~Farscape~

Spurred on by a combination of Paeter's Episode Zero discussion and internet reviewer SF Debris' positive episode reviews, I've recently been watching through Farscape.
At the time of this posting, I'm roughly halfway through the second season, but so far I'm loving, absolutely loving, this show!
What do you think of it? Who do you like? Who do you not like?
Myself, I love the gradual character growth, how the same people who callously chopped off one of their allies' arms ("It'll grow back, stop being so selfish!") would later risk all for arguably the most useless of their number. I especially love the performance of Rygel, and hope he will get some more focus later on (so far he's really only been comic relief or an obstacle).
I must say, she hasn't been here for long, but I'm not caring for Chiana. I wonder if she'll get better. So far, she seems like the worst of Jadzia Dax without any of the intelligence or experience.
What do you think?

WOOHOO! Welcome to the party! And you're now getting into the section of the show when they really start to hit their stride, so enjoy what comes next!

Rygel's character grows in substance and complexity as they move forward (as is the case for all the main cast). He certainly continues to be used for comic relief, but every now and then is written in ways that will remind you why he's the dominar of over 16 billion subjects (or more, I'm bad with numbers) and why he is not to be underestimated or screwed with.

I felt the same about Chiana at the start. But as they found her character more she grew on me, and she is a big part of a great, heart-wrenching plot-thread.

You're not far enough along for me to talk about characters I dislike, but when you meet Jool, you'll probably hate her as much as I do.

For me, this show shines in a few key relationships John has: First and foremost, John and Aeryn, but also John and Scorpy, and John and D'Argo.

I hope you enjoy! You've got some great stories ahead of you!

Paeter wrote:Rygel's character grows in substance and complexity as they move forward (as is the case for all the main cast). He certainly continues to be used for comic relief, but every now and then is written in ways that will remind you why he's the dominar of over 16 billion subjects (or more, I'm bad with numbers) and why he is not to be underestimated or screwed with.

Rygel tended to be my least fav character, but he did eventually grow on me. he progressed a lot from self centered dominar to a compassionate caring character.

Paeter wrote:I felt the same about Chiana at the start. But as they found her character more she grew on me, and she is a big part of a great, heart-wrenching plot-thread.

You're not far enough along for me to talk about characters I dislike, but when you meet Jool, you'll probably hate her as much as I do.

Both of these two were toss ups for me. Jool wasn't too bad, imho, but was never fully fleshed out either. There was something about Chiana that always struck me, but the character was well developed and I love her part in the plot-thread.

Paeter wrote:For me, this show shines in a few key relationships John has: First and foremost, John and Aeryn, but also John and Scorpy, and John and D'Argo.

Officer Sun. I so miss her (re-incarnated as Vala Maldoran, who certainly didn't know Cameron). the dynamic between John and Scorpy was one of the best peices of serial writing I've ever seen in any show.

Add to that, we actually have a complete "tele-novel" here. Beginning, middle, and end . . . with characters who CHANGE, for good and ill, over time in episodes that have lasting consequences.

My new bar that I set when I watch a TV series: is there a reset button at the end of every episode. Does an episode end with the status quo upset. even just a little?

BenAvery wrote:Add to that, we actually have a complete "tele-novel" here. Beginning, middle, and end . . . with characters who CHANGE, for good and ill, over time in episodes that have lasting consequences.

Totally agree. As it aired, this aspect is a lot of what killed the series since it was so hard for people to jump on. (It was just a handful of years ahead of its time, since now you can catch up on any show with blu-ray or eps-on-demand at i-tunes/amazon etc.) But now as a complete, in-the-can story, it's a gold mine waiting to be discovered by people who missed it on air or found it hard to jump into/stay with after missing a few episodes.

That's why I loved DS9, too.
I have to say though, many shows (like Lost or Heroes) never caught on with me because they start with TOO much and shift constantly. I think a show like Farscape is good because it does change, but gradually enough that you don't need to take notes.
Incidentally, I just watched the one where they reintroduced Stark (the half-energy guy with the half-mask) and, though I normally love their shifting status, this was just a cheesy re-addition. He is literally just in the hallway and says "Hey, by the way they picked me up while you were in your room".
Weak.
Fortunately that stuff is the exception, not the rule.
P.S. - I don't know if Stark will return again, so please don't tell me.

Dunadwarf wrote:
Incidentally, I just watched the one where they reintroduced Stark (the half-energy guy with the half-mask) and, though I normally love their shifting status, this was just a cheesy re-addition. He is literally just in the hallway and says "Hey, by the way they picked me up while you were in your room".
Weak.
Fortunately that stuff is the exception, not the rule.
P.S. - I don't know if Stark will return again, so please don't tell me.

Yeah, I'm still confused when I watch the show and get to that part. Thankfully, for me, the re-appearance of Stark at that point (despite the fact he can be annoying) was welcomed and outweighed the sloppy transition.

Yeah, I'm a few episodes into Season 3 at this point (the big sacrifice and betrayal have both occured by this point.
I just watch "Different Destinations". Even if you've never seen Farscape (assuming you can just accept a few odd notions that make sense in context, like Harvey), this is an amazing episode that had me crying openly. \
Best so far in a series already full of highs.
This show is what Voyager really could have been and should have been. New people join and leave with no set schedule with a half-serial, half road-show feel to it.
Of course if Janeway had an evil sociopath in her head...she'd pretty much act like she does anyway!

***Spoiler alert.***

Almost finished with Season 2 now, and Season 3 just arrived so I have all of that to look forward to.

A few thoughts on some very striking episodes, or moments from episodes:

Crackers Don't Matter: One of my favorites, because it doesn't seem like anyone is holding back while going insane! For some reason Crichton boasts that he isn't, but he sure does seem like he is going insane, for different reasons. Harvey/Scorpius is awesome, nothing beats that hawaiian shirt. "Kill her, John. Then we can have pizza, and margarita shooters!" "Nobody has margaritas with pizza." Everyone who makes insane John angry gets showered with laser-pulse blasted cracker-dust, because crackers don't matter! John Crichton, astronaut, outfitted like some kind of space-viking, smeared with radiation resistant puke lotion.

This episode really slams home the sense of some turning point for John, as if the Aurora chair drove him crazy, and these moments of suicidal insanity continue to rear up when things get bad. He gets goofy, but there's a dangerous hysteria there that's captivating to watch.

My Three Crichtons: I like how Crichton gets angry about another "alien" situation targeting him to mess with his mind. I thought it would have been interesting to keep one of the Crichton duplicates, but the only show I've seen to play extensively for a long running storyline with duplicate characters was Battlestar Galactica. Oh well, ho hum. :innocent shrug:

Look at the Princess: D'Argo has some fantastic words of comfort and consolation for John, before he gets turned into a statue. Then a bad guy chops off the statue's head! Then another bad guy drops the statue's head into a pit of acid!! (Then the credits roll, and we see John's head bobbing in the usual way, from turbulence of a wormhole trip. Great opening). Another memorable moment where John goes out of his ever-lovin' mind; he bounces off the walls so dangerously well that he his kidnappers are overwhelmed.

Clockwork Nebari: What are they doing to his eyeballs!!!??? Star Trek: First Contact has nothing on that special scene. Rygel's precious gem: "I'm nobody's puppet!"

Desert Kris wrote:***Spoiler alert.***
I thought it would have been interesting to keep one of the Crichton duplicates, but the only show I've seen to play extensively for a long running storyline with duplicate characters was Battlestar Galactica. Oh well, ho hum. :innocent shrug:

Holy crap, I SOOOO want to talk about season 3 after reading that last comment. But no spoilers. Just brace for a great story.

Yeah, I know what you mean, Paeter. The best use of that particular device I've seen if SF.
Okay, so Chiana went from being useless to annoying to loathsome to detrimental to outright hateful. Where is the part where I'm supposed to feel anything but loathing for the Monkeyslut? I swear, this must be what Neelix and Wesley are to Trek watchers who loathe them. I just...detest this thing. How can a character be immature, cloying, skanky, stupid, arrogant and selfish AND turn around and also be self-righteous, intolerant and uptight? Usually a character is one or the other, but Monkeyslut manages to go both ways (pun derisively intended) on these traits.
In short, not quite my favorite character.

Dunadwarf wrote:
Okay, so Chianna went from being useless to annoying to loathsome to detrimental to outright hateful. Where is the part where I'm supposed to feel anything but loathing for the Monkeyslut?

It's funny you make that observation. As I think back, I imagine I might have felt somewhat the same way, but for one factor. I simply roll my eyes and smile when I think of Chiana, and I think that's all because of John and the way I see everything through his eyes. When John gives Rygel a snuggy or laughs in disbelief at Chiana's behavior, it feels like an acknowledgment that, yes, these characters are totally unacceptable by our social standards. (Rather than everyone strangely putting up with Neelix and Wesley, or at least not seeming to notice that they don't fit.)

John is the glue that holds the entire show together for me, as he often reacts onscreen the way I imagine I would. So that's how I've managed to put up with and even love some of the annoying characters. (And yes, that includes Stark. Though maybe not Jool...)

It seems like there are some characters who are "supposed" to be tolerated and some who aren't. Why are Jool and (I honestly don't remember her name, but the redhead who pretty much replaced Jool) the officially annoying ones that the characters roll their eyes at? Yeah, they have obnoxious moments, but they also accomplish things, unlike the Monkeyslut.
I agree that John holds things together, though. I do really like Rygel, both because he's actually entertaining and because, despite himself, he's actually grown (unlike certain fiber-optic-haired wastes of oxygen). By this point (I've just started the "We're so Screwed" 3-parter that leads to the last episode, I don't see Rygel doing the things he would have done at the beginning of the show.
I think, for me, I can put up with an annoying character IF they have redeeming qualities and/or are the underdog for me to root for and/or who grow and change and acknowledge the annoying things they used to do. Even Neelix and Wesley improved in an objective way by the end of their runs. I don't want to run this into the ground, but I'll be Chiana was (for some reason) a fan favorite that the creators decided to keep as she was (if not dial up to 11) to draw in the viewers.
I don't know why, because I'm generally not that bothered by annoying characters (like Neelix and Wesley, neither of which bothered me that much), but Chiana...just pushes my buttons. Actually, that gives me an idea for a new topic...

I'd agree that Chiana possibly changes the least. (Or maybe that honor goes to Zhaan.) But one thing I see change is her level of selfishness. She still screws things up and gets the crew into trouble as much as ever. I don't think she "matures" at all. But she came on board Moya caring only about herself, and by the end we see that she cares a great deal about John, Aeryn and Moya. Even if she lacks any wisdom in knowing how to have a functional adult friendship with anyone or properly express her feelings.

Still, if her other characteristics are really rubbing you the wrong way, I can see how the small ways in which she changes wouldn't be very noticeable.

Alright, I finished the series, and if I didn't know there was a follow-up movie that I'm getting very soon...
Seriously, if you watch the finale, you will be royally ticked off if you don't know that there's more to come.
I hope Joffee (sp?) comes back in the movie so we can wrap that little betrayal on the part of Monkeyslut up.

Dunadwarf wrote:Alright, I finished the series, and if I didn't know there was a follow-up movie that I'm getting very soon...
Seriously, if you watch the finale, you will be royally ticked off if you don't know that there's more to come.

Imagine for a moment that you watched it when it aired and there was NO plan for a mini-series to wrap it up. That's just a taste of my nightmare world way back when.

I even went so far as to make an edit of the ending that cut out the bad stuff and ended on the warm romantic beat.

Whew. It was a tough two-year wait...

Paeter wrote:

Dunadwarf wrote:Alright, I finished the series, and if I didn't know there was a follow-up movie that I'm getting very soon...
Seriously, if you watch the finale, you will be royally ticked off if you don't know that there's more to come.

Imagine for a moment that you watched it when it aired and there was NO plan for a mini-series to wrap it up. That's just a taste of my nightmare world way back when.

I even went so far as to make an edit of the ending that cut out the bad stuff and ended on the warm romantic beat.

Whew. It was a tough two-year wait...

I don't knwo anything about the show and don't even know why i was reading this post but it got me curious was it a planed sereis ender or was it a season ender that got canceled after it was made?

They expected to go another season. Season four ended with a pretty amazing cliffhanger . . . IF they were going to be able to have a season. WITHOUT a season five, it was REALLY unsatisfying!

The TV "mini series" is a compromised ending, but it's not bad, all things considered.

I found the show one of the most depressing shows I have ever watched. I go part way into the 2nd season and stopped. They were always fighting, or in some kind of distress. I like shows that have at least one uplifting episode in them.

There are some that end on a happy note, revealing the growing bonds of family the group has, but yeah, it's a largely dour show.
I've got the movie, but haven't watched it yet. I showed the ending of the last episode to my girlfriend who only watched the pilot and didn't like it, and even she was bothered by the finale.
At least there's the movie! I guess it's sort of like Serenity to Firefly.

Okay, I finally finished the movie!
There will be spoilers here because I can't discuss this stuff without spoiling, though I'll try to be vague, but if you don't know the ending, you have been warned...

Overall, a good finale. I would have liked to see a little more closure for Rygel, but we got the hint of where he was going, so I guess we can just assume he went back to Hyneria.
Monkeyslut was hardly at her worst, although in her grief she was still pretty annoying and self-centered. When Rygel is rightfully getting high and mighty on you, you need to change.
Sikozu's end was just...wow. It makes enough sense that I suspect they always had this ending in mind.
Noranti just...went away but since she just...showed up at the start of the fourth season, I guess that makes sense.
I liked Stark's final turn, but I wish the source of his madness and power had been laid out. Maybe it was in a forgotten line, but I think you were supposed to infer the source of both his insanity and his cure, which works to a point, but makes it hard to really invest in him because they keep things so vague. Not a bad end, though.
I was really surprised at Jool's ending, not so much that she died, but the really effective way they did it with the transmission. Somehow it was more effective than a fiery, gory death. More heartbreaking, especially for a character with less development than even Noranti.
D'Argo...HELL YEAH!!! Best departure ever! His ending captured everything about him that I loved...his awesome fighting spirit, his courage and even his sense of humor. Not even Monkeyslut could ruin his last moments. The final tribute to him at the very end was completely predictable and I still cried when they said it. Even Pilot was stunned by D'Argo's great end.
Finally, John and Aeryn. Great end, though I wish they hadn't featured the lines from the end throughout the movie. I know why they did it, to imbue everything with a sense of inevitability and doom, but that's contrary to the message of the story, which is about forging your own destiny and doing what's right, not following the path laid out for you. What's more, when they overturned it (I warned you about spoilers), it didn't feel joyous, it just felt contrived. Maybe if we'd followed the story linnearly it would have worked, but with the overt hints that anyone who's seen a movie before could follow, it felt like if "Lord of the Rings" had Frodo getting on the ship, then just laughing and getting back off while calling out "NOT!" Still, after this little burp, the story ended gloriously with little D watching the universe.
This was a good series, not without its flaws, but certainly one whose strengths far outweighed its weaknesses. I'm glad I checked it out. I'll still call Deep Space Nine the better series, but this is right up there near the top of my list.

So what's your favorite episode of this series? I'm thinking "Out of Their Minds" (the body-switching).

Ooh, that's tough. I like Farscape for so many different reasons and there isn't a single episode that brings all those reasons together better than any of them are used in any other episode.

The Locket is an episode that stands out as emotionally powerful.
Out Of Their Minds is great for comedy.
Can't remember what the episode name is, but the last appearance of Crais and Talyn is freakin' EPIC.

I'm sure there are a number of others I'll say "Oh yeah!" to, but my memory for trivia is bad, especially details like the titles of episodes.

So I finally jumped on board the Farscape train as well. (woohoo!  )
Struggled through season 1; would have stopped halfway through if not for all of you fans, so I kept on watching. Gradually the show started growing on me and now I'm liking it a great deal!

I'm halfway season 3, at episode 14. So no spoilery replies please  

I like the whole atmosphere and the character development. Characters that annoy me are definitely Jool and Stark, but the one who got on my nerves the most was Zhaan! But then, people that talk and act like her IRL annoy me too  Although she grew on me a bit when she turned fiercer.
I'm actually starting to like Chiana, in that she's sort of like a little sister/young friend to John.

I've had the itch to rewatch this series recently. Perhaps on rotation with Stargate and Babylon 5 . . .

You ask about a favorite episoe, and I cannot really think of one. But here's why: it all blends together. I watched it as a binge thing. It all blurs together into one long story, one long whole. Not like some series, where they were all essentially the same, but in the sense that they all go together.

There are some stand out scenes -- like that creepy doctor who feels like a del Toro creation and when the ship gave birth and the season when the crew got split up and the pilot episode . . .