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As always, I really like the Lego which is incredibly charming, idiosyncratic and appealing. The sliders on the the staircases is a gorgeously eerie visual. The sliders standing in the temple is a beautifully alien environment rendered perfectly in this medium. The Reticulans are alarming and frightening. And the feast at the end is very cute with all the sliders enjoying their lavish sweets.

But the story. Oh, the story. This has nothing to do with Cez's work at all, but ARMADA just does not work for me and does not capture the appeal of the series which was not about these bizarre sci-fi aliens -- but about the sliders exploring the social and cultural differences of a history not their own. ARMADA doesn't attempt to do that at all. Now, to be fair, social commentary and grounded environments have not been at the core of some of the best SLIDERS stories. "Double Cross" had plenty of sci-fi setpieces and car chases with only the barest of references to environmental crisis. "Murder Most Foul" was a Victorian crime drama that didn't comment much on the genre or a world so devoted to entertainment. "World Killer" was about the sliding technology, not the social commentary.

But "Invasion," a story that emphasized the sci-fi aliens, deliberately kept the Kromaggs at a distance, largely only perceived from the sliders' limited, human perspective. ARMADA doesn't do that; the sliders regard inhuman, otherworldly threats with confidence and aplomb and are never truly challenged or outmatched. This is again representative of how Acclaim rushed the SLIDERS comics into production, didn't give their creators time to engage with the series to appreciate its visual tone or performances or writing style -- and the result is a superhero comic book and an odd fit for the SLIDERS.

I suppose I am as guilty of this as anybody, but I would argue that for all the sci-fi excesses, SLIDERS REBORN is fundamentally about Quinn, Wade, Rembrandt and Arturo, asking who they became after they got home, what they did between 2000 and 2015, and what sliding would be like for them if it were their profession and career. I feel I earned the superhero craziness that ends REBORN and built to it gradually whereas ARMADA starts with the superhero style and it is jarring and rings false to me. We all have very different perceptions of SLIDERS; I think that SLIDERS is about the sliders. Temporal Flux would argue, quite correctly, that SLIDERS is about a gently satirical tone that predicts the future and depicts it in an alternate present and justifies it with an alternate past and makes amusing comments about our society and culture but through inversion rather than forceful judgement. Other fans would argue that SLIDERS is about strong world building and asking what might have been if history had gone a different path; some fans declare that it is futile to define a SLIDERS story because you can go anywhere in imagination.

But ARMADA does not feel like SLIDERS to me; it doesn't have a strong depiction of the sliders, it doesn't have a believably human perspective on the sci-fi lunacy, it doesn't even have anything important to say. It's a superhero comic book writer and artist handed the SLIDERS license, a few VHS cassettes of the episodes, some headshots of the actors, and a tight deadline by which they must hack out some scripts and pages.

None of which has anything to do with the Lego which is lovely. :-)

JUSTICE LEAGUE in the Snyder Cut edition will apparently have a whopping, massive amount of newly filmed footage not produced during the original shoot. There will be extensive new material shot with the actors this past year. There will be four whole minutes. :-)

Snyder's interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsY_bdXTmJ8

You know, that episode of TITANS aired over a year ago! I think you can relax about spoilers. Haha!

It's odd: there may be a TV Tropes page somewhere about a ridiculously speedy trial, but all I see is the vague umbrella of "Hollywood Law" and "Artistic License - Law." https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ … LicenseLaw

The entry remarks that "Real litigation or prosecution takes months, not minutes, and almost none of it happens in court. Watching lawyers read mountains of documents and write briefs doesn't make for an enjoyable show, so creators modify the process to be entertaining to the audience. This causes the legal procedures portrayed in fiction to have little to no correlation with how the process would go down in Real Life."

I do recall a Season 1 episode of BONES, a forensic procedural where the leading lady crime scientist has to go to court to present her evidence and we're informed that it happens all the time, but this is the first time it's shown on camera and the trial felt like it was within days of the initial investigation. Generally, cop shows like BROOKLYN NINE NINE seem comfortable doing a time skip from investigation to trial if the trial is relevant or showing the investigation as a flashback before showing the trial in the present.

How ridiculously fast were Oliver and Barry's murder/conspiracy/vigilantism trials on THE FLASH and ARROW?

However... I don't feel that any version of the DC Universe with superhero teams like the Titans and presumably the Justice League and the rest is going to be quite like 'our' world. In a reality where all paranormal and science fiction concepts like demons, aliens, time travelers, mutants, poltergeists and such are real, the legal system must have heightened capacity to deal with all the complexities and must have hastened its methods for processing more 'mundane' crimes that don't involve devil robots and Earth-invading starfish and yellow fear monsters and fifth dimensional imps.

There was one thing that threw me off in the first episode of STARGIRL -- I thought it was an odd comedy choice for the dying Starman to tell Pat Dugan that someone would have to carry on the legacy of the JSA's heroism and then immediately declare, "Not you," as though Pat, a bold, valiant, self-sacrificing, caring friend who could build giant battle robots out of old car parts was somehow not up to the task of being a superhero.

Pat is not particularly more flawed than the average person on the show and is prepared to crash his own car to protect Courtney's secret identity and embrace the indignity of being a disrespected stepfather because he understands that the girl has been in a permanent state of grief. I don't know why Starman thought so poorly of his supposed friend or why he worked with someone he regarded so badly.

But first episodes are where the writers and actors are still working out how to combine their talents. Maybe Pat was supposed to be grossly incompetent only for Luke Wilson's performance to steer the character differently.

Posted this last year about TITANS (spoilers) and Iain Glen (spoilers).

Rob, you don't need to read Informant's Twitter. I don't need to read Informant's Twitter. I kept reading it because I care about him. I rant about him because I am hurt by him. But the only way anyone can hurt me with typing is because I have given them permission to hurt me.

I would never have expected him to become what he has; I'd expect him to be more concerned with being a loyal American than being a loyal conservative. But I am going to stop reading his social media. And I am going to stop talking about him as well. The election is over. And the pointless lawsuits from Trump are a waste of time and only to draw funds to pay off his campaign debts. I am still angry at anyone who voted for Trump, effectively voting to not have voting anymore. But I agree with Joe Biden that it is time to set that aside and focus on rebuilding our extremely broken world.

Nothing Informant says on Twitter takes away from all the wonderful things he did for SLIDERS and fans of SLIDERS. No vote Informant casts changes the fact that he was our friend: he worked on the SLIDERS REDUX with us, he gifted us with his companionship and perspective and friendship during FRINGE and the X-FILES revival and the Arrowverse and the DC Extended Universe. He stuck with SLIDERS long after most people had sensibly found another show and fandom. Fandom brought out the very best parts of Informant: his most generous, his most open-hearted and we were very fortunate to have the time we did with him.

I often think that writing fiction and caring about fiction will reveal who we really are; the unfortunate fact is that some writers will produce material that reveals a great compassion and love for humanity, but ultimately choose to live life as their most caustic, abrasive, antagonistic selves when they could be better than that.

I don't pray much, but when COVID hit the states, I knew before even reading Informant's Twitter that he would not wear a mask and I prayed for him and begged God to spare Informant when Informant wouldn't spare himself. I will pray for him again. Not for who he is now, but who he was when we knew him, who he chose to be for the bulk of his time with us. And I will pray that he finds his way back to that. The election is over, Donald Trump is done, Informant was our friend, he will always be our friend.

My iron grip on Joe Biden's decision-making remains intact, mostly because I write him letters begging him to do what he was going to do anyway.

True. But when someone acts to take away other people's votes, they no longer have the right have their decisions go unremarked upon.

As a rule, I don't criticize people for how they chose to participate in a (somewhat) fair and (nominally) free election. People have the right to go unjudged as good or bad for how they voted so that everyone can feel free to vote. And candidates must earn votes. Temporal Flux said he was probably going to write in his father's name because TF believes in term limits. Joe Biden has been in government since 1973. If Biden didn't convince TF to waive that stipulation, then Biden didn't earn his vote. Transmodiar said that Biden didn't reflect his values; if Biden couldn't make a case for Transmodiar to feel otherwise, then Biden didn't earn Transmodiar's vote either and Transmodiar was right to write in Andrew Yang.

And I totally understand why people voted for Trump in 2016. Government had ignored their desperation and suffering; Hillary Clinton was a Wall Street creature; Slider_Quinn21 and Informant were both appalled by her which is bipartisanship at is clearest -- I see why people who felt abandoned by government voted for Trump four years ago and wouldn't judge anyone for it.

However, anyone who voted for Donald Trump in 2020 voted in favour of not having a fair and free election but instead in support of a lifetime appointment for their cult leader. Trump voters supported a deranged authoritarian who declared for months that any votes for other candidates were illegal. Trump voters supported the view that any votes that weren't for Trump should not be counted. And Trump voters now are demanding that the election results be overturned.

Trump voters have lost the right to go uncriticized for how they voted in a (supposedly) equal election because they attacked the voting rights of others and 'voted' to not have an election at all.

I will never put another penny in Rowling's pocket. But I still have her books on my shelf. And Harry Potter has simply left his creator behind at this point; he's so entrenched in the cultural consciousness that Rowling's existence has become irrelevant to Harry's place in the hearts and minds of his fans. Fans of Harry Potter (and I am one) need no longer be fans of JK Rowling. To quote a great American quoting a Frenchman, "Death of the author, good sir!" At some point, we separate the art from the artist -- not to justify supporting them, but to appreciate what we got out of them before even if we won't be going back to that well for anything new.

All those ends are achieved through means that require seeing government as public service.

When Trump had clearly won the election in 2016, Obama contacted Hillary Clinton. "You need to concede," he told her. He didn't encourage her to falsely claim fraud and file lawsuits or declare a victory she hadn't won. When Trump was declared president-elect, the Obama administration committed fully to the transition, providing all documents and details and opening themselves ully to the incoming team.

Obama encouraged Trump to keep Obamacare but change the name to take credit for it. The Obama administration also provided a pandemic playbook and training for a viral contagion. Obama and Hillary claim they both offered to give Trump any advice and while it's fair to question the sincerity of that, the Obama administration's determined handover to the Trump administration indicates it was at least genuine from Obama.

Biden will not be getting that graciousness from the Trump team because Trump doesn't consider the presidency a public office, but a personal one for his own benefit. For attention and acclaim and notoriety and to prop up his failing businesses.

Biden may have to have the Secret Service drag Trump out of the Oval Office by his hair.

The celebrations show that stupidity and denial is not unique to Biden or Trump voters. There are plenty of fine morons on both sides.

I am going to defer to your judgement and TF's on this one. I'm shaky and unsure -- but at the end of the day, even if I have lost (some) trust in Americans, I haven't lost any trust in any of you.

My God! I just saw that footage of Biden supporters not distancing and sharing drink containers. I'm horrified. I understand euphoria, but that's just suicidal and deranged. I've written a message to Biden pleading for him to tell his constituents to stay apart and I guess we'll see if he's still doing whatever I ask him to do in my mail.

It's not really up to Biden if he'll be able to live up to his campaign promises. It depends on winning the Senate and it looks like the Democrats' last chance for it this cycle is with the runoffs in Georgia. If Democrats fail to win the Senate, I imagine that President Biden will be a genial figurehead of photo ops and speeches who addresses the working class but will ultimately be unable to pass any legislation to help them.

I hope Americans aren't bad people.

But looking at Informant, he's currently screeching that the media calling the election for Biden is illegitimate and too early, although he had no issue with Trump calling the election for himself. Informant is whining that the election is being stolen when his party made gains in the House, has the state houses for gerrymandering, and currently holds the Senate which means his problem isn't that conservatism lost (because it hasn't) -- he's mad that his cult leader's claims are being ignored and dismissed as the empty delusions of a soon-to-be disempowered madman and no one should ever be allowed to ignore Informant's cult leader.

And there are (apparently) at least 70 million people just like Informant.

Watched the first six episodes of STARGIRL. Wow! What a fun show. Thanks to Slider_Quinn21 for reminding me that it existed.

I've never really understood the appeal of the Justice Society of America, a group of barely published superheroes from WWII who were quickly eclipsed by the Justice League -- but STARGIRL manages to distill the appeal pretty effectively by revealing that the JSA is a multigenerational family of older veterans and young new heroes awkwardly co-existing. There is a wonderfully frank presentation of Courtney Whitmore as Stargirl: she's sullen, rude, self-centered, impulsive. She's also driven, inspired, daring, and has an instinctive sense of right and wrong.

It's interesting that the character is based on showrunner Geoff John's sister who died in a plane crash when she was 18 and this is Johns' portrait of his deceased sibling's persona and spirit. There is a wonderful sense of these awkward young people acquiring the mantles of dead and retired heroes and staggering in the footsteps of their predecessors.

The effects and location filming are impressive for a show that is supposedly to be moving to the CW for Season 2. The villains are creepy in how they've assimilated into civilian life but with their cruelty and sadism and pettiness in full force. There is a gleeful joy in superheroes in STARGIRL that I never felt when reading the first few issues of the 90s JSA comic book, although I confess that I never got to the Geoff Johns issues (he only started on the comic after the first story-arc).

It's funny how SMALLVILLE was always so embarrassed to really show superheroes, having all their superhero characters where street clothes with the same colours as the actual costumes. Then Geoff Johns wrote "Legion," "Society" and "Absolute Justice," all three of which declared that SMALLVILLE was a superhero universe and had a future and a past that had contained superheroes, and the show began to feel comfortable with costumes and superhero personas. Now Johns' joy in superheroes is mainstream and he's doing a show where all of his joy in superhero legacies and superhero families is presented in full force.

Yes, those conspiratorial Democrats rigged the election to not win in a landslide and not win in the Senate. The mythology of THE X-FILES looks airtight compared to this one.

It doesn't make sense (for me) to comment on results we don't entirely have yet. However, Slider_Quinn21 made a prediction about Trump:

This has proven entirely correct. Trump is calling for ballots to no longer be counted... just because. There's no legal basis for that and it isn't working. He's declaring the election a fraud before the count is complete and the results are clear; this too has no legal traction. He attempted to claim victory in Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina and Michigan and was reminded that campaigns don't reveal state victories. He says he'll go to the Supreme Court; there is no case before the Supreme Court to stop counting votes and no legal grounds to do so. His comments, made publicly, will undermine any potential lawsuit he engages in to contest the results because they're not based on evidence; he just doesn't like losing.

Why can't Trump seem to steal this election? It's because even though his employees want to steal it, he keeps interfering and leading the charge and his arguments, methods and measures are simply to shriek that any vote that isn't for Donald Trump is a fraudulent ballot because he doesn't like them. He is self-destructing.

As of 3 PM, Biden had an over 90,000 vote lead but with about 600,000 left to count. It was definitely called too early.

I forgot to mention: I also like pilight as a person.

All my favourite liberal propaganda websites are upset, hurt, shocked, traumatized and worse. They didn't get their landslide. They didn't even get a clear win. But they're looking at mostly Election Night numbers, counts of in-person votes where mail-in ballots had yet to be totaled. Some mail-in ballots still have days to arrive.

I just don't think it makes sense at this point to say whether or not the polls were wrong, whether or not Trumpism has won over men of colour -- I think we'd better see all the results first. We are not looking at the full picture right now. We're looking at red mirages that may or may not be red certainties; we are looking at blue shifts that may or may not fully shift.

It's possible that the full results will have Slider_Quinn21 moving to Canada to be my new roommate; it's possible it'll be not terrible but not great; it's possible that Democrats will have a close victory with some options to expand in the Senate with a Georgia runoff -- but it's now an Election Week (at minimum). But I will see if I can find Slider_Quinn21 an air mattress just in case.

So, let's talk turkey (again). My obsession with roasting turkeys comes from my favourite actress whom I'll persist in calling Felicia Day (it's not Felicia Day).

I've always hated turkey. It's cardboard protein. And when Felicia invited me to her annual turkey roast off competition, I was not keen. But my friend was in a competition. She asked me for my support. I never refuse to give that. I showed up, brought desserts, expected dinner by 7 PM and planned to head home by 10 PM as it was a work night.

We hit 8 PM and the turkeys still weren't ready, I let everyone at the gathering know that I would be leaving in two hours, but that it wasn't because I was bored or didn't like them -- they were all so nice to me and friendly -- but it was a work night. Felicia apologized to me, saying the turkey wouldn't be ready by the time I left. And I left the dinner party without dinner.

It was okay. I understood completely. I had observed that Felicia's competition had started late. Because she got out of work later than expected. It was clear to me from observing her efforts: turkeys were too damn big to be cooked inside a couple hours; that she had to repeatedly baste it every 20 minutes. Which loses heat from the oven. I could see that increasing the heat wouldn't cook the bird faster; it would simply burn and dry it when it needed to be cooked moderately and evenly.

When Felicia had time to speak to me, she explained the intricacies of defrosting a 20 pound turkey safely without killing anyone who ate it, the importance of adding moisture back into it as it cooked over the course of 6 - 8 hours, the desperate call for water-heavy vegetables, the critical need to have the turkey elevated -- I could see her struggling to get dinner together before I left; I could see her failing. I assured her that I understood.

And the evening wasn't wasted; I learned a lot from watching her roast a turkey and explain the process to me. I'm glad I was there. My niece is glad I was there; she thought my first Christmas turkey ever last year, inspired by Felicia, was splendid. My sisters are glad I was there; they said this year's Thanksgiving bird was perfectly cooked, moist and even throughout. No, I didn't get to enjoy any dinner at Felicia's turkey dinner competition. But it wasn't for lack of trying and there is no one I won't excuse from their failures if they tried.

Every year, I roast three turkeys, one for Thanksgiving, one for Christmas, one just because. It takes a week of preparation and I have to station myself by the oven from morning to evening to baste while referring back to the mental notes I made watching Felicia roast her bird (which are actual notes now as I wrote it all down the next morning). I make turkey to remind myself that trying counts.

I think Democrats learned a lot from 2016 -- they didn't learn what Transmodiar wanted, but it seems to me that they learned what you wanted them to learn.

They went with a candidate who, as Nate Silver puts it, speaks to lower class white people AND minorities and Hollywood elites and he in turn chose a vice president candidate who appeals to law enforcement and women. They went with a candidate who declares that addressing climate change IS the path to economic recovery, good union jobs, prosperity and redemption of both the American spirit and the planet. A candidate who tells the police that they are fundamentally good people and that he will need good police officers to help stop this horror of white cops shooting black men for no reason whatsoever.

Does he actually believe that most cops are fundamentally good? I dunno, but if I needed cops to help me with anything, telling them they all suck wouldn't get me very far with them. Good politicians tell people that they are better than they actually are to inspire them to be better today than they were yesterday.

**

Election results aren't going to be available right away tonight. We'll likely only have a good idea of who is winning without knowing who won. Five Thirty Eight breaks down what we'll know and when we'll know it here:
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/bo … -they-get/

I don't know what's going to happen. I know what is likely to happen.

Anyway. Once again, from the unpublished MARVEL COMICS #1000:

I don't have an opinion on your vote. I do have an opinion on the opinion that "nothing fundamentally changes" under President Donald Trump. I respect your view that Biden is a poor and uninspired choice; I reject the view from four years ago that Trump's ineptitude would reveal America's failings and therefore be the best thing for the country.

And in the face of Trump facilitating 220,000 deaths, pandemic denial, white nationalist militias, neo-Nazi insurgences and suppression of mail-in voting, I reject it again as an opinion that could only ever come from someone who isn't being targeted for harassment and assault by this presidency.

It is a rejection of the opinion, of course. Not the person.

**

Republicans tried to have 127,000 votes in Texas thrown out on account that they consider drive-thru voting illegal because it's in a tent instead of a building. They got the case to a deranged federal judge, Andrew Hanen, with a history of partisan craziness and legal rulings made up of movie quotes like he's, I dunno, posting on SLIDERS.tv or something. My expectation was that Hanen would have the 127,000 votes invalidated. My expectation was wrong, he ruled that the votes were valid.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/02/politics … index.html

"When you balance the harms you've got to weigh in favor of that -- in counting the votes," Hanen declared. Ultimately, the claim that drive-thru voting was illegal wasn't something Hanen thought he could get away with despite his obvious desire to do so. In a second term of Donald Trump, people like Hanen with power and the master they support will be emboldened; they will no longer hesitate to suppress votes even on such absurd terms.

As a great patriot once said, the line must be drawn here. This far. No farther. I'm not even an American and I can see the ripple effects hitting me and mine. It's time for Donald Trump to go.

**

And now regarding an opinion I don't respect at all:

I wasn't in SLIDERS fandom much from 2000 - 2010. But. I did note something very interesting about Informant's attitude to Chuck: he was a big fan of the Chuck character in Seasons 4, 5 and 10 where the character was in disguise or offscreen except for brief cameos and it was up to the audience to decide what to make of the character who was supposedly God himself.

Then Chuck returned in full force for Season 11 in "Don't Call Me Shurley," an episode where Chuck is presented as depressed, irritated by humanity, inclined to let all existence be extinguished by his sister, disdainful of Sam for saving Dean from his demonic existence and therefore freeing Amara, annoyed by the constant need to restore Castiel and profoundly indifferent to the well being of humans, angels, arcangels, demons and whatnot -- aside from being a 'fan' of their adventures, Rowena in particular.

Informant declared that he loved this episode and loved how Chuck was pretending to be disenchanted and distant from humanity to motivate the characters.

Now, there's nothing wrong with having a head canon, but this is most definitely not the story onscreen; Chuck abandoning humanity until Metatron changes his mind is never at any point in the episode shown to be anything other than genuine.

But Informant insisted that his interpretation was correct even when there was absolutely no onscreen evidence to indicate this was intended by the writers. Why is that?

The answer: Informant has a specific view of God and he requires that Chuck reflect that view. If Chuck doesn't reflect that view, Informant will say he does anyway or throw a tantrum -- like he did when Season 14 revealed that not only had Chuck been uncaring to human suffering, he had been actively creating it for the Winchesters because they were his "favourite show" until they refused to kill Jack (a threat to Chuck's existence) at which point Chuck decided to end reality.

Informant (on his own space, not here) screeched that this depiction of God was a betrayal of 10 years of characterization. And back in the old Bboard, he was constantly ranting about people not being religious themselves and therefore "blasphemous."

Not to get into the religious points, but the fictional character of Chuck has always been presented unflatteringly and with suspicion. As Chuck, he is suicidal, drunk, unreliable and more interested in money than saving the world. In Season 6, Castiel calls upon him for advice and guidance and is ignored. When Chuck revealed his true nature and approached the Winchesters in Season 11, he was regarded with mistrust for his absence, for his deliberately putting the brothers in the line of fire, and Season 14 decided to confirm that the Winchester's doubts had been correct.

In addition, Chuck is not God. Chuck is the originator of the fictional reality of SUPERNATURAL who has been worshipped as God -- but there is a clear distinction between the religious God and the character of Chuck who lays claim to that title but hardly lives up to it.

Informant is ultimately a zealot. There is only one acceptable presentation of Chuck; his own. There is only one acceptable version of Superman; his own.

And Informant takes the view that his personal tastes are the default when they're in the minority; that's why he's so enraptured by Donald Trump and Trumpism, a way for minority rule to continue insisting that it's the default.

That's why he lies that people don't need to distance and wear masks and lies that infanticide is legal in Virginia and lies that BATMAN VS. SUPERMAN was a smash hit. He's not stupid. He knows it's not true. He just wants to insist that his minority views are more than his own and objectively indisputable. In contrast, I've never felt that I believed much of anything that wasn't to be disputed, amended, updated, I'm aware that my opinions exist in a minority and I don't feel threatened by that. I hated AVENGERS. So did Informant. Most people liked it. As Transmodiar would say, "I am not the final arbiter of taste." We can agree to disagree and respect respective choices. But Informant? Informant got angry and had a meltdown over people preferring a CAPTAIN AMERICA movie to BATMAN VS. SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE (actual title).

Informant is actively resentful of his minority views and rains judgement down upon any who trigger him by making him in any way aware of his minority position, whether that's in being a Trump voter or a fan of BATMAN VS. SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE (actual title). And these days, his output is simply a relentless stream of attacks and insults towards anyone expressing progressivism of any kind; he hates transgender kids, he loves white people who shoot black people, he hates Alyssa Milano, he loves James O'Keefe.

I turned the other cheek towards him plenty and tried to see him off with pride, but now he supports the terrorist movement of Men's Rights Activists. And he's become a bioterrorist in his refusal to wear a mask.

It's time to face facts: Informant hates America.

**

I don't know where or when Informant took this turn. I don't know where he lost his way. I'm sure it's my fault. Probably should have put more effort into setting up that field trip with him and Slider_Quinn21 to go to the Alamo Drafthouse for dinner. And I don't think someone loses their way by disagreeing with me; I think it's when they are no longer able to process the fact that individual views are the views of individuals and are out to mock, sabotage and hurt anyone with a mind of their own.

And Transmodiar is absolutely right to say that I'm projecting into him. It's not fact. It is theory. My theory. Which could be wrong. And Transmodiar says it's wrong and Transmodiar knows himself better than I do, so take his word for it. But don't think like him. And don't think like me. Think like you.

I am certain that Informant hates America. And I am certain that Transmodiar loves America, loves his country, loves his people -- and he and I simply have strong ideas of how America should move forward and those ideas are colliding with each other, much in the same way our strong ideas of how SLIDERS should be presented in 2015 collided with each other. Transmodiar wanted SLIDERS to be rebooted and I wanted the sliders to be reborn. Neither of us were keen on the other person's ideas. But we still love and respect the person who originated the ideas.

**

LAUREN: "How d'you think the election will go?"

IB: "Probably fine."

LAUREN: "That's that you said about Season 4 of SLIDERS!"

Ib stares at his niece grimly.

LAUREN: "You told me to always say that to you every time you say that something will be fine."

IB: "It'll probably be fine."

Wow! This is really haunting and eerie and really captures the psychically aggressive tone of the original "Slide Effects" script. The Kromaggs were severely demystified in Season 4. I personally don't have a great take on the Kromaggs, but I decided that in my "Slide Effects" script, the Kromagg would never speak on its own and only deliver dialogue in the guise of the additional Season 3 - 5 sliders of Maggie, Colin, Diana and Mallory. On some level, this was, I confess, a gesture of disdain towards them. Those character were unwanted intruders, uninvited guests into my living room. In addition, the Kromagg was a representation of David Peckinpah, someone given an assignment he didn't care about and who resented the people who came with that assignment.

And yet, it didn't come off that way to most readers. All the feedback I got expressed appreciation that the faces of Maggie, Colin, Diana and Mallory were present in a story about going back to basics with Quinn, Wade, Rembrandt and Arturo. One piece of fan mail that I got remarked that they preferred my take to any hypothetical "Slide Effects" fully scripted by Torme because Torme would most definitely not have included Maggie, Colin, Diana and Mallory (or even been familiar with those characters). And this is something I tried to get into with SLIDERS REBORN where I accepted Maggie, Colin, Diana and Mallory as important and wrote them as beloved characters that everyone would be happy to see even if Colin is an artificial intelligence with Charlie O'Connell's voice and Mallory is only in a lengthy dream sequence.

Back to "Slide Effects" -- the script is effectively declaring that he is haunted trauma and that the most traumatic events in his life were the death of Professor Arturo, the rape and mutilation of Wade Welles and that horrific Scene from "Mother and Child" and the scene of the Kromagg morphing into different personas has the Kromagg sadistically inflicting all of that on the original sliders. And I find this Lego construct really captures that cruelty that the sliders ultimately overcome.

I can't speak to the series finale specifically, but I've read that due to COVID-19, it became unfeasible to have all the guest-stars they wanted because they would have had to cover the cost of having every performer quarantine for two weeks for a brief cameo. But they must have been able to get some, because some special guest-stars were sighted and on call sheets. Just not all the ones you expect. It's really sad. BLINDSPOT, which had its series finale earlier this year, had a guest-star from nearly every previous episode for the last installment and there's always a joyful sense of closure to seeing familiar faces back for a series finale.

I hope they get Jody and Donna. It looks like they couldn't get Kathryn Newton.

**

I'm sure absolutely nobody cares about my WAYWARD SISTERS fan fiction which is aimed at an audience of one, so I'm going to make it a post-script. I'm trying to write three scripts, 46 pages each (to be plausible teleplays and they need to be done in time for Christmas). The conceit I've concocted is that after WAYWARD SISTERS wasn't picked up, the CW purchased two extra episodes of SUPERNATURAL for Season 14 and one extra episode for Season 15 -- but these would be episodes with the WAYWARD SISTERS cast, and I want them to slot into the existing continuity of the series like a media tie-in novel. I'm writing these for my niece who loves SUPERNATURAL, loved the idea of WAYWARD SISTERS and I'm assuming she is a bit sad that Claire and Kaia (whom she heatedly shipped) will never have an onscreen reunion. I'm writing these for her as a Christmas gift.

1 - Hunter's Rage (14.3b)
Reeling from the disaster in the Bad Place, Claire dives into hunting with reckless abandon, taking risk after risk and dangling herself as bait for any monster she can find. Avoiding Jody and Donna and her extended family, Claire soon finds herself into a trap with no backup, no rescue and no way out. This story is set before the events of Season 14, Episode 3 ("The Rage") and would fill in the gap where Claire went from not knowing Kaia too well and feeling guilty about her death to considering Kaia her "first love," as Jody puts it in "The Scar." It's a really interesting writing challenge and I have an idea for how to give Claire that journey inside a TV episode.

2 - Hunter's Reckoning (15.11b)
Claire's search for Kaia's killer hits a dead end in Yosemite, but during a stop for gas, food and water, Claire comes across a peculiar town where everyone has lost the ability to die. This story is set before the events of "Galaxy Brain" (in which Kaia came back to life) and features the return of Harper Sayles, the necromancer with the zombie boyfriend from Season 14 because I like the actress, Maddie Phillips, who was just awesome in TEENAGE BOUNTY HUNTERS which has sadly been cancelled. I don't believe SPN was able to get Maddie Phillips back to play Harper again even though her character is supposed to be hunting Jack.

3 - Hunter's Reunion (15.12b)
En route to Sioux Falls, Jody, Kaia and Claire are interrupted by a storm and take shelter in an abandoned campground with a terrible secret beneath the earth. (I don't really know what this one's about plotwise, but I there's so much interesting characterization to mine: Claire has all these romantic feelings to Kaia whereas Kaia has probably given Claire no thought in the two years Kaia spent roughing it; Claire has all these fantasies about Kaia that will be confronted with actual reality; I'm also going to have to write a lesbian sex scene for my niece to read, but for it to be plausible, it can't venture outside the limits of what the CW would be willing to air and I've also never written a sex scene before.)

Isn't supporting another four years of President Donald Trump even if you don't support him an inclination to stick to the status quo of President Donald Trump? Are you sure you're as much as an iconoclast as you think?

You have the luxury of saying another four years of President Trump will be fine. You weren't in any way affected by the first four years of President Trump.

So the upshot of this would once again be: congratulations on being white, moderately affluent, and knowing you'll still retain your advantages and immunity under the status quo of a second term of President Trump. It's easy for you again to declare another four years of Trump will be a life lesson and a godsend like you did four years ago. After all, you're not the one who's going to take it in the neck for this tutorial in failing democracy.

You're not overly impacted by the absence of a national or federally supported testing plan; you're not affected by hospital supplies of PPE being seized; you don't suffer from ventilators being withheld; you won't be hunted by militias encouraged by the president to hunt black men in the streets; you won't be beaten by racists who think President Trump means they've gone mainstream. If you shot someone black, Trumpists would take up a collection to pay your legal bills. Informant would chip in!

And if Trump wins, you get another round of the civics lesson you thought so highly of the first time. I see why Trump is not to your disadvantage. Well done, you.

But regardless, a fair and free election isn't fair and free if you're chastised for voting fairly and freely, so I don't see what anyone could possibly have to say about you writing in a name on your ballot.

**

Regarding the blue wall, here's Nate Silver on why 2020 won't be 2016:

I too am ready for this to be done. I only have enough CAPTAIN AMERICA comic books from which I can paraphrase speeches to about November 7.

Ah, would that we could all be so uninvested in this situation that we'll just throw some snide remarks around and call it a day.

Politico has an interesting article about potential shy Trump voters.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/ … 016-433619

I think it is nonsense. Five Thirty Eight notes that Trump performed better than expected, but only within the margin of error. You never know which direction the error is in.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/tr … e-of-them/

Trump's path to victory, such as it exists, would be if the polls are slightly off in Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, and Iowa with Trump being a little ahead rather than slightly behind, but he'd also need Pennsylvania to get an Electoral College win. The odds of this? 11 out of 100. The chance of rolling a one on a six sided die. The chance of it raining in Los Angeles. Likely? No. It's not likely. Possible? Yes. It is possible.

And I am afraid. Anyone who isn't afraid of another four years of President Trump is either deranged or living a life of at least moderate privilege. But a great patriot once declared that the antidote to fear is action. Because evil triumphs when we allow it to paralyze us. But to respond by doing something, however small, is to defy the despair turns reason into panic and advance into retreat. Give one person the conviction that their small actions matter and that one person can win a battle. Give that same person an army with that same conviction united into a greater whole and they can win a war.

I post links to iwillvote.com into random corners of the internet. These are dark and desperate times.

Also, for those who think nothing fundamentally changed in going from Obama to Trump -- ah, to have the moral certainty that comes from being privileged, middle class, Caucasian, heterosexual and male.

What I take from that is that it is awesome to have:

• Good and supportive parents

• A stable upbringing

• An ethnicity that doesn't engender discrimination

• A sexuality that draws no attention

• A middle class economic status that means you can get laid off and bounce back

• A financial situation where you can total your car and take the economic hit

• A level of employment where you can lose your computer and instantly replace it with one that came free in a work contest

• A job that you can do from home

All that creates the opportunity to build a life where it doesn't matter to you who is President. And to be clear: Transmodiar earned these things. Temporal Flux has said that Transmodiar was handed everything in life. That's not true; Transmodiar was handed a strong starting point. He had to scrabble and scrape to keep it. He had to strain and strive to build on it. Transmodiar was given a good chance. He worked hard to make it a great success.

Transmodiar has a fundamental aplomb and certainty, a committed work ethic, a drive to succeed because he knows that there is nothing he cannot do; there are just things he has not learned how to do yet. This is inherent to his nature, but he was also blessed with the opportunity for his nature to be made manifest. To build a life where he is someone for whom "nothing fundamentally changes" if it's President Trump instead of President Obama or President Biden.

Too many Americans never get that opportunity and have it actively taken away from them. Too many Americans work twice as hard to get half as much if not less. And most Americans do not live lives where "nothing fundamentally changes" under a second term of President Trump.

Wow.

I don't know if SLIDERS: THE FINAL SLIDES was really meant to be an animated series. It was just a speculative essay on how "Slide Effects" could have been the start to an animated series.

I have mixed feelings about the first shot of Quinn waking up in his bedroom. It doesn't resemble the actual bedroom in the SLIDERS pilot, but given how cluttered and random all those elements were, I don't think anyone could have recreated it in Lego -- although a poster of the Milky Way might have been sufficient, although the photo of San Francisco is quite nice. Not sure about the truck; I think something sports related might have been a better decoration, but again -- it's Lego.

The shot of Quinn looking in the mirror to see Mallory, I really like. I like how it's a bathroom mirror instead of a mirror in Quinn's bedroom; Quinn in the Pilot definitely dressed like he didn't examine his own reflection often. It captures the stark shock of Quinn seeing the wrong face in the mirror except it's the face he'd expect to see, a sign of how troubled his identity became by Season 5.

I also like this shot of Rembrandt and Quinn in what looks like the Lamplighter instead of a steak house. And, to be frank, I don't think using some fictitious steakhouse for Rembrandt and Quinn's reunion in "Slide Effects" was a very good choice in retrospect. It was just an indoor, quiet setting where Quinn could sit across from Rembrandt, but this shot makes me wonder if Rembrandt would really have gone out to dinner after his performance or if he would have found somewhere quiet for a drink. At the time in 2011, I was not good at thinking about these things; I knew how the actors talked, but I didn't always have the greatest grasp of what their characters would do. I would go out for a steak after a big night. Rembrandt would get a beer. This is an improvement.

In terms of the separation point: because I didn't expect to write any SLIDERS stories after "Slide Effects," I decided that everything after Season 2 was a Kromagg simulation. This way, Arturo wouldn't be dying from a fatal disease ("The Guardian") and Logan St. Clair wouldn't be after them ("Double Cross"). But Torme wanted the separation point to be "The Guardian," the last episode he wrote. I think "Murder Most Foul" is a decent choice if you're doing sequels to "Slide Effects."

The scene of Quinn, Wade, Rembrandt and Arturo in the Professor's lecture hall is quite sweet. I missed my friends so much and Cory and Tom on REWATCH PODCAST really highlighted this scene as something that they longed to have been filmed with the actors, and I see that it was also chosen here to render.

There's a very interesting rendering here of The Cave with the Kromagg lording over Quinn in a psychic landscape. In my writing, I tend to rip off the climax of Brian Michael Bendis' SPIDER-WOMAN series where the villain will find the worst possible thing to say to the lead character or to the reader. The worst possible thing I could think of at the time for Quinn was for the Kromagg to bring up Quinn's out of character behaviour in "Mother and Child," and the most hopeful thing I wanted to hear then was an explanation -- although I didn't plot out that explanation in the outline and let it come to me naturally when writing the dialogue, which was that Quinn subconsciously knew he was in a simulation and no longer believed in the scenario. What is that Kromagg figurine? The Kroamgg looks sadistic and cruel and Quinn looks like he's in agony. It's good work.

The blue sky and Lego clouds and the green grass is quite vivid and powerful. I also like how there is a ladder escorting the sliders out of the cave, although I would gently note that in the script, Wade and Rembrandt left the cave first and Wade had the timer, whereas in this rendering, Wade is exiting the cave last and Quinn is holding the timer -- but I suppose if you're doing a final shot for your rendering, you want Quinn Mallory to be standing at the front and holding the timer. I don't love the Season 4 vortex. But I'm sure it's the easiest one to cut out of a frame and composite into a photo of Lego. Anyway, that doesn't really matter; "Slide Effects" is yours now and Brick Lady is doing some nice stuff and I can't wait to see what you put on our screens next.

In 2016, Batman in the pages of JUSTICE LEAGUE (written by Geoff Johns) encountered a New Gods machine, the Mobius Chair. It contained all knowledge in all existence. To test it, Batman asked the Chair a question that no one could possibly answer: "What is the Joker's real name?"

The Chair's reply haunted Batman. "No!" he exclaimed. "That's not possible!" Months later, in the pages of DC REBIRTH,  he confided Hal Jordan. "'There are three,'" Bruce told him. He didn't know what the Chair meant by that. And four years later, Geoff Johns released BATMAN: THREE JOKERS in which Batman, the Red Hood (Jason Todd) and Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) team up to finally track down the truth.

I just finished reading all three issues and... it really says something quite beautiful about what Batman is and it truly speaks to the heart of what this character is all about and what superheroes should be for us all.

People are Googling "Can I change my vote" because Trump encouraged people to do so and there was some effort to take some interest.

The cake is almost baked. It's no longer a question of whether or not Biden has enough votes to beat Trump. The real question is whether or not Trump's voter suppression efforts will lead to low enough margins of victory that Trump can contest the results. The Supreme Court, even without Amy Coney Barrett, will not allow mail-in ballots arriving after the election to be counted. They're going for Pennsylvania next. Brett Kavanaugh has signalled that he wants to have as many mail-in ballots thrown out as possible.

Slider_Quinn21 argues that any Democrat knows all this; that's why they either voted in person or deposited their ballot in a ballot box or mailed it in ASAP. But the reality is that Biden won't just win on Democrats; he needs independents, he needs Republicans who are appalled by Trump; he needs people seniors who might struggle to find a witness for the signature; he needs people who might not be able to mail their ballots as soon as they wish to; he needs undecideds -- and if the election results are close and contested, Amy Coney Barrett will rule in Trump's favour along with four conservative judges. She stood with Trump after her confirmation; she attended a superspreader event; she wants power. She doesn't care if people get sick for her to get power. And she won't want Biden in the White House because he is open to packing and rebalancing the court and therefore eroding her power.

Temporal Flux (an independent, as far as I can tell) is right to tell us Democrats to worry; I just don't think TF's looking in the right direction. Trump could still win. But... this is America. America's faced armadas bringing about its darkest hours time and time again under savage ultimatums from those wielding their false claims of deadly secrets wrapped in a crazed narcotica of counterfeit patriotism to feed their own hunger for blood and splendor. But for two centuries, America has always come through.

The world has predicted America's demise ever since George Washington was criticized for being a mediocre surveyor with a bad set of wooden teeth. And so far, every single person that's bet against America has lost money, because you always come back. And you can come back from Donald Trump. Temporal Flux has said Trump's successor could be worse; Transmodiar says America wouldn't be improved by removing Trump from office; they're smart guys, but sometimes, they're just wrong.

Donald Trump is incapable of using the presidency as anything but a platform for attention from crowds and rallies. He has no judgement other than his desperate need to be complimented by his intelligence without doing anything to earn it. He has no openness to the expertise of experts, no moral compass and absolutely no sense of responsibility for the over 300 million lives he is sworn to protect. And the results of this man's term in office have been catastrophic: 200,000 Americans dead. Transmodiar stuck in his house working from home. Temporal Flux could have died. Your standing in the world reduced to a punchline. This president must be removed from office. You can do that. Slider_Quinn21 has already done his part.

Trump could win. I bet Temporal Flux that if Trump won, I would write SLIDERS REBORN Part 7 which Transmodiar would inevitably have to read. I have prepared a plot just in case I have to script it and I've dug out my Season 3 DVD set in case I need to rewatch the Neil Dickson episodes to capture the actor's mannerisms. Is it likely? No. It's not likely. It also wasn't likely that someone would write a sequel to "Slide Effects," but that's happening.

I revisit SMALLVILLE, but in my head, to be honest. I don't actually rewatch it. I think of Clark's amazing supersaves in Seasons 8 - 10, especially him saving Lois from a crashing train and saving Chloe from a Checkmate fired gunshot to the head in almost still frames of slow motion superspeed. I think of how Tom Welling, who started as one of the worst actors to ever appear on television, came to embody Clark Kent's decency and humility and gentleness so well by subsuming the role into his own personality which turned out to be a perfect match.

On Planet Ireactions, SMALLVILLE opened its first season with Tom Welling, Kristen Bell, Sam Jones III, Kristin Kreuk and Michael Rosenbaum playing characters in Smallville University as opposed to Smallville High.

In my head, Kristen Bell didn't play Chloe; she played Lois Lane but was otherwise exactly the same as Chloe. Also, in my world, the Kryptonite freaks, having Kryptonite inside their bodies, often injured and nearly killed Clark and were increasingly powerful with each episode.

And on Planet Ireactions, Lex is heroic and friendly but a bit ruthless and with a troubled past. In Season 5, everyone has graduated from university and Lex starts LexCorp. In the Season 5 finale, Lex is forced to bankrupt LexCorp to help Clark and friends save the world from aliens.

All of Lex's friends are grateful, but his now out of work employees and investors and most of Metropolis despise him and when Lex tries to explain to the world at large that aliens would have destroyed the world, he's mocked and dismissed as a crazy person, causing Lex to become resentful and bitter and this leads to him becoming evil in the middle of Season 6 and Clark is forced to accept that his best friend is now his worst enemy by Season 7. Lex goes further ballistic when he realizes that Clark could have outed himself as an alien to restore Clark's good name but ultimately declined to do so to protect Jonathan and Martha.

Also on Planet Ireactions, the most exciting setpieces of every week are Clark's supersaves, any time a character close to the main cast's age dies should be alarming and unusual and the show should really focus on it -- and the Lana/Clark romance is over by the middle of Season 2 and in Season 3, Clark admits to himself that he's in love with Lois but is terrified to date her because he'll never be able to hide The Secret from her.

And Planet Ireactions' SMALLVILLE definitely has Kyle Gallner as Bart Allen join the regular cast in Season 3. I have no real affinity for Bart, but I know Slider_Quinn21 likes him a lot so yes. And we also have those weird starfish aliens pester the cast for a season because that will make Temporal Flux happy. I want to think of something that would make Transmodiar happy, but the only thing that comes to mind is to stop typing now.

I don't know what to say about Guggenheim. LEGENDS has mostly been run by Chris Fedak, Sarah Schechter, Phil Klemmer and Keto Shimizu. Certainly, Guggenheim has been present throughout ARROW, but during Seasons 1 - 2, he was working closely with noted sexual harasser Andrew Kreisberg. Season 1 was a CW attempt at a Christopher Nolan movie; Season 2 went more into SMALLVILLE-esque larger than life superheroics on a street crime level. It's hard to say which one was Guggenheim's style.

With Season 3, Guggenheim was paired with a new producer, Wendy Mericle and the series began stretching from street crime to assassin death cults and magical resurrections and Iron Man style battle armour that were an odd fit. Guggenheim and Mericle were also showrunners for the Season 4 dive into fantasy with magical totems and telekinetic villains at which point Stephen Amell declared that if he had to fight a magical villain for another season, he was out. One would think that perhaps Guggenheim had lost his way without the steadying hand of noted sexual harasser Andrew Kreisberg who, in Season 3, had been devoting more his attention to running THE FLASH and sexually harassing the writing staff of THE FLASH.

With Amell's support, Season 5 - 6, Guggenheim and Mericle shepherded two of ARROW's finest seasons which returned to the Season 2 style of heightened street crime stories while re-establishing the Oliver and Felicity romance as a partnership of equals rather than the peculiar Harlequin it had become. Guggenheim left as showrunner after this, with Season 7 run by Beth Schwartz who did an excellent job of maintaining the street crime adventures of Seasons 5 - 6. Guggenheim returned for Season 8 and with Schwartz, produced a human-perspective prologue to the cosmic events of CRISIS.

It's hard for me to say what Guggenheim's style is as when left to largely his own devices, he steered ARROW into a fantasy direction for two years, but he and Mericle also steered ARROW back to its roots for the two years after that. I will say that it takes humility and vision to shift a show in one direction but then decide to reverse course, although I'm sure it helps if the star of the show is demanding that reversal.

I'm sure Temporal Flux would have a much more coherent take on Mr. Guggenheim.