^ They ran into a gaggle of chronotron particles and were shunted into an alternate dimension via a micro-wormhole.
If you're going to technobabble, go for it.
If you're going to technobabble, go for it.
Defying Gravity: "H2IK" 8/16 - Grading & Discussion
- Thread starter Aragorn
- Start date
I saw the episode before this one as my first episode. I was about 50/50 on the show so I figured that I'd watch another episode. I'm okay with sexy people having sexy relationships while they're on board a little space shuttle; often times I feel that Sci-Fi forgets about little elements of being human like that. There's way too much of it, though. I liked the part with the power giving out and the space walk and what not, though.
I'm really digging DG. It's certainly not flawless, but it's still enjoyable. The realities of TV production conflict with the realities of manned space flight, but at least the producers have tried to give us logical explanations for why we can't have true zero G effects shots every time we see the crew. I would guess the hairspray needed for a six year mission takes much less room than the amount of booze consumed by Adama and Tigh in the 4th season of BSG.
Definitely brings the spookiness of deep space out.
Overall the episode was a big improvement over last week though I still can't figure out why Steve decided to stay in the module (besides the obvious ploy to put him and Paula together). It's kinda bad when the writers can't even bother with a McGuffin and just have the character too lazy to keep himself from freezing.
The British show had all of them, characters, a dramatised storyline, and a documentary narrator doing a voice over (David Suchet of Poirot fame) explaining the science background to what they are doing.
It was far superior and I was hoping for something similar.
See, the fallacy there is that it has to be one or the other. It's not a zero-sum game. There's no reason in the world that you can't have good drama and good science at the same time. As Pingfah says, the original Voyage to the Planets miniseries strikes a good balance of both (from what I've seen of it).
And bad science or bad technology gets in the way of good drama by being a distraction. It's hard to concentrate on the characters and their relationships if you're preoccupied with the stupidity of magnetic hairspray.
There is nothing logical about magnetic hairspray. Even aside from the fact that there's no practical benefit to making your hair behave as if it has weight when it actually doesn't, all those tiny magnetic particles would get into the equipment and short out the systems and kill everybody. It's not just unnecessary, it's an insanely bad idea.
What they should've done was just cut everyone's hair short, or at least have the actresses wear their hair in tight buns while in the "weightless" parts of the ship. What they've done is to put glamour over good sense.
I think the whole hairspray thing was responding to all the online stuff of "Why doesn't their hair float?" So when producerts do do something, they get ripped for it anyway.
The show is slow-moving, but I'm willing to stick with it a while longer.
I did like the "H2IK" bit, on its own and in the show. Nice that they all stood by Ajay.
The show is slow-moving, but I'm willing to stick with it a while longer.
I did like the "H2IK" bit, on its own and in the show. Nice that they all stood by Ajay.
^
They get ripped b/c they try to make it all sciencey but don't go all out. I mean would any of us been upset if they make up some mumbo jumbo gravity creating thingy device. But decided to go with this magnetism stuff.
As I've said before really liking the show but producers need to decide is it a drama show first or sciencey show.
They get ripped b/c they try to make it all sciencey but don't go all out. I mean would any of us been upset if they make up some mumbo jumbo gravity creating thingy device. But decided to go with this magnetism stuff.
As I've said before really liking the show but producers need to decide is it a drama show first or sciencey show.
What, do you think they're making this in real time? The entire first season of this show was already finished filming months ago, before it was even marketed to networks. Even in a more conventional production schedule, it takes at least a couple of months to get an episode from script phase to broadcast. So there's no way in hell this is a response to the past two weeks of Internet comments, unless the show's producers had a wormhole letting them gaze into the future. Nothing in this entire season will be a response to Internet comments, unless they do some editing after the fact.
No doubt this was a result of the producers themselves recognizing that it was an issue audiences would be wondering about. Perhaps it was a question raised by the test audiences or executives they screened the series for, or maybe it was something they asked themselves after seeing the pilot footage and its sloppy treatment of the hair issue.
Because it's stupid. "Doing something" is not a solution unless you do something that works or makes sense.
As I said before, that's a totally false dichotomy. There is no reason you can't make a drama show in which the science is accurate rather than bogus. The science doesn't have to be a priority to be plausible. You can keep it in the background all you want, just don't make it stupid and wrong.
Editing in a short stand-alone sequence is not that difficult, especially when cast, crew, and sets are available--although there was some consistency with Zoe's hair being styled so "well."
Anyway, I mostly agree with the rest here. It's six-of-one, half-a-dozen-of-the-other...so isn't really anything. What's the original version more, drama or scifi?
Anyway, I mostly agree with the rest here. It's six-of-one, half-a-dozen-of-the-other...so isn't really anything. What's the original version more, drama or scifi?
^ It's primarily focused on trying to present as accurate a vision of what the mission would be like as possible. There's a lot of planet based activity where the probable geology of the planets is explained to you and various experiments are carried out.
There is some dramatic tension inserted in the way of technical problems, but there's not much in the way of inter-character strife. The focus of the show is on imparting scientific information to the viewer in as entertaining manner as they can.
There is some dramatic tension inserted in the way of technical problems, but there's not much in the way of inter-character strife. The focus of the show is on imparting scientific information to the viewer in as entertaining manner as they can.
This was the first episode of the show that I've seen (though I missed the first ten minutes). It was okay. I kind of had to roll my eyes at the back and forth about who's sleeping with who while watching Donner perform a dangerous space walk, though. And what was up with the guy who was only in peril because he didn't want to leave a room? They should have had him and that woman trapped in there, rather than stuck there because he didn't want to leave.
Like I said, production on the whole season ended months ago. The cast and crew have undoubtedly moved on to other work, and would not be available to come in to shoot a scene just to respond to a few nitpickers on the Internet. And if you think all the people involved would drop everything they were doing and spend a lot of extra money and go through all the other difficulties that would be involved in that kind of last-minute rush reshoot, then not only do you have no comprehension of the complexities of television production, but you give WAY too much credit to the Internet.
And there's absolutely no reason even to postulate such a ridiculous idea, because it's hardly implausible that the producers thought of the issue themselves. I mean, hell, they went to the trouble to think up the whole magnetic-gravity system in the first place; while it may be silly, there's obviously been some imagination and thought put into coming up with it. It makes no sense to assume they never thought of the hair issue just because we didn't see it brought up on screen until now. Given the amount of care and attention that TV producers and executives give to their performers' hair, you can be certain there were dozens of in-depth discussions and memos about how to deal with their performers' hair, how the gravity situation would affect their hair, etc. Hair is a hugely important business in TV and film production. Most SFTV shows put far more thought into their performers' hairstyles than they put into the science. Since this is a hair issue as well as a science issue, it's a lead-pipe cinch they gave it a lot of thought.
Neither, really. The conceit of Space Odyssey: Voyage to the Planets is that it's a documentary made sometime in the future, following a "real" interplanetary mission. At its heart, it's a science program about the planets of the Solar System, but it uses the "documentary" about the space travellers as the vehicle for conveying the science and making it interesting. It was produced by Impossible Pictures, the company that's known for Walking with Dinosaurs and other specials that did a similar thing, pretending to be nature documentaries capturing footage of dinosaurs and other extinct animals in the past. By the same token, this was a faux documentary "shot" in the future, presented as if it were a real documentary being presented to audiences in that time. So we didn't get deep into the crewmembers' personal lives the way we do on this show -- yet I found it far more interesting and emotionally engaging than this show, partly because of that sense of realism.
And I object to the way your question is formulated, as though drama and sci-fi were mutually exclusive categories. There are plenty of SF dramas in existence.
No one in their right mind would ever respond to online crap, especially long after the show has already wrapped.
To say something positive... I thought the zero-G scenes were quite well done, especially for a TV budget. (I'm thinking about the cabin and maintenance shaft) The 'floating around' looked quite convincing.
Christopher said:
Don't take this wrong, but "object"? Shit, relax a bit, it's a tv show. Plenty of more important things to get upset about than this.
As for not responding to online comments, fine--so I no longer pay attention to filming schedules. I don't care. I just thought it was interesting that they even attempted any explanation at all.
Posters are making this sound like it's a limited series? As I said, I haven't been paying attention to tv as much lately--too busy studying for the Bar exam to worry about this. But since that's over, I can now waste/devote more of my time to the irrelevancies of television.
It's not really a "limited series" in the sense that there's a long-term plan, but the thirteen episodes were all written and filmed before they were aired (or even picked up by a network in some cases). I would assume that this means these thirteen episodes have some sort of ending that wraps things up, but also keeps things open should the show prove successful enough for a continuation (which doesn't seem to be happening here in the States).
Ha ha ha QFT.
Honestly this show is going to get shit canned soon anyways. So get your shots in now I doubt we are going to be seeing another Sci Fi show for a while.
Well in terms of actual science depicted in the show is accurate IMO,and to say that the show is a little slow is because the ship is traveling at full Ion drive a trip to Venus should take six years.
Also the communications lag is I Believe is the right amount of time consider the distance.
As for the two crewpersons being afraid of freezing to death is a valid point if environmental controls goes offline temporarily that would occur,but we're talking about a fictional account of a six year trip through our solar system.
That is my two cents good night all
Signed
Buck Rogers
Also the communications lag is I Believe is the right amount of time consider the distance.
As for the two crewpersons being afraid of freezing to death is a valid point if environmental controls goes offline temporarily that would occur,but we're talking about a fictional account of a six year trip through our solar system.
That is my two cents good night all
Signed
Buck Rogers