Sam Beckett

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Dr. Samuel John Beckett is a fictional character and the protagonist on the 1989-1993 science fiction television series Quantum Leap, played by Scott Bakula.^[1]

Initially, the audience knows very little about Beckett, much as he knows little about himself due to holes in his memory dubbed the "Swiss cheese effect"—a side effect from the time travel (an effective trope to allow the writers to add to the character as the show went on). Eventually, it is revealed that Beckett is a true Renaissance Man, equally good at math and science and the arts. His skills allow him to adapt to the various situations in which he finds himself, although many of those situations still take him off guard with comical results.

Beckett tends to fall in love easily, yet be naive about women; his travelling companion Al Calavicci has playfully called him a "Boy Scout."

He also learned painful things from his past that likely inspired him to travel through time in the first place. Beckett tries to do the right thing no matter what, although when the leaps hit close to home, he tends to lose perspective and make irrational decisions; at those times, he requires Al to guide him back to the right path.