The farm’s autumn attraction is starting to come together, and today we’ve been getting the petting zoo ready for visitors. 😊

Myra has apparently appointed herself chief goat-tester, which mostly involves handing out snacks, giving scratches, and making sure every animal gets the proper amount of attention. 💜🐐

The chickens and ducks are settling in, the little pig is already investigating everything, and the cattle seem convinced the whole event is actually being organized for them. 😂 Even the tortoise has reported for duty—although he may still be heading toward his assigned position by opening day.

One more piece of the farm’s autumn adventure almost ready to go. 🍁🚜🎃

Myra: “Dad, I’m not spoiling the goat. I’m conducting quality control.” 😇💜

Caught Myra reading Don Quixote today.

Apparently she got to the windmills and started remembering things. 😂

It wasn’t that long ago that I declared a few perfectly innocent windmills suspicious, renamed poor Biscuit Rocinante, grabbed a lance, and set off with my purple-haired squire beside me on Dapple.

Myra, naturally, remembers the adventure a little differently.

I remember courage, chivalry and the pursuit of giants.

She remembers having to bring the snacks, water, first-aid kit and most of the common sense.

And judging by the look on Sancho’s face back there, she still doesn’t trust me around windmills.

Myra: “Dad… for the last time, his name is Biscuit.” 😏💜

Myra: Okay, in my defense… the sponge totally slipped. 😇💜

It just somehow slipped out of my hand, flew straight across the booth, and hit Lauren square in the face.

Absolute mystery. Could’ve happened to anybody. 🤷‍♀️💦😂

Sorry, Lauren.

…mostly. 😏

Clint: 🍂☕ String lights overhead, a cool autumn evening settling in, and all of us piled onto the porch with warm mugs and good company. Sometimes the best nights are the simple ones. ❤️

Episode 8, “Spoiler: We’re as Confused as You Are,” finally starts untangling some of the chaos from last week — while somehow making the multiverse even stranger.

Gary leads a disastrous charge, Kripke makes a brutal decision and actually seems shaken by it afterward, Dean Norris and Joshua Malina return in very different roles, and Kaley Cuoco is back as Major Penny — “Firing Squad Penny.”

Then the gang discovers they may have been chasing themselves all along.

Oh, and apparently Stuart may now be trapped inside a comic book.

So yes, Shannon still has questions. Quite a few of them. 🤭

⭐ 4½ out of 5 stars

— Shannon Taylor O’Brien
The Replikatown News

THE MULTIVERSE FINALLY EXPLAINS ITSELF — SORT OF

Stuart Fails to Save the Universe turns last week’s confusion into a time loop, brings back a terrifying new Penny, and somehow makes everything slightly clearer.

BY SHANNON TAYLOR O’BRIEN

Spoilers for Episode 8, “Spoiler: We’re as Confused as You Are.”

There is something wonderfully reassuring about a television show looking directly at its audience and admitting:

Yes, we know this is getting confusing.

Episode 8 begins with Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke briefly enjoying their new lives as centaurs before remembering they still need the other machine — specifically the one carrying the controller that might finally help repair the multiverse.

So they go backward.

Not home.

Not forward.

Backward through places they have already visited.

And somewhere around there, Stuart Fails to Save the Universe stops being merely a show about alternate realities and becomes a story about people accidentally chasing themselves.

Honestly, the title is doing some heavy lifting this week.

Welcome Back to the War

The gang returns to the devastated Pasadena we glimpsed before, where Gary is now leading Charlie Company into what looks very much like a suicide mission.

It goes badly.

Very badly.

Gary climbs out of the trench and is brutally cut down by enemy fire. When the next man prepares to lead everyone out after him, Kripke shoots him in the back before he can climb over the top, arguing that he has just saved the rest of them from following Gary to the same fate.

Later, while trying to sleep, Kripke seems genuinely shaken by what he has done. Beneath all the jokes and inappropriate comments, the show occasionally remembers that even Barry Kripke has a conscience.

Then Dean Norris arrives as Captain Richard Williams.

That is cameo number one.

Norris previously played Colonel Richard Williams on The Big Bang Theory, the Air Force officer who became interested in Sheldon, Leonard and Howard’s guidance-system research. Putting another version of him in command of an actual battlefield is exactly the sort of multiverse recycling this series does well.

Stuart and company wisely decide they would prefer not to die for a war they barely understand.

The military calls that desertion.

Apparently “we’re from another universe” is not an approved leave request.

The Worst Court-Martial Ever

That brings us to cameo number two: Joshua Malina, formerly Caltech President Siebert, now appearing as Captain Siebert, the gang’s spectacularly unhelpful military defense attorney.

Chuck Lorre has explained the joke rather neatly: they needed an inept lawyer, remembered they already had an inept university president, and changed his profession.

Then the prosecution walks in.

Major Penny.

Yes, Kaley Cuoco is back, giving us cameo number three and her second alternate Penny of the season.

This is not Resistance Penny from Episode 2. This Penny is military, intimidating, and known — rather ominously — as “Firing Squad Penny.”

She charges Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke with cowardice, desertion, espionage, murder and mutiny.

Captain Siebert’s defense strategy can essentially be summarized as, “Good luck.”

They are sentenced to death.

Wait — We Were Chasing Ourselves?

Stuart manages to get the machine back within reach, and the gang escapes — accidentally taking Penny with them.

She becomes a centaur.

Penny takes this development considerably better than I suspect most of us would.

Then comes the part where the episode earns its title.

Stuart realizes they do not need to find the missing machine.

They already know where it was.

So they travel backward through their own journey, take it from their earlier selves, and become the mysterious military-looking group that their earlier selves were chasing in Episode 7.

The people they thought were alternate versions of themselves were, at least in this sequence, themselves later in their own loop. Their attempt to solve the problem causes the very chase that eventually leads them to the solution.

Confusing?

Absolutely.

But it actually hangs together.

Has Stuart Been Sliding?

Still yes — but this week the show adds something Sliders rarely emphasized.

The alternate worlds remain important, but now time and causality are tangled into the sliding itself.

Our travelers are no longer simply visiting different Earths. They can intersect with their own journey, become the people they previously encountered, and close a causal loop behind themselves.

That pushes Stuart farther away from simply borrowing the old Sliders formula and deeper into its own increasingly ridiculous mythology.

And I like that.

The Comic Book Problem

Just when Stuart appears to understand what happened, Kyle and Trevor receive instructions to stop the gang’s “forward progress.”

Then we discover Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke are apparently inside a comic book titled Stuart Fails to Save the Universe: Trapped!

Of course they are.

Eight episodes ago Stuart owned a comic-book store.

Now Stuart may actually be a comic-book character.

That feels less like irony and more like the multiverse showing off.

The Verdict

4½ out of 5 stars

“Spoiler: We’re as Confused as You Are” takes the chaos of the previous episode and does something clever with it: it reveals that at least some of the confusion was intentional.

The time loop works. The war universe gives Kripke an unexpected emotional beat. Dean Norris and Joshua Malina are smart Big Bang Theory callbacks rather than decorative cameos, and Kaley Cuoco once again proves Penny can apparently thrive in almost any universe you throw her into.

Even one where she has four legs.

And now the gang is trapped inside a comic book while somebody else appears to be deliberately interfering with their journey.

At this point, I no longer expect the multiverse to make complete sense.

I would simply appreciate it if Stuart eventually figured it out before I need a corkboard, red string and several different colored markers.

— Shannon Taylor O’Brien

Episode 7, “Spoiler: Dexys Midnight Runners Get a Royalty Payment,” gives the gang a universe where everybody can hear everybody else think — which is already dangerous enough before Barry Kripke gets involved. 🤭

There’s a Caltech break-in, Ramona and a very different Bernadette, some inspired musical camouflage, multiple versions of Stuart and the gang chasing each other through familiar universes… and, because apparently the multiverse wasn’t strange enough yet, centaurs.

And yes, Shannon asks it again:

Has Stuart been sliding?

At this point? Oh, absolutely.

⭐ 4 out of 5 stars

— Shannon Taylor O’Brien
The Replikatown News

EVERYBODY CAN HEAR YOU THINK — AND STUART STILL CAN’T FIND HOME

Stuart Fails to Save the Universe finally gives its travelers a steering wheel. Unfortunately, the road is still the multiverse.

BY SHANNON TAYLOR O’BRIEN

Spoilers for Episode 7, “Spoiler: Dexys Midnight Runners Get a Royalty Payment.”

Seven episodes into Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, I have learned an important lesson:

If Barry Kripke can hear everyone’s thoughts, everyone can also hear Barry Kripke’s.

There are some scientific discoveries humanity simply was not ready for.

Episode 7 picks up in the telepathic universe teased last week, where Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke discover that complete honesty is considerably less charming when it is mandatory. Their private thoughts are public, lying is nearly impossible, and Stuart’s relationship with Denise suddenly has nowhere left to hide.

Oddly enough, that part goes pretty well. Denise even admits she wants children with him — weak chin and all.

Stuart Bloom may actually be winning at something.

Naturally, this is when they decide to rob Caltech.

The Multiverse Needs a Steering Wheel

Stuart finally works out why the machine keeps throwing them sideways into random realities instead of taking them home. They have been moving laterally through parallel universes when they also need to navigate another axis: time. The machine was never finished.

In other words, they have been driving through infinity without a steering wheel.

Caltech has the missing technology, but stealing something is difficult when the receptionist can hear you thinking about stealing it.

Enter Ramona Nowitzki.

Riki Lindhome returns as another version of the physicist who once had a rather memorable interest in Sheldon, while Kripke immediately discovers that even telepathy cannot improve his flirting.

Their solution is wonderfully ridiculous: fill their heads with music.

“Come On Eileen” becomes mental camouflage, followed by “The Girl from Ipanema,” and suddenly the episode title makes perfect sense.

If Dexys Midnight Runners really do collect a royalty every time somebody gets that song stuck in their head, this universe could fund their retirement.

Bernadette, But Not Quite

Melissa Rauch returns too, but this Bernadette followed a very different road. Instead of becoming a microbiologist, she remained in the world of childhood pageants and now teaches tap dance in a strip mall.

I like what the show is doing with these cameos.

They are not simply familiar faces walking onscreen so the audience can applaud. The multiverse asks what these people might have become if one turn in their lives had gone differently.

That is science fiction doing character work.

Has Stuart Been Sliding?

Oh, absolutely.

And this week the comparison gets even harder to ignore.

The gang breaks into Caltech and discovers another Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke already working on the same problem. They chase their doubles through worlds we have already visited — the apocalypse, the happy universe, the magic world, paradise and the Cow Universe.

Then another team arrives.

Now we have multiple groups of the same four travelers, all apparently trying to save reality and none entirely certain which group is supposed to be doing it.

That is delightfully multiversal, but it also raises a serious question: if several Stuarts have been sent on the same mission, is our Stuart really the chosen one — or simply one attempt among many?

The show does not answer that yet.

It gives us centaurs instead.

The Verdict

4 out of 5 stars

“Spoiler: Dexys Midnight Runners Get a Royalty Payment” is clever, funny and important to the larger story, but it is also surprisingly short. At about fifteen minutes, it feels less like a complete adventure than the opening movement of something larger. In fact, it is the shortest episode yet produced across the Big Bang Theory television franchise.

Still, a great deal happens.

The travelers finally understand why they cannot get home. The telepathy premise produces some terrific comedy. Ramona and Bernadette return for reasons that actually matter to the world. And the arrival of multiple Stuart teams makes the multiverse mystery much more interesting.

Most importantly, the series has stopped asking only:

“Where will they land next?”

Now it is asking:

“Which Stuart is actually supposed to save everything?”

And just when I thought I had enough questions, everyone became a centaur.

At this point, I am beginning to suspect the multiverse has a sense of humor.

Unfortunately for Stuart, it seems to be a mean one.

— Shannon Taylor O’Brien

Labor Day seemed like the perfect excuse to put the chores aside for a while and settle something important: Myra and Amanda vs. Shannon and Emily at horseshoes.

Myra: Amanda and I pitched the tent down by the pond tonight and decided we weren’t in any hurry to go back to the house. 😊

Starlight and Sunflower are grazing nearby, the fire’s crackling, and the first stars are starting to show through the trees.

Some nights don’t need an adventure.

Just a good friend, a couple of horses, and nowhere else you’d rather be. 💜🐴🔥

Amanda, Emily, Myra and I moved on to Triangle Pose today.

Four mats, four different definitions of “perfect alignment,” and an impressive amount of pretending our legs weren’t starting to complain. 😂

Still, there’s something pretty satisfying about finally settling into the pose, looking up, and realizing everybody made it there together.

Trikonasana: accomplished. Next pose, please. 😄

Episode 6, “Spoiler: Corn Is Delicious,” may be the strongest one yet.

Stuart finally finds a universe he could actually live in, Denise gives him a reason to believe he might be more heroic than he thinks, Raj brings some very bad news about the fate of reality, Bert and Kripke keep doing what Bert and Kripke do best, and somehow Gary finally makes sense.

And yes, I’m still asking the question:

Has Stuart been sliding?

This week, the answer feels more like absolutely.

⭐ 4½ out of 5 stars

— Shannon Taylor O’Brien
The Replikatown News

CLOSE ENOUGH TO HOME — UNTIL THE UNIVERSE NEEDS STUART

Stuart Fails to Save the Universe gives its least likely hero exactly what he wants. Then asks whether he is willing to give it up.

BY SHANNON TAYLOR O’BRIEN

Spoilers for Episode 6, “Spoiler: Corn Is Delicious.”

Six episodes into Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, Stuart Bloom finally finds something rarer than an alternate universe:

One he actually likes.

Granted, humanity evolved from cows.

Everyone has four stomachs, people eat grass, and Denise’s decision to snack on a houseplant at the end of last week suddenly makes biological sense. But compared with realities actively trying to kill them, this world is remarkably normal.

For Stuart, “close enough” may finally be good enough.

More importantly, he and Denise are happy. After last week’s grief over the children they lost with another reality, this episode lets them look forward. Stuart proposes, and somehow a marriage proposal amid the digestive complications of bovine ancestry manages to be both ridiculous and genuinely sweet.

Stuart does not want another adventure.

He wants Denise.

He wants a home.

Then Bert and Kripke take the universe-hopping device and keep searching.

Naturally, they end up falling through an apparently endless interdimensional void.

Watching them plummet through infinity while bickering works because the show has not changed Bert and Kripke to fit science fiction. It has changed science fiction to fit Bert and Kripke.

Then Raj shows up with some very bad news.

Another version of Raj has discovered that stars and galaxies are disappearing. Reality itself is being erased.

The catch?

Stuart and Denise’s universe may still have a few hundred years.

Their reaction is basically: Great. We’ll be dead.

It is funny because it is such a Stuart response, but it also gives the episode its best question:

If the disaster will not happen during your lifetime, do you still have a responsibility to stop it?

An alternate Stuart explains that our Stuart became quantum-entangled with the original catastrophe and is apparently the one person capable of fixing it.

Stuart is not impressed.

He is not Superman. He is a former artist and comic-book-store owner who has spent much of his life convinced he is the least remarkable person in the room.

Denise gives him the answer the episode needs: being a hero is not about being extraordinary. It is about choosing to help other people.

And Stuart chooses to go.

That is the moment the series stops merely joking about Stuart as the world’s least likely hero and begins letting him become one.

Has Stuart Been Sliding?

Absolutely.

The Cow Universe is almost a textbook Sliders premise: take an otherwise familiar Earth, change one fundamental fact, and follow the consequences.

Here, humans evolved from cattle instead of primates.

But Stuart is becoming more serialized than Sliders usually was. These worlds are no longer just weekly curiosities. Stuart is learning why the multiverse is collapsing and why he is connected to it.

The Sliders echo remains, but the show is finally building mythology of its own.

There is also a wonderfully silly solution to one practical problem. Stuart gave Bert and Kripke the machine, so Alternate Stuart tells him to order another from the back of a comic book.

Gary delivers it.

Yes. Gary apparently works for UPS after all.

The replacement lets Stuart and Denise rescue Bert and Kripke, reunite the group and jump again.

Their newest world looks normal.

For about three seconds.

Then they discover everyone can read minds.

Because apparently “normal” remains the rarest thing in the multiverse.

The Verdict

4½ out of 5 stars

“Spoiler: Corn Is Delicious” may be the strongest episode yet because Stuart finally has something worth giving up.

He could stay with Denise and accept a peaceful, slightly ridiculous life while leaving a far-future catastrophe to somebody else.

Instead, he leaves.

Not because he suddenly believes he is Superman, but because Denise convinces him that you do not have to be Superman to help people.

Six episodes ago, putting Stuart Bloom at the center of a cosmic adventure was the joke.

Now the show is asking a better question:

What if being a hero has less to do with who you are than with what you decide to do when somebody needs you?

Stuart may still fail to save the universe.

But now I believe he is actually going to try.

— Shannon Taylor O’Brien

We’ve had so much going on lately that somewhere along the way, Shannon and I realized we hadn’t had nearly enough time where it was simply us.

So tonight, after everybody settled down, we claimed the porch swing.

No big plans. We just sat close, watched the last light disappear over the farm, and stayed there as the stars started coming out.

Sometimes you don’t need to go anywhere to get a little piece of the world back.

You just need the right person sitting beside you. ❤️

A little dancing, a lot of laughing, and absolutely no chance any of us were going to stand still once the music started. 😄

The four of us hit the floor at The Necklace tonight and pretty much stayed there. Good music, great company, and just enough purple neon to make everything feel a little dangerous.

Some nights you make plans.

Other nights you just dance. 💃🖤✨

Shannon and Myra, enjoying one of those quiet mother-daughter evenings where nobody really needs to say much. ❤️

Myra and I took Starlight and Ranger out for an evening ride and ended up on the hill overlooking the farm just as the sun started dropping toward the horizon.

From up there, we could look down over home—the fields, the barn, the fences, all the familiar little pieces of everyday life stretched out beneath us. Nothing dramatic happened. There wasn’t any grand adventure waiting at the top.

It was just a dad, his baby girl, two good horses, and a sunset over home. And sometimes those are the moments that stay with you the longest.

Which, of course, meant these two immediately took off their boots and sat down.

Best friends. Bare feet. Questionable decision-making.

What could possibly go wrong? 😏✨

The Blessing of the Two says that when two true friends of innocent heart sit barefoot and cross-legged, facing one another inside a fairy ring, each may silently make one wish for the other.

If both wishes are selfless, the fairies grant three gifts: good luck to the friends, prosperity to their home, and the secret wish each made for the other.

Neither friend may reveal her wish before it comes true. And if tiny lights appear around the fairy ring, it means both wishes have been accepted. ✨

Shannon’s been following Stuart Fails to Save the Universe week by week for The Replikatown News, looking at the comedy, the alternate universes, the character moments, the cameos — and, more than once, those increasingly hard-to-ignore Sliders echoes.

Here’s the complete series so far:

Episode 1 — “Has Stuart Been Sliding?”
The premiere, the multiverse setup, and Shannon’s first suspicion that somebody in the writers’ room may remember Quinn Mallory.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Replikatown/comments/1v8onk0/shannons_review_of_stuart_fails_to_save_the/

Episode 2 — “Stuart Finally Starts Sliding”
The show starts making fuller use of its alternate-world premise, and Shannon begins looking more closely at what kind of multiverse story Stuart wants to be.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Replikatown/comments/1vbg8cr/stuart_finally_starts_sliding_shannon_reviews/

Episode 3 — “Stuart Is Still Sliding — Now With Magic”
Bert, magic, demon Bernadette, and another universe that pushes the show farther into its anything-can-happen premise.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Replikatown/comments/1vhqiid/stuart_is_still_sliding_now_with_magic_shannon/

Episode 4 — “The Sliders Echo Gets Louder”
Amy, the psychiatric-reality twist, the week’s cameos, and Shannon’s favorite bit of speculation yet: Jerry O’Connell, Georgie Cooper, and a possible little wink toward Quinn Mallory.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Replikatown/comments/1vnxhcr/shannon_reviews_stuart_fails_to_save_the_universe/

Episode 5 — “Paradise Lost — and Stuart Probably Should Have Known Better”
Bert gets married, paradise goes sideways, Stuart and Denise face some painful truths, Kripke complicates matters, and the mysterious Red Quartz gives Shannon plenty to chew on.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Replikatown/comments/1vu9z92/shannons_latest_stuart_review_is_in/

This post will be updated as each new review appears.

If you’re just joining us, start with Episode 1 and follow Shannon down the multiversal rabbit hole.

— The Replikatown News

Episode 5 takes Stuart and the gang somewhere they probably should have left alone: paradise. Shannon looks at Bert’s unexpected romance, Kripke’s talent for making everything worse, Stuart and Denise’s lingering grief, the growing Sliders resemblance, and one very mysterious instruction involving red quartz.

“Spoiler: Bert Gets Married” — 4 out of 5 stars.

**THE REPLIKATOWN NEWS**

*Stories from the heart of Replikatown*

**ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | TELEVISION REVIEW**

# **PARADISE LOST — AND STUART PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER**

### *Stuart Fails to Save the Universe* finally gives its travelers a perfect world. Naturally, they ruin it.

**BY SHANNON TAYLOR O’BRIEN**

*Spoilers for Episode 5, “Spoiler: Bert Gets Married.”*

Five episodes into *Stuart Fails to Save the Universe*, I am beginning to think Stuart Bloom’s real superpower is finding a perfectly acceptable alternate universe and giving it a reason to regret meeting him.

This week, Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke arrive somewhere that seems almost suspiciously wonderful.

No killer artificial intelligence. No magic threatening to turn the scientists into targets. No psychiatric hospital convincing Stuart that the entire adventure may exist only inside his head.

Instead, they find paradise.

It is a beautiful island inhabited by people living peacefully with nature and with one another. There is no modern technology and apparently very little of the anxiety, competition and general nonsense that the rest of us have spent centuries inventing for ourselves.

For perhaps the first time since this series began, our travelers could simply stop.

Which, of course, means they absolutely cannot.

The episode was directed by *Star Trek: The Next Generation* veteran Jonathan Frakes, and that is an especially appropriate choice for a story that begins almost like one of those old-fashioned science-fiction thought experiments: What happens when outsiders carrying the assumptions of their own civilization are dropped into a society that never developed them?

The answer, apparently, is that Bert introduces monogamy and Kripke brings in plain old greed.

Paradise never stood a chance.

## The Trouble With Bringing Baggage Through the Multiverse

Bert falls in love with Chana, played by Zoe Cipres, and for a while his story is genuinely sweet. But Bert also introduces the islanders to monogamy, something this society has never practiced.

Kripke does considerably more damage.

Barry Kripke has never encountered a situation that could not be improved, in his opinion, by making Barry Kripke more important. He begins encouraging the islanders to think more about themselves — who has what, who deserves more, and why having something another person does not might make you more important.

Before long, envy, selfishness and possessiveness begin replacing the easy cooperation that existed before Stuart and his friends arrived.

There is a broad joke here — several of them, actually — but underneath those jokes is one of the better science-fiction ideas the show has attempted.

The travelers do not deliberately conquer this world. They do not invade it with armies or weapons.

They contaminate it with ideas.

Bert introduces romantic exclusivity. Kripke encourages selfishness and status. Once those ideas take root, the islanders prove perfectly capable of doing the rest themselves.

And that makes this universe considerably more interesting than simply giving everyone funny costumes and waiting for Kripke to say something inappropriate.

It also puts the blame squarely where it belongs.

For four episodes we have watched Stuart and company arrive in worlds that were already broken.

This time, the world was fine until they got there.

That is a rather important change.

## Stuart and Denise Finally Get Quiet — Almost

The part of this episode that surprised me most, though, was not the destruction of paradise.

It was Stuart and Denise.

They are still carrying memories of the children they had in the previous reality. Those children may no longer exist in any practical sense, but Stuart and Denise remember loving them.

That means their grief is real even if the life they are grieving technically was not.

Kevin Sussman has described that twist as almost painfully appropriate for Stuart: after years of being the unlucky outsider on *The Big Bang Theory*, Stuart finally found happiness with Denise just as that series ended. Now the new show gives him another version of the life he wanted — a family — and takes that away too.

That is both funny in the cruel cosmic tradition of Stuart Bloom and genuinely sad.

It also answers one concern I had when this series started.

A multiverse show can easily turn its alternate realities into disposable playgrounds. Nothing matters because another universe is coming next week.

But memories matter.

Relationships matter.

Stuart and Denise cannot simply jump through the machine and reset emotionally along with the scenery.

That gives the series something it badly needs: consequences that survive the slide.

## So… Has Stuart Been Sliding?

You knew I was going to ask.

Episode 5 may be the strongest evidence yet that *Stuart Fails to Save the Universe* understands the old *Sliders* formula rather than merely resembling it accidentally.

The classic *Sliders* structure was not simply “go to another universe.”

The interesting episodes asked what would happen if one part of society developed differently — politically, technologically, culturally or socially — and then dropped our familiar travelers into that experiment.

Paradise follows exactly that sort of structure.

Our travelers encounter a society organized around assumptions radically different from their own. They interfere with it. Their interference changes the society. Things spiral out of control. Then they have to leave.

That is *very* *Sliders*.

But there is one important difference.

Quinn Mallory and his companions usually tried desperately not to disrupt the worlds they visited.

Stuart’s group seems to treat “Prime Directive” as more of a friendly suggestion.

This week they do not merely observe an alternate society.

They accidentally invent its problems.

I am no longer wondering whether the similarity to *Sliders* is there.

It is.

The more interesting question now is what *Stuart* intends to do differently with the formula.

And Jonathan Frakes directing this particular installment adds another delightful layer of science-fiction history to the whole thing. A veteran of *Star Trek* directing an episode of a *Big Bang Theory* spinoff that increasingly behaves like *Sliders* is the sort of wonderfully nerdy television genealogy I cannot help appreciating.

## No Big Cameo Required

Another thing caught my attention this week.

There is no major returning *Big Bang Theory* star dropped into the episode as its centerpiece. The principal guest characters belong to this universe, including Chana and the other islanders.

And I think that helps.

The early cameos were fun. Seeing familiar characters in unfamiliar circumstances is one of the pleasures this premise promises.

But eventually *Stuart Fails to Save the Universe* has to prove that Stuart, Denise, Bert and Kripke can carry the show themselves.

This episode suggests they can.

Bert gets the romantic story. Kripke gets to be an absolutely terrible influence on an entire civilization. Denise gets some of the episode’s emotional weight. And Stuart continues becoming something more interesting than the perpetually miserable comic-book-store owner we knew before.

The show feels less like *The Big Bang Theory: Multiverse Reunion Special* and more like its own ensemble adventure.

That is progress.

## And Then There’s the Red Quartz

While paradise collapses around them, Stuart continues trying to determine who has been leaving the mysterious messages that seem to be guiding their journey.

His latest clue is:

**“Use Red Quartz.”**

He finds it under circumstances I will describe only as proof that saving the multiverse is considerably less glamorous than comic books have led us to believe.

The important part is that the messages are beginning to form a larger serialized mystery.

Someone appears to know where Stuart is going.

Someone appears to know what he needs.

And presumably someone knows considerably more about the damaged multiverse than Stuart does.

Considering Stuart is still trying to figure most of this out as he goes, that is not an especially high bar.

By the time the group realizes they have thoroughly wrecked Eden, leaving becomes the only sensible option.

They jump again.

And almost immediately Denise eats a leaf.

Because apparently the lesson “perhaps we should stop touching things in alternate universes” did not survive the trip.

## The Verdict

**4 out of 5 stars**

“Spoiler: Bert Gets Married” is one of the better episodes so far because it finally combines the two things this series needs to make its premise work.

It gives us a strange alternate world worth thinking about, and it gives us characters whose experiences carry over when that world disappears.

The comedy is still broad. Kripke remains Kripke. Bert introducing monogamy into a society that has never practiced it is exactly the sort of absurd idea this show enjoys.

But underneath that is a surprisingly melancholy story about Stuart and Denise mourning a family that existed only in another reality — and a clever little science-fiction parable about four travelers who discover paradise and promptly teach paradise how to ruin itself.

Five episodes in, my *Sliders* comparison is becoming less of a question.

Yes, Stuart has been sliding.

The difference is that Quinn Mallory usually worried about getting home before he changed history.

Stuart and his friends might want to start worrying about whether the next universe survives having them as houseguests.

**— Shannon Taylor O’Brien**

While Shannon, Coco, and Kynzie are out seeing just how much mud they can sling with Clint’s truck, the rest of us stayed back at the farm to take care of something equally important.

BBQ. Lots of BBQ. 😋

Clint’s got the grill covered, Myra’s working on the sauce, Emily’s handling the slaw, and Amanda’s getting the rest of the fixins ready.

Ribs, chicken, homemade sides, fresh tomatoes, onions, pickles, rolls… the whole backyard is starting to smell pretty darn good.

Of course, judging by the way Shannon and those two are treating that truck, we may need to make them eat outside when they get back. 😂

Clint: “They can bring home all the mud they want. Just don’t expect me to let ’em anywhere near the BBQ until they hose off first.”

🔥🍖🥗🌽 Farmhouse BBQ night!

Apparently all it took was one deep mud hole and three women making very questionable decisions in a perfectly good truck.

I’m trying to keep us pointed in the right direction, Coco’s cheering like we just won Daytona, and Kynzie has apparently decided mudding requires a victory salute. 😂

And before anybody asks—yes, we saw the mud hole.

Yes, we knew exactly how deep it was.

And yes… we went through it anyway. 😏

WOOOOOO!

Does this count as Motorsports? 😏🏁

Because if posing beside a big red truck counts, I think I just found my event.

No helmet. No pit crew. No checkered flag.

Just camo pants, boots, and entirely too much confidence around several tons of horsepower. 😂

Shannon: “Clint, be honest… do I get points if I can actually drive it?”