Television

XOXO, Puppet Girl #7

Farscape 1x13 & 1x14

Well, here it is: the episode widely regarded as worst Farscape ever. But first--"Rhapsody in Blue", an episode of which I have no memory.

Everybody awakens from sexy but sad dreams. We only see John’s directly: it’s a memory of his ex from Earth, Alex, dumping him immediately after they finish having sex so she can move to Stanford for a fully funded PhD. Good for her!

The crew discovers their dreams are a message from a nearby colony of Delvians, Zhaan’s species. Here we learn that Zhaan is bald on purpose. Many of the others have blue hair. The Delvians’ monastery is located in a completely blue German Expressionist version of The Orient.

Yeah, this is one of the German Expressionism ones.

Tahleen, the leader of the Delvians in the monastery, approaches Zhaan, seeking an exchange of psychic skils. Tahleen demonstrates her power by manipulating John’s mind.

Zhaan agrees to help Tahleen for some reason. She and John remain at the monastery. The other Moya crew members are not monk material. Zhaan reveals her sad sex dream to John. She murdered her last boyfriend, Bitaal, with her psychic powers, which is why she was imprisoned on Moya. John freaks out about yet another of his friends proving a murderer. Zhaan explains that Bitaal was her teacher (sketch that he was dating his student) and a Delvian leader, but that he refused to step down when his term limit was up. Bitaal hired the Peacekeepers to enforce his will, so Zhaan killed him by destroying his brain during their sexual psychic Unity. Now Tahleen wants Zhaan’s secret to psychic assassination.

Tahleen wants to torment John for some reason, so she makes a minion use psychic powers to summon a shade of Alex the Ex-Girlfriend to gaslight John.

For yet another impenetrable reason, Zhaan decides to share her psychic secrets with Tahleen. We see Zhaan share Unity with Tahleen, which is a fun bit of simple expressionist-style image-layering and intercutting as their minds and bodies merge. Obviously Tahleen steals all Zhaan’s psychic secrets and releases Zhaan’s evil self. Now Zhaan’s eyes are red, obviously.

John finds Evil Zhaan and tries to talk her back into sanity. Being evil does not make her receptive, so John searches the monastery for Tahleen. Alex the Ex-Girlfriend tries to distract him sexually. Pilot manages to break through the sexy appeals of Alex to get John back on track. When John finds Tahleen, she explains she’s collecting this psychic power to free the Delvian people, but her explanation makes no sense because we, the viewers, know almost nothing about what’s going on with Delvia or indeed minute-to-minute with this episode.

John is overwhelmed by false memories as Alex the Ex-Girlfriend gaslights him wildly, telling him that they are married and he needs to prioritize her over Zhaan.

Tahleen murders her own father when he tries to stop her from doing whatever it is she plans to do. She’s evil now too, so her eyes are red.

John tries to persuade Zhaan to come to Moya with him, but she’s still evil. John mentions Alex and Zhaan points out to him that Alex isn’t real. Then Alex shows up and admits to John that she isn’t real and she turns back into a hot Delvian lady. John is a bit cheesed off about this subterfuge. I think I will start counting “Times John Experiences a Sexual or Romantic Violation by a Villain”. At least this Delvian lady repents and apologizes.

John goes to evil Zhaan and goads her into doing Unity with him. Their heads fuse together and they go into the blue space. John freaks out a bit, but together they find the good Zhaan and John exhorts her to return, lifting Zhaan out of her despair by being a good friend. He’s a very sensitive guy, despite his fella-core posturing.

At Zhaan’s direction, John destroys the monastery’s sacred root. Tahleen tries to intervene and Zhaan trashes her. Zhaan gives up her role as Delvian spiritual leader.

When I describe it like this, maybe it doesn’t sound so difficult to parse? But it is incredibly mysterious to me, more mysterious than the other German Expressionism Farscape episodes. It lacks a strong emotional core. Zhaan’s struggles with her evil self and John’s struggles with his ex-girlfriend are half-assedly exposited and obscured by pointlessly weird camera angles. In describing the plot, I’ve had to say “for some reason”, like, five times. It’s not a winner, it’s a mediocre mid-century European psychological horror movie minus the rizz.

But at least it isn’t especially racist. Now on to the one that is.

Jeremiah Crichton

John has a big meltdown about being stuck in space for so long and bitches furiously at D’Argo, Zhaan, and Aeryn. He flies off in his module, but Moya needs to leave at exactly the same moment, due to pregnancy reasons. John is stranded.

John goes to live on a planet that is a lot like an Australian beach. Wow, time passes. We know this because John grows a god-awful beard. He catches a big funny puppet crab.

People live on this Australian beach planet, including a beautiful girl who seems to be into John. Unfortunately, the going style of dress is a combo of red and purple which attacks the eyes. Also, more importantly, the way these people are depicted is racist. Lishala, the beautiful girl, is a delicate and innocent princess, and played by an actress who appears East or Southeast Asian. Rokon, a mean guy who is vaguely sexually threatening to her, is played by an actor who is Black. They’re all “simple tribespeople” who were long ago bamboozled into believing Hynerians, Rygel’s people, are gods.

Oh, yeah, so that’s the plot of this episode. John’s friends on Moya have been looking for him this whole time. D’Argo is especially regretful that they didn’t support John during his emotional crisis at the beginning of the episode. Zhaan thinks John was being a bitch, and I’m inclined to agree with her. They arrive to the planet and find the settlement where John’s living. There the people recognize Rygel as their god.

Ugh, I literally forgot the tribespeople wear conical straw hats. If you told me this episode was written by the same lady who did Star Trek: The Next Generation’s “Code of Honor” and Stargate: SG-1’s “Emancipation”, I would not be surprised.

Aw, jeez, I forgot Rokon has an aggressive, domineering mother. She’s possibly the only Black woman who ever appears in the show and she is the villain. I hate this episode so bad.

John is still mad at his friends for upsetting him when he left, and this makes D’Argo sad. He explains that they’ve been searching for John for the last three months, and John forgives him a little. The local warriors feel threatened by D’Argo and comically immobilize them by throwing wee video game-ass nets over them. Anyway, that’s when the villagers find Rygel and think he’s God. They all bow and genuflect. Nubile maidens dress and rub Rygel.

There’s a prophecy of some kind about Rygel. I do like seeing the Rygel puppet out and about in new locations. He reminds me of my chubby cat.

John pedantically explains to Lishala that her religion is fake. She reveals that if Rygel proves to be a false messiah, he and his associates will be tortured to death.

Obviously.

Rygel discovers that his ancestors entrapped these people on this planet with a device to reduce them to a state of low-tech dependency on the Hynerian culture.

There’s so much “[ambient tribal dancing]”. I think the writers didn’t have much story for this one. What story they did have is bad.

Rokon’s mom overhears Rygel lamenting his status as emphatically not a messiah. She turns the tribespeople against Rygel, John, and D’Argo. Zhaan and Aeryn drop some supplies to the fleeing dudes. Oh, right, Zhaan and Aeryn are characters in this show. I forgot because the writers forgot to give them anything to do in this episode.

Zhaan and Aeryn’s drop reveals to John where the Hynerians hid the devious device which suppresses advanced technology on the planet. He and Rygel destroy it, proving that they’re nice guys after all. The tribespeople forgive them. Rokon turns out to be an alright guy outside the influence of his evil mother. He and Lishala will get married, because evidently she is not that into John, even though that was the crux of why Rokon hated him at the beginning of the episode.

John, D’Argo, and Rygel go home. We don’t even get a scene where Zhaan and Aeryn meet John upon his return.

THAT’S IT! THAT’S FUCKING ALL! This episode is like if a nothingburger could contain both nothing and racism at once. It's None Pizza with Left Racist. How's that for a vintage meme...

I considered not covering this episode, but it would be wrong to pretend Farscape committed only funny crimes. This episode is one of Farscape’s least forgivable crimes.

Let’s never watch it again.

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We’re through the doldrums now, me lads! Next time, two episodes which are 1) pivotal and 2) quite good as I recall. And…a new character joins the Moya crew!