Author Topic: Farscape  (Read 1063 times)

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Neumatic

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Farscape
« on: December 21, 2012, 06:58:41 pm »


Well, having finally watched the last remaining episodes and finishing the three-hour capper miniseries "The Peacekeeper Wars," I'm proud to say I finally finished the entire series.  Incredible.

The show was on Sci-Fi channel in the early 2000s (maybe 1999), shot in Australia and co-produced by the Jim Henson Company, and it's a sort-of update on Blake's Seven, centering around an unlucky astronaut named John Crichton who falls through a wormhole and comes out the other side in the middle of an intergalactic prison escape.  He finds himself aligned with a ragtag group of fugitives escaping the facist Peackeepers in a living leviathan spaceship called Moya.

Oh, and because it was Jim Henson Co, the aliens looked like THIS





And the draw was that they designed a new alien in just about every episode, so they just went NUTS and, especially in the first few seasons, the variety was astounding.  Not only did no other TV show look like it, no other movie looked like it... and to be quite honest, outside of the Hellboy (Heckboy?) movies, I don't really know of any SF/fantasy with this look to it.  Which is a darn rare thing.

And this is the true big bad of the series, Scorpius, a half-Scarran half-Sebaccean Peacekeeper with dingy metal rods in his head who's hunting Crichton to steal wormhole secrets out of his bed.

And beating Battlestar Galactica to the punch, there's a second Scorpius called Harvey inside Crichton's brain who's got a wicked sense of humour.



Harvey is slowly driving Crichton insane, but honestly he was well on the way beforehand, his brain just can't cope with what's happening.  Which works well for Ben Browder's brow and the fact he plays crazy and agitated very well... and very loudly.  There's one season opener where he's on another leviathan, an older dying one, and he's got a long bushman beard and loudly singing the 1812 overture in the hallways with a painted old DRD (these sort of bug/lice/robot things that fix the ship).

I always thought that Rygel, being an actual hand-up-the-butt puppet would be the first cast member to go (the cast does shift around), yet he stays the whole time and is pretty darn entertaining.  I'm still waiting for him to have a cameo in one of the muppet movies... he deserves it.


At the time, the only SF on TV was probably Star Trek, all clean and shiny, this is dark, grungy, the characters pee and puke (they puke a LOT), have surgery, open their heads up, it's not graphic or gory... well, it kind of is, but it's real and practical.  And the sense of humour on the show is brilliant, there's references everywhere and the episodes have titles like "Eat Me" (about cannibals), "Out of Their Minds," and the pregnancy trilogy is called "We're So Screwed."

And also unlike Star Trek, where the characters were guided by a higher ideal and a mission and the thirst for knowledge (which I do love), the Farscape characters are motivated by their basest desires, need, desperation, and outlaw spirit.  In a very early episode they amputate Pilot's arm to sell to a scientist who then stiffs them-- and never ask or apologize later, and I don't think they learned anything from the experience.  It's actually rather shocking (and Pilot is my fave character in the show probably, despite the fact he's a bug the size of a Volkswagon Bug).

Something I love that the series does is not just manage to imbue all these puppets with life, but also make you feel and care for the Moya, despite it not emoting at all and only communicating through Pilot ("Moya and I will not be part of this," etc).  It actually reminds me of how I felt for my old dog Cosima, an old, sweet thing with a dead eye.  There's a particularly sad episode that I won't spoil, but the crew is asked to kill another Leviathan and their first instinct (and mine too) was "yes, of course, we love you so much we will do that."

I'm sure you all have seen it, but if not, I had to throw in something about it, I enjoyed it so darn much.  It was a real rebel of a show and I'm so glad Netflix put it up because the DVDs were so darn expensive... ADV priced it like anime.
« Last Edit: December 21, 2012, 07:14:44 pm by Neumatic »

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Chiprocks1

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #1 on: December 21, 2012, 07:12:14 pm »
Heard of it, but never seen it. Is this series still on the air or did it conclude a couple of years ago?
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Neumatic

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #2 on: December 21, 2012, 07:15:09 pm »
Concluded a LONG time ago.

Chiprocks1

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #3 on: December 21, 2012, 07:17:17 pm »
I kinda figured since I realized that I hadn't heard much of the show in a while. Gonna move the thread to TV's Greatest Hits and Misses since it's out of production.

I intend to one day get around to checking out Farscape for sure.
Chip's Rockin' Art
Michael Scott To Meredith: "You've slept with so many men, your starting to look like one. BOOM! Roasted! Go here.

Neumatic

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #4 on: December 21, 2012, 07:25:08 pm »
Oh, definitely do.  They're releasing the whole series on Blu-Ray but since I'm sure it was edited on tape like every other show in that day I have no idea what quality it'll actually be in.  Though I would so love more adventures in that universe.

We were talking about the Stargate series, both Ben Browder and Claudia Black from this show wound up as leads on that show... almost by accident... and so in episode 200 one of the fantasy sequences is Farscape, but with Browder playing crazy man Stark instead of his own role, it was very cute but it makes no sense unless you know the show.  And even then...

Realizing now that I've only ever seen Browder play annoyed, angry, or crazy... and he's not that guy in real life at all.  It's just what he brings to the screen (I am anxious to see what he does with "Bad Kids Go To Hell.")

Oh, here are the DRDs... you can usually see one scuttling around the floor or sometimes on a wall.

« Last Edit: December 21, 2012, 08:53:56 pm by Neumatic »

Mac

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #5 on: December 22, 2012, 04:56:56 am »
I've heard of the show, but never saw it. Kinda wished I did now. But as Chip knows I have a very hard time staying with almost any show on a regular basis. I have to push hard to make a point of watching when I comes on. Hell, I just finished Walking Dead and American Horror Story last week.

The DVD series seems the way to go. Watching Archer series 1 & 2 as we speak. Zip right through them.
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Mac

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #6 on: December 22, 2012, 04:58:33 am »
Ok, just found out my library has 4 seasons. Sound about right?
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Chiprocks1

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #7 on: December 22, 2012, 05:27:52 am »
Watching Archer series 1 & 2 as we speak. Zip right through them.

I just put those on Hold at my Library this past week!!!!
Chip's Rockin' Art
Michael Scott To Meredith: "You've slept with so many men, your starting to look like one. BOOM! Roasted! Go here.

Neumatic

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #8 on: December 22, 2012, 03:33:49 pm »
Don't know why I haven't watched Archer yet, even my sister loves it and she's a hard sell on animation  Plus it's got Jon Benjamin who's awesome.

Yeah, Farscape has four seasons, and you do have to see them in order for the show to make any sense.

Mac

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Re: Farscape
« Reply #9 on: December 22, 2012, 08:19:36 pm »
Will do... I'll take them in order.

Archer is the story, the characters, the quick witted jokes. The animation is bold and unique... IMO.
Adult themes help it out as well  ;D
« Last Edit: December 22, 2012, 08:21:56 pm by Mac »
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