which suffers from the weak set-up ep--I forget the name, the one with Ryg and Scorpius holed up with the annoying aliens

I Yensch, You Yensch.

I do adore the operatic grandeur of the denoument of "Into the Lion's Den" though. "Talyn, Starburst!" (sob!), then the spectacle of Scorpius standing quiet and alone in the midst of the firework and the flooding and all that destruction.

Oh, yeah. It's gorgeous. Such a great fandom for vidding, with all those fantastic visuals.

I love the Crais scene, but the Scorpius scene finally breaks through "that's so fabulously over-the-top!" to "eye-roll." It was all just a little too artfully disastrous, y'know?

which kind of annoys me now because of my issue with Pod!Aeryn in S4.

I refuse to let my S4 issues taint my pure and unholy love of DWTB. I shouldn't love it as much as I do: it's the All Crichton Show, and the characters are deeply stupid (WHY is everyone leaving? Why do they think no one will come after them when they just blew up a command carrier?), and the whole baby thing just drives me crazy.

But the scene in the hangar bay, and the vision where Aeryn gets shot and Crichton lets out this incredible broken whimper? See my heart. See my heart shatter. See bits of it scatter all over the floor and end up under the couch where they gather dust.

They're both amazing, but Ben Browder consistently goes places I've never seen a tv actor go, and he just floors me.

I think Season 2 would be my favorite. As much as I enjoy Crichton and Aeryn, Zhaan was my favorite character on the show.

peeking through my fingers at the last few eps of season three and season four talk.

there've just been so many superfluous episodes in season three that i can't see it being my favorite season. i do think the twinning aspect is extremely well done though. can't wait to see how Aeryn acts with the Crichton twin on Moya. i have 5 more eps left to watch of season three.

the cartoon episode, while amusing, was pretty pointless i thought. except maybe for the setting up of D'Argo with the Luxan ship.

there've just been so many superfluous episodes in season three that i can't see it being my favorite season.

t ponders, looks at S3 episode list

I don't think they are as superfluous as you think. Even the throwaway ones like Sons and Lovers have some important character stuff going on. Different Destinations is incredibly powerful, and ratches up the fucked-up-ness of Crichton. Scratch-N-Sniff? Well, it's funny as hell. Incubator gives us Scorpius' backstory. Revenging Angel... well, nah. Not a lot of arc there. But most of the Moya episodes do show us M!John spinning slowly into obsession without Aeryn there to ground him.

I will grant that Meltdown is a total throwaway, of value only for the porn. But it's the honeymoon aspect which makes the Infinite Possibilities two-parter all the more painful.

but the Scorpius scene finally breaks through "that's so fabulously over-the-top!" to "eye-roll." It was all just a little too artfully disastrous, y'know?

I loved it. My tolerance for artful disaster is quite high, it seems.
____

Adored Crais's arc.

Still can't say which season was my favorite between 2 and 3, though.

Watching Smallville right now, I have questions:

When did Charmed's writers take over this show? Have they no shame? Is "wet and naked" a mandatory aspect of every show now? Is there any reason, any at all, to watch this anymore, beyond the HoYay?

So sad. On so many levels.

Kristin, for your last question, was there ever?

Dana, I know you're right. But it's just gotten so so much worse. I really knew it the second I saw the Charmed-esque promo this past week with the pukey subtitle.