This week on Sliders is a really good Rembrandt centered episode, even if it does re-hash ideas from season one’s “Prince of Wails”.
We learn that the gang is on an Earth where America is a monarchy, through the unnecessary return of Wade’s diary. The gang is at a hospital waiting for the Professor to get treatment for multiple bee stings he received by sliding on top of a nest. Suddenly, a pregnant woman is hurried in and she recognizes Rembrandt. Rembrandt recognizes her as well as, yet another of his old girlfriends, Danielle. Without thinking, Remy immediately springs into action, offering himself up for what he thinks is a blood transfusion. Remy is so focused on helping Danielle that he doesn’t seem to notice that everyone is calling him “your grace”. Arturo comes into the waiting room to see a news report claiming that the Duchess of Hemmingshire (Danielle) has had complication with her pregnancy and that the baby will be transfered to the Duke (Rembrandt). It seems on this world that viral outbreak occurred in the recent past and it caused women to be unable to carry a baby past the second trimester. Scientists were able to create a system of “shared pregnancy” where the man is able to carry the baby for an accelerated final trimester. Quinn, Wade and Arturo decide they have to get Rembrandt out of the hospital now before he gets knocked up.
Quinn tries to get Rembrandt out of the operating room but Remy is to doped up on sedatives to move and Quinn is caught by the royal guards, led by Deputy of the Crown George Stellos and his aunt, Lady Mary. Arturo is able convince everyone that he and the others are the Duke’s new personal assistants. The whole group then heads to the royal mansion and the gang breaks the news to Remy that he’s pregnant when he comes to. The next morning, the group gets the shocking news that King Thomas and his two sons were killed in an suspected arson and that now Remy’s baby is the future king. Unknown to the Sliders, but known to us, is that Lady Mary is the mastermind behind the fire and now wants Remy dead as well so that her nephew George can be king and she can, I’m assuming, be a puppet master.
With the gang having to slide before Remy would be able to deliver the baby, Quinn and Wade’s primary objective becomes to find the real Duke so they can transfer the baby from Remy to the Duke. After asking the staff at the estate, Quinn and Wade learn about the Duke’s cabin at Camp Muir. They head out and find the Duke in a not very trusting mood, having just escaped an assassination attempt by one of Lady Mary’s goons. Quinn and Wade convince the Duke that they are friends of Duchess Danielle and the Duke heads back with them to the estate.
Back at the estate, Danielle overhears Rembrandt singing a lullaby to the baby and she confronts him about it, since the real Duke is tone deaf. Rembrandt tells her the truth about being from a parallel world and explains to her about what happened with Earth Prime’s Danielle. They got into a big fight and Danielle drove off and got into a car accident. She survived but never wanted anything to do with Remy again. Danielle is touched and Rembrandt tells her that he’ll stay if the real Duke never returns. It’s a short while later that Quinn, Wade and the Duke arrive back at the estate and enter the main house through a secret passage. They arrive just in time, as Rembrandt is almost smothered with a pillow by another assassin that Arturo manages to interrupt and Quinn almost stops, but gets kicked in the stomach. The Duke is reunited with Danielle and she asks Lady Mary to help them secretly transfer the baby from Remy to the Duke. Quinn and Wade go outside the bedroom to keep the guards from finding out there are two Rembrandts and when they come back to the room, everyone is already gone.
Lady Mary brings everyone to Camp Muir and while the rest of the group goes inside, she schemes with one of her goons about setting a fire to kill everyone. Back at the estate, Quinn and Wade look for clues about Lady Mary’s involvement and where the group could have gone. In the backing for a painting of King Thomas, they find letters that reveal that George is the king’s son and Lady Mary is his mother, not his aunt. This would make George the rightful heir. Quinn and Wade reveal this to a shocked George when he finds them rooting around the Duke’s bedroom. He, Wade and Quinn find out from one of the drivers that he took the group to Camp Muir and they rush out to stop Lady Mary.
Back at Camp Muir, Lady Mary had drugged everyone’s tea and had her goon set fire to the cabin. Rembrandt manages to wake up smelling smoke and the Duke wakes up in time to help him escape. The Professor and Danielle are able to escape as well but unfortunately, Rembrandt inhaled too much smoke and the baby is in distress. Rembrandt begs the Professor to attempt to save the baby and, although he’s theoretical physicist and not a medical doctor, he’s able to successfully rescue the baby. While Arturo is saving the baby, Quinn and George are able to subdue Lady Mary’s goons and arrest her. With everyone safe, the Duke and Duchess head back to their manor and begin their new role as the new rulers and George is made Lord High Protector. Before the gang slides, Danielle gives Rembrandt a locket with a picture of little Rembrandt I.
In something we haven’t seen in a while, the gang lands on epilogue Earth, this time where it seems like the people have wings and are able to fly.
Sliders already covered the idea of what it would be like if America was ruled by a monarchy in “Prince of Wails” but this one has the pregnancy twist and a pretty good, twisty plot that makes it a fun episode (Even though it’s kind of a stretch that everyone would just disappear in the two minutes it takes Wade and Quinn to distract the guards in the third act) It’s also a very strong emotional episode for Rembrandt, who usually is relegated to the wacky side plot.