...but then again I wasn't. I get that the new show is trying to carve its own mythology, and build a team of Project members around Ben. And give him an observer who is his fiancee, and there's some big conspiracy/mystery, and so on and so on.
And I won't say any of those are bad, or that the production staff is doing those bad. It's about what I'd expect out of 2022-2023 television.
But...
It's not 'Quantum Leap'. It's more like 'Timeless' from a few years ago. Anyone remember that? The secret conspiracy, and the 2020-type relationships, and such are more like 'Timeless' than 'Quantum Leap' And I can dig that: I _liked_ 'Timeless'. But if the production crew of this show want to do 'Timeless 2', then _do_ 'Timeleas 2'. Don't call it 'Quantum Leap', and try to weld on the 80s show with Bakula and Stockwell, onto what they want to do.
This 'Quantum Leap' feels like the production staff is clunkily welding on the stuff from the old show, onto their new show. But they'd rather be doing 'Timeless 2', or 'Doctor Who' or all of the above, whatever timey-wimeyness they have in mind.
One thing that takes me out of... Quantum Leapiness every time I watch the new show is that... everything has to be narratively related. Last week Addison finds out Ben has been keeping secrets from him, and Ben keeps secrets from Carly until Addison tells him not to. This week Ben has to decide whether to tell people the truth, while Addison is figuratively sitting on his shoulder telling him to do so after he lied to her.
Say what you will about the original QL, it's fractured non-continuity storytelling meant that each adventure with Sam Beckett, the writers didn't have to weave something from the project's present into Sam's current time and storyline because there wasn't a "present" storyline. I think that freed up the old QL and Bakula to just tell stories. The new QL doesn't have that freedom: it's committing itself and half the screen time to telling the present-day conspiracy/mystery story. Instead of Ben, we get Jenn and Janis in a room talking and drinking.
Yeah, that's 2020 storytelling. And that's fine. If the new QL production story wanted to tell me the story they want to tell me, I'd watch it on its own. But it's like they don't have faith in their own story, so they had to bring in the old Q: its basic concept, its title, and its little "nods to history". At least the history of the original.
What about this week's episode. It was... okay. I liked Francois Chou, one of those "Hey, It's That Guy!" actors. Stan Shaw was good, and Eugene Byrd got to play the rather generic big bad administrator of the episode. Tiffany Smith didn't have much to do, and overall it seems like a generic "hospital story" like you'd see on 'ER'. It just didn't seem to amount to much.
In the old QL, they often focused on little victories, like Ben helping an elderly pool player, and playing the piano while he did. That's part of what I miss: Sam just hanging out and having _fun_. Ben never gets a chance to do that. He immediately lands in the middle of a crisis, goes into crisis mode, and pretty much stays in that mode. The new QL doesn't have the sense of awe and mystery. Yeah, I know Ben and Sam only leap mostly in their own timelines. But even then, Bakula always managed to find the wonder in time travel. Lee, not so much. Maybe that's because half the storyline is taken up with the mystery/conspiracy. It's the half we'd get of Ben just being... Ben.
Or take 'Doctor Who'. The Doctor has _fun_ traveling around in time. Ben, not so much. He's grim, grim, grim.
And an episode without Mason Alexander Park is like a day without sunshine. :)
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?
And I won't say any of those are bad, or that the production staff is doing those bad. It's about what I'd expect out of 2022-2023 television.
But...
It's not 'Quantum Leap'. It's more like 'Timeless' from a few years ago. Anyone remember that? The secret conspiracy, and the 2020-type relationships, and such are more like 'Timeless' than 'Quantum Leap' And I can dig that: I _liked_ 'Timeless'. But if the production crew of this show want to do 'Timeless 2', then _do_ 'Timeleas 2'. Don't call it 'Quantum Leap', and try to weld on the 80s show with Bakula and Stockwell, onto what they want to do.
This 'Quantum Leap' feels like the production staff is clunkily welding on the stuff from the old show, onto their new show. But they'd rather be doing 'Timeless 2', or 'Doctor Who' or all of the above, whatever timey-wimeyness they have in mind.
One thing that takes me out of... Quantum Leapiness every time I watch the new show is that... everything has to be narratively related. Last week Addison finds out Ben has been keeping secrets from him, and Ben keeps secrets from Carly until Addison tells him not to. This week Ben has to decide whether to tell people the truth, while Addison is figuratively sitting on his shoulder telling him to do so after he lied to her.
Say what you will about the original QL, it's fractured non-continuity storytelling meant that each adventure with Sam Beckett, the writers didn't have to weave something from the project's present into Sam's current time and storyline because there wasn't a "present" storyline. I think that freed up the old QL and Bakula to just tell stories. The new QL doesn't have that freedom: it's committing itself and half the screen time to telling the present-day conspiracy/mystery story. Instead of Ben, we get Jenn and Janis in a room talking and drinking.
Yeah, that's 2020 storytelling. And that's fine. If the new QL production story wanted to tell me the story they want to tell me, I'd watch it on its own. But it's like they don't have faith in their own story, so they had to bring in the old Q: its basic concept, its title, and its little "nods to history". At least the history of the original.
What about this week's episode. It was... okay. I liked Francois Chou, one of those "Hey, It's That Guy!" actors. Stan Shaw was good, and Eugene Byrd got to play the rather generic big bad administrator of the episode. Tiffany Smith didn't have much to do, and overall it seems like a generic "hospital story" like you'd see on 'ER'. It just didn't seem to amount to much.
In the old QL, they often focused on little victories, like Ben helping an elderly pool player, and playing the piano while he did. That's part of what I miss: Sam just hanging out and having _fun_. Ben never gets a chance to do that. He immediately lands in the middle of a crisis, goes into crisis mode, and pretty much stays in that mode. The new QL doesn't have the sense of awe and mystery. Yeah, I know Ben and Sam only leap mostly in their own timelines. But even then, Bakula always managed to find the wonder in time travel. Lee, not so much. Maybe that's because half the storyline is taken up with the mystery/conspiracy. It's the half we'd get of Ben just being... Ben.
Or take 'Doctor Who'. The Doctor has _fun_ traveling around in time. Ben, not so much. He's grim, grim, grim.
And an episode without Mason Alexander Park is like a day without sunshine. :)
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?