Nerfect Drifty

Yeah that's true, but Ian is pretty busy doing a lot of computery stuff with Ziggy. Ian is sort of like Gooshie from the original show, but presumably without bad breath. This episode was okay. Good leap story, decent service in present day. I'm glad they are finally bring some real progress to the present day story arc. I just hope they get some closure on it instead of a cliffhanger. But I am about 99% sure there will be a cliffhanger.

They showed it, twice I think. First at the beginning of the episode and later it showed both him and Martinez side by side in a mirror in the operating room. I liked that they made some real progress on the story arc. Usually they spend about 2 minutes and drop some vague clue. First off, forget about the ethics of that choice. Murdering a United States Marine with a good service record is going to land at least one person in prison or possibly death row. Secondly, I'm not sure that would do any good. Martinez seems to be taking orders from the military, and he just happened to be the guy who got this particular assignment. Kill him, and someone else steps in.

Wasn't all the pre-trial work done already? He was about to take a deal. Remember that episode from the original series where Sam leaped into the woman who had just been raped? In less than a week is the crime, arrest, trial, and verdict. That one was really nuts.

It's nice to see that they have improved the imaging chamber technology so that they can switch holographic observers around. I remember one episode of the original series, Al had important stuff to do in the present (hunt down and recapture the visitor who had escaped the waiting room) so Gooshie had to sub in as observer. Only making the brain wave connection wasn't easy so he kept flickering in and out. Seems like maybe they should have people taking shifts doing the observer thing. There's no reason Addison needs to be on it full time.

Your math confuses me. Are you thinking that this version takes place in the same year as the original (1999)? It's not; it is in 2022/2023. Martinez in this episode is older. He says to Ben "you met a younger version of me".

Project Quantum Leap is, of course, a military project. That's why a Navy admiral with a long and decorated career is running it. In 2023, the technology is still imperfect, but in whatever time Martinez and Ian leaped from, it has been refined, and Admiral Williams (AKA Magic) has lost control of the project. Likely that was not an amicable change. Also, does anybody find it weird that, for a military project, everyone is referring to the guy in charge by a nickname? Magic's real name is Herbert. He got the nickname back in Vietnam because he had a remarkable streak of luck saving the lives of whatever squad he was with. Magic worked closely with Sam's brother Tom back in his youth; it would be cool to have Tom show up. I also really want to see some of the weird flickering clothing they had in the original show, such as Tina's earrings. It'd love to see Ian wearing those things, and someone else make a comment on the weird retro fashion choice.

I wish I could do the same. Unfortunately I have compulsions and am actually pretty curious to see if the story arc goes anywhere before the series is abruptly cancelled and it ends on an unresolved cliffhanger.

In the original show, they could take whomever they want in the imaging chamber and that person could see and hear everything, but the leaper would not be able to see those others unless Al were making physical contact, and would normally not be able to hear anything either unless the technicians at QL did something special that consumed a lot of power and which they did once. That was kind of a dumb part though. Ian had talked about Addison filling some special role by "having skin in the game". But dragging another person into the imaging chamber to watch the live version of a game which was already available in pre-recorded form didn't involve any risk or sacrifice by Addison, and didn't give anything particularly special to Ian. I guess it would provide a cool semi-interactive holographic 3-D perspective which would be kinda cool.

He wouldn't be wearing a bra because he had boobs and other lady parts. He would be wearing a bra because he would be wearing all the same clothing as the person he leaped into. He'd be wearing the thing even though he doesn't actually need it. In the original show, it was established that Sam kept his regular physical shape but everyone saw an illusion of the host. This was shown definitively in a season 5 episode where he leaped into a man with no legs. In one scene, he got up and walked, to the surprise of a hostile nurse in the VA hospital. The nurse, and the mirror image, simply saw a double amputee floating in mid air. I don't know if they've actually abandoned that idea though. With this iteration, they seem to be making everything up as they go along.

Caitlin Bassett definitely saved craft services some money that day with all the scenery she was chewing. I liked this episode. I thought seeing Ben in 6 different characters, while at the same time having a chance to see those people normally, was a lot of fun. I'm glad that they were able to come up with a plausible way for Ben to accidentally trigger the explosion the one time he was in the villain, so that it didn't become quickly obvious.

Martinez and Ian, during their respective leaps, were both from the future where it was implied that they had control over the leaps. At least it was in Ian's case, since there seemed to be a specific targeted objective with the specific time and date. Seems like a better target could have been chosen than some random bartender with no connection to the project or the U.S. government though. It sounded like Martinez was not evil, but was rather a competitor. I do like this time travel trope of "my past is your future". You can never really determine cause and effect when you're dealing with people who don't experience time in a linear fashion.

I need to watch again though. I'm wondering when Martinez actually leaped in. Was he there before Ben got there? Or did Ben convincing the Captain to follow the distress call change history and bring Martinez in? There was that pause where Ben had trouble getting the guy on the radio. Was that the point that Martinez leaped in?

Was this an actually good episode? Action. Suspense. Real consequences (dozens dead, possible war). Less Ian. Less Jen. Less general boring present-day characters. I guarantee that the last episode to air will end with a permanently unresolved cliffhanger. I was wondering about that. I get that command structure and obeying orders is important in the military. But it seemed really odd that one stubborn or possibly insane commanding officer could have the potential to do something so reckless and nobody else would have no ability to stop it.

I got hung up on the A story--the leap--on this one, because it was all about money. Literally $30,000 would have fixed all their problems. Restaurant doesn't burn down, family stays together. The leap was in 2009. It took me 30 seconds to look this up https://www.lottery.net/powerball/numbers/2009 If only Ben had some sort of ally in 2023 who could provide this information. There was one episode of the original series, in the last season, where Sam was trying to save his host from some bookies by placing a bet on a horse race in 1958. He asked Al for the winner of the race, but Ziggy refused to provide that information, because Sam had said that Ziggy could not provide that sort of information. Okay, decent excuse. But I didn't need a parallel hybrid supercomputer to find that information and neither would Addison. She could literally look up the information on her cell phone without even leaving the imaging chamber. Also, the present day B-story was boring as heck. All the present day B-stories are. They're intentionally slow paced. I feel like I'm watching Lost, and the writers are so in love with their own mysteries that they need to drag this out. Also I have an incredibly strong feeling that they aren't going to resolve anything before the series gets cancelled.