DARK MATTER on SyFy

I was a huge fan of the SciFi channel in it's heyday (you know, when Stargate SG1, Lexx, and Farscape were all airing at once?) Not to mention, of course, Firefly and BSG. I wasn't a fan of the channel's rebranding as SyFy--not because of the name change, but because the change seemed to mark a shift away from hard sci-fi to the trend bandwagon. Vampires, werewolves, fairies, magic powers, REALITY SHOWS...and the inexplicable increase of terrible B movies without the commentary from the Mystery Science Theater guys that made such movies watchable.

So I was happy to read on Blastr that SyFy was going back to its roots, and introducing a new run of space-based series. I waited in anticipation for Defiance (imagine my disappointment that, despite having aliens, the entire series takes place in Missouri and has a backstory that is about a million times more interesting than the actual plot). But on to the next--Ascension looked promising. Alas, that was also -SPOILER ALERT- not really space opera.

SPOILER ALERT - Dark Matter episodes 1-3

I am now 3 episodes into Dark Matter. I waited to watch it until it was on Netflix for the simple reason that I can't afford cable. So far I'm still watching, but only because I'm in between episodes of new Fall TV.

Episode started off shaky, and it almost lost me in the first few minutes due to the CW-like casting and aesthetics (the crew awakens from cryo-sleep looking ready to pose for a GAP ad, the guys with artfully touseled hair and five-o-clock shadows, and the women with curled hair and flawless makeup). Then there was the fight scene with no explanation or reason ("you were in my way," says underwear model no. 2 to underwear model no. 1), then the trotting out of a barrage of cliches: waking on a ship with amnesia, the Asian dude with samurai swords, the creepy teenage girl who says cryptic things (knock-off Summer), the rough around the edges mercenary (knock-off Jayne). If the android hadn't woken up and started kicking the asses of the characters that were annoying me, I would not have gotten past episode 1.

Episode 2 was meh. I had guessed in episode 1 that the 'crew' would turn out to be prisoners of the ship, not actual crew, so the revelation that they were actually criminals/fugitives turned a deadly mercenary group was in line with my expectations. Not necessarily bad though obvious. I didn't care about their redemption through rescuing miners, but decided to give episode 3 a try mainly because of the mystery of the creepy teenage girl having everyone's memories (I want to know who ripped their assassins' eyes out), and because I want to see if the do-gooder guy is really good (I guess he's number 1, since he woke up first), or if he's the one who wiped everyone's memories.

At this point I don't remember anyone's names. The whole numbers instead of names things really doesn't work for me.

Episode 3...meh as well, except that at the end they reveal that do-gooder guy is actually evil. Since that was my criteria for moving on to episode 4, I shall sally on, and keep you posted!