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1[[foldercontrol]]
2[[folder:Why did Aeryn stay on Moya at first?]]
3* Aeryn Sun can't go home to her Peacekeeper planet. In one episode, she wants a [[Main/MadScientist mad scientist]] to find her a Sebacean planet where she would be able to live. However, just a few episodes earlier, they were at a Sebecean planet, and since they just saved that planets ass, it'd make no sense for them to report her. So why didn't she just go down and start living there?
4** She wasn't looking for just any planet, she was looking for the planet she came from.
5*** Nope, she states that she was born in space.
6** Because Aeryn has been a Peacekeeper since birth, she's not going to be any more at home on a planet full of Sebacean farmers than she is on Moya, its not Sebaceans that she misses, its the Peacekeeper discipline and lifestyle specifically.
7** Because they weren't Sebaceans. They were Sykarans. (According to the Sci-Fi channel site.) Related, but different.
8*** Indeed; John makes the mistake of assuming they're the same species and gets an earful of CulturalPosturing from Aeryn about it.
9** Not to mention that Sykar was a terrible choice to settle down on to begin with. It's quite hot during the day (don't forget that Sebaceans have a terrible time with heat).
10** Aeryn's not from any planet. She was born on a [[TheBattlestar Command Carrier]] like most Peacekeepers who aren't conscripted as children, like Crais and his brother were.
11** Also, Season 1 Aeryn would not have found any appeal in farming. If she ''had'' to settle on a planet of Sebaceans, she would probably have preferred a commerce planet where she might have been able to get work as a bodyguard or something.
12[[/folder]]
13
14[[folder:Why does Rygel stay on Moya?]]
15* He constantly tries to abandon the ship in the middle of a crisis, usually making the crisis worse as he does so. The ship is usually in the middle of nowhere when disaster strikes, and it's not really clear where he thinks he's going. Since he knows the ship gets into trouble on a regular basis, why doesn't he just disembark on any random commerce planet?
16** This was actually addressed. The cousin that deposed him put on bounty on him, so he's not really safe on his own. In a later episode, most of the crew went their separate ways, only to come crawling back to Moya after learning that they ''all'' have bounties on their heads.
17** Repeating from the opening post - he tries to abandon the ship in the middle of empty space ALL THE TIME!
18** My surprise is why they keep him around anyway. I think that he is just very cowardly and gets irrational (I never seen him as very smart too) and also between a sinking ship and the ocean, what is the better choice? Plus, "middle of nowhere" is a rather open term, the entire space can be described like that.
19** They keep him around because he's a better diplomat than any of the rest of them (with the possible exception of Zhaan) and on the rare occasion when he's helpful, he's far more helpful than anyone else on the ship. Plus, it's useful having a guy who can fit into DRD tunnels around in case you need to get some repair work done: refer to the episode with the beacon embedded in Moya's nerve bundle.
20** In her "I'm About to Sacrifice Myself to Save All of You" speech(there's probably a trope for that but I'm lazy), Zhaan refers to Rygel as "wise", and he was -- its just hard to see when he's also a complete selfish ass.
21** My assumption is that they kept Rygel around because he masterminded them originally taking over Moya. In a way, it's thanks to him they're all free and safe, so it's natural they'd be grateful. And also maybe their standards for him are less then their standards for everybody else (excepting maybe Chiana, sometimes).
22** They keep him probably firstly because it's an unwritten rule that they're all equal, fugitives, with the same right on and to the ship (see episode where they finally decide on a captain, which is seasons into the show; by this logic, if there is no one "more equal" than the others on anything, there is no one "less equal" or worthy to throw out). Strangely, the case of Rygel masterminding their escape was rarely brought up by the crew, usually just by him when he's boasting ''to others'' about his well-planned escape: this may be because he did it foremost to get his own ass out, which is obvious, so they really have little to be grateful for. As for leaving in the middle of space, it's implied he's very survival-savvy and could probably get on any other crew on any other condition, just by bargaining some precious stones or blackmailing the future crew if they try to screw him over.
23** In the Boom!Studio comics, which are an official continuation of the show and even written by some of the writers of the show, Rygel does eventually leave Moya to reclaim his throne (in fact, the short story "Horizons", which is considered non-canon, even has Rygel retaking his throne with the help of the Moya crew in a similar way as seen in the comics). So, after the events of The Peacekeeper Wars, which also mentions that he'll be leaving for Hyernia, he does.
24
25[[/folder]][[folder:Why does Crichton always carry that tape player around?]]
26* He could probably pick something better up at an alien pawn shop.
27** This troper seems to remember Crichton expressing a desire in Season 1 to get the tapes back to Earth, and it would be more convenient if the humans could actually play them.
28** Sentimentality. It's something from Earth, made on Earth by humans. I'm not sure why he had a tape recorder in the cockpit with him in the first place, but still.
29** Because he's a scientist and probably wanted to make his own notes during the Farscape experiment.
30** Because in the final episode, when the worm hole is closing and John leaves Earth behind, he leaves his notes on the Moon at the Flag his father planted. The notes will give us a few hundred years of technological progress and force us to restart lunar exploration just to get the notes. And by using tape he knows we can use them.
31* How long will that tape stay magnetized?
32** Certainly long enough for one of the many nations on Earth to scramble a mission to the moon. We've been there before, remember? We could dust off the old Saturn 5 blueprints and build another one if we had to.
33** Although this would be exceedingly difficult, given that many of the engineers who worked on the Saturn 5 are now dead and the industrial infrastructure that built the original Saturns isn't there anymore.
34** It would mostly just be expensive. All of the technology to fly to the moon exists, and NASA (among other space agencies) has the knowhow to fly such a mission. Given a compelling enough reason (such as John's notes) to fly to the moon, we could do it given enough cash.
35[[/folder]]
36
37[[folder:When did Moya's crew become fluent in English?]]
38* In the documentary shown in "Constellation of Doubt," they seem to be conversing fluently, but their stay on Earth didn't seem that long in Terra Firma. And if they're not speaking English and we're just hearing them as John would, why isn't the documentary subtitled for viewers who wouldn't have translator microbes?
39** Maybe [[HandWave they had the ]][[VoodooShark camera injected with translator microbes.]]
40** Maybe they just got the original version, when only the people who interviewed/commented got translator microbes. When they scooped it up for all we know it could have been being ''emailed'', or in the middle of being edited to include said subtitles. That stuff can take time.
41** The show made it pretty clear that they were at least attempting to learn English before and during their stay on Earth. The footage may have been from after they got the hang of it.
42** This brings up another question. How can you even learn another language, when you don't actually hear it? All you hear is the translated version.
43** It could be that the microbes leave the sounds phonetically intact and just sort of overlay meaning over them rather than the listener hearing everything in their own language. That would actually render other languages easier to learn, and might explain why idiosyncratic phrases are poorly translated and why characters who try to use English phrases (notably Aeryn) end up saying things that sound like, but are amusingly different from, the actual phrase, e.g. "churl power" for "girl power" and "she gives me a woody" for "she gives me the willies."
44*** We know that Aeryn was learning actual English outside of phrases that she heard from Crichton. In the first of the Season 3 two-parter ''Infinite Possibilities'', the Crichton she was with on Tayln was shown teaching her how to read what he had written in a journal. She is seen again trying to read his journal at the start of Season 4's ''Unrealized Realities''. And, in ''Kansas'' from the same season, the crew hang out in an abandoned house and had access to a TV, with them watching episodes of ''Sesame Street'' and ''Wheel of Fortune'', which probably helped them understand how to pronounce letters and some words. But, it's pretty clear that most of what they learned they picked up from hanging around Crichton for as long as they have.
45[[/folder]]
46
47[[folder:{{Translator microbes}} in general.]]
48* One of the very first episodes has them crash-land on a planet that has never seen outer space and treats Crichton like an ET. Unless one argues that these microbes are literally everywhere but Earth, how could they possibly understand him? They seem to be used as a HandWave more often than not.
49** If it helps, the "Journey Log" episode recaps on the old official site at least hung a lampshade on that, speculating that maybe there were microbes indigenous to that planet.
50** Link? [[VoodooShark That makes even less sense.]]
51** The world may have been "seeded" by a species that spoke a language the microbes knew, just so long ago that they'd forgotten about it (as shown happening a few other times). Since they would have had translator microbes to start with (and they would have been passed down), this could have kept the language stable enough that John's microbes could still parse it all those cycles later, and they could understand him. Same explanation works for an earlier situation, where the native population is ''explicitly'' stated to have been put there and to have been more advanced at one time.
52[[/folder]]
53
54[[folder:The assumption that the Peacekeepers are {{Always Chaotic Evil}}.]]
55** Sure, the commanders we have met haven't been too nice but considering the heroes of the show are a bunch of escaped convicts from their point of view how nice should we expect them to be? On my last run through of the series it seemed more like they were like the federation from star trek on the brink of war with an AlwaysChaoticEvil civilization on their border as viewed through the eyes of escaped murderers.
56** Well, they're not assumed to be Chaotic Evil- they're ''known'' to be Lawful Evil mercenary police with a penchant for conquering their own clients. As for "escaped murderers," only Zhaan was a murderer- she killed her lover for taking over Delvia (with Peacekeeper assistance). D'Argo was framed by his brother-in-law. Rygel was deposed by his cousin in another Peacekeeper-assisted coup. Aeryn was discharged for spending too much time with aliens. All in all, the Peacekeepers aren't as bad as the Scarrans, but they're certainly not the Federation.
57** The escaped murders line is valid. Zhan, and Dargo were ''convicted murderers''. Dargo may be, in fact, innocent but the Peacekeepers believe him to be guilty. While the reasons for Rygel being overthrown are never made explicit, just listening to the guy talk for 5 minutes will tell you all you need to know about what kind of ruler he was. It's more accurate to say "escaped prisoners" but I don't think that changes the sentiment, or makes it less true. How nicely should the Peacekeepers treat their escaped prisoners?
58** It's made clear that Crais was privy to the fact that D'Argo was innocent, and refused to speak of it. Plus, Rygel's attitude problems don't necessarily mean he was a bad ruler- especially compared to his cousin, who was facing so much bad publicity by ''Peacekeeper Wars'' that he just about ''begged'' Rygel to come back and take over.
59* What bugs me is... why are the Scarrans considered to be worse than the Peacekeepers? They do most of the same stuff, good or bad, and both are focused on expanding their territory.
60** Peacekeepers don't generally perform genocide, mass rape, or the barbecuing of 8 month-old fetuses. True, they're not angels, but when you compare them to the Scarrans, who frequently boasted that they'd cleanse the galaxy of all "inferior" races and hybrids if they ever got the chance, it's best to chose the lesser of two evils.
61** Agreeing with the above. The Peacekeepers are generally LawfulEvil but the Scarrans are ChaoticEvil when they're not trying to be diplomats. The Peacekeepers tend to fall into the category of KnightTemplar slash WellIntentionedExtremist, while the Scarrans just sit in the [[TakeOverTheWorld Galactic Domination]] slash EvilOverlord territory. I mean, it's not like either are ''good'' choices by any means, but, well, I know which one I'd vote for.
62** The thing people often forget about the Peacekeeper territories is that the Peacekeepers were ''invited in'' by the legitimate governments of the planets they protect. We've seen only a slim fraction of their command structure and general population, so judging the whole race by the few corrupt officials we've seen may not be entirely fair.
63** We are kind of forgetting that the Peacekeepers aren't a race, but a Sebacean political organizations. An entire species (like the Sebaceans) being AlwaysChaoticEvil is kind of a stretch, but an organization can self-select for certain personality traits.
64** The show went out of its way to show the [=PK=]s weren't AlwaysChaoticEvil. Power corrupts though, so the high-ranking [=PK=]s we saw tended to be in WellIntentionedExtremist territory (Scorpius, Grayza) or had BreakTheCutie-type personal backstories (Aeryn's mother was implied to be so ruthless because of how she had been punished for conceiving a child out of love). Rank-and-file [=PK=]s tended to be xenophobic, but would gladly cooperate with non-PK Sebaceans as well as other non-Sebacean races if ordered to do so, for example, when protecting a caravan of nurses from the Venek Hordes, or when fighting to stop the Scarrans from completely taking over the galaxy. In these instances, they actually were portrayed as heroic. Your average Peacekeeper suffers from xenophobic indoctrination but mostly "just follows orders."
65[[/folder]]
66
67[[folder:How can Scorpius travel incognito?]]
68* When they go to the Scarran border station in Fetal Attraction, Scorpius introduces himself to the Scarran freighter captain as 'Captain Wentrask' and says something in Scarran to convince the freighter captain that he and his crew are in the Scarran Ministry of Dissimulation. The captain takes this all in stride and I believe calls him 'half-breed' before that little discussion. In season 3 when we got Scorpius' backstory, he's told his Scarran mother was raped by a male Sebacean but after defecting to the Peacekeepers, finds that the opposite is true and that out of 90-something Scarran trials, he's the only one who survived. If he was the only half-Scarran, half-Sebacean in existence, wouldn't the freighter captain thought something was either a) generally fishy or b) knew he was Scorpius the whole time. It's entirely possible that both the Scarrans and Peacekeepers had lied to Scorpius about him being the only Scarran/Sebacean hybrid and we just never saw any others but..yeah. It just bugs me.
69** When he calls Scorpius a half-breed, does he specifically identify him as a Scarran/Sebacean half-breed? Hybrids seem to be relatively common in the Farscape verse. Maybe he could tell Scorpy was a half-breed but couldn't nail down his exact ancestry.
70** Well we see in season 4, when Aeryn was captured, that the Scarrans have been using other species to breed with in order to try to improve/find an organism they could use as a weapon. I would guess that there are quite a few half-breeds walking around. And it's not like you could look at Scorpius and ''tell'' he was half-Sebacean. So yeah, I'm guessing the Scarran just assumed he was another half-breed (non-specific) who rose through military ranks because he was an asset.
71** The next episode "Hot to Katratzi" has a moment between Scorpius and the Scarran Emperor where Scorpy says "I've served you for ten cycles as a spy!". I believe this may mean he has the contacts to create false identities for himself...
72** He probably does have the contacts to do that, but I believe that particular statement was just a reference to Scorpy's DoubleReverseQuadrupleAgent status. Later on he says the Emperor only ''believes'' Scorpy is a loyal spy for the Scarrans.
73** It turns out that the Scarran was lying, his mother was Sebacean, raped by a Scarran Male.
74[[/folder]]
75
76[[folder:The number of Human (Sebacean?) Aliens in the show]]
77* Too many, considering that Crichton's resemblance to the Sebaceans is supposed to be surprising... not believable in a universe where the inhabitants of seemingly every other planet are aliens that look like Sebaceans.
78** Sebaceans are an incredibly widespread species that are known to be capable of breeding hybridized offspring. Think about that long enough, and you'll find it makes perfect sense.
79** It was also considered strange that Chrichton looked not just Sebacean-like, but as though he were a full Sebacean. The reason for this is revealed in the Peacekeeper Wars mini-series.
80** The existence of so many near-Sebacean (but not "pure" Sebacean, whatever that means) aliens who could potentially infiltrate Peacekeeper society also somewhat explains why the Peacekeepers are so xenophobic... they're more afraid of the differences they can't see than they are of facial tentacles or blue skin. No wonder they're so obsessed with keeping the bloodlines pure.
81** "Sebaceanoid" aliens frequently had unusually colored hair, irises, or skin pigments that set them off, if only slightly, for the more human-looking full Sebaceans. However, at least twos Sebacean, Scorpius's nurse and Commandant Mele-On Grayza, had unusually colored irises like some of the near-Sebaceans the crew encountered on various planets. So it's possible that all these more or less HumanAliens are ''all'' Sebaceans, but from different ethnic groups, some of these ethnic groups being overrepresented in the Peacekeepers while others (the lighter-eyed varieties) are rare or virtually absent. Litigarians, another Sebacean-like species, actually had dark spots covering their bald heads which made them look more like RubberForeheadAliens when they took their nice [[PlanetOfHats hats]] off.
82** Considering that Sebaceans have been around that part of the galaxy for over 20'000 years they are likely splinter groups and genetic offshoots, then there are specifically bred slave races like Stark's people and the inhabitants of the blaster oil planet.
83[[/folder]]
84
85[[folder:What Happened to Stark?]]
86* Maybe this was addressed and I missed it, but Stark and Zhaan are seen attending Gilina at the end of the episode in which he is introduced, so we know he was on Moya. And the next episode, they are hiding in an asteroid belt, and he's gone. No explanation of when or how he left?
87** In his next appearance (season 2), he thanks them for lending him a transport pod.
88[[/folder]]
89
90[[folder:All Those Dead Slaves]]
91* In "Liars, Guns, and Money," Scorpius buys the lot of slaves containing D'Argo's son Jothee, so that he can [[IHaveYourWife hold him hostage]] and make Crichton surrender. Thing is, there are 10,000 slaves in the lot, and Scorpius has no use for 9,999 of them. He later gives them to Natira, so that she can sell them and try to recoup some of her losses from the events of the trilogy. Cut to: Stark having a fit because [[MySignificanceSenseIsTingling he just sensed all those slaves dying at once]]. Wait...what? Why would Natira kill them? There's no profit in that!
92** There could have been profit in it, depending on how and why they were killed. Maybe Natira sold them to a race that feeds on the brains of sentient species. Also, Natira is in charge of a Shadow Depository and is already spectacularly rich. She can probably afford to massacre 9,000 slaves for shits and giggles.
93** The original plan was to give the rest of the slaves to Natira. However, the slave traders weren't willing to go and find Jothee in the crowd, so Scorpius just opened up all the slaves to hard vacuum, relying on Jothee's Luxan ability to survive to separate him from the crowd.
94** When exactly was this stated? I know for a fact that the slave traders enforced a bulk-buy, but it's never specifically stated that Scorpius did a damn thing other than send a Marauder to pick Jothee up. He never said he was going to kill them, he didn't order the Marauder crew to kill them: all he said was that Natira could have the remaining 9999. Why would exposing them to vacuum be necessary at all? The slaves are all Banik; Jothee is half-Luxan: it's not that hard to tell them apart. Why would Scorpius bother? ''When was this stated?''
95** Scorpius orders Braca to get Jothee as quickly as possible, but doesn't give specifics. It was probably Braca's idea to space everyone and pick out the surviving lifesign. That was probably quicker than searching through a 10,000 strong crowd. A crowd that size would take a lot of searching, even for someone visibly different.
96** True, but the effects of hard vacuum are also problematic: Jothee is a known hybrid and not possessed of the exact same strengths as a pure Luxan - can tongue-stun but isn't as effective at it, doesn't like the cold but not as much as a pure Luxan, etc. Presumably, the same equation applies to the resistance to vacuum, and even Pure Luxans can't last much longer than fifteen minutes: spacing the slaves might be quicker than sorting through them rank by rank, but it also runs the risk of killing Jothee and losing Scorpy's bargaining chip. Furthermore, where was this strategy even mentioned? Is this from the comics?
97** It probably went something like this
98--->'''Marauder to Slave Transport:''' We're got big guns, you've got a Sebacan-Luxan Hybrid in your cargo. Go fetch him, and we won't show you how effective our big guns are.
99--->''[Ten minutes later]''
100--->'''Marauder to Slave Transport:''' Thanks! Oh, by the way, we lied about not blowing you up.
101** You seem to be forgetting that Natira is a power-hungry sadist, she revels in causing pain and misery to others, even if it didn't make logical sense to blow up the slaves it made her happy.
102[[/folder]]
103
104[[folder:AliensSpeakingEnglish]]
105* In "Kansas," most of the crew of Moya visits Earth in the year 1985. When they get there, every single one of them is shown to be capable of holding a conversation in English with the locals, none of whom have been injected with TranslatorMicrobes. Now, it had been previously established that Sikozou (who didn't go on that trip) had learned English from Crichton due to her photographic memory, and that Aeryn (who did go) had painstakingly taught herself the language, but does anyone believe that Chiana, Rygel, D'Argo, and (especially) Noranti had learned it?
106** How many conversations between the Moya crewmates and the local humans do we actually see? It seemed to me that all the on-screen conversations between aliens and humans in that episode involved humans who could plausibly have accepted translator microbes. When they were out touring Earth off-screen they could have had a translator assisting them.
107** Just rewatched this episode in my rewatch of the entire series. The only person anyone speaks to at length is the cop. Aeryn does most of the talking, and Dargo can only say "yes" "no" and "bite me" as previously said. Noranti, however, is able to speak with the police officer perfectly fine. But we can handwave that since she has a large amount of vague and ill-defined mystical powers. Chiana only speaks to young John in one word sentences. They don't really have a conversation.
108** Actually, Aeryn was learning how to speak English prior to him getting pulled down the wormhole in "Unrealized Reality." She was seen learning more in 1985 due to Sesame Street and Wheel of Fortune enough to be able to speak. D'argo, however, only knew four words, which Chiana taught him, which were "yes, no, bite me." And, also, keep in mind, they've been hanging around John Crichton for a couple of years. They're bound to pick up some English from him.
109* If Chiana had already injected Crichton with translator microbes when he was a teenager, why would he need them again as an adult when he first boarded Moya? And how would she have explained it? I suppose we can accept that Granny injected the Sheriff and his men with them while they were out, but that is hard to buy.
110** Ah, my mistake. I misread your JBM and thought you were referring to "Terra Firma". In that case I have no explanation.
111** She doesn't seem to hold up too big of a conversation with Crichton, so maybe it just seems like she was talking "normal" English so the viewers wouldn't have to struggle with her accent.
112** Watch the episode again. The fact that nobody but Aeryn can speak passable English is a major plot point. D'Argo himself can only say "Yes," "No," and "Bite Me." and he says that Chiana taught him, meaning that when she took interest in Aeryn's learning English prior to that, it wasn't wasted.
113[[/folder]]
114
115[[folder:TranslatorMicrobes injected at birth]]
116* When Crichton's injected at the beginning of the series, one of the characters remarks that they don't know why he wasn't injected at birth. If this is the norm, how do children ever learn a language? The microbes seem to translate based on the speaker's meaning (otherwise, how would the ever be able to translate into the vastly foreign language of English). Therefore, the child never has to learn a first language since the microbes have translated everything from day one. It seems like generation 1 of microbe implanted infants onwards would be speaking goo-goo baby noises and everyone else's microbes sending the meaning along. (But that can't be the case since Sikozou has to learn everyone's language, and she doesn't go through the point-and-speak ritual with everyone she meets.)
117** You still have to translate from something to something, though. The microbes don't just beam thoughts from one person to another (otherwise you wouldn't have to clarify "good frell" or "bad frell"), just allow people to understand spoken languages from other cultures. You have to learn at least one language for the translator microbes to work, since baby sounds don't have an agreed upon meaning and thus they can't be translated. Plus, it's not like it sounds like everyone is speaking English to Chrichton, just that he can understand the alien languages and they understand him. This is why he uses all the Farscape profanities instead of the real ones in English, he's learning to pronounce them but already knows exactly what they mean.
118** Maybe the translator microbes don't activate ''until'' the child has learned its first language.
119* Why do the DRD have a reserve of translator microbes in the first place when everyone is already suppose to have them?
120** They're floating around in Moya's body. She could just have them extracted from herself.
121** It makes sense that the DRDs are prepared for every eventuality, including alien visitors who have had no contact with them previously. Even more likely, they are prepared in case someone is born aboard the Leviathan, and needs to be injected with them.
122[[/folder]]
123
124[[folder:How are Sebaceans and Scarrans compatable in the first place?]]
125* Scorpius is cool and all but it seems... unbelievable a warm blooded lizard and a cold blooded mammal could ever produce an offspring.
126** Sebaceans aren't cold-blooded. They're endothermic like all mammals. They simply have a very low tolerance for temperatures above their optimum. There's a difference. If they were cold-blooded they wouldn't have any problem with heat because outside temperatures would be the main way through which they'd regulate their body temperature. It is because they are warm-blooded that they cannot tolerate much more heat than their optimal temperature. It takes less time for them to overheat.
127** Okay but it still seems utterly impossible for them to ever produce an offspring together.
128** Scarrans have the technology to transfer fetuses between women. It is entirely plausible that with sufficiently advanced technology and the canonical fact that there was a massive failure rate indicating that they tried this a lot of times, they could manage it once (and even then, the mother died in the process).
129** They likely used genetic splicing and engineering in a lab setting, attempting some mix and match with DNA and chromosomes. Along with forcing the Sebacean egg to receive the Scarran sperm and implanting it into the Sebacean. As for the raping? Because they want to hear the screams.
130[[/folder]]
131
132[[folder:The Maltese Crichton -- no one thought of this?]]
133* So at the beginning of the final episode of "Look at the Princess," Clavor and the Scarran ambassador chop off the head of the Crichton statue and toss it in some acid. Everyone else is running around for the rest of the episode trying to figure out who did it. Why didn't they just immediately pick up the headset D'argo and Chiana were using to talk to him earlier and use it to communicate with a witness they had right there -- Princess Katrala? The statues see and hear everything, and they can speak via headset. Clavor and the Scarran were clearly visible, they talked a lot before cutting off Crichton's head, they didn't bother with stealth -- so why not ask the Princess, "Hey, who cut off Crichton's head?" They even used the headset to talk with her statue ''later'', as they're about the leave the planet.
134** That's a really good point.
135** The one potential justification for this is that throughout the 3-parter, Katralla is really only treated by pretty much everyone except Crichton and Tyno as completely irrelevant except for her preference as ruler rather than Clavor. As for the headsets themselves, if it weren't for the fact that D'Argo and Chiana knew how freaked out Crichton would be at this whole situation and thus didn't hesitate to take advantage of the headset after he'd been turned into a statue, it's entirely possible that the headsets are more there to know you at least have the option to talk to the statues if you really wanted to rather than something that's actually encouraged to be used with any regularity. Basically, it's entirely possible that the thought to ask Princess Katralla what happened to Crichton simply genuinely never entered anyone's head because, to them, she's a relative nonentity. But yes, it's definitely something of a lapse in logic...
136** Another possibility not considered by those who watch the episode is this: it's known that Clavor had purposely poisoned his sister's DNA to make it impossible for her to conceive and thus taking her out of being a viable heir to the throne. And even Katralla knew Clavor did this to her. Essentially, if she told them it was Clavor and the Scarran with him, [[CassandraTruth everyone would have their doubt due to the fact that Kartralla had a justifiable reason to lie and frame Clavor for what he did to her]].
137** Yet another possibility is they did think of it (it just wasn't shown happening). When they discovered what had happened to John, the Empress was extremely angry and treated everyone, particularly off-worlders, as suspects in John’s beheading. She would be unlikely to agree to let the Moya crew, all of them suspects, talk to her daughter. She may well have talked to her daughter herself after they were gone (or before they arrived) as it seems reasonable that she wouldn’t have wanted to question Katralla with everyone else around. As to why she wouldn’t tell people what Katralla said, it wouldn’t be in her interests to do so. Katralla didn’t know where they took the head, so the Empress couldn’t have found that out from her. She may have found out her son was involved but couldn’t do much with that knowledge. If they didn’t find John’s head then her daughter would be rendered unable to rule, leaving her son as the only viable monarch. If she revealed his involvement (which a mother would probably be unwilling to do anyway) he would be seen as unfit to rule, pretty much plunging the succession into chaos. If she sent the guards after him, it would be basically admitting his involvement. If she sent her men after the Scarran, then even if they did manage to capture him he’d almost certainly have revealed her son’s involvement, giving the same outcome. If John's head hadn't been found, then it would work out much better for her if she could blame the disappearance on off-worlders (which she tried to do). Either way, it's quite possible there was only one person in a position to talk to Katralla (the Empress) and she would have no reason to tell people what Katralla said.
138[[/folder]]
139
140[[folder:How do ships other than Leviathans travel FTL?]]
141* Was this ever addressed? Isn't Starbursting something only Leviathans can do?
142** The nearest thing non-Leviathans have is the strictly un-starbustlike Hetch Drive; all it does is stop travel between planets and nearby star systems from dragging on for years. It also happens to be the reason why Wormhole travel is so desirable.
143** Hetch Drive is explicitly stated to be FTL. It's responsible for the CasualInterstellarTravel in the setting. Starburst, on the other hand, is implied to be much faster and untraceable: unlike Hetch Drive, which is easy to track, Starburst, by virtue of its unpredictable process (you enter another dimension, ride an energy wave, and end up in a pretty much random location), is preferable if you're trying to stay under the radar of the Peacekeepers or the Scarrans.
144** In one episode, John watches as Aeryn's Prowler sort of dematerializes into energy/plasma/mist. The episode never makes it clear if this is Peacekeeper FTL technology or just an abstract way of visualizing John and Aeryn's emotional separation.
145** As we never, ever see this happen again, I'd say it's most definitely abstract visualization.
146[[/folder]]
147
148[[folder:Moya in the field.]]
149* So, Moya's part of this grand scientific experiment to breed a half-Leviathan/half-warship. And the experiment is so important that Crais is able to get authorization to have the original Pilot executed and replaced with a new one. Then why is she still being deployed in the field as a prison transport, rather than being kept somewhere where scientists can observe her and she won't run the risk of being damaged or stolen?
150** In all likelihood, because nobody figured out where Velorek's sabotage had taken place and Moya failed to conceive a child, the Peacekeepers probably gave up on Moya and returned her to the field; in the meantime, they either tried the same thing with a different Leviathan, or scrapped the project altogether.
151** The above seems likely, but also it may be that Leviathans are too valuable to keep out of service, even for such an important experiment. Plus if the whole project was a secret, they may have wanted to give Moya a low-level, low visibility duty rather than risk someone asking "Hey, why's a Leviathan sitting around unused in that alpha clearance shipyard?"
152[[/folder]]
153
154[[folder:Why not just [=LoJack=] 'im?]]
155* When Scorpius implanted the neural chip in Crichton's head, why didn't he also put a tracking device in there?
156** There probably wasn't enough room left. In all seriousness, "Look At The Princess" showed that he had other means of tracking Crichton- hence the reason he tended to show up on planets Moya was visiting.
157** No tracking device small enough to fit inside a man's head has the necessary range to keep up with a starbursting Leviathan.
158** Besides, the neural chip was also designed to take control of Crichton's brain; once it had the wormhole knowledge, it'd simply take him over and use the nearest communications system to broadcast his location to Scorpius- which it did in Die Me Dichotomy. No need for a tracking device when you've got that on hand.
159** In addition to that, Scorpius injected the neural chip into Crichton's brain while he was a prisoner on the base. Scorpius may have planned on injecting the chip, waiting for it to remove the information and then him remove it all the while at the base all within the timeframe of a few days. He didn't expect a rescue mission by the Moya crew and a subsequent nuking of the base.
160
161[[/folder]]
162[[folder:"Crackers Don't Matter"]]
163* What exactly was T'raltixx hoping to accomplish by turning Moya into the galaxy's largest floodlight? I've watched it several times now, and I'm still unclear. Did they ever explain what the point of the exercise was?
164** T'raltixx's species seems to feed on light somehow. And just before being defeated he says there are thousands more of his species out there who will find another leviathan and use it to "spread across the galaxy like a plague". So his goal was to take over the universe.
165
166[[/folder]]
167[[folder:What happened to Moya's internal lighting?]]
168* In Season One, Moya was well lit. From Season Two on, the set was fairly dark. Does anyone know if the writers ever had a reason?
169** Symbolism perhaps? To indicate the gradual darkening of the mood of the show?
170** Moya also gets fairly beaten up over the course of the series, so it may be an indication of her internal lighting failing due to damage. Since the crew is constantly on the run they never had the opportunity to get her properly repaired.
171** It's also possible that from season two on they may have started using better cameras, and suddenly the sets didn't look so good anymore. It was either lower the lights or build all new sets, and one is a lot cheaper than the other.
172** Not so. All of the Farscape series (not sure about Peacekeeper Wars) was shot on 3-perf 35mm, a fact that's only remembered because the 3-perf was unusual enough that Panavision had to ship in cameras from LA. The lighting changes are just choices by the director of photography, in much the same way that some of the paint-job makeups changed between seasons.
173
174[[/folder]]
175[[folder:Starburst is random?]]
176* Starburst is said to be random, but in what sense of the word "random"? When Moya starbursts does she literally pop out at a completely random location in space? And if so, how does she navigate?
177** Could be that the distance is random, but not the direction. Or at least the general direction. So navigation would work as 1) Reference starcharts 2) Point in direction of destination 3) Starburst 4) Check location, realign direction 5) Starburst again when possible.
178** It's especially a problem in "Bad Timing," when Moya executes an ''extended'' Starburst with a specified destination. Granted, it's a difficult and disconcerting experience for everyone involved...
179** There definitely seems to be a limit to the distance travelled (since they always ended up in the Uncharted Territories) so it's not a completely random point in space and does somehow relate to your initial position upon entering starburst. Pilot mentioned in "Through the Looking Glass" that, "Starburst is technically the seam between space-time dimensions. Moya’s power cells allow us access and we simply ride out the energy stream until we're pushed out. At random." So presumably the direction could be chosen but you have no idea where you'll be pushed out (whether before or after your intended destination). An extended starburst could potentially just mean you guarantee it will be longer before you get pushed out, though still don't know for sure where you will end up.
180[[/folder]]
181
182[[folder:Luxan questions]]
183* Luxan biology makes no sense. What is the evolutionary advantage of your blood becoming fatally toxic unless you beat the shit out of yourself?
184** Well, maybe it wasn't evolved at all: if you prescribe to the theory that the Eidolons didn't stop at tinkering with the Sebaceans, then maybe it's not too much of a stretch to imagine that ancient geneticists with a very bad sense of humour added the "blood runs clear" attribute in order to a) force Luxans in a unit to rely on one another for medical support and b) force lone Luxans to beat the shit out of themselves or die.
185** Moreover, it might actually force Luxans to go out and ''fight more'', since it might be as effective as just hitting yourself. A cowardly Luxan who ran from a fight and then was too afraid of the pain to hit himself would die... may as well be brave about it!
186** Also, some organs and functions just stick around in an organism even though they are detrimental. Evolution won't weed out all bad traits if they don't prevent the creature from successfully and frequently passing on those genes.
187** Alternatively, the blood becoming toxic may not be an advantage but the way of dealing with it may be. Humans can get infected through an open wound. There's no evolutionary advantage to that and we have nothing to do about it. If a Luxan is particularly vulnerable to infection/toxicity in injured areas, their body may automatically redirect anti-infection agents to those areas when they detect the injury. They may detect injury based around pain level. When the pain level increases, more anti-toxicity agents are sent to that area. So a Luxan who causes themselves pain, can actually reduce their toxicity. The blood changing colour is then just a handy visual clue to them.
188* Why would Luxans use tattoos to denote military rank? First, tattoos are fairly permanent. A soldier would have to have his tattoo painfully burned off and replaced with a new one every time he advanced in rank. Second, why put the tattoo on the chin tentacles? I assume they want it to be visible, but why not a nice flat surface like the neck or the upper chest so you can actually tell what it is? When I first saw Dargo I didn't even realize he had a tattoo. I thought Luxans had naturally spotty skin around the chin area.
189** No idea why they chose the chin tentacles, but maybe there doesn't have to be any removal; maybe it's just a progressive system of tattoos with more being added to the initial design as time goes on; new recruits have only a small part of their chin tentacles marked, and as they rise through the ranks, the tattoos are expanded until- at the rank of General- it covers the entire chin. And besides, even if this isn't the case, having the tattoo burned off actually sounds pretty true to a Proud Warrior Race.
190** Take a look at the progression of the Tatau in ''VideoGame/FarCry3'' for how this might work.
191** And just because ''you'' didn't realize that the chin markings are tattoos doesn't mean the Luxans can't. It's prominent on the face. And necks aren't flat surfaces.
192** It also means that anyone demoted has to go through a rather painful tattoo removal process. . . which also fits for a bunch of proud warrior race guys.
193** They might just not bother with removal. D'argo was allowed to keep his fake General tattoos after the gambit that resulted in getting them, after all.
194* How advanced are Luxans? D'argo's ship is very advanced but described as ancient, and various characters remark that Luxans are considered a savage people and Chiana even says to Jool that most of them didn't learn to read or write until 300 cycles ago. But the existence of D'argo's ship suggests a past Luxan "Golden Age," and then Jothee shows up in the Miniseries with an even more advanced ship that not only remains undetected by the Scarran Flagship, but circumvents its defenses and boards said Flagship, liberating hostages and getting away. So apparently Luxans have superior defense screens, cloaking devices ("deception shrouds"), and weapons (D'argo's "ancient" gunship can disintegrate a fully grown Leviathan at full power) compared to the Peacekeepers and Scarrans. And yet, they're under Peacekeeper Dominion and threatened by the Scarrans?
195** Jothee's ship didn't circumvent the defenses. They targeted and damaged a critical component after catching ''Decimator'' by surprise by dropping suddenly out of "cloak," and ''that'' temporarily disabled its defenses. And Leviathan's don't have defense screens, unlike Peacekeeper and Scarran warships. Also, the Luxans weren't under Peacekeeper dominion, but an independent power. This is evident in Season 3, when Grayza brings the ambassador aboard Scorpius's carrier as his peoples' representative in a military alliance/mutual defense pact, not as a subject.
196** This may be WildMassGuessing, but here goes: Luxans are more a subversion of a ProudWarriorRace than a straight example. They like embracing the trope, but they're clever enough to know its shortcomings. Because they play to the spirit of the trope and bring swords to laser gun fights, a combination of CulturalPosturing and ObfuscatingStupidity makes other species see them ad just DumbMuscle, meanwhile the Luxans are just as intelligent and innovative as anyone else. Note Aeryn's shock when D'argo first unfolds his qualta blade to show a pulse weapon hidden in it, and compare ''Star Trek'', where everyone knows what a Klingon bat'leth is capable of. Luxans may like playing the ScreamingWarrior for fun, but when a real war breaks out, they'll be as sneaky and underhanded as they need to be to win.
197[[/folder]]
198
199[[folder:How do pilots get on their Leviathans?]]
200* It is stated that pilots must manage life support systems and leviathans explicitly cannot. So how does a pilot get on board in the first place? No air, no heating, nothing to make it a livable environment. Furthermore, it's stated that Pilots aren't able to travel in space on their own, and the only way they have to leave their home planet is to bond with a leviathan. This means that either Pilot society hasn't progressed far enough to invent space ships, or (and this is the impression I got) they're physiologically incapable of "normal" space flight without the support of a leviathan. So, how do Pilots get aboard Leviathans in the first place?
201** [[AWizardDidIt The Builders Did It.]] Or maybe the Leviathan sends down a transport pod when it finds a Pilot it likes.
202* The question that always comes up in my mind is, Pilot!Moya explicitly states that his species "cannot travel in space on [their] own." Does this mean that they are biologically incompatible with space flight, or that they simply haven't developed the technology on their own? We know how Pilot!Moya got on board Moya, but it doesn't explain how it "naturally" happens.
203** Leviathans can land on planets, Moya does it twice (and, yes, first time is called out as being very difficult and dangerous for a leviathan of her age.) But young Leviathans would have no problem, and those are the ones exactly in need of pilots. They land, open up the doors to fill the ship with atmosphere, and then the Pilot Elders (whoever they are) decide who should bond with it (however they do that), the new pilot scuttles aboard, and presto.
204** Actually, the when they discussed it Pilot said the only account of a leviathan landing on a planet is only a legend. Also that young leviathans only "see how close they can get", not actually touch the planet.
205** Considering that what we saw of Pilots' home planet had a smoky atmosphere, maybe there are rare elements in the atmosphere that aren't found anywhere else, with the result that Pilots need to be linked to Leviathans to be provided with an alternate 'air supply'.
206[[/folder]]
207
208[[folder:How did Moya get away in the first place?]]
209* There was one thing I was disappointed to never see addressed: how did Moya get away from Crais' armada in the first episode? Moya is a apparently a considerable distance from the command carrier, judging by the lack of being blown up the moment the control collar was released, but was repeatedly shown during the series to be slower than most peacekeeper vessels. In addition, you'd expect even a relatively unimportant prison ship to have a contingent of guards on board, yet apart from Pilot and the three prisoners Moya is abandoned. Rygel did bribe several peacekeepers for the codes needed for their escape, but no code is going to spontaneously displace you over fifty kilometres and make several dozen people evaporate.
210** A ship with only three prisoners wouldn't need a huge complement of guards. It's plausible that D'Argo and Zhan took them all out, maybe even D'Argo all by himself. The control collar only stops a Leviathan from starbursting, so they could still run for it at maximum hetch while attempting to break off the collar.
211[[/folder]]
212
213[[folder:Blue Jeans]]
214* Considering how excited Crichton is to find a pair of jeans in his size in ''Kansas'', why does he not take any back into space with him?
215** Best not to test the stress tolerance of the space-time continuum more than absolutely necessary.
216** But he's in the correct time-space in the next episode, being showered with gifts, and still changes back into leather pants when he leaves Earth.
217** Because [[DracoInLeatherPants Crichton in leather pants.]]
218** I actually don't think he was that excited to find a pair of jeans (his reaction wasn't like how he reacted to milk). The relevant dialogue would seem to be, "Are those jeans? Let me see those," and "Yeah, these'll fit." This was in the particular context where John would have benefited from getting changed into clothes which would help him blend in more, in which case jeans are a better choice than alien leather pants. His tone was generally down beat in the scene, so I don't think he was supposed to be all that excited about the jeans, and may well have preferred his normal pants when he wasn't trying to blend in.
219[[/folder]]
220
221[[folder:Crichton's flight suit]]
222* Why is Crichton, an astronaut test pilot, wearing an open-helmet flight suit for the Farscape One mission in the Pilot episode? He is trying to pull off a risky maneuver in the upper atmosphere, and if the hull was breached or he opened his cockpit he would suffocate at best. Its also implied he was going to slingshot to get into deep space. Am I missing something here?
223** IASA obviously did not anticipate the cockpit integrity failing. Perhaps they felt that if it did fail, then sealed helmet or no, it was a non-survivable situation and that Crichton's comfort and ease of movement offered a better chance of survival than a sealed helmet. Perhaps they felt the cockpit was so over-engineered that it just didn't need the pilot in a sealed suit, it's durability and longevity through the series certainly backs up that interpretation. That little pod took one hell of a pounding, even accounting for upgraded alien tech, it must have been made of stern stuff.
224** Another possible explanation: It was John's decision, mostly because he and DK designed the module solely for the test (this also explains how he was able to upgrade the module with tech from Moya, because he designed it and knew the systems well enough to integrate alien tech into it). And John had so much confidence that nothing would go wrong, that he felt it was unnecessary to have a helmet without shielding. Plus, knowing how John is, he probably figured, "I'll be going so fast, if anything did go wrong, I'd be so quickly dead that having a closed-face helmet wouldn't do me much good anyway."
225[[/folder]]
226
227[[folder:Whatever happened to M'Lee?]]
228* M'Lee was mentioned only once after being picked up by the Peacekeppers in "Bone to Be Wild," where the Scorpius bemoans the loss of the guard assigned to her. After that, her whereabouts and body count are unknown.
229** She was mentioned as being sent back to the base. We don't know which base specifically, but we do know of one, and that ended up being nuked by John and Company at the end of Season 1.
230[[/folder]]
231
232[[folder:How did the John on Talyn know that Scorpius was still alive?]]
233* In "Incubator" the John on Moya was surprised (though not that surprised) to learn that Scorpius was still alive since he'd earlier thought he was dead (since "Season of Death", before they split). Yet in "Infinite Possibilities: Daedalus Demands" John and Aeryn (on Talyn) speculate that the trap may be a Scorpius trap and Harvey mentions that he doesn't care whether Scorpius knows how to use the wormhole knowledge. They don't just speculate that Scorpius may be alive, no one even seems to consider the possibility that he's dead. When did the Talyn crew learn that Scorpius was alive?
234** Crichton doesn't have proof, but we saw him assume that Scorpius was still alive- and have Harvey support the idea- earlier in the season. And when Moya Crichton had it confirmed, he as much as said that he had known Scorpius was still alive and that the destruction of his Marauder was a "fake out." So presumably he just takes it as a given, and Aeryn goes along with it.
235[[/folder]]
236
237[[folder:How does the time travel in "Kansas" Work?]]
238* If Chiana was Karen Shaw, doesn't that suggest that they're in a stable time loop and that these events must have happened in John's personal history before? However, if it's a stable time loop wouldn't John remember that his father was going to go on the ''Challenger'' but then didn't? If history was different when they went back (as it appeared to be and as indicated by "Unrealised Realities" would happen) then was there just a completely different Karen Shaw that John originally lost his virginity to and Chiana taking that name was a complete coincidence? Following on from that logic, is it therefore possible that young John slept with both the actual Karen Shaw and Chiana? Did he assume that Karen Shaw was actually just Chiana out of her Halloween costume and never know they were separate people (causing the actual Karen confusion when he mentioned "last time")?
239** Would Jack Chrichton have told his (at the time) somewhat resentful teenage son which shuttle mission he was going on? Crews for shuttle missions were selected well over a year in advance, Jack being chosen to captain ''Challenger'' must have been as a replacement - John might have thought his father meant a later shuttle mission, and didn't give him time to explain about replacing the current slated ''Challenger'' captain.
240[[/folder]]
241
242[[folder:Aeryn’s response to rain In "A Human Reaction"]]
243In the episode "A human Reaction," John and Aeryn are walking in the rain. Aeryn opens her mouth to drink the droplets of rain on "Earth" and says "Rain... Is that what you call this? I like it." I know this was improvised by the actress. I know that Aeryn was born and raised on a Peacekeeper command carrier, but surely something as common as rain would be familiar to her. Aeryn has been sent to many worlds on missions being a peacekeeper. Any planet capable of supporting most forms of life is going to have liquid water on it, and when you have liquid water you have rain. That's just how liquid water acts in any environment. It's liquid. It evaporates and forms clouds. It falls as rain. That's just the hydrologic cycle. Earth is not going to be unique in this no matter how alien you make your setting. If the Command carrier is big enough, it's going to have interior clouds as well. There are some constants to the universe, and rain is going to be one of them. Is this a clue that she was actually an Ancient the whole time, because I can more understand that a godlike insect alien would be ignorant of rain than Aeryn? If so, that means that John had sex with an Ancient that he thought was Aeryn as was heavily implied when they go to his dad's secret place. So either Aeryn was an insect alien that John had sex with, or Aeryn is ignorant of literally one of the most common phenomenon in the universe. I don't which explanation is worse.
244* I think it's meant to be an indication that most Peacekeepers really do live ''such'' a controlled existence that those who serve aboard Command Carriers and were born in space literally ''haven't'' encountered something so natural (Crais by contrast was born turfside on a farming commune and was conscripted, so likely would have plentiful experience with rain). Furthermore, Aeryn was a starfighter pilot, with an occasional stint flying transports, not in the infantry. So it's not like she would have been slogging through the mud or engaged in a considerable number of ground battles. She'd fly from a Command Carrier, engage enemy craft in space, then return to the carrier again. Furthermore, while Crais' Command Carrier ''did'' have a park aboard, it's going to be a very controlled environment, and wasn't nearly big enough to sustain a natural hydrologic cycle.
245* Plus a lot of the planets Aeryn visits, she's visiting nasty areas or scummy city blocks, where moisture falling from the sky might have entirely different names like "sludge" or "skyvenom" or some crap, due to being mixed either with pollution or some local contaminant. "Rain", as in "fresh, harmless, actually drinkable water falling from the sky" might be a novel concept.
246[[/folder]]
247
248[[folder:It Didn't Make Sense That They Couldn't Find Their Way Home]] How did they not find their way back home? I know they were in the Uncharted Territories, but there still had to be reference points. Peacekeepers knew how to get back to base, and everyone probably knew where the non secret bases were, so the crew could have used that as a reference point. They had a PK on board and later a PK captain on their side. No way Crais didn't know how to get to their planets or couldn't at least point them in the right direction.
249* Keep in mind they didn't start out as expert mercenaries or space travelers, they weren't experienced in space navigation or long-distance travel at that point.
250[[/folder]]
251
252[[folder:Who or what built Dargo's ship?]]
253* In Peacekeeper Wars we see that the Luxans have similar ships to the one that Dargo flies and they seem to be just as powerful but considering that they are a warrior race with access to such dangerous technology why aren't they using it to fight the Peacekeepers and Scarrans themselves?

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