Quantum Leap

Another Mother - September 30, 1981 - S2-E13

Plot hole: Sam wallops both kidnappers and rescues the son. They then leave the two child molesters unconscious beside their van. No one calls the police or has them arrested, so they're free to kidnap another kid. Sam doesn't leap until after an epilogue in which the loose ends are supposed to be resolved - but this question is left unanswered. It's not excused by a "just because we didn't see it happen doesn't mean it didn't" defense. The viewers shouldn't be left with a dangling plot hole, and one line could have cured this one.

Jean G

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Al: I went over to check out the cheerleaders. Oh, Sam. There was one little girl who had these pommelos, man.
Sam: Pommelos are grapefruit.
Al: Pommel - that's my point.

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Star-Crossed - June 15, 1972 - S1-E3

Question: Al tells Sam that he's there to prevent the professor and his undergraduate student from having a shotgun wedding and ruining both their lives. That implies she got pregnant. Sam succeeds in keeping them apart. Um, does that mean he prevented someone from being born?

Brian Katcher

Answer: He means he's there to prevent there ever being the need for a shotgun wedding-that is, to stop the affair before there is a possibility of the girl getting pregnant.

raywest ★

Which would erase the child from history. That's my point.

Brian Katcher

Not if there was never any pregnancy to begin with. There was only the chance of one.

raywest ★

Answer: Not necessarily; it could also mean that someone such as Jamie Lee's (the student) father discovered that the professor was having a sexual relationship with her and coerced the two into getting married.

zendaddy621

This doesn't answer the question. You just described what a shotgun wedding is.

Bishop73

I think their point is that the "shotgun" aspect might not be due to a pregnancy, simply a forced attempt to legitimise an otherwise scandalous relationship.

My point was that a "shotgun wedding" doesn't always happen because an unmarried girl becomes pregnant; it can also happen because someone "stole her virtue", i.e had sex with her without being married or at least engaged to her. There's no reason to believe that Jamie Lee was, or would become, pregnant as a result of the affair or subsequent marriage.

zendaddy621

The term "shotgun wedding" means a forced marriage due to unexpected pregnancy. It's sometimes even used when the woman is pregnant but it's planned or the wedding isn't "forced." In common colloquialism (especially in the 80's when the script was written), it doesn't refer to a force marriage just because of premarital sex (which the term "make an honest woman" is used for).

Bishop73

No, in the 1926 Sinclair Lewis novel 'Elmer Gantry', they talk about shotgun weddings, when a groom is forced to marry a woman because he took her virginity. Obviously, the term usually refers to a pregnant bride, but I see zendaddys point.

Brian Katcher

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