BlackGeekdom Science-Fiction from a Different Perspective

I don’t know how many shows Sci-Fi has left to air. And at this point it doesn’t matter. The show that myself and many other fans of the character Flash Gordon had been waiting with baited anticipation for has been, in my opinion, a resounding failure.

After the first episode, I realized at the time that many new shows have growing pains; however, the fact that Flash had had been reimagined as a marathon runner who lived at home with his mom should have been my first clue of impending doom. Two more episodes in I figured it was bad enough that it could only get better, and I still thought that the show had potential. When I read that this week’s episode would feature Vultan, the Hawkman, coming to Earth to find his son I thought, “Finally, the show is going to take off!” I was wrong. Spoiler Alert

There was taking off, but guess what…It wasn’t on wings. What!?! No Wings! Are you kidding me? They glided with capes. Taking a page right out of Batman. Okay. Maybe I expected too much. Someone suggested to me that they didn’t want them to look hokey. But they couldn’t look any more hokey if they tried. A bunch of shirtless men running around flapping their capes like wings and screeching like hawks. That was pretty damn hokey. So I’m done. I can’t watch anymore. It’s a moot point anyway since Flash was given the axe for next season along with Dresden Files, one of the best series Sci-Fi had ever done, and Painkiller Jane, one of the worst. But to me, this season of Flash Gordon is over.

Where did Sci-Fi go wrong? They got away from the things that made Flash Gordon a cult classic for the last 70 years.
1. There was no sense of serialization. I know that doing serials is not popular with producers since it complicates syndication. 2. There was always a diverse set of alien races that made the political situation on Mongo interesting.
3. They spent more time on Earth than on Mongo. There couldn’t have been a cost issue, because Stargate Atlantis takes place on other planets. Stargate SG 1 takes place on other planets more than on Earth, and Battlestar Galactica takes place on a space ship.
4. Flash, in every previous incarnation, had been an adventurer. He was always a person with uncanny skill placed in extraordinarily alien circumstances. This most recent Flash was an average guy looking for his dad who just bungles around hoping to stumble across his dad. Flash Gordon was supposed to be just a rallying point for the different races of Mongo to come together to overthrough Ming the Merciless. (At least that’s my interpretation)

Though all these things could be coming to a head on the show, or maybe the writers needed a little more time. But nothing I have seen have indicated any sign of realizing the potential of the show. My biggest problem and the main reason I am not going to watch anymore is that the writers and producers didn’t even seem to try. They didn’t put forward their best effort. The show always feels like no one in the production cares, least of all the actors. They just go through the motions. That’s most evident in the three female lead characters who all have the same characterizations, look the same, and are almost completely interchangeable.

I am going to long into my Netflix account and request the old Flash Gordon serials. I need to drown out my memory of this terrible Sci-Fi Channell effort.
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Posted under Television