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March 28, 2024, 06:14:39 PM

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New Quantum Leap

Started by Shaky, January 15, 2022, 09:08:52 AM

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Shaky

NBC have ordered a pilot, the original creator is on board as producer and it sounds like Scott Bakula will make some sort of appearance as well.

https://variety.com/2022/tv/news/quantum-leap-sequel-series-nbc-pilot-1235153875/

QuoteIn the new iteration, it's been 30 years since Dr. Sam Beckett stepped into the Quantum Leap accelerator and vanished. Now a new team has been assembled to restart the project in the hopes of understanding the mysteries behind the machine and the man who created it.

I fucking LOVED Quantum Leap, although it did somewhat lose the plot in the final season as it started bending/breaking it's own rules. The controversial final episode I quite like because of it's oddness, even if it was all thrown together at the last minute after the show was cancelled.

Some potential for shitness with this new one but anyone excited for this (assuming it actually makes it to the screen)?

JamesTC

Apparently Bakula hasn't signed on yet, which is worrying. No point in bringing it back without him.

Also worrying that Deborah Pratt is only an executive producer. She was the creative driving force behind some of the decisions that really made the show what it was.

Quote from: Shaky on January 15, 2022, 09:08:52 AMThe controversial final episode I quite like because of it's oddness, even if it was all thrown together at the last minute after the show was cancelled.

I like the final episode until the caption completely ruined it. If anything, the new show can hopefully undo that.

The final episode was not thrown together at last minute, aside from the shitty caption. They still assumed they were going to be renewed and ended the episode on a cliffhanger with Al, in his newly altered present with Beth, leaping to try to find Sam and ending up in a bar in the far future. The scenes were considered to be cut before they were recorded for many years before footage was recovered a couple of years ago to show they had recorded some of the original ending.


It has to be better than the idea they had in the mid-00s which would have seen Bakula cameo in the opening episode having leaped into a first responder on 9/11 and his daughter Sammy Jo would be leaping to try to find him.

mothman

As soon as I heard about it I immediately guessed the plot would be something like this, almost word for word:
QuoteNow a new team has been assembled to restart the project in the hopes of understanding the mysteries behind the machine and the man who created it.
I like the ending. Is it an all time classic one? Not sure. It's obviously a fudge. But it has that gut-punch element. Either let it be, or find some way to bring Bakula back front and centre, or do something leftfield with it. But this... you know what it'll look like. The QL lab set will be gleaming and antiseptic and split-level. There will be a stern tightly wound pretty female scientist who gradually learns to relax. The token black man (he'll probably be bald). And so on.

You know what I'm saying here. It's going to be Seven Days. I kind of liked that show but its limitations were obvious. By trying to stop these big 9/11 type disasters it became this world that felt increasingly distanced from our own. But can QL with its focus on small personal stories ("OK, we can't stop the Kennedy assassination but let's make sure this random guy gets to ask the right girl to the prom so he can later invent the Cabbage Patch Doll") feel any more relevant when there is so much unpleasantness in this world?

Sebastian Cobb

The original one was perfect and both Scott Backula and Dean Stockwell were G's so this can fuck off imo.

Mister Six

Will it still have the fantastic theme tune?

No. So don't bother.

Mister Six

Seriously, though, what's the point? It's a good concept, but the execution was what made the show - and Bakula and Stockwell were key to that execution. Plus the fact that it was an episodic show with the ability to swing from lighthearted silliness to (slightly) more weighty drama.

Will the new producers be able to resist the urge to make it a serialised show that chokes on its own melodrama and worthiness? And stars a 23-year-old, so all the episodes take place no earlier than 1999?

Maybe I'm wrong, but QL was perfect for a particular moment in time. We're no longer in that moment, and I'm not sure if a variation for the "now" is worth pursuing.

Sebastian Cobb

One of my favourite lighthearted ones is Good Morning, Peoria when he's leapt into a radio dj, complete with a cameo from Chubby Checker and his love interest is Patricia Richardson off of Home Improvement.

Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

I forgot about the "within his own lifetime" limitation. Was that just to keep the costume budget down? Did he ever leap to the (then) future, around when the time machine was made?

Mister Six

There was an episode where he and Al switched (was that the finale?) and one where he went back to the civil war era (IIRC) because he'd leapt back into his own grandfather. But those were the exceptions. They could just drop that aspect, I guess.

JamesTC

I was surprised when I rewatched them all on Blu-ray that my favourite episode is now Private Dancer. It really encapsulates the heart of the show. The big flashy episodes (like MIA or The Leap Home) were great, but it was those sorts of episodes that made it.

Quote from: Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth on January 15, 2022, 02:53:32 PMI forgot about the "within his own lifetime" limitation. Was that just to keep the costume budget down? Did he ever leap to the (then) future, around when the time machine was made?

He never leapt into the future, but we did occasionally see the future. In one episode he leaps into a murderer who escapes the facility, while everybody in the future sees him as Sam. He also leapt to the civil war and they used the excuse that he is leaping along his genetic line. The intention for Season 6 was this Sam and Al would leap together, and they would start going into the future as well as the past.

Blumf

Ziggy says there's a 98.7% chance you need to win all 34 missions on Gran Turismo 4.

mothman

Ever since Dean S. died I've been very annoyed I can't find a Ziggy hand link case for my iPhone.

Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

Just glue a bunch of Jelly Babies together.

I really liked the episodes with the 'evil' leaper, I hope they bring that angle back.

JamesTC

Quote from: canted_angle_again on January 15, 2022, 07:40:02 PMI really liked the episodes with the 'evil' leaper, I hope they bring that angle back.

Spoiler alert
Alia escapes her evil hologram and is now presumably leaping alone whilst Zoey was shot by Sam so unless she survived that she can't come back. I guess whoever is controlling the evil quantum leaping could just bring in somebody else.
[close]

Damn, I don't remember any of that lol.

Replies From View

I loved the Evil Leaper trilogy when I first saw it in my early teens but it's all pretty desperate "shaking up the formula" stuff when you revisit it.  Along with many decisions made with season 5.

Replies From View

Quote from: Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth on January 15, 2022, 05:37:30 PMJust glue a bunch of Jelly Babies together.

I think Al refers to it as a useless block of gummi bears at one point, when he's swapped places with Sam, is inhabiting the body of someone in the past yet inexplicably has a dead version of his Ziggy handlink with him that he can't adequately justify to anyone.  An example of an end-of-season cliffhanger not turning into a brilliant start-of-season episode.

Shaky

Quote from: Mister Six on January 15, 2022, 02:55:10 PMThere was an episode where he and Al switched (was that the finale?)

That was the Leap Back in Season 4. Remember thinking it was the last one at the time.

I'm tentatively intrigued to see what they do with this. I liked the world-building in some of the novels - maintaining the mystery while adding a lot of details re the running of Project QL, the effect Sam was having on the present etc. I could go for some of that on the screen. But that finale... very bittersweet that he never returned home, but it wasn't handled in the greatest way.

Surely - SURELY - they'd have to keep the theme tune, though?

Rev+

Quote from: Mister Six on January 15, 2022, 02:18:00 PMWill it still have the fantastic theme tune?

I'll be disappointed if there isn't a right-to-left scroll of QUANTUM LEAP when said theme tune goes into its calmer stage.  What was it, about a quarter of an hour for those opening titles?

Mister Six

One of the few shows whose opening theme tune had a middle eight.

Das Reboot

Quote from: Mister Six on January 16, 2022, 03:45:22 AMOne of the few shows whose opening theme tune had a middle eight.

Oh boy

mothman

Quote from: Das Reboot on January 16, 2022, 10:16:26 AMOh boy
Oh yeah, that element of the show will DEFINITELY be back.

All Surrogate


petril

as long as the preview hype isn't all just misquoting Ziggy about the probability of various things being planned

Replies From View

Quote from: Shaky on January 16, 2022, 01:01:03 AMThat was the Leap Back in Season 4. Remember thinking it was the last one at the time.

It was the first episode of the season and the next episode was already listed in the Radio Times!

Very bad deduction!!

Replies From View

Quote from: Rev+ on January 16, 2022, 01:08:10 AMI'll be disappointed if there isn't a right-to-left scroll of QUANTUM LEAP when said theme tune goes into its calmer stage.  What was it, about a quarter of an hour for those opening titles?

About 45 seconds I think, with an increasingly cut-down monologue explaining the set-up immediately before that.  THAT WERE NOT HIS OWN

Both together it was somewhere in the region of 70-90 seconds I suspect.


Plus the "oh boy" leap recap before that, as well.  Once all this stuff was factored in the average episode had about eight minutes' worth of unique material.

JamesTC

Plus they re-used the cliffhanger of him leaping into the 50s diner as a black man in the south around 20 times.

DrGreggles

Liked QL in the early days, but then I realised that every episode started with Al telling you how the episode would end.

Icehaven

I loved QL so much back in the 90s, and rewatching them on Pick recently for mostly the first time since then* has been great. Not particularly interested in a rehash/new series as I love it as it is, although agree there's so much to do with the idea there's almost endless possibilities. Bad enough Dean Stockwell obviously wouldn't be involved but if Scott Bakula isn't either then that's even more reason to not be bothered, it'll just be a totally different show with the same basic premise.



*For some reason I didn't see the finale at the time and didn't end up watching it until years after.