by Jess Anastasi
If you ever ask me about my favorite sci-fi heroes, one of
the first that always comes to mind is John Crichton from Farscape. His journey
from scientist without a clue of what he landed himself in the middle of, to
badass space soldier who saves the universe is one of my favorite character
tropes.
Back in the late 90's and early 2000's, sci-fi shows were
actually doing okay. Maybe it was the turn of the new millennium or something,
but there were a number of them on TV at the time, with Stargate SG1 leading
the pack. For a while through the late 2000s, a few new sci-fi shows popped up
every year, but none of them seem to catch on. Shows like Terra Nova, Almost
Human, and Intelligence never got more than one season. It seemed like sci-fi
just wasn’t marketable anymore. But with the recent popularity of series such
as Killjoys, Dark Matter and The Expanse, and Netflix ordering a remake of Lost
In Space, I’m hopeful that’s about to change!
Considering the fact that Farscape, as whacky as it could be
with all those puppets and what-not, managed to last for four seasons is pretty
remarkable in the current cut-throat, ratings-driven television industry.
One of the things that really hooked me on this show in the
beginning was the relationship between John and the ex-peacekeeper soldier
Aeryn Sun. After recently re-watching the series, now I remember why.
From the first moment these two laid eyes on one another, the chemistry sparked
to life. In the pilot episode, even when they didn’t know each other, they both
put the other first to detriment of their own well being. Aeryn spoke up for
John when the villain, Crais, threatened to lock him up and experiment on him.
Crais turns on Aeryn, and accuses her of being contaminated. When John realizes
this means a death sentence for Aeryn, he risks his own life to take her with
them when they escape.
From there the connection only deepened. I don't know if maybe the fact that
they were the only two humans on board the ship Moya had anything to do with it
or not, but John and Aeryn continually gravitated to one another.
The amount of body-on-body contact these two have in the
first four episodes alone is more than some TV couples get in an entire season.
They covered everything; when the ship was making an emergency landing on a
planet (which structurally it wasn't designed to do), Aeryn and John wedged
themselves into a corner and braced against one another. When the ship
overheated and Aeryn started deteriorating because her people can't handle
extreme high temperature, John lost it for a moment over the fact that Aeryn
may die. When D'Argo put on a cuff that made him more aggressive and started
shooting at them, they took cover in a corner, pressed up against one another.
And let's not forget stuff blowing up and Aeryn landing on top of John. Yep,
they were pretty much all over one another. It’s exhausting to keep up with!
The relationship with Aeryn aside, I really love the
character of John Crichton. He started out as a scientist lost in space, who
didn't know much about weapons or defending himself. In fact in the fourth
episode, he blew up Aeryn's rifle when he tried to fire it. And there's several
times when he runs instead of fighting. But as the seasons progress on, and he
has no choice but to fight in order to save himself and Aeryn, John becomes the
Alpha male, but still retains that sensitive side, the one which fell in love
with Aeryn so easily and could still hold out hope, even when things were
looking so dark.
One other thing that’s so great about John — he’s one of
those tough guys who couldn't stop the tears. A bit like Dean Winchester on
Supernatural. Yeah, they're tough guys who'll do anything to protect the ones
they love, but if something really gets to them, they're not ashamed when a few
manly tears roll down those handsome cheeks. And you always remember the first
time. Like with Dean, when he made that desperate phone call to his dad,
because he was worried about Sam.
For John, the first time we saw this depth of emotion was
toward the end of season one. Crais had been relentlessly chasing them all over
the galaxy to get revenge for John killing his brother in the first episode
(though, it was an accident, a collision that happened only moments after he
first came through the wormhole).
Moya’s crew manage to capture Crais, and while he's locked
up, John goes to confront him about why Crais wouldn't listen to reason and
just leave them alone. Until that point, no matter what had happened, John had
just gone with it, adapting as best he could. But I think in that moment,
everything that had happened finally caught up with him, and the knowledge that
he may never get home to see his friends and family again, that he was stuck in
this deadly galaxy he still didn't quite understand, just trying to survive, overwhelmed
him, and the emotion needed to come out. Yeah, give me a tough guy who cries, and I'm a sucker.
If you happen to be a sci-fi fan and haven't watched
Farscape, then you're seriously missing out. Yes, yes, I know the puppets and
the hardcore costumes are a little much at first. But if you can manage to get
past that, then you're in for some sci-fi romance gold. In fact, I wouldn't
hesitate to say that Farscape has been to date the best example of sci-fi
romance and how well it can work on TV, and will probably retain that title for
a very long time.
*This post was adapted and re-blogged from
jessanastasi.blogspot.com
Jess has been making up stories ever since she can remember.
Though her messy handwriting made it hard for anyone else to read them, she
wasn’t deterred and now she gets to make up stories for a living. She loves
loud music, a good book on a rainy day, and probably spends too much time
watching too many TV shows. Jess lives in regional Victoria, Australia,
with her very supportive husband, three daughters, two hyper-active border
collie dogs, and one cat who thinks he’s one of the kids.
Atrophy will be on sale for only 99cents from the 1st-8th of August!
www.jessanastasi.com
Twitter @JessAnastasi
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