
Former scientist Sam Beckett finds himself trapped in time due to an experiment gone awry, leaping into the body of a different person each week. Al Calavicci, at first known only as The Observer, is Sam's holographic adviser -- he provides Sam with some details about his new identity and gives him guidance on how to help the people affected by his presence. But with little memory to help guide him, our hero is forced to bluff his way through many a wacky situation.

Sam leaps into Al's life as a young Navy pilot and must prevent his execution after he is wrongly accused of rape and murder.

Sam becomes a mentally impaired dockworker whose sister-in-law (Laura Harrington) wants to put him in an institution.

As a Southern lawyer in 1957, Sam defends a black housekeeper (Tyra Ferrell) accused of killing her employer and lover.

Sam assumes the existence of a stage understudy who must prevent a ruinous fall by the show's drunken lead (John Cullum).