Subject: Farscape favorites
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Posted on: 2012-07-08 22:02:00 UTC

Because I can't pass up a chance to plug it.

It's a sci-fi TV series, and it is vastly under-appreciated. I'm not complaining that the drooling fanbrats mostly haven't heard of it, mind you, but still.

Basically, it's about an astronaut, John Crichton, who gets sucked down a wormhole in the process of a test flight and ends up... somewhere else... right in the middle of a space battle. He gets hauled on board the fleeing living ship, Moya, just before she and her crew of escaped prisoners Starburst the heck away from their captors, the Peacekeepers. John's now stuck with these people, and he has to try to work out a way to get back to Earth while keeping away from the Peacekeepers and trying to cope with culture shock, conflicts of interests, other people besides the PKs trying to screw the crew over, various members of the crew trying to screw each other over, etc. It's so much fun, you guys.

I love Farscape because it's so quirky, yet so deep; so silly, yet so intelligent. It's not afraid to have fun, and it's equally not afraid to stab you right in the heart and twist every so often. It can be a little cheesy, especially in earlier episodes, but it has incredible heart.

It's got an amazing cast of characters. I have my favorites, of course, but there are very few I can truly say I don't like. Even some of the ones I raised my eyebrow at the first time around grew on me in subsequent viewings of the series. They've all grown on me, in fact: the ones I loved to begin with, I just love even more. The bad guys are as awesome as the good guys. Everybody gets a character arc here.

It has absolutely fantastic settings and creatures. I mean, the Henson Creature Shop did all the non-humanoid aliens. Of course they're fantastic. Two of the main cast are extremely complex, wonderful puppets, only one of which is even bipedal. You'd never mistake them for humans with makeup, and yet the puppeteering and voice acting, not to mention the acting of their co-stars, are so good that they come across just as alive and real as the humanoids.

I can't recommend this series enough. It's one of the best sci-fi shows out there. Unfortunately, it suffered the same fate as Firefly and got cancelled unexpectedly after its fourth season. (We were promised five. Jerks.) The fans banded together and protested like mad, and we got a miniseries out of it to tie things up. It does a pretty good job, too, so you won't be left hanging.

~Neshomeh

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