User Reviews

Sam leaps into the body of a 16-year-old girl, Billie Jean, who is being rushed into a hospital delivery room, apparently about to give birth. Certain he cannot do this, Sam gets off the table and tells the doctor (Parley Baer, Mayberry's former mayor) that it was a false alarm. He returns with the woman's friend to her hair salon, where he (with Al's help) learns about his newest leap.

It appears his mission is to avoid the original history where the girl gave up the baby to adoption and regretted it for the rest of her life. But it was tough in 1955 for a teenager to raise a baby, especially when the father wants nothing to do with the child because it would ruin his life (as presented later in this story) and her mother is dead. The friend with the hair salon, Dotty, was only willing to help her until birth, because she has a boyfriend who wants nothing to do with the girl or her baby.

It would seem that this is to be a rather sad, serious story, but the facts are this Quantum Leap had more laughs than the average episode. Al and Sam quarrel about whether or not Sam, as Billie Jean, CAN give birth. Al insists the waiting room 40 years in the future has a pregnant Billie Jean and that Sam needs to leap back before she gives birth to a baby who winds up trapped in the future, that is, who doesn't leap back with her mother.

But Dottie, and Sam, each feel the baby kick convincing Sam that the baby is actually inside him. This presents an interesting debate into the "rules" of Quantum Leaping. We have it as a given that if Sam leaped into a young mother holding her young baby that the mother would go into the future and Sam as the mother would be holding the baby. But what if the baby is not yet born? Does the baby go with the mother while Sam inhabits the mother's figure, or does the baby stay-as a separate person inside the mother-and temporarily reside inside Sam's body? This episode suggests, given what Sam felt, that in the form of the mother, Sam would in fact give birth.

There are some other laughs, particularly regarding Sam's comment to a hair salon customer furious about her hair turning purple when things went wrong. Sam said, "Looks kinda punk," forgetting that that phrase meant nothing in 1955. He tries to explain "It's gonna be very big in the 80s." The customer responds with my favorite line, "Well, I don't know where Aidees is; but here in Oklahoma, we don't like lookin' like an electrified cotton candy."

Some of the attitudes of people regarding the situation may have been cliche and the resolution somewhat predictable given the limitations of the setting, but most actions seemed logical or believable to me and I always enjoy this series when there are some good laughs in it. I happily give it a 9 out of 10. I wrote this because there isn't at this point another actual IMDB review of the episode, only one listed that just has a comment on one forgettable line from the show.

Through the whole series, I assumed it was Sam's "consciousness" that was leaping around. That is why he sees the physical body of whoever he leaps into, and the person in the future sees Sam's body in the reflection.

This episode throws that out the window... and I have no idea what is going on now...

Al says that Billie Jean was in full labor and the medical staff in the future had to stop the labor. They also discuss the possibility that the baby might be born in the future, and abandoned there when Billie Jean leaps back.

I am really confused and want some answers. Is this just a massive gaping plot hole? Or am I misunderstanding the whole premise pf the show?