Quantum Leap backdrop
Quantum Leap poster
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Action & Adventure
Drama

The Best Episodes of Quantum Leap

Every episode of Quantum Leap ranked from best to worst. Let's dive into the Best Episodes of Quantum Leap!

The Best Episodes of Quantum Leap

Theorizing that one could time travel within his own lifetime, Dr. Sam Beckett stepped into the Quantum Leap accelerator and vanished... He woke to find...

Seasons5

  1. Background image for The Leap Home (1)
    9.2/10(965 votes)

    #1 - The Leap Home (1)

    S3:E1

    November 25, 1969: As himself at the age of 16, Sam has the opportunity to both win the high school basketball championship and save his family from their sad fates.

    0 Comments
    View all
  2. Background image for The Leap Home (2): Vietnam
    9.1/10(890 votes)

    #2 - The Leap Home (2): Vietnam

    S3:E2

    April 7, 1970: As a Navy SEAL in his own brother's squad, Sam must determine whether he is there to save Tom's life or ensure the success of the mission on which his brother was killed. Also Al from 1970 was a P.O.W.

    0 Comments
    View all
  3. Background image for Mirror Image
    9.1/10(957 votes)

    #3 - Mirror Image

    S5:E22

    August 8, 1953: Sam lands in a not-so-ordinary bar in a coal-mining town, where strange things are happening and familiar people don't know him. With the help of another Al, he still has something to set right ... or is there more than one thing he needs to change?

    0 Comments
    View all
  4. Background image for M.I.A.
    8.9/10(793 votes)

    #4 - M.I.A.

    S2:E22

    April 1, 1969: When Sam leaps into the life of an undercover cop, Al explains that his mission is to convince a navy nurse that her MIA husband is still alive, and to prevent her from marrying a lawyer she meets on the day Sam leaps in. But a series of coincidences causes Sam to wonder about the true nature of his mission.

    0 Comments
    View all
  5. Background image for Shock Theater
    8.7/10(606 votes)

    #5 - Shock Theater

    S3:E22

    October 3, 1954: Leaping into Sam Bederman, a mental patient who is suffering from acute depression, Sam receives an overloaded electroshock treatment, which causes his Swiss-cheesed memory to be replaced by personas from previous leaps. Al, finding himself visible to the mentally absent, must try to complete Sam's mission, and convince him to take another shock treatment, in order to leap Sam out before contact is lost forever.

    0 Comments
    View all
  6. Background image for The Leap Back
    8.7/10(679 votes)

    #6 - The Leap Back

    S4:E1

    June 15, 1945: Struck by lightning, Sam and Al find their roles reversed, as Sam returns to the future, and to a long-lost love, while Al leaps back to 1945 to prevent the death of a returning World War II hero and his former girl friend.

    0 Comments
    View all
  7. Trending NowTRENDING NOW

    The 20 WORST Episodes of Quantum Leap

    READ
  8. Background image for Jimmy
    8.5/10(755 votes)

    #7 - Jimmy

    S2:E8

    October 14, 1964: Since mainstreaming the mentally disabled is not yet a popular concept, Sam must help Jimmy LaMotta, the "slow" young man he's leaped into, get a job and gain his co-workers' acceptance, to prevent his brother from returning Jimmy to the institution.

    0 Comments
    View all
  9. Background image for A Leap for Lisa
    8.5/10(548 votes)

    #8 - A Leap for Lisa

    S4:E22

    June 25, 1957: Sam leaps into Al Calavicci to prevent the death of his married lover. But when Sam accidentally alters history, and finds out too late about her untimely demise, it could mean the gas chamber for Al and disturbingly a whole new situation at Project Quantum Leap.

    0 Comments
    View all
  10. Background image for The Color of Truth
    8.4/10(864 votes)

    #9 - The Color of Truth

    S1:E7

    August 8, 1955: Sam experiences racism firsthand when he leaps into the body of an elderly black man in the pre-civil rights South of 1955.

    0 Comments
    View all
  11. Background image for It's A Wonderful Leap
    8.2/10(502 votes)

    #10 - It's A Wonderful Leap

    S4:E18

    May 10, 1958: Sam finds himself behind the wheel of a New York taxicab, in the life of Max Greenman, a driver striving to win his own tag, a license to drive his own cab. His mission is aided with the help of a woman who claims to be a guardian angel.

    0 Comments
    View all
  12. Background image for Good Morning, Peoria
    8.1/10(694 votes)

    #11 - Good Morning, Peoria

    S2:E6

    September 9, 1959: Rock 'n' roll is about to become big, but not in Peoria. That is, unless Sam, as DJ Howlin' Chick Howell, can manage to keep the radio station where he's employed from being shut down by overly conservative town elders.

    0 Comments
    View all
  13. Background image for Justice
    8.1/10(492 votes)

    #12 - Justice

    S4:E4

    May 11, 1965: Sam must don the robe of a Ku Klux Klansman in order to save the life of an ambitious young civil rights leader, who is trying to register black voters.

    0 Comments
    View all
    Director:Rob Bowman
  14. Background image for Raped
    8.1/10(517 votes)

    #13 - Raped

    S4:E6

    June 20, 1980: It's up to Sam to try to bring a rapist to justice when he leaps into the perp's victim, a young woman who may have been unwilling to press charges against the young man - the son of the pillar of the community.

    0 Comments
    View all
  15. Background image for The Leap Between the States
    8.1/10(453 votes)

    #14 - The Leap Between the States

    S5:E20

    September 20, 1862: In a bizarre twist of a genetic coil, Sam leaps into his great-grandfather, Captain John Beckett, during the Civil War. He must not interfere with his ancestor's romance with a riled southern belle named Olivia. He must also avoid being hanged as a Yankee dog by some home guard Confederate soldiers.

    0 Comments
    View all
  16. Background image for Camikazi Kid
    8.0/10(801 votes)

    #15 - Camikazi Kid

    S1:E8

    June 6, 1961: Sam leaps into the life of a teen-age hot-rodder who must stop his sister from marrying a wealthy bully.

    0 Comments
    View all
    Director:Alan J. Levi
    Writer:Paul Brown
  17. Background image for So Help Me God
    8.0/10(627 votes)

    #16 - So Help Me God

    S2:E9

    July 29, 1957: Though he can't remember much more than habeas corpus, Sam finds himself the defense attorney for a young black woman accused of murdering the son of the most powerful man in a small Louisiana town.

    0 Comments
    View all
    Director:Andy Cadiff
  18. Background image for The Boogieman
    8.0/10(665 votes)

    #17 - The Boogieman

    S3:E5

    October 31, 1964: Things do more than go bump in the night when Sam leaps into Joshua Raye, a horror novelist on Halloween. Although Ziggy claims he's there to prevent the death of a church deacon, things get even stranger when two more people die without warning.

    0 Comments
    View all
  19. Background image for Future Boy
    8.0/10(531 votes)

    #18 - Future Boy

    S3:E13

    October 6, 1957: Sam leaps Kenny Sharp, better known as "Future Boy," sidekick to Moe Stein, host of the kid's show, "Time Patrol," who also happens to be building a time machine in his basement. Unless Sam can prevent Moe's daughter from attempting to have her father committed, Moe is destined to be killed as he tries to hop a freight train.

    0 Comments
    View all
  20. Background image for Last Dance Before an Execution
    8.0/10(482 votes)

    #19 - Last Dance Before an Execution

    S3:E19

    May 12, 1971: "Just think of someplace far away" is the advice Sam hears as he leaps into Jesus Ortega, a Cuban-American being strapped into an electric chair. A last second stay of execution gives Sam just forty-eight hours to either prove himself innocent or fulfill his mission so that he can leap before the Big Switch is pulled

    0 Comments
    View all
  21. Background image for Deliver Us from Evil
    8.0/10(510 votes)

    #20 - Deliver Us from Evil

    S5:E7

    March 19, 1966: Things are already on there way downhill when Sam leaps back into Jimmy LaMotta. Despite Sam's inaction, history continues to change for the worst. The cause is unknown until Sam discovers another time traveler on the scene, one who's determined to destroy Jimmy's family, as well as Sam.

    0 Comments
    View all
  22. Background image for Trilogy (3)
    8.0/10(483 votes)

    #21 - Trilogy (3)

    S5:E10

    July 28, 1978: Sam is an aging lawyer, recruited by Abigail, now thirty-three, to defend her when she is put on trial for the murder of Leta Aider, the woman whose daughter Abigail was accused of killing almost twenty-five years earlier.

    0 Comments
    View all
  23. Background image for Another Mother
    7.9/10(639 votes)

    #22 - Another Mother

    S2:E13

    September 30, 1981: As a divorced mother of three, Sam's job of preventing his teenage son from running away, never to be seen again, is made more interesting by the fact that his youngest daughter can see both him and Al.

    0 Comments
    View all
  24. Background image for A Little Miracle
    7.9/10(549 votes)

    #23 - A Little Miracle

    S3:E10

    December 24, 1962: On Christmas Eve, Sam leap into Reginald Pierson, valet to a wealthy contractor, who is in danger of losing his soul in an attempt to demolish a Salvation Army mission, so he can build his "Blake's Plaza." Seeing a similarity to the Dickens's character, Sam and Al decide to "Scrooge" the greed out of the man.

    0 Comments
    View all
  25. Background image for Nowhere to Run
    7.9/10(484 votes)

    #24 - Nowhere to Run

    S5:E4

    August 10, 1968: As a Marine captain whose legs were amputated after a mishap in Vietnam, Sam finds himself in a veteran's hospital, where he must prevent the suicide of a fellow patient who would rather be dead than face life paralyzed from the neck down. Making matters worse, his wife seems incapable of accepting the fact that she and Sam's host can still lead a normal life, in spite of his condition.

    0 Comments
    View all
  26. Background image for Killin' Time
    7.9/10(473 votes)

    #25 - Killin' Time

    S5:E5

    June 18, 1958: Sam leaps into a tricky situation as an escaped killer holed up in a house with a mother and daughter as hostages. Escape isn't going to be easy for either Sam or his hostages, when the real killer breaks out of the waiting room, stranding Sam in the past, destined to die at the hands of a vengeful sheriff.

    0 Comments
    View all

Best Episodes Summary

"The Leap Home (1)" is the best rated episode of "Quantum Leap". It scored 9.2/10 based on 965 votes. Directed by Joe Napolitano and written by Donald P. Bellisario, it aired on 9/28/1990. This episode scored 0.1 points higher than the second highest rated, "The Leap Home (2): Vietnam".