Wow, Farscape was awesome!

Discussion in 'Science Fiction & Fantasy' started by Zoloft, Jan 17, 2010.

  1. LitmusDragon

    LitmusDragon Commodore Commodore

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    I'm midway through the second season now, and yes, it is awesome!

    I'm shucking and jiving the spoilers in this thread the best that I can. :lol:
     
  2. TheBrew

    TheBrew Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I just started watching this through Netflix. Fun show so far, about 4-5 episodes deep.
     
  3. LitmusDragon

    LitmusDragon Commodore Commodore

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    Silly thing I want to mention- I think the opening crawl for this show is the best of any sci-fi show that I can think of. "Can anyone hear me?" "I got sucked through a WORMHOLE" "A ship, a LIVING ship". It just seems to get better the more times I see it. :lol:

    Also, the sets on this show are absolutely mind-blowing. Where did they get the money for this stuff? I'm going to have to research that point after I'm done with the series.
     
  4. Kegg

    Kegg Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    It changes come season three. I prefer the one in the first two seasons, personally.

    IIRC the show cost around half the budget of a Star Trek series, and was helped by the fact the Jim Henson company were fine with even losing money on the project, as it was a good opportunity for them to flex their puppeteering skills.
     
  5. Lindley

    Lindley Moderator with a Soul Premium Member

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    Season 3 was my favorite intro. It began to hint that things were no longer quite so simple as in the first two years.

    The season 4 intro lost something. Hard to say what, though.
     
  6. RoJoHen

    RoJoHen Awesome Admiral

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    I think the Season 4 intro was just a bit too literal and lacked the poetry of Season 3. "I've made enemies." Well, no shit.
     
  7. stonester1

    stonester1 Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I LOVED season 4, myself.
     
  8. RoJoHen

    RoJoHen Awesome Admiral

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    Oh, I did, too. However, when the first half was originally airing, I just remember being a little frustrated by the fact that the episodes had so little to do with the main story arc.
     
  9. HappyDayRiot

    HappyDayRiot Commodore Commodore

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    I literally just finished up with Bad Timing - I've been avoiding the other Farscape thread for weeks even though I remember nearly everything from the original run.

    My most enduring memory though is always back in 2003-04 when Bad Timing finished. What an amazing cliffhanger, I thought. Then the BBC Two announcer said something over the credits like "And that was the last ever episode of Farscape..." I was dumbstruck for about a month. I had no idea it was ending! Peacekeeper Wars was superb though.

    I also don't remember hating Jool so much. Unlike any other character, I was really glad when she left. Everyone else I loved and it probably made for my favourite ensemble cast of any show.
     
  10. RoJoHen

    RoJoHen Awesome Admiral

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    My mom watched Bad Timing with me, having never seen any Farscape before. I knew at the time that it was the finale, and when it ended, my mom looked at me and said, "Wow, you must be really pissed off right now." :lol:
     
  11. tomalak301

    tomalak301 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    This was one of the major reasons I don't hold Season 3 in a high regard like others. It was a great season, don't get me wrong, but all the yelling and screaming was a bit annoying, mostly coming from Jool and Chiana. Jool slightly improved though (Especially in the What was Lost two parter) but she might be my least favorite character. I was surprised too how much I didn't mind Noranti though.
     
  12. HappyDayRiot

    HappyDayRiot Commodore Commodore

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    Noranti was great. I loved all her healing concoctions and her belief that they definitely might do what they were supposed to and that may or may not be a bad thing for all involved. Not to mention the hours and hours of drunken teenage fun my friends and I got out of imitating her blowing stuff in people's faces :D
     
  13. Bisz

    Bisz Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Having never seen the show but hearing a lot of good things about it I bought the complete series on DVD at Costco for $60 or $70 a couple of weeks ago. Earlier tonight I finished Bad Timing. Now I just have to get my hands on Peacekeeper Wars.

    I enjoyed the show, but honestly, I don't think its all that great. I wouldn't put it on the same level as B5, DS9 or Firefly. It may be that I had very high expectations because peope always compare it to those shows and list it amongst their favorites, but I honestly don't see it.

    Its fun and it has some good stories and characters, but it also has a lot of annoying characters and stories. On numerous occasions I found myself yelling at the TV to STFU because one thing or another on the show was making some horrid noise (and because I didn't feel like reaching for the remote). There are numerous plot points that don't make sense or don't stay consistent.

    Reading though this thread people point out how fantastic the romantic relationship between John and Aeryn was... I don't see it. The sets being fantastic... again nothing.

    Maybe its just me, I liked the show and all, but I won't be getting the same mileage out of these DVDs as I have out of TNG, DS9, B5, Firefly, SG1.


    P.S. I really enjoyed the opening musing in S1 and 2, very much less in 3 and 4.
     
  14. RoJoHen

    RoJoHen Awesome Admiral

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    Farscape is, first and foremost, about the characters. If you don't like the characters, you're not going to like Farscape.

    I'm also wondering what you think doesn't make sense about the story.
     
  15. Bisz

    Bisz Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    There are several episodes that have enormous plotholes. I noted all of these mentally as I went through the show but the only one that comes to mind now because its so recent is the Scarran threat to Earth - they don't have wormhole technology but they can somehow navigate a wormhole to a specific place and time (Earth) without becomming goop like all of Scorpious pilots. If they can do all that what exactly do they need from Crichton?

    I don't like Jool, does anyone? I don't like Stark. D'Argo can get very annoying.

    I very much enjoyed the character of Crais, both as a PK and as Talyn's pilot... my problem is that those are two entierly different characters. There was no transition from one to the other. One minue Crais is insane with anger at Crichton, snapping the necks of his Officers, then as soon as he's found out by Scorpius he becomes a reasonable, charitable animal lover. This guy spent years and years as a PK trying to create Leviathan gunships, then he has his change of heart and becomes worried that his Leviathan gunship is too violent and he wants to remove its weapons. Inconsistent.

    Crais isn't the only inconsistent one. For a very long time, too long, the first two seasons I think, the characters all went from being friends one episode, to selling each other out and abandoning each other in the next episode. Then they would be friends again in the next episode and you'd think it was a learning and bonding experience for them... but in the next episode they would all be screwing each other again. This back and forth made it difficult to like the characters because for a very long time they weren't likable. I'm not talking about Rigel because he did that up the very end, its mostly D'Argo and Zhaan.
     
  16. Kegg

    Kegg Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I wasn't the biggest fan.

    No, really.

    I liked the characters particularly Crichton but the theatrics of the relationship did wear thin on me at times. Fan favourite episodes like "The Locket" aren't really my preferred ones.

    That does come out of left field, yeah, and is not transitioned at all smoothly. He's not as nice as you say, though, albeit it's easy to claim that in retrospect after his big heroic sacrifice. He's more of an untrustworthy ally who has the Moyans along basically for his self-interest. Which is why he neglects to tell them about the little incidental fact Zalaks Sun is after him in season three, because like hell would they feel sorry for him then.

    This I'd disagree with. In the first season they're people basically thrown together by circumstance, and who are willing to help each other - up to a point. And that point is whenever it obviously conflicts with their own interests. They lose nothing in trying to save each other, but if a route home is on the line all bets are off. The only one willing to sell them off any time, every time is Rygel.

    Eventually the experiences make them a bit into more of a dysfunctional family and less a band of people at each others throats, though Rygel and Chiana tend to provide the antagonism and Stark's handy whenever the plot calls for someone to do something really, really insane.

    And families are a little like that. You screw each other over but you're smiles the next minute, so to speak, so long as it's none too serious (and it rarely is, Rygel's odd more insane ideas excluded). It's best summed up in an episode, I forget which, where the crew split off into two groups because they feel they can't trust each other, and then proceed to outline exactly the same plan, even predicting some of their own reactions.

    Zhaan's character arc sort of dropped the ball. She lost her faith then she got it back then she was in some sort of trance, she was all over the place early season two until they thankfully shelved the whole affair.
     
  17. HappyDayRiot

    HappyDayRiot Commodore Commodore

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    I forgot to mention my love for Scratch N' Sniff. Can't remember any other episode of a sci-fi show having me in tears of laughter for the whole 45 minutes. Farscape did comedy-what-the-frell-is-this-crazy-dren-episodes exceptionally well.
     
  18. Kegg

    Kegg Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I'm not a big fan of Jool, but "Scratch N' Sniff" is definitely one of the funniest things Farscape did, right up there with "Won't Get Fooled Again" and "Revenging Angel." If Farscape sometimes feels a little like a deranged drug trip gone south, well, imagine trying to explain this week's plotline to a sensible indoors type like Pilot. Priceless.

    I like the little callback to this episode in "Revenging Angel", too. In "Scratch" Crichton is insisting Pilot doesn't get it because he doesn't get out much, in "Revenging Angel" the image of Pilot in his head deadpans "I don't get out much, so I read."
     
  19. LitmusDragon

    LitmusDragon Commodore Commodore

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    I'm just getting up to the part where Scorpius keeps popping up in John's imagination saying things like "you'll never see the trap until it's closed". What foreshadowing. I want to know what happens now. :lol: Seriously though don't spoil me.
     
  20. DS9Continuing

    DS9Continuing Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Ah but that's the thing - they actually did have plenty to do with the arc, just not in ways everyone immediately understood or expected.

    That would be "Wait for the Wheel," where they're trying to save Moya from the Pathfinders.

    Ooh - "Beware of Dog," one of the creepiest episodes ever, and the best use of Harvey of them all.