farscapin' and other

[jazzfish]

So almost a year ago I asked the internet what television I ought to watch. The consensus seems to be: Avatar is awesome, Babylon 5 is good but this may be colored by nostalgia, BSG is either really really good or pretty good and then it falls apart, and Farscape is kinda iffy although the people that love it really love it.

Avatar was, in fact, awesome, and I'd recommend it to pretty much anyone.

We then watched season 1 of Damages (ugh), and then the entirety of Slings & Arrows to clear the vile taste. After that, well, I'd acquired the first season of Farscape before the move thanks to rebelsheart, so we dived in.

We're eight episodes in so far, and... um. Of those eight:

• Two have been Pretty Good: "Exodus from Genesis" with the space cockroaches, and "PK Tech Girl" with the Peacekeeper love interest.
  
• Two have been Decent: "Premiere," and "Throne for a Loss" with the battle-drug junkies who kidnap Rygel.
  
• Three have been Interesting Premises With Meh Execution: "I, E.T." with the alien UFO watchers, "Back and Back and Back to the Future" with the flash-forwards and the !Luxans, and "Thank God It's Friday... Again" with Hippie Planet.
  
• And one, "That Old Black Magic," had a premise (an evil sorcerer? seriously, sci-fi show?) that snapped my Disbelief Suspenders enough that I couldn't muster up much caring about the (probably quite decent in retrospect) character development at the end.

Episodes tend to end on a pretty open note, which is good: it's setting up things to be carried forward and resolved later. Trouble is, nothing is actually getting carried forward. Every episode starts from the baseline and ignores anything that's gone before. This... is the opposite of what I'm looking for. I want story development. I want progression from episode to episode. In the absence of that I need a really compelling reason to keep watching, and a hit rate of 0.25 isn't doing it for me.

I'm not giving up yet. Right now I'm mostly watching for Aeryn Sun and Zhaan and the Creature Shop creatures, hoping each time for another Pretty Good episode, and waiting for something that'll blow me away. I've heard that parts of season 1 were weak and getting past those will help. Plus it looks like at least the first half of the season was originally aired out of order from how it was written and filmed.

So... it's got until the end of the first season to make me want more.

---

At this point I'm also interested in any comments people may have on Burn Notice, Leverage, and/or Veronica Mars.

Comments

[tam_nonlinear]

I have never tried Burn Notice, but it has Bruce Campbell, so there's that. Veronica Mars is one of those shows that has a fandom saying - such a pity it was canceled after the first season (first season awesome, later seasons not so much). I'm a fan of Leverage, but totally admit that it is fluffy and silly, and it's a good show if you don't look too closely at the details.

I've tried Farscape several times and tend to get a few more episodes in each time, but I never developed the love of it that others did. I mostly liked Aeryn and John. I liked the idea that their courtship was so utterly messed up with time travel and clones and alternate time lines and so on that they had four or five first kisses (I love first kisses), but by a certain point the lack of sustained forward momentum got to me. Unlike you, I hated the creature shop aspects (Rigel annoyed me endlessly and was my least favorite character). I've never made it past season four.

[jazzfish]

I admit, I picked up Burn Notice partly on the strength of the premise but mostly because of Mr Campbell. VM and Leverage just look like things I'd enjoy. Thanks!

Rigel as a character is bloody annoying and makes me wince just a bit when he comes onscreen. Rigel as a Muppet is fascinating in that he's so clearly descended from Sir Didymus, and he's got great eyes. And as minor characters with little to contribute go, I rather like Pilot.

[centuryplant]

The first season of Veronica Mars is outstanding; the rest is mostly skippable.

Farscape does get better, though it's pretty hard on the suspension of disbelief throughout.

[jazzfish]

I thought I remembered having heard that about VM after the first season but wasn't sure. Very skimpy research (read: lightly skimming Wikipedia) indicated that it was the third season that sucked, so I came away even more confused. (Which ought to be a normal state of affairs after going to Wikipedia for counsel.)

My disbelief suspenders have a lot more give in them when I'm in the middle of a plot arc I'm deeply invested in, I suspect. I'm hoping the plot comes together a bit more.

[rbandrews]

Dexter is good, though harrowing. Cassie likes it more than I do, I think. The second season is amazing and it's all pretty good though.

Stargate: SG-1 is pretty much the best thing ever broadcast on television, but I'm resigned that I am the only one who thinks so. :) West Wing is also excellent in the long-plot-arc department.

[jazzfish]

Yeah, Dexter's pretty much on my "um no" list.

I occasionally find myself tempted by Stargate SG1. I restrain myself by remembering that I would be watching television until the day I die and still not be caught up. :)

[rbandrews]

Dexter: I keep flip-flopping. I mean, it's well done, it's compelling, and I want to watch more of it, but... I don't feel happy after watching it. When I started noticing that I started thinking in terms of "let's grind through this as fast as possible".

Stargate: There's only, what, ten seasons and two movies of SG1, and five more seasons of Atlantis? Then a season of Universe, which actually feels like a much different show. Sixteen seasons, two movies, plus the original film, how long can it possibly take? :)

I second Warehouse 13. It's a little cheesy but fun. And I should point you at Anime for the Nonplussed, a Steve Yegge post about, well, anime for people who don't get anime. I've watched part of the two shows he recommends in there, Twelve Kingdoms and Last Exile. I think I've watched enough of Twelve Kingdoms to declare it good. :) (also, you're enough into the software industry to find most everything Yegge writes interesting, so you should maybe look at that)

[marcmagus]

The thing I remember hooking me on Farscape was that every single time I yelled out loud at the television (not something I do often, especially when watching alone, but with Farscape it happened at least a few times), by the end of the episode I had either taken it back or John said the exact same thing I had yelled so it turned into a good laugh moment.

I quite enjoyed Veronica Mars all the way through.

I encourage you to watch the Leverage pilot. It's really beautifully done. Got me hooked thoroughly enough that I'm still along for the ride, even though it's been kind of uneven thinking back on it.

I still encourage Babylon 5. Despite its many flaws, it did a great job at constantly advancing plot and developing characters, and having a good enough vision to plant seeds for the future and a good enough memory to generally not contradict its own past.

[jazzfish]

So far the things I've been yelling about in Farscape have mostly been either acting (the extras are either very bad, or being directed in ways that make them look very bad), or structural (apparently my tolerance for mystic shit in space opera extends to background mysticism a la Zhaan, but not to an actual EVIL SORCEROR DUDE). Half credit for, after jettisoning D'Argo into A FRELLING VACUUM, at least acknowledging that humans wouldn't have survived it.

I keep going back and forth on B5. The local going-out-of-business DVD place (source for Leverage S1 and Burn Notice S1&2, cheap) has B5 S1 for cheap as well. And, well, it /is/ big epic plotline, which is what I keep saying I'm looking for. I will probably continue to waffle until I either finish or give up on Farscape, and then pick it up.

[alecaustin.livejournal.com]

The first season of Veronica Mars is amazing. The second season is mostly good, but the reveal at the end is problematic, I feel. The third season lost the plot a bit in its desperate attempts to avoid cancellation (which didn't work).

[jazzfish]

Ah, understood. That makes the bits and pieces I've heard fit together. (Except for "problematic reveal at the end of S2," which is new information.) Thanks!

[kaelikat.livejournal.com]

Warehouse 13 caught our attention awhile ago and we're still amused by it. :) Artifacts imbued with power by their bearers, e.g. Marilyn Monroe's hairbrush (Changes any hair's color into platinum blonde by brushing it.) to someone more violent and negative things. A small little team of Secret Service agents are in charge of finding and retrieving them - it's light and funny and entertaining.

We watch a TON of stuff - this was one that I thought you might find some amusement from as well. :)

[tamnonlinear.livejournal.com]

Seconded. The series is fun a silly and interesting (plus Claudia reminds me so much of Rislyn that it's a little weird).

If you like Warehouse 13 you might also like Haven, which also has that "X-Files without the angst and pointless conspiracies" feel to it.

[jazzfish]

Huh! That looks reasonably cute and entertaining. :) Thanks!

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I loved Aeryn, but most of the rest of Farscape left me pretty cold. There were a few good eps, but far, far more of Planet of the Amazonian Women types of things.

I adore Burn Notice with a purple passion, but it pushes all my fiction buttons. Leverage is not quite as good (for me) in spite of Parker and Hardison and sometimes the martial arts guys.

Veronica Mars' first season, really good, and so was second. Third was pretty awful, though the last ep was fun.

[jazzfish]

*grin* I'm pleased to hear that Burn Notice works for you. It, and Leverage too, seem like they ought to be exactly the kind of thing I'd like: twisty plots, neat and occasionally snarky characters, etc. I'm a little hesitant on Leverage just because it seems to be much more purely episodic, and I tend to burn out on those.

It's sounding like if I want to get into VM I should stick with the first season, and the second if I really like the first. Which is perfectly doable. Thanks!

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Burn Notice actually has a semblance of overarching storyline, which I find the weakest aspect of the show. It's even painful at time, it's so cliche . . . but on the other hand, those scenes are very, very short. And don't impinge much on the awesomeness of the stings that are the backbone of the show.

[mikailborg.livejournal.com]

I would also recommend Warehouse 13. I only catch an episode here and there, but I enjoy it about every time.

Leverage... I want to like, because it's got the Mission: Impossible TV / Ocean's 11 massive con game thing going, and it's got some guest stars I like, but it just keeps rubbing me the wrong way. I think possibly because all the characters' dysfunctions keep popping up whenever the writers need to slow the plot a bit, and they keep finishing jobs through good fortune rather than the uber-competence of the classic IMF teams.

Watched the pilot of Burn Notice last night on a friend's recommendation, mainly because I knew it had Bruce Campbell in it. It's a little silly, and is buried in gratuitous bikini girl shots... but I think I liked it. Every time I thought, "Well, I don't think I believe that," it turns out that there was a good reason after all. I'm gonna watch more of it :)