Question on Killin' Time episode

mgcrans

Project QL Intern
Aug 24, 2005
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I have read the Killin' Time episode review on the guide and I can't find any mention of this, so I thought I would try to ask here. This has always bothered me about the episode since the first time it aired:

When Styles makes Al take him out of the waiting room and they approach Gooshi:

Why does Gooshi look at Styles and say "Dr Beckett" as if he is saying hello.

Later Styles holds up the gun and Gooshi again says: "Dr Beckett?" with a questionable tone in his voice.

I realize Styles looks like Sam to him, but Gooshi knows what the project is all about. He knows that isn't Sam. It makes no sense.

The first time I showed this episode to my mom she asked about it and I had no answer.
 
mgcrans said:
I have read the Killin' Time episode review on the guide and I can't find any mention of this, so I thought I would try to ask here. This has always bothered me about the episode since the first time it aired:

When Styles makes Al take him out of the waiting room and they approach Gooshi:

Why does Gooshi look at Styles and say "Dr Beckett" as if he is saying hello.

Later Styles holds up the gun and Gooshi again says: "Dr Beckett?" with a questionable tone in his voice.

I realize Styles looks like Sam to him, but Gooshi knows what the project is all about. He knows that isn't Sam. It makes no sense.

The first time I showed this episode to my mom she asked about it and I had no answer.

Styles: Why do you keep calling me that name!?

Gooshi: Well you look like him.

*shrug* That was Gooshi's answer to your question anyway. Interesting though, I have wondered about that.
 
Sam Beckett Fan said:
Styles: Why do you keep calling me that name!?

Gooshi: Well you look like him.

*shrug* That was Gooshi's answer to your question anyway. Interesting though, I have wondered about that.

It sure makes Gooshi's character look dumb...as if he has no idea----minute to minute---what's going on.
 
Yeah it makes it appear as if despite that Gooshi is obviously in on the whole progect and knows whats going in, that is he still missing something important.
 
I think the point is that under normal circumstances the leapee would never be let out of the waiting room unless it was actually Sam.

Since "Sam" was out of the waiting room, obviously Gooshie must have thought Sam had leapt and leapt back to the project, i.e. that it was actually Sam. Obviously he realised he was wrong when Stiles asks "Why are you calling me Dr Beckett?"
 
naggindragon said:
I think the point is that under normal circumstances the leapee would never be let out of the waiting room unless it was actually Sam.

Since "Sam" was out of the waiting room, obviously Gooshie must have thought Sam had leapt and leapt back to the project, i.e. that it was actually Sam. Obviously he realised he was wrong when Stiles asks "Why are you calling me Dr Beckett?"

I like your theory except he wouldn't he along with everyone else be informed when there is a new arrival in the waiting room, and When Al first went to the waiting room wouldn't he excuse himself by saying that he was going to check on the visitor. I think EVERYONE would be informed as a whole when the person in the waiting room is finally Sam.
 
The real reason Tommy Thompson wrote it in the script this way, I think, was to remind the audience that Leon looked like Sam, because there was no nearby mirror until later in the episode. Because of this decision, it makes Gooshie's response seem to not make sense, but I think it was just easier for Gooshie to instinctively call Leon "Dr. Beckett" because of his ditziness.

We know Gooshie knows better because not only has he been involved with the Project for at least the past 5 years at the time, but he clearly states to Al at first that "Ziggy has reviewed the preliminary data on the new leap, and..." (or something along those lines). Since I highly doubt he'd have forgotten right away, again I attribute it to his ditziness. Not unlike the time in "Mirror Image" where he makes a common sense oversight by not beginning the brainwave search for Sam on the actual day he was born.
 
also gushie hanging out with tina's pants does make him a little less smart...come on, here guys. hot girls do well, make guys go dumb...my cousins are living proof of that. some guys just can't think about anything when they are with a hot girl. remember with the leap back, "dammit ziggy tell me something i don't know!" "tina's having an affair with gushie."
 
QL Nut said:
The real reason Tommy Thompson wrote it in the script this way, I think, was to remind the audience that Leon looked like Sam, because there was no nearby mirror until later in the episode. Because of this decision, it makes Gooshie's response seem to not make sense, but I think it was just easier for Gooshie to instinctively call Leon "Dr. Beckett" because of his ditziness.

We know Gooshie knows better because not only has he been involved with the Project for at least the past 5 years at the time, but he clearly states to Al at first that "Ziggy has reviewed the preliminary data on the new leap, and..." (or something along those lines). Since I highly doubt he'd have forgotten right away, again I attribute it to his ditziness. Not unlike the time in "Mirror Image" where he makes a common sense oversight by not beginning the brainwave search for Sam on the actual day he was born.

I agree with Chris here. Even though Gooshi is obviously an intelligent guy otherwise he would not have been recruited to the project; His brain does tend to have some slip ups, like the Mirror Image example given here. As well as an example from The Leap Back. Gooshi Tells Sam that they did not know that Al was in 1945 until receiving his letters requesting the opening of the imaging chamber door. However in Leap Between the States somehow they were able to figure out where Sam had gone when he zoomed off his time line without the help of a letter. Although Leap Between the States takes place after The Leap Back it still makes not sense how they have trouble finding him without a letter once and then find him no problem without a letter another time. The fact the the leaper in The Leap Back was Al instead of Sam makes little difference because either way it was past Sam's lifetime which is the only lifetime they have in Ziggy's Data banks.

So I think Gooshi had somewhat of a slip up there in the sense that he did not consider entering other years into the data banks when they realized that Sam was not being detected anywhere in his lifetime because Al's brainwaves are also connected to Ziggy so if they had randomly typed in 1945 they should have been able to detect him there. So either way they could have figured out that someone was back in '45.

So I think Chris is right that Gooshi's mind seems to have occasional slip ups in which case that's what happened when he kept referring to Styles as Dr. Beckett. It also makes sense because I don't think Gooshi has had contact with the visitors before Styles because thats not his area of the project so it being his first contact with a visitor could have also effected his mind and caused him to speak on instincts thus addressed what he saw instead of considering what is actually there because he is not used to the Sam persona having a different person under it.
 
He was like the absent-minded professor... it works for me, especially since the writer wanted to remind the viewers who he looked like to us. Gooshie does act like a loon :eek . Or maybe he got a square whiff of that breath of his and went crazy momentarily or somethin' :lol
 
Yeah I thought of this aswell.

My view is that he's always so wrapped up in whatever he does at the project - drinking coffee etc. that he just plain didn't noticed.

I also quite like the 'absent minded professor' answer from HologramIAm!
 
Some people believe he was clutching it so tight that when he leapt the gun leapt with him.

But the truth is that a scene was cut where Stiles had a scuffle with a PQL guard and took his gun.
 
superfade said:
Tis a good question...but I'm more curious as to where styles got the gun...

Just to add to that, you can catch a glimpse of the guard's feet as he's laying on the Waiting Room floor when Styles exits. Since that can be seen in the episode, it can be explained as canon that that's what had to have happened in order for Styles to get the gun.
 
QL Nut said:
Just to add to that, you can catch a glimpse of the guard's feet as he's laying on the Waiting Room floor when Styles exits. Since that can be seen in the episode, it can be explained as canon that that's what had to have happened in order for Styles to get the gun.
Yeah I pointed that out in the Killin Time thread. I was so excited when I noticed I love it when I pick up stuff like that because I love when they do that, so it gives fans something to talk about. :)

And just to add a small something to Naggindraggins comment about the theory of the gun leaping with him; that is impossible first of all because Items have never leaped with Sam before. It is established in Her Charm that they can't when Sam wishes aloud that he could take Danna's bracelet that she gave him with him. Second Sam is holdng Stile's gun when he leaps in which is the first thing he notices upon arrival.
 
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Oh my gosh! I have always wondered where Styles got the gun, but I was never observant enough to see the guard's feet! Thank you sooo much for clearing that up!! Geeze, I might have to go and watch that episode now just to see it! Haha, Quantum Leap spazz-out. Thanks again!