Search and Destroy the previous generation of sci-fi tv shows (Farscape, Lexx, Andromeda, StarGate SG1, Babylon 5, Space Precinct, various Star Trek shows and more)

I'd like to see a series set at starfleet command concerned with political machinations, house of cards style. An outwardly utopian culty org like the Feds are gonna have a seedy underbelly rife with greed and corruption.

That's basically what DS9 grew to be, although not to the level of venal self-interested levels that are common in today's political dramas.

I chuckled when Section 31 got a nod in Into Darkness

This probably isn't a fair criticism but whenever I watched Deadwood intermittently without knowing the backstory I still found it brilliant and fascinating.
But whenever I watch modern Battlestar Gallactica in the same manner it's a complete slog. I've watched over half the show out of order with my sister (who loves it, she has watched it all many times). I guess sometimes some things really do need to be seen from the start; but not finding it at all enjoyable makes me sure I'll probably never watch it from the start.

Nicki Clyne is super gorgeous though. Seems she hasn't been on film or tv for 4 years.

I asked my friend who watches all this stuff and he recommended "Dominion".

xp she's great "subbing" for Neko Case in "The Laws Have Changed" video

Not certain your friend has a great grasp of 'previous' there. Or 'sci-fi' for that matter.

I suppose I'm going to be the only stan for this show: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space:_Above_and_Beyond

Straight-up military sci-fi from the mid-90s - actually predated the Starship Troopers movie. Has aged pretty well.

Another obscure one is the War Of The Worlds TV series: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_Worlds_(TV_series)

In practice the episodes were mostly OK - basically a redo of The Invaders. However a new creative team was brought in for the second season. Half of the characters were killed and the action jumped years ahead into a bonkers Mad Max body-swapping dystopic future that Makes No Sense at all. Totally dumb and totally awesome!

xp she's great "subbing" for Neko Case in "The Laws Have Changed" video

― Nhex, Sunday, 28 December 2014

I can't find it. All I can see is New Pornographers.

that's the right video. neko's the singer for TNP. well, usually!

I've started on Babylon 5, and even though it definitely has the typical rough first-season edges, a couple of the episodes are pretty great (Tomalak I mean G'Kar singing a Broadway tune!), which is better than DS9 managed.

Satire of American Beauty in an episode of Lexx?
http://strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/articles/lexx-at-ten/

I maintain that the Replicators stuff in Stargate SG-1 is some genuinely good SF for a cheesy TV show. Well thought through and actually frightening, unlike the Borg. The origin story is really good as well, although it might be pinched from some old short story. The Replicator planet is less credible but kind of haunting and weird IIRC.

Been thinking a while about a difficult to pinpoint aesthetic change in sff and I wonder if its crucial in its gaining wider cultural acceptance. Did there used to be more ugly, dorky and twee stuff? Dorky is hard to define. Plenty of sff today looks ugly in a bland way and I'd argue amateurish cgi and photoshopped covers are worse than anything in the past, but most of that is from small presses.

I was watching some episodes of Prisoners Of Gravity (an 80s-90s Canadian interview show) and it was just so dorky in a way I cant imagine such a thing being today (but if there was such a thing today, I think more authors would be embarrassed to show their cover art).

If Game Of Thrones was on tv in the 90s, Jon Snow would have had a furry wisecracking sidekick called Queequar and there would have been more scenes of people laughing (especially men with beards) and dancing around a fire to quaintly merry music (all 80s-90s films set in medieval Europe have these scenes, I'm sure you could make a long compilation of them).

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Sunday, January 12, 2020 12:51 PM (two hours ago)

I know it's bad form to post the same thing in multiple threads but I thought this might be more relevant to this thread. Fantasy equivalents being Xena and Hercules. And a lot of these shows were uncool in a way that is difficult for me to define, probably why I never watched most of them. I guess my idea of cool sff needs to have a certain measure of prettiness (which Marvel movies fail, but perhaps not as badly as some of these shows).

I bought the book Lost Transmissions this week and it includes an essay by Charlie Jane Anders about an obscure 90s show called Space Island One which she thought was genius. Had scripts by Stephen Baxter and Diane Duane.

I guess the type of show we're talking about here is tailored to an audience of 'fans', unlike yr prestige TV shows which are supposed to be 'what everyone is watching' and talking about?

If Game Of Thrones was on tv in the 90s, Jon Snow would have had a furry wisecracking sidekick called Queequar and there would have been more scenes of people laughing (especially men with beards) and dancing around a fire to quaintly merry music (all 80s-90s films set in medieval Europe have these scenes, I'm sure you could make a long compilation of them).

This is basically The Witcher

Haha, I only seen the first episode.

Never cared for the Star Trek uniform. Deanna Troi is the only one who got to dress nice.

> I suppose I'm going to be the only stan for this show:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space:_Above_and_Beyond

i remember it fondly but i bought the dvds and it was slightly disappointing on a rewatch. i'll try again.

will certainly watch Firefly again (not sure that's last generation enough for this thread)

and space 1999 holds up well, the first season certainly. forcesTV showed it recently, along with UFO (is currently showing dukes of hazzard and V the series)

I really liked Space Above and Beyond at the time, no idea how it holds up. I remember watching it on a double-bill with the similarly short-lived Nowhere Man. There was some initial hype as the showrunners were two of the best X-Files writers, but that must have died down quickly. It's a shame Kristen Cloke only ever seems to act in things her husband is directly involved in....

LOL@ Space Precinct, dear god

There's an episode of TNG where an admiral takes over the ship and tells Deanna to fix her uniform to the standard.

https://i2.wp.com/media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/troiuniform.jpg?w=1000&ssl=1

(+ ok, eva habermann)
Wasn't there someone else? Oh, had to look it up, Xenia Seeberg.

lol milo

xp the episode where Dick Jones from Robocop take over the enterprise, classic!

Lexx was a really weird show.

https://images.justwatch.com/backdrop/8612800/s1440/lexx

Right. Who was that guy from Renaissance Italy?

Amazing that some of this goes back into the early 80s
https://fanlore.org/wiki/Whump
https://fanlore.org/wiki/Woobie

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=whump

“The amount of whump in that movie was delicious!“

“I heard there was a lot of whump in this show.”

https://fanlore.org/wiki/Get_%27em
https://fanlore.org/wiki/Hurt/Comfort

This one is amazing
https://fanlore.org/wiki/Manpain

I didn't know that 'Poochinski', as referenced in the Wormhole X-Treme episode of Stargate SG-1, was apparently a real pilot for a show that inexplicably never got made.

https://youtu.be/LytgLZDzzAY

Not as funny as I would have hoped but I'm still glad it exists somehow.

Yeah sorry, it wasn't supposed to be a recommendation as such ;-)