The Quantum Leap Revival Was a Love Letter to the Original

TV Rewind: Up to Its Final Episode, the New Quantum Leap Was a Love Letter to the Original Series

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The recently finished Quantum Leap revival at NBC may have started a bit slow, but by its second season it grew into an incredibly fun and compelling adventure series. But much like the early 1980s series that inspired it, it was never quite a ratings smash—and the network wrapped the series after two seasons.

30 years after it first ended, the original Quantum Leap remains a cult favorite that continues to resonate with fans. A modest hit after premiering in 1989 and running through the early 1990s, it followed the journey of scientist Dr. Sam Beckett (Scott Bakula) as he bounced through the past jumping into people’s lives, setting right things that had gone wrong, essentially making the world a better place one choice at a time.

More than anything else today, the original Quantum Leap might best be known for its abrupt series finale, which has become one of the most iconic endings in sci-fi TV history. The series ended after five seasons, but the creators were hopeful it would continue for a sixth—and wrote a finale that kept the door open for more adventures and higher stakes. The story found Sam learning how to control his leaps, and jumping back into the life of his close friend Al to reunite him with the lost love of his life. After setting things right, fans were met with a title card that simply read: “Sam Becket never returned home.” Yes, the title card ending was so rushed, they even spelled “Beckett” wrong.

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The wording also left the ending open to interpretation, as Sam had seemingly learned to control his leaps (meaning, theoretically, he could’ve chosen to leap home at any time). If he never returned home, it stands to reason Sam truly saw the importance of his mission, and chose to stay out there leaping, making the future a better place, one small change at a time.

With the 2022 revival, the creative team wisely opted to set the new series in the same continuity of the original series. It wasn’t a reboot: it picked up the story decades later following a new team researching the time travel technology, while Sam Beckett is still out there, lost in time.

Our new hero is Dr. Ben Song, a scientist played by Raymond Lee (Kevin Can F**k Himself), who also leaps through time and finds himself unable to leap back home. Ben’s journey follows a similar trajectory as Sam’s, leaping into different lives and setting things right. But the format gets some welcome tweaks, most notably in Ben’s hologram observer from the present who can communicate with him, played by Caitlin Bassett. Bassett’s character Addison Augustine is Ben’s fiancée—a twist that gives the story a star-crossed lovers arc that takes some surprising turns along the way.

Much like the original Quantum Leap, the 2022 run had fun with its format, dropping Ben into everything from an Exorcist-esque Halloween story, a space mission gone wrong, an Indiana Jones-style adventure in Egypt, and plenty more topical eras and situations across the decades.

But even separated by time and space, the show was always a love story for Ben and Addison (even when they both got new love interests in Season 2, with Ben falling for The 100 fan favorite Eliza Taylor as a young woman who learns his secret and connects with him across decades, pulling on threads that will be familiar to Doctor Who fans). It’s that tether that differentiates the second Quantum Leap from what came before, and gives it its own flavor. It’s also the crux of what sets up the beautiful, exciting series finale—the type of ending the original series can only wish it had had the time to shoot itself.

The Quantum Leap team in the present had spent the better part of two seasons trying to figure out how to bring Ben back, and by the end of Season 2 they believe they’ve cracked the code. There’s just one catch: for Ben to return home, someone else has to leap out and take his place. Addison volunteers, which led fans to understandably believe they were setting up a potential role reversal where Addison becomes the leaper, and Ben her hologram companion.

But instead of swapping places, Addison leaps out and… no one returns to the present. Just when they think the plan had failed, Addison spots Ben across the distance. In the past. Instead of taking his place, Addison joined him. The two are finally reunited, just not in the way either of them imagined or intended.

But together, finally, all the same.

“[W]e knew we were not going to end it on a cliffhanger. We were going to end it on the first scene from Season 3, and we’re going to end it with the two characters together, but in a way that you never expected,” producer Dean Georgaris explained to Deadline at the time of the finale. “And that sort of says to the audience, ‘look at all the great places we can go.’ So if it feels like a completion for audiences, that’s wonderful. It is a completion of part of the journey, but I think for us, it serves as the launch for the rest of the journey.”

It ended the story at arguably its most exciting point, with Addison and Ben’s biggest adventures still ahead of them, but in a way that brought emotional closure and hope to fans who had watched the two fight so hard to be reunited.

And in that, the ending is effectively the same as the final title card in the original series, just not as starkly pronounced (who’s to say Ben and Addison wouldn’t eventually leap back at some point), ending with the story as open-ended as ever, with three leapers (including Sam) now potentially bouncing across time, helping those in need across history.

Trent Moore is a recovering print journalist, and freelance editor and writer with bylines at lots of places. He likes to find the sweet spot where pop culture crosses over with everything else. Follow him at @trentlmoore on Twitter.

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TV Rewind: Up to Its Final Episode, the New Quantum Leap Was a Love Letter to the Original Series