Farscape Fans Produce Commercial

angst writes "Farscape fans have come together and produced a commercial called 'I am Farscape'. In the hopes of bringing more media and consumer awareness that the fans of this show are not happy that it is being cancelled. So far it will be aired in 24 cities nation wide. Look for it the week of Nov. 24th if you are in the list."

Re:This has been done before

[Minna Kirai]

Now I feel really old. Kids today... no attention to history.

Heard of Star Trek? The campaign [trekplace.com] that ressurected the cancelled original series is what inspires all of these latter-day fan-intervention imitators.

Re:This has been done before

[Anonymous Coward]

Roswell got another season due to a tabasco campaign. The aliens were partial to tabasco sauce and sent little bottle to the studio.

I can't remember but I think Once & Again had a viewer/fan driven extension.

Star Trek, of course, was the ultimate "saved" show, if just for one more season.

Typically where these work they fail because the network then tries to "tweak" a show to bring in more ratings and destroys it by making it something it never was meant to be (see also SeaQuest DSV -> SeaQuest 2032).

Re:Why was the show canceled?

[Robotech_Master]

There are several reasons given, depending on who you ask and when. Among the big ones are:

Too expensive: The show costs an awful lot to produce, as SF shows tend to, and apparently Sci-Fi's in a bit of a money crunch. The high production cost wouldn't be so bad, except...

They don't own the show; Henson does, as part of the production agreement (though they each finance half the show's cost). Which means SFC doesn't get the back-end income from syndication and DVD/video and such to recoup their costs. Adding to the problem is the fact that...

The show's fandom isn't expanding: Farscape is keeping the fans it has, but it's not causing more people to come to watch the show. See, that's the problem with shows that build up a lot of backstory...if you haven't watched the first four seasons, you have no idea what's going on. (This problem has been noted in other mega-arc-based shows, such as Andromeda.) SFC wants shows that suck more people in (and get them watching SFC). And finally, it's been said that...

SFC is supposedly moving away from "space-based" shows and heading more toward the "paranormal," in keeping with the latest fads/trends in the TV people are watching. Which makes you wonder why they even bother calling themselves "sci-fi," but there you go.

Re:with this much support

[Dallascaper]

I assume you are referring to Nine Network in Australia. Nine thought enough of Farscape to help bankroll it with the Jim Henson Company in 1999. Knowing Australia's bleak history with science fiction, Nine waited until May 2000 to broadcast the first half-dozen episodes. The show didn't do well, so Nine decided to put the show up against the 2000 Olympics. No wonder Farscape hasn't done well in Australian ratings.

My experience with Australian Scapers is that they are among the most vocal and intense Farscape fans out there. Last December/January, when Nine finally broadcast the show's second season, my Farscape site got more hits from Australia than from any other country. My point is that Aussie Scapers may be few in number, but they do have excellent taste in television programming.

Long live Farscape!

Dallascaper
Webmaster, http://www.farscapefantasy.com

Re:It's very ironic

[packeteer]

AOL/Time Warner is very bad but there are 6 coprorations that is considered to own pretty much all media the average american gets. AOL/Time Warner, Viacom, News Corp., Disney, General Electric and Bertelsmann are the companies in no order. 5 years ago it was about 10 companies and 20 years ago there was 50. You can find a list [cjr.org] of who owns what in the world of big business. Just look at the freakishly long list that is owned by only Viacom [cjr.org].

It makes me glad i dont watch tv. Although slashdot is no suppliment for an all enclusive news source it sure fills the most time of my news reading in a day.

Re:This has been done before

[Babbster]

Good examples except one: Buffy the Vampire Slayer was dropped because Mutant Enemy wanted more money per episode than the WB was willing to pay - UPN picked it up before any groundswell of fandom had a chance to build up. No fan intervention necessary. UPN felt that they needed more than one franchise show (Enterprise), so they were willing to pay the green necessary. The WB, on the other hand, still had Angel to keep a lot of Buffy fans watching, Smallville getting a following, and had Birds of Prey in their sights (a WB property via DC, as is Smallville) - I think they figured BoP would meet their "hot fighting chick(s)" requirement.

Re:Why was the show canceled?

[spectecjr]

There are several reasons given, depending on who you ask and when. Among the big ones are

These are all the reasons given by SciFi.

They also have all been - to greater or lesser extents - debunked.

For example - too expensive? SG1's budget was increased for their 7th season, and is way more than that of Farscape.

($2.5MM for SG1 vs. $750K for Farscape, per episode)

Simon

We *have* a geek lobby

[Spoing]

We need a geek lobby. Now.

There are actually multiple lobbies for tech related issues. Some are just starting out, though most have some efforts occuring right now.

The first that has to be mentioned -- even if some moderator is hostile to it -- is the grandaddy Free Software Foundation [fsf.org], though there are others if that one is somehow not to your liking;

Bruce Perens has 3 efforts at the Global Technology Policy Institute [techp.org].

The folks at The Linux Show [thelinuxshow.com] often promote two efforts; GeekPac [geekpac.org] and American Open Technology Consortium [aotc.info]

...and I'm sure that is not a complete list. If you can't support one, support one of the others.

Re:Nielson and digital cable...

[Gutzalpus]

The only people that get "factored in" are the Neilsen families:

http://www.nielsenmedia.com/FAQ/ratings.html#How do you figure out the ratings? [nielsenmedia.com]

Re:Commercials..

[T.E.D.]

Babylon 5 showed me that it doesn't matter how insanely popular a show is, it won't last.

WTF are you talking about? Babylon 5 was going to be a five-year show from the start, and it ran for all 5 seasons. It ended after that not because it got canceled by network types, but because the story was over.