Check this out! DK, BB and CB tell it like it is...

[jadeshand]

http://the-janissary.com/

This is Maayan's blog, and she has scanned the article in, but it is extremely interesting reading.

<Jackie goes off to stick more pins in her Michael Jackson doll>

[Roland]

The text was very small!
But what i could see was very interesting.

Thank's jadeshand! :)

[LiLOrion]

Yes, now my vision is REALLY blurry and I have a headache! :)

Is this in the current issue of SFX? Cause I'll just go buy it

[Kerlin]

Hates them we does, hates them...

Jades, stick in a whole box of pins for me, would you?

ARGH.

Definitely check out that article, gorgeous spread and some really interesting stuff.

[jadeshand]

I suggest you download the page and then take it into a graphics program and use your zoom tool to enlarge it.

<throws Michael Jackson doll on floor and stumps on it repeatedly> Does that help, Kerlin?

And LilOrion, I don't know if it's out in the States yet. I'm sure Maayan got it in the UK.

[Xenajules2]

There is no way I can read that, Jackie. My eyes are too frelling old!

Waaa! (that's me being a big baby... I wanna know what Claud says!)

Jules ;0)

[jadeshand]

right click, save picture as - then take it into PSP and enlarge it. A bit blurry still, but readable.

And both Ben and Claudia's interviews are filled with the Black/Browder 'mutual admiration' society. Both of them couldn't say enough good about the other.

Ben thinks that the beginning of season 4 was a mistake because it was an attempt (ordered by Sci-Fi) to reintroduce all the characters so 'new viewers' would know what was going on. Ben thinks all it did was just alienate the regulars and that not having Claudia in the first episodes was a huge mistake.

Claudia pointed out that Sci-Fi 'wanted more chicks for more sex appeal' and believes that the Sci-Fi new executives had no clue about the relationship of John and Aeryn and how special it was for the fans. She says also that they didn't understand the chemistry between her and Ben. (What the hell? Michael Jackson must be BLIND as a mole!) She talked about 'gaining' control of Aeryn during the middle of the first season and how wonderful it was to have a role like that and how gratifying it was to hear things like "you were born to play the role' because it meant that she had succeeded in what she wanted for Aeryn. She ended her little interview by saying she was delighted that John and Aeryn were able to 'get together' at the end. "In the scene on Moya, she finally acknowledges that it is a good thing being right for each other. They never have enough time and she just draws his face to her and chooses to kiss before they potentially die. Nothing was ever really the right time for those two." :cry2:

DK hinted that the 'new management' didn't understand Farscape and wouldn't take the time to learn. When DK gave them "Crichton Kicks", the reply was "this is crap!" Then they told him they didn't have enough money to promote Farscape - they changed the time - and he says he began to see the handwriting on the wall then. Basically, his opinion is that the 'new management' didn't like the show and did all they could to get rid of it. (Those are my words).

[GeekedOut]

Damn! They wanted it like South Park! What a pile of bull!

Freakin hell!

[Kerlin]

Step in the right direction, Jades, but honestly with the temper I'm in right now I could stomp on dozens of Michael Jackson dolls for weeks at end and still be just as ticked off by the end of it all...

Words just fail me right now. There is a special circle of hell reserved for TV execs.

(okay, this is the point at which I'm just going to go find something to plan industriously...work now, freak later.)

[ComfyChair]

Wow! That was an amazing article. Must find magazine!

[jadeshand]

oh...and DK talks about what season 5 would have been like and what we would have seen..... <wails inconsolably>

The earth story was finished, so John had to have a new reason for living - thus the intro of the baby. <collapses on floor, kicking and screaming> I take it that John and Aeryn would have been a working couple, fighting to save the universe and their baby together. <slams fist into wall>

Fran would have been an recurring character ALL through Season 5 as would the emperor.

May I say that I categorically HATE THE SCI-FI CHANNEL!!!!

<goes off to write Viacom another letter>

[Maayan]

I rescanned the article when I got home. The scans are bigger, it'll mean you'll have to scroll sideways, but the text should be easier to read now.

Maayan

[AyuRocks]

OMG...

OK.. .. um.. wow..

<screams>

I want my show back now!

Ashley

[jadeshand]

Thanks Maayan - you're the best.

And you know, Deneba told me she was getting irate emails from Farscape fans who just found out about the cancellation and they seemed to think she was the Sci-Fi Channel. Do you think the Sci-Fi Channel passed out the email addys of you guys? :D

[millahnna]

I didn't have small font problems but I did have problems figuring out which pages I shuold have read first. Fotunately I have a half decent memory and it all came together for me in the end.

I really want to know what is up with the ep BB said he and Froonium Ricky were supposed to write (something about having to refilm the Premiere yet again...neato).

I creid when I read the three fan picked favorite moments. Particularly the one whose favorite was The Hidden Memory. I'm totally with him on the acting in that episode....as an aspiring actress I think all would be actors should be forced to watch this show in school (and a few choice other shows as well). But then Claudia is sort of my idol so I'm a little biased.

Thanks for the link.

[Tiriel]

exhales slowly and deeply

OK, now I'm really pissed off.

Throughout the entire "character reintroduction" phase I just kept watching and thinking "What the...?! What happened? This is off!" Well, now we know why. Not only did Mr. Jackson prevent the fifth season on the SFC, he also screwed up almost a quarter of the fourth season.

And I WANT my pretty red emperor back! And I want him NOW! And I WILL have him! Y'all hear me?! I WILL have him! I have every RIGHT to my pretty red emperor!

stomps off mumbling under her breath I am not a particularly gracious looser, so I simply don't loose. It's not healthy for my general environment. Frelling, stupid, little...

And thanks so much Maayan! I hope the same article will appear in the US edition later on...

Love and Peace and Voodoo...

Tiriel :grr:

[BlackThorn]

Ever since my little sobbing binge during 4.22 and a couple minutes after, I've been waiting for it to hit me. Since that night, I've felt this numb disbelief (shock I guess) and I've felt the urge to cry and let it out. Yet, nothing would come.

This did it for me.

[Tiriel]

I believe this warrents the introduction of an entirely new word: POBAR. Pissed Off Beyond Any Recognition.

My colleagues keep smiling nervously at me as they stay out of my way. I am pobar!

Tiriel :bounce:

[AyuRocks]

I think we need ice cream.

LOTS of ice cream.

and maybe some oreos... (with the receipt of course)

also, lots and lots of letters!

Ashley

[Paleoanth]

It is nice to see the truth finally come out. Someone needs to send this to Matt Rousch!

[Stargate2077]

Actually, I don't remember where, but I remember someone saying months ago that Sci-Fi messed arounf with the beginning of Season 4 so that it would be less backstory to the show. However, this proves it.

[LiLOrion]

Ok, SciFi claims that the ratings were lacking and that is why the show was cancelled, cause they could not justify spending the money on a show with declining ratings (which makes sense)...but if the ratings did not start their fairly noticable "downward spiral" until the beginning of season 4, and certain people(persons) at the SciFi channel were screwing with the script during that time...arent THEY the people to blame for the decline? I know, that is SO stating the obvious. :)

In that SFX article (the parts I could read) DK said something about not wanting to mess with it cause he would alienate the core viewers, but he obviously did it anyway cause he had to listen to the suits (now who was it, Jackson or Stern?) who told him to change things to make it "more accessible".

Did they NOT think this would eventually get out? The REAL reason why the show was cancelled.
I would be curious to know what they would have to say about this.

[slates]

I wonder if the Sci-Fi influence went as far back as DWTB, because that's where the whole plot line started... who knows. From that point through the first 1/3 of Season 4, there's no question that the show became a bit muddled. Heck, everything after Fractures was not-quite-right...... something seemed different to me, at least, even w/ITLD which was a pretty good 2-parter. The strongest S4 episodes were the ones dealing with the plotlines that related to everything post-Unrealized Realities -- NO SURPRISE, I'm sure that's what the creators intended from the very beginning, especially now that these details have come to light. I'm just surprised that TPTB actually caved to Sci-Fi's pressure and compromised their creative process... though I guess in reality, when you get an order from the top, there's really nothing you can do but try to make the best of things, same with any job. It's not like they were all going to quit.

That's depressing, what a waste..... I remember feeling very nervous, thinking that the show couldn't afford what was happening in the beginning of S4, particularly since it seemed VERY unlike TPTB. Hell, we all did, the message boards were loaded with complaints back then (easy to forget since things turned around completely through the later part of the season)... now all is revealed. Screw Sci-Fi, what a bunch of clueless jerks. There's no doubt in my mind that the early S4 stuff contributed to the show's demise. Bastards. I'm glad *I* never gave up on FS, it was worth sticking around until the end. What pisses me off even more is that Kemper and Co. told us not to get angry with Sci-Fi when we wrote letters... Bah! No more :)

[Delinquent]

arrg. Can't write. POBAR!

I actually hadn't thought about it till this time, but the beginning of season 4 WAS really weird, I remember sitting there for crichton kicks going, "What the frell is this!?". ARRRG! I like you word Triel. POBAR I am.

[Zen Blade]

nice article...


I agree with the "early season 4 sucked" comment... although I thought the no-Aeryn episodes were interesting, I thought they were too.... "stargate-ish" for lack of a better description.

I wish we could have another 13 or so episodes with some crazy crud...

-Zen Blade

[waltersgirl]

while i have loved the entire season, i am irked at the forced story change, not for what we got which i well and truly enjoyed, but for the lost potential.

gawd, i hate Skiffy.

[MediaSavant]

Originally posted by LiLOrion
Ok, SciFi claims that the ratings were lacking and that is why the show was cancelled, cause they could not justify spending the money on a show with declining ratings (which makes sense)...but if the ratings did not start their fairly noticable "downward spiral" until the beginning of season 4, and certain people(persons) at the SciFi channel were screwing with the script during that time...arent THEY the people to blame for the decline? I know, that is SO stating the obvious. :)


I'm not sure what "downward spiral" you are referring to. If you check out Farscape's historical ratings (available on many websites), the ratings declined in the middle of Season 3. I still wouldn't describe it as a "downward spiral" but a decline that plateaued in the 1.1-1.3 level and then stayed around that level for the remainder of the series. (barring a few occasional bumps)

What seems apparent from DK's account is that the increase in the show's license fee from Season 3 to Season 4 made it imperative to them to increase the ratings and justify that increased cost. Thus, the orders to broaden the audience.

Unfortunately, the noodling didn't work and the ratings didn't budge enough.

One wonders if the pressure for higher ratings had been less if the cost of the show didn't go up. It's probably a moot question. If the fee hadn't gone up, Henson probably wouldn't have produced the fourth season at all. We'd probably have had to cry about having only 66 episodes instead of 88.

[BlackThorn]

Season 4 reminds me of Season 1. The first half was mainly composed of stand-alone eps. Didn't really hit its stride until halfway through. Mind you, I haven't seen an ep of Farscape I didn't like, but most of the first half of 4 ranks close to the first half of 1 for me. Frell those Skiffy idiots. If it ain't broke don't fix it!!! Now Skiffy's broken ideas on advertsising (or lack of) that needed fixing.

[DangerWillRobinson]

Quality SciFi for Michael Jackson is "Scare Tatics" and "Tracker"

Need we say more?

[KozmikBloo]

Maybe the cancellation was just a really, really bad judgement call on the part of the executives, but it seems more likely that it was a pissing contest. Make Farscape more like South Park?! WTF?! (I had to read that sentence 4 times before I could believe that 'South Park' was actually written on the page.) :mad:

If I were DK, or anyone associated with the show, I would've told the executives to go frell themselves.

Honestly, considering the direction Skiffy wanted the show to head in, maybe it's better that the network's involvement ended with S4. I will still help find a new home for S5 and/or a new avenue to get the story told, but I don't think I'll be asking Skiffy to bring back the show anymore. My correspondence will simply be to ask them to release the 88 episodes and maybe the occassional 'up yours' letter, written more eloquently of course :ewink:.

Why do executives always seem to want to mess with a good thing? The big-wigs at my company dish out similiar BS and everything always gets screwed up. What is the matter with these people and how do they get to be in charge of anything?

:mad:

[Vampgrrl]

Ok I'm pissed now. I've been sitting here reading posts on another board where people were saying they hope many Americans die horribly (mad) and then I want to come here and not think about war and I see this.
FRELL you SCIFI. Micheal Jackson is an idiot, I Am not a fanatical person, never even been to a Scifi type con but M J is a loser of the highest degree.

[kymom5613]

It's obviously not what you know.....
Ginnie

[Y2B]

(Look of shock and anger on face having just read article)


Tiriel get me my gun

[the_cadpig]

Here's the main body article.

~cp

------------------------------------
Rarely has a show with so much potential been wrenched off our screens. And the bitterness in the Farscape camp is still palpable, as Paul Simpson found out when he met up with the cast and crew for the series’ post-mortem.
------------------------------------

The warehouse complex at Homebush Bay should be bustling with activity. But it’s dead.

Actors should be coming out of their trailers parked at the intersection of Moya Avenue and Talyn Way, and heading down to the makeup rooms, before cutting through the warehouses, or down narrow passageways to the set on which they’re filming.

In the production office, new directors should be sitting in the anterooms by the entrance, looking at maquettes made by Creature Shop Supervisor Dave Elsey of the alien races that are going to feature in their upcoming episode. The notice boards should be constantly changing with updated production schedules. Upstairs, around the large table in the writers’ room, David Kemper, Ricky Manning, Lil Taylor and the writers should be working out the broad strokes of five episodes ahead, while still breaking the story on the episode that’s due to start filming in a few days’ time.

But nobody is filming the fifth season of Farscape, and it looks as if it’ll be a long time before we know just why Crichton and Aeryn were “neutralised for inspection” at the end of the final episode. The cast and crew have scattered to the four corners of the Earth – some are in England, others in America.

Six month ago, at the start of September 2002, nearly everyone was on a high. The end of the fourth season was in sight, with only a few days of shooting left. The final episode, “Bad Timing”, was in the can. Only a few more segments for the documentary episode, “A Constellation Of Doubt”, needed to be filmed.

“I had been on location since four in the morning and was exhausted,” Gigi Edgley recalls. “So I decided to put some tunes on in my trailer and have a little dance, as aliens often do. I heard rapping outside. I thought it was Claudia, as we share trailers, asking for some quiet. I turned the music down and realised it was someone knocking on the door. My makeup artist popped her cheeky smile in and said, ‘Did you hear?’ ‘Hear what?’ ‘It’s over.’

“’What’s over?’ I asked. ‘It’s a hard wrap!’ she said. ‘Farscape’s finished.’

“’Yeah, I know,’ I said excitedly, ‘We go on holidays tomorrow.’ She replied, ‘No hon, that’s it. It’s not coming back. They’ve asked us to package up all the makeup goods and send them to the States.’

“’What? Oh frell, are you kidding? You’ve been playing with the hairspray again, haven’t you? No, this can’t be right! Shit, I’ve gotta tell my dad, my agent. I need a new job…’

“My nervous giggles fell to my trailer floor. ‘It’s lunch’, she says, ‘you coming?’

“Usually I stay in my trailer over lunch as Nebaris and sun don’t mix too well. There was no chance I was staying in my trailer today. I was done up head to toe in Nebari as they required Chi in all her fullness on this day. I stumbled out of my trailer in shock, and fumbled all my grey bits into the mini van to go down to location for lunch. The feeling was bizarre. Claudia and I gazed into each other’s eyes whilst we blurted on the phone to all the necessary people.”

Looking back, David Kemper notes that, “It was rancorous from the beginning, to a degree.” Although the Sci-Fi Channel gave the show a two-season pick up at the start of October 2001, there were some considerable strings attached, most important of which was that the show needed to widen its audience.

“What they were always worried about was that new people couldn’t get into the show, because it was semi-serialized,” Kemper recalls. “We pointed out that new people can’t get into NYPD Blue or The Sopranos either. You have to have good promotion and advertising.”

Kemper wasn’t concerned about the publicity part of the equation – “The people at Sci-Fi do great publicity,” he notes. What concerned him was the promotion of the series on air. “They brought in a new team of people, and we understood from the get-go that they didn’t understand the show or like the show. The stuff I was seeing told me there was something wrong. I said we’d do the best we could, but you can’t get people to come to a show in the fourth year without promoting it.”

The next “request” Kemper faced from the network was to alter the style of the show. “They were saying, if we could make it more like Stargate, everyone would love it,” he says. “I knew that was wrong. We’d piss off our core audience, and nobody new is going to know the show’s on the air if it’s not promoted properly. How do people watch The Sopranos? They have good publicity, which we had, and lots of promotion, which we didn’t have. Sci-Fi kept saying they didn’t have the money to do it.”

The argument continued during the pre-production period. “We were getting, ‘Make it more like South Park’ – a small show on a small cable channel that got the cable channel a lot of heat,” Kemper continues. “In the end we said to them, ‘What do you want?’ and they said they wanted a bigger audience. We said, ‘That’s not our job. Our job is to make a good show that will hold a bigger audience, but you’ve got to deliver the bigger audience.’ Then they moved us to 10pm, and it seemed like a lot of things were stacking up against the show.”

Despite this, Kemper was determined to make the fourth year the best ever. The season opened with “Crichton Kicks”, which only featured Crichton, Chiana and Rygel from the crew, as well as introducing Raelee Hill as Sikozu. “There was a mandate to reintroduce the series with season four,” Ben Browder comments, “and with the number of people we had, I think that’s one of the reasons we started with Crichton alone and reintroduced the characters. We had a chance to give the new audience a chance to catch up.”

While Browder thinks this worked for newcomers, “I’m not sure it worked for the long-time audience because they immediately want all of the characters back. There’s a certain amount of frustration at the beginning of the year from people who want to see everyone back together. Where’s D’Argo? Where’s Aeryn? Crichton on his own was designed to reintroduce the series. It may not have been the best idea to have a drunken, crazed, bearded lunatic but I think that it was an interesting choice.”

“We turned the episode in to the network, and Sci-Fi’s attitude was, ‘This stinks!’” David Kemper recalls. “We pointed out that they couldn’t change it – the episode was completed, and we’d already done the next five episodes before we turned it in. They said that they needed Claudia to come back into the show earlier. But they knew that she wasn’t going to be there – she wasn’t even in the country at the time!”

“Crichton Kicks” had a knock-on effect throughout Farscape’s final year. “When we were making it, we were sure we had a hit, and we spent a lot of money,” Kemper explains. “We spent the whole year paying for it, trying to claw it back and doing magic tricks to keep the audience from knowing we were saving money. It was supposed to be the chance to bring new people in. We had the cover of TV Guide booked – that’s why Ben, Claudia, Andrew Prowse and I were in New York on 9/11. We had negotiated Ben on the cover, and also worked out coverage in Entertainment Weekly. We were counting on having a great episode that knocked everybody out, and we were counting on getting great on-air promotion. They were trying to shoot promos that made John Crichton into someone who slept with every alien dominatrix, and who was out to save the universe. I had to go to the President of Sci-Fi, Bonnie Hammer, and say, ‘Help, this is not our show!’”

Having made the decision to split the crew up at the end of the third season, Kemper took his time bringing the other characters back. D’Argo, Jool and Noranti appeared in the second episode, while Aeryn didn’t come back until episode five, “Promises”. “Anyone new watching this show can watch the cast being rebuilt piece by piece,” Kemper recalls explaining. “They won’t be confused as to who they are. They won’t come in and have nine people sitting around a table shouting at each other like a dysfunctional family. The whole beginning of the season was geared toward getting and keeping new fans, because if we didn’t we were going to be in trouble. A lot of our regular fans were complaining. We did the best we could, and it didn’t work. If we hadn’t done that, it would have been worse. We were on the bubble right till the end. In retrospect, you can say it was a mistake, and we didn’t get the new viewers. They didn’t come to look at the show. We didn’t double our available audience. In hindsight, the year would have been just as good developing the Farscape story, but the attempt back in that day was trying to service the possibility of new people.”

Claudia Black considers that the network didn’t understand the power of the romance between Crichton and Aeryn at the heart of Farscape. “I think they wanted to have a lot of new chicks coming in to add some more sex to the show,” she comments, “but even people who came to it who hadn’t watched it for long just saw the chemistry between us, and they were hooked. There was just something about it that was fun and entertaining when Crichton and Aeryn were hanging together. If you just put them in the same space it was exciting – but the network didn’t get that.”

Believing that he had two years worth of episodes, Kemper plotted accordingly. “The whole design from the beginning of the year was that the centrepiece of the season was going to be going to Earth at Halloween in the ‘70’s or ‘80’s, and then again in real time,” he says. “I knew there had to be another episode in the middle that referenced Earth, and that became the documentary episode. I wanted to set everyone up to think that Crichton is going home, and then he closes up the wormhole in the final episode and never sees his Dad again. He’s starting a new adventure. We thought season five might be the end, and I wanted people to be wondering at the end of the year what we had in mind for year five. It would have been really startling. There was a bigger design to the story. Crichton’s purpose was not to go home. That’s what the baby was about: there’s got to be a new reason for living if you’re not going home. The main titles for the fifth year would not have had the words ‘I’m trying to get home.’ His whole reason for living had changed. He knows it, and doesn’t want to go home any more.”

Kemper has always described each year of Farscape as being like a chapter in a book, and points out that “the show was going to take a hard turn at the end of the year, and start steamrolling to the end of the show at the end either of season five or the end of season six. This was the turning point in the book, two thirds of the way through. We were entering the final third.”

Although he won’t give too many details away, Kemper drops a few hints. “Francesca Buller played a re-occurring Scarran, Minister Of War Ahkna, who would have gone right through the fifth season, as would Duncan Young as Emperor Staleek,” he says. “Jool was not done with
Farscape. The fifth season and beyond would show that the Priests on Arnessk and what they did for a living may have had something further to do with way that Farscape unfolded. But Jool needed some time on her own with these people to fulfil what I had in mind. I would have loved to have done a whole crossdressing episode with Chiana and Aeryn in man’s clothes, Crichton and D’Argo in women’s clothes so they could find out about the other side. That’s a concept that really appealed to me.”

One element that Kemper won’t miss is finding out about the edits that the BBC have made to the series. “They chose to run us at an early time when kids are watching,” he says slightly bitterly. “I think it’s up to the broadcaster to appropriately programme a show. If you buy a show, you probably should try to run it where you can show what the film-makers made. Why do this? My attitude is, are the BBC the kind of librarians who would buy a book for a library and then tear out pages from the book because they don’t want people to see it? It’s defacing artwork. If the BBC do that, it show them to be bad programmers, because they can’t figure out where to run the show, and no patron of television. It makes them mercenary and cold. People worked really hard to make these films, and it’s either up to the parents not to let their children watch it, or the BBC should put it on at 10pm or whatever time is appropriate in your market, and not screw with it.”

Even now, six months later, there’s clearly a part of Kemper that finds the cancellation amazing. “They cancelled us when we were at our creative peak,” he says. “They pulled the plug on us. That staggered us. We were at our creative zenith. It wasn’t a creative decision. It was purely politics. All of a sudden we had people who didn’t get our show who had been lobbying since we refused to shoot the promos that we weren’t playing ball. What you have is a network that only has two original programmes cancelling 50% of its line up and it’s the one that gets critical praise!” -- SFX

[Dominar of Action]

If I may indulge for a moment ....

C'MON VIACOM!!! BUY SKIFFY AND FIRE THEIR A$$ES!

There, I feel a bit better (not much, but a bit)

What an absolute waste. :cry2:

[trubador]

WOW... just... just... WOW!!!

[quendi]

yea, this article enrages me. I am very thankful to have read it, for it puts SciFi Channel in a completely different light for me.
I cannot help but feel that SciFi's timeslot changes and hiatus' and lack of promotion were the result of them "giving up" on Farscape. That really frustrates me. Having been a SciFi Network viewer for at least 10 years now, I feel completely betrayed by them. Eventhough I secretly want them to change their minds and reverse their decision, I find them undeserving.

[JA_Shipper]

Somebody fire Michael Jackson and Bonnie Hammer NOOOOWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!

:grr: We all knew this was the bottom line, didn't we? We knew that Skiffy frelled with the show and then blamed the failure of the changes on Farscape and/or DK. @$$HOLES!!!!!

Viacom, pleeeeeeease buy Skiffy and fire the clowns masquerading as station runners. :mad:

Edited to add, now we *really* know how good Ben and Claud and everyone are as actors, asking us not to get mad at Skiffy when they knew all along it was ALL Skiffy's fault!

Suse

[Farsight]

It just confirms what many of us suespected all along. You could easily infer SciFi's apathy towards the show from their actions. Even total ineptness would not have explained the calculated method in which they undercut their flagship show at every turn.

SciFi deserves nothing less than our apathy. May every show they produce be as successful as "The Dream Team"... :)

[DocCamille]

well, I really hated the beginning of season four and thought they had lost their minds. I almost thought they had deliberately made "Crichton Kicks" as a sort of "up yours" to somebody, and I thought it was an expensive way to thumb your nose at the money people. perhaps they were trying to be original while complying with orders, but I think DK and the rest of us realize, whether we want to or not, that the first few episodes of season four really sank it for the first half of the season.

New people may have needed some sort of introduction into the story, but they also needed something that drew them in and grabbed them by the throat right away. since they have always known that the central relationship between Crichton and Aeryn Sun is the biggest draw, it was really dumb not to have her for all that time.

But I have never been quite clear on what was going on with that. Was she off dealing with personal issues or doing something else so that they had to write her out for that time? Or did DK decide they didn't need her for the first quarter of the season so she went off somewhere and wasn't available if they wanted to backtrack?

From my reading of the article, DK sounds just as pig-headed as the new management. It is hard to justify complaints that they won't promote your show if you bail on all the promotion they set up for you. I understand that he didn't like the approach they were taking, but it would at least have gotten the attention of a wider audience, who would then have had the opportunity to discover the quality of the show--just as the whole production had a temporary brainfart (technical term for random creativity that doesn't go anywhere)

One must walk away shaking one's head at the missed opportunities lost all down the line, right down to being upstaged in their bit photo-moment by the biggest disaster in the US since the Civil War.

DocCamille

[DocCamille]

Their BIG photo-moment, not "bit" photo-moment! Oops.

DocCamille

[uisceboo]

Originally posted by kymom5613
It's obviously not what you know.....

..it's how big a mark you can leave in the snow.

"Talyn, you've seen them both naked. Perhaps you can tell us who's bigger."

Okay...we already know skiffy washed their hands of Farscape. I had no idea they had done it so long ago. this pretty much proves they attempted to murder the show (no promotion, time slot shifts) and then blame a small dip in ratings and cancellation on us. And the whole frelling industry is kicking back their heels laughing at them for their idiocy.

POBAR. Mega-POBAR. Mega-POBAR meets Gozilla and kicks his eema all over Tokyo!

We know of one big, rich conglomerate that may indeed want some fine science fiction. I'm going to continue to bat my eyes at Viacom.

boo (malcontent little weasel)

[shaith]

should we REALLY expect anything different from a network run by people who in fact detest sci-fi?

[BritAngie]

it....there *is* other stuff about Sci fi that will have you all BEYOND Tiriels "Pissed off beyond recognition.." I hope one day that that info will be allowed out..until then I'm gratified that at last we are getting to see in print what we knew/suspected all along.. :mad:

I hope Matt Roush does get to see this stuff..I think a little article in Tv guide about the "The murder of a Tv show" would be most interesting...
:rollin:

[LittleVorc]

i don't think that 'crichton kicks' was a mistake
i really love that episode because it was surprising (and weird...and a weird beard) but i think a new viewer would say 'what the hell is going on there' and watch something else
so the sfc was wrong
but their stupid plans led to a really good episode

[Mike@Pilots Chamber]

This just annoys the hell out of me. Skiffy wanted it more like South Park and Stargate?!? Since when were they allowed creative input on the show? It isn't theirs! All they're supposed to do is promote and broadcast it, and the idiots couldn't even get that right!

I really like the sound of what was to come though -

SPOILERS FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVEN'T READ IT OR DON'T WANT TO KNOW!!!
-
-
-
-
-
-
Francesca Buller staying on as Ak'nor (yay) as a recurring character, along with Staalik!

Jool's return (double-yay - I hated her but her character evolved SOO well)!

Return to Arnessk (the planet Jool left on) to discover what the priests there did (remember the Egyptian heiroglyphic on the toy?)

I am VERY tempted to get this magazine now. Skiffy must be coughing up into their coffee.

Maybe we should start sending a copy or two (or faxes of the pages) to Skiffy...

[Stargate2077]

I personally think that David Kemper was doing what he thought was best for the show at the time. I think, in any case, Sci-Fi would have cancelled the series anyway because the higher executives did not want the show. Anyway, if you advertise falsely, you get the wrong audience to show up and then they will not stay even if the show is good. By the sound of how they wanted to do the promos, they wanted to make Farscape sound like a crappy Sci-Fi show where everything is simple and the good are good and the bad are bad. John getting an alien each week.....Ha!

[vhsiv]

Ya know, nobody ever really *got* the alien babe in either of those shows. And if they did, it wasn't consensual. Sure, John eventually got Aeryn, but that was a relationship, and they've been going around the barn on that one for 4 seasons.

In short, Skiffy misrepresented *both* shows...

[Digger]

POBAR just says it all. I remember watching the first few eps of S4 and thinkin "what the hezmana are they doing?" I liked Chriton Kicks, but the next few eps really turned me off. It just goes to show that the people running skiffy don't understand sci-fi.

And as for our favorite troll who always complains that DK ruined the show this article proves him wrong. DK did the best he could in a difficult situation.

[Mike@Pilots Chamber]

I liked Crichton Kicks, the What Was Lost was quite good, but not great. Lava was awful. Promises was OK.

But I can understand why Crichton Kicks was like it was. I liked the idea of gradually re-introducing the characters, it made it more realistic. I personally would'a hated it if season 4 started off set about a minute later, John still in his module, and then everyone comes back and says hello again.

I thought it was a good way to bring in new viewers, to introduce them gradually. To do what Skiffy were suggesting would have ruined the show overall. If they had done it it would have probably got awful ratings, but Skiffy would have had no problem promoting the hell out of it. But because they didn't, and produced the show as it is (thank the Goddess) Skiffy for some reason didn't promote it.

[jadeshand]

Skiffy's take on "Crichton Kicks" - "It's crap." That's why they didn't promote it or chose to promote it in a erroneous way.

The point here is that the new management who obviously thinks with the brain in its pants took a quality show that delved into such human issues as moral choices, empowered women and extreme emotionalism and tried to turn it into a tit and giggle show.

God help me, it's reason for justifiable homicide.

[DorothyGail]

Originally posted by jadeshand
God help me, it's reason for justifiable homicide.

Is that "Because he needed shootin'" law still on the books in TX? :boom:




{{{{{Jade}}}}}}} :love: Nice to see you today!

[Has]

This makes me so MAD, Well in a way I am not surprised this just cement what an idiot Michael Jackson really is. He has no clue on what quality Sci-fi really, just look at his track record, passing on x-files because he felt the pilot was awful while he was controller of channel 4. And I think he cancelled Dr Who when he was at the BBC, and now Farscape. UGHHHHHHHHH

[jadeshand]

Hey DorothyGail!!! :D

So good to see you. We could only hope that law is still in effect.
;)

btw, looks like a big Scaper party is organizing over here for the weekend of April 25th. Want to come? CMScaper is thinking about popping over for the weekend. We are just going to push back the furniture and lay out the 'blow-up' beds. You are more than welcome to stay and Scapers are coming from all over the country.

[Chaym]

Thank you cad_pig for posting the article. I'd checked out Barnes&Noble last night but they don't have this edition available yet. Thanks muchly :-)

[Kalliope]

I can hardly wait to lay my hands of this issue of SFX...
In the meantime... someone P L E A S E throw a bomb at SlyLie from me...

Katarzyna

[Kalliope]

of course "on this issue of SFX"...

K.

[redvenus]

As a little side note, does anybody remember the show "First Wave", which was bundled with Farscape on Friday nights? It was a Canadian production and the first two seasons were really good until Scifi forced the creators to add more "sexy-ness" to it and made them change the story in way that there was room for Traci Lords as a new main character. It was just about the same deal from Scifi: either you change what we want you to change or we won't support your show anymore. They filmed the last season in 2000, when did MJ get on board of Scifi?

I see a pattern there, get more viewers by apealling to lowest emotional level instead of the intellect of the viewer. Those managers are definitly running the wrong network. Send them over to E! and let the Scifi channel be a Scifi channel!

Thanks
Redvenus

[operaghost666nj]

POBAR :thud:

[StephX]

You gotta be kidding me. They (the sci fi channel's suits) wanted them to make Farscape more like Stargate.... so... people will love it....
:headbang:
Hmmm.. I don't even know what to say... errr... other than... hmmm... Stargate didn't get ratings that were THAT much better!!

What the frell?!

(lol my saying lately on farscape stuff)


:boom:
(yes I typed this on the discussion board. I just noticed this one... so I just copied and pasted what I said.)

[LiLOrion]

I was wondering what the whole Tracie Lords crap on First Wave was about!!!

Now, does anyone know the story behind Invisible Man? (Liked it better than First Wave, but not as much as Farscape. :) )


Why do suits insist on having their little grubby hands in EVERYTHING!

[StephX]

Maybe they secretly want to destroy their network?:eek:

[CrazyChick]

Originally posted by Digger
And as for our favorite troll who always complains that DK ruined the show this article proves him wrong. DK did the best he could in a difficult situation.


LOL! I don't know about that! I've just read Pisher's reaction to this article at the board he usually posts at- I don't think anything would convince Pisher otherwise. ;)

[Tokeya]

Somebody break me off a stick, there's 'bout to be a whipping!!!:mad:

[jeffrabb]

Dorothygail,

I don't know if that law is still on the books, but I'm sure George W. doesn't need an excuse to put someone in the electric chair.:devil:

I wonder if there is any chance that we can get his mind off of Iraq for the 60 seconds for him to sign the executive order?:lol Man, where is Radar O'Reilly when you need him?:ewink:

Jeff

[CMScaper]

Jeff, Dorothy, Jadeshand,

There's a few ways that someone who "just needs shooting" can still be shot legally around here. We need to call a meetin'...

This article just drives home how shabbily everyone has been treated by Skiffy. It's not just us, the viewers, who have been getting crap from them, everyone involved has been getting it. It looks to me like DK was in a no-win situation. If he had done to Farscape what they were required to do to First Wave, the results wouldn't have been pretty, we'd have all probably bailed in disgust and the show would have been cancelled anyway. This was a done deal from the moment they saw Crichton Kicks, if not before.

[jadeshand]

CM!!!! My bud, my pal!!!

Happy to see you! :D :D :D

[DorothyGail]

Jade, thanks for the invite! If it works out, I would so like to be there. I had such a good time with all you girls at AggieCon. I never get to hang out with Scapers, and I think I've found someone of like mind in Seva! With my daughters both gone, I have no one to discuss Farscape with! My husband is just dumbfounded with my level of frustration with Skiffy.



BTW, Seva, if you're lurking - YS! :love:

[scrubschick]

I had to wait until I was emotionally ready to read this and I'm glad I did. Instead of making me sad it has made me angry!! :boom:

Was it Kerlin who said "Frelling Skiffy Rat Bastards" a few days ago? They are evil, evil, evil!! :evil: :evil: :evil:

This cancellation cannot stand, will not stand! We WILL get our show back!
Meanwhile, I'm gonna wait on a nearby rooftop for BS Bonnie to drive past in her motorcade. Of course, I could have a long wait since I'm in Columbus, Ohio, but I'm sure she'll drive by eventually. After all, don't all roads lead to Columbus? And when she does, I'll be ready ! :sniper:

Well, it's beer o'clock :beer:
hugs and chocolate kisses to all!
scrubs :)

[Kerlin]

LOL, scrubs, I think the original quote was something that came out of my mouth in the midst of the long stream of obscenities that was my reaction to the "thank you" screen after 4.22..."Goddamned frelling Skiffy rat bastards can take their frelling 'thank you' and - "

::delicate cough:: Yeah, well you get the idea...:D

[jadeshand]

I'll be expecting you then, DG!!! It's gonna be a parrrtayyy in Old San Antone!!

btw, scrubs is coming too! :D

[DorothyGail]

<sniff>:cry2: I deleted the Friday night event timer from my pvr today. Felt like I was throwing a "fistfull of dirt" into the Big Wormhole. Ouch. I need comfort. Chocolate.

[jadeshand]

Here, chica...think suckao - warm, melted chocolate on a spoon that Claudia Black is holding for you! :D

[millahnna]

I think the thing that is bothering me the most about the whole article is the great lackof intelligence displyed by these people (the suits not our beloved cast and crew). The wanted the show more like South Park? Now I don't know if that was an analogy that was actually used by execs or if it was just something that was used by the crew to sum up what they were being expected to do but here's the thing. I love South Park. It is a great intelligently written show. So intelligently written that it scares away people who think it is stupid...its sort of like the Simpons on crack. But South Park is not Farscae (although SP has paid homage to Scape in an ep or two). OK they wanted more Alien Babes, more alien of the week garbage. Don't most TV networks nowadays pay someone to read major fan sites (in the interest of suing them for screencaps ) and no that this sort of crap is what is getting ready to get Enterprise cancelled? Haven't they read how even the men who watch the show are drawn to the J/A relationship.

Who the frell are these idiots and how did they get their hands ona TV network. You mean to tell me I can't even take solace from our currently retarded world in a tv show. OK fine. Then I'm going to go back to finding ways of buying all things french just to tick of my conservative friends, while simultaneously showing support for the war to tick of my liberal friends and when the resulting riot ends up in the news....there will be a note stapled to my forehead that says "Blame it on frelling Skiffy."

OK sorry for the weird mini rant but I think you see my point. What were they thinking....had they even watched the show?

[Dominar of Action]

:rollin:OK fine. Then I'm going to go back to finding ways of buying all things french just to tick of my conservative friends, while simultaneously showing support for the war to tick of my liberal friends and when the resulting riot ends up in the news....there will be a note stapled to my forehead that says "Blame it on frelling Skiffy.":lol: I don't know why, but this just tickled me no end. Thanks :)

[DocCamille]

I keep going back to that "south park" reference and wondering. At that point, clearly, communication had failed. But maybe they didn't mean DK should make some paper cutouts of Aeryn and John paste them on sticks and do the voices himself--okay, exaggerating there--

maybe he meant they could swear in English and didn't need to make up a fancy vocabulary to get around standards and practice.

It would have been a bad suggestion, since it would limit the usefulness for syndication, but they may have thought it needed "I'm edgy" markers so the audience knew they were watching something daring.

Of course, an audience stupid enough not to notice they were watching something daring would be too stupid to get the show in the first place, but the suits aren't really known for following the logic through. Just for throwing it out there and seeing what sticks to the wall, so to speak.

Just a midnight (almost) maunder...

DocCamille

[Melkor]

Nice article.

Kind of makes me want to boycott Sci-Fi, even if it won't do any good. Because Sci-Fi deserves to be boycotted for being a bunch of outrageous morons.

Mark

[LadyCrais]

Re: Alien Babes

I don't think I've seen this mentioned in the thread, and forgive me if it has....

But DK delivered on that and the fans have bitched to high heaven about it. First Sikozu gets introduced and for some reason everyone and their brother is speculating on John shifting his interest in her direction for a few episodes. Then Grayza (who I like) comes on the scene with her sex, chains, boob sweat and rape of John, and likewise even more hell is raised.

Now I personally did not have a huge problem with the first half of S4, but it was definitely not on my best of Farscape list either, except John Quixote. But I can remember coming to the boards last summer and getting horrible feelings seeing such an incredible amount of bitching and complaining about the episodes. I seem to remember hearing Skiffy thought Coup by Clam was the best episode ever, and sorry to say, that is the one and only episode I have ever seen on first viewing and said to myself afterward that they have made their first episode that I have precisely zero use for now or any time in the future. I know others liked it, which is fine, so please don't get lost rebutting my opinion at this late stage of the game.

At any rate, having recently come from boards that trashed X-Files up one side and down the other preceding its cancellation (er.. decision to end before being cancelled), I was really really worried last summer that TPTB were going to see these posts trashing the episodes in a fairly high percentage and it could put the show in jeapordy.

NOW of course we discover all this stuff that everyone was bitching a blue storm about was DK trying to meet Skiffy's frelling demands in the first place. We saw them promote the bloody thing totally wrong with SG-1 all over the frelling country. Even Nashville had the damn billboards. They totally screwed with their commercials, picking the scenes THEY thought would be titiillating and exciting for the previews to attract new viewers without coming within a metre of giving some clue what the actual episode was about. Not to mention reducing them to a fraction timewise so they could sink all their promotion into SG-1. I'm assuming the crap we saw for previews last summer was the same crap they used in their commercials on other shows.

So now in retrospect, we should have been raising hell last summer about the changes. But we didn't, because we have confidence in DK and had no frelling clue it was Skiffy demanding these changes. Yes, the first 11 are still better than anything else on televition. But DK obviously said frell it the last 11 and produced the finest 11 episodes of the series thus far. He delivered 300% on that promise to us. And he is bitter and angry for being cut down at their creative peak. I just hope they don't lose that edge and can get back in that creative zone when S5 gets picked up. My guess is we'll have to be patient for a few episodes for everything to start clicking again. And that is absolutely criminal on Skiffy's part, to interrupt that flow of creativity and synergy that was so well established between the entire cast, crew and production staff.

[jeffrabb]

Hey guys,

As a B5'er I could tell you some tales that JMS had to endure from TNT and to a lesser extent SciFi (gee, what a surprise!)
TNT frelled with the writing, content, and even the broadcast of order of Crusade so much that after only 13 episodes (I think) JMS himself pulled the plug on the show. Then Skiffy picked up the B5 franchise and the B5 fans thought at last we had found a home. HAH! They did nothing to finish up Crusade, and their one B5 movie, Legend of the Rangers, wasn't anything to write home about. Since then the franchise, a REAL HONEST TO GOD FRANCHISE, has been sitting in limbo at SciFi. Now tell me how much sense does that make?

<climbing down from my soapbox>

Jeff

[Shipscat]

Well, you know, Lady Crais, some of us were saying it at the time..that maybe the things we didn't like about season four were due to Scifi interference..and during the hiatus and campaign I said that I DID NOT think that was DK's fault...and then when we saw the last 11 eps, that were true Farscape, there was an incredible difference.

It's really good to have confirmation.

[shaith]

I seem to remember Bonnie talking about Farscape prior to season four, telling the world it was going to be edgier, sexier, I believe it was in TV Guide. So I wasn't surprised at the introduction of the scantily clad Sikozu (nor particularly upset either). But in so doing, I think Bonnie did exactly what she claims she was trying to avoid. If you fill it with sex, potty humour, and nearly naked women, just who do you think is going to be the core audience?

Surprise, Bonnie. Go back to marketing 101, tralk, and pay attention to Professor Numbmivonks, as he explains the theories of marketing to a target audience.

I never had any illusions whatsoever regarding the reason behind the change in styles, but I was sure glad when they got over their reintro period. "FINALLY they bring back Aeryn."

For a new network to pick up this series, what they really need is a two-hour special episode that takes the first four seasons, throws in 4x22, and then goes from there. This way you make the core audience happy, you let the newbies know what the frell is happening, and you set the stage for what's to come.

[LadyCrais]

Believe me Jeffrab, I feel the B5-Crusade pain. My understanding is that JMS pulled the plug before the first episode had even aired. And yes, when it was rebroadcast it was supposedly put back in the correct order and at least one unbroadcast episode was put back and aired as well. You are right that the reason JMS pulled the plug was because TNT was demanding a lot of changes with regards to adding sex and violence which he refused to do. From what he said, Skiffy's budget was already set and they couldn't come up with the money to continue the series "that year". But as you say, it has languished in limbo ever since Skiffy acquired it. Someone really, really needs to get a network and give JMS and RO'B, DK and undoubtedly a few others a place to let their creativity run rampant without suit interference. Why they have this misperception that they wouldn't be far more profitable than interfering to produce dren-on-demand completely eludes me.

[Quaisior]

Originally posted by Stargate2077
Anyway, if you advertise falsely, you get the wrong audience to show up and then they will not stay even if the show is good. By the sound of how they wanted to do the promos, they wanted to make Farscape sound like a crappy Sci-Fi show where everything is simple and the good are good and the bad are bad. John getting an alien each week.....Ha!

As a Firefly fan as well as a Farscape fan, I can tell you that false advertising would have been just as bad as no advertising. A lot of people passed on Firefly because the ads made it look like a wacky space comedy and they totally objectified the female characters in the commercials (in truth, they were as strong as the women of Farscape). And, not coincidentally, both shows were treated in almost the same manner by their networks. What is with the anti-SF backlash? <rhetorical question, since I know what's up with it, actually>

Anyway, this article made me so :mad:
:finger: to SciFi, you losers suck! There, I've been wanting to say that for a very long time now! And as sad as I am to lose my favorite show, I think I'm even more worried about what this reality garbage/stupid show trend is going to do to our culture. This lowest-common-denominator, dumbing-down approach is just so wrong!

[Mr Badcrumble]

I always think Buffy is a great example. The suits were all over the film, and it died. Joss gets to do it his way on TV and it's a cultural phenomenon.

You'd think they would've learned their lesson, but no, they decide once again that they know better than Joss, and destroy Firefly.

Their baseless arrogance takes my breath away.

[farscapefan4eva]

who ever posted that article up thank you thank you thank you and to sci fi i hate u hate u hate u. They where about to bring two of my fave characters back in s5 (stark and jool!) but now cos of you blotches they cant...yet! bonnie dear start using your brain instead of insulting peaople by first calling us geeks then by the sounds of it really bad advertising go back to school and learn how to do it properly......

[Bekka/Sicosu?]

frell i just wrote a massive thing about how they improved over the seson (using the sicosu was suposed to be an empty love interest angle) and just frelled up posting it

gods i hate SIFI USA

[Gaussian]

Well......this is what I've suspected for some time.

I had a feeling that the two year contract was contingent on bringing in new viewers hense the change in season four.

Let's not forget, either; that the end of season three was when scifi decided to schedule an 8 month hiatus. Seems a strange thing to do if you're wanting new viewers.

I think they planned to sabatoge it any way they could.

[Stargate2077]

Gaussian: That is not exactly true. Episode 18 of Season 3 aired August 21, 2001. Now from August to December, they showed Farscape from the beginning at 8PM ET. The ratings for the reruns were horrible (Maybe because people were watching the news during 911--personally I was watching both the news and Farscape). Normally they would show the final four episodes in January, but for some reason the pushed it back to April. Now the only reason I can think of that would make them do this is because 911 just happened and the plot of the last four has him blow up a command carrier, which the channel might have thought not appropriate at the time. Since the final four were moved with little promotion, I think that's why the ratings were so low for Season 3's final four.

Now if you discount the reruns of Farscape, the new episodes were on a 7 month hiatus. If you count the reruns, it was a 3 month hiatus.