Just saw a preview for Braveheart on the Sci-fi channel. Am I missing something...this is certainly not science fiction. Could it be that because Mel Gibson recently starred in Signs?...is that the connection?
Using this logic shouldn't they be playing the Naked gun movies? After all, Leslie Nielsen once starred in the movie Forbidden Planet.

Trying not to think about the shows coming on friday night, thats for another post.

Heh. The website says "Don't miss this sprawling tale of a world where magic and superstition were as real as the ground beneath one's feet."

I betcha they run An Affair to Remember in February.

In all fairness, they can only run that Dune miniseries so many times a month...

I wish I had the Sci-Fi channel.. Used to but the cable company here is run by a bunch of (sorry!) *******s. And next year, guess what they are doing? We all have to get Digital Cable. They are discontining the normal cable network. It is only so they can get more money. Again, sorry for the use of that word, but they really are just a bunch of cheap, spoony bards. -Colt

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Be not afraid of any man no matter what his size; when danger threatens, call on me, and I will equalize.

I'll take the sci-fi channel anyday with all its faults over the two "religious" (a.k.a. Screaming Preacher) channels that are part of our basic cable pakcage.

Since we're venting about television...

Am I imagining this, or have TV documentaries become less 'info' and more 'tainment' recently? I seem to recall that a few years ago the Discovery and Learning Channels ran generally reputable stuff, but now their programming is either warm and fuzzy (e.g. That show about people having a baby) or shrill (e.g. Killer asteroids, we're all gonna die!!!). Obviously, it could be worse, but it could also be much, mcuh better.

Screaming preacher channels. I got two of em'. Funny as all get out. Especially the one that keeps telling me the world is coming to an end because his interpretation of the Bible says that the world will come to an end 400 years after when the "chosen people" are taken into slavery. He is basing this on when the first African slave that was brought to the new world.

He's hilarious in a scary sort of way.

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Valiant Dancer

Actually, the cable companies don't have much choice in the matter. The gummint has mandated that all TV stations will broadcast digital programming by 2006 (and discontinue analogue broadcasts as soon as the majority of sets in the country are "digital ready"). The purpose is to phase in HDTV (High Definition TV), but the broadcasters have figured out that they can cram three channels of LDTV (Low Definition TV) into one digital channel, thus tripling the number of ads they can sell. HDTV is still a long way off.

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Be alert! The world needs more lerts.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Kaptain K on 2002-11-22 13:21 ]</font>

The Sci-Fi Channel is changing its focus. It dropped Farscape, the last of its original series, paid something like $168 million to get the rights for X-Files, shows John Edwards, has a new show coming out where caller's dreams are interpreted, airs Frake's (Riker from ST:NG) show where paranormal events are shown and YOU decide whether they depict actual events or something the writers just made up. They have new series for Friday nights based on Tremors the movie. They donated $750,000 for a petition to the US government to disclose all UFO files. They have sent archeologists to Roswell to discover new evidence about the supposed crash. They are running some sort of mobile museum cross country with UFO/abduction junk in it - to promote their Speilberg alien abduction miniseries they paid $40 million for. They did renew Stargate @ $1.5 million per episode for another season, but couldn't find $750,000 per episode for the final season of Farscape, which they had contracted for. They have moved from showing science fiction to horror/paranormal. They seem to have to show at least one giant alligator movie a week. AMC and HBO have done a better job showing scifi in the last week with 2001, 2010, all of the Alien movies plus a documentary on the making of the Alien movies. The Sci-Fi channel no longer offers anything unique, unfortunately. It was the reason I purchased a satellite dish system 7 years ago, since the local cable outfit hadn't heard of the channel nor had any plans to change their programming. They finally added it last year when they went digital. With the exception of Taken to be aired next month, you would probably be better off by not subscribing to cable just for the Sci-Fi channel and using the money to buy DVDs of the programs you are interested in. They would be uncut, commercial free with no annoying popup ads and bugs in the lower half of the screen.

Right on Alan! The Sci-Fi channel has really dumbed down!

I think Steven Speilberg has done some terrific work in the Sci-Fi cinema area, (E.T., Jurassic Park, etc...as well as his non-Sci-Fi films,) but personally, I have ZERO interest in "Taken."

It will of course have great cinematography (a Speilberg hallmark,) and (probably glimpses) of really cool aliens. It will also fuel the "we were abducted" crowd. If the show is popular, some of them might even show up here.

Funny how Alien Abductions, Planet X, Moon Hoax nonsense, Roswell etc...don't catch on until someone makes a movie, TV special, book, or is a radio guest. Funny how these subjects don't seem to originate with the folks most likely to observe them if they were real. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

I'd love a show on Sci-Fi, called ta-ta-da-da!!!! - "Sci-Fi?"

Basically, they do an In Search Of sort of thing, but from a much more skeptical viewpoint. They could go around debunking various psychics, dousers, conspiracy theories, etc. At the same time they could delve into really weird and true science in a kind of compare and contrast sort of way. Hence the "Sci-Fi?"... it's weird, but is it science or fiction? Each episode could be themed like an episode could compare psychic surgeons to high-tech surgical methods (like work on remote surgery with robots), or ultrasound surgery.

Maybe the Amazing Randi could host. It wouldn't be too hard to make interesting to viewers of Sci-Fi, History, TLC, etc.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Rich on 2002-11-22 14:23 ]</font>

Unfortunately, Sci-Fi's highest rated show in viewership is John Edwards so I don't think you could convince them to produce a more expensive show that has the exact opposite demographic, one that is intended to show the audience that their other shows are a scam or a waste of time.

One of the rumors going around for the cancelation of "Farscape", is that the head of the company that took over the sci-fi channel doesn't like 'spaceship' shows.

Except for "Farscape", and SG1 I quit watching the sci-fi channel a long time ago. The show I really miss on that channel is "SF vortex", they should bring it back, it couldn't be any more expensive that Mr I-talk-to-dead-people.

David.

I'll see that ZERO interest and lower you 20 points. I have negative interest in that show. I don't know what it is about Spielberg, but his SF shows just annoy me. Close Encounters struck me as pretentious garbage, and ET as manipulative schlock. I much prefered Poltergeist. Jurassic Park was fun, but i like dinosaurs (I went to see it with a crowd from work--we accepted the dinosaurs ok, but there was a groan of disbelief when they power cycled the Unix boxes in the computer room and they came up without an fsck. Also a few derisive chortles about the user friendliness comments). Anyway, Taken seems to be an excuse to take all the bad alien encounter movies of the last decade or two and run them through the Spielberg grinder.

Yes, that rumor is stated here.

If anyone is interested in helping save Farscape, write to UPN and request they pick up the show at

Dawn Ostroff, President of Programming

Adam Ware, COO

Todd Lituchy, Senior Vice President, Scheduling & Aquisitions

Danielle Greene, Alternative Development, Current programming

United Paramount Network

11800 Wilshire Blvd

Los Angeles, CA 90025


and to SciFi asking them to sell the rights to air Farscape on other networks

Michael Jackson, President and CEO of USA Entertainment

Bonnie Hammer, Executive Vice President and General Manager

Thomas Vitale, Senior Vice President of Acquisitions, Scheduling, and Program Planning

c/o Sci Fi Channel

1230 Avenue of the Americas, F115

New York, NY 10020-1513



Check out http://www.farscapeworld.com/helpfarscape.shtml

and http://www.watchfarscape.com/ for more information.

It is good that they are showing SG-1 on the Sci-Fi channel, at least it is SF. They still show ST:TOS I believe. I don't have the channel but I can still drool over the TV guide. -Colt

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Be not afraid of any man no matter what his size; when danger threatens, call on me, and I will equalize.

Yeah, I thought about that. I don't think they would ever put it on, just that there are plenty of people who would watch it. I've re-thought my proposed host though. They need to bring Lee Ermy over from "Mail Call" on THC. Wouldn't you love to see him get in the face of some pet-psychic or moon hoax beleiver? I would! [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif[/img]

This is all very depressing. I had no idea the Sci-Fi channel was planning such a serious change in focus (I have been out of touch for a while). But on a slightly better note, the Cartoon Network finally bought the rights to G.I. Joe. It's not science fiction (well, now that I think of it, it does have the occasional sci-fi plot), but it is more entertaining than John Edwards. Now that I think of it, we might be able to use him to convince the HBs that the Apollo program was real. If he could contact some of those who were involved, but are dead...

Aporetic

Speaking of the Cartoon Network, do they still show Space Ghost Coast to Coast? I am sure they are still not making new episodes of this, but I'd love to see this show again.

I saw that they braught back GI Joe!! It was on over the summer at 1:00 A.M. but they have moved it to 12:30 now. When i saw this i jumped for joy!!! I love that show. Brings back so many good memories. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

Back on to the tpoic. I hvae noticed that scifi has gone more into the whole ghosts, psychic B.S.. They used to be good, but now thye suck. They will, once in a while, show alien type movies and sci fi shows like when they first started, but now they are going very havily towards fantasy.

I think the Taken series is a way to get more viewers to watch the channel b/c of its big names. Hopefully with the success (uuugggh i hate it too.) I hope it fails, but then again...the show might give them the idea to make more actual sci fi shows. Who knows maybe we can see a return of syndicated sci fi.

I really don't care if they make new shows because other than farscape and the jules verne show they all sucked. They should stick with what they started out with: Sci fi movies and syndicated sci fi shows.

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GIYUL :-)
"It takes Thousands to fight a battle for a mile, Millions to hold an election for a nation, but it only takes One to change the world." - Dan Sandler 2002

Oh yeah, that's great. Gunnery Sgt. Lee Ermey (shouting of course): "Now listen up you superstitious, empty headed non-thinking believers in hokum! The only real hoax is from con artists who want your money! Shadows need not be parallel! The ground also is a reflected light source! The moon looks different from earth because the moon is not the earth! They actually went there! Get it?" [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

I think the only good "Sci-Fi" left on the Sci-Fi channel are the old black & white Twilight Zones! [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

Now they have gone ever further down the path of silliness and stupidity with the supposed archaelogical dig at Roswell. Who knew that a balloon train for an experiment in contant altitude ballons would have caused such a huge amount of nonsense?

They make money off of it--great for tourists....

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"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it." — Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man

441!!!! :)

Gotta' weigh in here.. I have the sf channel and like the others was really excited also... However;
The talk to your dead-aunt guy and the talk to your cat woman is such a complete waste of bandwidth it makes me want to find another culture, Are the american people really this stupid? This is worse than the National Enquirer "Hilliary's Alien baby" /3 new commandments found stuff. I rarely watch it anymore.
Tech tv is pretty good. Though, you have to get past the gen x (gen y?) progeny and the materialistic (he who dies with the latest retina scanning - voice recognition/video gameplaying cell-phone wins stuff).It's a *@#&& Telephone fer chrissakes!!

BTW oh yeah, sorry about the women=evil(keo's proof) thing someone at work posted it and claimed authorship. I had to see where it really came from.

The difference between the national enquierer/Weekly world news and the Sci-Fi channel is that the two magazines know they are stupid and they are making the stuff up.

Sci-Fi is playing off of the recent alien trends and peoples beiefs in the inadequacy of the govt. and how the govt. does nuthing for them. They know that for their priimetime shows they will get the hard core geeks. But they are trying for that crucial womens viewership and also the millions of trailer living hicks and/or very gullible people to get to watch their channel. All of their recent shows have been over govt. coverups and alien abductoins. Check out their new show "Abduction diaries" where they interview people and reenact scenes "unsolved mysteries" style, for people who really believe that.

Truthfully it is all about the ratings. Look at all of the really dumb shows fox has put out. "Who wants to marry a [fake]millionare", "temptation island", ect. they are big ratings grabbers, so who cares if it is stupid of not. The moneymakers in sci-fi don't care as long as it keept their SUV's fed with gas.

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GIYUL :-)
"It takes Thousands to fight a battle for a mile, Millions to hold an election for a nation, but it only takes One to change the world." - Dan Sandler 2002

So what, we're saying that the Roswell Incident didn't happen? (lol) Darn.. and I was ready to head up to the 'mother ship'.

actually, whenever I see something like this advertised on the subway, I like to point out that this is exactly why it's called the Science-FICTION channel.

You are not the only ones with an unfavorable opinion of the SciFi Channel:

http://bboard.scifi.com/bboard/brows...957/1439624/10

Not to get too much off the topic, but I have to add that everytime I go into a book store I have the same reaction that many of you have to the Sci-fi channel. Almost the entire section of those stores labeled Science fiction is taken up with, in my opinion, low brow fantasy that is about one step away from the bodice rippers in the romance section. If you're lucky you'll find a little Robert Forward or Larry Niven, or something that actually tries to be science fiction. Disclaimer: Not talking about Tolkien or LeGuin here, just the junky fantasy that's taken over the science fiction sections of most bookstores these days.

Too many of those sci-fi books are just robot parades. "Hey, look at this totally cool robot I came up with, and this awesome looking spaceship. And I also made up an awesome looking big alien robot thing, too. Here they are! Oh. Oh yes. Some sort of narrative. Yes, yes, I'll get right on that, I suppose." But then again, if that sort of thing gets adolescent males reading, I suppose it's better than nothing.

Aporetic

[edited for spelling]

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: aporetic_r on 2002-11-25 11:06 ]</font>

But the Sci-Fi Channel advertises and portrays it as *FACT*. They did the same with the Blair Witch movie with "documentaries" on the incident and its history. They also ran a series of teaser commercials with footage from "actual events" like a ufo or a kid running into a power substation and getting magnetized with instructions to visit their website to get the full story.

[RANT]They are moving their target audience to uneducated, unemployed, trailer park living hicks in the belief that there are more of them out there who will watch their tripe and give their ratings (and advertising income) a boost, forgeting that their new target audience will be hardpressed to purchase a dead YUGO to set on blocks in their front yard.[/RANT]

I have told Sci-Fi my displeasure at their change in direction, I have removed the channel from my television, and haven't missed it a bit in the last couple of months. I already have Space 1999 and UFO on DVD, all of the Farscape DVDs produced so far. I am considering getting ST:TOS on DVD as a christmas present for me. Babylon 5 is becomi ng available on DVD now, so it will not be that difficult to collect a better library of science fiction programming than that offered by the Sci-Fi channel and since they have decided not to produced anything original from now on (science-fiction-wise), I won't be missing anything in the future from them.