Trying again to get into Farscape

[Greg Cox]

And there's more to human selfishness than suddenly betraying your friends every time a short term gain manifests in front of you.

At least in the context of Farscape, as early into the show as you are, you have to remember that these characters are NOT friends yet. They are a bunch of fugitives, thrown together against their will, and they're just waiting around until an opportunity shows itself for them to get what they want.

Exactly. Later on, they'll go out on a limb for each other, but in the beginning? Not so much.

But I never saw FARSCAPE as being particularly dark or pessimistic or cynical (unlike, say, LEXX). I found the characters colorful and eccentric and, yes, refreshingly different from a well-disciplined, thoroughly professional, perfectly respectable Starfleet crew.

Heck, Moya didn't even have a designated captain for the first few seasons. FARSCAPE wasn't pessimistic; it was just anarchic--in a good way.

 

[Mudd]

As far as who aboard Moya is "really" a criminal and who isn't - again, the show takes a refreshingly observant attitude toward that question. I doubt that it's accidental that the group, all treated more or less equally by the authorities, consists of:

• Political prisoner - Rygel
• Violent felon - Zhan
• Unjustly convicted innocent - D'Argo
• Slave - Moya

Later in season one, they add a social nonconformist, Chiana.

To the authorities, they're all just criminals.

 

[Greg Cox]

As far as who aboard Moya is "really" a criminal and who isn't - again, the show takes a refreshingly observant attitude toward that question. I doubt that it's accidental that the group, all treated more or less equally by the authorities, consists of:

• Political prisoner - Rygel
• Violent felon - Zhan
• Unjustly convicted innocent - D'Argo
• Slave - Moya

Later in season one, they add a social nonconformist, Chiana.

To the authorities, they're all just criminals.

And Crichton is an illegal immigrant!

(Who, okay, accidentally killed Crais's brother.)

 

[Marc]

As far as who aboard Moya is "really" a criminal and who isn't - again, the show takes a refreshingly observant attitude toward that question. I doubt that it's accidental that the group, all treated more or less equally by the authorities, consists of:

• Political prisoner - Rygel
• Violent felon - Zhan
• Unjustly convicted innocent - D'Argo
• Slave - Moya

Later in season one, they add a social nonconformist, Chiana.

To the authorities, they're all just criminals.

And Crichton is an illegal immigrant!

(Who, okay, accidentally killed Crais's brother.)

And not one of them are Sebaceans which is probably their biggest crime.

 

[Mudd]

I thought of the Crichton-as-undocumented thing and didn't include it for the reason that Greg noted: John's being pursued for a specific act rather than his status (at least, at first).

The other way in which Crichton's exceptional, I suppose, is that he's not been judged by any system - he's a fugitive, but never a convict.

Chiana, I suppose, is representative of misuse of medicine by the authorities - someone judged to be mentally unstable by the state and sentenced to a "therapy" which is in fact a punitive use of power for social control.

 

[Greg Cox]

Speaking of Chiana . . . we haven't really talked about how striking FARSCAPE is visually. I loved the exotic look of the characters and universe, which was more more colorful and appealing than, say, all those dull khaki uniforms on Stargate.

FARSCAPE has a visual richness to it that harkens back to the classic space operas of old: Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, Adam Strange, Edgar Rice Burroughs, etc.

 

[Mudd]

Exactly so.

 

[Greg Cox]

Exactly so.

Dare I mention that I have a Chiana action figure on my bookshelf and an autographed photo of Gigi Edgely (in full makeup, of course) framed on the wall of my office, just a few feet from where I'm typing this?

And somewhere I have a photo of me with Claudia Black at the very first FS convention in Burbank many, many years ago, but it's buried in my files somewhere. Here's hoping it turns up someday.

 

[RoJoHen]

One of my favorite things about Chiana is the bizarre way she moves. It makes her that much more alien.

Though none of the other Nebari we see move like her, so I'm not sure what that says about it.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

It's said, that the contact lenses Gigi wore forced her to move her head in such a way so as to be able to see. The other movements are pretty cool too.

I completely agree about the visual aspect of the show. B5 might be the only other show with the number of aliens and makeup.

 

[JD]

Farscape's visuals are all thanks to the fact that it was made by Jim Henson Productions and had The Creature Shop at their disposal. My lovefor JHP is due just as much to FS, Labyrinth, and The Dark Crystal as it is the Muppets. I really wish they would do more of that kind of SF/F stuff.

I discovered Farscape (finally) during my senior year of college while it was in late-night reruns on SciFi (2002-2003ish?). Really enjoyed what I saw and started collecting the Starburst Edition DVDs. Unfortunately, they were pretty hard to get my hands on at the time so I only wound up being able to see season one and most of season two.

When the entire series got re-released on DVD in a beautiful box set a few years ago, RedFenix and Top41 got together and purchased it for me on my birthday and I managed to finally sit down and finish watching all of it last summer. Brilliant show, but I can also see why it might turn some off or just be viewed as "going off the deep end."

I've sort of held off watching "The Peacekeeper Wars" only because I dont want to be done with the show just yet... but I'm definitely a fan.

Oh, PKW isn't the end of Farscape. Boom! Studios also did a comic book series, with stories by series creator Rockne S. O'Bannon and scripts by this BBS's own Keith R.A. DeCandido (mostly). They did three 4 issue miniseries, a 24 issue ongoing series and a 8 issue Scorpius miniseries, written by David Mack instead of Decandido, all set after PKW, and 3 D'Argo miniseries set during (and possibly before, I'm not sure) the series. That's got to be at least another season or two worth of stories.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

So I think I'm going to start reviewing episodes as I watch them, cause I'm a nerd and that's what we do.

Durka Returns:

I was mildly spoiled for this episode because Chiana's in all the pictures, so I knew she'd be a main character. The villains in this episode show off both the strengths and weaknesses of the series. They are both very well conceived and not particularly well acted. I love the idea of a race that uses Pavlovian techniques to correct nonconformity. That's a particularly terrifying villain and a good one considering the makeup of the cast. I also love the ambiguity about whether it was Durka or Chiana who killed the Nebari. Chiana seems like a good character so far but it also seems like she's very aggressive in a very sexual way which seems fanservicy to me.

Grade: B-

A Human Reaction:

Whenever Claudia Black is important in an episode she acts circles around the rest of the cast. She's the only character I'm consistently convinced by. I like this episode and its criticism of the way humans would probably treat aliens if they met them. But they gave away their hand too soon killing Rygel, and that point it was blatantly obvious it was somehow an illusion. I like the way they revealed the illusion with Crichton going into the women's bathroom because he hadn't been there yet.

They constantly tease a relationship between John and Erin, I hope they just get it over with soon and don't do this for four whole seasons.

Grade: B+

 

[RoJoHen]

They constantly tease a relationship between John and Erin, I hope they just get it over with soon and don't do this for four whole seasons.

This is definitely not something you'll need to worry about.

And BTW, her character's name is spelled "Aeryn."

 

[sttngfan1701d]

I watched Farscape when it was originally on, but only intermittently. I remember various plot threads. Ultimately, it didn't hold my interest.

I tried to watch it on Netflix this summer, and I tired of it quickly in season 1. It looked so glaringly cheap these days. So I skipped ahead and watched a handful of episodes from the latter seasons...but that was it. It still just didn't hold my interest.

I will say that the production design was indeed inspired in many ways, and I didn't really mind the puppets...but all I could stomach was watching a smattering of "recommended" episodes that I read about on various guides (such as "episodes where Crichton went back to Earth" or "The Crichton/Aeryn relationship arc"). The value of being able to skip around and watch them was great. I can't see myself sitting through all the episodes in a total rewatch.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Through The Looking Glass:

This is a weird episode. It's kind of like reverse technobabble. Instead of establishing a threat and then communicating the jeopardy through sciency sounding words, they communicate the jeopardy entirely through camera techniques. It's a little like the way old black and white films often set the mood of the scene by dying the film. Fractured reality, familiar premise for any scifi fan. Weird areas of the ship where things are off kilter, which they communicate by tinting the screen, spinning the camera in weird ways and messing with the audio. I approve of this, but toward the end of the episode it got a little thin, really leaning heavy on the dramatic camera effects, even with a dramatic countdown thrown in. (Also big suspension of disbelief moment, that all four managed to count at exactly the same rate). A little bit of a style over substance episode, but a fun one.

Grade: B

Lately I have been impressed with the range of facial expressions they've given Rygel.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

"one mippippippi...two mippippippi..."

 

[RoJoHen]

"one mippippippi...two mippippippi..."

Pretty much the best thing about that episode.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

A Bug's Life:

I couldn't really connect with this episode. Another pretty standard scifi premise, but nothing wrong with that. The progress of the episode didn't logically track. It was implied that when the virus was in Chiana at the start it only needed a few more minutes to plant spores and infect the entire ship. Its deception that the virus had actually gone into Rygel fooled everyone. The virus won! Instead it decided to move to Crichton and start the clock over again.

It's like, it had victory within its grasp. All it had to do was run away for a little while longer. And it decided to pass itself to another crewmember instead, running the risk that the other crewmembers will be able to intercept it. I mean, what kind of idiot would do something like that?

It was also patently obvious the whole episode every Peacekeeper would end up dead one way or another.

Grade: C

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Nerve:

A lot of cool ideas in this episode. Crichton goes off on an incredibly risky quest to save Aeryn, secure in the knowledge that he is the main character and will therefore survive. I like Chiana's role in the episode though the writers can't seem to use her without sexualizing her in some way. All of her combat scenes involve a lot of angular poses and jumping on top of people.

I like the new villain introduced in this episode, I prefer the calm, collected villain to the raving revenge crazy psychopath. His costume leaves something to be desired, it seems a little bit Power Rangers, but it was clever the way he looked at Crichton's memories and due to his own agenda misinterpreted the reason he came to the Peacekeeper base.

Characters are trusting each other more, more willing to risk their lives for each other, and it makes the show more enjoyable. It does seem little bit like a sudden jump from 0 to 100 rather than a gradual warming up to each other. Like, Dago's sudden total compassion for Aeryn doesn't seem completely earned.

Grade: B

 

[JD]

D'Argo not Dago.