Quantum Leap
Season 2, Episode 8:
Jimmy
Written by Paul M. Belous
Directed by Robert A. Wolterstorff
Airdate: November 22, 1989.
October 14, 1964
Sam leaps into a man with Down Syndrome named Jimmy LaMotta who has the I.Q. of a 12-year-old. Having recently been taken out of a mental institution called Bayside, Jimmy lives with his brother Frank and his family. Frank has managed to get Jimmy a job interview at the dock where he works; Frank instructs Jimmy to tell the boss, Mr. Samuels, that he isn't retarded, just slow. Sam confidently tells Samuels he can do the job despite his disability, and is hired.
Several of the other workers pick on Jimmy, and Sam can barely keep Frank from getting into a fight with them. One particular worker named Blue seems to have it out for Jimmy. Under constant pressure from people around him treating him, as Al puts it, "like a dumbo," Sam continues to make foolish errors, which everyone but Frank has no patience for, including Frank's wife Connie. Things get worse when Frank's son Cory starts a fight with a neighborhood boy who mocked Jimmy, and Sam's attempt to separate them is mistaken for assault by the boy's mother.
Sam is fed up, as it seems he can do nothing right. Al, more emotional than we've ever seen him, reveals that his sister Trudy was picked on for being mentally retarded too, and that when their father's work took him out of the country, she was institutionalized and Al placed in an orphanage. When Al came back for her as an adult, he learned she had died from pneumonia, even though it should have been easily treatable. Sam vows to save Jimmy the way Al couldn't save Trudy. That night, Sam tells Cory a bedtime story that begins: "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away..."
At the docks, Sam notices Blue has trouble reading the labels on crates, and determines that he has undiagnosed dyslexia. Realizing that his own job could be on the line if Samuels finds out, Blue frames Jimmy for leaving a spigot of sealant on and causing a collision, leading to Jimmy being fired and Frank resigning in protest. Connie is livid that Frank continues to throw his life away for his brother and begs Frank to take him back to the institution.
Frank sadly tells Jimmy that until he can get another job and ingratiate himself to the point where they would take a chance on Jimmy, he will have to return to Bayside. Although Frank promises it will be temporary, Al notes that Jimmy would remain there for the rest of his life.
As a last-ditch effort, Sam steals Frank's car and drives to the dock, with Cory following on his bike. Sam proves to Mr. Samuels that Blue is dyslexic and that he caused the accident; Samuels re-hires Jimmy and Frank and fires Blue. Outraged, Blue tries to run down Jimmy and Samuels using his forklift, but instead knocks over a stack of crates where Cory had been surveying the action since his arrival. Cory is knocked into the harbor, and though Frank is able to pull him out, he is not breathing. Despite Frank's, and especially Connie's reservations, Sam convinces them to let him perform CPR on him. While it initially seems to be a lost cause, Sam whispers to Cory that if he dies, he will miss out on seeing Star Wars for real, and Cory manages to cough up the water. Having saved Cory's life and gotten Jimmy accepted in the eyes of his community, Sam leaps.
