#because they felt that John and Aeryn only had their hearts on each other

[this-is-a-love-story-isnt-it]

Claudia Black and Ben Browder being captains of their own ship since 1999.

ComicCon 2009 Wintercon 2019 Wintercon 2023

[jesterlady]

Absolutely feel free to skip this one because it’s very long and very spoiler-y.

How can I explain Farscape?  No, I'm not going to do the Mean Girls thing, it wouldn't do it justice. I think what makes Farscape so special was that it wholly embraced its scifi-ness and yet somehow managed to invert most of the tropes therein, in such a way that still managed to make it seem ground breaking and yet completely scifi.  One of the ways it does this is the fact there's only one human on this show.  John Crichton is our guide to the universe and the eyes through which everything is filtered (totally making him like the companion on DW, lol) but the show is a big melting pot of alien.  Even the aliens that are humanoid or look human have very specific cultures, physiology, mannerisms, and values that make them completely alien.  It's a bit shocking to get used to. Before I watched Farscape the only thing I knew about it was that it was extremely popular and made with Muppets in Australia.  In fact during the first episode I got all confused because all along I'm been assuming John Sheppard from Stargate Atlantis was Crichton, whoops. The first episode itself didn't immediately make me fall in love but it didn't take much more than the first half of a season to make me completely involved, in a good way or a bad way.  Like I said, this show doesn't play by humanity's rules.  Crichton may be the lead of the show and he may influence them all in huge ways, but these are incredibly different creatures with extremely different morals.  One of the very first episodes deals with three of the characters cutting off the arm of the Pilot in order to secure maps to their home worlds.  I was so pissed off and I kept on being pissed off through the whole episode and you know what...they don't apologize or realize it was wrong and they weren't influenced by the alien bad guy like I thought at first, in fact, in the end scene D'Argo even says he'd do it again.  He was attempting in his own way to make it up to Pilot, but he wasn't backing down.  I fretted and fumed about it for a while and then started writing fic in my head to fix it, but the episode brings home an important fact.  This isn't Star Trek, these aren't people, this show does things differently, and the main characters might not always be likeable.  John and Aeryn both bring up the incident later when they're being accused of something to remind everyone that that they were the ones who were a. psychotic about reaching home and b. not exactly careful about treating Pilot well, but that's all you get on that front. So, yeah, it's an interesting show to get used to.  The cute little Muppet is a dirty, greedy, rotten old man who betrays them countless times and constantly deserves to get spaced.  When Chiana joins the crew later she's like a little alien street rat who uses her body and whatever else she can to get by, but even though the only thing alien looking about her is makeup, her physicality is so incredible.  The actress just makes her move and stand and be alien, it's amazing, she's like a living puppet on strings. It's not the greatest budget on the planet and the special effects weren't amazing, but using the prosthetics and the puppets, actually made it really cool.  I love shows set in Australia, they just don't care if they reuse actors a bunch or if everyone speaks with an Aussie accent, they just focus on making their show and trust it to deliver what the budget can't.  It's very inspiring. And like I said, it turns things on their head.  Our lead John Crichton is so very Southern and he's all action hero and all, but he's also a scientist, an astronaut, incredibly smart, peculiarly fitted to understand space and learn to live with aliens.  His plans are insane and they always work even though they require a lot of improvisation along the way.  He's a pop culture machine, always spitting out references, which we get, but the aliens don't.  It's always a joy to wonder what he'll say next and what new nickname he'll give someone.  Now, he's got a reason to act crazy.   Literally just being shot to the other end of the universe and living among aliens would do that, but then he is hunted by Crais, Mr. Head Peacekeeper, and then gets the most wanted tech in the universe, wormhole knowledge, encoded in his brain.  So literally everyone wants to capture him and when he does get captured, he's tortured and then turned into Mr. Nosferatu Scorpius's pet science project, up to the point of having a chip in his head and then neural clones.  Imagine living with your worst enemy in your head.  I mean, it's no wonder Crichton is insane.  To be honest, I love Insane!Crichton, he's hilarious.  But...it's torture to watch at the same time.  At the end of S2, when they're desperately trying to get the chip out and each time it doesn't work out, I was audibly begging the invisible showmakers to please let him get the chip out. Of course the torture didn't end with the chip, why would it?  What is most torturous and most wondrous about the show is John and Aeryn's relationship.  I mean, talk about a romance for the ages.  They're never fully together it seems, they're never actually apart, but it doesn't feel like a 'will they, won't they' type of deal.  They are bound by astonishingly amazing chemistry and it just builds and builds until their UST is enough to make you explode.   But even that's all backwards because they have sex like first thing in the first season, and then it's never a thing really.  But they talk and talk and talk and work well together and protect each other and look at each other and sometimes even cuddle in Pilot's den.   Now Aeryn is stiff and bred for war and was taught love was a weakness.  She is an outcast from her people and adrift amongst the very people she was born to kill and hate.  It's difficult, oh yeah.  All through S2 she's just fighting it like crazy.  There's this whole 3 parter where John actually gets married to and has a baby with some Princess but he'll never live long enough to see his child and Aeryn is off freaking out while he's being held hostage in this situation.  At the end...do we get a beautiful reunion?  Nope, we get them both knowing that they're compatible and smiling.  Finally, finally when she does admit she loves him, he's being taken over by the evil clone in his head and he ends up killing her. Oh, and then when she's brought back to life by Zhaan (so sad Zhaan died like that.  I mean, it was beautiful, but I hated that she was gone) Aeryn admits to John she loves him but she won't be with him because Zhaan gave her life for Aeryn and Aeryn won't risk feelings because it would get people hurt.  Trope annoyance alert! I hate the whole 'I love you but I won't be with you because I would lose focus and it would hurt more if one of us died' bits.  You're gonna be worried about him anyway, honey, you might as well enjoy the fun part of love. Anyway...S3 was all sorts of fun and angst.   Because they twin John so now there's a copy and an original.  As soon as they didn't resolve that by the end of that episode I knew there was going to be angst about it, I spent like 10 episodes analyzing everything they each did and trying to figure out who was the copy and who I should root for to live and be with Aeryn.  By the way, they never reveal who the copy is.  So I will never know if John Crichton actually died in the Uncharted Territories.  This show, this show. But what they did was actually really clever and interesting.  They split the crew up for most of the season on two ships.  One Crichton on each. So they got to develop some interesting storylines that way.  Of course, as soon as Aeryn ended up with one of the Crichtons on Talyn, you kind of felt he was doomed.  Red shirt alert!  Another trope not inverted but held for maximum angst.  Because of course she and that John got together and it was beautiful and perfect and wonderful.  Then in a dramatic two parter, that John finally unlocks the wormhole tech in his brain and gets rid of the Scorpius clone living in his head while with Aeryn in beautiful, tangible love so...naturally he dies of radiation poisoning. It wrecks Aeryn, she finally opened up and then she had to grieve so she clams right the hell back up.  I mean, I knew it would happen, but I was so sad for the other Crichton because he's been on Moya missing her like hell and the saddest moment in all of Farscape (apart from Zhaan and D'Argo's deaths) is when he runs up to the transport pod with the cutest love struck look on his face, so anxious to see her again, and she just cuts him.  Oh, it breaks my heart to think about it. Of course, then they have to work together and it's obvious they both still care.  I get it with her, but I'm just like 'girl, you have the best opportunity in the world, to watch the one you die and still be able to have exactly him.'  They've both had to watch each other die at this point.  At the end of the season she leaves and he tries to stop her but she can't deal and he lets her go because they freaking toss a coin to see who wins that argument.  Wow.  Of course, magically (this whole bit is kind of silly) he finds out she's pregnant after she goes!  (Neranti is just weird but again, a delightfully non human element of the show that they just stick in.) So next season when they get reunited and she's finally figured things out a bit, but she still can't tell him the whole truth or if the baby is even his (weird alien gestation alert) and so he decides he can't trust his heart to her.  Ack!  Then she's working on building his trust back up and he's taking drugs to dull his feelings for her.  I am usually with Crichton on their relationship stuff cause she's so bad at (unused to) it but this time I was about ready to smack that boy.  I was clutching a pillow and yelling at the screen for him to say no to drugs for so much of that season.  Turns out it was all a ploy to protect her and the baby from Scorpius (which is also silly) but then as soon as she called him on it they started a secret relationship and it's going to be fine but she gets kidnapped and tortured and he breaks all hell and makes a deal with the devil to save her and they accidentally start an interstellar war and the Scarrans are going to attack Earth and Crichton collapses the wormhole that would let him go home again and then the baby is his and he proposes and they kiss and are happy and happy and happy and then they get shot and turned into crystals and the series ends... Yeah, this show ends every season on a cliffhanger and they got canceled.  I actually only found that out at the start of S4 when I started to question if it would be okay.  I freaked out and googled it and found out they had a miniseries to wrap things up.  Heart quieted at that point, maybe it was knowing that the story would continue on, but actually the ending wasn't so bad if it had ended there.  I could have happily pretended the last two bits didn't exist and that it ended with them getting engaged and having a baby and defeating the Scarrans.  I don't know. What I do know is that there was a miniseries that wrapped things up really well, completing the arcs and wrapping up the wormholes and the Peacekeeper/Scarran war and resolving John and Aeryn perfectly, giving them the happy ending they deserved with marriage and baby. Not to say that everything ended happily because D'Argo died and I don't like that at all.  He kind of asked for it, resolving things with Chiana and Jothee like that. Now, bits of the show that were weird and involve all of that.  D'Argo and Chiana get together in S2.  It was a bit weird and out of the blue if you ask me.  Not that they couldn't be together, but I feel like it was fairly obvious that D'Argo and Zhaan were really heading somewhere and then it just...stopped.  D'Argo and Chiana were not an obvious couple and she's all innocence and sensuality and little girl (D'Argo always felt a bit like her dad to me).  D'Argo is all honor and loyalty and commitment.  Now...D'Argo has been searching for his son Jothee for the last two seasons and they finally reunite at the end of S2 and it's so beautiful and gorgeous, but all hell breaks loose and they have to fight a war and all that and in the chaos Chiana and Jothee sleep together.   WHAT?  Chiana's been freaking out about D'Argo preparing to ask her to marry him, but geez.  It's another example of how the show is not afraid to make its characters do things that aren't likeable and aren't human, but still, that one threw me.  I feel like there were so many other ways they could have gone with that.  I would have really liked to have had Jothee join the show and have him and D'Argo really struggle with getting to know each other again and, if they weren't meant to be, Chiana and D'Argo could have plenty of relationship issues without that huge betrayal.  Maybe Jothee and Chiana could even end up together but only after proper development.  But instead, they did that.  Jothee leaves and we don't see him again until the miniseries.  D'Argo forgives Chiana but they don't get back together until the end of S4 and then things get all good between them in the miniseries and then, naturally, D'Argo dies. John and Aeryn name their baby after him!  Sob! But like I said, the show wrapped everything up pretty well and they were extremely good about pacing, really, about telling a deliberate story with plenty of room for natural development along the way and making sure every character and relationship and story arc got fulfilled.  The only thing I felt like got dangled and forgotten was from S3.  Stark, I have a special place in my heart for Stark, not sure why.  Boy is legit crazy and sane at the same time.  Him and Zhaan could have been nice.   But they do this whole thing with him being on Talyn while the crew is split up where he finds out what Crais and Talyn are up to and there's this whole menacing threat to Crais and then when he leaves, he encodes a message for Crichton on his mask and when John starts to listen to it, it gets interrupted and we never hear what Stark wanted to say.  Even when Stark comes back, it's never referred to ever again.  It might have become a moot point because Crais and Talyn sacrifice themselves for everyone at the end of that season, but I still feel like it was a pretty big thing to just leave hanging like that. So...I can't describe Farscape and what it means to me.  The show completely wrapped itself in my insides and won't let go.  I just want to watch it over and over again and I wish there was more and yet I'm so glad it ended the way it did.  This show lived and breathed naturally and it wasn't afraid to make bold choices, assuming its audience's intelligence, and yet it entertained.  The episodes Crackers Don't Matter and John Quixote are so hilarious.  Every bit where John interacts with Harvey in his brain is so amazing and funny.  The acting is flawless, the writing brilliant, the creativity boundless.  This show is submersive, you can't help but be drawn in and caught up in the plight of the living ship Moya and her crew.  Found family is one of my favorite things and this absolutely encapsulates that.  I remember reflecting in S1 that I didn't think they could ever all be a cohesive whole because everyone was so different.   That never changed but even the unlikable characters (Jool started out so so annoying but I actually really grew to like her) and the people who did things that made you angry, somehow they're still a vital and amazing part of a family and they fight for each other, they're trying to survive.  They're caught up in a galaxy's machinations and politics and wars, and mostly what they want to do is go home and protect each other.  They have to do horrible things along the way.  They don't always win.  There's a truly awful episode where they go back in time and end up causing the slaughter of a bunch of nuns!  I mean, wow.  But in the end, you root for them and you will die rooting for them.  All the different interactions are important.  Obviously John and Aeryn are the heart and soul, but Aeryn's relationship with Pilot is so touching and tender.  Crichton and Chiana have this slightly sexual but yet not, brother and sister relationship that could be weird yet never is.  John and D'Argo's epic, bickering bromance is a thing for the ages.  It's just beautiful.  It's like Crichton, a plague that has ruined my life.

I watched 4 seasons and 1 mini series in 14 days.  It was perfect because I was on vacation for the first 10 days and I actually really took my time, feeling like I had the time. I started it casually, but it quickly consumed everything.  I lived and breathed Farscape for those days even when I was doing other things and I made sure I did other things.  My hands were shaking, my heart was racing, I clutched pillows and yelled at the screen, and I did happy squee flailing and monkey dancing around my living room on more than one occasion.  This show is not casual, it is a lifestyle.  I am so glad I was not watching it while it was on air because having to wait even a microt for between seasons would have been horrible and too much.  It is such a blessing though, the perfect sci fi show.  It's not a perfect show like Leverage is literally perfect and I would never change a thing about it and it's not fluff and happiness and comedy like Parks and Rec is perfect, but it is everything a scifi show should be and it has all the ingredients necessary to make it absolutely one of the best shows I have ever seen. 10 out of 10 recommend.  Make sure you have some time because binge watching is so necessary with this one but do it, do it, do it.