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Why is SLIDERS not the show SYFY is relaunching?

Mutara Nebula 1967

Mutara Nebula 1967

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Captain
Has ANYONE been clamoring for an ALIEN NATION relaunch?

Yet, SLIDERS is still talked about today on many message boards. It ALMOST had all of its Seasons released on DVD (Some Series only get the FIRST year out even when they were MUCH bigger hits like MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW for instance-before the DVD are abandoned.

If SY FY wants an audience...bring back SLIDERS...if Jerry O'Connell doesn't want to do it they probably could at least get him for a two hour show to tie up loose ends and relaunch the show with some or all of the original cast.

I'm always amazed with all these remakes that SLIDERS is constantly overlooked.
 
Sliders along with Earth Final Conflict are possibility the most underrated shows of all time.

Sliders up until the end of S2 was brilliant other than the cheesiness due to budget. S3-S4 the writing took a dip but was still a good show. As much as I love rembrant I like to pretend S5 didn't happen.

EFC was excellent all the way through S4. Production quality was excellent all the way through.
 
What people talk about on Internet message boards is not representative of what audiences as a whole want to see, since the people who post on Internet message boards are a tiny and nonrepresentative sample of the general population. Tons of people on the Internet talked about Firefly, yet it bombed in the ratings. And tons of people watch cheesy reality shows, soap operas, and game shows, yet I hardly ever see any Internet discussion of those, not around here, anyway.

I have a suspicion that SyFy's interest in an Alien Nation revival is an attempt to capitalize on the upcoming Peter Jackson-produced film District 9, which is built on a similar premise: aliens crashland in South Africa and are restricted to quarantine camps. The executives are probably thinking that if that film does well, they'd like to have something similar in the works to capitalize on it, and Alien Nation is the obvious candidate.

If at some point there's a successful film or show based on travel among alternate histories, that may spark a Sliders revival.
 
Honestly, I think SyFy isn't going with Sliders or a number of reasons, such as lack of mainstream recognition and the fact that most scifi viewers prefer arc based shows nowadays instead of the standalone format of the original show. That said, it would be easy to modify the show so that 2-3 episodes are spent on each universe encountered, but then they would need better writers to flesh out those universes, otherwise you get some really horrible/unimaginative alt. verses.
 
I wasn't a big fan of Alien Nation, but I did like it better than Sliders. I think Alien Nation gives SyFy a chance to make an adult, edgy type of show that will probably deal with contemporary issues, a companion piece to Caprica perhaps.

To be honest, I haven't seen much clamoring for either AN or Sliders. I did think Tembe Locke was very cute though. I would clamor to see her again.
 
ZeNd said:
Sliders along with Earth Final Conflict are possibility the most underrated shows of all time.

Sliders up until the end of S2 was brilliant other than the cheesiness due to budget. S3-S4 the writing took a dip but was still a good show. As much as I love rembrant I like to pretend S5 didn't happen.

EFC was excellent all the way through S4. Production quality was excellent all the way through.
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Season 1 + 2 = 22 episodes.
Season 3 + 4 + 5 = 65 episodes.

It's amazing how the shear hoard like number of shitty episode don't sink the good ones?

I watched the final season recently, all of it really, but there wasn't no serious drop in anything from seasons 2 through 5.
 
SyFy also may think more audiences can relate to an otherwise straightforward buddy cop show (albeit with some people dressed with large rubber headcaps, I grant you) than a show about many different parallel Earths...
 
So, SyFylis is planning an Alien Nation relaunch or reboot? This is all news to me.
 
Well, I also think it most likely that SyFy has jumped on Alien Nation because of the upcoming District 9 feature film; I imagine SyFy wouldn't mind having a similar, name brand product on their channel when that feature film is being talked about (and purchased on DVD).

With Sliders, you have something that the networks have unfortunately never figured out how to market, and that's generally what keeps them away from it. Of course, it's a pretty simple proposition to market it if characters were made the focus on the advertising. The "hidden" premise of Sliders is that of misfits fitting in. Here would be my rough stab at a campaign:

Wade Welles is a dreamer who failed to find a direction in life; Rembrandt Brown is a soul singer who failed to hold on to his fifteen minutes of fame; Professor Arturo is an accomplished scientist who failed to gain the recognition he deserved; and Quinn Mallory is a genius college student who just failed to discover anti-gravity...but he discovered something else.

Sliders - a daring adventure through what might have been and what could be. Becoming lost is sometimes the best way to find where you belong.
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In any case, Universal's general pattern is to revisit their properties every 25 to 30 years (i.e. Knight Rider, Bionic Woman, Battlestar Galactica); so we can probably look for something Sliders related in 2025 or so. On the other hand, there's been talk for years that Steven Spielberg has some kind of parallel universe movie he's wanting to make; so a huge success on that could accelerate the process.
 
District 9 also popped into my head when I saw the remake, although to be fair when I saw the first trailer for District 9 I thought of Alien Nation.

BTW, I wouldn't be shocked if SyFy looks into a time traveler type show if the Time Traveler's wife does well ;)
 
TemporalFlux said:
With Sliders, you have something that the networks have unfortunately never figured out how to market, and that's generally what keeps them away from it. .
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Along similar lines, Quantum Leap Don Bellisario said at the recent convention that Universal does not think the title "Quantum Leap" is marketable. Which is one reasons sighted to him in the past why they have never revived the show. Can't help but think they have similar "reasoning" with Sliders.
 
"Alien Nation" takes place essentially in the current day - hell, it can take place in Vancouver as easily as Los Angeles. And it takes place partly on the same sets - homes, police station, etc - every week. It's a "Good Cop/Weird Cop" premise (there've actually been enough of them for that to be a mini-genre) and doesn't demand a lot of novelty in plotting or developing the week's main plot (murder this week, drug deal gone wrong next week, etc).

All of which makes it a lot more appealing from SyFy's POV.
 
I think it works better in Los Angeles than Vancouver, thinking about it. Vancouver isn't exactly known for the same sort of racial tension that Los Angeles has been, and that should be a major theme of Alien Nation in any incarnation.

Then again, I don't want to see a Los Angeles filled with evergreen trees, either.
 
Christopher said:
What people talk about on Internet message boards is not representative of what audiences as a whole want to see, since the people who post on Internet message boards are a tiny and nonrepresentative sample of the general population. Tons of people on the Internet talked about Firefly, yet it bombed in the ratings.
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I don't think that is fair to Firefly. I remember trying to watch Firefly when it was first run on Fox and it was a big game. It was shown out of order and preempted by the World Series and was aired on different days of the week till Fox cancelled it after I believe 13 episodes were aired!
How is a show supposed to get ratings if no one knows when to watch it?

Sometimes I wonder why Fox and to a lesser extent other networks even bother to place orders for Sci-Fi shows. Look what Fox did to Sliders: screwed with the writers and demanded changes in the show till they finally cancelled it and Sci-Fi picked it up.
 
I would adore to see the whole concept fromt he perspective of Lothos and his Evil leapers.

Watching them kill rape and lie across time, winning at every turn destroying lives and dooming the world completely would just be so tastey... and then half way through the first seaosn, Sam Becket shows up and puts these peolpe in their place till they can figure out rules and codes of conduct short of murdering each other at the first opportunity that Backula is Spirew Agnew and Carollyne Seymore is Kissinger pushing Nixon between the side of angels and demons.
 
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