klingons and Cylons" does. Or "ailerons and futons." However similar they sound, they just don't go together.

They could've just said "neurons" and it would've worked fine.

 

[Marc]

"Neurons and mesons" has a nice sound to it.

One of the novels describes Ziggy having braincells from Sam but can't remember how much was actually implied or stated in the series.

So combine that with Ziggy being a quantum computer it's possible for it to have neurons and meson.

 

[DimesDan]

"Neurons and mesons" has a nice sound to it.

Might even be a good name for a band.

As for the inconsistencies in the science, put me in the I don't give a flying fuck category.

 

[Trekker4747]

Was Quantum Leap truly inconsistent, or did it just evolve?

There's a difference between "evolving" and not being consistent with the very premise of how things work in your world. It's not "evolving" to go from Al not seeing Sam for who is but who he's supposed to be to Al always seeing Sam's actual body.

 

[Admiral James Kirk]

"Neurons and mesons" has a nice sound to it.

Might even be a good name for a band.

As for the inconsistencies in the science, put me in the I don't give a flying fuck category.

Mind if I join you there?

QL was a sweetheart of a show with likeable characters, a good sense of humor and one hell of a fun premise. I loved it for it's idealism. It's lack of realism and scientific accuracy never once bothered me.

 

[Captain Kathryn]

Yeah I'm with you. I totally stopped caring about the "science" behind it and am just enjoying it. It's a pretty good show. Scott Bakula is adorable in this show (much more likeable of a character than he was on ENT I think). The morality is a little bit too in your face at times, but it's still a great show. I'm having fun watching it.

 

[Trekker4747]

Oh, I enjoy the show but sometimes that geek/Star Trek part of my brain goes "THIS DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE!!!". "WHAT?! YOU JUST CONTRADICTED SOMETHING YOU SAID TWO EPISODES AGO!!!"

 

[Captain Kathryn]

Oh, I enjoy the show but sometimes that geek/Star Trek part of my brain goes "THIS DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE!!!". "WHAT?! YOU JUST CONTRADICTED SOMETHING YOU SAID TWO EPISODES AGO!!!"

Oh yeah, I know that. That was the entire reason I created the thread in the first place. Because I didn't understand the science behind what was going on and they didn't really explain anything and when they did, it was not clear.

But at this point, I'm not looking at it as sci-fi anymore. It's a morality show / comedy / fantasy. So I'm having fun watching it and not really worrying about the science and specifics now.

 

[DarthTom]

Oh, I enjoy the show but sometimes that geek/Star Trek part of my brain goes "THIS DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE!!!". "WHAT?! YOU JUST CONTRADICTED SOMETHING YOU SAID TWO EPISODES AGO!!!"

Meh - Trek is as guilty of that as much as any sci-fi fantasy show. How many times do we see the characters get out of a rough spot only to completely forget the solution 3 - episodes later.

One of my favorites is when Dr. Polaski is de-aged by the transporters using her DNA. This magic trick is forgotten and I guess completely forgotten because the Son'a in Insurrection would not have needed to harvest the planets magical de-aging rings - or for that matter anyone in the federation - because they could just step onto a transporter pad with a follicle of hair and follow the same procedure they used with her.

Oh and this particular magic trick was also used to age people in the TNG episode where several crew members get re-aged.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

It's not "evolving" to go from Al not seeing Sam for who is but who he's supposed to be to Al always seeing Sam's actual body.

I don't agree. That could easily have been the result of some minor change made in the mechanics of Project Quantum Leap.

I mean, obviously Al has to have some kind of link with Sam in order to be visible at all to him. It's not a stretch to assume that, somewhere along the line, some technician made a change so that Al would always see the real Sam, because it would obviously make it easier for both of them to do their jobs (i.e. when Sam leaps in as some hot chick, it would not be helpful for Al to keep drooling over the 'leapee').

There are indeed some gripes I have with the show. For example, Al's girlfriend Tina - when we first meet her, it's the pilot episode, and she is the woman who is riding in Al's car in the very first scene. Obviously she's got beauty AND brains. But when Al leaps home a few seasons later, Tina has become, well, a ditz. Not just a different actress, but the entire character is different.

(Also, I thought it was a real cop-out in "A Leap For Lisa" when we meet the young Al in the waiting room and for some reason they had to have Dean Stockwell overdub his voice. That was way out of place, IMHO. Come on, can't Jamie Walters talk like Al for like 2 minutes? And the overdubbing itself was really really bad)

That being said, I wish they could have kept Roddy McDowall on the show for awhile longer because I thought his character was hilarious.

 

[Mistral]

QL was a fantasy, a light-hearted morality play that sometimes rose above itself to tug at our heartstrings. It had enjoyable actors and breezy plots. You could say the same about most of Burn Notice-and poke just as many holes in its "logic" if you wanted to. I mean, how many bombs actually go off in Miami, anyway? This isn't STTNG, attempting to explore the Human Condition in a future, technical context. This is just fun tv, like Eureka or Stargate SG1. As a wise man once said, "Lighten up, Francis."