[karajorma]

Originally posted by Stryke 9
And technically, I'm quite sure sci-fi fans are demographically MUCH more tech- (and internet-) savvy than the average Billy-Bob, and seeing from all the *****ing I've seen online if you organized this well you could make the Sci-fi channel easily lose about 5% of its viewers.

In case you weren't aware, 5% for a big company is a lot. That, and the possibility that the trend wouldn't stop there, would mean that SFC execs would be faced between the choices of replacing the show and bankruptcy. Extortion, yes, but only in that you're refusing to be sold by them any more.

The trick is, of course, getting all those people willing to go that far. Not impossible, by any means, but you need a cause more sweeping and... well, interesting than Farscape to get a boycott. Maybe a whole BUNCH of good shows they canceled for the current crap.

Hell. Do it out of self interest. If people continue to watch Sci-fi even though it only peddles low risk, low budget crap (and stargate, the only surviving good show) then that's all that they will make. If they see people leaving they'll have to do something about it.
 Seriously is there anything new on Sci-fi that isn`t crap apart from SG-1? I ask as someone who never bothered watching that POS channel. (especially since the BBC managed to transmit the final episode of Farscape before the channel that commissioned it did)

[Stryke 9]

Originally posted by karajorma

 Seriously is there anything new on Sci-fi that isn`t crap apart from SG-1?  

The last part of that sentence is misleading and contradictory. It should just read: "Is there anything new on Sci-Fi that isn't crap?"

[an0n]

Originally posted by Stryke 9


The last part of that sentence is misleading and contradictory. It should just read: "Is there anything new on Sci-Fi that isn't crap?"

Don't make me *****-slap you.

[Stryke 9]

You should be ashamed of yourself. The only way they could do worse would be to make Super Mario Brothers: The TV Show- just like the movie, but with lower production values and an even more robotic script.

If that's the best thing on the Sci-Fi channel these days, I'm immensely relieved I don't have cable. It was bad enough when they showed that thing broadcast.

[an0n]

Stargate f*cking ownz.

Enterprise. Now there's piece of ****.

[Stryke 9]

A-men. That's even on the SF channel? Thought it was restricted to Fox or WB or whatever.


You gotta admit, though, it looks cool, and that's the one ST ship that actually looked interesting for more than maybe a minute.

[Martinus]

Originally posted by an0n
Stargate f*cking ownz.

[color=66ff00]Word.

As for enterprise, I haven't seen enough of it to say but it really hasn't done too much for me thus far.
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[an0n]

The thing with Stargate is, it started out with some pretty crappy episodes (the one exception being Emancipation, simpy due to the dress), but Sci-Fi had signed them up for 3 seasons already so they had time to work out the kinks and get good.

And by the season 6 finale, Stargate was into legendary status. Full Cirlce kicked it out of the realms of legend and into mythical status.

I mean, if you've seen Full Circle, you can't help but love Stargate.

The latter half of season 5 and season 6 (bar 2-3 episodes) got so dark. Whereas before we had SG1 = Good, Goa'uld = Bad, the lines started to blur with people like Yu and the rebel Jaffa, then the NID started becoming more prominent.

All in all, Stargate started off shaky, but with good potential and although it did nothing particularly spectacular for the first 4 seasons, when the 5th season rolled around and they started tying together old story-lines it came into it's own.

Sufficed to say, season 7 is gonna rawk.

[Turnsky]

not only that, but as the seasons progressively improved over it's early days so did it's budget therefore they could use something a little more technical I.E more (and longer) computer special effects

[Stryke 9]

Eh, maybe I was seeing Season 3 or something.


I really, really wish there was more hard sci-fi out there. I mean, sure, the effects can be pretty and it's nice and light and fun to just have people out having wacky adventures in space and time, but after a (very short) while the whole "science is all magic and we can defy the laws of physics 'cause we're rebels against the law!" thing starts insulting my intelligence to an unacceptable level (I mean, ****, it's TV, I'm willing to meet it halfway if only because it's naive to hope it'll go any farther).

I mean, ****, I nearly failed junior year in Physics, and STILL I get strongly tempted to throw something heavy at the TV screen and scream "What the **** were you thinking???" too often to like most SF shows they have these days.


I mean, if they just once in a while took the time to explain how one of their big fancy phasers would work in theory without inventing a dozen new technical-sounding words that don't mean anything ("recalibrate the tertiary lambic guano drive NOW!"), or even didn't go out of their way to ignore Newtonian physics, I'd be okay with 'em. Takes next to no intellectual effort on their part, and would make things so much more interesting. But no, we've got ships with rockets that appear to suck rather than expel force, and people can survive in a vacuum if they just hold their breath.

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Stryke 9
I really, really wish there was more hard sci-fi out there. I mean, sure, the effects can be pretty and it's nice and light and fun to just have people out having wacky adventures in space and time, but after a (very short) while the whole "science is all magic and we can defy the laws of physics 'cause we're rebels against the law!" thing starts insulting my intelligence to an unacceptable level

Unfortunately hard Sci-fi is incredibly unpopular. Seriously, name a hard Sci-fi TV series. You ask for more but at least by my definition I can`t think of any.

[an0n]

S:AAB

Anyone says Lexx and I cut their throat.

[J.F.K.]

Originally posted by an0n
And by the season 6 finale, Stargate was into legendary status. Full Cirlce kicked it out of the realms of legend and into mythical status.

I mean, if you've seen Full Circle, you can't help but love Stargate.

I already love Stargate, and I haven't even finished Season 5.

[Martinus]

[color=66ff00]S:AAB was a good show

I don't think that hard scifi would be as good as you think Stryke, lets face it, one of the most popular Scifi shows ever made; StarWars, is very light in the real science department.
Farscape shares SW's 'put the characters first and the science second' ideal so what you have is an interesting cast that makes the material interesting. If Pilot constantly babbled techno-nonsense at the rate it was churned out in some episodes of ST:TNG, Farscape would really suck.

Science is good when used to introduce interesting scenarios but it bites if it's used to try to make something look 'cerebral' which is what most bad scifi does. Too many people are getting hung up on the science and not paying attention to the second part of the genre's name 'fiction'. When was the last time you read a heavy physics text? They're pretty damn boring.
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[karajorma]

Originally posted by an0n
S:AAB

Anyone says Lexx and I cut their throat.

Yeah. S:AAB was quite good but I never figured out why they didn`t just invent some proper space fighters rather than insisting on using the Hammerheads for space combat when they were clearly designed for combined space/atmospheric work.

Also the tactics in that show were always airplane like (or freespace like). You never saw anyone flying backwards shooting at an enemy behind them. B5 is probably much better when it comes to space combat as the starfuries do fly backwards occasionally.
 Unfortunately B5 screwed up the biology badly. Almost everyone is humanoid.

I guess S:AAB is the closest thing we`ve seen to hard Sci-fi though. Kind of explains why it got canned after only one series.

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Maeglamor
[color=66ff00]I don't think that hard scifi would be as good as you think Stryke, lets face it, one of the most popular Scifi shows ever made; StarWars, is very light in the real science department.
Farscape shares SW's 'put the characters first and the science second' ideal so what you have is an interesting cast that makes the material interesting. If Pilot constantly babbled techno-nonsense at the rate it was churned out in some episodes of ST:TNG, Farscape would really suck.

Science is good when used to introduce interesting scenarios but it bites if it's used to try to make something look 'cerebral' which is what most bad scifi does. Too many people are getting hung up on the science and not paying attention to the second part of the genre's name 'fiction'. When was the last time you read a heavy physics text? They're pretty damn boring.
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I guess you haven`t read much hard sci-fi in that case. Done properly it can be just as gripping as the soft stuff.

What I`d like to see is something with B5's sweeping storyline and use of real world physics in combat (at least with the Starfuries) and aliens that don`t even look remotely human and above all behave in an alien fashion.

Soft sci-fi has it's place. I love B5, SG-1, Farscape and the rest of the good soft sci-fi but there is a place for those of us who want to see sci-fi that doesn`t treat us like children.

Most sci-fi ends up building it's own framework of psuedo physics anyway. The reason why modern trek get laughed at so often by sci-fi fans is precisely because it fails to even stick to it's own set of rules.

If instead you start off with the real rules of physics and only deviate from them when coming up with priciple like FTL drives etc and the stick by your own rules you have the basis for a good series.

Hard sci-fi doesn`t have to be a dry text book. Every single show that isn`t sci-fi or fantasy sticks to the laws of physics yet you don`t complain at them for doing so.

[Stryke 9]

Maeg: Mostly, what kara said. It doesn't need to break up the plot or action at all, and in fact these things are usually better the more you understand what's going on, never mind that it's more immersive and interesting as a story if it appears to all be in the realm of the possible, that it might happen sometime in the future, rather than just being something somebody thought up the night after too much bad pizza. The problem is, it involves actually understanding several fields of science, and, while there are few limitations if you care to think of a way something could happen, those limits are still there.

Besides, I can name dozens of hard SF movies. 2001 being the most famous (and I don't ask for it to the extent 2001 had, where there was no sound in space and ****), of course, but far from the only.

Really, the reason you never see any these days is because education is such ****e that you'd get people saying "Hold on, why isn't stuff slowing down when it doesn't have an engine actively burning behind it for a minute?"



You'll also notice that Star Wars is a fair sight more accurate than most sci-fi on TV. It was fluff in many respects, but occasionally they took efforts to get things right. They NEVER do anymore.

Beh. Anyway, if anyone is stupid enough to ask why in MY renders and movies things can be moving without thrusters being on all the time, or starts going on about how the heatsink for a fusion-fission powerplant wouldn't need to be that big, I'm going to do my best to burn their ears (eyes?) off. You've all been warned.

[Martinus]

Originally posted by karajorma


I guess you haven`t read much hard sci-fi in that case. Done properly it can be just as gripping as the soft stuff.

What I`d like to see is something with B5's sweeping storyline and use of real world physics in combat (at least with the Starfuries) and aliens that don`t even look remotely human and above all behave in an alien fashion.

Soft sci-fi has it's place. I love B5, SG-1, Farscape and the rest of the good soft sci-fi but there is a place for those of us who want to see sci-fi that doesn`t treat us like children.

Most sci-fi ends up building it's own framework of psuedo physics anyway. The reason why modern trek get laughed at so often by sci-fi fans is precisely because it fails to even stick to it's own set of rules.

If instead you start off with the real rules of physics and only deviate from them when coming up with priciple like FTL drives etc and the stick by your own rules you have the basis for a good series.

Hard sci-fi doesn`t have to be a dry text book. Every single show that isn`t sci-fi or fantasy sticks to the laws of physics yet you don`t complain at them for doing so.

[color=66ff00]Actually I'm a big fan of Asimov and Clarke because they write interesting hard scifi (or hard as I see it) the reason it's interesting is not the actual events but how they are broken down and percieved by the characters, usually scientists, placed in unusual scenarios and relying on their understanding of the physical world.
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[Stryke 9]

That's an extremely limited perception of what's out there. Both have some good stuff, but get some Niven, some Miller (definitely, he's God, Buddha, and Jesus on his encore tour all rolled into one), some Gibson (he counts as hard even if he made half his stuff up, 'cos he was consistent and none of it is, technically, impossible or even improbable)... hmm, maybe I should make a list.

[Martinus]

Originally posted by Stryke 9
That's an extremely limited perception of what's out there. Both have some good stuff, but get some Niven, some Miller (definitely, he's God, Buddha, and Jesus on his encore tour all rolled into one), some Gibson (he counts as hard even if he made half his stuff up, 'cos he was consistent and none of it is, technically, impossible or even improbable)... hmm, maybe I should make a list.

[color=66ff00]*Maeglamor makes a list*

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