OT - Good sci fi TV shows?

[DavidG]

IMO if you want good Sci-Fi forget the TV, get a book or even better, a magazine like Analog

[gregebowman]

Originally posted by Ragnarok:

quote:

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Taken - Never seen it

I must comment on this one. I would strongly recommend seeing this miniseries. It was a awesome show and very well written. What do you expect from Spielburge though. It was only 5 or 6 shows but everyone of them were great.

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I just didn't have time or opportunity to watch the mini-series. I'll just wait for it to come out on DVD.

Now for some of my favorite shows, I can't believe no has mentioned Britain's contribution to sci-fi shows. Let's not forget a little show called Doctor Who, which has run longer than all of the Star Trek shows put together. And there's also Red Dwarf. Now who says the Brits don't have a sense of humor? This has to be one of the funniest shows of all time, and it's sci-fi.

Of all of the sci-fi shows I can remember seeing, either in prime time or once they were in re-runs, here's what I would call my best

1. Star Trek
2. St: TNG
3. Voyager
4. DS9
5. Enterprise
6. 6 Million Dollar Man
7. Dr. Who
8. Red Dwarf
9. The Time Tunnel
10. Star Blazers

Some of these shows may have started out slow, like ST: TNG, but got better as they went along, and some others started out good and then devolved, like the 6 Million Dollar Man.

Most of the modern shows that are on Sci-fi channel I just don't get the chance to watch, so I can't rate them. Or they're on Showtime, which I don't get.

[javaslinger]

What's that god awful series wehre people crash land on some planet. There some kind of underground race there called diggers?

It's a recent show.

It's kind of strange when you think about it just how many relatively new Sci-fi shows there have been. And so few any good. I think the networks are giving up on them so it's hard to get the money to put together a good one.

On another genre and speaking of british shows, I just saw a comedy series called Blacks Books or something. Funny as ****!

On the comedy channel one night but can't find it anymore.

Ken

[orev_saara]

Well, Farscape was the best show on television, but I'm afraid you missed the boat on that one. So did a lot of people, which was the problem really. Produced by Jim Henson's creature company, the show had outstanding production values. The stuff didn't have that sleek, expensive look you expect from any recent ST shows, but it was very imaginative. Picture "The Dark Crystal" as a sci-fi TV show.

Sadly, Farscape was too good for it's own good. It had strong plot development throughout the entire four-year run, and intricate character arcs. So anyone who hadn't been watching couldn't just jump in and have any idea what was going on. And since Sci-Fi, like any good network, doesn't care as much about the quality of a show as the quantity of its viewers, it got cancelled. Sometimes I blame Stargate, but that's just petty, I know.

I can't believe, though, that several people have rated the best sci-fi of all time and forgotten the best TV show ever, "The Prisoner"! This show was great! Psychological philosophy disguised as entertainment! And darned entertaining too! If any of you haven't seen the show in its entirety, I command you to rent it or buy it immediately and go mend!

[Omega_Prime]

I not only have the complete Prisoner series on tape, but several McGuin interviews and the Gurps Prisoner RGP.

I don't think of it as sci-fi though. You never know if it is a dream, aliens, his government, another government. Instead of a sci-fi mythos, it builds psychological tension using fantasy/action elements, sometimes in the guise of science. I think that is a different animal, but it is one of my all-time Favorites.

Battlestar Galactica was canceled not because of a lack of interest, or return on capital invested, but because George Lucas kept suing the production.

He claimed he owned "capsule shaped laser fire", sound in space, the design for the viper, etc, etc. He litigated one of the best Sci-fi series ever, off the air.

He is a hack at best, and the best of the Star Wars universe was written by other people than himself. Jealous of real talent, he went after Galactica with every tool at his disposal.

I wish him well on his new project. To make himself look like a Death-Star. It is coming along nicely. Soon he will not be able to leave his own home, and will spend his days playing his level 60 necro on EverQuest.

[ February 13, 2003, 05:00: Message edited by: Omega_Prime ]

[Grandpa Kim]

Originally posted by DavidG:
IMO if you want good Sci-Fi forget the TV, get a book or even better, a magazine like Analog

Absolutely!! Hollywood is at least 50 years behind what is being written for book publication. Do you think anyone in Hollywood has the guts to produce "Stranger in a Strange Land" for the motion picture audience? And that was published in 1962!

Kim

[Cheeze]

Maybe I'm getting my shows mixed up, but Taken was a 10-episode miniseries. It had its good points, but with a great deal of interesting build-up and mystery I felt kind of disappointed by the wrap-up and ending. It seemed to fall short.

I had a similar reaction to the conclusion of Babylon 5's Shadow wars saga. Not necessarily the entire series, but that significant part ended on an odd and somewhat underwhelming note. And much as I liked the show, the story seemed to lose punch without that focus, but it did find interesting ways to recover. Much as I liked the 'rangers' concept, you didn't think that one human would have pointed out that the name of this elite covert Minbari group came from an ancient Earth novel? I might have liked that better if they were named the Rangers by some humans and had kept some other Minbari name.

Stargate becomes more enjoyable the more I watch it, and Farscape is awesome....but some of those wacky episodes from the previous new episode release Last year were far out there. I was lucky, I caught up with Farscape during a two-week period where they seemed to play every most-exciting and pivotal episode, so I think I caught up on the action just as they went into a new season. And I still have some season 1 stuff I'm sure I haven't seen yet.

Andromeda is fun, but a little too silly sometimes. I'll keep watching it. Earth: Final Conflict had me hooked, but somewhere in the end of the Taelons I just didn't keep up. Enterprise is one of the few shows I consistently watch.

I can't get enough of the Star Treks, although I miss much of Voyager. As much criticism as Roddenberry's vision gets, I rather like the idea that in the future we haven't just progressed in technology but that humanity has become better. That kind of optimism is rare in entertainment and current sci-fi, and it is refreshing.