(no subject)

[shadowkat]

Been sleeping poorly and feeling overly edgy and irritated. Have come to the conclusion that the high frequency mouse repellers plugged around my apartment were repelling me. So they've all been unplugged, except for one that I placed in the cabinet below my sink. Hopefully will sleep better tonight, feel better already.

Finished Farscape S4 and it is by far the best science fiction television series that I've ever seen. This season, while weaker in some respects to S3, still blew me away. What's depressing is it had two more seasons plotted and blocked out. While tv shows that were renewed and did continue at that time didn't. Makes me wish I was actually watching it back then and so was everyone else instead of wasting our time on tv shows that well, are sort of forgettable (too long a list). That said, can see why I wasn't. The show, because it is a novel for tv, works better on DVD than it did airing week by week. Novels for tv work better on DVD actually. I'm guessing sometime in the not to distant future - we'll be seeing more and more novels for television. Series released in this format, either via HBO (True Blood) or Showtime (Dexter) or on broadcast networks (LOST). What is innovative about Farscape is it is a sci-fi series written for women, to attract women, and for a female nitch audience. Normally sci-fi is targeted towards men, and fantasy towards women. It is also possibly the most feminist sci-fi series that made it to four seasons.

Went online to see what the talented writers, actors, and directors were doing now? Got depressed. Does anyone want to explain to me why Frances Bueller, Ben Browder, Claudia Black, Anthony Simco, Gigi Edgly, Raleigh Lee, Wayne Pygrim, Paul Goddard, Rowan Woods, David Kemper, and Rockne S O'Bannon aren't getting work? Don't bother. Walking into a bookstore or looking at Amazon's new releases or the one's on my Kindle depresses me. Current Popular taste unfortunately is cheese whiz and spam. Honestly, Ben Bowder is double the money, the man can write and act. Why he isn't getting more roles, I've no clue. Same can be said for Claudia Black. They did both get on Star Gate - which I did watch for a bit in 2004 and 2005, just because they were on it. But gave up. I honestly will never understand why people like that series.

Farscape got cancelled because it cost Sci-Fi too much. As much as I'd really love to blame Star-Gate, it really zip to do with it, outside of the fact that it was cheaper and more popular in the ratings. And NBC, Sci-Fi's parent company couldn't afford it. Sort of reminiscent to what NBC did with the original Trek years ago. And I can see why it had troubled attracting new fans - the series is a novel for tv, you can't just come into it at any time like well 95% of the tv shows on right now. Was talking to Momster about this - and she said you can come into Mad Men or The Wire at any time and figure it out - they really aren't novels for tv. You don't need to watch previous episodes to figure them out. (She's done it). You couldn't do that with Farscape. Farscape unlike most sci-fi - was a series about the emotions and the mind - it delved into those areas and in new ways. So it was based on the characters and how they grow and evolve and change. Most sci-fi is interested in things external to the characters, and external problems, and rarely deals with emotion or psychology.
Farscape also was dirty sci-fi - with spitting, showers, vomit, pissing, and the daily life of living on a ship in space. It wasn't clean. Fanfiction wasn't as required - because the focus was so much on character.

Am on to the mini-series now - The Peacekeeper Wars.

Comments

[jennylayne.livejournal.com]

Well, I have been following your posts and you have convinced me to try Farscape next. I am trying DW since everyone raves about it ... not really feeling it yet, but have only watched the first 6 episodes so it's still pretty early - I am trying to stick with it though I can't summon any interest from my son or my husband so that makes it even harder.
Have you watched Chuck? I have just finished what I can get my hands on from Netflix of that (season 1 and 2) it was popular around here with everyone after a bit of a slow start.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Don't know if you'll like it or not. It gets very violent and graphic, albeit no worse than Buffy or Angel. BattleStar Galatica is actually more violent. It's darker and more violent than Doctor Who, but Doctor Who is intended for a much younger audience.

Doctor Who? I didn't get interested in the series until S3. And only loved about five or six episodes. The current season?
I like some, don't like others. Uneven.

Chuck? I've watched it off and on. More frequently when it started, less frequently now - mostly because it was opposite other shows that I liked better and I can't DVR three shows at once. ;-) It's one of those series that you can sort of drop into from time to time, without making a strong committment. Find it a lot of fun.

Farscape? I don't know if you'd like it or not. It's told in an odd manner. Often non-linear. I love it too pieces, but it may not be to everyone's taste.

[jennylayne.livejournal.com]

I don't mind Buffy type violence. Strangely, Chuck seems more violent to me than Buffy ever did. Probably because of massive amounts of shooting and blowing up type deaths, seems more real somehow, maybe because its shooting and blowing up people not monsters...hm.

Anyway, I kinda asked about Chuck because I really ended up liking it. Loved the way they ended season 2. But then I watched the first ep of season 3 - a big mistake cuz now I am so angry. Either Chuck has done something completely OOC or they have yet to re-frame the situation. I guess I want a hint, because I won't be able to get the rest of season 3 for awhile and I don't want to be left hanging AND angry. *g*

So you are not so much the DW fan? it seems like almost all the BtVS fans love that show. I think I will just give up on DW for awhile and try Farscape, who knows maybe I can get my teenager interested, that is how I got into Buffy. I didn't really love Buffy all that much till season 5 when the whole Spike/Buffy thing started, so your comments about Aeryn and Crichton intrigue me.

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

I started Farscape too on your rec. I'm at episode six now but at the moment it's more all the promises of future goodness that keep me going than the show itself.

I love some little details, like the cell neighbour of the puppet emperor in one episode who was the great Cthulhu but I have a very hard time connecting with the characters. It happens often though, that I need a season or so to warm up to something.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

When I tried watching it back in 1999, I got turned off by the first six episodes - thought it was a bit cheesy and silly at the time. But a close friend, whose opinion I trusted, coaxed me into giving the series a try - again, when Syfy re-ran the whole series prior to it's first airing of the mini-series The Peacekeeper Wars. So, I did, and she was right - when you reach about the seventh or eight episode, it's the one that appears immediately after the worste episode in Farscape history, Jeremiah Crichton (that's by far the worste episode you'll see of the series), the series changes completely. The episode is titled "A Human Reaction" - and that episode pretty much changes the series, it's the episode in which Crichton loses his innocence, Aeryn begins to fall in love with him, and the villians start to change. Up until that episode - they were basically catering to the SyFy channel's desire for a series that was more like Star-Gate and Star Trek, where they visit planets and try to help. The first 6-8 episodes have that standard sci-fi tv format. The writers note in commentaries for that season and later seasons, that they were basically feeling their way with the series at this point and were busy negotiating with SyFy network which was their main distributor and funding source at the time - to be permitted to write arc episodes as opposed to stand-a-lone's.

Another bit of info on S1 - they were filming the first four to six episodes scenes out of order and back to back. (It's how Australia does things.)In other words first scene of episode two, then the first of episode three, then the second of episode 4. They stopped doing that work schedul - because it didn't work, confused everyone, and everyone was exhausted by it.

So there are a bunch of kinks production wise in the first six-eight episodes. That said? You'll be happy you watched them, because the writers do reference them later in interesting ways.
Making those episodes far more interesting in hindsight.

Anyhow, let me know what you think of the series after you see A Human Reaction - the Season Finale. It's dark by the way. Torture. Graphic Violence. But no worse than Buffy or Angel or Firefly, or Dollhouse, or BSG (actually BSG is more violent and graphic that any of the above), or Caprica (ditto).

For myself? I fell in love with the two leads - Aeryn and John Crichton...and unlike Whedon's story, they actually resolve the Aeryn/John relationship in a satisfying manner. It's basically what I wish Whedon had done with Buffy and Spike but never did.