Which
Sliders episode... (poll)
Date: 06/26/2002
From: ThomasMalthus
About a year ago, I asked the board which "Sliders" ep had the worst alternate history. Now I'm asking you which ep had the best.Partially this goes back to a discussion I had with Recall317 and SL4ever about cool character stories and alt worlds. This also carries over to gimmicks, I think. Even though "PTSS", "The Guardian" and "Double Cross" would make most everyone's top ten episode list, but none of them really have fantastic alternate histories.
Which raises the question: is "Sliders" really a show about alternate worlds or is that just the setting? Are eps better when the plot directly connects to the allohistorical content, or worse?
Before I weigh in myself, I'd like to say that I think "Obsession" is an episode whose alternate history is underrated. Although psychic ability is not explainable by science, the episode does (I think) explain believably how this world's history came to be (if you presuppose that psychic ability actually exists).
Also, sometimes it's more fun to just celebrate the differences between worlds without having to actually explain what the divergence point was. For example: "The King is Back" doesn't say what made this world different. Remmy speculates that if he'd gone with Jack he would've been a superstar, but it obviously didn't cause all the changes of that world. On the other hand, "The Weaker Sex" weakens its own plot by suggesting that women got tired of men killing each other and took over the world centuries ago. It would have made more sense for the assumption to be that the society was matriarchal all along, just as ours has been patriarchal, rather than try to picture some sort of women's revolution.
Anyway, which ep do you think had the best alternate history?
The
Pilot
Date: 06/26/2002
From: Grizzlor
The Soviet invasion scenario was the most well-thought out. Other eps. showed San Fran or the USA with only minor changes. Others, particularly season 3, were just plain crazy. Season 4 had many outlandish yet revolutionary ideas. Season 5 was a farce from alternate history aspect. It got so absurd sometimes. So I would concentrate on Season 1 and 2. But clearly, The pilot was the most well-established and all encompassing.
Easy
Slider.
Date: 06/26/2002
From: Brand_S
Come on, it makes so much SENSE!Seriously, Prince of Wails, if only because from reading enough Tormé interviews you can pinpoint the exact circumstances of the exact second the world diverged. That one little spark (one soldier not missing when he shot at George Washington) started alternate ramifications of rapidly, exponentially increasing magnitude, and here we have a world where everyone is a limey.
To
the Revolution: "Weaker Sex" + more
Date: 06/26/2002
From: Recall317
Those who do not learn history are doomed to write subpar scripts. :)First off, great observations, TM. I agree "The Weaker Sex" damaged itself by having a societal upheaval vs a matriarchical society since time gone by. "The world is this way because it is this way" would have been a valid argument. And you can usually get away with that in worlds that depend on cultural differences because lord knows we have a difficult enough time explaining why our own earth is the way it is.
But there's a greater flaw. The very idea that a world run by women would be war free flies smack in the face of reality. Why should women be any less warmongering then men? There's no evidence in our history to support it. Some of the most bloodthirsty and vicious monarchs were queens.
The authors of "The Weaker Sex" fall victim to an order they'd LIKE to see vs an order they'd LIKELY see. The model should have been "Eggheads" where Wade comments that they're supposed to be in some sort of elevated society but things are just as twisted as they were back home.
When "The Weaker Sex" operates on that level, it is brilliant satire. And fortunately it operates there 95% of the episode.As for alt-history, I think "Fever" is one of the most complex of the lot. Not everything is told on screen, but you can read a lot between the lines. A disease is being used as a means of class warfare and through context clues, you can derive that it's a national crisis being instigated from above. We only get to see a small slice of it. But the timeframes, motives, and results appear consistent and the scenario is certainly plausible.
R317
Wow...
Date: 06/26/2002
From: Slider_Quinn21
This question is too big for BT to handle...There are a few that I like and actually very few that I do. The episodes behind them are good, but the worlds are unlikely.
I liked "Russia World" from the Pilot. Its definately one of those worlds that would be completely possible and oddly close and far to Earth Prime at the same time.
Then, the problem with some of the rest of the episodes is that they were set up so "someone" was in control. Whether it be smart people, women, gangsters, or "aliens".
While those worlds were also cool, they seemed a little too unlikely also.
Like TM said, the episodes that were the best were the worlds with casual differences that really affected the characters. We could say that there are creative alternate worlds, but the Sliders were always able to count those worlds out as crazy and try to "fix" them.
So, oddly enough, I think my favorite world was the one from "World Killer." And the reason wasn't even mentioned on screen.
Its because of a line cut out of the final cut that talked about the religious differences between the two worlds. Its the part where someone asks one of the nuns why she wears a rock on a string, and she says its because that's the way Jesus was killed on her world.
I don't know why but I always thought that was very intriguing and thought-provoking. And surprising since it came from the Season 4 guys.
So, that's my answer. My very VERY long answer...
I
say... Fever
Date: 06/26/2002
From: Slider_Sarah
give BT a fever!!Good question! I had to think about this carefully. There was rarely an alternate history I was completely happy with.
Fever is simplistic and believable in it's history. One small difference can devastate things.
But it is hard to write a comprehensive alternate history. At Hull university where I almost went but didn't(I chose to go elsewhere), they do a module called 'Virtual History' which is this kinda thing. I've tried it for my fanfics, and one I went back as far as 1830 to make a minor difference there in Europe that could forever change the face of the world (I added a war in somewhere basically). I still have my timeline and it's not bad really... shame the fanfic hasn't been finished.
Damn
you, Recall...
Date: 06/26/2002
From: SpaceTime
Enough with Fever already! ;PI think the most "immersive" world we saw was Hoover Double Prime in "Time Again and World." Nothing was left unexplained... except the bizarre mess of the plot. :P
Personally, I dug "The Alternateville Horror" for all the little touches. Close to Earth Prime, except they clearly have fusion technology and easy-to-build nuclear reactors. Acid rain, Santa Monica Bay catching fire from all the chemicals in it (not far from the truth) - but my favorite line is where the scientist introduces himself as John Smith.
Maggie: What kind of an idiot checks into a hotel with the name 'John Smith'?
John: I *realize* it is *not* a very common name...
That, and that the translation of John in Greek is the god of lost objects... kills me every time.
Peace,
ST
I'd
go with "Last Days"
Date: 06/26/2002
From: The_Seer
Could this be BT's last day???*****
The atomic bomb was one of the most significant developments of the 20th century and the impacts are being felt even today (i.e. the concern over the possibility of Pakistan and India developing their own atomic bombs). I really liked the way they dealt with it in this episode, with Einstein actually sacrificing his own reputation (by lying about his findings) in order to prevent the atomic bomb from being unleashed on the world. This episode also had one of the best endings of any episode and showed that, while they usually made a positive impact, the sliders could have a negative impact on the worlds they visited, even if it was unintentional.
Certainly there are other worthy candidates but it's kind of hard for me to go along with Russia world in "The Pilot" and British world in "Prince of Wails" as being the best alternate worlds simply because they were too predictable. Did Russia world have to mean K.G.B agents dragging U.S. citizens out of their homes in the middle of the night? Did British world have to mean the U.S. is ruled by a Monarchy? To me, it's not much different than the sliders landing on a world where the U.S. is ruled by Germany and, lo and behold, the Germans happen to be Nazis.
P.S. Despite what may be perceived as me putting down both "The Pilot" and "Prince of Wails", I really do love both episodes.
"It
isn't fair, it isn't right!"
Date: 06/26/2002
From: MissingSliderRyan
BT brought to you by Tessie Hutchinson in Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery"http://www.underthesun.cc/Classics/Jackson/TheLottery/
I have to go with Luck of the Draw. It reminded me so much of Jackson's "The Lottery" when I was watching it especially when they were riding in the limo and the lottery official was telling them about the White Card.
Lottery official: It's society's way of saying thanks.Quinn: Thanks for what?
Lottery official: Thanks for playing the lottery. What else? <laughs>
In "The Lottery," there was mention of the boys guarding piles of stones which to me was strange along with the fanfare surrounding the lottery with the box full slips of the names of everyone in that town. There was mention of an old saying, "Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon." To me this lottery was a sacrificial ritual in the beginning of this town then later passed on but the ritual itself along with the significance of it was lost. The slips of paper were used instead of wood because of the population explosion in that town. Nothing was left except the black box, the lists, and the stoning of the person who drew the paper with the black mark.
The world the Sliders slid to was one of low population, no crime, plenty of resources and high standard of living. The lottery on this world was population control where the winner was given a White Card, where no merchant could not refuse and his/her family was treated well the rest of their lives.Quinn and Arturo discussed the nature of the lottery.
Quinn: It's barbaric.Arturo: On the contrary, my boy. In some ways it's more humane than our society.
Quinn: Professor! They kill people to limit the population.
Arturo: And in our world, millions of people die every year through war, famine, disease, caused in part by the fact that we refuse to accept limits on our population. Here, they kill volunteers -- painlessly -- and generously reward their beneficiaries. Now, you may abhor their methods, as indeed do I, but as a man of science, you can not dismiss the result.
On that world, the sacrifices of the few have helped many. Given this society's attitude in making way, it is the right choice. The scientist in me sees the logic in that thinking, but it also devalues life to a point where it's far easier to play the lottery, win the millions and then die in the morning. Consequences of your actions just prior to your death are meaningless. Responsibility goes out of the window and irrational behavior sets in because you aren't going to be around much longer. Yes, your family will reap the rewards of your sacrifice as does society in the whole, but down the line, if a cataclysmic disaster takes place and whittles down the population even more, will that world survive? Most probably not.
MSR
Luck
of the Draw as well
Date: 06/26/2002
From: TemporalFlux
Gotta go with MSR, though for somewhat different reasons. In a college literature class at the time, I had read "The Lottery" not long before LotD first aired. As such, the similarities really jumped out at me...but what impressed me was how Povill managed to actually tie the concept to our own history.Of course I'm referring to the Reverend Thomas Malthus (a familiar name to be sure ;-). Relegated to mostly a footnote in Economics and Philosophy texts, the views of Malthus are a fine example of those small, widely forgotten bits of history that could make all the difference if one small thing changed. For instance, Malthus was ignored in our history because the majority saw the slaughter of war as the only needed population control - anything else would be excess. But what if a world had not experienced as much war up to that point? What if there actually was general peace on earth and good will toward men? While never flatly stated in the episode, this is the assumption we are left with.
On LotD world, they found their solution in the thoughts of Thomas Malthus. And not breaking character...it was a peaceful solution. Of course, this was damaged in the story by the appearance of the pro-lifers to a degree; but I also know that wasn't Povill's idea. Fox forced Povill to include these demonstrators - not for some political reason and not specifically. Fox wanted more action in the episode, and that's what Povill came up with. Povill's original thought was that this world had no problems with the system...only the Sliders did. So I tend to look at the story as it was intended...not what Fox forced it to be.
In any case, this is my choice. In my opinion, the framework of LotD world was probably the best - both for its subtlty and its starkness.
Tf
temporalflux@hotmail.com
http://dimensionofcontinuity.com
Let
them eat juicy babies!!
Date: 06/27/2002
From: Dexibal_Lector
:-<I unfortunately don't have a copy of "Luck of the Draw" in front of me and it has been ages since I last saw it so I do have some questions. How often were groups of people killed? How many people died at a time? It was half a dozen along with Wade, wasn't it? Something like that. Did this happen in every city in the US or just in San Francisco and "winners from all over the country” were flown in?
Let's assume for the sake of argument that 6 people die a week in each of the top 100 major metropolitan areas. That's 600 people dying each week, or 31,200 a year. That's not even as many as die from car wrecks in an average year! (over 40,000) True, we're talking an additional 31 thousand above and beyond all causes of death we have here in this world. But given that over 2 million people die every year (according to http://www.disastercenter.com/cdc/dethrate.html) I don’t think that another 31 thousand would mean a whole lot in terms of population control, especially when you lose the hundreds of thousands of people who die from crime each year since this is a peaceful world,
A total of 4,040,121 births were reported in 2001. So to keep our current population at the same level, we’d have to kill approximately 2 million people on top of the 2 million who die from other causes. To reduce the population in any meaningful way we’d have to kill twice as many. To kill 2 million people a year, you’d have to kill almost 5,500 people EVERY day!
Okay, so maybe this parallel world started sooner than now and so would initially have to kill less people each year to maintain an equilibrium. Well, the earliest birth numbers I can find in a casual search show that there were 4,065,014 births ten years ago in 1992. (I have the government statistic links if anyone cares) So you’d have to go pretty far back in time to make the kill number dip much below 2 million every year.
(And given that not even CHINA, with their brutal methods, has had much success enforcing birth control, I doubt any “free” society would have much more success. Parallel worlds does not change basic human nature)
Then there is the matter of payment to family members. The lottery winners get the reward of their family members being taken care of for life. Let’s say the winners average three family members each and that it costs a 100,000 dollars a year to “take care” of someone. This is very low, personally I think it would take a lot more money, but let’s say a hundred grand.
If you kill 31,200 a year, that translates to $100,000 going to each 93,600 family members a year, which is $9,360,000,000 (or 9.3 BILLION dollars) a year! And that is just one year’s batch of winner’s family members being taken care of. Next year the cost rises to $18.7 billion, $28.06 billion in Year 3, and so on. Within the first decade the cost would exceed 100 Billion dollars EACH YEAR, just to keep the promise of supporting the family members of the winners. Even if you reduce it to only one family member, we’re still talking over 30 billion dollars after only the first decade with 3.1 billion more being added each year.
None of this includes the cost of giving the winners “everything they want” for their final day, running the lottery, enforcing it, carrying out the executions, or the funeral and burial costs.
So what? Our government spends 3 billion a year just on toilet seats and hammers, right?
Maybe so, but if we get more realistic and say 2 million people need to die each year, you can see how quickly the numbers get out of hand. I just don’t think this system would work in a realistic world. The only way it could work is if it had begun 100 years ago, back when the population was low enough you could get ahead of population growth. The only problem is, if the population was that low, who would ever foresee the need to limit growth? And the Soviet Union showed us what happens if you spend too much of your GNP on something that doesn’t promote more financial growth (in their case, the military). The Soviets didn’t last 40 years spending their money like exwives with a card their husband forgot to turn off.
This entire long boring post is just my reasoning why I don’t find the LOTD world very realistic. I’ll offer my own ep for you all to shot holes in tomorrow! ;-)
As
a card carrying member of
Date: 06/27/2002
From: MissingSliderRyan
Cannibals Anonymous, I am entitled to eat anyone at any time.
~~~ Cannibal Arturo
>>>> I unfortunately don't have a copy of "Luck of the Draw" in front of me and it has been ages since I last saw it so I do have some questions.You're in luck, I've got a copy. ;-) Anything reason to watch this episode again, I'll take.
>>>> How often were groups of people killed?Nothing specific was told except for a short conversation between the lottery official and Arturo.
The lottery official said, "Every day I work with lottery winners. Good, decent men and women making honorable sacrifices for society.
>>>> How many people died at a time? It was half a dozen along with Wade, wasn't it? Something like that.In the lottery drawing, 12 people were chosen.
>>> Did this happen in every city in the US or just in San Francisco and "winners from all over the country” were flown in?According to the Right to Life leaflet given to Quinn, Arturo said, "My, God, it says the lottery has killed 50,000 people nationwide.
In the beginning of episode, Arturo asks a bystander, "Is there a limit to the lottery."
The man replies, "Are you from out of state?"
Remmy adds, "In a manner of speaking, yes."
The man smiles saying, "The sky's the limit. The more you take, the more the chances to win."
Apparently, there are limits in other areas of the country, but not in San Francisco.
MSR
But
is the Cannibals Anon. card white?
Date: 06/27/2002
From: Callie21V
Beginning Dext must be EATEN!!!As to another of your questions, DL, it *was* emphasized that the Lottery wasn't the only means of population control. Click the second photo on this page and you'll get the idea. :-D
http://members.fortunecity.com/mdim121/photo/s1e10.htm
Still haven't picked my top alternate history. Maybe tomorrow.
>>> C/21
Good,
good...
Date: 06/27/2002
From: Sliding_Skull
BTW, I wish BT was DOA!!That picks up my questions, thanks! :-P So they do 12 at a time, but only 50,000 nationally. Presumeably that's per year. Going back to my money discussion, that would cost an even 5 billion a year if one family member per winner got "taken care of" with 100 grand.
That BC cola ad was LOL and maybe the convinence would help stem the tide a little, but reduce 4 million births a year in half?
This was an entertaining ep by all means, and I'm not serious about nitpicking the alt world because it holds up better than most (especially with that billboard to imply there is even more than that going on which the Sliders didn't see) but personally I don't think you could kill enough people to matter, and even if you could you couldn't pay off their families without going broke. And without the payoffs, the people who would risk life for free money would be quickly thinned out by the process.
Have any of your read the "Ringworld" series? In it, Larry Niven puts forward the idea of "breeding luck." In his universe, you have to win a lottery to be allowed to have more than one child. What if two people born because their parents won the lottry got together and had a kid? What if that kid married someone who was the child of two lucky parents and THEY had a kid? After six or seven generations of this, you'd have some very lucky people!
Kinda the reverse of this would happen in LOTD world. All the morons stupid enough to play the lottery would soon be bred out of the human race. The state Powerballs would reach a Trillion dollars and no one would care. :-P
Well
let's see
Date: 06/27/2002
From: TemporalFlux
First there's the problem of killing enough people to matter. If that
world had started today with today's population...I could see it. But,
that's not the case. We are led to believe this world had been following
this system since Thomas Malthus wrote his essay on population in 1798.
Around this time frame, there were approximately 1 billion people on earth:
http://www.prb.org/Content/NavigationMenu/PRB/Educators/Human_Population/
Population_Growth/Population_Growth.htm
200 years later when we find "Luck of the Draw" world, the world population is 500 million. Could 200 years of the Lottery system coupled with birth control measures change the population accordingly? I believe so if the system was strictly adhered to - and by all apearances it was on that world.
Next we have the problem of money. I think the problem is trying to examine their economy through the eyes of our own. Going by what we are shown, there was little to no war on LotD world. Greatly lessened defense spending would be a likely result of that. We also see that there is less and less welfare spending - it is even mentioned that the last homeless person won the lottery not long before LotD. This frees up alot of money - thus meaning that the bulk of resources could be devoted to the lottery. To take a gander, let's look at our current national debt thanks to our old friend Ed Hall:
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
We're able to function to the tune of 6 trillion dollars in debt? We can extend ourselves more than one would think...especially if the entire world was in cooperation as we are left to believe LotD world was.
That's not to say you don't have a point. It was unrealistic to say in the episode that each lottery winner won 5 million dollars (which comes up to 250 trillion just for those 50,000). I can overlook that to a degree, though. It was a glitch created because Povill wasn't thinking within his own bounds. Povill had already established early in the episode that the economy of this world was extremely different - 12 apples for 25 cents? 2 cents per apple? Obviously the dollar went alot further on that world - and this should have been taken in account with the lottery winnings. In today's world, you would probably be looking at 40 cents per apple - so you're looking at 20 times difference. 100,000 per winner would have been ample - that would translate to 2 million by our economy. 5 million (as stated in the ep) was overkill - do we really want to think they were giving each winner the equivalent of 100 million dollars?
If we assume that America's population shrunk to 25,000,000 (about 1/10 what our American population - 5% of the population on LotD world just as we are 5% of our world's pop), then a tax of 200 dollars a head would generate the needed 5 billion per year in revenue to give 100,000 to each lottery winner. Obviously it would have to spread through the different classes (the upper classes paying more and the lower less), but in the end what are we talking about? By our economic equivalent, that would only be 4000 dollars per year in tax per person. That's not terribly off from what we end up with if you were to average all the classes together in a per head value. And, of course, this tax would serve a double purpose on Lottery world - it would help finance the system, but it would also entice more people to play the lottery at least a little each year (thus perpetuating the system).
Of course, all of this could probably be endlessly debated...but that's one reason I picked LotD as the best alternate history. It's a history that really makes you think and examine many facets of our life on earth.
Tf
temporalflux@hotmail.com
http://dimensionofcontinuity.com
Original URL http://bboard.scifi.com/bboard/browse.cgi/1/5/545/1501802
Nominated by TemporalFlux
