Farscape

Farscape
created by Rockne S. O'Bannon [DVD Farscape]

Farscape, which ran on the Sci Fi Channel from 1999 to 2003, was one of the most inventive, imaginative, creative, emotional and mind-blowing science fiction series to have aired on television in the past 50 years. Produced by Rockne S. O'Bannon and the staff of Jim Henson Productions, Farscape combined human actors (many in heavy prosthetic make-up designs) and highly detailed muppets (think Yoda as he appeared in the original Star Wars film trilogy), to create an exotic cast of characters. The main character was human astronaut John Crichton, who is testing an experimental spacecraft design in near-Earth orbit when he is thrown through an unexpected wormhole to the far edge of another galaxy. There, he quickly finds himself on a living ship, fleeing a tyrannical military police force with a group of intergalactic escaped convicts. His fellow rebels include a gigantic warrior, a peace-loving and highly spiritual blue-skinned woman evolved from a plant, the dethroned leader of an alien race, and one of the military pursuers, whose interactions with the rebels have contaminated her beyond the ability to rejoin her military brethren. As the series progressed, characters both left and joined the series, making the cast fluctuate. But at the heart, it was Crichton's hot-and-cold relationship with ex-Peacekeeper Aeryn Sun that formed the core of the show. Over four seasons, there were some truly horrible villains, some bad guys who became good guys, and more bizarre alien species than you can possibly imagine. There was also some of the best writing, acting, set design and special effects you'll ever see in a genre-based television series. Farscape is a series not-to-be-missed by science fiction fans, and I would recommend it to non-SF fans as a good example of how mind-bending genre TV can be! I'm rating it 9 instead of 10 only because in four seasons there were a few scattered misfires, but on the whole this was a terrific series! -- recommended by Scott C. - Bennett Martin Public Library

[ Internet Movie Database entry for this film ] | [ official Farscape web site from Jim Henson Productions ] | [ official Farscape web site from the SciFi Channel ]

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