Wednesday, 29 February 2012
Monday, 27 February 2012
Saturday, 25 February 2012
Farscape Marathon Part 7
Farscape Marathon
Season 2 Part 7
Picture if You Will
A trading post offers bits and bobs for the unwary. Chiana purchases a painting
which seems to both predict the future and reveal hidden truths but it's a trap
laid by an old enemy.
Zhaan is desperate for nutrients provided by real meat so Moya visits a mining
facility inside a huge dead space beast. Problems arise when Chiana's past once
again crops up and it's not all sweetness and light.
Dream a Little Dream
What happended to the crew whilst John, D'Argo and Aeryn were missing?
A tale of a world where Zhaan is arrested and unjustly accused of murder and
Rygel and Chiana rise to the challenge.
Out of Their Minds
A damaged alien warships fires on Moya believing her to be in league with Talon,
thanks to the defence screen she is undamaged but the energy causes the crew to
swap bodies with jiggly yet hilarious results.
One of the best and funniest episodes of the series and combines slap stick humour
with some fairly serious alien related issues.
A mysterious probe envelops Crichton and suddenly there are three of him at various
stages of evolution. The probe intends to return with a specimen but the crew sees
something in each of the versions of Crichton but one has to go.
A nice idea on the idea of replication/cloning an oft used idea in science fiction.
Deleted Scenes
Listening in with composer Guy Gross
Friday, 24 February 2012
Farscape Marathon Part 6
Farscape Marathon
Season 2 Part 6
Mind The Baby
Aeryn has done a deal with Crais to save the lives of John and D'Argo but what is
the future for Moya's new born hunted by the Peacekeepers and desired by Crais.
D'Argo meets an aging Luxan priestess who he is honoured to aid in her passing on
but thanks to a huge life force she rejuvenates herself with disastrous results.
Taking The Stone
A Chiana episode as we meet her brother, I really do not like this
episode:)
Crackers Don't Matter
The show bounces back with an alien scientist promising a cloaking field for Moya
but he has his own agenda. Meanwhile the crew go a little bonkers with plain old
crackers being the focal point of their paranoia.
An excellent episode on every count.
The discovery of a recording of Moya from years ago shows the murder of her
original pilot by the peacekeepers. A moving episode with both back story for
Pilot and Aeryn who despite their past grow even closer.
Another excellent episode.
Commentary for Crackers Don't Matter with Claudia & Ian Watson
Commentary for The Way We Weren't with Ben & Claudia
Deleted Scenes
Listening in with composer Guy Gross
Thursday, 23 February 2012
Tuesday, 21 February 2012
Sunday, 19 February 2012
Farscape Marathon part 5
Farscape Marathon
Season 1 Part 5
Bone To Be Wild
Trapped in an asteroid field Moya and her son detect a distress call from a nearby
source and the crew go to investigate. A survivor is found telling a tale of a ravenous
beast that had killed her entire family but all is not as it seems.
Meanwhile Moya asks Aeryn to name her son in honour of Aeryns friendship and
help in comforting the nervous young leviathan.
We are also introduced to Lt Braca played by David Franklin.
Rygel abandons Moya to deal directly with Crais to save his own hide but finds
that he Peacekeepers will not be honouring any deals and even Crais is being
sidelined by Scorpius who wants John at any cost even the destruction of the
Peacekeeper base. A worthy finale to the first season with a good cliffhanger built
upon solid story telling and excellent CGI.
Commentary for Bone To Be Wild with Anthony Simcoe
Two commentaries for Family Ties featuring
- Ben and Claudia
- Rockne and David
Making of a Space Opera
In the Beginning
Farscape in the Raw
Behind the Scenes
Anthony Simcoe
Jonathon Hardy
Lani Topu
The first season of Farscape may have been the last, the renewal came very very
late and then promoted the movie away from the FOX studios to their own facility
(sans sound stages). If nothing else is taken from the first season it's the fact that
Farscape set standards in alien life design and creation on camera the likes of
which few theatrical features have matched. Couple that with some very likeable
and pretty down to earth characters and both dramatic and humorous writing
they were onto a winner.
Saturday, 18 February 2012
Boldly Gone
Boldly Gone is a Star Trek web comic created by Kevin Church and Ming Doyle, lots of laughs yet still Trek:)
Boldly Gone Website
Boldly Gone Website
Farscape Marathon Part 4
Farscape Marathon
Part 4
A Human Reaction
Moya finds a wormhole which offers a glimpse of the Earth on the other side,
John returns home leaving everyone behind but on return he is imprisoned due
to the paranoia the first wormhole had created.
A clever episode which is fundemantal in the series arc.
The crew consider leaving Moya due to her inability to Starburst and the danger
that brings when they are still being chased by Crais.
Pilot jumps the ship but in her weakened condition she hits some sort of rupture
and is locked in mid starburst and split into three separate entities and the crew
spread amongst them. This is one of my favourite episodes of the series,
wonderfully creative and looks fantastic.
A Peacekeeper commando unit land on Moya and John and Aeryn play the role
of loyal soldiers with the rest of the crew pretending to prisoners. A terrible accent
from Crichton but an good tale as Rygel and Chiana are incapable of restraining
themselves for a few hours and as a result Aeryn is injured.
Aeryn is still suffering from the effects of her wound and is in a downward spiral,
the only solution is to visit the secret Peacekeeper base and get a treatment which
will repair the nerve damage.
Can we have a big round of applause for Stark, Scorpius and Peacekeep Barbie
not to forget Chiana at her slutty best:)
Moya goes into labour while John remains under interrogation by Scorpius using
the Aurora chair, Crais arrives but finds himself under scrutiny and they get
caught up in the rescue attempt.
Commentary for A Human Reaction and Nerve both with Ben and Claudia.
Tuesday, 14 February 2012
Farscape Marathon Part 3
Season 1 Part 3
Till The Blood Runs Clear
Doign some wormhole reasearch in his modified ship John lands on a planet and
meets Furlow an mechanic with an interest in his ship.
The crew also learn that a bounty has been placed on their heads by Crais and
bounty hunters are hot on their trail.
The discovery of a Delvian colony offers a future for Zhaan who can teach these
people the gifts that resulted in her imprisonment. This isn't my favourite episode but
the costuming and makeup are exceptional.
Trapped in an invisible web the transport shuttle with John and Aeryn struggles to
free itself meanwhile D'Argo goes on a treasure hunt with a bit of a scoundrel.
One of the funniest episodes with lots of misunderstandings and also John and
Aeryn gettign a little closer.
John throws a temper tantrum and whilst joyriding Moya has to Starburst away to
protect herself, months later they find John as a sort of cast away living with some
native people in relative peace.
An episode which gets stung rather badly by cast and crew in it's commentary.
Moya meets a Nebari ship whose crew practice mind manipulation and control,
they were responsible for the destruction of the Zelbinion and they bring aboard
the prisoner "Chiana" played by Gigi Edgley and Durka the peacekeeper commander.
The episode marks the debut of Gigi playing the irrepressable Chiana, a wonderful
character.
Commentary track for Jeremiah Crichton
Monday, 13 February 2012
Sunday, 12 February 2012
Farscape Marathon Part 2
Farscape Marathon
Season 1 Part 2
Thank God It's Friday, Again
D'Argo in a hyper rage seeks John on the planet Moya is orbiting, concerned John
goes looking for him and discovers he has like totally mellowed out and is content
to work in the fields of this argicultural world.
However all is not as it seems and despite being told tomorrow is a rest day that
day never comes. This was another of the early episodes I watched which put me off
the series, Rygel and his exploding urine really didn't work.
The discovery of the wrecked Zelbinion the Peacekeep flagship raises questions
on who could have defeated it in battle but Moya isn't alone. We also get flashbacks
of Rygel's time on the ship when he was first kidnapped and tortured.
Alyssa-Jane Cook plays Gilina the tech girl.
Crichton runs into a mage who offers to solve his problem with Crais however this mage
has his own agenda and bringing the two enemies together to make peace is not his endgame.
DNA Mad Scientist
A scietist who speciliases in genetic based research provides the crew with the locations
of their homeworlds in return of DNA samples but the key to the deal is an arm from Pilot.
Rygel, D'Argo and Zhann attack Pilot reasoning that since he will regenerate then he has
no right to refuse to aid them. A rather brutal episode with unethical research on sentient
beings as well as the crew turning on each other.
D'Argo has a minor mishap while exporing the most inaccesible parts of Moya
but it starts a chain of events which has Moya putting the health of the crew in
jeopardy as she uses her energy for another purpose.
I'd forgotten how quickly this part of the Farscape was introduced, the beginning
of something quite wonderful.
Extras
Two episodes have commentaries with DNA Mad Scientist having two seperate tracks
one from in front of the camera the other behind.
Saturday, 11 February 2012
My Farscape Marathon (Part 1)
Farscape Marathon
Season 1 Part 1
Ben Browder - John Crichton
Claudia Black - Aeryn Sun
Anthony Simcoe - Ka D'Argo
Jonathan Hardy - Rygel (voice)
Virginia Hey - Pa'u Zotoh Zhaan
Lani Tupu - Crais / Pilot (voice)
I own the original DVD's (mixture of R1 and R2) but for the price and features
not to mention the bump (albeit within the limits of PAL SD masters) in picture
quality I decided to buy the Blu-ray boxset as a christmas treat. The price had
recently dropped so that took a lot of the sting out of it so here are my
re-watch thoughts as I go along.
Premiere
The series kicks off with John Crichton a scientist and astronaut
who is testing his theory of propulsion which exploits gravitational
forces. Whilst in orbit he his dragged into a wormhole and ejected
somewhere in the universe and finds himself surrounded by beings and
wonders he could never have imagined.
A Peacekeeper device on Moya has activated and to mask the signal
the ship buries itself in a huge swamp on a nearby world. The crew
search locally for an element which can heap Moya and John finds
himself being the first alien contact for mother and son.
A strange dust cloud in space seems to be benign but an entity enters
Moya intent on exploiting the ships energy to create heat in which
to expand it's life cycle. A fun episode in which we get multiple copies
of the crew and Rygel gets to play diplomat.
Rygel's arrogance makes him the target for some kinappers who ransom
the rich and powerful back to their ships/people but since Moya has no
money (only food cubes) the future doesn't look too promising.
This was an episode which nearly turned me off Farscape when I first
watched it, the puppets, weak fight sequence and simply not
understanding the show had me reaching for the remote.
The rescue of a research vessel had Dargo falling in love with it's female
occupant and fully committed to helping her and the scientist to reach
their destination. Things start to unwind when John is hit by an energy
burst on the alien ship and experiences jumps in the timeline revealing
all is not what it seems.
A very clever episode and underlined how good the graphic houses were in
creating some beautiful CGI on a tight budget.
All five episodes have commentaries the highlight of which is Ben Browder
and Claudia Black on the "Throne For A Loss" episode, they are very very
funny together.
Monday, 6 February 2012
Sunday, 5 February 2012
A snowy weeked.
wasn't a big frost overnight which would have left the roads
and pavements treacherous.
I have to start preparing to drive to work, the hardest
bit is getting over the incline and ridge of the pavement
given that you can't really have a run up to it:)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)