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Which Sci-Fi series to buy on DVD?
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Posted by: ronb

After reading a few threads here, I have decided to start watching (from episode one) either Stargate, Farscape, or Babylon5. I plan on buying the DVD sets, one season at a time. I haven't seen any episodes of any of the choices. Which one should I try? Thanks for any thoughts and/or comparisons!

Posted by: Deja-vue

get the Stargate SG-1 Seasonpack 1-3.
If you buy all three of them, i think there is a Discount at Best Buy, $34.95 for each Pack.
It is really worth it.

That will keep you busy until September, when Seasonpack 4 comes out.
:)

Posted by: metaphore

Hummm, while i love Farscape i'd just catch them on reruns as the series has no ending. (they cancelled it on a whim). I love stargate as well and watch it every friday, but again its not done yet.

Id go with Babylon 5 as it is the best story arc that has ever been on TV. Stuff that comes up for 5 minutes in season one turn out to be crucial to the entire story in season 5. Its brilliant.

Posted by: Philosofy

HIGHLANDER! :)

Posted by: Rob Helmerichs

Farscape has better episodes, B5 has a better overall story, and Stargate is more consistently fun.

Not much help, I know, but they're all great shows in different ways!

Highlander, on the other hand, sucked. :D

Posted by: ClutchBrake

The only DVD set I care anything about is Firefly.

Posted by: VinceA

B5 is the one. You'll be popping discs in for episodes in earlier seasons to find the hints that lead to an event that you're seeing in later seasons. Only the first two seasons are out now with season three due later in the summer (8/12)

Posted by: stevel

Stargate SG-1 is good. The first DVD set is of mediocre technical quality, the second and third seasons are much better.

I am still waiting for the Firefly DVDs...

As for Highlander - well, my wife has the first three seasons on VHS - she was once a big Highlander fan, but she lost interest around season four.

Posted by: Hunter Green

Another vote for B5. Warts and all, the best thing TeeVee has ever brought forth, particularly if you watch it straight through instead of having to wait five years for it.

Posted by: Rob Helmerichs

The important thing about B5 is to give it a chance. The first half of the first season has some pretty dreadful episodes, and it's only in the second half that the overall arc of the series begins to emerge. The second season is much more consistent and engrossing, and the third is possibly the most magnificent sustained effort in TV history.

One thing, though--the acting is always a little, er, low-budget, especially the human characters, and JMS's dialog can be kind of juvenile and mannered at times. If you're somebody who obsesses on details, this might not be your cup of tea. B5 is definitely a big picture kind of show!

Posted by: ronb

Thanks for the really good comments. I've eliminated Farscape since it doesn't really conclude. Still undecided between B5 and SG1. As a point of reference, I have enjoyed futuristic movies such as Fifth Element, Blade Runner, and Total Recall. As three had very strong visual images of future life and life styles. Do these movies bring to mind any comparison points between the 2 series?

Thanks again!

Posted by: Sinuralan

I'd definitely go with B5, but then, I'm buying the B5 DVDs as they come out.

B5 has such a wonderful cohesive story with lots of foreshadowing and tidbits early on, its nice to have it all in a collection. The DVDs themselves arent' the highest quality DVDs made, but I'm glad to have them.

Stargate is fun.. but it's mostly just a by-the-episode show.. not much different to see it on reruns now and then.

Posted by: Rob Helmerichs

quote:
Originally posted by Sinuralan
Stargate is fun.. but it's mostly just a by-the-episode show.. not much different to see it on reruns now and then.

...although after the first season, the production values of SG-1 FAR exceed anything B5 ever dreamed of. The DVDs are true anamorphic widescreen, unlike B5.* For sheer eye candy (expecially on a 16:9 screen), B5 can't hold a candle to Stargate. Farscape, on the other hand, in its final year was absolutely spectacular, shot widescreen with very high production values. I'm dying for the Season 4 DVDs!

*B5 was shot 1.66:1, and matted one way for broadcast, the other for DVD. Some directors were good at framing it so it would look good either way, but many were not, so you get a lot of cropped heads, dead space, and whatnot. Further, the FX were only done in the 4:3 section of the image (JMS wrongly assumed that by the time they did the DVDs, CGI would be cheap enough to just add the extra FX), so any scenes with CGI are first cropped from 1.66:1 to 4:3, then cropped again to 16:9, with a resulting loss of resolution. When the station moves, you can really see the artifacting. Stargate, on the other hand, was shot pure 16:9 from the beginning, so the DVDs show it exactly the way it was intended to be seen.

Posted by: murgatroyd

Buffy! ;)

But seriously --

I can't be a strong advocate for Farscape because I've never been able to get into it. However, what I've seen has some really fine work by the Henson Creature shop, so I can see why others like it.

So that leaves Babylon 5 and Stargate SG-1, both of which I adore, for the same reason, and for completely different reasons.

B5 gets off to a slow start. Some of the early first season episodes are awful -- on the first viewing. On the other hand, once you know the universe and go back and re-watch them, they have a completely different feel. But be warned -- B5 really comes into its own (or did for me) in Season Three, when there was enough of the background and story arc under our belts for us to really grasp what JMS was trying to do. So I agree with the others who say 'give it a chance'.

Taken as a whole, B5 is an extraordinary journey, giving its characters the space to grow and change over the arc of the show. This is especially true of G'Kar, played by Andreas Katsulas. So fabulous to see Andreas, who is so often stuck in dumb thug roles, get a chance to show just what he is capable of as an actor.

B5 is also notable for having so many of its episodes written by one guy. This gives a coherence to the show that was unheard of at the time (and is only found now in stuff like The West Wing and maybe Buffy). Since so much of it is the vision of one person, it feels much more like a novel than an ordinary TV show.

Stargate SG-1? Funny, witty, intelligent, full of action, great effects, and fun, fun fun! It doesn't have the super-duper story arc that B5 does, sure, but it's not a pure episodic show. While you can get a taste for what it is like by watching episodes out of the middle in the syndicated run, there is enough continuity that the show is best watched from the beginning.

SG-1 doesn't foul its own nest, either, like Some Other Shows I Could Name. It's honest through and through -- they don't reinvent the universe every week. They pay attention to where they have been and where they are going. And I love its sense of humor.

With both shows, it's all about the characters with me. So I couldn't recommend either show for a strong visual image of future life or future life styles. The point is not the big sweeping vision of the future, but how each of the individual people within that place and time meet the particular challenges that are presented to them.

So my answer is, it depends on what you are in the mood for. If you want something intense and serious, go for B5. If you want something more liighthearted and action-packed, then SG-1.

Both are on my 'must-buy' list.

Jan

Posted by: tanstaafl

Well, I would say to go for Farscape anyway. Yeah, they got screwed on their ending but if you stop watching 1 minute before the end of the final episode you get a more-or-less satisfactory ending. (And Ben Browder, who played John Crichton in the series) has gone on record as saying that the way they ended, frustrating as it was, does in an odd way fit with the rest of the series.

Besides, they're only up to the middle of season 3 on DVD now which means they're at their peak.

Posted by: JerryLBell

If you're looking for lots of good individual episodes, Stargate: SG1 is an underated gem of a series. The storylines are often quite interesting, the acting and writing are extremely "natural" (the characters sound like real people talking to each other), the special effects range from good to extremely good and occaisionally the show is downright funny. There's no overriding story arc but a LOT of elements introduced in one season are picked up on in later seasons. The show is still in production, so there's no word yet if the series will have a definitive conclusion or just dribble to an end. Only the first three seasons (of six so far) are available in the US on DVD. If you have a multi-region player, seasons 4 and 5 are available in Europe.

If you're looking for a series that feels like a 125+ episode mini-series with a very series story arc that takes five years worth of episodes to fully reveal itself, Babylon 5 has no peer in any TV series (scifi or not) ever made. The first season is a bit wooden and they occaisionally throw in some "standalone" episodes that dont' add to (or detract from) the arc, but if you stick with it, the payoff is immense. The series had a definite ending (though they tried an abortive spinoff series in "Crusade"), so you know when you've purchased the final season that you are done with it. They did do a few made-for-TV movies that are quite good, two of which are available on a single DVD. Like Stargate, the "full" B5 series is not yet available in the US, so you may have to wait several months to see it all.

Both are excellent series to own and enjoy. As a plus, if you have a widescreen TV, both series are shown with 16:9 aspect ratios, giving them a more theatrical feel than, for example, the Star Trek Next Generation and Deep Space 9 boxed sets. Note that the pilot movie for B5 is only available in 4:3.

Posted by: Rob Helmerichs

Some addenda to Jerry's comments about B5: The 2-movie DVD contains the orignal pilot of the series and one of the movies, not 2 of the movies. And, as I noted before, the 16:9 presentation of B5 is marred by the bad framing of some directors, and the double-cropped CGI scenes. There were three movies altogether, two of which have not yet been put on DVD.

Posted by: ronb

Wow... What a wealth of feedback! Thanks for all of the replies. All three sound interesting. I am trying to calculate how many hours I am about to spend watching all 3 of these series! :D

I think I will start on B5 tonight. But I may end up sort of multi-threading SG1 at the same time. I have Tivo'd individual episodes of all 3 in the last 24 hours, so as to get a taste of each. It's kind of hard to pick up the characters and story lines this way, but I could judge (somewhat) the look and feel. Of the three, I seemed to understand the SG1 concept the most, maybe because I saw the movie and remember the basic idea.

Thanks again. I am certainly still interested in comments and feedback, and tips. Sounds like there are some serious Sci-Fi folks out there!

Posted by: Hoffer

Stargate SG-1

Posted by: weymo

quote:
Originally posted by murgatroyd
Buffy! ;)
B5 is also notable for having so many of its episodes written by one guy. This gives a coherence to the show that was unheard of at the time (and is only found now in stuff like The West Wing and maybe Buffy). Since so much of it is the vision of one person, it feels much more like a novel than an ordinary TV show.
Jan

Sadly for everyone, "The West Wing" has potentially killed the goose that laid the golden eggs.

Check out:
http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/en...ter/5810097.htm

Posted by: bprothero

I own the first two seasons of STARGATE SG1 and love the show; but if you want real drama and a piece of TV history, then go for BABYLON 5. B5 has a fantastic 5 year story arc with a beginning, middle and end. It is like a book (or 5 volumn book) with each episode a chapter of the story.

As some have pointed out, season one starts off slow and you couldn't really see where JMS was headed. I remember him hanging out on Compuserve and he would post to the message board daily. We would all beg for hints on what was next, what certain things meant (a scene, comment, etc) and he was purposely cryptic just like his alien character Kosh who's answers would only create more questions.

If you do choose B5, stick with it through the first season as many events foreshadow or tie into future events.

The FX shots do get better during the 5 year run as the CGI technology improved. Unfortunately, as others have mentioned, the CGI shots were rendered as 4:3 rather than 16:9; so I've heard there is some artifacts generated as part of the cropping/resizing process. Yet, the special effects themselves are fantastic and were impressive for a TV series at that time. Prior to B5, all space ship special effects shots were filmed with physical models. B5 was one of the first, other than SEAQUEST, to use digital models with any realism (unlike Space Rangers and other laughable attempts). This, the warehouse filming location and the sometimes cheesy sets kept this independent show on budget (a very low budget for a sci-fi series of this scale). I think they did a fabulous job!

Their are currently 2 seasons on DVD (with a 3rd soon to release... or may have already) and an individual DVD with the pilot episode and a prequel appropriately titled "In the Beginning". It is a good background film; but it does contain many spoilers for the series.

Brian

Posted by: brahamt

Much as I love Farscape, and I have every episode released in the US on DVD and the rest on disk, I gotta say if you are only buying one, it has to be B5.