Theorizing that one could time travel within his own lifetime, Dr. Sam Beckett stepped into the quantum leap accelerator and vanished. He awoke to find himself trapped in the past, facing mirror images that were not his own, and driven by an unknown force to change history for the better. His only guide on this journey is Al, an observer from his own time who appears in the form of a hologram that only Sam can see and hear. And so, Dr. Beckett finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong, and hoping each time that his next leap will be the leap home.

A Hunting We Will Go

• Sam leaps into a phone booth and is immediately confused when a man on the other end of the line calls him “Gordon.”
• He quickly notices that he’s handcuffed to a woman, who spots an opening to scream for help, claiming that her ex-husband is trying to kidnap her.
• This gets the attention of several nearby men who grab Sam and slam him into the side of a building.
• June 18, 1976
• She’s laying it on real thick, saying he’s been trying to kill her for years.
• When the guys offer to get the sheriff, the woman says there’s no need to do that and just reach into his pocket for the key to the handcuffs.
• At this point, they find a flyer for the woman, Diane, who is wanted for embezzlement and Gordon is a bounty hunter who’s tasked with bringing her in.
• Al arrives and informs Sam that he’s actually the third bounty hunter on the case.
• They board the bus for Decatur, and Diane promises the driver that she won’t give Sam any more trouble.
• She even apologizes to Sam as they get on the bus.
• But then once they’re on the bus, she pretends to be sick and Sam handcuffs her to the seat while he walks off with Al to get more information.
• Al is convinced that Diane has been falsely accused of the crime she allegedly committed, but this is because she reminds him of one of his ex-wives, Maxine.
• What can’t be disputed is that the two of them somehow wind up dead later tonight.
• The official history claims that Diane shot Gordon and disappeared.
• Once Al leaves, Diane gets her and Sam thrown off the bus by getting Sam into a fight with another passenger.
• And, of course, as they’re stranded on the side of the road, it begins to storm.
• They’re lucky enough to find shelter in a barn nearby.
• As the two of them argue some more, she decides to turn on the charm… trying to seduce him just a little bit.
• Clearly an act…
• More fighting… more chasing… leads to both of them falling into a stall filled with manure.
• Al is convinced that, with all the fighting, that Sam and Diane are falling for each other.
• Ha… Sam and Diane… like Cheers… Will they/won’t they?
• As they turn in for the night, Diane is tied up and claims that she didn’t really steal that money.
• Her old boss, Rodney, was running a scam that was defrauding people out of their money and he knew she was onto him.
• And in Decatur, Rodney is a powerful man who pretty much owns the judge that will preside over her case.
• And, in Decatur, Rodney is none too happy to hear that the bus driver threw Diane and Gordon off the bus.
• The next morning, Sam and Diane are hitchhiking but having no luck.
• Diane suggests that the handcuffs are keeping people from wanting to stop, so he uncuffs her and then she manages to flag down a car.
• When Sam tries to get in the car, too, she shoves him into the mud.
• Luckily, the driver she hitched a ride with must have quickly gotten tired of the manure smell and kicked her out just around the corner.
• Sam grabs her again and they manage to get to a nearby motel.
• While Sam is getting a room and food in the motel office, Diane lifts a cigarette lighter that looks like a gun.
• In the motel room, Diane again insists that she’s innocent and that Rodney was preying on elderly people and stealing their money.
• So Diane took the money and hid it away so that she could somehow get it back to the people Rodney stole it from.
• She’s convinced that if she returns to Decatur, she’s as good as dead.
• Sam tries to rub in some pain reliever into his back but he can’t reach, so Diane offers to do it for him.
• He decides to let her and uncuffs her from the bed.
• Which inevitably leads to the two of them making out.
• They stop when Sam mentions that as soon as he starts to trust her, she beats the crap out of him.
• So then she goes into the bathroom to see if her dress is dry.
• And why wouldn’t she sneak out the bathroom window?
• A move that Sam was ready for and he catches her… which is when she pulls the fake gun she stole from the motel office.
• She forces Sam to handcuff himself to a trellis outside the motel room, then reveals the gun is a lighter.
• Diane runs off and pays for the lighter as she passes the desk clerk.
• Before she can get away, though, Sam shows up again, having broken the trellis.
• Just as he confronts her about paying for the lighter, the sheriff from Decatur arrives and frees Sam from the cuffs and takes Diane into custody.
• Al shows up and warns Sam that Diane is going to die in approximately 20 minutes.
• Ziggy says she gets shot trying to escape.
• Sam has Al go to Diane and is convinced that wherever the sheriff is taking her, Rodney will be close by.
• Al arrives to the back of the sheriff’s car, Rodney is in the back, slapping Diane until she reveals where she hid the money.
• So that proves that the sheriff is in Rodney’s pocket.
• The two men swear they’ll let Diane go if she tells them where the money is hidden.
• She buys herself some time by saying she’s forgotten exactly where the money is, so she’ll have to show them.
• Al relays the information to Sam and warns him that now the history shows that Diane is framed for Gordon’s murder and then she’s killed when she reveals the location of the money.
• Sam gets to the train yard just as Diane gives the money to Rodney and the sheriff.
• And just as they’re getting ready to kill Diane, Sam arrives to take down the bad guys.
• Diane puts up a good fight, too, proving she really can take care of herself.
• Sam helps Diane mail out all the money back to the people it belongs to.
• Diane then turns herself into the State Police, who treat her better than the locals.
• The charges against her are dropped while Rodney and the sheriff get 15 years in prison.
• As Sam tells Diane good bye, he wonders why he hasn’t leapt yet.
• Al suggests he has unfinished business with her, which leads to a conversation where she decides to go into bounty hunting and Al says she becomes one of the best in the business.
• And Sam leaps into a man being secured into an electric chair.
• This time, it’s scary enough that Sam doesn’t end with an, “Oh boy…”
• This time, it’s “Oh God…”