In “Quantum Leap”, Scott Bakula stars as Sam Beckett who is part of a team of scientists that create a time-traveling machine. Sam steps into the time machine prematurely (due to the possible cancellation of the project) and vanishes. The introduction to the show sums it up:
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 himself trapped in the past, facing mirror images that were not his own and driven by an unknown force to change history for the better. His only guide on this journey is Al, an observer from his own time, who appears in the form of a hologram that only Sam can see and hear. And so Dr. Beckett finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong and hoping each time that his next leap will be the leap home.
At which point he ‘leaps’ into the body of a particular character and has to figure out who he is and what needs fixing as fast as possible (with Al’s help, of course). By the end of the episode he has made this corner of reality a little better by solving a problem. Mostly the stories deal with someone dying and Sam helps them to live a normal life (which he never sees because he’s leapt into someone else).
At the end of the episode, you see Sam leaping to his next adventure and get just a hint of what will be happening before he says his tagline: “Oh, boy…”
In “My Name is Earl”, Jason Lee stars in the title role as a low-level crook who would steal the clothes off your back. Here’s how Earl sums up his life:
You know that guy you see, when you stop off at the convenience store in that little town on the way to Grandma's house? Sort of shifty looking fella who buys a packet of smokes, a couple'a lotto tickets and a 'Tall Boy' at 10 AM in the morning? The kind of guy you wait to come out before you and your family go in? Well... that's me. My name is Earl. And if you took the time to really get to know me, find out what kind of person I really am instead of just stereotyping me, because of the way I look... well, you'd be wasting your time. 'Cause I'm exactly who you think I am. Hell, I'll pretty much steal anything that's not nailed down.
Until he wins the lottery and then gets hit by a car on the same day. Laying the hospital bed he hears about Karma (from, of all places, Carson Daly) and thinks that this particular force has been causing all his problems. He begins to make a list of all the wrongs he’s committed in his lifetime and uses his lottery winnings to help him reverse his evil ways. With his not-too-swift brother Randy, they try to come up with a plan that will appease the victim of Earl’s original crime. Sometimes it’s hard because the victim doesn’t want the help but, in the end, he always satisfies the requirements to make Karma happy.
In both shows, the ability to make-good on an unwritten promise is there. Using money, energy, and other forces to get someone back on the right track in life. Isn’t that really what life is all about – helping one another? The problem is that not everyone has the resources to help. In the case of “Earl”, he has lottery winnings to help and the guilt of Karmic disaster to support him.
“Sam” has the desire to leap home that helps him get through his adventure. He could leap into someone’s body and be a total n’er do-well but if he doesn’t leap he won’t get home. To me it was always a cruel game of “carrot before the horse” – while he was always thinking that his next leap was the leap home, it was always to set someone else’s world right.
I think we all have the desire to do well, something just gets in the way. Knowing that we have the ability to help someone else, that should be inspiration enough.