This month, Wizard magazine created a list of the 25 best sci-fi TV shows (that aired in the US or UK) ever made and failed to include "Farscape" in their list. In a sidebar, they said why it didn't "make the cut".
They admitted they weren't sure why they were luke-warm about the show, but suggested two possibilities:
1. The idea of a spaceship as a melting pot for alien races had been done many times before.
2. Alien muppets are still muppets.
Okay, they've really dropped the ball here. Point #1 is not what made the show great. That's like saying Battlestar is no good because it's another "military sci-fi" show. Farscape took a familiar model and turned it on its ear because of how unconventionally it treated it. With ongoing, unresolved plotlines, the show demanded you watch every episode and rewarded you for your commitment by delivering emotionally gripping character-driven stories, in addition to crazy concepts.
How many space shows let you see the lead character die for real and stay dead, while at the same time being alive? How many shows make a perfect "clone" of the main character that sticks around for an entire season! This show took plot concepts and played with them in ways you never expected them to, but somehow always wished they would. Battlestar Galactica (the recent series and number 5 on Wizard's list) producers all but admitted to taking cues from Farscape in the character-driven department, so give credit where it's due.
As for point number two, it's totally bogus. If Farscape's creatures are muppets, then so is Yoda and every creature in Star Wars. And in 20 years when everyone finally realizes how lame CGI looks, these creature shop characters will look just as real as they did on day one. Besides, aren't we all tired of putting play-doh on someone's face and calling them an alien? Let's have some REAL aliens for a change!
1 comment:
I think CGI's have their place . . . but hollywood is still in its infancy stage when it comes to computer graphics and they are(slowly) learning what works and what doesn't. Babylon 5 demonstrated that space-based ship CGI's look great . . . but people/alien/monster CGI is rather awful (just think of digi-JarJar, digi-Neo for examples).
I'm reasonably sure that the folks over at Wizard didn't watch "Farscape," or if they did they failed to take notes on how the puppet Rigel was a convincing character, while digi-Rigel (season 1) was a rather horrendous occurrence in this otherwise stellar show.
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