Entry tags:
Farscape Rewatch: We're So Screwed (Part 3): La Bomba (4.21)
Wiki summary: Crichton and the crew of Moya, must find a way to escape Katratzi before the Scarrans decide that they are disposable.
I feel all the possible flower puns were probably already made. When I first watched this episode back in the day, I felt the "this flower trumps wormholes" was a bit sudden and unbelievable. Upon this rewatch, I just think Scorpius is lying when telling John that destroying the intelligence flower would cancel his "wormhole debt" so John gets rid of the flower for him, so no problem there. Also, I wonder whether if Zhaan had never been written out the show could have done something with her plant nature that would make the entire flower plot less flower ex machina and more connected to the show.
The Scarrans needing the flower to be more intelligent strikes me as the kind of weakness Scorpius would have targeted before now if it had been less of a last minute idea. Otoh, it actually would provide them with a motive for all the attempts at producing hybrids beyond "favoured body horror trope for Sci Fi" if they're looking to get rid of such a genetic blind spot this way, but you'd think genetic engineering would work better. Aaanyway.
What I remembered best about this episode were Braca's Finest Hour on the one hand, and the John and Grayza scene on the other. Both were still very good when rewatched. The later because while John Crichton isn't the sole male lead character who is raped in canon with canon acknowledging it as such anymore whom I've seen, he's still one of a few, and I feel the way Farscape handles it to be bracingly honest. There's never the suggestion that because Grazya is an attractive woman, John enjoyed the experience at any level, as there would have been in most media I'm familiar with. That the whole thing comes up in a scene that's actually about something else - Grayza's last attempt at her "negotiate peace with the Scarrans from a position of wormhole strength" project - makes it even better. It's not a Very Special Issue Scene (tm). And the audience is trusted to get what he's referring to when John says "raped" without any elaboration.
As for Braca - here for the first time gaining a first name spoken out loud: after Crais and Scorpius, Grazya is the third superior he watches losing it (well, okay, Scorpius didn't quite, but he certainly got close), and the way he prepares his takeover and executes it flawlessly, complete with recitation of the appropriate paragaph - chef's kiss. Though I have to say, if the Peacekeepers have such a law, how come no one thought to use it against Crais (after Teegan's death)? I especially appreciate that Braca taking over command here isn't on Scorpius' behest, or to rescue him, but to prevent Grayza from driving everyone on board to a pointless death. Which says something about how Braca sees his duty.
As for what I had forgotten: last week's Stark being bioloid!Stark. I'm not sure I buy Scorpius' argument that Stark would never torture him - any input from a Stark expert,![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
astrogirl? -, and I'm not clear on how the bioloid machine replicated the part of Stark's face that's pure energy. Otoh, Stark in whichever version always took his duty to the dead very serious, and him not abusing this ability even to take revenge on Scorpius, this would have been my argument as to why the other Stark couldn't have been the genuine article.
Speaking of bioloids, just as I had forgotten last week's reveal, I had forgotten this week's follow up that Sikozu isn't a bioloid but a Kalish with specific modifications. (Though I did remember her radiating all the Scarrans to death.) Possibly because The Peacekeeper Wars immediately backtracked on the "secret resistance fighter" backstory revealed here.
John's mental scenario with Harvey this time casting himself as a corrupt cop is pretty telling. Mind you, Scorpius not having learned anything new about wormholes from Harvey is something he should have figured out himself (given that otherwise, Scorpius would have had no motivation to bother with the Aeryn rescue deal), and having Harvey reactivated only if John doublecrosses him is a very Scorpius thing to do. I appreciated the double conversations scene - which I hadn't recalled - much more this time, not least because Wayne Pygram really plays Scorpius and Harvey and the way they talk to John quite differently by now, and it shows how much has happened with all three since the s2 finale.
Detonating a thermonuclear bomb: it's never just science, indeed. Blowing up bases is par the course for our regulars and the season finale by now, but I did notice the episode took the trouble of killing off the only Kalish who has had sympathetic interaction with our heroes before the nuking, and unlike last season's finale, there was no child in sight. But there were still thousands of people - Scarrans, Kalish, Charrids - on that base, and so we get a final scene showing Crichton's awareness that mass killing while escaping is something he does and keeps on doing by now. How many construction workers on the Death Star?
The other episodes
I feel all the possible flower puns were probably already made. When I first watched this episode back in the day, I felt the "this flower trumps wormholes" was a bit sudden and unbelievable. Upon this rewatch, I just think Scorpius is lying when telling John that destroying the intelligence flower would cancel his "wormhole debt" so John gets rid of the flower for him, so no problem there. Also, I wonder whether if Zhaan had never been written out the show could have done something with her plant nature that would make the entire flower plot less flower ex machina and more connected to the show.
The Scarrans needing the flower to be more intelligent strikes me as the kind of weakness Scorpius would have targeted before now if it had been less of a last minute idea. Otoh, it actually would provide them with a motive for all the attempts at producing hybrids beyond "favoured body horror trope for Sci Fi" if they're looking to get rid of such a genetic blind spot this way, but you'd think genetic engineering would work better. Aaanyway.
What I remembered best about this episode were Braca's Finest Hour on the one hand, and the John and Grayza scene on the other. Both were still very good when rewatched. The later because while John Crichton isn't the sole male lead character who is raped in canon with canon acknowledging it as such anymore whom I've seen, he's still one of a few, and I feel the way Farscape handles it to be bracingly honest. There's never the suggestion that because Grazya is an attractive woman, John enjoyed the experience at any level, as there would have been in most media I'm familiar with. That the whole thing comes up in a scene that's actually about something else - Grayza's last attempt at her "negotiate peace with the Scarrans from a position of wormhole strength" project - makes it even better. It's not a Very Special Issue Scene (tm). And the audience is trusted to get what he's referring to when John says "raped" without any elaboration.
As for Braca - here for the first time gaining a first name spoken out loud: after Crais and Scorpius, Grazya is the third superior he watches losing it (well, okay, Scorpius didn't quite, but he certainly got close), and the way he prepares his takeover and executes it flawlessly, complete with recitation of the appropriate paragaph - chef's kiss. Though I have to say, if the Peacekeepers have such a law, how come no one thought to use it against Crais (after Teegan's death)? I especially appreciate that Braca taking over command here isn't on Scorpius' behest, or to rescue him, but to prevent Grayza from driving everyone on board to a pointless death. Which says something about how Braca sees his duty.
As for what I had forgotten: last week's Stark being bioloid!Stark. I'm not sure I buy Scorpius' argument that Stark would never torture him - any input from a Stark expert,
astrogirl? -, and I'm not clear on how the bioloid machine replicated the part of Stark's face that's pure energy. Otoh, Stark in whichever version always took his duty to the dead very serious, and him not abusing this ability even to take revenge on Scorpius, this would have been my argument as to why the other Stark couldn't have been the genuine article.Speaking of bioloids, just as I had forgotten last week's reveal, I had forgotten this week's follow up that Sikozu isn't a bioloid but a Kalish with specific modifications. (Though I did remember her radiating all the Scarrans to death.) Possibly because The Peacekeeper Wars immediately backtracked on the "secret resistance fighter" backstory revealed here.
John's mental scenario with Harvey this time casting himself as a corrupt cop is pretty telling. Mind you, Scorpius not having learned anything new about wormholes from Harvey is something he should have figured out himself (given that otherwise, Scorpius would have had no motivation to bother with the Aeryn rescue deal), and having Harvey reactivated only if John doublecrosses him is a very Scorpius thing to do. I appreciated the double conversations scene - which I hadn't recalled - much more this time, not least because Wayne Pygram really plays Scorpius and Harvey and the way they talk to John quite differently by now, and it shows how much has happened with all three since the s2 finale.
Detonating a thermonuclear bomb: it's never just science, indeed. Blowing up bases is par the course for our regulars and the season finale by now, but I did notice the episode took the trouble of killing off the only Kalish who has had sympathetic interaction with our heroes before the nuking, and unlike last season's finale, there was no child in sight. But there were still thousands of people - Scarrans, Kalish, Charrids - on that base, and so we get a final scene showing Crichton's awareness that mass killing while escaping is something he does and keeps on doing by now. How many construction workers on the Death Star?
The other episodes
no subject
Did I hear my name invoked? :) I have been reading these posts and enjoying them, by the way, but it's been so long since I've done a Farscape rewatch, myself, that I haven't felt I've had anything useful to contribute, comment-wise.
And I'm afraid I probably don't this time, either, really, as these are issues I always had, myself, to the extent that that whole plot device never set well with me, even if I did try to be okay with it just because it at least meant we got Stark back before the end. :) But I do remember my reaction to Scorpius' assertion that Stark would never torture him boiling down, basically, to "really?" We've seen Stark be capable of a lot of things in his darkest moments, and his hatred for Scorpius is deep. But when Scorpius is that confident about something, it's hard not to believe him, and he did spend a lot more time with Stark than the audience did, honestly. So I can either chalk it up to Scorpius actually knowing him, and exactly where he draws his lines, better than I do, or figure that what he actually means is that he knows Stark wouldn't do it in that particular way or under those circumstances, or on behalf of the Scarrans, whom he also hates, or... something. None of which is 100% statisfying. And the bioloid being able to replicate the energy part of him doesn't make any sense to me at all, in a way that really can't be dealt with by any means other than trying not to think too hard about it. Well, it's hardly the only plot point in Farscape about which that's true. (Although, hmm, looking back on the notes I made at the time, I seem to have a comment that might suggest I thought the Scarrans just faked it somehow. Don't remember the details well enough to say now whether that's plausible or not, though.)
I also had issues with the idea that the thing Stark was hiding from Scorpius all along was the location of Katratzi, but that's another matter.
no subject
Re: the energy part, it occured to me that the Scarrans could have simply re-used one of their heat rays, since the effect on Scorpius seems to have been the same as when he was exposed to the later, which is utterly different from how the dying react when Stark exposes his face to them otherwise.