Welcome back leapers! This week, Sam is faced with women’s liberation and pregnancy in two very estrogen heavy episodes.
1. I like that Sam is always Sam
There’s a moment early in the episode where Sam, despite being a leaper for however many months/years at this point, can’t help himself but talk about The Feminine Mystique as if he’s a learned man of the 1990s and not a 13 year old in the early LBJ Era. He knows that he’s supposed to be Butchie and not Sam, but he can’t help but still comment on it the way that Sam would.
While some might find this frustrating, especially from a clean narrative perspective, I quite like that Sam, despite not being “Sam” in some time (well, except for “The Leap Home” Parts 1 & 2) hasn’t lost sense of who he is or what he’s like. It helps make the show feel like something a little more consistent and thorough than the standard “____ of the week” procedural.
2. Cause of Death: Wedgie Rage
“Runaway” is an episode that telegraphs a lot of its ‘revelations’ in some pretty clunky ways, but makes for a decent episode because of the genuine love that is felt between the family, even when there are serious issues at play. Dad Hank is a ‘man’s man’ who isn’t able to understand why his wife may want something of her own. Mom Emma is trying her best to live a life that satisfies her. These aren’t mutually exclusive options, but both parties flirt with that thought throughout. Sam and Al both jump to these conclusions as well, but the episode does a good job of playing with those expectations and helping move the story forward.
But the real star of the episode is Ami Foster as big sister Alex. Foster, who was fresh off of Punky Brewster at this time, plays a snotty sister with perfection. It also leads to a very un-Sam moment. When Sam is done saving his mom’s life and his parents’ marriage, he still hasn’t leaped. Al brings up ‘The Big Sister’ theory, which seems to be that Alex needs to lay off of Butchie. Sam, to allow for this to happen, dangles Alex over a well until she promises to be nice to him. I know that the show wouldn’t allow Sam to commit manslaughter over wedgies and nicknames, but it sure was a close call.
3. Signs of the Times
Both “Runaway” and “8 1/2 Months” do something that Quantum Leap is often not as deft at, which is allowing Sam to give people hope for the future without being completely iconoclastic. When Sam, as Butchie, is talking to his mom about going back to college, he is able to couch it in a way that doesn’t sound like a time-traveler telling her that. Similarly, in “8 1/2 Months,” Sam is able to not fall into the ‘you must do the right thing and get married’ conversation vis a vis teen pregnancy without making everyone around him look at him crosseyed at his boldness.
This, coupled with what I said from my first point, leads Sam to appear more nuanced and true to himself than he sometimes does.
4. Tin Roof Rusted
Sam leaps into a very pregnant sixteen year old in “8 1/2 Months,” and then show does a few really interesting things with the experience. This is the first time that Sam has leapt into someone with a physical difference that would affect Sam’s ability to function ‘normally.’ The closest was when Sam leapt into a young man that had Down’s Syndrome in “Jimmy,” but even then, Sam wasn’t terribly limited in what he could do, at least that’s how I remember the episode. I think maybe he was clumsy?
Regardless, this episode has Sam leap into a pregnant woman and actually have physical manifestations of pregnancy: hot flashes, cravings, etc. Al spends the whole episode shitting on this concept, and the show never really gives an explanation as to why Sam is able to feel a baby kick. But it also doesn’t need to as, to quote the great Mystery Science Theater 3000 theme song states, “it’s just a show, I should really just relax.”
Continued below5. The best idea Sam ever had
In this episode, when there are no solutions to be found for who will help raise the baby, Sam tells Al that he should talk to the future version of the person he’s leapt into and ask her what she would do, with the benefit of hindsight. This is a brilliant idea that I can’t believe the show never explored before. Sure, there’s probably some sort of paradox at play here, but what the hell, this show is one giant paradox.
The Oh Boy Teaser
Sam leaps into someone dressed in silver sparkles in a fake spaceship. This is promising.
