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tv_talk2025-01-14 08:26 pm
yourlibrarian) wrote in tv_talk2025-01-14 08:26 pm
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TV Talk Rec Fest: SciFi/Fantasy
Welcome to day 4 of Rec Fest! Today please recommend shows which could be considered science fiction or fantasy. These may come in a variety of genre formats but are likely centered on supernatural or futuristic events, worlds other than our own or different versions of our world.
Please include in your recs the following information:
Show Title:
Audience Rating: Young Children/All Ages/Teen and Up/Mature Content
Warnings: (Could include gory content, raunchy situations, explicit sex, offensive content, etc.)
Length of Episodes: (30 minutes/1 hour/Other)
Length of Series: (Number of seasons or number of episodes)
Why you recommend it: (What draws you to it? What niche does it fill/mood is it good for?)
You can copy and paste the following code into your comment.
Feel free to include any other information you’d like, such as what year(s) the show was originally broadcast, standout cast members, or what other shows it may connect to or be like. You can also include outside links to Wikipedia, Fanlore, IMDB, your favorite review etc. which contain more show information.
If someone else has already recced a show you were planning to rec, please include your own rec as well! People have different takes on shows and it can also help people if they see a number of people find a show to be a must-watch.
If you have questions about what to post or how the Rec Fest will run, please ask them at this link, not in comments below
Star Trek: TOS
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: Period sexism
Length of Episodes: 1 hour
Length of Series: 3 Seasons (79 episodes)
Why you recommend it: I don't think I'm very objective about this show as it was my first fandom. However I did a rewatch with my partner in 2020 as he had never seen the whole run, and have to say it held up fairly well. Special effects and sets are pretty unimpressive by today's standards though hair, make-up and costuming are still fairly striking.
As this was an era when serialized storytelling was almost completely absent, the character development is not what we might expect today. But I think it is still present in both the writing and acting. While the writing quality varied, particularly in its final season, when it was on it burned bright. This is an ur show for fandom and TV science fiction, and I think looking at it as a whole will make it clear why that's so.
As an aside, I came to Trek through the animated series (2 seasons, 22 episodes), and while the animation is pretty basic and the 23 minute runtime truncates story development, I think that the storytelling is pretty strong for something designed as a children's cartoon. I expected less during a rewatch and was pleasantly surprised.
Re: Star Trek: TOS
We use it every New Year's eve and watch random eps from all the series. It's fun! :)
Re: Star Trek: TOS
Battlestar Galactica (2004 reboot)
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: Gender targeted violence, suicide
Length of Episodes: 1 hour
Length of Series: 4 Seasons (76 episodes + 2 TV films)
Why you recommend it: While the final season was disappointing to many viewers, the first two seasons are quite strong, and a wonderful reinterpretation and exploration of the underbelly hinted at in the original series. While the show can be grim and depressing, the political aspects and the very real stakes in a fight for survival are highlights. For many characters the storyline can be heartbreaking. though this seems fairly realistic given the circumstances and there are plenty of surprises in people's decisions.
I should add that although the original series is a very different type of show I still enjoyed it on a rewatch as a 70s period scifi show and it would make for good family viewing.
Re: Battlestar Galactica (2004 reboot)
It did lean into more dramatic interpersonal themes (one of the show's strengths) and some of the big theme items seemed... less thought out? in later seasons. But overall I felt invested enough that I enjoyed it all.
Re: Battlestar Galactica (2004 reboot)
Firefly
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: Episode with torture
Length of Episodes: 1 hour
Length of Series: 1 Season (14 episodes)
Why you recommend it: Although Firefly is a mixed bag in terms of how forward thinking it was about societies, there is an enjoyable group of characters here and some wonderful humor. The show presents a mix of rollicking adventures, tense action and a running conspiracy. Unfortunately the series never gets to properly develop its premise given its short run and significant tampering by its network. There is a movie which weaves together some of those threads but the biggest reason to watch is how much the characters grow on you.
Re: Firefly
Re: Firefly
It's certainly not a perfect show, especially in terms of its world-building (interesting, but not quite as polished and certainly not as forward-thinking or as diverse as it should have been for the concept it was going for) however I consider Firefly to be kind of that comfort level of nostalgia that's equivalent to a warm hug. I adore rewatching it, loving the space cowboy vibes, the characters and their found family dynamic, the warm western atmosphere in a scifi setting. As much as I would've loved to have seen what could've been done had it got its chance to properly flourish as a story, it's fun and enjoyable as it is. :)
SurrealEstate
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: Jump scares, they see dead people, danger and physical attacks
Length of Episodes: 43 minutes
Length of Series: 2 seasons with 10 episodes each, 3rd season TBD
Why you recommend it:
Have you ever wondered how real estate agents sell those haunted houses? Luke Roman -- who sees spirits -- and his team do their best to either quell the spooks in a haunted property, or at least to make sure that the dead and the living can reside together in harmony. Tongue firmly in cheek, this show is a supernatural fantasy that is sometimes scary, sometimes funny, and always interesting. It hits that sweet spot for me of the early monster of the week episodes of Supernatural and the comedic chemistry of the Ghostbusters teams.
Re: SurrealEstate
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Audience Rating: Teen and up (I think?)
Warnings: some raunchy situations, lots of cursing
Length of Episodes: 45 minutes
Length of Series: 4 seaons plus 2 movies
Why you recommend it: I have a rec post about it, but ultimately, because this is a scifi show from the late 90s and early 00s featuring practical effects from the Henson creature workshop. It holds up pretty well after 20 years. We have a bunch of non-human characters (including a plant) and non-humanoid characters (including the living ship most of the show takes place on) and a pretty consistent story over the whole series. It's fun!
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I know, right?
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It should be noted that the first season is a bit weak compared to the others. The show was still finding its feet, and there are a lot of standalone eps that feel a little cheesy and popcorny and just... bad? But hold on until you get to the two-parter Nerve/Hidden Memory (1x19/20). It's a pretty good example of where the show will go. Intense and visceral.
Also (of course for me the most important), the romance is amazing.
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Audience Rating: 12/16 years
Warnings: sex, drugs, alcohol, violence, but not all too graphic
Length of Episodes: 40-69 minutes
Length of Series: 4 seasons = 36 episodes (finished)
Wikipedia: Link
Why you recommend it: Umbrella Academy tells the story of seven (adopted) children of Sir Reginald Hargreeves, all of them with a special superpower. Hargreeves trains six of them to fight crime; one girl is left behind.
The first season starts with Sir Reginald's death, and six of his children, now grown-up (most of them have left their past behind and begun to build a new life), return home for his funeral. They soon discover some mysteries about their father, leading them to a future where they must use their superpowers to fight an imminent global apocalypse.
I will admit that the series' story is a bit weird (sometimes a bit more than that), but that's what it lives from. A robot as a mother, a chimpanzee as a butler, a ghost brother, another one living on the moon. Strange, but fun.
The characters are great, even the evil ones, and the storytelling always knows to surprise you with new ideas.
And the best of it: the series has an end! No annoying cliffhanger that leaves you behind with lots of open pots and unanswered questions.
The Expanse
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: None that I remember
Length of Episodes: 1 hour
Length of Series: 6 Seasons (62 episodes)
Why you recommend it: Complex plotting as well as great roles for women make this show stand out for me. I had a hard time getting into it, as S1 had to set up a lot of stuff and it was late in coming together as a coherent whole. But I don't think future seasons had this issue and I really enjoyed the show.
I particularly liked how political issues and factions were central to how the story played out as I don't think this gets seen so clearly in many other shows of any genre.
Re: The Expanse
I love it very much, it's such a brilliant show and I cannot wait to start reading the books as well.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: None that I remember
Length of Episodes: 1 hour
Length of Series: 7 Seasons (176 episodes)
Why you recommend it: It has been a very long time since I've seen any of this show and with 7 seasons and the traditional 22+ episode seasons, there is an awful lot here to watch. However I think in terms of seriality, character development, and a more political and complex sort of role for both the Federation and its member worlds, this iteration of Star Trek is hard to beat as an overall story. I think many Trek viewers would agree that it's held up particularly well as not just a Trek show but as good TV.
Re: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Sense8
Audience Rating: Mature Audiences
Warnings: Nudity, Sex Scenes, Strong Language, Homophobia/Transphobia
Length of Episodes: 1 hour
Length of Series: 2 seasons, 24 episodes (including the Christmas special)
Why you recommend it: Sense8 features a unique story concept: Sensates are species of humans that are telepathically and emotionally connected to one another, and the show centers around a newly born cluster of sensates who discover they are connected and help each other out with the issues in their lives, alongside a very real threat that is after them. This is a very character-driven show that is about the inter-connectivity between human beings, how despite our differences we can understand one another which can help the world become a better place. Created by The Wachowskis, this is a very diverse and LGBT-friendly show that was gone far too soon. I remember when Netflix cancelled it after two seasons (one of the first that they started cancelling) the fans were deeply upset and rioted, creating fan campaigns to help save it, which while unfortunately it didn't get saved it at least got the show a two-hour series finale movie to wrap things up. Even though it rushed certain aspects of the story that was supposed to be told over seasons, it was better than nothing and it ended up a good note.
The show is beautiful, not just the story and the characters but the cinematography is amazing, they literally shot in many places around the world, the way scenes were done to feature the cluster together even when they weren't physically there with each other was amazing (simple, yet clever camera work and editing). It's just a work of art, and clearly a labor of love from everyone involved.
Re: Sense8
Scavengers Reign (2023)
Audience Rating: TV-MA (I think?)
Warnings: All the science fiction xenobiological body horror
Length of Episodes: 23-27 minutes
Length of Series: 12 episodes
Why you recommend it: Scavengers Reign is a haunting, vivid, absolutely beautiful animated series about the survivors of an accident in space that leaves a handful of crewmembers from an interstellar cargo ship marooned on an alien planet whose strange flora and fauna connects differently with each of them. It's visually inventive in a way that had my eyes glued to the screen every second, and every episode had me thinking about what it means to be human and what it means to be part of an ecosystem.
Here's a link to the trailer and official key art from one of the creators.
Re: Scavengers Reign (2023)
Re: Scavengers Reign (2023)
Re: Scavengers Reign (2023)
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: Violence
Length of Episodes: 45 minutes
Length of Series: 2 seasons, 31 episodes
Why you recommend it: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles is a spin-off television series of the Terminator movies, taking place after the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, as it continues to follow Sarah (Lena Headey) and John (Thomas Dekker) as they try to prevent the creation of Skynet from happening. The show has been highly regarded by many to be a fantastic addition to the Terminator franchise, standing on its own while continuing to explore different areas that the films didn't with the focus of the characters, time travel, and different timelines, along with the complicated mother and son relationship between Sarah and John.
The show also gave us the amazing character of Cameron (Summer Glau), a reprogrammed cyborg from the future sent by future!John to help and guide John. Not only is Summer Glau's acting in this superb, given that Cameron isn't human seeing her navigate through the nuances of human interactions and situations is interesting, hilarious, and even heartbreaking at times. There's a lot of tension and questioning of trust of a machine who is trying to help them. Also, the teasing and implications of the building romance between John and Cameron is captivating to watch (as I am a sucker for human/non-human pairings, especially human/robot pairings, this really got me good).
This has quite an ensemble cast beyond just those three, including Shirley Manson of Garbage not only providing a song for the second season (collaborating with the show's composer, Bear McCreary) but also portraying a character in that season, as well.
TSCC was sadly and unfairly cancelled after two seasons, much to many people's dismay. But it is worth watching, especially if you're a fan of the Terminator movies. And while there were definitely plans on more to the story, I personally think the series ends on a nice note, open-ended and full of possibilities.
Re: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Re: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Dark Matter (2015)
Audience Rating: Teen and up
Warnings: Violence
Length of Episodes: 45 minutes
Length of Series: 3 seasons, 39 episodes
Why you recommend it: Based on a comic book series, Dark Matter is set in the future where six people awaken from stasis on a spaceship with no memory of who they are or how they got there, and trying to figure out themselves, from who they were to questioning who they are now, and where they go from there especially once each of their pasts comes back to haunt them.
Despite this description, Dark Matter features a lot of wonderful tropes that are like catnip to me. Aside from it starting with amnesia, we also have doppelgangers from parallel universes, secret identities, time loops, and so much more. Scifi tropes can be a hit or miss, but somehow this show manages to actually make it interesting, at least to me. Obviously what makes it worth it is the cast, because I like this group of characters so whatever ridiculous nonsense they're dealing with it just works because I'm already emotionally invested with them and their little crew.
The show ends on a cliffhanger because Syfy cancelled it after three seasons, but it is really good otherwise.
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Audience Rating: M for horror and gore (no sex)
Warnings: This is a demon possession show, and a fairly violent one, so there's lots of bloodiness, some body horror, etc.
Length of Episodes: 60 minutes
Length of Series: 16 episodes
Why you recommend it:
It's so good! Excellent worldbuilding, interesting look at musok (Korean shamanism), wonderful characters, good plotting and pacing. The three main characters--a psychic, a Catholic priest, and a detective (see icon)--have a wonderful relationship built on fighting back against mutual trauma, and the supporting cast is wonderful too. The main demonic antagonist is sufficiently otherworldly to be scary.
This is undoubtedly a horror show, but it's not a slasher. It's very suspenseful and quite violent, but even if you're not typically a horror fan (as I am not), you might really enjoy this character-driven show.
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Audience Rating: teen and up
Warnings: None that come to mind but I guess there's some gore/violence in some episodes when they're battling aliens.
Length of Episodes: Officially 1 hour, but there are ad breaks, so more like 45-47 minutes
Length of Series: 2 complete seasons (10 episodes each) have aired, it has been renewed for seasons 3 and 4 and it's expected that season 3 will start some time in 2025.
Why you recommend it: Because Star Trek Strange New Worlds (SNW) is simply THE BEST of all the Trek franchises, and an excellent show even outside of the Trek universe.
If you're at all familiar with the Trek universe, SNW is about the USS Enterprise when she was captained by Christopher Pike, before command was transferred to James T. Kirk. So it's sort of a prequel to TOS. Many critics have lauded it for its return to Star Trek's original episodic format, but it does still have on-going background stories. The episodic format does allow for more focus on character development. The show has everything -- great writing, great casting, great production, etc. They've had super serious episodes, fun episodes, scary episodes, a musical episode (which was actually great and I usually find musical episodes total cringe), and even a cross-over episode with an animated series (Star Trek Lower Decks). It gets bonus points for having an episode largely set in Toronto with Toronto being Toronto and not a stand-in for some random US city (the series is filmed here in Toronto). There is nothing negative to be said about this series, IMO. Even if you're not generally into Trek, you'd probably still enjoy it. It probably does help a bit to have at least some passing familiarity with the "big names" from the original series (e.g. Spock, Uhura), but I think it can be fully enjoyed without that -- I'm not a big fan of TOS and have never watched it in its entirety (because so much of it is so bad), but that hasn't affected my ability to totally get into SNW. As I said, it's simply the best Trek yet, and just a damn fine show in general.
In Canada it's on Crave and the Sci Fi network (new seasons only). Elsewhere, I guess Paramount+???
Don't get me started...
Couldn't agree more! And in the musical episode, Ethan Peck wrecked me! I also love Melissa Navia (the new Chekov!).
Babylon 5
Show Title: Babylon 5
Audience Rating: Teen
Warnings: none that I remember, it's very similar to Trek in tone
Length of Episodes: 40min
Length of Series: 5 seasons of 22 eps each + 8 movie-length specials
Why you recommend it:
OMG where to start. Off the top of my head: the space station is full of interesting characters with well thought-out motivations. Some of the most important characters are aliens, some good, some less so, most of them mysterious. We learn a lot about their cultures. There are mind readers. The main antagonist (alien race) is very scary. There's a central storyarc that spans all seasons and involves time travel. Michael J. Straczynski created the show with all five seasons in mind, so it holds together really well. Unfortunately, he was thwarted by the late renewal for season 5 so the plot timing in the last two seasons is a bit wonky, ymmv. Last but not least, it had one of the first canon lesbian characters.
Re: Babylon 5
It is also a tale of resistance and resilliance, and we need those in the days to come.
Wheel of Time
Show Title: Wheel of Time
Audience Rating: rated TV-14 with violence, some nudity and language.
Warnings: Season 2 deals with a culture that enslaves and tortures.
Length of Episodes: 54-69 minutes.
Length of Series: 2 seasons, 8 episodes each. Season 3 premieres March 13th.
Why you recommend it: Do you like a large and varied cast of characters? Romantic and platonic BFFs? Do you like pretty fantasy costumes? Cool magic systems? Extremely cool villains? An expansive fantasy world with varied cultures? Does a whole magical faction with a lot of power in the world, consisting only of women, peak your interest? (behold our awesome lady Pope!) How about psychosexual fixations? Some loyalty kink? Bound by fate to fight the Dark One/doomed by the narrative?
There are so many great characters on this show!! Though season one opens on a much smaller scale, and was strongly hampered by Covid and a main cast member abruptly leaving. The world opens somewhat through the first season, but in season two the political games and factions come much more into play. And there is evil in the world.
Or to parrot the flawless rec from an angry chud on Twitter: Season two is just a bunch of middle-aged women with strong jawlines talking at one another.
(false, but also, ✨✨✨)
To close this off: they cast Shohreh Aghdashloo. I am very aware this is highly relevant to some of y'all's interests. *g*