Farscape 1-01: Premiere - Part 1

Episode:

1

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Writer:

Rockne S. O'Bannon

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Director:

Andrew Prowse

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Air Date:

19-Mar-1999

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm writing about Premiere, the first episode of cult 90s sci-fi series Farscape! That's 'late 90s' by the way, not 'early 90s'; late enough for them to have deliberately given it a unique name so that the series would be only thing that comes up if you do an internet search. It was originally going to be called Space Chase, but thankfully they swerved away from that at the last moment.

Farscape first aired in 1999, back when Deep Space Nine and Voyager were still defining space sci-fi, Stargate SG-1 was starting out and Babylon 5 had just finished. Trek was losing its shine at this point and there was a feeling that space opera fans were tired of well-trained military crews following orders on starship bridges and wanted a bit more... anarchy. And muppets I guess?

The series was produced by Hallmark and The Jim Henson Company, so it belongs to the same family as Fraggle Rock and The Dark Crystal. The puppeteered aliens actually put a few people off at the time, probably still does, even though everyone loves puppet Yoda in the Star Wars movies. I'm trying to dig into my memories to excavate my own first reaction to learning about the series, but I'm not getting much. I think I saw a review or a preview in a magazine next to a photo from a series about Vikings and assumed it was going to take place in a mead hall or something.

I do remember liking the series, but I only watched it the once and that was years ago, so who knows what I'll think about it now. Maybe it's horrifically dated now. Perhaps it's been utterly surpassed by its successor/clone Guardians of the Galaxy. I'm hyped to find out if it can still hold my attention.

There will be SPOILERS below for exactly half an episode, no others. I'll be going through Premiere scene by scene, recapping and sharing my thoughts along the way, so this will kind of be like a commentary track. Except you can't put it on in the background while you get other things done. All the screencaps will be from my PAL DVD, but you're not missing much as the Blu-rays aren't particularly HD either. Seems like the original 35mm footage was lost and they weren't keen on spending the cash to recreate all the CGI visual effects in a higher resolution anyway. It's a bit of a tragedy, considering that even Babylon 5 eventually got a HD release.

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The epic space saga begins with a man wearing a shirt covered in octopuses, sitting on a convertible, staring right into the sun. That's a space shuttle over there, so chances are that he's looking at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It's just as likely that this was actually filmed down in Australia, along with the rest of the series.

Also the Space Shuttles were in operation between 1981 and 2011, so that narrows down when the scene takes place.

It cuts to a page with the incredibly eye-catching headline "Childhood Friends out to prove a Theory".

You'd hope that the guy writing the teaser to the very first episode of a new TV show would know how to write a better hook than this, but I'm sure they were too busy with the actual script to also write on all the props. Especially considering how much text is on this thing. This doesn't look like Lorem Ipsum, it looks like whoever did this has written a whole damn article for this shot. Or maybe just a bit of an article that they've copied and pasted a few times, I dunno.

The episode was written by series creator Rockne S. O'Bannon, who also wrote the Alien Nation movie plus episodes of Revolution, Evil and the 80s Twilight Zone. He also created the shows SeaQuest DSV and Defiance. I'm not sure if this is a good sign or not, as I haven't seen Defiance and I don't remember anything about SeaQuest. Well, except for the dolphin and that holographic face.

The scene reveals that the guy from the car and the article photo has got a space suit on now, and is in a very white room undergoing final checks by experts with white jumpsuits and lanyards. Lots of white in here. One tries to listen with a stethoscope but the guy's too preoccupied with what his Childhood Friend is saying and walks off mid-examination.

Seems like everything's fine though. Well, meteorology's apparently detected some 'hiccup' but it's nothing to worry about. Probably. The astronaut's still worried about something however, and not even his friend reading exposition straight from the magazine can cheer him up. "Can a manned spacecraft overcome atmospheric friction and exponentially increase speed using only a planet's natural gravitational pull?" is the question they're setting out to answer here. Spacecraft have been doing gravity assist slingshots since 1959, so I guess the big deal here is that they're doing it while still in the atmosphere. Which raises the question 'Why?'

The astronaut confides in his friend DK that he feels like something big is about to happen. Then someone else walks into the room and gives the protagonist a name: Commander Kryten.

Actually I'm fairly sure I knew his name was Crichton even back when I first watched this. Though I probably didn't suspect he might be named after Jurassic Park author John Michael Crichton.

Turns out that the guy on the left is Crichton's dad and the two have a conversation while walking down a white hallway in their extremely white building on the way to the Space Shuttle.

It's revealed that Crichton broke quarantine last night due to the 'rattlers in his stomach', even though he's been up in the Shuttle twice already. His dad's a Shuttle mission veteran as well and he reveals that he had the same fear when he first went EVA... and when he walked on the moon. So his dad's got some serious astronaut cred and Crichton feels like he can't be his kind of hero. They're really packing these scenes with everything you need to know about the protagonist. Also lots of foreshadowing that he's going to be doing some proper heroism soon.

The scene ends with his dad giving him a good luck charm that he got from Yuri Gagarin: a ring on a chain. The plan is for Crichton to give it back to him when he returns later tonight, but we already know there's no chance that's going to happen. I mean if it did there'd be no series.

Then we get what looks like stock footage of the shuttle taking off, with the name "Collaroy" superimposed on the side. It looks very fuzzy, but you can't get more realistic than actual reality I suppose!

Collaroy's a beach in Sydney, which shows that they've started to get a bit more international with the Shuttle names in the Farscape universe. Part of the reason for that is that this isn't a NASA mission. It's being run by an organisation called IASA that was invented for the series. The good thing about inventing your own space agency is that you don't have to make an arrangement with an actual space agency to use their logos or give them scripts to look over.

Okay that's definitely CGI now. These really aren't terrible effects for TV, especially in 1999. This aired six months after Babylon 5 ended and two and a half years before Enterprise, to put it in context.

The shuttle reaches orbit and we get a voice over by a woman addressing the press, explaining that Commander John Crichton will pilot a smaller craft of his own design which is parked inside the shuttle. It's a shame really that they called the episode Premiere instead of Pilot, as then it could've joined the exclusive group of series with a pilot called Pilot that actually has a pilot in it, like Lost, Agents of SHIELD, Space: Above and Beyond etc.

We never get to see the press, but we do get to see the Farscape 1 module launch from the Shuttle's cargo bay. The voice over claims that this will be the first concrete step towards interstellar travel, though that seems like a bit of a leap. We haven't even landed anyone on another planet yet and they're aiming to slingshot people to other star systems? It's a nice looking craft by the way, looks very NASA, very legit.

Mission control at Cape Canaveral looks a bit small though. Seems like all their set budget went on ring binders.

Crichton fires up Farscape 1's engine and blasts off, the module heating up from all the atmospheric friction. I think the music's trying to sound dramatic here, but I can barely make it out and what I can hear isn't really helping. I guess the composer was told to make something that sounds 'sci-fi' and they assumed that meant lots of sci-fi noises.

Just then DK calls the module to give Crichton some concerning news: he's approaching some kind of electromagnetic wave. I'm no physicist, but it seems like the kind that'll either freeze him until the 25th century, give him superpowers, or send him hurtling into the Delta Quadrant. Mission control loses contact with him as he enters a wormhole and vanishes, and we get a brief shot of the people Crichton's leaving behind, just to confirm that the Earth didn't get destroyed or anything.

It's a really nice looking wormhole though. By the time Farscape debuted Deep Space Nine and Stargate had already made wormhole travel feel routine, but the series really stepped up to bring the spectacle. It looks like it's tunnelling through water, in a good way.

Farscape 1 emerges among asteroids, with the Earth nowhere in sight. This is a bad sign, as if you're in a modern day spacecraft and you can't see the Earth, you likely ain't ever getting back to it. Fortunately he's also found himself surrounded by alien space fighters! No seriously, he's won the lottery here, as teleporting across space and arriving right next to people with spaceships is some incredible good fortune. Yuri Gagarin's luck charm is really working.

And that's the end of the seven minute long teaser. Man, I can't wait to find out where he ends up after this and what kind of strange alien creatures he'll meet!

And then the opening credits start and reveal the hero ship and the whole damn cast, so that's ruined that mystery. At least they didn't include Crichton's usual voice over as that would've been even more spoilery.

The series regulars include two human-looking characters, two actors in makeup, and two puppets. You don't usually get humans outnumbered by aliens like this in a sci-fi series, because humans are more relatable and considerably cheaper, but Henson is a little more puppet-focused than most production companies. Their aliens look great as well so I can understand why they were eager to show them off.

Plus despite what I've said about the music so far, I have to admit that I like the theme. It's got exactly the right kind of alien tone to suit the show and an acceptable amount of sci-fi noises.

ACT ONE

Act one begins with those alien space fighters flying right past the Farscape 1 module, basically just ignoring it. In fact they're so indifferent to its presence that one actually flies into it, clipping the wing and spinning off to collide with an asteroid. The module is bright white, how the hell did the pilot not see it?

We get a nice shot of Farscape 1's RCS thrusters firing as Crichton stabilises his module and he soon gets a clear view at what all the flying around is about.

The space fighters are doing strafing runs on this massive spaceship, swooping by with guns blazing then flying around to take another pass. Personally I'd just turn the engines off and park my fighter next to the thing, it's not like it's firing back. Then again Crichton's just drifting by and the ship grabs him with an invisible tractor beam, so maybe it's wiser to keep moving.

A door opens in the side and Crichton's module is pulled into the belly of the massive space whale.

Then we get a look at the inside, which is just as bronze as the outside and surprisingly hollow. I guess when you design a ship like this you always have to make sure there's enough room to fit the Millennium Falcon in the docking bay. There's no way Star Wars would ever do a crossover in a million years, with anything that's not made of LEGO... but you can dream.

Crichton's a smart guy so he remembers to lower the landing gear just before touching down. He also keeps the canopy closed instead of making assumptions about the atmosphere out there.

His landing goes very well, until a Roomba with eyes starts peering in through the window and everything in the module starts bursting into fire for some reason that I've never figured out. He extinguishes the fire and ejects the canopy so he's not breathing smoke, inadvertently launching the poor thing across the room.

The squeaky little bug robot emerges from under the canopy with a broken eye stalk, clearly not happy about how it's day has been going, while its friend sneaks up on Crichton and shoots him with a gun. Robots in sci-fi can be hit and miss, especially if they're cute little beepy ones, but I like these ones.

Turns out that Crichton is unharmed. They just wanted his cooperation as they herd him to the ship's bridge.
 

I wonder if that's a screen or a window.

Here we meet two of the people from the opening credits. A blue woman (played by the actress who played 'Warrior Woman' in Mad Max 2) and an alien Warrior Man. Crichton's definitely not in Kansas anymore... I guess the I in IASA stands for 'isekai'.

This is Crichton's first contact with aliens and he has an appropriate "Oh shit" look on his face. Especially when they notice him and the Klingon in red comes over to pick him up by the throat. Trouble is he's speaking 'alien', so Crichton can't understand a word he's saying to him.

Fortunately one of the robots knows what to do, and injects some red stuff right through Crichton's boot. The two aliens carry on talking to him and he finds he can understand what the blue woman says. She's suggesting that he answers her friend's questions quickly, as he knows how Luxans can be. (He doesn't).

Crichton does at least learn that they grabbed his ship deliberately. They saw him appear from nowhere and they could really do with disappearing in a hurry right now. They want that wormhole tech. But Crichton doesn't respond and the Luxan throws him aside so that he can get back to the urgent task of not dying in a space battle.

The Luxan contacts a massive awesome-looking puppet called Pilot, which we get a nice good look at. For some reason I remembered that Pilot only appeared on a holographic clamshell communicator until later in the series but I am clearly wrong about that. You know what isn't called Pilot? This episode.

Pilot can't do a whole lot of piloting at the moment though as their ship, Moya, has a control collar on that's preventing them from manoeuvring. I guess the only thing that's under manual control right now is the 'grab space modules and drag them on board' function.

So the Luxan switches to plan B: ripping cables out of a console. Pilot tells him that these cables have got nothing to do with the collar, but he carries on ripping them out anyway under the assumption that if he keeps digging he'll have to find the right one eventually. This is very different to how Scotty carried out maintenance on the Enterprise.

Just then another puppet flies in on his hover chair. Turns out he's checked all the cell levels on the ship and they're the only people aboard. Crichton puts two and two together and figures out that the aliens are actually escaped prisoners! Surprise, he's on Con Air.

They're moments away from destruction now and things seem bleak.

But then it turns out that the Luxan's wire pulling has actually gotten the job done, as bolts fly out of the control collar like missiles and it falls to pieces. They can finally move!

I'm guessing each of those white dots is a window and there's none along the centre line of the ship, so I'm thinking that the bridge has a giant viewscreen instead of a window. Really I have no idea though.

We get a beautiful shot of Pilot's lair here, revealing that the ship has been designed with the same 'narrow walkways over chasms with no railings' philosophy that you see in Star Wars.

The Luxan tells Pilot to engage 'starburst', mentioning that it's the only defensive manoeuvre that Moya's capable of. This is a ship with no guns and no shields, which was rare for TV sci-fi at the time. Though you did have ships like Red Dwarf and the Bebop I suppose.

A voice on the radio commands all the prowler fighters to terminate their assault, but one of them seems to ignore the order. They're too late though, as Moya's already ready to starburst.

I love the starburst effect, with all of Moya's lines lighting up as a wave of blue energy travels through it to open up a portal at the front. It's pretty unique FTL effect... though the end result is pretty familiar. They've disappeared through a hole in space, just like Crichton did when he fell into that wormhole. So I guess they didn't need to drag his module on board after all!

The episode takes a break from Crichton and his new friends for a moment to check in with what's happening back at the fleet. Seems like there's nothing unique about Moya, they've got lots of other ships like her here, each with an indeterminate number of non-escaped prisoners aboard.

It's hard to get an idea of the scale of this Command Carrier compared to the other ships. I've read that it's three times the size of Moya and that it's about 1500 meters long (just a little shorter than a Star Destroyer), but I don't actually know for sure. All I know is that I never liked those rings sticking out of the side.

The guy who was on the radio to the prowlers earlier arrives on the Command Carrier's bridge and it turns out that they've got a harsh red and black colour scheme going on, which is a bit of a contrast to Moya's cosy brown look.

Also these guys look entirely human! It raises the question of whether Crichton jumped in time as well as space.

A lieutenant addresses the man as Captain Crais and explains that one of the escaped prisoners, a Hynerian royal, got the key code to the cells and let everyone else out. She also reports that were casualties during the escape, but Crais doesn't give a damn about them... until he discovers that one of them was his brother. His prowler was lost due to a collision with a mysterious white ship, and a second prowler was lost in Moya's starburst.

I've been staring at this room trying to figure out what it looks so cheap and scruffy to me, and I think it's mainly the grating on the floor that's doing it. The consoles all facing random angles isn't helping though.

Also the reverse shot of the front of the bridge really doesn't work for me. I thought it was supposed to look like the tapered cockpit of the Millennium Falcon at first, until I noticed the tiny person and realised that it's actually a long cylinder.

Anyway it turns out that Crais' motivation in this episode is going to be his desire to get revenge for his brother... who was a pilot. That's three important pilots now in this episode not called Pilot!

Moya emerges from starburst, along with the prowler that got dragged in with them. The prisoners decide to pull it aboard, I guess because they just love collecting spaceships.

Here's a good shot of blue woman and the Worf, showing how extensive and elaborate their makeup is. The guy's got hair and tentacles all over the place, like a cross between a squid and a Viking. Even his voice is fake, as the actor's pitching it much deeper than he usually talks. It's amazing watching behind the scenes clips and hearing Anthony Simcoe talk normally in all that makeup because his normal voice and personality does not match the look at all.

He becomes very slightly less alien after the first three episodes however, as the actor decided that the green contact lenses were a bit too much. Plus he accidentally got the alcohol used to remove his makeup in his eyes and burned his corneas, so that didn't help.

Here's that holograph clam communicator I mentioned earlier. Wow, this is the first time I've ever noticed it's connected to a spinal column. That's kind of weird.

The good news is that they've escaped and no one's following them! The bad news is that they have no idea where they are right now.

It's at this point that the puppet spits on Crichton

I don't think I'll ever figure out why he gets spat on here, except to make things more confusing for him. He doesn't have long to think about it though as the Luxan knocks him out with his tranquilliser tongue.

With the protagonist having a nap, the alien fugitives have time to have a chat amongst themselves and it turns out that they don't even know each other's names yet.

We learn that the blue woman is Pa'u Zotoh Zhaan and the Luxan is Ka D'Argo, so now I finally get to call them by their names. She's a Delvian priest, and D'Argo's heard that they're into sex. He's a bit flustered about the turn the conversation's taken though, and her increasing proximity, so he tries to stutter out a question about why she was arrested.

Turns out that she was the leading anarchist on her world, so that's pretty impressive. All he did to get imprisoned was kill his commanding officer. We also learn that he's 30 cycles old, which is apparently pretty young for his species. He's definitely much younger than she is; he's only seen two battle campaigns! The topic soon switches to their time in prison and how they saw people suffering there while the Peacekeepers did nothing, so we're definitely being led to sympathise with these guys over their pursuers.

Crichton wakes up naked in a cell, to find the puppet pressing buttons outside. He asks why they took off his clothes and the puppet explains that he's Rygel XVI, Dominar to over 600 billion people, so he doesn't have to tell him!

For a moment I thought that's really all we were going to get, but then he relents and tells him that they were examining him to see what he is. You know what aliens are like when it comes to abductions and probing. At least they cleaned all that spit off his face.

Then we get more well-integrated exposition, with Rygel explaining that his cousin stole his throne, and that Crichton can understand them now because he was injected with translator microbes: Farscape's equivalent of the babel fish (or the universal translator).

Rygel here isn't just a latex rubber muppet with a puppeteer's hand up his ass, there's actually a complicated mechanism in that tiny head filled with remote controlled servo mechanisms to allow him to move his eyes and express himself. It took a team of four or so people to bring the expensive animatronic to life, plus the voice actor, but it was all worth it I reckon. The dude's at least as real as Yoda or Jabba the Hutt.

Rygel also draws Crichton's attention to the Peacekeeper prowler pilot unconscious in a spacesuit on the other side of the cell. So that's the fourth and final important pilot in this story. You know how many premieres have been in the episode so far? Zero! The really should've called the episode Pilots.

I suppose there was no need to strip this one naked as the prisoners are already well aware of what a Peacekeeper is. There are some great costumes in this episode and this particular costume looks very practical as well. It's funny how the futuristic space fighter pilot gets a sealed spacesuit and the astronaut from a primitive planet flying a prototype space module doesn't, but I guess if a Peacekeeper ejects there's an actual chance someone will be able to rescue them.

The Peacekeeper pilot takes off the helmet to reveal that she's a human-looking woman, and a relieved Crichton goes over to say hi.

A few seconds later Crichton finds himself kicked around and pinned to the floor. Seems that the pilot's taken real offence to the way he's not in uniform and she demands to know his name and rank. I bet he really misses Earth right now. No one spat on him or kicked him back on Earth!

Here's a question though: what would've happened here if he had been a Peacekeeper and he outranked her? Here's another question: what's going to happen here? I'm halfway through the episode now and I've already hit my self-imposed screencap limit so I'm going to have to find out next time.

TO BE CONTINUED IN PART TWO

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NEXT EPISODE

Next on Sci-Fi Adventures, it's the second half of Premiere!

Will Crichton and the mysterious Peacekeeper pilot team up with the escaped prisoners and go on space adventures? The opening credits have already spoiled that they will, but have a spoilery thumbnail as well.

Please consider leaving a comment if you have anything you want to say about the first 23 minutes of Farscape!