I was looking for a new funny sci-fi story and some said I might like this one. I am a fan of the sci-fi so I thought I would get some opinions from other Dopers.
Worth renting/buying?
“Yay, but with a caveat”
Don’t get me wrong- I really liked Farscape. It’s definitely not for everyone, however- it’s not your typical sci-fi setting or story.
The characters, though, make it worth watching, and the actors portraying them. Especially Virginia Hey, Claudia Black, Gigi Edgley… oh hell, all of them.
Muppets make good aliens.
There’s a lot of great funny moments. There also are plenty of very sad and/or disturbing parts too. I rented them, then I bought 'em.
Definitely worth watching, if you have the $$$, worth owning. Ben Browder chews the scenery even better than William Shatner… and much easier on the eyes.
DO NOT under any circumstances watch the Peackeeper Wars before seeing most of the rest of the series.
The first two seasons were first-class science fiction space opera – some of the best ever on TV. Fast action, interesting characters, good dialog, and lots of fun.
The third season flagged a bit, but was still well worth watching.
The fourth season sucked so bad that it is singlehandedly responsible for the vacuum of space. Stupidity piled upon stupidity and the action became completely disjointed and incomprehensible. Avoid if you wish to keep your sanity.
Agreed. Well worth the time to get into the characters and the sub-plot.
Frell Yeah!, 'Scape ROCKS!
to be honest, 'Scape is ONE LOOONNG story divided up into four seasons (and PK Wars), you really should watch from beginning to end, but some good standalone humorous eps would be;
Season 1; no “humor for humor’s sake” episodes, E4 episode “Throne for a Loss” has some good Rygel-bashing (literally) moments, and E13 “The Flax” has an amusing twist ending that catches D’Argo by surprise
Season 2; a good concentration of humorous eps, E4 “Crackers don’t matter”, S2E9 “Out of their minds”, E16 “Won’t Get Fooled Again” are highlights, i really like CDM and WGFA
Season 3; E13 “Scratch N’ Sniff” E16, the BRILLIANT “Revenging Angel” episode, my absolute favorite humorous episode, two words sum it up “Road Runner”…
Season 4; E7 “John Quixote”, E12 “Kansas”, E13 “Terra Firma”, E17 “A Constellation of Doubt”
these are some of the more humorous episodes, bear in mind there’s always the humor of John Crichton’s “obscure” 20’th century Earth references (“Crichtonisms”) that fly over the heads of the rest of his companions, but the above eps are more humorous than most
of the above listed eps, the ones that can stand on their own the best are “Crackers Don’t Matter” “Revenging Angel”, and the “Erp Arc” episodes “Kansas”, “Terra Firma”, and “Constellation of Doubt”
now, if you’re looking for DRAMATIC eps, try Season 2’s “The Way We Weren’t” and “Die Me, Dichotomy” and Season 3 ep “Different Destinations”…
watch TWWW, and try to see Pilot as a Henson animatronic again, in TWWW he becomes real
the ending of DMD hurts, really hurts, seeing one crew member possessed by their mortal enemy, and losing another loved crewmember to the possessed crewmember just …hurts
DD is a unique twist on the Sci-Fi staple of the “time travel episode”, most time travel eps are the stereotypical “Reset Button” eps, not DD, things are not all better at the end of the ep, and they have to live with the results…
My only quibble with a series I otherwise loved is there’s a few too many “OMG we’ve got some
alien fungus/plant/virus/other bizarre life form on board and it’s taking over the ship!” kind of
episodes. But there’s enough good/great ones to definitely make it worth your while.
Oddly, I loved the “Road Runner” ep., while I loathed the Angel ep where he gets turned into
a puppet. :shrug:
Ì’m a big Farscape fan after re-discovering it at the local library (Despite being Australian in origin, the show has never received a decent run on Australian TV.)
My take on the run -
First Season - Pretty rough going until about episode 16, the first of the back on earth scenarios.
Second season - Introduction of Scorpius, more comedy and a heart breaking finale.
Third season - More comedy (Harvey!) and the best use of the “Twin” idea ever. Unfortunately it does have the introduction of the girl whose scream melts metal. (“I’ve got an idea, let introduce an irritating character who produces ear piercing tones!”)
Fourth Season - Some good, some total shite. Scorpius becomes Spike. The less said about the Ben Browder penned episode the better. Does have the excellent documentary episode though.
Mini-series - Almost perfect end to the series. Funny, sad, etc.
See, I actually liked that. If you’re going to have a living ship, you’d expect the equivalent of colds, flus, schizophrenia and STD’s. Moya was really a living ship (as opposed to other scifi stories) because she got sick with fungi and parasites. Too often “living ship” is used to sound all neato and set up the obligatory rebellious ship scene, but the full ramifications of living inside a living being are conveniently ignored.
I always hoped she’d have some gigantic form of PMS when it was really inconvenient. Alas, post-partum psychosis was as close as we got.
I’ve watched the Four Seasons (which I borrowed from a pal) and subsequently bought PKWars.
Got to say didn’t really appeal much to my sense of humour although interesting enough as a SCI FI.
There is a plot arc so best watched in sequence. I don’t think I’d pay retail purchase prices to watch the four seasons and PKWars is really only worth buying as a conclusion/wrap up to the Series.
That said I really didn’t find it funny so may well be in a minority. Doubtless if I had I might have enjoyed it more. Quirky is how I’d describe it.
I like the series, but I issue a standard disclaimer to anybody who wants to start watching: please don’t give up after the second episode, "I, ET. "
The rest of the series isn’t nearly as predicable, boring, and stupid. It is apparently out of order, too, so all the overall plot and character notes which made it good in retrospect will go right over your head and leave you with a bad episode.
Have I mentioned Ben Browder.
Oh yes, I have.
Forgive me obsession.
Taken overall, Farscape rocks.
Season 1: like the vast majority of new shows, 'Scape had its share of rough spots. A few eps. are godwaful; the best are better-than-average sci-fi/SO.
Season 2: 'Scape settles down and hits its stride. The average ep. is better-than-average sci-fi/SO, the best are awesome.
Season 3: builds on season 2. We begin to see glimpses of where the series is headed, so, naturally, some call 'Scape “predictable” at this point.
Season 4: 'Scape is an expensive series, w/o a huge fan base outside its core, which probably stabilized somewhere in season 2. Management tries to boost series profitability, sadly at the expense of the writing, and it shows.
Peacekeeper Wars: neatly tied up the series, and possibly left it open for one-off miniseries later.
My advice: watch them all, in order, and see if it appeals to you.
thanks all! I was going to buy first season DVD, but the damn thing is like $129.00 on Amazon! How in the hell did a 22 season show get so expensive? I bought Veronica Mars season 2 for like $39.00 at Best Buy!
Anyway, I ordered the first 3 discs thru netflix, should here today so I will be giving them a viewing over the weekend!
Amazon’s prices can be a bit screwy at times. Check some other sources before you write off any of the season box sets.
The Muppets are obviously Muppets. Even more obviously than Yoda was with his Fozzie Bear doing the Cookie Monster voice. They so totally and irkily scream MUPPETS! that I cannot watch the show. That, and it’s boring in that Tedious British SF way that Dopers find so irresistable.
So, I guess if you LIKE Muppets and “Space 1999” and “Dr Who,” or if you’re looking for a good nap, you’ll like “Farscape” but I’ll warn ya, it ain’t no “Babylon 5” or “Battlestar Gallactica.” Hell, it ain’t even an “Enterprise.”
I have the first 3 seasons on DVD and am in the middle of rewatching them. The first season is a little uneven, but it has some enjoyable episodes. The second is easily my favorite (although John Crichton’s voice-over on the opening credits is out of date plotwise); I especially enjoy the 3-part stories of “Look at the Princess” and “Liars, Guns, and Money.”
I did not originally intend to buy the third season, due to some changes that I will put in spoilers:
The replacement of the ultra-cool Zhaan with screetchy Jool and the excessively annoying Stark. I do understand that Virigina Hey had to leave because of problems with the makeup, but I still hated to see Zhaan go.
But there were still enough good stories in the third season that I did end up buying the Starburst editions after all.
I’m not getting the 4th series; that was when I stopped watching in the first place.
I may be biased, but I say yeah!