Naw, Xpav is right; about 4 episodes were well worth watching. At least one episode ranks right up there with some of the best SF done for TV.
Considering how completely devoid of lesbians this show is, Anders’ endorsment should make you sit up and take notice. I wish it was on DVD! There’s an 8 GB torrent floating around for the entire run of the series, but I’ve only obtained 66% so far, and now I don’t have net access at home!
Invisible Man and and Good Vs Evil/G vs E were both really cool. Again not on DVD. How sci-fi does this stuff need to be?
Can’t go wrong with Firefly (and if your friends don’t like it, they’ll be conveniently gathered for the purge!)
Thanks for your suggestions, but I’ve seen them all :cry: I’ve updated the original post to show them all.
I notice no-one mentioned Lexx :P While I like it, I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone either.
I guess it would be Earth 2 jazzed up with two hours of preparation consisting of subjecting ourselves to Starhunter. Or finishing First Wave or 7 Days using the same technique. Unfortunately, I lost the two seasons of Starhunter and 9 seasons of X-Files and other assorted television shows in the weekend when I kicked over the hard-drive they were on :o
At least theres some bright spots on the horizon… Battlestar Gallactica 2003 the series, Firefly the movie and the Farscape mini-series. And the next seasons of Stargate (SG1 and Atlantis).
I can’t believe I forgot about Lexx. I love that show, though it doesn’t deserve it :p
Unfortunately they’ve only show “seasons” 1 and 2 here.
Have to get those on dvd.
And Space:Above and Beyond was so long ago that my opinion might be skewed.
This show keeps on giving. Its one of the few shows I can put on in the background to watch and enjoy everytime despite repetitively watching it over and over (the other was the X-Files).
[quote=“JessicaM”]
Naw, Xpav is right; about 4 episodes were well worth watching. At least one episode ranks right up there with some of the best SF done for TV.[/quote]
I agree.
While I dislike the “theres just aliens and americans in space” theme I seem to remember this show having (which it had every right to have) it is much better sci-fi than most of the other dreck out there. I remember it having a uncompromising feel to it. Like the writers had some kind of respect for the viewer - the opposite of the feeling I get when I watch Enterprise.
And you know, fantasy is almost sci-fi, so Xena :D
The problem with S:AAB was that they didn’t decide from the getgo what the hell the show was going to be about. They started the characters off as pilots and had them fly around and what not, and then they realized that the life of a pilot can be kinda limiting, so then they turned them into “commandos who also fly planes when we can afford the SFX” and had the standard “war is hell episodes”.
I don’t really get into TV sci-fi, I liked ST:TNG and put up with ST:TOS, but ST:DS9 and since have fallen flat for me. Babylon 5, Farscape, and a host of others didn’t trip my trigger enough for me to even watch an episode. But the trailers for SAAB intrigued me enough that I almost tried to watch it when it was still on, I’ll try to torrent it once I free up space and bandwidth for the 10 gigs.
The good reviews of Firefly prompted to torrent that already, and although I’ve only watched the first 2/3 of the pilot, I’m stunned. TV sci-fi has no right to be this good. It’s focusing on the human relationship rather than the tech, which was always the intent, if not reality, of ST. The tech is interesting, advanced but not magic. I love the lack of sound in space although that may just be the novelty of genre-breaking. I could be mistaken, but it looks like they even do space ship orientation right. The soundtrack is appropriate to the wild wooley western feel. The special effects are subduded and look realistic. I’m basically loving this series six ways to Sunday after just less than one episode, and I’m looking forward to the rest. Did they DVD this so I can watch it on the moderate screen?
The boxed set of Firefly came out in the 2003 holiday season. I agree with you that it was a great show. The boxed release not only includes 3 episodes that never aired, but you can watch the show in the order intended by its creators – as part of Fox’s mismanagement of the show (bad timeslot, axing it after less than a season), they often showed episodes out of order. The 2 hour pilot showed about halfway through the season, because Fox wanted a first episode with more action.
This thread may have mentioned it already, but a Firefly movie was approved about a month ago; not sure if it’s started production yet.
Great…writing about this has made me realize I don’t know if I can wait until late summer now to get this boxed set for my birthday…wonder if my wife will get me a St. Patrick’s day gift…
Squirrel Killer, you may want to give Babylon 5 a try if you get the chance- it has many similarities to the things you enjoyed in Firefly. The focus is definitely on characters though the story and plot are quite epic. The science is much more realistic than Trek- they use Newtonian mechanics for spaceflight for the most part, Earth ships don’t have artificial gravity (have to use rotation), minimal Trek-like technobabble, etc. There is sound in space, but they did debate whether to include it when it initially aired and ultimately decided to let realism slide on that one.
Be warned if you do try it- Season One is significantly weaker than the following seasons and not necessarily representative. There is a lot of foreshadowing and setting up in the first season that isn’t necessarilly obvious the first time through. I myself really enjoyed the first season, but that was knowing that there were great events to come.
Well, this may not qualify as Sci-Fi per se, but i offer it up as an excellent series rental…
The Prisoner!!
Cheers,
C
Naw, Xpav is right; about 4 episodes were well worth watching. At least one episode ranks right up there with some of the best SF done for TV.[/quote]
I agree.
While I dislike the “theres just aliens and americans in space” theme I seem to remember this show having (which it had every right to have) it is much better sci-fi than most of the other dreck out there. I remember it having a uncompromising feel to it. Like the writers had some kind of respect for the viewer - the opposite of the feeling I get when I watch Enterprise.[/quote]
well, they were basically following u.s. marines around. i do remember an epsiode where they get to invade a planet with some chinese troops (a scene where a chinese general in uniform and other generals are talking about the battle plan)
B5 is teh bomb, but I’d like to concur with the observations about season 1 - low production values compared to the rest. The arc in the first four seasons is incredible, though, and relies on the setup in the first so don’t miss it. What you can miss, IMO, is most of season 5, apart from the last episode (Sleeping in Light).
To summarise the seasons:
1 Okay, but give it the benefit of the doubt, some good bits
2 Good, hitting its stride
3 Damn fine
4 Holy Jesus I love this show
5 Moments of brilliance, invariably involving G’Kar and/or Londo. Ending fantastic. The rest poo.
I’m such a fanboi.
You’re not allowed to talk any more.
VR-5 maybe? :)
I used to watch Cleopatra 2525 mostly for the chicks, but mostly it was too eye-scratchingly awful to linger for more than a few minutes at a time.
— Alan