Quantum Leap S3 E07–09

3–7 Black On White On Fire

I have some vague childhood memory of this one. We start with Sam about to kiss a lady and then suddenly some street toughs are on them and Sam is doing kung-fu kicks to fight them off! They stop fighting, start arguing. Turns out Sam is a black guy and these other black guys object to the relationship he’s having with the white girl and OK, it’s another episode where QL solves racism.

We’re in Watts, in 1965 and Sam is going to stop the riots maybe? Sam drives the girl home and big shock, her dad, the LAPD dude, is not super happy with his daughter dating a black dude and tells her to stay out of that damn ghetto because “coloreds” are beating on whites right now and then starts in about Malcolm X and the brothers. His black housekeeper watches all this shit with a look on her face that suggests perhaps she doesn’t think dad is super cool.

When Al gets there they go through the usual routine.

Sam: I don’t like this! What am I hear to do?

Al: We don’t know yet.

Sam: Do you know anything??

Al: Here is a bunch of info you figured out for yourself like your name and what country you’re in and what the weather is. Ziggy is having trouble with the rest.

Nice one. One thing Al knows is that the riots are about to start. Sam has no memory of this. He’s not hear to stop the riots because, of course. The only stuff he’s ever there to change is weird minuscule points of history, that one might even say were totally insignificant. Like oh hey, you have to keep these two together so you she can be a doctor. The doctor that cures cancer? No, just a doctor. OK, cool.

Sam’s buddies are throwing a party, they’re not too concerned about whatever riots are going down. They’re busy trying to set Sam up with a black girl and to be fair the girl they set Sam up with is super hot.

They do a good job of making it seem like a sweltering 60’s summer, sweat on clothes and foreheads, low ceilings, Motown blaring everywhere. The party is quickly over because Sam’s brothers and buddies are getting militant about stopping the cops beating on black folks. Fair enough. Sam is trying to stop them but they don’t want to to be stopped which, again, fair enough. At least, don’t worry, police brutality against minorities? That’s all changed in our modern day world and never happens now. Oh, wait.

In an unwise move, Sam’s white gf shows up in Watts and is hear to help. I mean, on one hand, sure she loves her bf and this is a big night, but on the other hand, Jesus Christ! Lady you gon die. The riots go on all night and day and there’s a lot of talk about how Sam needs to keep working to be a doctor. White gf is helping treat the injured, and they decide, hey why don’t we go down to the clinic and help people that way. Not a bad idea.

The riots go and Sam tries to keep the peace and help people and there’s standoffs with militant black dudes and the whole thing is a little weird because it’s hard not to feel like Sam is meant to be the sensible white savior here while the black guys are all going crazy. But then Sam hasn’t exactly has the same life experience as these guys so maybe he needs to take a step back from sermonizing?

One dude kidnaps white gf and holds her hostage, saying he’s going to kill her if one more black person gets killed. Al helps Sam track white gf down. With the help of LAPD dad, Sam says he can talk his brother down from this whole killing the girl plan. The police tell the brother to step towards the window which, doesn’t seem like a super smart idea dude. Sam goes in and talks his brother down. I mean there’s a little tension but the brother was never going to blow away the white lady with a shotgun, don’t think that’s going to air on network TV.

But then the episode does redeem itself with a surprisingly brutal (for QL) ending where the brother, now having given up both the girl and the gun, gets shot dead right away with Sam and the girl crying. Yikes Again, this could only happen in the 60’s, the cops would never shoot an unarmed black guy these days.

Al tells Sam, this is sad, but now the dude Sam is in will become a doctor and him and the white gf will stay in Watts and make it a better place. So uh, silver lining?

3–8 The Great Spontini

Sam is in a coffin with swords being slid towards him! He is sweating a whole lot. He’s a magician; The Great Spontini! Now he has to saw a little girl in half! I’m shocked he’s able to do anything covered in this much sweat. He manages to struggle through the rest of the set with guidance from the girl.

In the dressing room, Al shows up, suggesting that he had to go next door and spy on the women changing because his wife has been away for a couple of weeks and he has needs. He seems to be suggesting that he jerked off in the imaging chamber while watching the women change. OK, sure. Just then, one of the women Al violated shows up and starts kissing Sam and she’s really mad and wants to bone Sam in order to help him forget his old gf. Al is all for this and I’m pretty sure he wants to watch his best friend fuck?

None of that can happen anyway as Sam’s ex-wife Maggie shows up and wants to take their daughter (same kid from the act) away. Mom left three years ago but now she’s back and wants a divorce. Sam immediately protests and tries to talk her around even though, why would he? She walked out on him and his kid three years ago. Why not say adios for good? But no, Sam projects that Spontini never stopped loving the ex and his mission should be to get them back together. Based on nothing apart from hey kids, divorce is bad!

At the hearing, her lawyer is like, the mother should get sole custody of the daughter. Which sure, if I was the judge and saw this, pretty sure I’d be like uh, give full custody to the woman who walked out three years ago, has not been in contact even once, and literally showed up out of nowhere yesterday? Hard pass lady. But because Spontini lives in a trailer he’s shit out of luck. Never mind his 3 years of solo parenting. Sure.

Al rails against family court where “women have all the power” and that sounds insane, but this judge, equally insane. Hilariously the judge also says Sam will have his visitation rights limited to his ex-wife’s home. The same ex-wife who walked out three years ago. I guess they don’t want to at all involve the kid in asking her opinion here or give Sam/Dad any credit for his three years of solo parenting. Cool, cool.

The kid doesn’t take it well and says she’s going to run away from her new home. Sam is working on a new trick which is apparently deadly, but if he pulls it off he’ll win back custody, which yup, that checks out. Al says he has to pull it off though, because if he doesn’t the kid ends up on the street, stealing, like some Dickensian orphan.

Sam makes his pitch to the mom, slapping on the Aqua Velva and a roll neck sweater and helping her soak her hand in butter when she burns it (??) and it’s working!? He makes out with the mom, she wants him back! But he has to drop the magic show, because mom really fucking hates the magic show. Sam is not into that and they go back to being adversarial.

The mean new guy/lawyer shows up and is comically evil, declaring to the daughter how it’s going to be a cold day in hell before she sees her dad again so get used to this house. Nice! That’s a reasonable way to act! The mom tries to be nicer, like hey things will all be fine, don’t worry about your dad, you’re on my team now. The kid is not into this and immediately runs away from home to do the super dangerous trick (sorry Gob, illusion) that will make Spontini a huge star, but actually Al says, it will kill her!

Sam is tied up in court with the rascally evil lawyer so he can’t help. Al butts in and starts screaming at Sam that the kid is going to die in 14 minutes so fuck this court shit! Sam runs out right away (which would no doubt put him in contempt and have him lose the case, never mind the part about him screaming at an invisible man) jumps in his car and hightails it to the magic workshop where the kid is about to get dead.

Some giant object is ready to fall and crush the daughter, but Sam extricates her in the nick of time. Back in court the lawyer creep is all like this man should be charged with child endangerment because she nearly died! I mean, she nearly died technically under the wife’s custody. Which means that she was fine for three years, but in the one day you guys have been in control she escaped your supervision and would for sure be dead if not for the dad. but OK sure.

This last accusation is one too many for the mom and she breaks up AND fires the lawyer guy and they make a happy family again in the magic world. Not super sure I’d feel she was a reliable party moving forwards, based off her previous behavior here, but whatever, case dismissed! Huzzah!

3–9 Rebel Without A Clue

This has to be the most dangerous place for whoever is controlling the leaps to dump Sam. Speeding down a winding coastal road on a huge motorbike. Thanks! Sam crashes at high speed almost right away, and is dead. No, wait, he’s totally fine and not dead, although that would have served the leap controller right.

It’s 1958 and Sam is part of a biker gang who helpfully dress like the Brando cliche, less you don’t get it. One of the guys is super mad Sam crashed and starts punching him for some reason. I guess the guy is subtly called Mad Dog so fair enough he’s not the most reasonable chap. The head biker’s gf helps Sam up but oh no, Mad Dog cuts Sam’s fuel line. Thanks a lot Mad Dog! Christ, what an asshole.

Sam has only been with the gang a week and they don’t seem to like him a lot. Mad Dog says he’ll kill Sam if he messes with him again. It’s a little confusing as the ‘messing with him’ part seems to be Sam crashing his bike then defending himself when Mad Dog started punching him? OK, dude.

Al helps Sam ride the bike because of course he knows everything about bikes because his first car was a Harley. He immediately segues into how it’s impossible to fuck on a bike which is the one drawback. Yeah. That’s the drawback.

Sam is apparently the clown of the gang, which, I’m not sure where that is recorded in the historical notes Ziggy sees, but sure. After running through the controls in about three seconds Al heads off. What else does he have to do? Isn’t this his full time job? Wouldn’t he want to spend every single second in the past, since it’s goddam time travel? Even if he didn’t give a shit about viewing the literal past, shouldn’t he be morally obligated to there for like 90% of the time to help his friend not die? Whatever, Sam is on his own riding to Ernie’s diner where the bikers are harassing everyone and doing biker things. The girl though, is sat alone, reading On The Road, because of course she’s reading that book.

Hey the gang leader is Diedrich Bader! He’s so young and clean shaven and good looking. I wonder if his dream is still, two chicks at the same time man. He’s rambling on and on to his gf about how life was hard in the Korean war while Sam explains Kerouac’s metaphors. Right Bader, that’s totally related to Sam explaining what a metaphor is.

The old black guy who owns the diner talks about how his son is coming home soon, even though the war has been done for five years. Errr. Seems like the son is dead, dude. Mad Dog discovers the pictures Sam’s biker drew of Kerouac girl and seems to hope this will lead to Sam being beaten up but it doesn’t. Jeez this MD guy really has a problem. I think he’s more like insane rabies dog. MD then says Sam has to draw a picture of him and of course as soon as MD looks at it, wants to fight Sam again. Jesus fucking Christ dude, maybe take a valium or something. You asked for a caricature of yourself then got mad when he did it, but you were about to be super mad when he didn’t want to do it? Christ. What. An. Asshole.

Al shows up, and tells Sam, bad new, Kerouac girl is found stabbed to death in the next 24 hours! The bikers keep acting like jerks, stuffing cheeseburgers into their mouths so Sam follows KG to the beach. She goes on about how the bikers aren’t great, but so what, they’re the mad ones, living life on the edge, and that’s what she wants from life. I mean, it does sound more fun than her life in Wichita. They’ve talked for at the most, two mins before the bikers show up. Which is pretty quick given that they were all just starting in on beer and cheeseburgers at the diner and here they all are. But anyway, they’re hitting the road. These bikers are really in a rush.

Back at the diner the old dude helps Sam repair his bike. Oh damn, in the shed the old man has a Vincent Blackshadow! I have no idea what the is but it sure looks pretty. It’s his son’s, and he’s keeping it polished, waiting on him coming back from the war. He starts reading Sam some fake news about how some guys are still alive and well in Korea and no doubt his son is going to be back soon. Al is like, nope. He dead. They’ll send his remains back in a couple of years. Wow, bummer Al.

At the beach, Bader is slapping around KG, encouraged by MD and the rest of the goons. Just in time, Sam shows up and she hops on the back and they cheese it. Bike chase! No, wait, no bike chase, the bikers are all too drunk to give good pursuit. Back at the one diner, old man barges out with a shotgun yelling that the kid stole his son’s bike! The bikers buy it and ride out after Sam and KG. But the plan falls apart when all of two minutes later, KG is like, nah, I changed my mind maybe he won’t rape and murder me, I’m getting back with Bader. Upstairs in the diner where the old man lives, Sam and KG find a bunch of Christmas presents that the old man had saved for his son. It’s a sad little scene.

Sam deduces that — of course — KG had problems with her dad, which has led her into a string of abusive relationships, and maybe one of Sam’s doctorates is in psychology? After she goes to sleep, Al starts talking about how he too loved On The Road. In fact, it changed his life! The 50’s were conformist and materialistic and Sam wouldn’t remember that — On The Road rebelled against all of that. I mean, the 50’s sound a lot like the 80’s. Sam appears to not have ever heard of Kerouac or understand him at all. Nerd! Al builds off his love, dropping in that as a young cadet, he partied with Jack Kerouac after a reading. He was magnetic and awesome and oh yeah, he’s just 10 miles up the road right now, at his writing cabin in Big Sur. Way to not dial it back QL.

Sam drives up there, banging on his door, and trying to act cool like, hey man, I’m just another guy on the road. This guy playing Kerouac. Not super convincing. Might have been better to just leave it at Al’s story about how charismatic he was. He starts ranting about life on the road and truck stops and diners and jazz and bebop mannnn, like he’s at a horrible open mic. Kerouac isn’t stoked about having to tell KG not to stay on the road with bikers since that sort of goes against his whole world view and all. Sam is his usual sad sack self, totally unimpressed by Kerouac and not understanding that maybe Kerouac doesn’t think KG should go back to suburbia and get a job at the grocery store.

At the diner, uh oh, the gang is back. They bash up Sam a bit then MD takes the Blackshadow for a joyride, turning donuts on it as old man almost has a heart attack. Sam does his karate kick on MD and knocks him right out. But it’s not over yet. Bader comes in swinging. He knows Kung-Fu too! And was in the marines! And is the leader of a tough biker gang! But no worries, Sam the nerdy scientist, soon knocks him out too. KG still refuses to go home, and Al says, well, she just disappears. Great, thanks. You have info on what role Sam plays in this biker gang but not on the fate of a human being.

Sam has the idea, hey, why not stay here and live the dream of being a waitress in a diner in the middle of fucking nowhere. Great idea Sam! But no, she wants to see the world she’s not going to get stuck in this dump. But just like that, in walks Jack Kerouac and persuades her that hey, maybe you don’t gotta be on the road nonstop with the bam and boom and the run and hide you feeeeel me? Based off those 30 seconds of wisdom she changes her entire life philosophy and is like, OK sure. I’ll work in a diner for the rest of my days.

I mean on the one hand, it’s a diner that Kerouac is probably going to pop into on the regular, so maybe it’s a good resource to have as a writer. On the other hand it’s a weirdly conservative resolution, having her settle for being a waitress instead of a life of excitement. Although Al is like, hey also, she becomes a writer, yada yada, her life is just fine. OK then.