Quantum Leap 2×10 “The Family Treasure” is a little about the bond between family, a little about the risks we’re willing to take for the ones we love (and the consequences we therefore bear), a lot about pretending to be something we’re not, and a lot about the collision of past and present. I’m riding an emotional high after this one, so enough preamble. Let’s jump right in.
Family Matters
“The Family Treasure” gives Ben (Raymond Lee) one of his most fun Leap projects yet. In order to move on, he has to find a buried treasure! Ben meets Indiana Jones. I dig it. (Pun intended.)
Of course, the treasure isn’t the point. At least, not the physical treasure. Though it’s also not entirely not the point, since he isn’t able to leap until it’s found. But in true Quantum Leap fashion, his cosmic task is really about bringing a family back together. Helping them to understand each other. And reminding them that they’ll always have each other.
It’s also about inadvertently breaking up Addison (Caitlin Bassett) and Tom (Peter Gadiot).
We’ll get back to that. But I think everyone can guess what I’m feeling right now.
Back to family! This episode also gives Ben and Ian (Mason Alexander Park) a really beautiful bonding moment. In the way only Quantum Leap can, given that the two don’t even share screen time. (Unless you count the video footage, which I don’t.) But in helping Dean (Wilder Yari) understand and embrace their gender identity, Ben inadvertently helps Ian feel seen. Watching Ian process their emotions in that moment is beautiful – probably the most poignant scene in the episode.
Speaking of Ian. If I have one complaint about the episode as a whole, I want to take issue with some of the camera work. Everyone on this show does a good job, don’t get me wrong. However, Ian’s outfit looked amazing from the close-ups. I wanted a good shot of the whole thing, and I don’t think I got it. Could we give Ian a “catwalk” moment in every future episode where they’re wearing amazing clothes? I know for a fact how much their fans enjoy their outfits, and we need “Tumblr spam worthy” shots.
Moving on.
The Great Pretenders
As much as I’m about to enjoy talking about ships, ships aren’t what Quantum Leap is (or even should be) about. And as much as some people like to pretend that social justice issues are all “woke” propaganda that was invented for the modern age, that’s simply not the case. Homosexuality has always existed. Nonbinary people have always existed (even if they didn’t have today’s terminology to put their experience into modern terms). Transgender people have always existed.
People whose lived experiences didn’t adhere to the status quo may have been forced to live behind masks and hide their reality behind closed doors. But refusing to recognize something’s existence isn’t the same thing as something not actually existing.
Quantum Leap 2×10 “The Family Treasure” is all about the masks we wear and how we pretend to be something we’re not. Whether it’s for our own safety, as in the case of Dean. Whether it’s because we want to ignore the scars and baggage we carry, as Addison does. Or whether it’s because we simply have no other choice, as we see with Ben.
When it comes to Dean, they’re struggling to understand, embrace, and be embraced for who they truly are. In a world and a time that generally lacked understanding toward people who didn’t live according to their assigned roles. (Even less than today, and one glimpse at the news makes it clear how far we have to go.) And, honestly, understanding and acceptance is something everyone wants, at the end of the day.
Baby, Don’t You Break My Heart Slow
I know what you’re all thinking. I’m gloating over the end of Addison and Tom. (I know they called it “taking a break” or “getting some space” but we all know what that means. That’s the real life equivalent of the Facebook “It’s complicated” relationship status. It’s not complicated. It’s ending.) And you’re…okay, not entirely wrong. But I do have a heart, honest.
If I hadn’t been screaming in pain, I probably would have seen this coming from the moment Addison and Tom announced they were racing to the courthouse to seal the deal. At the very least, a tiny little death knell tolled when Addison admitted she didn’t want a big wedding because she’d already planned one once and it didn’t exactly work out for her.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to skip the big wedding. There’s also nothing wrong with wanting to seize the day, before something can happen to separate you from the one you love. Heaven knows, everyone on the project has ample justification for wanting to live in the moment. However. Addison’s desire to skip to the chase is really more about her relationship with Ben – losing him, and her grief over losing him – than it is about Tom. And that’s no way to start a marriage.
To her credit, I do think Addison was honest leading up to this moment regarding her feelings for Tom. I think she genuinely loves him. (And, if I set aside my single-minded determination that he must be evil, I can even easily see why. He’s a good character. Part of the reason I think he must be evil is that he’s almost too good, on a show of very good characters. If he isn’t evil, I do genuinely want him to get the happy ending he deserves. Just…not romantically with Addison.) I think she was genuine in her desire and attempt to live in the present, rather than the past.
But desire and ability are two different things, and if this episode reminded Addison of anything, it’s that she’s living behind a mask of her own. Pretending like she can let go of the past with Ben. Or even that she’s ready to do such a thing. Maybe even that she entirely wants to. And continuing to play make-believe isn’t fair to Tom. It isn’t fair to Ben. And, honestly? It really isn’t being fair to herself.
So it’s not terribly shocking that the episode ended with the two breaking up. *cough cough* I mean, agreeing Addison “needed more time and space” from Tom. As much as this ship has hurt me over the course of the season, I’m going to give it to Bassett and Gadiot. They really sold the heartbreak on me. I mean, I even ended up feeling bad for Tom. Not enough to regret this turn of events. But bad.
Still, I feel like this was an inevitable ending for this ship. In the same way that I think Ben and Hannah (Eliza Taylor) would be doomed for similar reasons, even if they weren’t doomed by the fact that she’d be, like, 90 years old today. Or the fact that she’s married (and maybe Ben saved her husband? Although I suspect not because I still think her son, Jeffrey (Connor Esterson last episode) is the season’s Big Bad going by a different name.) Whether the writers drag things out longer before the official end of either couple. Tom wasn’t wrong when he said that, the more time Addison spends with Ben, the more time she spends focused on the past, the more space was growing between them in the present. And he’s also watched Addison and Ben working together. The man is no fool. He even called her on it (in a line that was somewhat brutal for its honesty). This is the inevitable outcome for all those conversations they haven’t been having.
But while I’m speculating, I’m still speculating that the season ends with Addison somehow making a choice to save Tom’s wife. Giving him his happy ending, even at the cost of their past together. As a parallel to Ben’s actions the first season, it would almost be poetic.
Bad Moon Rising
(I swear not all of my Quantum Leap review subtitles will be song titles for the rest of the season. I swear.)
Speaking of conversations that aren’t being had. Ian has been avoiding telling Magic (Ernie Hudson) about their little deal with the devil to try to find Ben. And those lies of omission are about to come back to bite them on their – to borrow a word from Park themself – “tooshie.”
This plot is really just ramping up, but you could cut the tension with a knife at the end of this week’s episode, when Gideon (James Frain) saunters into QL HQ like he owns the place. We don’t know a lot about him, but he carries a subtle air of menace that’s strong enough to set even Jenn (Nanrisa Lee) back a pace or two.
Like Addison and Tom’s breakup, Ian’s deal regarding the computer chip was bound to come to a head eventually. Even more because every character on this show is horrible at subterfuge. I’m not saying that Rachel (Alice Kremelberg) was ever going to escape unnoticed from Gideon’s watchful eye. I will say, however, that if you’re trying to hide your act of industrial espionage, calling your co-conspirator and talking about your clandestine activities in front of the goons tasked with finding the mole is really not the key to a long and fruitful life.
Bless their hearts. Everyone on this show is too good for this world. Except, apparently Gideon. And as for him? Well, thanks to Quantum Leap 2×10 “The Family Treasure,” I’ll be spending the next week doing side-by-side comparisons of Gideon and young Jeffrey Nally. I know my pet theory is highly unlikely. But I have to spend the time waiting for the next episode of my favorite show somehow, right?
You’re definitely not alone in speculating on where in the world Jeffrey is headed! Too many potential plot paths seem to have Jeffrey sitting somewhere near the junction.
A lot of that will be determined by where things stand with Hannah the next time she crosses paths with Ben. If Jeffrey is bitter about Ben not warning Hannah about Josh’s pending death, then wouldn’t Ben’s letter to 1970 Hannah basically retcon any kind of revenge motive for Jeffrey (that is, if he actually grows up to become Gideon)?
If Hannah’s been telling young Jeffrey the stories about this time traveler leaping around to right past wrongs, I find it hard to believe that he would grow up with some evil motive in mind, at least with Ben. The Hannah story is headed to a conclusion, but it can still take on many different forms.
With Addison and Tom, I had a very strong inkling that they weren’t going to tie the knot (thought that last week, and still thought that even when they were getting ready to head down to City Hall). You’re right that Addison isn’t ready to let go of the past. She might have thought she was, and Tom was going to steady the ship for her. But, Ben’s not exactly in the rearview mirror either.
Addison and Ben are both driven by the need do right, even at great personal cost. Ben was still driven to write that letter to Hannah, even though Josh’s death would actually create an opening for the “happy ending” that he desperately wanted. If Addison has the opportunity to reunite Tom with his dead wife, it seems that she would use it. But, I think the probability of that happening has lessened since it carries less dramatic weight that it might have if, say, Addison and Tom stayed together.
All in all, the constellations seem to be aligning for Ben and Addison to reunite. Of course, that could be setting us up for yet another redirect. Even if Gideon isn’t Jeffrey, Hannah and Jeffrey will inevitably cross paths with PQL at some point.
I’m so torn about your comments regarding Jeffrey because you’re absolutely correct. If Ben managed to save Josh with his letter, Jeffrey would have no cause to be bitter. Unless Ben’s letter didn’t get to Hannah in time? Who knows what happened to that letter in the intervening years? Also, I keep coming back to the fact that Ben only needed a few more seconds to warn Hannah in the first place. If the cosmic force behind his leaps – the force that keeps causing him to cross paths with Hannah – wanted him to save Josh, wouldn’t it have held off a few more seconds? It’s throwing the two in each other’s paths repeatedly, so it’s not like everything it does is random. In which case, maybe there’s a reason things “need” to play out this way, and “fate” (so to speak) would intervene and stop that letter from getting to Hannah in time.
Wibbly wobbly timey wimey…
This plot could go so many directions. Maybe Hannah doesn’t tell Jeffrey about Ben (because it really is hard to explain that without sounding like you need to see a doctor). Maybe Jeffrey finds the letter and wonders how this “Ben” person could have known in advance. And that sends him down a path of obsession. Of course, I could be off entirely and Jeffrey isn’t the Big Bad. On the other hand, I think it would be interesting as an opportunity for the Big Bad to be redeemed, rather than eliminated (as Ben had to eventually do with Martinez last year). Jeffrey/Gideon gets a closer look at what Ben does and it helps him let go of his bitterness when it comes to the past and his dad’s death. This season is about letting go of the past and moving forward, after all.
You’re probably right that the dramatic weight of Addison saving Tom is lessened by the fact the two aren’t together. On the other hand, I could see the show making the decision to let Addison make the choice out of a positive emotion (love) rather than a negative one (sacrifice). Particularly since Tom brought up the idea that the mechanism behind the leaps requires sacrifice earlier in the season. And that’s never been revisited since. How better to prove that sacrifice isn’t an essential element (and Ben isn’t doomed for a tragic end in the same vein as Sam) than to remove the sacrificial element from the equation in this instance?
So much to think about as this season comes to a close! I’m looking forward to Ben and Addison reuniting, but Caitlin Bassett’s comments about what to anticipate for the end of season 2 have me really wracking my brain to think of where all these plotlines are going! I know some have speculated Hannah is behind the code that Tom just found, and THAT at least I see as a possibility. As for where that leaves us with Jeffrey (if he’s not Gideon)? Man, I have no idea.
Thanks for the comment!