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Quantum Leap
Season 3, Episode 5:
The Boogieman
The Devil: Who gave you the right to go bungling around in time, putting right what I made wrong?!
Sam: I'm just trying to get home.
The Devil: Well, you're not going to make it...
Written by Chris Ruppenthal
Directed by Joe Napolitano
Airdate: October 26, 1990.
October 31, 1964
Sam leaps into the life of a horror novelist and soon finds a terrifying story playing out around him in the form of a series of mysterious and unexplainable deaths.
Tropes:
- Acting for Two: Dean Stockwell plays Al and the Devil in a single scene.
- All Just a Dream: The deaths and Sam's battle with the Devil were all just a dream. Or was it?
- Animal Assassin: Tully and Dorothy are killed by a goat and a snake, respectively.
- A Rare Sentence: "The problem with quantum leaping is that it often left me feeling like a scarecrow. With my head all full of stuffing, and no idea as to why I was really there."
- Ask a Stupid Question...: After Sheriff Masters asks Sam what the goat he saw looks like, he bluntly remarks that it looked like a goat.note
- Badass Bookworm: Okay, it was a dream (maybe), but Sam strangles the Devil.
- Bait-and-Switch: Al didn't show up until the climax. That guy you thought was him? Satan.
- Big "NO!": Sam lets one out after he finds Sheriff Masters dead.
- Blatant Lies: When Sam asks Sheriff Masters about the star tattoo on his wrist, he sarcastically spins an elaborate story, followed by the truth.Sam: That's an unusual tattoo, Sheriff.
Masters: Okay, you caught me. I'm really a warlock, and that's the sign of my coven. And I killed Dorothy and Tully because they were about to expose me.
Sam: That's interesting, to quote a sheriff I know.
Masters: Isn't it? Unless, of course, the real story is I got drunk one night on shore leave and almost had an Air Force tattoo put on my arm. Pretty embarrassing for a guy in the Navy. - Brick Joke: All of the spooky things during Sam's nightmare (such as a car driving by itself) pay off as a joke when we learn who Stevie really is.
- Burn the Witch!: A local legend tells of a witch who was burned at the stake. Mary suggests that Josh use this trope in his next book.
- Chekhov's Gun: Right before Stevie caused Sam to swerve his car off the road, Sam took notice of a truck following close behind him before pulling off to the left. After receiving word that Sheriff Masters was going to pick Mary up at the hospital, Sam took off to get to Mary first... only to pass by the truck again. It turns out it actually crashed when it went off the road, causing the death of the driver... Sheriff Masters.
- Chess with Death: A retroactive example: When discussing how Mary could've been responsible for both Tully and Dorothy's deaths, "Al" starts talking about poker:"Al": Maybe she's a great poker player. I knew a guy, you could look him in the eye and couldn't tell whether he had four of a kind or a busted flush.
- Cliffhanger Copout: Downplayed: When Mary starts seizing, Sam says she needs to get to the hospital immediately before the show cuts to commercial. When we cut back, we're at the hospital.
- Continuity Snarl: Both the Devil and Al use the colored cube version of the Handlink even though it doesn't get formally introduced into the show until "The Great Spontini" three episodes later.
- Creator Cameo: Episode writer Chris Ruppenthal appears in the mirror as Joshua Rey.
- Delayed Reaction: When he shows up during the climax, it takes Al a minute to realize how bad things had gotten for Sam:Al: (enters via the Imaging Chamber; to Sam) Geez, Sam, I'm sorry I'm late, but something was goofing Ziggy all up (glances towards the Devil) and... (practically bricks it) and... Oh, Sam, this is not good...
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Sam and Satan try to strangle each other. Sam wins.
- Dramatic Irony: The first time Tully fell off the ladder, Sam spotted a goat nearby, and was unable to convince anyone else that it was there (which makes sense, given it turns out it was the Devil in disguise). Towards the end, when Sam prevents Tully's fall that go-around, he tries to point out the goat to Al... only there really wasn't a goat this time.Al: I don't see any goat...
- Dreaming of Things to Come: If it's actually fact that Sam dreamt most of the episode, the fact that Tully still wound up almost falling from his ladder counts as this.
- Evil Is Hammy: Dean Stockwell clearly had a ball playing the Devil.
- Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Variation: After Sam wakes up towards the end, Al begins to rattle off who Sam leapt into and why he's there... only for Sam to bolt up the stairs before Al can finish saying Tully's name.
- Foreshadowing:
- One particular example that raises questions if Sam did in fact dream most of the episode: when Stevie leaves the house for the first time, he remarks that he wants to be a horror writer some day.
- After Sam spots the goat, the camera pans slightly to the left to show the bottom of the ladder Tully's on.
- While this particular trait is repeated throughout the episode, when Al first appears, you don't hear him pop in.
- Similarly, when Al fiddles with the handlink, you hear none of its usual beeping.
- When Sam tries to figure out why Ziggy didn't detect Tully's death, Al abruptly starts talking about the black mamba snake that's behind Sam.
- When Sheriff Masters is giving his sarcastic explanation for his tattoo, Al bluntly tells Sam to grab him.
- For the series as a whole: The concept of an evil entity directly interfering with Sam's mission by changing history for the worse, whose identity is revealed via a flash of red light, will be further examined in Season 5, with the introduction of the evil leapers.
- Gender Bender: At the end of the episode, Sam leaps into beauty contestant Darlene Monte. This was the lead-in for the next episode, "Miss Deep South."
- Glamour Failure: Prior to returning to the Spook House to meet with Mary towards the climax, Sam discovers that Sheriff Masters had died in a car crash. So, when Sam sees him at the house regardless, he impulsively grabs his arm... causing a flash of red, revealing it was Al. Or, rather, the Devil in Al's image.
- Halloween Episode: While there were a handful of spooky episodes, this was Quantum Leap's only true Halloween episode (at least until the 2022 revival series).
- Hired to Hunt Yourself: Variation: After the black mamba snake kills Dorothy in the kitchen, Sam aggressively demands that Al find out how the snake got out. When "Al" turns out to be the Devil, it all but admits to being behind it.
- Historical In-Joke: Sam recounts various sights in his dream to Stevie before learning who he really is.
- Hollywood Heart Attack: After the skull flies across the room, Mary denies having anything to do with it before collapsing to the ground and writhing on the floor. Al remarks that what's happening is something akin to The Exorcist, while Sam quickly deduces that what's actually happening is that Mary's having an epileptic attack.
- I Never Said It Was Poison: As Sam points out in the climax, Al quoted Tully's line about those who dance with the Devil... when he should have had no way of hearing that line, since he showed up after Tully died.
- It Amused Me: As it turns out, the mysterious instances of the typewriter suddenly displaying text describing recent kills? That was purely the work of the Devil For the Evulz.
- Locked Out of the Loop: Right in the middle of the climax, Al shows up via the Imaging Chamber, apologizing to Sam for not being able to reach him until then... only to be considerably taken aback by seeing Sam with another Al.
- Lovecraft Country: This leap takes place in Coventry, Maine. This is actually a big clue as to the punchline of the episode.
- Mind over Matter: Telekinesis is child's play for the Devil.
- Never Say "Die": Played for laughs: After checking back in with Mary at the hospital, Sam is about to leave, before promising to come back:Mary: Promise?
Sam: Cross my heart and hope... ... ...to limbo... ...in the Bahamas. - Not So Above It All: Despite being so scientifically inclined, Sam indirectly admits to believing in psychokinesis when discussing how a skull was flung across the room prior to Mary's seizure.Sam: Psychokinesis is very real, Al. The brain works on a chemo-electrical level. Epilepsy is a sort of crossing of the wires. So that maybe when [Mary's] neurons short-circuited, maybe it stimulated her psychokinetic energy.
- Not What It Looks Like:
- When Sam first leaps in, he notices he's in an extremely gothic looking room, and is reading from a book that was written in 1879, causing him to think he leapt that far back. And then he gets scared by two costumed individuals, and falls down the stairs.
- When Sam got distracted comparing his leaping to a scarecrow, Mary assume he was struggling figuring out "how to kill him", which considerably puts Sam on edge. And Mary insists he has to... otherwise, he'll need to rewrite his new book wholesale.
- At one point, upon seeing Sam talking to "Al", Sheriff Masters accuses him of being schizophrenic.
- Number of the Beast: Mary lives at 966 Salem Ave. The first 9 inverts after Al follows Sam into the house.
- One Dialogue, Two Conversations: Variation: When Sam explains what he had dreamt, he is directly talking to Al, but both Al and Mary respondnote :Sam: (breathless; to Al) For a while, there were... two of you... and one of you was trying to kill me...
Al / Mary: (confused) I was trying to kill you?!
Stevie: (awed) Cool, what a neat idea... - Or Was It a Dream?:
- After waking up, Sam knows immediately where to go to save Tully from falling off the ladder, something that he couldn't have known if it was all just a dream...
- In a lesser sense, there's also the fact that Stevie's excuse for bailing towards the endnote is the same one Stevie gave upon leaving the first time Sam woke up...
- Paranormal Episode: With enough material for an entire series.
- The Reveal:
- Al was never talking to Sam throughout the episode; it was the Devil.
- Similarly, him bahhing after revealing himself once Sam grabs him reveals that he was the goat Sam kept seeing throughout the episode.
- By the end of the episode, it turns out that "Stevie" is actually Stephen King.
- Al was never talking to Sam throughout the episode; it was the Devil.
- Rewatch Bonus: As Sam says during the climax, the Devil, while pretending to be Al, never walks through solid objects or uses the handlink to pop in and out.
- The Scottish Trope: This episode ended up becoming infamous in the fandom, as some viewers reported strange occurrences when it originally aired on NBC. They preferred not to spell out the title in full. As explained on the official Quantum Leap fan site, Al's Place
:This episode first aired near Halloween 1990, and from the first time it aired, weird events have been associated with this episode. As an example, this episode seems to have the highest incidence of VCR / cable / local station failure than any other episode aired. There have been numerous reports of VCR’s cutting out during the taping of this episode, local station and cable companies dropping their signal. Even mentioning it by name is hazardous, as one net. Leaper can attest. He lost his job AND his net. access. Its mention has been known to cause power failures and auto breakdowns, so it’s best to just refer to it as "The Halloween Episode" (episode #3.5). - Set Right What Once Went Wrong / Make Wrong What Once Went Right: Discussed, as the Devil demands to know who gave Sam the right to fix what was made wrong.
- 6 Is 9: Joshua Rey's street address is 966. Near the climax, the 9 flips upside down to reveal that the devil is amongst them.
- Spotting the Thread: Upon noticing Al after waking up from his fall, Sam confirms it's the real deal when he reaches out and waves his hand through his hologram.
- Title Drop: When Sam postulates on who could be behind the deaths, Al quips that "The Boogieman" is responsible.
- Wham Line: Played for Laughs at the end.Mary: Hi, Mrs. King.
- Wham Shot: Three-fold during the climax: Sam grabbing Mathers, who is supposed to be dead, and he turns into Al... despite the fact that Sam is still holding him, Al suddenly having red, glowing eyes, and the light from the Imaging Chamber suddenly appearing, followed by a different Al, apologizing for taking so long to get to Sam.
- Year Inside, Hour Outside: Variation: if you remove the fact that most of the episode was a dream Sam had after falling down the stairs, this particular leap lasted roughly a couple of minutes, from when Sam leapt in to when Stevie leaves in his mom's car.
- You Can See Me?: Before he outright confirms it, you can barely notice the Devil glancing towards Al's direction when he arrives.Al: (begins hammering away at the handlink) Sam, uh, Ziggy says there's definitely something there.
The Devil: (turns to look at Al) ...that's more than I can say for you. - You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Just like with Buddy Holly two seasons prior, Sam is dumbfounded to realize that he had indirectly inspired Stephen King's career as an author.Mary: (as a car pulls up and honks; Stevie runs over) Hi, Mrs. King! (Sam practically bricks it)
Stevie: Hi, mom!
Sam: (to Al) ...Stevie?
Al: (glances at the handlink) ...King. - You Look Familiar: Paul Linke (Sheriff Masters) previously appeared as Lionel in the Season 1 finale "Play It Again, Seymour".
- Young Future Famous People: Josh's young friend Stevie will someday be the most successful horror novelist of all time.
Sam: When I was growing up, Halloween was always one of my favorite holidays. "Trick or treat", we used to say. Of course, back then we always expected a treat, and if we did play a trick, it was always funny and harmless. But tonight there were no treats. There were no tricks. There was only death.
