The Worlds of Farscape (35 page)

This narrative structure should be familiar to any one of us. As David Leemings' ambitious, though not exhaustive, anthology
The World of Myth
illustrates, the Indian Krishna, the Greek Theseus, the French Joan of Arc, the Celtic King Arthur, the Hebrew Moses, the Roman Aeneas, the Native American Hiawatha, the African Wanjiru, the Mesopotamian Gilgamesh, the Blackfoot Kutoyis, and the Jewish Jesus—all of these figures, both fictional and historical, follow a similar path. Therefore, while some scholars may elect another myth as “
the
essential human story” (Leeming 8, emphasis added), the hero's journey will play the lead role in my argument and consideration of
Farscape
fandom. It, more than any other narrative, helps us understand something about who Scapers are and what
Farscape
fandom means.

Even from the briefest review of literature on the subject, it is clear that mythologies are extremely important to and for humans. They help us chronicle and recall details about our past and present. They aid us in our desire to shape our future. They give us a sense of identity and purpose. They provide us order in the midst of chaos and crisis. They bind us together. They justify our actions and social structures (Rowland 103). In other words, myths represent one of many examples of humans engaged in rhetoric. As Krista Ratcliffe defines it, rhetoric is “how we use language and how language uses us.” If grand narratives are considered from a rhetorical perspective, understanding myth does just as much to illuminate the nature and significance of fan efforts to save favored television series as understanding fandom does to illuminate the nature and significance of myth. Thus, exploring the relationship between the myth of fan power and Scapers should prove a most enlightening endeavor.

From its very beginning,
Farscape
attracted a loyal and disparate fan base. Both regular viewers and entertainment critics raved about the series' innovative use of animatronic aliens as main characters (Prescott T02) as well as the creators' choice to the make the starship Moya a “biomechanoid” or living vessel. Eventually, scholars began to notice and comment on its refreshing approach to gender and sexuality (see especially Battis,
Investigating
Farscape). As Jes Battis explains, the series also boasts a narrative arc that spans “galaxies, with a deeply critical undercurrent of discussion around issues of racism, xenophobia, miscegenation, and sexual freedom” (“
Farscape
” 104–105). (With a focus on such issues, it might be said that
Farscape
was the
Star Trek
[1966–1969] of its time.) Simply put, there are a plethora of reasons to appreciate and enjoy
Farscape
. As many viewers, journalists, critics, and scholars have noted, though, it was a series destined to either fail miserably or become a fan favorite, an instant cult classic. It quickly achieved the status of the latter, and most people—especially fans—know what that means, states Alex Strachan: “‘Cult classic' is another way of saying small audience” (D9). Paul Sheehan reduces “small audience” to an even smaller one, calling Scapers a “micro-cult” (3). Thus while there was a large enough fan following to “[generate] a considerable demand for DVDs, soundtracks, computer games, books, apparel, action figures and every imaginable tchotchke—even Halloween costumes” (Belenky A13), the fandom was never able “to grow beyond its core fan base” (qtd. in Petrozzello 72). Unfortunately, no matter how brilliant a television series may be, attracting merely a micro-cult means certain death.

In “The Nitty Gritty of How
Farscape
Got Cancelled,” Scaper Cosmic Theorist notes that Syfy,
³
network home of the series in the United States (U.S.), offered the press the usual reasons for its choice to cancel: high production costs and low ratings (Petrozzello 72). A year before the cancellation, however, on 1 October 2001, then Syfy president Bonnie Hammer, had praised the series and announced a two-year contract for renewal, a move Comic Theorist calls “unprecedented.” Hammer had declared, “We are excited to renew our commitment to this smart, sexy, intelligent, and fun series that rewrites the book on sci-fi entertainment.
Farscape
is not only the most ambitious original series on basic cable, we think it's one of the best-written shows on television, period. It's no wonder that it's the top-rated series on [Syfy] for three years running” (qtd. in Cosmic Theorist). This statement, made eleven months prior to announcing the show's demise, led fans to question the reasons offered for the cancellation. Scapers wanted to know: “What the frell happened?”
Farscape
Executive Producer David Kemper attempted an answer, explaining that there is always “an out clause” for businesses and that Syfy had merely exercised its right to pass on a fifth season. Expressing the entire crew's disappointment, Kemper said, “We are all hugely sad. We all cried on the set ... [but] we are as helpless as anyone” (qtd. in Melloy 20).
Helpless
is not a word that usually appears in fan activist vocabulary. Rather, actions speak louder than such words. Like Athena, fully grown and already armed, springing from the forehead of Zeus, the “Save
Farscape
” campaign (later renamed “Watch
Farscape
”) was instantaneously born. Within moments of Kemper, Manning, and Browder confirming Syfy's decision, Scapers began to organize in not only typical but also original ways (Laskin 54; Morey 83).

Those familiar with contemporary fandom know that
Farscape
fans are not the first media enthusiasts to engage in save-a-show kinds of activism. As scholar and fan of the series Sean Morey notes, the Scapers' campaign “shared its roots with the letter-writing campaign to save
Star Trek
from cancellation in the 1960s” (83). When after only a season and a half the U.S. television network National Broadcasting Company (NBC) announced plans to cancel
Star Trek
, several fan leaders, specifically John and Betty Jo “Bjo” Trimble, stepped forward and began to organize additional devotees. The Trekker community then successfully employed the most effective existing technology to make their discontented voices heard: hardcopy letters written and addressed to network executives. Accordingly, the Trimbles have gone down in fandom history as the show's saviors—even though only one additional season aired (
StarTrek.com
Staff). When the series was syndicated, the cult fandom multiplied exponentially. Today, the franchise's global success strongly suggests the Trekker community exemplifies the famous Vulcan blessing: “Live long and prosper.” In Scapers' case, surface mail to Syfy executives was never going to achieve the same results that Trekkers had achieved so many decades before. Rather, Scapers' letters were “more symbolic in nature” (Morey 83). This homage to the past, though, signals how the myth of fan power may have begun—an origin story. Particularly, grand tales of Bjo, “the woman who saved
Star Trek
,” inspire Scapers and many other fan communities. The legend of Bjo also continues to give fans and their communities a sense of identity, a historically- and culturally-situated model, and the hope of potential triumph. Yet the myth of fan power does not begin and end with Trekkers, although it would be easy to assume the tale of saving
Star Trek
is powerful enough by itself to encourage future fan campaigns. Trekkers' victory arguably serves as
the
essential story that forms the foundation of the myth; however, many other fan success stories provide necessary scaffolding.

Though not as well-covered by the press or discussed among scholars as Trekkers or Scapers, several fan communities have in the past applied enough collective pressure to save their own objects of fandom while simultaneously strengthening the myth of fan power. For example, Rati Bishnoi places
Farscape
in a lineup of fan-rescued series beginning with
Star Trek
and followed by
Cagney & Lacey
(1982–1988),
Designing Women
(1986–1993), and
Roswell
(1999–2002). Regarding the female-centric police procedural
Cagney & Lacey
, Bishnoi attributes the show's survival to fans' letter-writing campaign as well as “growing ratings for reruns and an Emmy for Tyne Daly [who played Mary Beth Lacey]” (9E). The official website for
Cagney & Lacey
confirms both that low ratings caused U.S. television network CBS Broadcasting Inc. (CBS) to cancel the show in the spring of 1983 and that devotees ultimately helped reverse that decision. Showrunner Barney Rosenzweig received thousands of protest letters when the news made its way to the mostly middle-aged, female audience. Of course, much like
Farscape
's Kemper, Rosenzweig himself had no control over the network's decision. As a result, he encouraged fans to write even more letters, yet instead of sending them to the network, he advised devotees to target local newspapers. “Studio heads do not necessarily read their viewer-mail but they do read their daily papers,” argued Rosenzweig (qtd. in “About
Cagney & Lacey
”). In the end, the series was renewed and spent seven seasons on the air. During that time, it was nominated for 36 Emmy Awards and won 14 (“About
Cagney & Lacey
”; Bishnoi 9E). The example of
Designing Women
, says Bishnoi, involved Viewers for Quality Television lobbying CBS and eventually securing a short reprieve for the series;
Roswell
fans, “as part of a ‘
Roswell
is Hot' campaign, sent network execs thousands of bottles of hot sauce,” a strategy that ostensibly convinced The WB Television Network (The WB) to order a second season (9E).

In the midst of “Watch
Farscape
” campaign,
Herald Sun
television critic Robert Fidgeon “received several letters ... from readers wondering if campaigns by viewers to ‘save' shows after they have been axed are ever successful” (47). One of those readers was Lauren Parker, a Scaper. Would her and fellow enthusiasts' activism be in vain? In fact, once in a while fan lobbying does work, notes Fidgeon, but it works best when shows under threat of cancellation are still on the air. As does Bishnoi, Fidgeon comments on the success stories of
Cagney & Lacey
,
Designing Women
, and
Roswell
and to that list adds
China Beach
(1988–1991),
The Sentinel
(1996–1999),
The Pretender
(1996–2000), and
Once and Again
(1999–2002), all of which received extended lives—whether by means of additional episodes, seasons, or telemovies—as the result of viewer interventions (47). Again, these narratives of passion and successful activism are important because they add texture and detail to the fan-spun myth of power, tales that echo Trekkers' love for their series and their salvific letter writing.

For
Farscape
lovers, hardcopy letters were a nice touch, a traditionally tried and true approach, but letters were going to be neither the first nor the only approach. Scapers, who had found each other not in local fan clubs but on World Wide Web message boards and blogs, immediately turned to the technologies they had been using all along. Only hours after the online chat with Kemper, Manning, and Browder, fan-built websites and fan-initiated web petitions were up and running, demonstrating “that people from varied backgrounds all over the world can come together using the Internet to fight a common goal,” argues Laskin (54). The variety of supporters is evidenced by examining the electronic signatures on one of the very first petitions. Using
iPetitions
, Evan Berman started “Save
Farscape
!” on 6 September 2002. Within a day, 6500 people had added their names and comments, and within six days, 30,000 had pledged their support. In the end, however, Hollywood still counts viewers; numbers usually matter more than a micro-cult's intense passion. For instance, “in Australia,
Farscape
battled to attract 500,000 nationally, which is simply not enough” (Fidgeon 47). Coupled with a small viewership, the growing popularity and ease of using the Internet to register one's distaste or distress has made devotee campaigns in general and online petitions in particular an all-too-common response, observes Fidgeon (47). Of course, all-too-common fan responses run parallel to all-too-common network responses.
⁴
Therefore, fans must continue to innovate to make an impact.

In the last decade or so, one of those methods for getting noticed by networks has involved fans using the Internet to coordinate the selection of an object that symbolizes their beloved series or character and the subsequent
en masse
shipping of that object to physical addresses for television studio offices. As mentioned above,
Roswell
fans chose hot sauce, a favorite food item of the show's alien, teenaged main characters. Enthusiasts of
The X-Files
(1993–2002) selected sunflower seeds, the preferred snack of central character FBI Agent Fox Mulder; Browncoats, fans of Joss Whedon's
Firefly
(2002), picked khaki pants in honor of Captain Malcolm Reynolds; and
Veronica Mars
(2004–2007) fans purchased Mars chocolate bars. Even this strategy, though, has become almost commonplace as it has been used quite a few times to arrest the attention of decision makers. Fans understand that these tactics do not work every time and certainly do not work well if predictable. For example,
Veronica Mars
fans hired a small plane to fly from Los Angeles to Burbank with a “RENEW VERONICA MARS!” banner in tow (“About Cloud Watchers”; Cochran 172; Turnbull 320). Though
Veronica Mars
was canceled after three seasons, innovating remains essential for each new campaign. As Fidgeon observes, “
Farscape
fans knew that the usual outcry probably wasn't going to be enough to bring back the show, so they came up with BraScape, their most creative moment” (47).