Sliders was initially intended to be part scifi/satire. I’ll outline the top 5 episodes that’ll give you the most laughs.
Honorable Mention: Season 4 – “O Brother, Where Art Thou?”
“Can I buy you something with an umbrella in it?” – Colin. The naive brother Colin Mallory, has just left his Amish-like world and has been introduced to a modern parallel world. The poor boy has never seen a toilet in his life and he’s just like a little child that wants to take everything apart to examine it. Seeing Colin discover new things is the funniest gist of the episode. He gets to talk on a phone that “has no cord” and thinks the purpose of an “umbrella” in a glass is to protect the drink from the elements.
5. Season 1 – “Pilot”
(mocking) “Ross J. Kelly got me a million bucks.” – Rembrandt. Quinn Mallory just opened the gateway to parallel worlds bringing with him three other individuals and a bundle of laughs. This episode is one that’s full of adventure but mixed with comedy to tame the drama. You can’t help but laugh at the numerous things in this episode including Rembrandt’s outrageously hilarious “People’s Court” scene and the obsurdity of a world where a guy waves you off where a red street light means “go”. Words just don’t do it justice, you have to see it to believe it.
4. Season 1 – “The Weaker Sex”
“Maybe now we can move to a bigger motel room and I won’t have to sleep in the bathtub.” – Quinn. The Sliders have just landed on a world where women hold the dominate position of power. Arturo puts on a false show of weeping in front of a crowd while “opposing the bad things and supporting the good things”. To top it all off, Wade and Arturo keep arguing about equal rights in his quest for mayor. In the end Arturo becomes Wade’s slave on the next world.
3. Season 1 – “Summer of Love”
“Well we can’t have that. Boomerangs and kangaroos everywhere, what a nightmare!” – Quinn. This episode starts off with a humorus Conrad Bennish, Jr. which is bound to give everyone a laugh. There’s everything from Quinn knocking Arturo unconcious with a large rock to hippies carrying on about the Sliders being prophets. Rembrandt nearly becomes a slave to his double’s wife, while Mrs. Tweak calls the FBI thinking Quinn and Arturo are planning to assassinate president Oliver North!
2. Season 4 – “Lipschitz Live”
“See, that’s the trouble with you kids today, you know that? You read too damn much, you don’t watch enough television.” – Hal. Quinn and his team have just slid into a world where everyone habitually watches a program called “Lipschitz Live”. This whole episode is steered toward comedy. We have Colin and his double in two bizzare situations while Quinn is on a talk show with another “alien” from a different world. Quinn gets royally ticked at the guy and even gets into a fight with him.
1. Season 1 – “The King Is Back”
“Gentlemen, check your flies.” – Arturo. Rembrandt has found his dream world where everyone mistakes him for his double, who is as famous as the King of rock and roll. What really makes this episode the funniest of them all is the “Pavarotti scene” that many of us like to call. Arturo is mistaken as the Italian tenor, Luciano Pavarotti. He finally loses it and wreaks verbal havoc on the man at the front desk. Even Jerry O’Connell (Quinn Mallory) almost destroys the take, after he nearly bursts out laughing while John Rhys-Davies (Professor Arturo), verbally chews out the clerk.