What would be your idea of a perfect science fiction series?

[Lapis Exilis]

How about a series(realistic) about a colonized Solar system. Titan, Mars, Ceres, etc all have thriving, established colonies with their own political and social conventions. Humanity is turning it's eyes to the stars and the ongoing thread of the series would be all of the efforts(and machinations) of funding, building and launching Humanity's first starship. Character driven with Nasa level realism in the prediction of the technology of the time period. If the assumption is established that there are at least a few million people living off Earth you create a thriving background to work with, I think.

The West Wing in space.

I'd watch.

 

[Kegg]

I dunno. Maybe some bizarre dark comedy space opera which also did hard science stories for a lark. It would be very immersive in its science fiction framework and rather serious about that, but with plenty of amoral wit that'd tickle me senseless. Think Dexter, with tentacles.

The year is 2550; Earth is a backwater world in some alien empire. As a point of dry humour, make the hero a Belfastian who can comment on the peace process that is still ongoing even though Ireland is completely depopulated and nothing more than a processing plant for alien luxury goods (tentacle wax?). Meanwhile the alien empire we're part of is at war probably with another one, developing a superweapon that could very possibly wipe out the universe it's so ludricously overpowered... and then we get into Dr. Strangelove territory. Universe explodes, "We'll Meet Again"... it'd make a nice series finale.

Also rip off Farscape liberally and lots of bizarre artwork (H.R. Giger meets Tamara de Lempicka meets El Greco, a senseless mishmash of stuff I like to make it appropriate eye candy). And we're done.

Yeah, it's a pretty lousy idea, but I guess I'll know the perfect series when I watch it rather then when I'm trying to invent it.

 

[Stone_Cold_Sisko]

A series with:

-The acting and production values of BSG (new)
-long-term plotting of B5
-Dense and unfolding story like LOST
-humor of Buffy and arcs with emotional highs of Buffy S2 and 3, complete with metaphors
-Exotic and off-the-wall risk-taking qualities of Farscape
-Completely arc based, with no "...of the week" fillers.

 

[Leroy]

An arc based series set in space with likable characters with outstanding and also creative special effects. No adherence to stupid rules like "no aliens", "no laser guns" etc. realism should only be used to help keep suspension of disbelief down to an extent so no civilizations with FTL yet they still use chemo to treat cancer. The arcs should be planned properly to keep continuity errors to a minimum. Last but not least no Luddism unless it's portrayed in a negative light.

 

[Candlelight]

Novel adaptation of any of the following:

- Rendezvous with Rama - short-lived, six-part series maybe? Don't care for the sequels
- Pandora's Star / Judas Unchained - 22-part season for each novel, with the option of the sequel Void trilogy as a season a piece. Five season arc, not bad...
- Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy - three seasons of 22 eps each

 

[Australis]

All these ideas are pretty good. But they'd mostly rely on really good characters, especially if they're like, as suggested above, 'West Wing' in space. Good characters would be crucial.

 

[RandyS]

"Naked Space Babes of Gamma Sector 14"

Sells itself. Seven seasons right there just from the title.

Baywatch in Space?

"Layworld" would make a better title.

 

[Mistral]

All these ideas are pretty good. But they'd mostly rely on really good characters, especially if they're like, as suggested above, 'West Wing' in space. Good characters would be crucial.

Well, I challenge you to name one good tv show(fiction-based) that doesn't have "good" or at least, memorable characters in any genre. Even those CSI stories rely to some extent on their characters.

 

[The Wormhole]

We've already had a few:
Star Trek (TOS)
TNG
DS9
SG-1 (the RDA years)
NuBSG
Doctor Who

 

[Mr Light]

I've been working on the perfect sci-fi series since 1993. Hopefully one day it will become a reality! To me the quintessential SF series must be a huge epic war story like Star Wars or Babylon 5, but it's also important that the tone isn't relentlessly dark (like NuBSG). There has to be a sense of fun and humor without being silly (again, B5 and Star Wars to some degree). There should be space ships. There should be people with super powers. There should be NO technobabble; the story should never be about technology or be dependent upon it. Technology is just a tool for characters to use in a story, not what the story is about. The characters, and the world, have to go through a drastic change. There has to be plenty of action. And the fate of the world/civilization/galaxy/universe must be at stake. I'm also a firm believer in moral relativity. In my world, the bad guys are good and the good guys are bad. Everybody has a understandable motivation. Nobody's a mustache twirling villain. It's got to be about war, politics, religion, and ultimately the meaning of life. Why are we here? Were we created and for what purpose? What happens when you die? Ultimately it's got to be about the larger cosmic issues. Cosmic forces of good and evil.

 

[zakkrusz]

My ideal science fiction series would be Babylon 5 combined with elements of a live action version of Starship Operators. Some kind of epic space drama where it's a lone ship is on the run, filled with tactical spaceship and fleet battles, galactic and civil wars, political intrigue, information warfare, zero G combat, and ship(s) using strategy, science, and real world physics, to win against seemingly impossible odds and gather allies. Throw in some romance, telepaths, and aliens and you'll have a winner.

 

[Buck Rogers]

What about Operation Time search based upon Andre Norton's book it tell the tale of an man without a family who has worked for the government via the military now a photographer working for a tabloid stumbles upon a top secret Time travel experiment,and gets zapped into the time-frame of Atlantis,MU finds himself a prisoner of Atlantis he then makes his escape along with a Murian who was also captured,they are picked up by a Murian ship going home to MU.
Because of his actions of saving the Murian's life it creates the ultimate fate Paradox the man cannot return to his own time.

What about that

Signed

Buck Rogers

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Yknow what the most depressing thing about Heroes is for me? That I can distinctly recall answering a thread like this before that series debuted, and described my ideal series being exactly like Heroes, only set in the near future and with scientifically plausible explanations for the powers (and having powers more like "enhanced intuition or intelligence" rather than comic-book derived superpowers).

So that's what I want. Maybe Gattaca could be that show? Sorta taking the opposite direction with the material that Heroes did.

Or: civil war between Earth and an Earth colony in the Solar System, preferably Mars. What could be cooler? I defy Hollywood to frak that up!

Or: something I wouldn't think of on my own in a million years. Lost is the best example of this. Obviously, this is difficult to describe in detail but I'll know it when I see it.

How about a series(realistic) about a colonized Solar system. Titan, Mars, Ceres, etc all have thriving, established colonies with their own political and social conventions.

I remember a fascinating comic book with characters from each of the planets, all genetically engineered to fit their particular environment. It's crazy to imagine what adaptation could work, say, for Venus, so the planets would have to be terraformed to meet the genetic engineering halfway - maybe there's a way to make Venus livable for some variation on humanity, if not the ones inhabiting Earth.

Think Dexter, with tentacles.

Dexter is the most convincing depiction of a inhuman mentality I've ever seen on TV. How ironic that it's not even sci fi. (I think of it as "honorary sci fi.") I'd love to see a show dispense with the notion that the aliens, mutants and robots must be metaphorical humans and attempt to create a protagonist - not a villain, that's too easy - with a truly alien way of thinking.

But they'd mostly rely on really good characters

Every story depends on really good characters, so that's a given. Also competent writing and acting, and production values that don't make you laugh. There are many ways to take a great idea and utterly destroy it, which brings me full circle to Heroes...

 

[Australis]

All these ideas are pretty good. But they'd mostly rely on really good characters, especially if they're like, as suggested above, 'West Wing' in space. Good characters would be crucial.

Well, I challenge you to name one good tv show(fiction-based) that doesn't have "good" or at least, memorable characters in any genre. Even those CSI stories rely to some extent on their characters.

It's a good point. TV characters are a lot better written than they used to be

I've been watching 'West Wing' (seasons 1&2) the last few weeks, and I find the characters perhaps a level deeper than your average show. Oh, I prefer SF much more than CSI or NCIS, but the interaction in TWW just seems to go a little further which makes it richer.

 

[Mistral]

If you want to tap books-Allen Steele's Orbital Decay/Clark County, Space and Lunar Descent would work. The depiction of near-Earth space as a place where ordinary people work and live is perfect in those books. He actually has an ex-biker who does high orbit construction who straps a music machine into his "workbee" craft during shifts and jams to the Grateful Dead. That's what I'm talking about!

 

[Kegg]

Dexter is the most convincing depiction of a inhuman mentality I've ever seen on TV. How ironic that it's not even sci fi. (I think of it as "honorary sci fi.")

An interesting take on it. I've considered it an honourary superhero story (even before the writers knowingly poked at the idea in S2). He's got the whole deal - the tragic backstory, the moral guardian father figure, and the mission to eliminate the bad guys using unorthodox methods and undercover (of course nobody must ever pull back his 'mask', either, though it's a psychological mask rather than a goofy costume). That he kills the villains rather than punts them over to police headquarters with a little bat logo is, well, just what a grown up superhero probably would do.

Explicitly acknowledging the insanity of the whole idea and playing with it is also an improvement over superheroing tending to merely toy with it but refusing to outright say it.

But yes, aliens = bizarre, inexplicable or weird personalities definitely is a damn good idea and a damn sight better than my tentacle universal apocalypse wax show. (Which totally should be the title.)

 

[Warp Coil]

nuBSG is awfully close to perfect, for me. I'd take a series like that and have the story plotted out in advance (as to avoid random storylines appearing out of nowhere, continuity issues, etc.). Give the show a set number of seasons and episodes so that the writers can pace themselves accordingly. Trim the episode number down to about 13 per season, as to avoid any unnecessary "filler" episodes. Run the series on cable (possibly even premium cable outlets such as HBO) since you can get away with more, and have a better chance at growing creatively.

 

[DigificWriter]

Several years ago, myself and several others got together to collaborate on a project that was going to, essentially, be 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer in Space'. Entitled 'Nova', it took all the things that were great about Buffy and gave them a sci-fi tone and feel (instead of vampires, you had a race of alien dictators which the main character, Nova, had been genetically created/engineered to fight, for example). Beyond my simple fascination with the idea, though, the thing that had me really excited about the project - and disappointed that it never came to fruition - was that it was my first real experience with taking Joss Whedon's 'story model' and applying it to original material. I bring all of this up in answering the question because my ideal/perfect sci-fi series would be one which followed the Joss Whedon story model to a T (emphasis on characters, an overall storyline that plays itself out over the course of the season, characters who are believable and relatable, etc.). As for specific content, most of the sci-fi that I've gravitated toward tends to be about revolutions, so my ideal sci-fi series would be about one person - or a group of persons - fighting back against oppressors, or against outside invaders (another genre staple that I gravitate towards when it comes to sci-fi).

 

[WillsBabe]

I think nBSG was it. I've wanted them to do something like it for years and never dreamed it would happen.

 

[Joe Washington]

"A series with:

-The acting and production values of BSG (new)
-long-term plotting of B5
-Dense and unfolding story like LOST
-humor of Buffy and arcs with emotional highs of Buffy S2 and 3, complete with metaphors
-Exotic and off-the-wall risk-taking qualities of Farscape
-Completely arc based, with no '...of the week' fillers."-Stone Cold Sisko

One can hope.