Favorite Fantasy TV Series

[Kai "the spy"]

I had the Vader = Mordred and Luke = Arthur correlations pointed out to me by one of my High School teachers, so they are there even if you guys want to pooh-pooh them.

This sounds more like a teacher's scheme to get students pay attention to Arthurian Legends. "Hey kids, let's read 'Le Morte d'Arthur' by Sir Thomas Malory. You'll like it, it's just like Star Wars."

Also, the other correlating things from Arthurian Legend that exist in Star Wars may be implemented slightly differently, but they're still correlations.

Your claim was 1-to-1 correlations, not somewhat similar motifs. If that's the standard, I can give you the reasons why Babylon 5 is LotR in space (which you yourself pooh-poohed):

- the Minbari are Elves, an elder and culturally advanced race who often look down on less advanced people.
- the Vorlons are the Wizards, with Kosh I being Gandalf and Kosh II being Saruman
- the Shadows are Sauron, the Ringwraiths and the Orcs
- Sheridan and Delenn are Aragorn and Arwen, the mortal human and the "higher being" falling in love and that higher being giving away part of what makes her "higher" to be with the man, though Delenn also has elements of Galadriel
- Ivanova is Éowyn
- Mr. Morden is the One RIng, trying to corrupt the people around him
- Sheridan falling to his doom on Zahadum and resurrection (through the alien Lorien, named after the elf-kingdom of Lothlorien) is corrolating with Gandalf falling to his doom in Khazad-dûm and his own resurrection
- the Earth Alliance Civil War is the Liberation of the Shire

And yet, B5 is not just LotR in space, but also took inspiration from the Dune series, E.E. Smith's Lensman series, the film Forbidden Planet, George Orwell's 1984, Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, Arthurian Legend (again, and even pretty openly) and even the Bible. And most certainly a lot of other works of film and literature. Plus real life history and events like the rise of the Third Reich, or the Cold War.
And the same goes for SW. There's a bit of Arthurian Legend, a bit of LotR (again), a bit Flash Gordon, a bit Buck Rogers, Akira Kurosawa's Hidden Fortress (and other films by Kurosawa), the Vietnam war, the Third Reich (again), etc..

 

[DigificWriter]

The context in which the correlations between Star Wars and Arthurian Legend came up was in casual conversation between this teacher and myself based on the fact that me and my best friend were both reading Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy for fun.

 

[Kai "the spy"]

Was that teacher, too, talking about 1-to-1 correlations?

 

[Timewalker]

The context in which the correlations between Star Wars and Arthurian Legend came up was in casual conversation between this teacher and myself based on the fact that me and my best friend were both reading Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy for fun.

I'm not familiar with that trilogy. How did your teacher explain Han Solo and the correlations, if true, being incestuous?

My favorite version of the King Arthur story is actually the First Knight movie (starring Sean Connery, Julia Ormond, and Richard Gere). There's not a scrap of magic in it. No Merlin. No Morgan. No Mordred (although the villain's name does begin with "M" - Sir Malagant). No Lady of the Lake.

The focus of the movie is on Lancelot (played by Richard Gere), and is a refreshing break from all the fantasy elements in the other stories.

 

[kirk55555]

How can you not count the entirety of Xena as fantasy? There's not a single episode that could be considered science fiction, and the same goes for history. The episodes involving Julius Caesar, Octavian/Augustus, and Caligula are abominations to anyone who is familiar with the Julio-Claudian dynasty.

I should have been clearer. This was a talk about favorite fantasy, and I consider Xena Season 4 to be the worst Fantasy I've ever seen (only two good episodes, the rest are crap) , with 5 barely better (about 4-5 good episodes) and I legitimately refuse to watch any of Season 6. Also, all the parts of Season 3 about Gabrielle's "daughter" are atrocious. So, Xena Seasons 1-2 and about 75% of season 3 are fun, very entertaining fantasy TV. The rest is still fantasy but I consider it to be mostly crap, so it doesn't count as my favorite fantasy, which is what the topic is about.

 

[Timewalker]

I should have been clearer. This was a talk about favorite fantasy, and I consider Xena Season 4 to be the worst Fantasy I've ever seen (only two good episodes, the rest are crap) , with 5 barely better (about 4-5 good episodes) and I legitimately refuse to watch any of Season 6. Also, all the parts of Season 3 about Gabrielle's "daughter" are atrocious. So, Xena Seasons 1-2 and about 75% of season 3 are fun, very entertaining fantasy TV. The rest is still fantasy but I consider it to be mostly crap, so it doesn't count as my favorite fantasy, which is what the topic is about.

Okay, thank you for clarifying.

We're in total agreement about the "Gabrielle's daughter" storyline, and it's good to know that I'm probably not the only Xena fan who doesn't like the "Bitter Suite" musical episode.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

I've never seen Star Wars being correlated with the Arthurian legend and I really don't see it.

On the other hand, Babylon 5 and Lord of the Rings has many obvious and subtle connections, which Kai only partially covered (for instance, omitting all of the name parallels).

 

[DigificWriter]

I'm not familiar with that trilogy. How did your teacher explain Han Solo and the correlations, if true, being incestuous?

The scope of the conversation between my teacher and I was the correlations between Luke and Arthur and Vader and Mordred.

As far as Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy (which consists of The Crystal Cave, The Hollow Hills, and The Last Enchantment) is concerned, it's a really good read and is recommended for anyone who likes Arthurian stories.

 

[kirk55555]

Okay, thank you for clarifying.

We're in total agreement about the "Gabrielle's daughter" storyline, and it's good to know that I'm probably not the only Xena fan who doesn't like the "Bitter Suite" musical episode.

Oh, I lost my mind (in a bad way) over that episode. Same with "Lyre, Lyre Hearts on Fire", although that was just bad, not infuriating like the poorly done middle school musical that was "Bitter Suite".

 

[Timewalker]

I should say that I liked some of the musical stuff on Xena and Hercules. I found Madam Twanky and her dance studio hilarious. And I'm quite used to the conventions of musicals since I spent many years working in musical theatre in RL.

Even Gilligan's Island had a musical episode, in which the characters performed a very condensed version of Hamlet to the music of "Carmen."

 

[Sparkle Fabulosa]

I very much enjoyed “Bitter Suite.” I thought a lot of the songs conveyed the emotional struggle between Xena and Gabrielle quite well. I didn’t care for “Lyre Lyre Hearts On Fire”, with the exception of Jace’s song.

 

[kirk55555]

I should say that I liked some of the musical stuff on Xena and Hercules. I found Madam Twanky and her dance studio hilarious. And I'm quite used to the conventions of musicals since I spent many years working in musical theatre in RL.

Even Gilligan's Island had a musical episode, in which the characters performed a very condensed version of Hamlet to the music of "Carmen."

The only good thing to come out of a Xena musical in my opinion was Jace, because he was hilarious and I'm a sucker for all the "look a like" characters on Xena. Even then, it sucked when he was in singing scenes, I just liked a few of his funny scenes.

As for musicals in general, if its not a Disney animated movie or Buffy's "Once More With Feeling", I absolutely loathe them.

 

[Greg Cox]

I love "The Bitter Suite" and still listen to the CD on a regular basic. As for "Lyre, Lyre," . . . okay, that wasn't very good.

Then again, I'm an old-school musical fan: Singin' in the Rain, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Lerner & Loewe, Stephen Sondheim, etc,

You can actually make up a decent list of live-action musicals with fantasy elements: Camelot, Brigadoon, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, Finian's Rainbow, Into the Woods, etc.

 

[Timewalker]

I love "The Bitter Suite" and still listen to the CD on a regular basic. As for "Lyre, Lyre," . . . okay, that wasn't very good.

Then again, I'm an old-school musical fan: Singin' in the Rain, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Lerner & Loewe, Stephen Sondheim, etc,

You can actually make up a decent list of live-action musicals with fantasy elements: Camelot, Brigadoon, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, Finian's Rainbow, Into the Woods, etc.

Back in the spring of 1987 I worked on a production of Camelot, on the costume crew. I was Lancelot's dresser, and a friend was King Arthur's dresser. King Pellinore kind of had a committee of dressers; it took several of us to get him ready in an extremely quick change between his first scene and his second, since 5 years lapsed between them and we had to get him cleaned up from unkempt-hunting-dragons to cleaned-up-for-court.

So we got Arthur, Lancelot, and Pellinore dressed and out on stage on time (the other guys didn't have dressers), and there was one night when Lancelot's armor came apart on stage. Unfortunately it happened in one of the quiet, dialogue-only scenes, and when he exited stage left, his breastplate went <creak! creak!> with every step.

The actor kept it together until he got past the sight lines, while the rest of us in the wings were trying extremely hard to stifle our laughter. The actor then had a broad grin on his face, and I told him I'd get his armor fixed immediately.

So the other dresser and I (who looked after King Arthur) decided to check on Arthur and Pellinore's breastplates... and sure enough, they were just about ready to pop in the same way Lancelot's had. When you've got armor put together out of plastic and staples and the person wearing it has to run and fight and dance, it's going to give out.

A quick application of staples and duct tape and glue during intermission fixed them up, though.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Twilight Zone (original)
Dark Shadows (original)
The Night Stalker (original)
Xena: Warrior Princess
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Warehouse 13
The Librarians

Sorry for the belated response, but I’ve been streaming Dark Shadows on Amazon Prime over the last few weeks. I’m having a grand time revisiting shows I used to run home from school to watch when I was 8.

50 years ago!!

That Jonathan Frid was quite a fine actor. Same for Joan Bennett and Louis Edmonds.

 

[Mudd]

The original Star Trek.

 

[Greg Cox]

That's nice. My high school English teacher assigned my partner and me to argue in the affirmative (during our unit on debating) that history should not be taught in schools.

Then in the Q&A part, she got huffy that neither of us mentioned the Bible, claiming it to be "history."

In short: Teachers aren't always right.

My grade-school music teacher utterly refused to believe me when I told her that Michael Jackson's song "Ben" was actually about a super-intelligent killer rat, as seen in the movie of the same name.

But I was right, damn it!

 

[Timewalker]

My grade-school music teacher utterly refused to believe me when I told her that Michael Jackson's song "Ben" was actually about a super-intelligent killer rat, as seen in the movie of the same name.

But I was right, damn it!

A different teacher docked me marks for capitalizing Earth. I asked her why, when she hadn't docked marks for my having capitalized Saturn.

"Well, Saturn is a planet," she said.

"So is Earth," I said.

She wasn't happy about changing my mark.

 

[Owain Taggart]

've never seen Star Wars being correlated with the Arthurian legend and I really don't see it.

I've never thought of it that way either. But maybe the Jedi Council and the way they sit around in a circle is supposed to be one of those things?

 

[Bilbo Baggins]

Robin of Sherwood

Happy to see someone remembering this one. Loved the celtic mythology approach.