Something in The Leap Back that bugs me.

SonOfSam

Project QL Intern
Jul 18, 2006
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Indianapolis,IN
Is it me, or does The Leap Back make no sence. If Sam and Al switched wouldn't Sam have ended up in the waiting room and the person in the imaging chamber be who Al leapt into. Also I never understood why the handlink made the jump too.
 
The Handlink made the jump probably because of how hard Al was holding onto it so tightly, kind of like how Leon Stiles ended up with the gun in the Waiting Room in Killin' Time.

And Al and Sam Switched places, so each ended up where the other was supposed to be. In Sams Case, that meant him ending up in the Imaging Chamber. and Al ending up in the past. Then when Sam leaped into Al, it dumped him back into the Imaging Chamber
 
SonOfSam said:
Is it me, or does The Leap Back make no sence. If Sam and Al switched wouldn't Sam have ended up in the waiting room and the person in the imaging chamber be who Al leapt into. Also I never understood why the handlink made the jump too.

I'm with you here. The actual mechanics of "The Leap Back" can be explained in a way that can make sense, but the problem is that it could have made a lot more sense from the get-go had they stuck to the ground rules. I think the mechanics of the show were sacrificed for plot devices in this episode. And so that's why we have to conclude that the lightning bolt duplicated Sam Bederman's hospital clothes, struck the point where Al would have been had he not been a hologram, have the handlink possibly be the catalyst for the overload and leap with Al, and have the fermi suit inexplicably disintigrate.

Anyway, the way I'd have written it would have been:

1) Sam gets struck by lighting and that causes him to switch places with Al. However, the lightning bolt never splits to strike Al because Al is not actually there in the first place. Rather than going to his next leap, Sam would leap back to the Project via the lightning bolt, in Al's place.

2) Sam arrives in the Imaging Chamber in his fermi suit with the handlink. Al arrives in the past without the handlink and Tom Jarrett arrives in the Waiting Room in Al's clothes from "Shock Theater." It would have been so much neater this way. Oh, well...
 
Yup, but you've got to remember they would have lost around 15 minutes of this episode (when Sam's trying to get out ofthe imaging chamber) if Sam had got the handlink, and the heart of the episode would be lost! So it's probably for the best that the episode went this way.....

BTW, you can watch the entire episode 'The Leap Back' on Youtube.com (Just do a search for Quantum Leap and have a hunt round the pages), it'll take a while but it's a great episode. Enjoy!:)
 
Tom Jarad leaped into Al when Al leaped into him, in fact if you look closely after the Sam and Donna Kissy kissy scene where they enter the control room hand in hand, Jarad is trailing them from behind in Al's red jacket (this is incorrect because Al was in a brown jacket when the simo leap occured, but they got it right when the retrieved Al which is what matters).
you can also see Jarad when Donna fires the accelorator up and leaps Sam, hes being touched by a string of Ziggy's light as he switches auras. So Jarad had originally leaped into Al as the other leapees would leap into Sam.
 
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I'll have to watch the episode again never noticed Tom. I undersatnd the "why" of how the episode went. It was a Cliff hanger season finale so you needed that scene of Sam and Al looking at eachother. You can chalk it up to sci/fi vodo I guess. That's what I love about QL, I think of as a drama with a sprinkle of sci/fi.
 
I just saw the episode again here, and I saw the guy in the red jacket, but I think that was just a technician, as he was standing next to Donna when Al came out of the Accelerator (or Imaging Chamber, they are both on the same side of the Control Room, it seems). And then he is standing between Donna and Verbeena as they are trying to retrieve Sam. I would think that Jarrett would go back into the Waiting Room when Al came back into the Control Room.

Or I may be way off. Who knows? :nut
 
woot, you guys are back!!

I watched the episode the other day. The way it looks to me is that these scenes might have been intended to go with scenes cut in a lost plot thread where we see interaction with Tom/Al.
 
Ive always tried not to analyse this episode because I knew Id get totally lost! I love it, the absolute best moment of the episode has to be:

"If a pound of butter's all it takes, I got me a dairy farm!" ANd his reaction after. Scott is a genius!

Angie
xxxxx
 
I know kristen (my best friend) and I love to laugh over that line especially after he says it and Al lets the container of sugar he's olding clunk on the table and goes
"Stop that!"
and then Scott's reaction. He is more than a genious, if there is even a word for that.
 
Sam Beckett Fan said:
then why was he touched by a string of Ziggys light when they were retrieving Al?

I'm not so convinced that the electricity was actually touching that guy, who I also believe was just a technician. When Donna initiated the retrieval program, the same technician was standing behind the computer console and not in front of the electricity stream. I'm also assuming the other stream of electricity was leading into the Accelerator Chamber. You have a point that it would have made sense for one end of the stream to hit Tom and the other to lead into the Accelerator Chamber, though. An interesting thing to think about. Good eye, Cyd. :)
 
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QL Nut said:
I'm not so convinced that the electricity was actually touching that guy, who I also believe was just a technician. When Donna initiated the retrieval program, the same technician was standing behind the computer console and not in front of the electricity stream. I'm also assuming the other stream of electricity was leading into the Accelerator Chamber. You have a point that it would have made sense for one end of the stream to hit Tom and the other to lead into the Accelerator Chamber, though. An interesting thing to think about. Good eye, Cyd. :)

Thanx. I like to pay attention to the littler things like that. hehe.
I could swear it was him though, he looked kinda simular to the guy oppsite Al in the diner mirror.