Seaquest DSV: Not bad writing in the beginning, worth a weekend watch or two.

[Overmind One]

I watched this sporadically when it was live on TV. It is set in the late 21st century, when Man has colonized (and found life on( Mars, has colonized the ocean floor and has an active space program and very advanced military. It is written very well in terms of character development, but the storylines got rather thin later in the series.

In many ways, this reminds me of Star Trek in the way it plays out from episode to episode. The problem with it is that we are still on earth. We do not get to invent new creatures and have hidden undersea civilizations. But they do it anyway.

Still this is worth watching for episodic fun in the vein of Star Trek TOS, Voyage Beneath the Sea, Lost In Space, etc. This is not a 1960s show, so it has some modern effects and a modern look.


William Shatner appears in Season 1, episode 18.

 

[Joelist]

I liked Seaquest DSV.

Season One was more in the vein of speculative fiction and worked well. Good characters, proper pacing and tone and interesting stories (like finding the Great Library of Alexandria and also the stories about the magma buoy).

Season Two went totally off the rails with a major cast changeover plus weird stories (the one with Neptune was just nonsense). It also ended on a ridiculous cliffhanger.

Season Three (aka Seaquest 2032) was probably the best. Bringing in Michael Ironside as the new Captain was genius and the redone tone and premise suited the show well. Unfortunately NBC preempted the show to death (damaging their relationship with Steven Spielberg in the process) as it really felt like it had hit a good stride.

 

[Overmind One]

I liked Seaquest DSV.

Season One was more in the vein of speculative fiction and worked well. Good characters, proper pacing and tone and interesting stories (like finding the Great Library of Alexandria and also the stories about the magma buoy).

Season Two went totally off the rails with a major cast changeover plus weird stories (the one with Neptune was just nonsense). It also ended on a ridiculous cliffhanger.

Season Three (aka Seaquest 2032) was probably the best. Bringing in Michael Ironside as the new Captain was genius and the redone tone and premise suited the show well. Unfortunately NBC preempted the show to death (damaging their relationship with Steven Spielberg in the process) as it really felt like it had hit a good stride.

Wow...it took only one season to ruin the show. Season 2 was so out there I could not finish watching. They took the sub to another planet just to be able to have aliens? I suppose that was better than having them on earth as aliens hiding underwater. But then they doubled down with it in season 3, and even made a hidden UFO base on earth. It was fun to watch for a while though!

 

[Joelist]

Huh?

They got rid of all the alien stuff in the first episode of season 3. Season three had VERY little loopy stuff in it.

 

[shavedape]

Wow...it took only one season to ruin the show. Season 2 was so out there I could not finish watching. They took the sub to another planet just to be able to have aliens? I suppose that was better than having them on earth as aliens hiding underwater. But then they doubled down with it in season 3, and even made a hidden UFO base on earth. It was fun to watch for a while though!

I gave up on it very quickly too.

 

[Overmind One]

Huh?

They got rid of all the alien stuff in the first episode of season 3. Season three had VERY little loopy stuff in it.

They got rid of it but it was not gone. The previous season had us watch the Seaquest literally be taken from the earth and dropped in an alien sea to fight aliens in a war on a different planet. Then, in the first episode of Season 3 (10 years later) the Seaquest magically reappears on earth and then they start up with the whole Macronesia arc? I am not as forgiving.

 

[Overmind One]

You cannot have the appearance of aliens from another planet happen, and then life on earth goes back to normal as if nothing was wrong. The previous episode had the aliens fully examined, catalogued and interviewed. Season 3 acted like none of that ever happened that that is unacceptable. It is sorta like Avengers. You cannot have a magic portal open up in the sky and have ginormous flying vehicles destroying skyscrapers and then expect the next movie to just act like none of that ever happened much.

How do you undo this?

 

[Joelist]

You cannot have the appearance of aliens from another planet happen, and then life on earth goes back to normal as if nothing was wrong. The previous episode had the aliens fully examined, catalogued and interviewed. Season 3 acted like none of that ever happened that that is unacceptable. It is sorta like Avengers. You cannot have a magic portal open up in the sky and have ginormous flying vehicles destroying skyscrapers and then expect the next movie to just act like none of that ever happened much.

Actually it was the only way the new writers could get the show back on track. The entire alien plot was rubbish and they disposed of it in the fastest way they could short of a "dream sequence". The previous incompetent writers (who came on at the start of Season Two) created the mess and got fired around the time Roy Scheider left.

Plus, they didn't act like it never happened. The ship and crew were missing for ten years because of relativity effects (which was explicitly laid out in the first episode of Season 3) and their absence caused a boatload of trouble. The way they chose to reset things worked well and let them put the show into a much more grounded scenario - where it worked.

 

[Overmind One]

Actually it was the only way the new writers could get the show back on track. The entire alien plot was rubbish and they disposed of it in the fastest way they could short of a "dream sequence". The previous incompetent writers (who came on at the start of Season Two) created the mess and got fired around the time Roy Scheider left.

Plus, they didn't act like it never happened. The ship and crew were missing for ten years because of relativity effects (which was explicitly laid out in the first episode of Season 3) and their absence caused a boatload of trouble. The way they chose to reset things worked well and let them put the show into a much more grounded scenario - where it worked.

I really liked season 1.

 

[Joelist]

So did I. It was Season 2 where things went wacko. Then the new writers in Season 3 had to fix the mess of Season 2.

 

[Tripler]

Same here . Season 1 was excellent as I am a huge fan of Roy Sheider but it very quickly went the way of jump the shark sadly ...

 

[Rac80]

You cannot have the appearance of aliens from another planet happen, and then life on earth goes back to normal as if nothing was wrong. The previous episode had the aliens fully examined, catalogued and interviewed. Season 3 acted like none of that ever happened that that is unacceptable. It is sorta like Avengers. You cannot have a magic portal open up in the sky and have ginormous flying vehicles destroying skyscrapers and then expect the next movie to just act like none of that ever happened much.

How do you undo this?

View attachment 31559

ever notice those aliens look an awful lot like the "original" asgard in SG1? Did someone have something on a backlot to save them money? (like the ever present wig on sg1,sga, & sgpoo? )

 

[Overmind One]

ever notice those aliens look an awful lot like the "original" asgard in SG1? Did someone have something on a backlot to save them money? (like the ever present wig on sg1,sga, & sgpoo? )

That wig! LOL! You might be right. The Star Trek cast members found their way into this show from time to time, and they were going for a Trek vibe for season 2 but that failed.

 

[Bluce Ree]

They got rid of it but it was not gone. The previous season had us watch the Seaquest literally be taken from the earth and dropped in an alien sea to fight aliens in a war on a different planet. Then, in the first episode of Season 3 (10 years later) the Seaquest magically reappears on earth and then they start up with the whole Macronesia arc? I am not as forgiving.

Yes but that was the season 2 finale and season 3 premiere. At the end of the season 2 finale, they were lifted and brought to an alien world to help fight some kind of civil war. In the beginning of the season 3 premiere, they're back on Earth and everyone (including us) gets a brief explanation of what happened between the two seasons. It seems the powers behind Seaquest decided against going the alien story route with the show and, instead, wrap it up this way.

 

[Joelist]

Right Bluce. The writers who hatched the silly alien civil war plot were rightly dismissed. The new writers had to write their way out of a black hole, and in the premiere of season three did so in pretty good fashion. Granted they basically deep sixed the entire alien storyline as rapidly as possible.