RobertScorpio
Pariah
Well, great. Looks like this show is getting some love here on BBS. We will watch the first episode sometime this week. My squeeze it in tonight after the new 24...
Rob
Rob
FARSCAPE..worth the trouble?
- Thread starter RobertScorpio
- Start date
I dunno, I think you ought to squeeze a little 24 in around Farscape. Your friend got you the whole series? Dang, Rob, that's a pretty pile of change-the only reason I don't own the whole thing is the price. I would suggest 2 things-1:make sure you have The Peacekeeper Wars in your possession before you finish the series or you'll regret it. 2: Don't watch more than 1 or 2 episodes a day so as to make it last as long as possible. That way you're guaranteed a little goodness in your life everyday for a couple months. Once it is done you can never watch it for the first time again. (Exception-there is a 3 parter that should be watched all together).
Certainly true. As far as cult sci-fi goes, if Babylon 5 is a show that requires you to be very tolerant of certain faults, Farscape is a show that requires you to like specific things. It's very, very excellent at what it does but what it does is weird, trippy, demented and odd.
That said, quite candidly, it's one of my most favourite space operas and TV shows in general. It is in fact the only TV series I have seen from start to finish twice; and I'm considering doing that a third time some day.
Farscape is in my personal top ten, right along side these two you mention and the other four Star Trek series.
Watch it. You won't be sorry, or bored.
A friend of mine gave me his old DVD's of the new Battlestar Galactica, a show I had written off because I was tired of the the never ending-over the top angst and melodrama. He wanted me to like the show so much that he bought me new copies of season 4.5 and The Plan (he upgraded his to the Blue Ray complete series). I've been working my way nightly through both this and Farscape.
Farscape is the better show.
Does your set include the Peacekeeper Wars?
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This appears to be the popular view among the fans, and I have to say, I don't get it. Personally, I love those early episodes the best. I love the whole show, but there's a magic to the early first season that the rest of the series doesn't quite match. It's one of those rare series that was excellent right out of the gate.
To Farscape I say:
Good show.
Good show.
I would agree with this to some extent. There were some episodes where they were obviously still getting a feel for where the series was going to go. By the end of S1 they've really got it down though, and even the more mediocre episodes are fun.
I will certainly say this for Farscape: it's one of the few series with very consistent quality of storyline. The major arcs move forward at a good pace and the individual episode plots are very entertaining and move the characters forward. I felt that it got better with each season and was wrapped up nicely in the Peacekeeper Wars. It's a very satisfying viewer experience.
First time viewer here, I'm up to S3 at the moment, and yes it's definitely worth it.
Scorpius is probably my favorite sci-fi villain since Gul Dukat on DS9. Extremely memorable and well-acted character with a nice back story.
Scorpius is probably my favorite sci-fi villain since Gul Dukat on DS9. Extremely memorable and well-acted character with a nice back story.
Checkmate
Commodore
Like I said before, once Crichton puts on the Peacekeeper uniform for the first time, the series takes off like a bat out of Hell. Up until then it's both the show and the audience trying to get a feel of each other.
Oddly enough, the only people I've ever personally met that didn't like the show didn't like it for the show itself, but simply because they use puppets for some of the aliens. (Of course, they're the same people who bitch and moan about Star Trek always having foreheaded "aliens," so I really don't know what the Hell they want!)
But considering both Rygel and Pilot are fascinating characters all on their own, those people can just frell off for all I care.
It's also the first space fantasy in a long time where you care about the ship as much as the crew. I honestly hadn't felt that way since the original Star Trek. I <3 Moya.
Oddly enough, the only people I've ever personally met that didn't like the show didn't like it for the show itself, but simply because they use puppets for some of the aliens. (Of course, they're the same people who bitch and moan about Star Trek always having foreheaded "aliens," so I really don't know what the Hell they want!)
But considering both Rygel and Pilot are fascinating characters all on their own, those people can just frell off for all I care.
It's also the first space fantasy in a long time where you care about the ship as much as the crew. I honestly hadn't felt that way since the original Star Trek. I <3 Moya.
To Farscape I say:
Good show.
That is a great pic. Perfect avatar. Hmmmm....
I've never really got that. I mean, Yoda. If you have a problem with Yoda being a puppet in Empire Strikes Back, I don't want to know you; and if you don't, then what's the difference? This is even the same puppet company; Farscape's puppets are directly building on the legacy of the Yoda puppet but are also, frankly, more complicated and convincing where the two regulars are concerned.
It's true many of the guest star puppets vary wildly in how convincing they are - some of them not at all - but the principals are definitely the equal of Yoda.
Absolutely worth the time, IMO. I like it much better than Babylon 5 or any of the Stargate shows. It's all subjective of course, so as others have already noted, your mileage may vary.
Initially, Farscape seemed like a fun if lightweight change of pace from Trek and B5. But it was entertaining, and I kept watching. And it got less and less lightweight, more involving, and sometimes downright heartbreaking. I think it lost its way sometimes, but it had some great characters, generally solid acting, a distinctive look, and some episodes like nothing else in any of the other big space operas.
I have to agree with the majority of the people here. Farscape is my all time favorite space opera. No show has ever moved me the way this one has. I'm 42 and I grew up with Star Trek TOS, Space 1999 and all the sci-fi shows that followed and not one of them made the impression on me this one did. I consider Scorpious to be the all time best baddie around and I find his character simply fascinating and feel that the show could have been done from his point of view and worked as well.
I've had a similar experience. Of all the criticisms of Farscape I've seen / heard, it's probably the most absurd.
This is part of why it makes no sense to me. So many people bitch about forehead aliens. They get something alien and bitch about it because "they're puppets". So what? (It's particularly absurd in the case of one person who's a big Star Wars fan and therefore, presumably, can cope with Puppet Yoda.
)This is the other reason I don't get the "puppet" criticism. To each their own, of course, but Rygel and Pilot rock.
It has been years, but I thought it was boring and weird... sometimes even both. 
But maybe I'll have to give it another try some day as well.
But maybe I'll have to give it another try some day as well.
I'll be honest, that was something that made me skeptical about the show to begin with, but in hindsight it was an idiotic and illogical bias. And I agree, those puppets were absolutely fascinating characters.I've had a similar experience. Of all the criticisms of Farscape I've seen / heard, it's probably the most absurd.This is part of why it makes no sense to me. So many people bitch about forehead aliens. They get something alien and bitch about it because "they're puppets". So what? (It's particularly absurd in the case of one person who's a big Star Wars fan and therefore, presumably, can cope with Puppet Yoda.
As others have said, Farscape went places other shows didn't dare, and while it didn't always pay off, when it did, it did so in spades.
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I swear I could read that puppet's lips sometimes.Similar threads
