WEEK ONE

After some moderate difficulties in obtaining my DVD’s from Amazon, and some other not so moderate difficulties involving me having no time to actually do this because of classes and teaching and grading papers and such, it’s finally time. I don’t think that I could ever adequately convey the quality of my excitement. I think Lindsay came close when she said the prospect of these DVDs made her feel “like a kid on Christmas,” but I’m not even gonna try. I just wanna get this thing going before I start puking from joy.

Before you click on through, make sure you visit The Archives for ground rules and such, and make sure you bookmark that page. And now . . . Farscape! In which we meet John Crichton and some aliens from far, far away . . .

1X01 — “PREMIERE”

John Crichton looks out at the ocean. He is preparing for the biggest adventure of his life, but he doesn’t know it yet. He just thinks he’s going up into space, following his father’s footsteps. He tells his partner, D.K., that he has a funny feeling, like the feeling you get before graduation. Something big’s gonna happen. Commander Jack Crichton, John’s father, comes to wish him farewell, gives him a good luck charm: a puzzle ring, that was given to him by Yuri Gagarin. Then John Crichton, IASA astronaut, is launched into space. He is preparing to test his own theory: that by using Earth’s gravitational pull, he can slingshot around the planet “in a craft of his own making.” The idea behind this is to increase speeds to such a degree that this experiment will ultimately be known as the first steps of interstellar travel. But something goes wrong. Crichton loses control of his ship and is sling-shotted through a newly formed wormhole to a very strange place.

Almost as soon as he gets there, he’s causing trouble. He accidentally hits a strange ship with his Farscape-1 module, killing its occupant. He’s then pulled aboard another strange ship, this time a very large one shaped kind of like a giant tadpole. He exits his module; he is very freaked out. A strange and small yellow robot with pinchers knocks him out. I’m going to stop saying “strange” now because everything is going to be strange for our hero from here on out. He comes to in another room, where two aliens appear to be commanding the ship and firing on other ships. They speak in garbles, until he’s injected with translator microbes and is able to understand what they’re saying. The bald blue alien woman and the scary man with tentacles on his face are both very angry and violent. John soon learns they’re escaped prisoners — along with a small green alien named Rygel, who is apparently some sort of exiled Emperor — and that they’ve taken over the ship that was imprisoning them. A giant puppet alien named “Pilot” controls the ship, and we’ll learn soon, that he’s symbiotically attached to her. Yes, her: the ship is alive and her name is Moya. Moya, a Leviathan, uses her only defensive capability to help them escape. It’s called Starburst, and it’s not a candy. They WHOOSH away in a burst of light.

Over on the Peacekeeper ship — the Peacekeepers being the humanoid-type army that was holding Moya and the three prisoners — Commander Bialar Crais learns that his brother has been killed by Crichton’s ship. He’s pretty pissed, especially when he sees Crichton’s face. Back on Moya, tentacled alien knocks Crichton out with his tongue and then they lock him up. We soon learn that tentacles is named Ka D’Argo, and that he’s a Luxan warrior. Bluey is called Pa’u Zotah Zhaan, and she’s a Delvian priest. This seems to interest D’Argo very much; he’s heard some pretty pervy things, it seems. The third prisoner is Dominar Rygel XVI, deposed and formerly of Hyneria (an aquatic planet). Meanwhile, Crichton wakes up naked in a cell and is informed that he isn’t to be trusted, “any more than we can trust that.” Meaning, the Peacekeeper sharing Crichton’s cell, and who was pulled in along with Crichton before they Starburst. Her name is Aeryn Sun, and she kicks the shit out of Crichton. He thought she was human, but she’s not. She’s a Peacekeeper, which is a group, and is Sebacean by race.

While Zhaan, Rygel, and D’Argo are acquiring supplies, John and Aeryn “escape.” Aeryn wants to turn the prisoners in, but John begs her to have compassion, a sentiment she isn’t familiar with. Once the Peacekeepers arrive, however, they classify Crichton as a threat. Crais is so blinded by anger at his brother’s death that he won’t listen to reason, and when Aeryn attempts to defend Crichton, she is classified as “irreversibly contaminated.” She then has a choice: return with the Peacekeepers, mostly likely to be condemned to death, or leave with Crichton and D’Argo, and become an outlaw from her own kind. She chooses exile. Crais swears revenge on them both. They escape using Crichton’s slingshot theory, and this time it works, and the episode ends with Crichton addressing his father, hoping that someday they’ll meet again. So that’s it, there’s our crew. Destination: the Uncharted Territories. Will they ever get home? Where is home?

Trivia

• In the original script, Zhaan was called “Pa’u Zotah Zenn.”
• John Crichton was originally written as a NASA astronaut, but by the time the pilot aired,  he was part of the “IASA.” NASA decided to distance itself from the production.
• The scene showing DK and Jack trying to contact the module after it enters the wormhole was a late addition to the edit of the episode. The purpose was for viewers to realize that the earth was not destroyed when Crichton left.
• In the scene where Zhaan is meditating naked in her quarters, she is chanting the same mantra she uses throughout the series.
• This is the only episode where the voice over was not used during the intro credits.

Metaphorically Speaking

“Premiere,” I think, remains one of the best television pilots I’ve ever seen. Certainly it’s not perfect, but it does such a good job setting up the world, the characters, and the themes that will run throughout the rest of the series, that any minor flaws it does have can be easily overlooked. Unlike a lot of science fiction, Farscape is an emotionally driven character set-piece, in which the science often takes a backseat to the fiction. In fact, most of this show is just ridiculously unbelievable, so you should just shake any thoughts of realism out of your head. That’s not what this show is about.

Right from the beginning, when we first see Crichton, we can tell what kind of show Farscape wants to be. John Crichton is an astronaut, like his father before him, and he has some issues with that. Watching these scenes, it becomes apparent to me that even before he goes up in space billions of miles away from earth, he’s kinda lost. Browder never once lets his smile get to his eyes. “I can’t be your kind of hero,” he says to his father, whose shoes he’s having trouble filling. “No, you can’t be,” says Papa Crichton, “But each man gets a chance to be his own kind of hero.” Mission statement! One of the things I love about Farscape is its willingness to admit that in the grand scheme of things, humanity as an idea is very, very small. We are a small planet in a vast universe, in which none of the habitants have even heard of us. We are small people with small ideas, who have yet to even step past the borders of our own solar system. So John’s journey in all of this is to find who he is in the larger picture. At this point in the show, he’s still talking to Canaveral, to his father, and he’ll do that for a while because that’s home for him. He doesn’t know anything else. Dude is lost in space with a bunch of potentially dangerous, criminal, and hostile aliens.

His shipmates are a different story. I love that they are escaped prisoners, and I love that all of them are assholes. D’Argo has anger issues, Zhaan has an ego, and Rygel is the most selfish creature to have ever existed. The great thing, though, is how their crimes and villainy — murder, anarchy, despotism — overshadow their species, so yes the divisions and lack of trust have a lot to do with race, but it also has a lot to do with issues that cross any sort of racial barrier. We are all criminals. Which brings me to Officer Aeryn Sun, formerly of the Peacekeepers. She is a soldier, duty born and duty bred, and she has had all human feeling trained out of her. One of my favorite scenes in the episode is when Crichton has to teach her about compassion; she doesn’t even have a word for it, but she knows the feeling: “I hate it,” she says, because it gets in the way. It doesn’t make sense. So when John tells her in that pivotal scene, “You can be more,” it’s not only a challenge to her as a character and what she might become, but to the show as a whole. It’s such a good beginning.

The other thing is trust. Right from the very beginning, no one trusts anyone else. They are all companions out of necessity, and they are all alone in their heads. And of course they don’t trust anyone; they’ve been prisoners, they’ve been locked up, which I’m sure does wonders for one’s interpersonal skills. They’ve all learned to rely on exactly one person: themselves. Everyone, that is, except for John. John is alone because he has yet to find common ground with these people who have all lived in this universe since birth. He has no basis for his experiences, at least not yet, until he figures out, well . . . I’ll leave that one for later. Suffice it to say that Crichton is an optimist aboard a ship full of pessimists. I also love the early “relationship” between Crichton and Aeryn. When he first sees her in the cell, he believes her to be human and a look of relief passes over his face, until she kicks him to the floor and he learns she is just as alien as the blue one, or the tentacled one, or the one on the hovercraft. Aeryn makes the same mistake about Crichton, treating him differently than the others simply because he looks like her, but this is less a bonding moment for her, and more of a we familiar/superior beings must stick together kind of thing. The Peacekeepers are basically NAZIs, except without the genocide. Moreover, Aeryn thinks in terms of allegiances, not relationships. There is a perverse sense of satisfaction on Claudia Black’s face in the last scene between Aeryn and Crichton, as she tells John he’s in for a world of shit. She’s still a Peacekeeper at heart; she’d be back there in an instant if she could.

Trash Bin

The music of Farscape was never its strong suit, but the “music” in the pilot is just laughably bad. And I’m not talking about that wonderfully weird theme song (which I love), just the interstitial stuff.  The puppetry and prosthetic make-up of the main characters Rygel and D’Argo is still a work in progress this early in the season, but it’s by no means bad. The make-up artists and puppeteers simply hadn’t settled on a concrete “look” yet. The writing (and everything else about the show) is still being tinkered with, but all the makings of greatness are there, and besides the problematics of Crichton being a “scientist,” I have nothing to complain about.

1X02 — “I, E.T.”

There is an extremely high-pitched alarm going off on Moya that makes John go a little crazy, but it just pisses the others off. Turns out that the alarm is coming from a Peacekeeper broadcast, and was triggered by the removal of the control collar. Through her skin, Moya is broadcasting a signal to every Peacekeeper within range, and Moya will soon be found. Before they can even worry about turning the signal off, first they have to muffle it. Crichton has the first of many stupidly brilliant ideas, saying that they should use the water of the nearby planet to muffle the signal. After some argument about whether or not Moya — a space creature– will be able to survive the landing, the crew agrees, and Moya lands in not water, but mud on a planet that resembles Earth. Meanwhile, Crichton looks like a crazy mofo with his eye-twitch. They have to hurry about their business; the gravity and weight of Moya’s own mass is crushing her.

After landing, they determine that Rygel is the only one small enough to get into the space and turn off the pulse beacon, but he’s too freaked out by the mud to be of any use. “Get someone else to do your dirty work.” Pilot interrupts, telling them that the beacon is situated on top of Moya’s primary neural nexus, an extremely sensitive area. Removal of the beacon will cause her severe pain. Crichton convinces Aeryn to help he and D’Argo find a numbing agent called clorium for Moya down on the planet. When native inhabitants show up, Aeryn and D’Argo provide a distraction while Crichton goes off alone in search of the element. He comes across a farm that reminds him a lot of Earth, and a kid finds him, one who resembles a human, but looks a little freaky in the face. The kid has never met an alien before, an alien being our friend “John.” Neither expected each other to be so familiar looking. Crichton quickly befriends the boy, whose name is Fostro. Fostro freaks out when he sees the clorium indicator, though, and Crichton ends up paralyzed on the floor (giving us our first really good Crichton-freak-out scene — he does those so well). Fostro’s mother, Linnaea, is an amateur UFO tracker or something, so she had been aware of Moya’s presence, but wasn’t sure of her nature. Crichton pleads with her, saying they mean no harm, and it freaks her out that the alien is so much like her.

Back on Moya, Zhaan convinces Rygel to help remove the beacon, and they have to start without the others due to Moya’s condition. Zhaan says she will help alleviate Moya’s pain using her priestly superpowers. Meanwhile, D’Argo and Aeryn are stuck up a tree waiting for Crichton, and arguing enjoyably (for us, not them). On Moya, Zhaan and Rygel start the removal, Rygel using D’Argo’s penis knife. Moya, Zhaan, and Pilot are soon overcome with pain and Rygel has to soldier on alone.  Aeryn returns to the ship mid-crisis and Rygel has a freak-out, biting Aeryn like a vicious piranha. He eventually agrees to continue, and Zhaan and Aeryn have a little bonding time. Aeryn couldn’t give a shit, but Zhaan is coming to understand her better. On the planet, the local military has captured D’Argo, who has come looking for Crichton. Fostro and Crichton manage to rescue him and head back to the ship, but not before Crichton charms his way into their hearts forever. Once the pulse beacon is removed by a triumphant Rygel, Moya pulls out of the muddy morass and heads back to the stars, leaving Fostro and Linnaea down on their cruddy little rock. Aeryn asks Crichton sarcastically whether he’ll miss “that rock,” and he replies, no, “Not that rock.”

Trivia

• This episode was broadcast out of order during Farscape’s first run – it is actually the second episode of the season, hence the odd conflictions in character continuity during this episode if watched at a later stage – references to the control collar from “Premiere,” Aeryn yearning for Peacekeepers, and little functionality between the crew.
• Series creator Rockne O’Bannon admits that while the episode suffered in execution because it was filmed so early in the series, he stands by the script since it keeps John down-to-earth and serves as a touchstone for the writers for all the episodes that follow.
• Aeryn says “crap” instead of “dren,” one of the few times “Earth words” are unintentionally spoken by non-human characters within the series. However, “crap” is said again–this time intentionally–by both Crichton and Aeryn in Peacekeeper Wars when Moya crash lands onto Qujaga.
• The first of six Forbidden Cargoes for Leviathans is identified here: Clorium, which numbs Leviathans. Zhaan says it’s a fairly common element, being an atmospheric-induced isotope of ‘trillium.’ But we can just call it ’salt.’

Metaphorically Speaking

This is the perfect second episode, why they aired it as number seven is beyond me. “I, E.T.” is, fittingly, a reverse E.T. story. It’s perfect as the second episode because a) the crew are still getting to know one another, and the crisis on Moya acts as a kind of catalyst for change, and b) Crichton realizes, really and truly, his place in regards to the rest of the universe. They drop into a culture very like Earth’s, and one which has also not left its planet. They are “earth”-bound. But this time, Crichton is the alien, so of course the obvious thing to observe here is that Crichton is learning to see himself in relation to others, and that other species feel the same way tht humans feel about themselves. They thought they were alone in the universe, and now they know they’re not. But it’s also that by having this encounter, by being able to see a reflection of himself in the form of Linnaea and Fostro, that he can really understand how far he’s come in such a short time, and how lucky he is to be able to explore it. He’s ready to stop thinking about the universe by his old standards and reevaluate his core beliefs. He tells Linnaea that he knows she must be feeling that “a zillion of your facts about religion and science are wrong, or at least suspect,” and that he knows he wasn’t what she was expecting. And it’s clear when we see Linnaea being left behind on the ground and she’s looking up at the stars, that in gaining the knowledge of alien life, she’s also lost something. She, too wants to be up in the sky. She’s wanted to be up there her whole life, so even though Crichton is far from home and he may never get back, he is lucky for the opportunities that are open to him and that he didn’t have before.

In this episode, we also get the first sense of a couple of things, the first of which being the other Moyans’ contempt or underestimation of Crichton as an evolved being. They view him as primitive and kind of backward in both technology and intelligence. The conversation between Aeryn and D’Argo up in the tree is pretty revealing. D’Argo holds John in contempt. He certainly acknowledges that John isn’t not useful, but in comparison to himself and Aeryn, definitely inferior. It’s kind of a weird bonding moment between Aeryn and D’Argo, an acknowledgment that they’re both warriors — albeit ones from very different cultures — and John is FAR from a warrior. This is also Rygel and Zhaan’s episode as much as it is Crichton’s. In the face of crisis, Rygel feels useless. He doesn’t know how to cope with pain or do things for himself, let alone others. He’s had servants to do everything for him; even in jail he didn’t have to worry about doing things. But Zhaan bucks up his courage, showing him a compassion that only a saint or a blue alien could muster up — and he lives up to her expectations. It’s one of my favorite moments from early season one, when Rygel shouts out “I did it! I did it!” after fixing Moya, and then proceeds to eat part of her cure. Just goes to show you that even with progress, people can’t shake off their basic natures, and Rygel’s basic nature is self-serving and greedy.

This episode is also indicative of something else. Each crew member has certain aptitudes. Aeryn and D’Argo are warriors; Zhaan is spiritual and a healer; Rygel a leader, but more importantly, he represents the body, the baser instincts of the group. Crichton’s ultimate use is not yet clear, but he does show an aptitude for finding solutions, and he has a certain technological know-how that comes with not caring about social status (Aeryn and D’Argo both scorn the Peacekeeper tech as menial). I also think it’s pretty apparent that Crichton understands things. Lastly, get used to those outfits. The crew change clothes about once a season, but they never really change their color scheme, and for good reason. Now that I think about it, it’s kind of symbolic. Zhaan is always blue, a healing color. D’Argo, red: a warrior. Aeryn, black. Rygel, green. And John is white (for now). Go nuts with that one.

Trash Bin

Fostro and Linnaea shouldn’t be able to understand Crichton. They don’t have translator microbes. The little kid who plays Fostro is kind of a bad actor; they could have done better. I also think the last act of the episode suffers a little from lack of sophistication. Endings and such are something the show will become exceedingly good at, but as previously stated in regards to “Premiere,” they’re still working out the kinks.

As a point of interest, I went to see Planet 51 over the weekend solely because it reminded me of this episode. Basically, they have the same plot, and the astronaut in that movie looks exactly like John Crichton. Unfortunately, while not horrible, the movie in no way lived up to my expectations. I hate when animated films think making references to pop culture or other films is a suitable replacement for originality and genuine emotion. Anyway, I bet you a hundred bucks somebody working on that that film was a Farscape fan.

- – -

Crichtonisms

• “You fart helium?!”
• “Boy, was Spielberg ever wrong. Close Encounters, my ass.”
• “It feels like it’s melting my brain. It couldn’t actually be doing something to my brain, could it?”
• “Well if she can’t, she can’t. And we can stick our heads between our legs and kiss our asses goodbye.”
• “Hey! Does this bother you? Because it bugs the crap out of me. So can we go? Before we become a permanent tourist attraction in this bog, and my eye falls out?!”
• “It’s kind of like Louisiana. Or Dagobah.”

PuppetWatch!

• Rygel XVI: His hairy ears and his moustache, and how he’s so small! I love the greedy little bastard.
• Pilot: Personally, Pilot is my very favorite puppet on the show, including all the various guest puppets. I love his big dish shaped head.
• DRDs: Can we consider these puppets?
• The scary merchant puppet from “Premiere” had way too many teeth and like five mouths. Pretty awesome puppet, though.

- – -

“Crackers Don’t Matter!” (Miscellaneous Thoughts):

• A Farscape Glossary: arn=hour, cycle=year. A metra is a measure of distance; a hetch is a measure of speed. DRD stands for Diagnostic Repair Droid. IASA is most likely an acronym for “International Aeronautics & Space Administration.”
• Interstellar swearing: hezmana=hell.
• Zhaan says, “I am nothing if not a product of my upbringing.” Show philosophy!
• “I must have come here through a wormhole. The only way I’m gonna get home is through a wormhole. That means I have to either find one or make one. Yeah right.”
• “I know that feeling. I hate it.”
• “He claims to be a human, from a planet called ‘Urp.’”
• “And there’s life out here, Dad. Weird, amazing, psychotic life. And uh, in Technicolor.”
• Crichton messes with Aeryn, telling her that Yoda is real. “Who’s Yoda?” “Little green guy. Trains warriors.” “Oh.”
• D’Argo kind of looks like a duck when he’s roaring.
• Crichton’s throwaway line about militaries rarely being compassionate and understanding is pretty key to the central thematics of the show.
• Aeryn’s eyebrows are crazy out of control. I read an interview with Claudia Black a few months back in which she talked about her evolving appearance on the show. She cringes when she watches early episodes of herself, but I think her unkempt appearance and lack of vanity is very fitting for the character.

- – -

Classic Moments in Farscape, #1

[Crichton, Aeryn, and D'Argo are in the midst of escaping Peacekeeper custody.]
Crichton: [holding a weapon on the Peacekeeper guards, speaks to D'Argo] Can you get me away from here?
D’Argo: What?
Crichton: Can you get me off this rock? Away from these over-amped rent-a-cops? Away from Crais. [nodding at Aeryn] And we take her, too.
D’Argo: What? Never! I will take you. You are a man and she . . .
Crichton: [interrupting] If she stays . . . we all stay.
[Crichton hands D'Argo the blaster and releases him from his cuffs, and then moves to do the same for Aeryn. She flinches away.]
Aeryn: No! I will not come with you.
Crichton: You’ve been irreversibly contaminated, remember?
D’Argo: It means death.
Aeryn: [earnestly] It is my duty, my breeding. Since birth, it’s what I am.
Crichton: You can be more.

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Coming up on the Farscape Rewatch: “Exodus From Genesis,” “Throne For a Loss”

It’s always nice to be surprised by people – in a good way, not a bad way!

I remember sitting on a log with a Sales Director from Greene King on a course discussing one of his junior members of staff. He had seen a whole new side to him during an outdoor training course and it had made him reconsider his future potential with the company.

In reality how often do we get to see our colleagues and team members outside work? We might see them singing out of tune at the Christmas karaoke party after a few too many mulled wines but do we see them in an environment where they can excel?

With such fierce competition in the workplace it’s not always easy to spot someone’s hidden depths whilst still at work. You get a good feel for how they operate; whether they hit their targets; whether they communicate effectively. But you don’t always get to see specific skills such as conflict resolution, inspirational leadership, project management etc. Sometimes it requires a step away from the norm for talent to emerge.

A recession is a great time to invest in talent identification and training. If you can find the hidden gems amongst your team – those people with bags of potential, lots of energy and a creative approach to work – and then invest in them, they will stay with you because you have shown your commitment to them. And they are the ones who will drive your company forward and out of recession.

But don’t just rely on your impressions in the workplace. Think creatively about how you can get staff away from the office and performing so that you can see their true talent and potential emerge.

By Ruth Moody

John Crichton: “I can’t be your kind of hero.”

Crichton Snr.:  “No, you can’t.  But each man gets to be his own kind of hero.”

It is this exchange in the first episode that could be used to describe the difference between these two science fiction TV series.  That difference is down to the difference between the main characters.  They are their own kind of hero, though truly, only one of them is heroic.

Mal Reynolds captains the Serenity in “Firefly”. He is a part time smuggler whose character seems lifted completely from Han Solo.

John Crichton is an American astronaut who enters a different part of space through a wormhole.  He lands close to the Moya and joins its crew of outsiders.

As I’ve hinted, I believe the main difference between the two is the character of the hero of each story.  I use the term hero for “main character” in this case.  The problem, of course, is that only one is heroic.

Reynolds is the very definition of a self-centred person.  His actions and words demonstrate this throughout.  His first concern in every situation is himself.  There are certainly numerous times that he does the right thing, but each occurrence simply coincides with Reynolds looking out for number one.  If your well-being helps him, then he’s your hero.  If not, sorry.

Crichton arrives in a generally immoral environment.  He refuses to let it compromise his morals.  He knows what’s right and he risks his safety and standing to defend it.  He abhors random violence.  He rejects bigotry.  If you need someone to help you, this is your guy.

I stopped watching Firefly after four or five episodes because its hero had nothing to offer me.  I love Han Solo as much as the next guy, but Solo changed in his hero’s journey.  He learned to care for others and rely on others.  I’m watching Farscape on Netflix and I’m in for the long haul.  Every episode has a lesson, not just snark.

Today is a monumental occasion, my friends. Today, after not one but two, massively expensive previous failures on this front, Farscape is being released on DVD at an affordable, normal price, and my copy shipped yesterday afternoon at 4:00 PM. I’ve been lucky enough for the past six years to live in a town with a video store that has every DVD you could ever, ever possibly want, so when I wanted to watch Farscape, I could. But you, my friends, you have not been so lucky . . . until now. As of today, Farscape is easily accessible on DVD in every major retail store near you (and on iTunes), and you have no more excuses. Do you know what this means? It’s Farscape Rewatch time!

This is how it’s going to work: you’re going to go out sometime this week to your local Blockbuster, Target, or Amazon.com, or you’re gonna get on your Netflix . . . and you are going to acquire Farscape on DVD. You are going to do this for me, because you love me, just as I am doing this for you because I love you. I want you to know what I know. Because we are friends, and friends give each other presents. Here is what I want to give you. I want to give you even more friends: hot ones, funny ones, creepy ones, puppet ones. I want to show you my #1 TV Boyfriend, and the love of his life. I want to give you to the best executed romance to ever air on television (not the first time I’ve said that, won’t be the last). I want to give you some damn fine science fiction, and even better, some damn fine storytelling. I want to give you lots of other things, too, but this will have to do for now.

After you have acquired your DVD’s, here’s what you’re going to do: You’re going to sit down in front of your TV or your laptop or whatever platform you people use to watch your DVDs, and you’re going to watch the first two episodes of the first season (“Premiere,” “I, E.T.”). Then you’re going to come back here a week from today and we’re going to start ourselves a rewatch. If you’ve never participated in a rewatch before, here’s your chance. You get to experience (or re-experience) a great television show with a whole big whopping community of viewers. You get to talk to each other, to complain, to laugh. You will automatically have a ton of friends to cry with when shit hits the fan, and I promise when we get to the end, you won’t be sorry. Just bring your brains and your typin’ fingers, and the rest’ll be easy.

To the Farscape Noobs (I’m talking to you): If you’re feeling doubtful, or if you’re not thinking about doing this and just feeling like giving me the big middle finger, I want you to think long and hard. Do I not have impeccable taste? Have I ever led you wrong? Ask the many, many, many, many people I have forced to watch my DVDs over the years. I am a one-woman TV proselytizer, and you should listen to me. Two episodes a week for a year is not a big commitment (and you can even go faster if you like — that’s what she said).

And finally, to all the Scapers reading this: tell everyone you know, this is the place to be on the internet right now. I’m making a declaration. It’ll be almost like it’s 1999 and Farscape is premiering all over again. It’s gonna be awesome. Well? What are you waiting for? Lock up your women and hide the fried chicken! It’s Farscape time.

[UPDATE: I've been informed that Netflix is currently streaming the first three seasons, so you don't even have to wait for the discs, if you don't want to!]

Do you ever get frustrated that you’ve told someone how to do something and then they ask you how to do it again the next time?

It’s easy to lose patience with people when you feel that you’re investing time in training them or sharing knowledge with them only to find that it’s gone in one ear and out the other.

I’m incredibly impatient.  And I’m also pretty good at remembering things.  This doesn’t make a great combination because I measure people against myself and then get frustrated when they don’t meet my standards.

I was reminded today about the Ebbinghaus Curve of Forgetting.  It highlights how most people forget most of what you tell them in as little as an hour.  It’s no wonder therefore that instructions and information and knowledge, however interesting and creatively delivered, will often be forgotten.

Once I’d remembered about Ebbinghaus I felt my frustration levels come down.  This nugget is useful in so many areas of life – when training staff; when giving instructions; when marketing a concept.  For your message to last you need to find innovative and creative ways to repeat that message so that it is reinforced and remembered.

And my learning point?  To remember that people naturally forget and then forgive!

By Ruth Moody

It’s really easy to focus on the things we’re not good at and forget the things we’re great at. I’m very upfront about my weaknesses – I’m extremely impatient, I don’t suffer fools gladly, I can be over-emotional and I’m very judgmental. On the flip side of the coin I very rarely tell people about my strengths – somehow it feels like I’m being conceited or arrogant.

Yet actually if we’re to get the best from people, we need a balanced view. In my company we’ve adopted a system of ‘above expectation’ and ‘below expectation’. This means that as a matter of course we talk about the good things and the bad things. And actually I think it works.

The best example I’ve ever seen of this is in Beyond Boundaries. My business partner Ken Hames led these televised expeditions, which saw him work alongside people with disability crossing some of the most remote and hostile terrain in the world. And what made them successful was an open and honest approach and a willingness to discuss each other’s function. Within days of working together they knew exactly what they could and couldn’t do and they weren’t scared to discuss it. They celebrated each other’s achievements and strengths and they were almost brutal about each other’s weaknesses.

This focus on people’s ability, not disability was liberating and it made the disabilities so much easier to deal with. Whether a disability is physical, skill specific, emotional or attitudinal, focusing on abilities can make it much easier to address the negatives. And if we reinforce people’s strengths they’re far more likely to excel because their confidence will grow, which in turn will allow them to deal with the weaknesses.

By Ruth Moody

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0187636/

Maybe it’s just the nerd in me, but every once in a while I get a huge craving for something so Sci-Fi that it should make non-nerds brains melt. And this time I stuck with Farscape. I remember a long time ago I watched an episode or two while it was actually on the air still and all I could think of at the time was “Wow, this is almost too Sci-Fi.” But here I am watching it again and loving every little bit of it.

Now when I went into this, I knew that it had puppets. What I forgot was that Jim Henson was responsible for the puppets. You know the Muppets guy? Ya if you think he is only good for kids things, then sir, you are dead wrong. His puppets actually make you think that these are living creatures and that they could actually exist in this universe. On top of that it doesn’t ever make you go, “Bah! Look at the outdated CG crap of a character!” It will always seem real which is awesome!

Now the story is way to massive to cover in a single blog entry, so I will leave that part out. But let’s just say that it was actually hard to get into. That’s because like the human character in the story, John Crichton, he has a hard time adapting to his new environment. So in a way it’s like you are struggling with him to get a grasp on this new world. But once he gets used to it, the series takes off and it never lets go. I actually have had a hard time trying to put it down and even now that I am done with the first season, I want to start the next one. Now you don’t have to see each episode in order, but I do recommend it as this series constantly references past episodes. It is often overlooked in almost every other series.

The other thing that threw me off for a while was the fact that the ship they are on, Moira is actually a living creature. That’s right a ship that’s alive. Now the twist is that it never really hits you until the ship gets pregnant. I’m not kidding, the thing that they rely on to carry them throughout space gets knocked up. It adds a lot to the series and after a while you stop thinking of it as a ship, and more as a character in the series. Genius.

I really can’t think of anything bad t say about this series. It’s fantastic from about the half-way point on. Really the worst thing about it is that you have to suffer through the first half of the series before you get really sucked into it.

All in all, if you are like me and your Sci-Fi urge goes off like crazy, this is what you use to calm it down with. Well this or Star Trek, but I was looking for something out of the ordinary this time, and I was beyond completely satisfied. You know, kinda like when you go to a massage parlor because your back hurts, and the next thing you know, you get a happy ending without even asking for one … and they also forgot to charge you for it.

Base Score = 9
+1 for massive Sci-Fi geek out
+1 for Jim Henson
-1 for slow beginning
+1 for amazing story
+1 for a living ship
= 12/10
Now like Being John Malkovich the highest score I can give is a 10, because this is based on scores from 1-10, so with that in mind.
=10/10

In a recent meeting with a Director of a large insurance company we started discussing relationships and sales.  It was interesting that he felt his sales people, whilst good at closing the deal, often didn’t have the long term in mind.  His description of a stereotypical sales person was someone who would always go for the quick win.

It struck me that good sales people hit targets but great sales people build long term relationships.  If I had a menu of skills to choose from to create the ideal sales person, they would be tenacious, able to build trust, create openness and know how to communicate with lots of different types of people.

If everyone approached a new prospect as being a potential relationship rather than a potential sale, the long term gains would be far greater than the short term payout.  If sales people could prioritise creating trust and not trying to sell, they’d be amazed how quickly they would start to see sales opportunities coming to them.

Our sales training focuses on the soft skills of building relationships.  And the nice thing is it means that people who have never considered themselves to be good at ‘selling’ come away feeling that they can be successful if they take a gentler approach.  I’ve also come across an innovative product called EssentiaMail (http://www.essentiamail.com) which offers a great way of building relationships with customers and prospects so that when they are ready to buy, they come to you.

So my tip for successful selling is to help your sales people to recognise the importance of making business friends because if people trust you, they’ll want to buy from you.  And if you prove worthy of their trust they’ll keep buying from you and not your competitors.

By Ruth Moody

My first experience of true leadership was up a mountain.  On paper I’d led before – as a team leader in an office.  Looking back I was being a manager – managing a team and a process.  Leadership is a skill that’s much harder to quantify and to learn.  Leadership is about inspiring people to follow you, even if the way ahead isn’t clear – and they only follow you if they trust you and if you trust them.

I led my first expedition to Kenya.  The expedition had been going well – the odd loose camel incident, but nothing really to worry about.  We even reached the summit of Mount Kenya with minimal drama – some mild altitude sickness but not a lot else.  So when one of the team collapsed half way down and everyone looked to me – I panicked.

The detail of how we got down the mountain is not important.  We eventually got to a mountain hut where we could call for help through a combination of carrying and supporting.  It was here that I learnt my first lesson.  Another expedition leader told me that I couldn’t do it on my own because I would eventually fall over.  As a leader I had metaphorically (and physically) tried to carry everyone on my back.   Even as a leader we have to know when to ask for help and when to be a follower.  If you show this kind of trust in your team and ask for their help, it’s amazing who steps up to offer support.  Showing vulnerability is not a weakness – it’s a strength.

As soon as I realised this, I asked for help – and I got it in spades.  And a few other leaders emerged that night.

I recommend that any leader who is serious about being the best they can be should step out of their comfort zone.  It might not be up a mountain, or in a jungle but if you’re willing to expose yourself and your strengths and weaknesses, you’ll be far better equipped to deal with any leadership challenge that comes your way.

By Ruth Moody

Now some people might be surprised that I use Sex and the City as inspiration for workshops; however I think that there are some great lessons to be learnt from Carrie, Miranda, Samantha and Charlotte.

Stress impacts us all and depending on our makeup, some will feel it more than others.  However we all make different thinking errors from time to time, which impact on how stressed we feel.  The trap I fall into constantly is “I should, I must, I can’t” – basically setting unrealistic standards for myself.  “I should be able to cope with this.  I must do this better.  I can’t handle this”.  In the words of Carrie – “Why are we should-ing all over ourselves?”

One of the main things that hold people back from reaching their potential is these thinking errors, which lead them to believe that they aren’t good enough.  Whether it’s magnifying problems, predicting future failures or discounting positive feedback, we are all our own worst enemies.

I’ve learnt now to combat stressful situations by challenging my own thinking errors.  If I’m faced with a difficult situation to handle the first thing that I do is take a deep breath and say to myself “I’ll handle it”.  If I find myself saying that I ‘should’ do something, I challenge myself.  If I find myself predicting failure, I challenge myself and instead start to imagine success.

The mind is a powerful tool and it has to be trained and used properly.  It’s worth putting the time into training yourself if you want to enjoy success without too much stress.  And if you’re thinking that it isn’t possible then you’re already back into your old habits of predicting failure!  See how easy it is to sabotage yourself?  Good luck!

By Ruth Moody

I’m a big Hugh Laurie fan ever since Chris introduced me to Jeeves and Wooster. I’m not much of a House fan, the drama behind the drama is tedious and I never could learn to like any of the supporting cast other than, no wait, no exceptions there. And the hallucinated blonde is just annoying. Farscape pulled that off, House did not. The chronic pain theme on the other hand is interesting. Living with any chronic pain condition is a challenge. I can be a little condescending when it comes to pain, when you hurt it always feels as if nobody else can quite grasp how much pain you’re in, but it’s a knee-jerk response that’s really just an attempt to justify why you’re allowed to do less than you think you ought to. Spending my time watching the world go by annoys me. I feel guilty.

I keep thinking that it’s a temporary state of being, that things will change, get a little better or I’ll get better enough at dealing so that it doesn’t take up almost all my time, but I’m still waiting for it to happen. For now, I’m reassured by justification. There’s enough things serious wrong with me that I couldn’t do more even though I want to, I try to tell myself. I don’t really believe it; I still think that there’s always a way to make life work regardless. People have written books by blinking after all, what makes me so special that I can’t persevere a little more?  It’s difficult watching something like House and not feel guilty for not trying harder, until I remind myself that it’s fiction. It’s also rather easy to watch and be mesmerized. Hugh Laurie does pain rather well and living in constant pain is an issue that pulls me back in with its familiarity. It’s not a fun world to live in.

I struggle to deal with it well. Some days are easier than others, but even the easy days are still rather difficult. Everything requires boat loads of effort and I start to feel a little lost in the fog. Pain can be overwhelming and it makes my life particularly unpredictable and me rather unreliable. It seems like a flimsy excuse to say ‘I can’t, my head hurts, I can’t my wrist hurts, I can’t, my ankle hurts’. I think about the darker times, like lying on a hospital gurney with a hand clasp tightly over my fentanyl patch thinking that maybe pressing harder will make my skin absorb the drugs a little faster, but it didn’t help. Nothing helps. But life doesn’t stop because I hurt and that’s the part of House that I enjoy watching the most. Despite the small details of addiction and a little insanity, House copes with pain rather well. I’m a fan of the humour and season six of House is fun again. I hope it stays that way. I’d really prefer not to go back to Stargate Universe.

Sat Navs and Tom Toms are my worst nightmare. If someone gives me verbal instructions I zone out so when Tommy speaks, I panic about where exactly I should be turning. I feel similarly about lots of information in lists – I often describe it as ‘panic looking at a train timetable’. Give me a good old fashioned map and I feel much more relaxed. Firstly I can see what the turning looks like and what landmarks I’ll pass before I get there. Secondly I’ve got ownership of which direction I’m travelling in!

So all of this means that I’m a visual person (and perhaps a bit of a control freak!). Yet how often do we think in these terms in the workplace? Information is so often given out through verbal instructions or emails. What about those people who don’t learn by listening and who need to draw something for it to make sense? It takes very little time to adapt our behaviours to the people around us. With a little bit of time and thought we could get far more from our colleagues and team by communicating with them in a way that works for them. It takes practice and it requires commitment.

So – next time you’re delegating a task, try thinking about how you’re communicating. Find out how people in your team like to learn and then match your style to them rather than expecting them to match to you. You’ll be amazed how much for effective you will become.

Top tips:

• People who are visual respond to language like “Can you see what I mean”. “What does that look like?”
• People who are auditory respond to language like “How does that sound?” “What did you hear?”
• People who are kinaesthetic respond to language like “How does that feel?”

By Ruth Moody

Claudia Black is a badass. Ben Browder is okay too.

While I am ecstatic that the entire series of Farscape, season for season the best sci-fi series of all time (just ask Kanye West), will be out in a new DVD box set this November, I’m a bit upset. I spent over $400 collecting the four seasons individually, including season 1 which was out of print for so long. Currently, my collection of Farscape takes up two whole shelves in my DVD collection.  This new sleek box set looks like it will take up less than a quarter of that. Awesome, and yet upsetting.

Still, it doesn’t answer the biggest question on most scapers’ minds. It’s beer o’clock, where are my Farscape webisodes? I am hoping that the re-release of the series on DVD is just a way of building interest in the return of the series. So, I’m going to buy the new set and I hope other scapers will too. Huge DVD sales could translate into another series, or maybe a feature film, like Serenity.

This photo reminds of a story told in the early millenium show, Farscape, regarding a dog with two bones. Fortunately for the egret in this picture, one fish was not a reflection, and did not have to let go of the real one in order to chase the illusion.

The Egret with Two Fish
27 August 2009
Cranberry Marsh, Westhampton Beach, NY

With a much talked about name change, the Sci-Fi channel, now SyFy, transformed itself from a caterpillar into another, different looking caterpillar on the night that Warehouse 13 debuted back in July. Better people than me have discussed the pointlessness and silly rhetoric accompanying this transformation ad nauseum, so I won’t take the discussion further. What I do want to talk about is the future of the channel and how they might really effect the changes they were hoping to make with that new name.

I think Julia Louis-Dreyfus said it best at the Emmys last Sunday: “Welcome to the last official year of network television broadcasting.” She was joking, of course, but the sentiment rings true. Once upon a time, the Big Four were in charge. If it wasn’t on ABC, NBC, CBS, or FOX, it wasn’t worth watching. And then came HBO, the fabled provider of censor-free television, which of course critics heaped praises upon because it was something! different! HBO television is a rant for another day, but it’s important to note that that’s when it all started. Soon other networks joined the fray, Showtime of course is responsible for that bastion of military science fiction, Stargate SG-1, which debuted in 1997. Prior to all of this, the only science fiction show to ever air on a cable network was the fabulously successful Star Trek: The Next Generation, also the only science fiction ever show to be nominated for Best Drama Series. It all snowballed from there.

Nowadays, thanks to DVD, DVR, and the internet, viewers are just as likely to watch a cable TV show as a Big Four one (Five, if you count the CW/WB or UPN, which nobody really does). What’s more, as was the lesson learned from Sex and the City and The Sopranos, smaller network means less restrictions on content (if not budget), which, funnily enough, leads to better quality (for the most part).

In 1998, the SyFy (then Sci-Fi) channel had its first successful original series in the short-lived Sliders, which only ran for two seasons, and which was quickly overshadowed by the Henson Company’s Australian puppet sado-masochism space opera, Farscape, in 1999. The critically heralded Farscape ran for four seasons when a contracted fifth season, which would have wrapped up all story-lines, was unceremoniously interrupted by the show’s cancellation, which nobody saw coming. Despite losing it’s first successful original series, the network didn’t suffer much, having rescued sci-fi juggernaut, Stargate SG-1 from the Showtime graveyard. In 2003, the channel made the somewhat controversial decision to fund the re-imagining of the classic (if cheesy) ’80s TV show, Battlestar Galactica. Hardcore fans threw a shit fit, but the gambit paid off. The re-imagined Battlestar Galactica quickly became a critical success, garnering the prestigious Peabody Award in its first season, and officially stamping the Cylon and “frak” into pop culture. While Battlestar Galactica was busy pushing boundaries and taking names, Sci-Fi had brought several new series to light, all of them successful, including: Stargate Atlantis, Eureka, Doctor Who (first-run until the rights were bought up by BBC America), and most recently, Sanctuary. Firefly even got a second birth on the channel in 2005 in honor of the release of Serenity, and the network has a constant stream of revenue from endless re-runs of The X-Files, Lost, and other classic sci-fi shows like Star Trek and The Twilight Zone.

It seems that since the imminent expiration of Battlestar Galactica, Syfy as a network — with the exception of Stargate Universe, which is really a sure bet with the franchise’s built-in fanbase — is playing it safe with shows that are quirky and fun and a little bit off, but that are in no way able to supply for that hardcore sci-fi need that some of us feel. Eureka is a quirky little show that isn’t so much science fiction as it is fantasy and comedy, and even the Jane Espenson led Warehouse 13, while being a bit darker, is still just a bit of fun. This is to be expected, and there’s certainly nothing wrong with a little fluff every now and then, especially in summer. But unless we’re counting Stargate Universe — which might very well deliver on this front, only time will tell — there is a distinct lack of anything resembling “hard-core” science fiction, let alone space operas, on any channel on television right now.

In July, David Howe, the President of SyFy spoke with io9 about the promise of a new space opera to replace the holes left by Farscape and Battlestar Galactica. Howe acknowledged that the cancelling of Farscape was a mistake, and cites Firefly as something he’s looking to emulate. (And he’s not the only one, she screams, pointing out the irony.) The prospect of a new space opera to sink my teeth into makes me drool, but only if it’s done right. FOX has said that it is in the works for a Firefly rip-off, but it’s seven years too late. SyFy needs to be thinking about the future right now. Sci-Fi/SyFy has always excelled in giving small shows a chance, whether they be groundbreakingly excellent like Battlestar Galactica or small homespun pieces like Eureka. Instead of trying to distance itself from its image — which was never the problem — SyFy should be focusing on producing high quality television programs, quality shows on all ends of the spectrum. With the highest ratings ever on the channel, they have done just that with Warehouse 13.

Warehouse 13’s pilot, which besides having the dubious honor of heralding the new SyFy era, broke the ratings record that was previously held by Stargate Atlantis’s pilot, “Rising” in 2004, and then went on to break the record previously held by Eureka, to become the most watched original series in the channel’s history. So just what exactly is this show doing right? Well, everything really.

Eddie McClintock (Bones’s Sully), C.C.H. Pounder, sci-fi veteran and character actor Saul Rubinek, and newcomers Joanne Kelly and Allison Scagliotti, populate the fictional top secret warehouse, led by writers Jane Espenson and Brent Mote. So you have two answers right there: top notch character acting, and top-notch writing. Certainly the idea of government conspiracies and paranormal wonders is not a new one, but Warehouse 13 doesn’t claim it is. Instead, the show plays on those who have come before. McClintock’s and Kelly’s characters, reluctant Secret Service partners Myka Bering and Pete Lattimer, have distinct traces of Mulder and Scully in them, but only a little. Bering and Lattimer have their own distinct, charming and smart-ass voices. And where The X-Files was there to scare, Warehouse 13 is there to titillate and intrigue. Like Bones, but with weird mystical science. The Artifacts that are stored in the Warehouse can be dangerous, sure, but the whole thing is just too fun to ever really scare me.

But perhaps the smartest thing about Warehouse 13 is that it’s not done cooking. The first nine episodes of its first season were spent developing the world that these characters will be populating for hopefully quite some time. As Myka and Pete were becoming acclimated to each other and the idea that they aren’t just Secret Service agents anymore, we as viewers are developing an emotional base from which to jump off of so that when series (?) villain MacPherson was introduced, we had something to lose. The brilliance of this strategy is that it allowed new viewers to come in every week and viewers who’d been watching since the pilot to ease their way in with silly storylines and humorous character bonding, and with that out of the way, Warehouse 13 is pretty much free to do anything it wants. I can’t predict where the show is going in future seasons. Hell, I can’t even tell you whether or not that character [SPOILER!] who “died” in the finale is really dead or not. So, if SyFy is smart, it’ll keep this show around for a good long time and allow it and its writers and characters to grow into the premise. When a show is executed this well (not perfectly, mind you, but there’s always something to be said for care and consideration), you can never anticipate where it will end up. If SyFy keeps giving us shows as well made as this, and like Eureka, with heart, it’s in good shape for the future.

On the Friday before Warehouse 13 aired its season finale, Eureka ended The Longest Season of Television Ever™. A lot can be said of the thinking behind SyFy’s proclivity towards splitting show seasons into halves (i.e. Battlestar Galactica 2.0, 2.5, 4.0, 4.5, etc.). Season Three of the town of crazy geniuses who live in Oregon and cause lots of trouble while charming, aired its first episode in Summer 2008, and especially considering that there were only eighteen episodes in the season, that’s a really long time. Season One remains the strongest season to date of this show, but that doesn’t seem to matter (to me, or to anyone really), because we come back for the characters and the atmosphere. In a lot of ways, Eureka doesn’t even really need plots — and those are pretty implausible most of the time anyway — as long as we have those characters to love. Regardless, Season Three was fragmented, and not just by time and space. The first half, aired back in 2008, was relatively tight-knit, focusing on a single major story-line and culminating in a couple of startling revelations, but with those revelations came change-ups to the beloved formula. The departure of a main cast member and the pregnancy of another gave Season 3.5 a choppy feeling that made it feel more like a transition than an actual story.

That’s not to say that I didn’t enjoy this season, because I did. Jaime Ray Newman was a breath of fresh air, finally letting our beloved Sheriff see some action other than the violent kind, and his daughter, Zoe, seemed to come into her own. Mostly, I’m excited to see where this ends up. I’d like to see Taggart back full time, and I hope that Zoe will be back, because she is an integral part of the show, but the thing I most want to see is pay-off from that damn Season One finale. Carter needs to discover what he lost when Henry messed with the timeline. There is so much potential in all of those revelations. I mean, think how Alison will feel knowing that it was supposed to be Carter’s baby she was having, not Stark’s! If they never come back to that story, honestly, I will feel incredibly cheated.

As for fall SyFy programming, there is much potential. Caprica, the gorgeously rendered Battlestar Galactica spin-off looks very promising, although to be honest I’m not sure it’s going to be really be my thing. Mafia/Crime Lord/Terrorist stories have never really done it for me. I mean, I hate The Sopranos, so that should give you some clue (no, I mean it, I really really hate that show), and I fell asleep during The Godfather and never finished it. On the plus side for you noobs, you don’t even need to have seen Battlestar Galactica in order to watch it. But, Caprica doesn’t start until January 22, 2010, for newer fare we look to Sanctuary. Like Warehouse 13, Sanctuary has incredible potential. Unfortunately, unless some major re-hauling was done over the summer, I have a feeling that potential will not be realized. I have more detailed thoughts on that show here, but suffice it to say that I have my fingers crossed. The SyFy show that I have the most hope for, even over Caprica, is Stargate Universe. I will be writing more about this after the premiere on Friday night, but if that show can overcome its previous limitations, then we might be in for a real treat.