Via Chuck, I see where Boston.com put togther a list of the Top 50 SciFi TV Shows of all time. The list and my comments on it are after the break, though - on preview - I will say that any list which includes Batman and Sliders but not The Prisoner might as well be written on Charmin Plus (With Lotion).
50 Earth - Final Conflict
49 Wild Wild West
48 Third Rock From the Sun
47 Buck Rogers in the 25th Century
46 That Was Then
45 Greatest American Hero
44 Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
43 Nowhere Man
42 Science Fiction Theatre (1955-57)
41 Futurama
40 Thunderbirds
39 The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
38 Batman
37 Space: 1999
36 Bionic Woman
35 Battlestar Galactica (original)
34 Avengers
33 Lost in Space
32 My Favorite Martian
31 Alien Nation
30 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
29 Six Million Dollar Man
28 Adventures of Superman
27 Buffy the Vampire Slayer
26 Stargate Atlantis
25 Jetsons
24 Wonder Woman
23 Tales from the Crypt
22 Andromeda
21 Quantum Leap
20 Hitchhiker
19 Dark Angel
18 V
17 Firefly
16 Flash Gordon
15 Logan's Run
14 Star Trek Voyager
13 Outer Limits
12 Xena: Warrior Princess
11 Lost
10 Sliders
9 Mystery Science Theater 3000
8 Dr. Who
7 Twilight Zone
6 Stargate SG-1
5 Babylon 5
4 X-Files
3 Star Trek: The Next Generation
2 Battlestar Galactica (new)
1 Star Trek (original)
I'd insert my standard disclaimers about stupid website lists (especially ones that are posted one entry per page to drum up ad banner traffic), but you're probably already familiar with it. And you didn't come here for my mealy-mouthed rationalizations anyway, let's get to the vitriol.
48 Third Rock From the Sun
I guess Alf was too high-brow.
In these troubled times, it's hard to believe the genius of French Stewart was once confined to the small screen, especially in light of his meteoric rise to superstar after Inspector Gadget 2.
47 Buck Rogers in the 25th Century
35 Battlestar Galactica (original)
29 Six Million Dollar Man
2 Battlestar Galactica (new)
Glen A. Larson was the Aaron Spelling of TV sci-fi. He was executive producer for all of these shows, in addition to two not included on the list: Manimal (heh) and Knight Rider.
[Come to think of it, where the fuck is Knight Rider? The Batmobile couldn't even talk.]
All of Larson's early shows had some interesting ideas, but couldn't compete with the '70s cheese factor or the need to include ridiculous romantic angles.
Still, I'll buy Buck Rogers, as it's hard to believe the girdle technology necessary to harness Gil Gerard's mighty gut existed back in 1979.
45 Greatest American Hero
Hey, remember that episode where Mr. Hinkley (redubbed "Mr. H" following the attempted Reagan assassination) had a hard time flying? Hilarious.
44 Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
38 Batman
24 Wonder Woman
It appears all superhero shows are "science fiction" by default, even ones that are essentially romantic comedy-dramas in disguise (Lois & Clark), or ones that are really just Syd and Marty Krofft prototypes (Batman). And as much love as I have for Wonder Woman, it was hardly good sci-fi. More like BDSM 101.
41 Futurama
25 The Jetsons
Both of these deserve to be listed, but you leave the door open pretty wide. I can think (Jonny Quest) of at least (Escaflowne) twenty (Galaxy Rangers) animated series (Battle of the Planets) that should (Transformers) be included (Star Blazers) as well(Macross).
33 Lost in Space
I could never watch this show for too long, Dr. Smith always gave me the creeps. And that was even before this guy in high school invited me over to his house to see his collection of Dr. Smith paraphernalia.
Oh god, what a breakthrough. {collapses sobbing]
31 Alien Nation
Seriously? I never caught this when it aired (basshole and I were usually watching cable access), but the movie was awful. An interesting concept subordinated to a moronic buddy cop plot.
30 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
Hot damn, I'd totally forgotten this one. Ranks up there with CSI: Miami as one of the most unintentionally hilarious shows ever made. Vincent Price led an army of evil puppets in one episode. In another, the Admiral was turned into a werewolf.
This isn't on DVD, why?
23 Tales from the Crypt
20 Hitchhiker
TFTC is more horror than science fiction, surely. That being the case, I'd put Night Gallery ahead of it.
Still, gotta give it up to HBO's entries. Finally we get some much needed nudity on this list.
18 V
Meh. A decent miniseries, but didn't work in a weekly format. One can only watch so many alien invasion stories before asking, "Didn't these technologically advanced races ever develop antibiotics?"
15 Logan's Run
see #31. Only in this case, being based upon a sem-classic sci-fi movie doesn't make for semi-great (or even good) TV. Replace this with The Dead Zone.
12 Xena: Warrior Princess
Not only do I reject the proposition that Xena was a better sci-fi show than Futurama, Buffy, Quantum Leap, Firefly, or The Outer Limits (to name a few examples), I'm also not sure it was better than Hercules: The Legendary Journeys.
11 Lost
Time will tell. It seems to be off to a good start, but - as with any show that creates mystery upon mystery - its true success will be measured when everything is finally revealed. J.J. Abrams and company have made a decent show of it to this point.
10 Sliders
Or, as it might be more aptly titled, What If Marvel's 'What If' Series Became a TV Show? Sliders shouldn't even rank in the Top 10 of Shows Aired on FOX on Friday Nights.
5 Babylon 5
Only saw a few episodes of this, so I'm not really the best judge. It was certainly an ambitious effort.
14 Star Trek Voyager
3 Star Trek: The Next Generation
1 Star Trek (original)
Far be it from me to argue against the high placement of the original Star Trek on this list, but putting the erratic Next Generation at #3 and the generally awful Voyager at #14 while completely ignoring Deep Space Nine? Neptunian, please. DS9 was the best of the new Trek series, hands down.
I haven't seen a number of the entries on this list. Some because they're too old, some because I didn't have a means to record them back in the day, and some because I just don't watch a lot of TV anymore. And while it would give me great moral superiority to denigrate everything on television as mindless pap, the truth is I just don't have the time.
My top 10 would look something like this:
10. The X-Files
9. Futurama
8. Blake's 7
7. Star Blazers
6. Firefly
5. Star Trek: Deep Space 9
4. The Twilight Zone
3. Star Trek (original)
2. The Prisoner
1. The Man From Atlantis
Hm, maybe I better think about this some more.
I'm not sure I've ever watched an episode of Man From Atlantis. I'll strongly agree that Farscape and DS9 deserve a place in the list. And Galaxy Rangers rocked.
And if we're including shows that lasted less than a season, why not Harsh Realm?
"Are you kidding me? This is Harsh Realm. Kindness is when your buddy robs you and shoots you and DOESN'T rape your woman. "
Pete at APCB takes a gander at a list of Boston.com's 50 Top Scifi Shows of all time. He's unimpressed, and makes his own list. So, my top 10. I'm excluding superhero shows and horror from the start. The ranking......
| --Posted to Owlish Mutterings on Oct 5, 2005 5:45 PM:. |
Quark. Richard Benjamin deserves more press for boldly hauling what no man had hauled before.
I'm not saying it was a good show by any means(though that hardly seems a prerequisite for this list), but wouldn't "Mork and Mindy" qualify as sci-fi? And wasn't it at least marginally better than a good deal of these shows? I'm not saying it would get MY vote; just thought I'd throw it out there.
No. I'm sorry. No. You're wrong and you're hurting people.
Anybody who fails to list the original Twilight Zone as the #1 scifi TV program of all time should be shot. And the Nightstalker doesn't even get a mention? That's all screwed up.
I wash my hands of this. You're dead to me.
Anyone remember a late '80s show called Probe, starring Parker Stevenson as a brilliant, arrogant prick of an inventor? It was waaaaaay ahead of its time, and vanished after about 4 episodes, but I'd rank it in the Top 10.
And btw, I've seen Gil Gerard recently on the autograph circuit, and it looks like he ate William Shatner. Seriously--he needs a truss for his jowls, fer chrissakes.
Fascinating, Captain...sensors are detecting a distinct lack of Duffy love.
And I've never seen Farscape.
DS9 better than TNG? The hell you say!
Good god, did I really just have that conversation?
"And I've never seen Farscape."
The fact that one of the primary characters, Rigel, (who is a short, disgusting, froggy little muppet who floats around on a hover chair) is known to fart helium on occasion (when he gets nervous or excited, mostly), should draw you in immediately. There is also an episode that has several of the characters enter a universe which turns them into cartoons, Chuck Jones style, that is absolutely brilliant.
Basically, it's the first sci-fi series where the great ensemble cast is shown farting, pissing, fucking, hating each other, hallucinating, etc. It is the antithesis of the sterile perfect world of Star Trek and from episode to episode threw curveball after curveball, never becoming stagnant or predictable. If the dvds weren't so damn expensive, I'd own the whole series by now.
It also has the best first episode of a series, sci-fi or otherwise, that I think I've ever seen.
Alien Nation was actually decent, and for good or bad was one of the shows that started to put Fox on the map (along with Depp's 21 Jump Street).
There seems to be a blurring of lines between sci-fi, fantasy, and horror genres here. Now in some camps, these are all sub-genres of the larger fantasy genre, but I say Ffffahh to that. A show is either predominantly based on the elements of horror (gives you the creeps), fantasy (swords and sorcery derivatives of Tolkien's work and oral traditions before that), or sci-fi (based on, dare I say it , science (predominantly in the future sense - including space travel, extraterrestrial contacts, and new twists on developing scientific methods and theories (nanotechnology, robots, DNA splicing, etc.).
* Buffy I would put in the fantasy realm (having demons and vampires, with or without souls, does not really inspire the creep factor)
* Night Stalker and Night Gallery (mentioned in the posts) would qualify as horror as they creeped the shit out of me as a youth.
* I agree with Pete, that comicbook superheroes for the most part don't really belong in the sci-fi genre, although they have some characteristics (especially with superman), but don't really rely on science to advance the storyline.
* In a similar vein, I would not put Lost in the sci-fi genre either, because it really hasn't shown one way or the other whether it includes sci-fi elements.
*Twilight Zone and Outer Limits both have enough sci-fi stories to qualify for this list, as well as many other horror/fantasy lists.
* And why are the Bionic Woman and 6 Million Dollar Man considered Sci-fi? Just because they have some implants doesn't count (or perhaps we should put Bay Watch on the list too). The story is really in much more of an action/secret agent vein than anything else.
* What about the Land of the Lost? Should that be considered Sci-fi? After all they fell through a portal and those Sleestaks with their Pylons definitely were sci-fi elements. I used to watch this show all the time, and the Sleestak factor should put it above many others on this list. Oh yeah, that talking proto-human kid was really creepy.
"Chaka! Chaka No botha!"
Wow, TTTWLAM, I thought that I and the three friends I arm-twisted into checking it out were the only people in the country who ever watched Probe. (Everybody else -- including the rest of my family -- had to have their Cosby Show.)
TTTetc, in the 80s you weren't secretly a fuzzy-haired junior-high-school girl named Tonia, were you?
Futurama is #41?? Forty One?
Feh, why bother reading the rest of the list? They obviously are having some quality head/ass time.
TTTetc, in the 80s you weren't secretly a fuzzy-haired junior-high-school girl named Tonia, were you?
--Posted by Karen at October 6, 2005 09:23 AM
If I had a huge rack that made me the fantasy of every boy and the envy of every girl...then yes, yes I was.
(And btw, I go by "Champagne" now, and you can catch my show every Thursday-Sunday at the Boom-Boom Room. Bring your wallets, guys, and splurge for the VIP treatment--you won't be disappointed!)
Great list with just a coupla omissions. I'd add The Invaders (Roy Thinnes), American Gothic (Lucas Black), and Night Gallery. The Invaders successfully brought the "there are aliens among us and I'm the only one who's seen them" theme to TV. American Gothic was short-lived but featured some solid, nonderivative writing and a fine leading performance by child actor, Lucas Black. Night Gallery wasn't Serling's greatest creation, but it did provide some creepy moments, especially the Earwig episode. I lay awake in bed late at night terrified to sleep because I knew that damned earwig was awaiting her chance to turn my brain into baby food.
I see one glaring omission on this list: Farscape
I rank Farscape, Firefly, and the new Battlestar as my top three Sci-Fi shows of all time currently. And before anyone disses it because of the presence of muppets (and shame on you for that! Star Wars had muppets, for crissakes), think about all of the forehead prosthetic combinations we saw on the various Trek series. As if all lifeforms in the galaxy were bipedal- please!
On a side note, I was looking for Man From Atlantis on this list just for the sake of sheer sillyness, and lo and behold Pete lists it below! It's hard finding anyone that even remembers that wacky pre-Dallas effort of Patrick Duffy.