Four Key Episodes – “Farscape”
By Robert R. Garver
Bob Garver here with my third column for F.A.N. This week I’ll be taking a look at a science fiction show that ran on the channel called Sci-Fi before it was SyFy
What I know going in: Next to nothing. I know the show ran from 1999 to 2003 and that it had aliens. The only other detail I remember is that there was a bald blue female alien who had a strange sex appeal. Should I have paid more attention the first time around? Let’s find out.
First Episode – “Premiere”
Plot: During an unprecedented mission, Earth astronaut John Crichton (Ben Browder) gets sucked into a wormhole and comes out in a very different part of the universe. He is immediately abducted by the crew of Moya, a ship overrun with by prisoners, all of whom are beings from other planets. The crew consists of the hotheaded D’Argo (Anthony Simcoe), the relatively coolheaded Zhaan (Virginia Hey), entitled prince Rygel (a puppet voiced by Jonathan Hardy), and whiny pilot Pilot (a puppet voiced by Lani Tupu). John has been abducted along with Aeryn (Claudia Black), a human-like female working for the Peacekeepers, enemies of the criminals of Moya.
Wanting to side with the good guys, John helps Aeryn escape, but it turns out that he’s already on the bad side of the Peacekeepers because he had inadvertently killed the brother of a high-ranking official. The Peacekeepers turn on Aeryn as well, as she has been “contaminated” by John’s ideals of compassion. Deciding that his enemy’s enemies are his friends, John sides with the crew of Moya, helping them escape the Peacekeepers. He ultimately makes peace with the fact that Moya is his new home, the crew and Aeryn are his new family, and his life is going to be a series of bizarre adventures from here on out.
Thoughts: The series is off to a bad start. The special effects are unconvincing, especially the ones that involve the ships moving through outer space. The presence of tacky puppets from the Jim Henson Company doesn’t help either. Also, how many times must viewers endure the tired “humans are dumb compared to advanced alien life-forms” cliché? The one redeeming quality of the episode is that it does a good job of establishing the characters, undeniably important should we choose to continue following their adventures.
Rating: Two Stars out of Five.
Second Episode – “Exodus from Genesis”
Plot: The temperature aboard Moya is rising quickly. The crew scrambles to identify the source of the problem and discovers a nest of giant bugs who have commandeered the heating system. Even worse is that the pests soon turn into living copies of the crew members. Worse still in an unwelcome invasion from the Peacekeepers.
Thoughts: It’s getting better. I guess once the show got picked up as a series they decided to up the special effects budget. The images are much more professional-looking than they did in the pilot. The puppets are still a nuisance, but even they aren’t as shoddy as they were before. I can now officially point to Zhaan (the aforementioned bald blue female alien) as my favorite character. John complains more than I’d like him to, but he’s stepping up as a leader and I suspect he’ll become more tolerable as the series goes along. On the downside, we spend too much of the episode having to look at the ugly bugs and the supposedly formidable Peacekeepers are starting to become joke villains.
Rating: Two and a Half Stars out of Five.
Middle Episode – “Die Me, Dichotomy”
Plot: A villain named Scorpius has implanted a chip in John’s brain that allows him to take over John’s personality. Manipulating other crew members, John/Scorpius escapes. Aeryn, who seems to have become John’s lover, pursues him. The Scorpius personality badly damages her plane and she’s forced to eject over a frozen lake. The John personality is unable to save Aeryn and she dies. After a funeral, John agrees to undergo a risky procedure (basically a brain transplant) to have the chip removed.
Thoughts: Roughly the first two-thirds of the episode are pretty standard, with a by-the-numbers split personality storyline. At least Scorpius is a scarier villain than those Peacekeeper softies. But then you get to the last third and it’s heartbreaking. Aeryn dies, John has to live with his role in her death, Moya looks like she’s about to be abandoned, and John has to listen helplessly while Scorpius condemns him to a fate worse than death. All the emotion is portrayed better than I would have expected. Even the puppet is curiously touching.
The show has introduced a number of new characters since the second episode, including Scorpius, an all-white girl, a guy with a half-mask, and D’Argo’s angst-ridden son. None of them except Scorpius do anything for me. Maybe if I followed the show I’d be more attached to them, but from here they just seem superfluous.
Rating: Two and a Half Stars out of Five.
Final Episode – “Bad Timing”
Plot: John undertakes a dangerous mission to save Earth from a set of deadly enemies called Scarrans. With help from Pilot and Aeryn (so much for her death in “Die Me, Dichotomy”), he saves his home planet. He and Aeryn end up in a boat somewhere, where she tells him she’s pregnant and he proposes marriage. It looks like things are going to be happily ever after when a villain I’ve never seen before blows them both to bits.
Thoughts: My girl Zhaan has been killed off, presumably so the chalky white chick can get more screen time. That’s mistake number one right there. The Scarrans look like formidable villains (they’re even uglier than Scorpius), but they get about a minute of screen time in the whole episode. I can’t follow John’s strategy at all, from wormholes to starbursts to a moon landing, but that may be my fault for not watching the rest of the series. The scene in the boat seems completely out of place. Also, there’s an inexplicable scene with two guys in Easter Bunny costumes.
Once again, the show is somewhat redeemed by its emotional scenes. The John/Aeryn relationship has a number of compelling ups and downs, and a conversation between John and his father has just the right amount of sappiness to end their relationship on an appropriate note.
On the other hand, the episode has two guys in Easter Bunny suits.
Rating: Two Stars out of Five.
Final Thoughts: “Farscape” got off on the wrong note with its cheap-looking premiere. I can tell that it got better as it went along and the characters and storylines developed. It isn’t a show that lends itself well to this column, as clearly it is a series where important details evolve from one episode to the next. It is probably more enjoyable (but much-more time-consuming) to watch the series in order. Of course, paying attention to the continuity wouldn’t change my opinion that the show could have done without the puppets.
Robert Garver is a graduate of the Cinema Studies program at New York University. Check out his movie review blog at www.bobatthemovies.com. He welcomes feedback, criticisms, and suggestions for future columns at rrg251@nyu.edu.