"Journeyman" Recap & Review - "Game Three"

Journeyman
"Game Three"

Original Air Date: October 8, 2007

Jeff L - TwoCents Staff Writer

Vasser and his wife are talking. She’s asking him if it’s something he was born with like a genetic condition. We’re meant to think she’s talking about his Quantum Leaps, but she’s actually talking about his leaving up the toilet seat. She jumps in the shower and Vasser starts to strip down to join her, but only gets his shoes off before he’s traveling.

He awakes, shoeless, in 1989. It must be 1989 because Field of Dreams is playing at the movie theater. He’s trying to figure out what year it is when he sees signs for game 3 of the world series. Suddenly a two men nearly knock him down as they fight on the street. The attacker tries to push the victim into his van, but Vasser rescues him and they run and hide out behind an Asteroids and Galaga machine in a nearby arcade.

The rescued man introduces himself, Alan Pratt (John Billingsley, Enterprise). He tells Vasser that the he didn’t know his attacker, but Vasser thinks something else might be up. He travels Back to the Future and his wife has to bring him his shoes since he showed up outside of his office in present day. Vasser realizes that he had Leaped back to right before the big San Francisco earthquake and reads about the victims of the quake, including his boss’ sister. Katie asks Vasser if he ever met anyone he knows in the past and he lies and says no. He Leaps back to 1989, the first time he’s ever gone to the same place in the past. This time Livia (Moon Bloodgood, whom I’ve decided has the coolest name ever if she were a werewolf/vampire) is there waiting for him. She says she saw him on his last Leap but he ran off before she could stop him. She tells him that sometimes you travel to the same day because whatever it is they are supposed to do in the past they haven’t done it yet. So then Jeffrey and Bogg get out their Omni and (Ok, I’m kidding. Does anyone even remember Voyagers?)

Livia tells Vasser that she was traveling before they were together but it stopped right before she met him. Vasser’s watch is broken and Livia loans him hers. Vasser makes a few frantic phone calls to the police to try and warn them about the earthquake that is about to hit, but they don’t listen to him. Vasser is frustrated and turns around to see Alan Pratt walking into a bar. He follows him in and overhears him trying to be $50K on some games. The bookie won’t take his action since he owes money all over town. Vasser confronts him and Pratt spills the beans that he’s $448,072 in debt. Vasser tells him about his old addiction to poker. He almost lost his family because of it. Pratt says that doesn’t matter to him because his wife already left him. Pratt likes the sound of playing some poker though. I guess California didn’t have any card rooms back in 1989 and it would ruin the plot for Pratt to just go to Vegas, so he bribes Vasser into getting him into his old poker game. Pratts got the gamble pretty bad and he’s almost at rock bottom. He’s been through 12 step programs and therapy and tried all kinds of prescription medication, but nothing has cured him. He joins the poker game and Vasser leaps back to present day.

He tells his wife about being back in 1989 and she’s worried he’s going to get killed in the earthquake. Vasser tells Katie that he’s not going to be killed and that he can feel that there’s something he needs to do in 1989, he just doesn’t know what it is.

Back at work his boss is on him for the story he’s working on, but his source hasn’t called him yet. He tracks down his cop brother and asks him about how someone could warn the police if they knew an earthquake was coming, but his brother thinks he’s crazy or on the drugs again. His source finally calls but just as he answers he Leaps. He decides to pretend to be a terrorist this time and tells the police that he’s got bombs planted on all the bridges and tunnels around the city, since that’s where the people died in the earthquake. Livia shows up and tells him that she doesn’t think he’s there to save all the people who died in the earthquake and that pretending to be a terrorist isn’t going to work. A nosey bartender overhears them talking and calls the police. (Who that have happened in a pre-September 11th, world? I doubt it.) As they sit in the bar, Vasser sees his boss’ sister walking down the street and thinks it’s her he might be there to save from being killed in the earthquake. He starts to follow her, but runs into Pratt again, who asks for his bribe money back so he can get back in the poker game. They argue on the street and the cops show up. Vasser throws him the money and ducks into an alley where the cops chase him, but since they don’t have a flux capacitor or a warp drive, they can’t catch him since he jumps Back to the Future again.

Vasser asks his boss about his sister, but he doesn’t walk to talk about it. He looks her up online and finds out where she works. He tells his wife to talk to his source because he’s going to get fired if he doesn’t get the story on which he is working. He travels again and this time he goes to his boss’ sister’s job and asks her to meet him for a drink after work.

If he can keep her in the bar for a half hour she won’t be in the tunnel when the earthquake hits. Back in present day, Katie gets the call from the source, who’s having second thoughts about spilling the beans on the rigged bidding at the Capri Center. Katie talks him down and since she used to be a reporter she gets the information out of him.

Back in 1989, Livia and Vasser are in the bar waiting. They start talking and Vasser lets is slip that he’s married to Katie, his brother’s ex. Livia and Vasser get into it and the sister shows up and overhears them. She decides she doesn’t want to get involved and she was suspicious of Vasser to begin with so she’s storms out. Vasser tries to chase her down, but the good Samaritans in the bar stop him.

Back in present day Vasser’s wife tells him she’s got the story for him and stops for lunch with her ex. Officer Vasser tells Katie that he thinks Vasser is back on drugs and that Vasser told him he had met Livia in the past. Katie blows him off and heads to the Chronicle to help with the story. Vasser asks around and finds out that Pratt had killed himself three days after the earthquake. His wife shows up and he’s trying to Quantum Leap, but is unable to. He takes off his jacket and throws it as Katie tells him that she had lunch with his brother, but he’s not there to hear her. He’s back in 1989 and he grabs Pratt from the poker game and drags him out onto the street. They fight and Pratt goes back into the building with the backroom poker game, just as the earthquake hits. Vasser digs him out of the rubble and Pratt is laughing because he is happy to be alive. Livia shows up and they talk about Katie. He tells her that he is happy with Katie and leaps back to the future. Now Alan Pratt is an attorney who defends those who are helpless. He’s just gotten two innocent people released from prison. All is right with the world, Vasser talks to his boss about his sister and for the first time he talks about her death. Back home, there’s more trouble though, since Katie finds Livia’s watch in Vasser’s jacket. 4 out of 5 stars.