Relocate

Transmodiar and I had an exchange over in "The Return of Sliders" which ended with him saying, "Bye for now!" I think it would be best if he didn't come back. This is not a ban; I'm not saying that as an administrator. I'm saying that as his friend.

I love Transmodiar. When he became friends with me, it was like when Quinn discovered he had a brother. That hasn't changed, but my brother has crossed a line.

A SLIDERS fan posted on a SLIDERS message board that the SLIDERS creator was pursuing a SLIDERS reboot with the original cast of SLIDERS. As the fans in that thread were touched by the news and hopeful of a revival, Transmodiar declared in that thread that he didn't want SLIDERS to come back and that there could be better shows to fill SLIDERS' place, perhaps his show -- a remark I found ungracious, ungrateful, inappropriate and inconsiderate.

I mock SLIDERS all the time, but to say that it should stay dead when the creator is trying to revive it? That is unprovoked cruelty. Anyone who can't at least respect the fact that people love and miss Quinn, Wade, Rembrandt and Arturo should not be here.

The reason Transmodiar behaved this way: he has been trying to sell a legally dis-similar series about parallel universes. It'd be hard to sell if SLIDERS itself came back. Transmodiar feels threatened by SLIDERS potential return.

If Transmodiar's reaction to a potential SLIDERS revival is to declare it shouldn't happen and that he doesn't care about SLIDERS himself and that it's not worth his time to update his SLIDERS website anymore -- he could say that to me privately. Or put it in the Writer's Room thread. I see his argument that there should be more to life than servicing tired, old, corporate copyrights. I sympathize with his creative situation.

I don't sympathize with putting those feelings into a SLIDERS thread about a SLIDERS revival.

I was furious with Transmodiar's behaviour, but because we are friends -- and because my niece has told me that my fits of incendiary invective frighten her -- I transmuted my rage into a lengthy standup comedy routine where I 'joked' that I too was upset that STAR WARS was preventing me from selling a legally dis-similar INTERSTELLAR SCUFFLES, that DIE HARD meant I couldn't do LIVE PLIABLY, that ROBOCOP would stop me from selling SYBER SERGEANT, that my pitches for JUNKY STEWSTER, CONDEMNED BY THE KLANG, PSI ARCHIVES, ALABAMA SMITH and PACER: WISCONSIN TROOPER would be curtailed by PUNKY BREWSTER, SAVED BY THE BELL, THE X-FILES, INDIANA JONES and WALKER, TEXAS RANGER and snarked that surely fans of those franchises should simply recognize the brilliance of my knockoff.

I was very angry. I'm still fuming a little.

It is morally and ethically wrong to declare on a SLIDERS message board in a SLIDERS revival news thread that SLIDERS should stay dead when SLIDERS' fans are hoping it will live again. It declares that despite Transmodiar's signature declaring his site to be "Earth Prime | The Definitive Source for Sliders™," he doesn't really care about the show and doesn't even like it; it was just something to mine for connections to Hollywood writers and producers and for his own film and TV career.

Maybe he didn't mean it that way. I sometimes say things with implications I didn't intend. Or maybe he absolutely meant it. It's not a crime to not be a fan of SLIDERS -- even on a SLIDERS message board. But it was a hurtful and insulting declaration when posted it in a space designed for SLIDERS fans to share their hopes for a revival.

I am shocked that he would do that. He was always so very kind to me with SLIDERS REBORN. Since then, I have followed Transmodiar's example fully with other people's projects, treating Temporal Flux's SLIDERS DECLASSIFIED and Cez's LEGO SLIDERS -- and a couple other fanfic writers -- with the same interest and care he showed me.

I see now that Transmodiar pitied me. I am a deeply damaged person, and he saw that helping me with my SLIDERS writing would help me heal. My mental health shortcomings brought out a kindly gentleness in him that he has declined to share with this board.

I'm going to give Transmodiar's project the same consideration he gave mine: he is a very good writer. Transmodiar's writing is to SLIDERS what INDIANA JONES is to JAMES BOND. Indy originated as a legally dis-similar version of Bond that Spielberg and Lucas made their own. Transmodiar claimed that his parallel universe series concept is "superior" to SLIDERS. I have read his scripts and series bible and I can assure you that it is spectacular -- but neither superior nor inferior. SLIDERS and his project use similar tools, but they're not doing the same things.

SLIDERS fans talking about a SLIDERS revival in a SLIDERS revival thread on a SLIDERS message board should not have to bear the brunt of Transmodiar's difficulties in selling a legally dis-similar SLIDERS replacement just as SUPER MARIO fans shouldn't have to listen to me groan about my failure to get FUNGI PLUMBERS off the ground.

Transmodiar and SLIDERS fandom have done a lot for each other and had a great run. I think it'd be best if he didn't come back and left proud and with his head held high. I'm not forbidding him from returning, but he obviously doesn't want to be here any more. He's working on a really terrific project that we would all enjoy and if it gets off the ground, I'll certainly promote it here on his behalf (in the appropriate threads).

And I will gather myself and then I'll once again be happy to support him in all his creative endeavours just as he supported my SLIDERS creative endeavours -- but over Google Hangouts.

Hmm. In all seriousness, I actually am getting my annual psychiatric evaluation this week as well as a CAT scan. I'll forward your post here to my physician, you could be onto something. In the mean time, I agree that we should keep this out of JWSlider3's thread.

Thank you. Be well, write lots of scripts.