Sell your favourite "cult" TV show to everyone in one post in this thread

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

Easy. You have one post here, some words, pictures, maybe a video or two, to put across your favourite "cult" TV show of all time. These could be sci-fi, kids, old spy or detective shows, weird stuff...anything really unless it's popular right now. Hopefully this means that some new people will get into the programme you love.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

I'll promote the sci-fi-tastic...

Farscape

Farscape ran around the turn of the century into the early 2000s before being cancelled after the fourth series. Fans of the show, as with Firefly, wrote plenty of complaint letters about it being cancelled. To finish the story (which had been left on a tiny weeny little bit of a beautiful cliffhanger) a two part mini-series was produced with a bigger budget, titled "The Peacekeeper Wars" which wrapped things up nicely....but.....but..... *sigh*

Also as with lots of sci-fi there has been loads of comic books and fan fiction surrounding the Farscape world, along with plenty of rumours about new series, web episodes etc.

....and it had Claudia Black (also known for Stargate along with Farscape co-star Ben Browder, as well as her voice in the Uncharted games and Dragon Age).

My favourite of all the sci-fi totty. *sigh*

Anyway, Farscape was good because it was filmed in Australia and all the actors etc pretty much (except for Ben Browder) were from Australia or New Zealand. It gave it a nicely different slant. Also, they weren't afraid of using animatronics. In fact it was a big lure of the series as some great creatures were set up by Jim Henson's workshops (an integral part of the venture).

One such creature was "Pilot", the, well, pilot of the ship they travelled in - Moya. Oh yeah, Moya was a living ship. Pilot is plugged into her and feels what she feels and talks directly to her. Therefore, while they can suggest what they want to do, ultimately their movement is determined by a living creature that exhibits fear, hate, love, happiness, pain etc.

Quick intro to the series. Human pilot guy John Crichton flies into space in his mini space shuttle (known as the "Farscape 1", part of the Farscape Project). Once up there a wormhole opens up and grabs him, depositing him in some space a long way from home, in the middle of a big space battle in fact. Anyway he ends up on the big living ship Moya, which is being manned by some runaway criminals - a big blue plant lady, a touch-but-stupid soldier alien and a little dude who is a deposed leader of billions of once-loyal subjects. Then the lovely Claudia Black joins the team from the "baddies" (not that she has much choice about it). We also get various crew-joinings and crew-leavings as the 4 series go on (of course).

The first series is a reeeeeaaaally wonderful look at how they're all thrown together but don't trust eachother whatsoever.

The second series builds on that, gets a bit formulaic at times but has some excellent 2 and 3 part episodes.

The third series is the greatest sci-fi series in the history of television and gets darker (and also weirder).

The fourth series changes all your concepts of who good guys and bad guys are and gets slicker.

Another really strong point of Farscape are the main villains. As the series goes on you have episodes where the main "Peacekeeper" villains don't figure and you get villains of the week (one such episode is the fantastic first series episode where they end up on a planet, digging up plants with planet dwellers who are doped up to the eyeballs). However overarching that is the constant threat (sometimes closer, sometimes more distant) of the Peacekeepers and, later, the Scarren.

The first main villain (Crais), the second main villain and main antagonist throughout the series (Scorpius) and the final main villain (Grayza) all have MOTIVATIONS. They all show good side and bad side. They all have reasons for what they're doing that aren't all selfish and two dimensional. In fact, the "good guys" like Crichton are often selfish and make bad decisions.

THIS IS THE BIGGEST STRENGTH OF THE SERIES. It is not black and white. Not good and bad. Not yay and boo. Everyone is flawed, everyone has skeletons in their closet and even the biggest baddies have true motivations. A later episode focussing on a younger Scorpius changes EVERYTHING.

Oh yeah, Scorpius. I remember watching it when I was younger and half-dismissing the gimp BUT he's an amazing TV character. Really, REALLY well fleshed out. Everything he does is motivated and has a reason and he's brilliant. Add to that his alter-ego "Harvey" (who's in Crichton's head) and the way that he and Crichton are pulled together at the heart of the series.....brilliant.

So yeah, Farscape. It's camp at times, weird at times (it has a few weird episodes set in Crichton's head, an episode that is mostly ANIMATED and an episode told purely throw random half made-up flashbacks from Crichton's shore-leave), is over-acted at times and has a main villain who looks like he's straight out of a BDSM porno. However, for me, there is no better sci-fi show. It has a cult following on a par with Firefly and both were cancelled far too early.

Here are some clips. You might hate it, but the world it paints is wonderful and it pained me when I finished watching through the series - there would never be a new adventure to watch. Oh, and wormholes.

[Gazz]

[LittleDaniel]

I don't even care who wins.

[Liam]

Summer Heights High

Whilst short lived, this is just a really funny comedy from New Zealand (or Australia......it's all the same >_>). Chris Lilley, who then went on to write and star in Angry Boys, plays three different characters: an effeminate drama teacher (Mr G), a Polynesian boy who is always getting in trouble (Jonah) and a rich girl who is doing an exchange (Ja'mie). The show follows them across a term, and what they all get up to.

Whilst not always hilariously funny, it has enough stuff going on per episode that is worth a watch. The Mr G character in particular is brilliant, as he tries to think of an idea for the school musical. Jonah is also pretty funny, whilst Ja'mie is a little more hit and miss. It all builds up, leading to an awesome end show with the musical.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAoATVaCTCo

Two clips there, one for Mr G and one for Jonah. If anything, it is only 8 episodes, so you might as well give it a try >_>

[Berober]

I'm on it.

[Sousa]

The episode of The Simpsons where they join the Movementarians because nanananananananananananananananaLEEEEADEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEER.

[Maxx]

PEOPLE LET ME TELL YA BOUT MY NEW BEST FRIEND!

BARNABY JONES!

Nap.

http://video.adultswim.com/frisky-dingo/meet-barnaby-jones.html

[Lint]

I'm promoting Jack Of All Trades. Just watch the intro..you'll be hooked

[The Brian J]

The show is based on a sci-fi novel by Robert Sawyer, and aired on ABC in 2009-2010. The premise is (sorta) simple - on October 6, 2009, everybody in the world blacked out at the same time for about 2 minutes, and saw a vision of themselves 6 months in the future. Naturally, the blackout wreaks havoc on the planet, but the big question remains - why did it happen.

The main character of the show is FBI agent Mark Benford, who is trying to piece together clues as to what happened. The ironic thing is that he GOT the clues from seeing his future - in his vision, he had a completed "Clue Board", so he follows leads from his vision to get the clues to complete the board itself. There are several central characters on the show, and we get to see how their lives change based on the visions they saw, as they try to figure out if it's a definite future they saw, or if it's just a possible one. There are a lot of surprising twists and turns that the show takes, to the point where each time you think you've started to piece everything together, the show suddenly throws a new element or plot point your way that

The downside is that the show only lasted 1 season, and ended on a sort of cliffhanger, so while a lot of questions are answered, not ALL of them are. It's available on Netflix Instant right now, and if you like suspenseful sci-fi, it's absolutely worth your time. A lot of fans still hold out hope that a Season 2 will be made, but considering the show was cancelled in 2010 and there's been no word on another season, it seems doubtful the show will ever have closure.

[C-MIL]

PEOPLE LET ME TELL YA BOUT MY NEW BEST FRIEND!

BARNABY JONES!

Nap.

http://video.adultswim.com/frisky-dingo/meet-barnaby-jones.html

First thing that came to my mind.

How long ya been ridin', Tex?

[I Don't Mind]

Trailer Park Boys

Canadian mockumentary following drug dealers Julian and Ricky in their illegal activities in their trailer park. The duo are joined after season one by the near-blind kitty-loving Bubbles. Throughout the entire series the group is harassed by Park Owner Jim Lahey and his consistently shirtless assistant Randy.

[Your Mom]

I did a quick bit of Farscape research to find out her character name. Chiana is hot

[Benji]

I did a quick bit of Farscape research to find out her character name. Chiana is hot

Gigi

[Damian WayLNKe]

Everyone should go watch The Night Stalker with Darren McGavin...or even the remake TV series. McGavin plays a newspaper writer that is always investigating some sort of supernatural being that nobody believes is real. If you liked The X-Files, then you'll probably like this.

Instant Streaming: http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Kolchak_The_Night_Stalker/70202871?trkid=2361637

[MLWXTREMEHORSEMAN]

R.L. Stine's Goosebumps television show:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qf3InKohXQ0

I can remember on Saturday nights, YTV (Canadian channel) would air this and Are You Afraid of the Dark as well as countless other shows (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, System Crash, Breaker High, Freaky Stories and Radio Active). It's what made me want to get school over with during the week and then go sit home on a Saturday night to be spooked out of my mind.

*sigh* I miss those days...

[Stevie B]

Tucker was so awesome! Cannot believe this show got cancelled. It was such a big hit over here when Nickelodeon started broadcasting it... then we all found out there was only 11 episodes ever made, so it got a bit tedious after a while. Still, so much wasted potential.

[StevenRichardsRules]

No love for Undeclared or Freaks and Geeks?

For shame, EWB!

[NM!]

I would think these are already universally loved on here. By "cult", I think they mean shows that EWB isn't killing themselves over.

[Guest mr. potato head]

Trailer Park Boys, Summer Heights High, even Goosebumps

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