The Last of Eden

// K1820 · Originally aired March 28, 1997

On a world plagued by earthquakes and populated by primitive people, Wade stumbles upon a vast, deserted underground city overrun by a race of nonhuman creatures.

Written By // Josef Anderson
Director // Allan Eastman
Music // Danny Lux

Reviews

// Earth Prime

“Last of Eden” is by no means their best effort, but at the very least it’s a far more fitting send-off for John Rhys-Davies than that farcical piece of dung known as “The Exodus.” It’s also a very ironic title, as there’s a good chance nothing that comes after will be any better than this.

// Think of a Roulette Wheel

It must be really stressful to write something like this.

// External Reviews

Martin Izsak

Worlds Visited

Forest World

Wade has a nightmare about the past events that happened on Welles-Niven World. She recounts the events to Rembrandt, thus setting up the flashback.

Wells-Niven World

An intriguing world of artificial design that is populated by a simple tribe of humanoids on the surface and subhuman monsters amidst the technology far below.

Details

The black sign with yellow letters, that’s entangled in the trees, reads “Forbidden Zone.”
The plaque that Quinn reads on the wall (though he reads it aloud) states:SEISMIC SHOCK COLUMN
Number 6860
North Quadrant
Operational
July 7, 1972.
Another sign that Quinn reads underground features a small crowd of people with the following words above them:RELOCATION DATES
15 & 16
Another poster found underground reads “Move Up,” accompanied with a picture of a finger pointing toward the surface.
Brock calls his sister’s name as Haley and later reveals that Haley’s baby is a girl.
When Wade, with child, bumps into Rembrandt, they meet at “GRD.10” according to the black stenciling on the wall.
At the same juncture, what looks like a fire extinguisher case is numbered 014.

Character Information

Rembrandt says that he had an uncle who once worked in the coal mines of Tennessee, and was once trapped in a cave-in.
Quinn says that he was once the highest-grossing baby-sitter in his neighborhood and that he could change a diaper in nine seconds (his personal record). As for his fee, he says he charged 75 cents for the first child and 50 cents for each addition child. “I’d give them a discount if I dropped a kid,” he jokes.
Quinn says that he wants to have a big family when he grows older. “I missed out on having a brother or sister to share things with,” he says about growing up an only child, adding that he’d someday like to have five children. “Then I’d have my own basketball squad,” he adds.
Wade says that she would like to have at least three children.

Notable Quotes

“I wonder if they could seat a party of four.”—Arturo’s comment about the native’s barbecue, and again thinking with his stomach.
“The longer I’m away, the more it seems that way.”—Quinn’s response to Brock’s question “Was your world perfect too?”
“I can’t help noticing we might be dinner.”—a frightened Wade in response to Quinn’s observation that they may be outnumbered by the scavengers.
“Oh yeah, this is a great idea. Going underground while the earth is still shaking.”—Rembrandt as he descends into the hole, and then “Oh man, this is one big freakin’ basement” as he finally gets there.
“Maybe she’s hungry. I can’t do anything about that.”—Wade about the baby’s wails; the joke being that it’s not like she can breast feed the baby or anything. It’s interesting to note how uncomfortable and impatient Wade is with the baby, even thought she admitted, in The Fire Within, that she really wants to have children some day.
“Maybe I’ll just give them a timer when they graduate and tell them to go slide for four years. They’d learn a lot more.”—Quinn’s answer to how he’d pay for his future children’s college education.
“Can’t save everyone.”—Wade, echoing Arturo in The Young and the Relentless when he admitted: “Can’t save every world you land on.”

Nitpicks and Errors

When the ground begins to break open a foot from where Wade is standing, she makes no effort to move even though she has a good 12 seconds to jump away. What does she do? She stands there like an idiot, covers her face with her arms (as if that’s going to help) and subsequently falls into the chasm. To the producers’ credit, however, the effect of her falling down the crack is pretty convincing.
What are the odds of Wade falling face-first onto a steel “I-beam” and not 1) falling off or 2) breaking a few ribs?
When Arturo answers Quinn’s question (“Do you think the syzygy is causing the earthquakes?”) his mouth isn’t moving as they round the tree.
In their room in the tower, Arturo goes to scratch his skin while Rembrandt looks out the window. He pauses, and looks at the rash which appears to be scabby and red. He calls Rembrandt over to look at it and all of a sudden, there are thorns growing out of his skin! A remarkable turn of events in such a miniscule duration.
Arturo and Rembradt’s heart-to-heart is botched when Arturo says he saw a doctor in San Francisco. In The Guardian the Sliders note that sliding onto Van Meer World was the first time they’d been to the city since the events in Double Cross.
After they rescue the baby, Quinn says that the group has an hour until the slide—which means that Rembrandt and Arturo have been trapped in the tower for three days while Wade and Quinn have been underground for the same amount of time. Highly unlikely.

Neatpicks

Arturo’s illness (last seen in to The Guardian and Desert Storm) is addressed in what is probably the only interesting scene in this episode. Arturo and Rembrandt share a very meaningful exchange about the terminal illness.
Is Quinn foreshadowing when he says “I missed out on having a brother or sister to share things with?” Quinn finds out he has a brother on another world in the fourth season premiere Genesis.

Guest Starring

Ron Melendez as Brock
Don Jeffcoat as Keegan

Unaccredited

Christian Hill as Clay

The actress playing Haley (Brock’s sister).
The baby.
The various performers from Cirque du Soleil.

Script Archive

Click on the links below to download rare scripts, outlines, and memos associated with this episode.

The Inside Slide

Jerry O’Connell calls this episode “the weirdest world we’ve slid into.”

“When I first read [the script] I thought ‘this is kind of spooky, maybe it’ll work,’ but to play—it’s unbelievable—to play the underground people, they got all these members from Cirque du Soleil. And they were unbelievable. These guys were flipping, climbing trees with their toes, climbing up walls, it was so freaky, man. It was the freakiest episode we have done. And it freaked me out. And they lit it so well, and they have them in this make-up. And it was really a Class A operation. It looked terrific.

“Hey,” Jerry adds, “if you went to Las Vegas, you’d pay $80 to see Cirque du Soleil.”

· · ·

This episode was originally supposed to air on February 7, 1997, but because of John Rhys-Davies’ exit, things were switched around a little. The episode ended up airing on March 28 — afterArturo had been killed off in The Exodus, part II. As a result, an opening scene was hastily filmed for this episode which explains that Wade was dreaming about the events here. She relates her dream to Rembrandt, which basically sets this episode in a flashback.