Battles rage eternally against the whirlwinds of time, sin and men | MARK HUGHES COBB

Longer I enjoy "The Blacklist," the more I feel James Spader's Red may be a life role model.

For those who don't jump on bandwagons as they roll merrily along, but wait 'til they're abandoned, weeds crawling up wheel wells, forlorn in a burnt-out Iowa cornfield where shooks shimmer to constant winds with voices like banshees — in Ye Olden Dayes, it was called "reruns" — streaming services can be a blessing.

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We can bookmark promising shows, documentaries, narrative films, or whatever, with the idea that a spare hour or two may emerge for leisure. You can check 'em out, then uncheck, if they don't land for you.

For example, I'm ambivalent about both of Natassha Lyonne's vehicles, "Poker Face" and "Russian Doll." In the former, the poodle-cut veteran actor plays a ramblin' gal ― on the run from both mobsters and the law, a hoary yet proven premise — whose gift is she can tell people are lying.

I share this superpower: You know they're lying 'cause their lips are moving.

Rotating guest stars and landscapes, reminiscent of classic adventure/crime series such as "Route 66" and "The Fugitive," kept it rolling. For the latter, the surreality didn't cook for me. Seemed tired, overly mannered.

But as they're stored, I may go back and dip in again, after I restrain the impulse to force-feed their star a lozenge. Her voice reeks of whiskey and smoke, not necessarily bad things, but my downtime prefers them in moderation.

Bingeing does have drawbacks. Little things that seem cute and quirky in the beginning can begin to grate; the grit of agitation becomes pearls of indignation. Not unlike being married.

Trapped within layers of recurring scenarios, different than but linked to the rest, can intrigue. Is it a multiverse, a mental illness, or all-powerful outside force ― Don Bellisario ― mastermind behind the two "Quantum Leap" series?

In the 1989-1993 original, Scott Bakula plays Sam Beckett ― not the playwright, though Sam patiently goes about others' business while waiting for God(ot) to return him home ― who becomes an instrument of universal change, butterfly-effect moments. They ranged from a veterans' wife holding out for his return, though he's been marked killed in action, to trying to stop the JFK assassination. Sam leapt into that two-parter from a couple of places, including inside Lee Harvey Oswald. Suffering partial amnesia, Sam as Oswald is unaware of who he actually is, so that story escalated like a slow-motion nightmare.

The 2022 NBC reboot picks up after Sam. The Quantum Leap project restarts, 30 years after its inventor got sucked back into alternate lives. New hot-stuff physicist Ben Song (Raymond Lee) leaps, for unknown reasons. Like Sam's, his memories fragment. Links to the future/present, and the QL project, remain tenuous.

I couldn't get into the sequel, because the initial run, despite a finale cobbled together when creator Bellisario found it probably wouldn't be renewed for a sixth season, felt rounded, complete. It ended with Sam meeting Godot, er, God, or a god, as a friendly bartender, played by, I kid you not, D-Day from "Animal House," somewhat fleshier, still with that jovial yet intimidating leer. Sam completes one of his most heart-rending missions, then in silence comes a card reading "Sam Becket (sic) never returned home." Fade to black; credits.

Yes, the card misspelled its lead's name. If the Internet had been at current strength in 1993, instead of its then-nascent phase in colleges and government institutions, speculation would have exploded as to what the mispelling meant. Was it a hint there was more than one leaper, perhaps an ur-Sam setting the path, or a darker counterpart, a demon, working to craft chaos out of order?

Could it be a slightly ajar door for a season six ... or 22 years later, a sequel?

I'll check back in later, hoping the sequel comes to grips with Sam, still out there in an eternal war against ennui, stupidity, cupidity, and plain old evil. As the cliche sorta goes, there's no rest for the weary, or for those who would battle wickedness. We see you, Kal-El.

Thirty years later, my time leaps instead to "Blacklist," which over 10 seasons won raves, awards and buzz; it spun off another show, novels, a video game, comics.

And oh, my friend Diany Rodriguez, UA theater kid, jumps on board, in season eight, I think.

There's gold support, obviously ― way to go Diany, aka Weecha Xiu ― for a solid premise: The FBI forms a task force focused on a black book of evildoers, some previously unknown, or thought of as myths. The key belongs to Spader, as the FBI's No. 1 Most Wanted, Raymond "Red" Reddington. Spader matches Gary Oldman, in "Slow Horses," as indefatigable aces-in-the-hole who seem to be having the insouciant times of their lives.

One day Red shows up, with reasons for alliance best left to the unfolding. In return for assistance, Red guides the FBI to monsters. It's an episodic structure ― with running subplots ― and villains o' the week who, like Red, turn out to be more than they appear.

It is a dark-comic show, but comic indeed, thanks to sly Spader as master manipulator, a man who relishes life, as long as it's his own, or those of others not in his way.

If Red were inclined to write rules, they might go like this:

Treat any tiny thing with childlike fascination. Find joy in moments.

Savor words. Never give straight answers; tell stories/parables.

Smile at the folly of who you were. Shoulder baggage.

Always have a plan, even if no one else can tell you have it. Especially if they can't tell.

Help scour the world of monsters.

Be fanatically devoted to those worth time and love.

Pop the rest, two in the chest ….

That last bit needs refinement.

Red's a monster, but for now, on the side of good. An avenging an ... something ... with a smoking gun for a flaming sword.

Mark Hughes Cobb is the editor of Tusk. Reach him at mark.cobb@tuscaloosanews.com.

This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Antiheroes: 'Good, bad... I'm the guy with the gun' | MARK HUGHES COBB