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.

[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.

[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.

[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.

[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).

[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. :)

[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.

[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 :)