bamlou

Sam left it there after catching up to Pete. She used Jay’s car to get to Laura’s place and back to the mansion. Zombie Jay wouldn’t be able to drive Bela’s car back. Pete stayed with his family. Ah yes, of course! Forgot they took off in Jay’s car and ditched Bela’s. Thanks for explaining.

This was such an enjoyable episode! But I seemed to have missed something - why was Bela’s car left at a rest stop in New Jersey? (And then how did Sam, Jay, and Pete get home?)

I was surprised that Janine was able to get her job back at Abbott so easily. I thought Ava had already hired her replacement? And Ava is no fan of hers either, so it would have helped if they’d explained the plot convenience here better. I agree with those who weren’t fans of how this played out in order for Janine to return. I liked seeing her blossom at the District and earn respect and get recognition and praise from her colleagues there that is sometimes met with an eyeroll by the Abbott staff. So I wish they’d found a different way for her to find her way back. But if this was how she comes back (and I am happy about that) then I can still go with it. Even if predictable, it hit the right emotional beats for me, and they’ve been planting the seeds for a while that she’s been feeling conflicted about staying on at the District. So for what it is, it works.

Did I I hear right that the consulate flew the Bulgarian victim back to NY so that she could be interviewed by Olivia? And that the victim hopped on that plane at a moment’s notice? Seemed like a stretch even for this show, but maybe I misheard, or I’m underestimating how cooperative the consulate would be to help. I was also surprised the school only expelled the 3 guys from the robotics dept. - the press conference didn’t mention any consequences for the other student from the genetics dept. who was testing/verifying the DNA swabs, and he was the one directly involving the school by using its equipment on school property.

Yeah, I felt that this audience was willing to embrace his comedy for the most part, but it was his own hesitation and awkwardness with some of the delivery during the monologue that stopped him short of getting the belly laughs he was expecting. And then calling it out added to it feeling clunky, and maybe it made the audience less sure of how to react and laugh after. They seemed on board to have a good time, but even Update got a more tepid response to jokes I thought would land better. I feel too that there was a missed opportunity to more openly address what happened with his hiring/firing, rather than just a brief mention and "don't Google it" which made it more the elephant in the room. I was wanting some more direct jokes about the situation, or for him to talk about what he's been up to since then, or, if he and Bowen are actually cool with each other (like their hug at the goodnights suggests), perhaps Bowen could have joined briefly during the monologue to poke fun at how they were hired together. That might have shown some goodwill and put skeptics more at ease to laugh, given more of an introduction to those unfamiliar with him, and could have set a better, more relaxed tone for the rest of the night. It was just an okay show for me. The sketches were a little half baked, and that cold opening dragged - knowing that this ep would be attracting non-regulars checking it out, it's too bad they didn't open with something more accessible. If not for all the hype around Shane's hosting, this would probably be a very 'mid' episode, but the expectations were high, so there's more scrutiny and it makes this miss maybe land harder.

Got it, thanks. So I guess it's along the same series of coincidences/convenient plotting that similarly led the guy on the train who got Maddie's note to also happen to be a drug dealer who also happened to have a connection to George and also happened to sit right behind them the whole train ride lol. With stronger writing I can often accept these types conveniences (or they're masked better) to enjoy the ride, but there were some leaps along the way to wrapping up this story that were harder to ignore.

YES! I had the same questions. They seemed to have completely ignored that this is how the story started, which was actually the more intriguing part of the case for how warped it was and the loose threads they couldn't figure out. Maybe it was case closed when they found that warehouse of the dolls in the first episode? But it seemed like they hit a dead end as to who the was running the larger business and only caught the underlings/customers. And maybe I'm remembering this wrong, but I thought the guy who had originally kidnapped her was some doll obsessive who wanted to have the real Maddie. I must have missed when she also somehow got entangled in this trafficking ring.

Yeah, I'm glad their reaction was more sympathetic than glib. I haven't been a fan of how they re-wrote the family's dynamic with Bev to be so mean-spirited to go for easy jokes, so this was an unexpected more caring response from them, especially when their lazy solution to the credit card fraud earlier in the ep was to take advantage of Bev's senility and pin the charges on her.

These final two episodes delivered better as the action-adventure show that this reboot has chosen to be, so on that grading curve I found the finale to be mostly satisfying in tying up the stories for the season, particularly that second hour. It helped too that they gave total fanservice bringing back that original score for a scene, plus the buggy handlink which I was ragging on about just last episode! I was holding my breath that we might get an imaging chamber door effect too (which I also sorely miss) since Janice was using older tech, but oh well. It all just reminded me that it's those small touches that help add some fun and character which often feel missing from the show. Especially that score, which helps convey so much emotion and humanity to a scene, I wish they'd use it more. But again, the human drama is second to the ticking clock action plots. We barely got to know anyone in either leap, since they were just backdrop to this whole Hannah-Jeffery story, which didn't fully add up to me. How is it that Hannah was able to create a formula that's a supposed way to bring Ben back home when she has no reference for any of PQL's work, especially since the project doesn't exist yet in her timeline? And I can't even begin to wrap my head around how "time is a river/they need a fixed point in the present or some such" somehow equates to "we need to swap Ben with someone else" as the solution. I was with Beth when she's like "I don't understand any of this, but it sounds bad". I was glad though when Hannah stopped Ben from telling her about future tips that would help her life out. He's been so brash willing to do anything for her without considering the consequences of his actions (to both the timeline and in accomplishing what needs fixing in some leaps) that it was getting a little frustrating. You'd think there'd be more oversight on the project using time travel for their employees' own personal gain (and yes, I know the original show kinda walked that back with Al and Beth, but still, it's worth calling out and they gloss over it). It also kinda made me see Jeffery's side and maybe that he ...had a point? Not with using time travel to become all powerful, but his anger towards Ben I could kinda sympathize with, especially when Ben has had such tunnel vision with Hannah. The cliffhanger, I'm feeling neutral about. But if having two leapers could mean more time spent on the leap and less at HQ, then I'm for it.

Thought this was a good start to the season! I just caught up with this show recently, and watching season 2 on a binge I could feel the padding that expanded season had - the writing here felt much tighter with mostly all the characters tying into the alien shenanigans in some way. As much as I dislike this being a shorter season, hopefully that means we'll get stronger, more focused storytelling. I'm glad that Asta wasn't kept in the dark about the new sherrif for too long. Thankfully they've already moved it along so that she and Harry can use it to their advantage. It can be so frustrating when you just want characters to say the thing that will explain what's going on but they choose not to (same thing with not telling Max the truth about the alien tracker, ugh the avoidable conflict!). But I did like the ep's justification that Harry's alien species/ his personality is that he knows best and he's not used to working with others. Plus the reminder that he's emotionally equivalent to a child in how he communicates. And it led to that sweet and funny scene at the end of Harry showing some growth and vulnerability in opening up to Asta. It was also interesting how they incorporated owls being a bad omen to some indigenous communities. I'd only learned about that watching Reservation Dogs, so that was my first thought when the owl showed up and I liked how they addressed that in the diner scene.

Agreed completely with this. I'll add to this too that for me it's also lacking a lot of those small quirky sci-fi/tech touches within the leap which were always part of the fun of this concept - finding neat ways to show the hologram effects, the buggy handlink, determining or disagreeing with Ziggy what wrong needs to be put right, trying to have a conversation with a hologram no one can see, a reflection or mirrorshot of who Ben's leapt into ...they don't consistently lean into these things and when they do they often feel like afterthoughts. Perhaps there's just no time for these smaller moments since they have to barrel through the leap story and also service the present day drama at HQ. And again this episode, they didn't consult with Ziggy on what Ben's purpose was for this leap. Addison gave the run-down that Connie went from big New York journalist to small town reporter, and that was somehow enough for them to conclude that they had to help Connie get her back on top. Even though there was nothing to suggest at the time that she didn't live a good life this way. Ben didn't even question the mysterious phone call he got as possibily the reason why he was there. I'm not opposed to them going off of hunches, but it would make more sense (and make things more interesting) if they at least ran these hunches by Ziggy to find out the probability, and possibly get some pushback on these hunches - and that would have served this episode well too since the purpose of the leap ended up being bigger than just Connie. Ziggy is supposed to be this supercomputer and should be used for more than just internet research, and even there they somehow missed that Robbie gets "killed" in a car bombing (plus they never questioned if maybe *that* was who Ben was there to save?). Nitpicking aside, I did like this leap story, enjoyed the guest performances, and I do want to like this reboot and can respect them wanting to forge a different path than the original. But a lot of their creative choices just aren't making as strong or as interesting of a show for me, and I was hoping that at this point in the show's run they'd have a better handle on what does and doesn't work.

This finale hit a level of cheese, rushed writing, and production constraints to a point that I just had to go with it and get some enjoyment out of how baffling they chose to wrap up plotlines. It would be fascinating to hear the behind the scenes of what went wrong on this season because even with a reduced episode order and actor availability, they still found ways to write themselves into new confusing corners and ignore established plot from the past seasons which didn't help. You could feel the budget/actor avail/writing limitations when entire scenes were being explained through exposition and characters were missing - all this buildup to 1965 and Eve's rescue and heroic sacrifice in 1965 happens offscreen, and then Riley is "just in the backseat of the car" unconscious lol. My favourite was the beat they spent on Scott and Lucas deciding to go and save Petra, and then two seconds later with no scene or explanation, "okay, saved her!" The show's time travel and internal logic just made no sense by the end, and everyone here is making great and amusing points about it all. Some other questions I still have: So, there ended up being no connection between James's time travel efforts that caused the sink holes and this completely separate military time travel project of Maya's that's also conveniently operating in 10,000 BC? It was just pure coincidence that Eve time traveled using James's device back to 1965 where Maya's military base operations also happened to be located? Scott's paper/knowledge about that prehistoric plant was important because...? They completely dropped that. Scott also seemed to have no memory of Ty visiting him in 2021 before falling into the sinkhole. So is this a multiverse time travel situation? Yet at the same time Eve can leave a box of letters under a tree and expect it to be there in 2021. The show wanted its time travel to work both ways. The aurora to 2021 took Ty back to before the sinkhole in LA happened, yet in the finale (given that Scott's fiancée thought he was dead) it's taking everyone back to 2021 after the sinkhole appeared? How the aurora decides this makes sense only for the convenience of the plot. But at least this avoids there being a second "pre-sinkhole" version of each character being present at the same time (I still squint at how they just ignored this when Ty went to 2021 earlier this season). And I'm still confused at what point Levi was recruited by Maya (or was he a double agent this entire time?). That came out of nowhere to me. No doubt everyone involved didn't intend to make such a mess of it, but this was a rough way to end the show. Still, it was at times a fun and fascinating mess to watch.

This is why I feel conflicted about how this 'teaching moment' was inserted into the episode. On the one hand, I look back on my TV childhood and these preachy-type scenes probably informed my thinking in a positive way more than I realize, even though I smirk when I watch those same old TV shows today. And on the other, the execution and dialogue could have been way less heavy-handed, even just by having another scene maybe where the sister voices her hesitations about Dean before coming around, so it didn't feel so clunky happening all at once. Agreed with everyone too about the plotholes and underwriting with this leap, though I did like the setup and the dynamic between the sisters. Ziggy also felt like a non-factor helping out. What happened to Ziggy's theories about what Ben has to do to leap? I feel like recently they've been going off of Ben or Addison's hunches moreso to drive things, which makes the leaps seem a little more generic to me.

Ditto. This episode felt especially sloppy to me. The "sitting in a tree" song mentioned above seemed out of place, the way of speaking, and the makeup/hairstyles all felt too modern and took me out of it. It also seemed contradictory that Ian was able to give information about the townspeople's deaths when Jenn hadn't returned yet with the library records. But I did like that in the absence of Ziggy, Ian gained info by eavesdroping on the townspeople. And I know they've been pretty loose all along with Ben talking to himself in front of others, but it seemed especially egregious/not the smartest when he's doing it during the trial where he's being accused of witchcraft (or at least have the townspeople notice and call it out!). I'm trying really hard still to like this reboot, and have accepted/been worn down now that they're going for a more action-adventure angle than the more human drama of the original, and I try not to compare. But the writing should still put the effort in to make me care about the people in the leap so that the stakes matter, and this was pretty bare bones. We kinda learn about the girls on trial but it's mostly in service to moving the plot along. And I would have liked to have gotten at least some nuance from the magestrate to humanize him more or have more of an attempt by Ben to reason with him. But both him and the townspeople just came off as cartoon villains to root against and nothing more. As with many of the episodes, it all seemed so hasty. I wish they took at least one or two beats to let the plot/scenes breathe a little. For me, it would help even if they removed the music constantly underscoring every. single. scene.

Totally agree that Ian would have been the better choice for hologram. The show needs some more levity, and it would be interesting to see Ian bring that energy to the scenes with Ben - the tone of these first two episodes have been very intense, and lacks the warmth and humanity (for lack of a better word) of the original series. I wish too that they would spend more time in the past, and not get bogged down with this mystery of Al's daughter - the leap is where the magic of this concept is, and feels like they're kinda missing the mark by not developing the story more there or the chemistry between Ben and Addison. I get that this version is trying to do something different with a more modern take, but with the faster pace and focus on Al's daughter and all these secrets the team is tracking down, it's kinda coming off like any other generic sci-fi or high-concept drama with a mystery/conspiracy twist, and not fully leaning yet into what makes Quantum Leap feel more special. Hopefully future episodes will also have more everyday stories and people - everything so far has felt very high stakes and, again, intense. And I still miss seeing a proper / more visual leap effect.