I've written many times about Farscape's ability to take iffy plot twists and make them into really interesting developments. The core of this good writing is a willingness to go dark, to sacrifice beloved elements of the show and bring the characters into some really troubling frames of mind. Farscape never really had a status quo, so it never really returned to one after a big shift in the story.

Different Destinations

A fine example of this show's willingness to go dark is the episode "Different Destinations". As an added bonus, it uses that old sci-fi standby, the time travel plot, to surprisingly strong effect. Some of Moya's crew gets pushed back in time at a historical tourist trap, a sort of interstellar Alamo, to the fateful day when aliens attacked. Having been introduced into a time when they weren't supposed to exist, Crichton and company end up struggling just to make sure history goes the way it was supposed to. Most shows would make sure that it does, either by convenient coincidences or by suggesting that the original history actually included time travelers. Such is not the case with Farscape. The crew ends up screwing over the timeline, ruining a slice of history and causing innocent people to die. This is why I love this show. It's not afraid to use science fiction to hit us viewers with a cold splash of reality.

Eat Me

When I first watched this episode several years ago, I assumed it was a stand-alone weird science plot. After all, no show short of a soap opera would even consider using a clone of a main character in an extended plot. For everyone except Crichton, this principle holds. A mad scientist on a dying Leviathan feeds a cadre of mutants by cloning wayward travelers for live game. Moya's crew escapes having seen their clones eaten, except for Crichton. His clone is alive and well. To make matters more confusing, there's no way to tell who's the clone and who's real. The cloning process is instantaneous and the resulting replicant is an exact duplicate. Cue an existential crisis. For example, for all we know the Chiana who lives out the rest of the series could be the clone and we'll never know.

Thanks For Sharing

The two Crichtons allow Farscape to split the crew into two different parties without losing its show-runner for half the proceeding episodes. One Crichton goes with Aeryn, Stark, Rygel and Crais on Talyn, with the rest of the crew joining the other Crichton on Moya. The reason for splitting up the crew is their pursuit by a Peacekeeper special operations team headed by none other than Aeryn's own mother. At this point in the series, it's high time Aeryn Sun gets her backstory fleshed out. The resulting pathos happens to include some of my favorite episodes in the entire series.

We're heading into the thick of Season 3, which is really the most vulnerable the show ever gets as well as bearing the best performances from the primary cast, especially Claudia Black. Thanks for reading. I'll be back next week with another three episodes.