First Memories of Lexx
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Chatting with someone in my X-Ray Lexx chatroom we discussed the first time we came accross lexx and I thought it might make an interesting discussion here on SG.
One night after a few beers I was flicking through UK TV and I flicked on Channel 5. It was a Friday and Channel 5 is well known for showing slightly crap softporn on a Friday late at night. But tonight there was something different on. There was this strangely dressed blue haired lady crawling down or walking down what looked like the inside of some living creature. She was speaking in a strange german accent and the whole thing looked a bit strange. I must have chanced upon one of the first four movies. I watched for a short while and thought it was some german take on Barbarella and then flicked back to some other programme on another side. About 6 months later my boss from work said he’d been watching some strange sci-fi show on Channel 5 late at night called Lexx. He described it and it sounded totally weird and totally different to anything else that was on TV. So one night I tried again and watched a bit more. I think it was part of Season 2 and it was okay though I found it a bit hard to get into. Then I got some free Lexx postcards on the front of SFX and thought “damn it! Ill buy em!”. So I set about collecting the series on VHS. I was blown away. Superb it was and it had me hooked. Just as I was working my way into Season 2 Sci-Fi started is premiere run of Season 3 so I began taping it and fell totally in love with the show. This is probably why Season 3 is my favourite. And that was just the start of my Lexx addiction. What about you guys?
I think I saw an article about it in SFX when it first came out. The words “Canadian-German co-production” didn’t inspire confidence, but all the guest stars in the first 4 movies were people I liked, so I popped a tape in the video. I’m glad I did. A shiver went up my spine the first time I heard that Yo-A-O. And the design of the Lexx, and the whole show was like nothing I’d ever seen before – so many sci-fi shows look so clean and dull. It was a little more gory than you’d expect from Sci-fi too – if anyone had told me when Eating Pattern first aired that one day I would be crying my eyes out at at the last episode, I would have laughed in their face – sigh.
Of course, after the movies there was quite a gap. And no merchandise (apart from the soundtrack) which is usually what fans turn to while a show’s off the air. By the time season 2 started, I was too poor to buy videotape, so I didn’t record it, and kept kicking myself – especially after Wake the Dead. That was when I decided I really had to tape Lexx (even if it meant wiping X-Files). Somehow it wormed its way into my heart. I’m going to miss it.I think I caught Lexx completely by chance, like JJ it was on late on channel 5.
At first I thought it was the weirdest programme I’d ever seen, it was IWHS, and I never paid it too much attention, so I never really understood what was going on (in truth I only paid attention when Eva was on screen!!!), so I never really understood it back then.
Then I chanced upon the movies again, and watched IWHS without blinking, it got me that time, it was like nothing I’d seen before.
I then fell in love with Lexx, as it was so original and fresh, but even now I can see the point of those who couldn’t understand it, as it took me two times before I knew what was going on!!!
Squishy [img]images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img] [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img] [img]images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img]I guess it was pure chanse for me to, late night and i switched channel and saw the brunnen-g attack in their stingers singing yo-way-yo. I got curious and continued to watch, but soon the whole thing just got ridiculous when i first saw stanley tweedle. I hated him from the start, but as i continued to watch i really began to like him. But i still wasnt very attached to the show, i was really confused about the whole concept of buggs in space.
And then their was no more episodes, end of season one. I was really disappointed and i discoverd my true feelings for lexx =P hehe
It was when season 2 began that i understood i was hooked for good
//St@ff@n //sweden [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]My first memories of Lexx are somewhat hazy due to the fact that I was in a lot of pain due to a root canal and the large amount of Vicodin that I had just injested. So, there I am lying on the couch watching TV and desperately needing some kind of distraction, any kind of destraction when I came across this rather strange science fiction program on SCIFI. The very first episode of Lexx that I was exposed to was LAFFTRAK. A very bizzare experince, but I found it innovative, as compared to Star Trek. Sort of hit and miss after that. I didn’t watch again until Wake The Dead, we all have bad hair days, then Woz, which I liked very much, Brigadoom, which I found magical, and lastly The End of the Universe. [img]images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]
Reveal_7
I remember the first episode I saw was ‘Nook’. It interested my enough that I watched again for some reason I wanted to see more of this. Other than Red Dwarf the show didn’t remind of anything.
I remember it was the begginning of 2000, I had just had a bizarre event happen to me involving an old friend of mine. It was unbelievable, but the last half of the nineties weren’t too kind to me so I guess it was fitting that it end that way at the end of December. Anyway, I haven’t talked to him since and probably won’t again. That’s just to give you an idea of what kind of state of mind I was in.The second episode I watched was Luvliner. I was repulsed. I nearly didn’t watch again. I think the few ones they played were White Trash and Love Grows. Eventually, SciFi got around to playing some of the real cool episodes like Mantrid and Norb.
Yep, that all sounds right. As part of a semi insomnia (it just takes ages to sleep instead) i tried some late night channel surfing.
I saw part of Terminal (i realised it was lexx as a had seen the vids in a sci-fi catalogue). It was wierd but i started watching it (unfortuately a temporary transmutation in to a muppet caused a 2 week gap so i saw lafftrak. Before seeing Lyekka i always wondered where Xev came from when Zev got turned in to goo
My first full episode was a rerun of “Nook” on Scifi. After that, I started watching, and eventually saw every episode. But I have to admit that the thing that first hooked me was the bun. I kept thinking: “What the heck IS that on that guy’s head?” The camera wouldn’t stay on him long enough to get a good look at first. Then my next thought was: “It’s hair. Why does he wear it THAT way?” Then I started getting into the story, the music, the weird black humor, the guy in the red suit, the lizard woman, everything.
My very first memory of Lexx, is seeing bits and pieces of the Rated Lexx special on Sci-Fi. I recall only halfway paying attention to it at the time, and thinking, “What is this? Is this a movie? It seems rather disjointed for a movie. Like a lot of stuff has been cut out.” I recall the makers in the special making a big deal out of the ships in the show being insect-based (Sci-Fi must have shown a behind-the-scenes thing around the same time), and thinking, “that’s nice, but sounds gimmicky.”
At the time, I actually believed the clips in Rated Lexx were all there was, that they pieced this stuff together to set up the show. I didn’t realize the clips were from actual movies Sci-Fi hadn’t bothered to show yet!
But, as I said, I only halfway paid attention to it. Sci-Fi was pushing the show as all sex and weirdness, and while there’s nothing wrong with that, it just didn’t grab me. At the time, I was more interested in Farscape.
The first actual episode of Lexx I recall seeing was Luvliner. I remember mostly the episode fit the concept Sci-Fi was pushing. I wondered about the guy in black with funny hair, then thought I remembered something about him having an interesting history. Then that mercenary in Luvliner tells us about Kai being an assassin, and again I was intrigued.
I still didn’t watch regularly. The show still didn’t seem to have much of a direction or coherency (at this time, I didn’t realize Sci-Fi was showing episodes out-of-order). Then, I happened to flip around and catch the last half of Mantrid. The plot in Mantrid was clearly “bigger” and more serious than other episodes I had seen, again hinting at a backstory (the Insect Civilization). Finally I knew what those little things were that were destroying planets at the end of earlier (out-of-order) episodes.
Later I saw Norb, another big Mantrid Drone episode, and thought, “Wow, there really is an ongoing plot in this series!” It was about this time that Sci-Fi finally started showing episodes in order. I finally started making a real effort to watch the show, though I still wasn’t actually hooked.
At the end of The Net, I saw a commercial for Brigadoom. I thought, “Wow, what the heck is this?” I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it sure looked different, so I looked forward to seeing that episode next week.
Then Brigadoom actually came on, and I saw it, and I was AMAZED. [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img] The richness of the backstory and history of the characters, the epic events portrayed in that episode, totally hooked me. Since the story in Brigadoom took us right up to when Kai met Stan and Xev, I began to wonder just how far back the series did go. Just how much of the events in Brigadoom were actually Lexx episodes that I’d missed?
I searched the internet for more information about the show, and discovered [url=http://www.sadgeezer.com!]www.sadgeezer.com![/url] [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img] I was looking for episode information, and sadgeezer seemed to have the most comprehensive episode guide.
When I first looked at the top of the episode guide page, I saw where Saddy had typed out the Lexx’s little intro speech from the movies. I thought, “What is this? Is this supposed to be the Lexx telling us all this? I never saw him talk that much in the show. Did the website guy make this speech up, as if the Lexx were telling the story, just to be cute?”
Then I started reading the episode reviews, starting with IWHS. Wow! I saw they really did do the big knock-down-drag-out fight with His Shadow. I thought, “Why did Sci-Fi not show these movies?”
Almost immediately aftwerwards, I saw commercials that Sci-Fi WOULD show the movies for the first time! I eagerly anticipated the films, and got my tapes ready. I was not disappointed. [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]
From then on, Farscape took a distant back seat to Lexx. I was and continue to be a BIG fan.
Originally saw it back in the late ’90s (not sure of the year) when I was working at Tower Records. We’d just gotten in a pre-release screener of [i]I Worship His Shadow.[/i] Not having anything better to do, I took it home and watched it. At first (after my initial reaction of “What the f@ck???”), I thought it was too self-conciously weird. Tried too hard. The villain was too much like the Emperor in [i]Star Wars[/i]. Forced. Then I kept thinking about it, and watched it again, and thought it was much better. We kept getting pre-release screeners in, and I kept watching them, and liked it more and more. It was years after that that I finally caught up with [i]LEXX[/i] again (didn’t have SciFi Channel), and I didn’t know what it was at first as the videos didn’t have the name [i]LEXX[/i] on them anywhere except the spines, and I didn’t remember that. But upon tuning in, I was ecstatic. There was the guy with the hair!!! There was the guy in the red suit!!! There’s the robot head!!! Who’s the redheaded chick???
–Aleck
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Originally posted by Aleck:
There was the guy with the hair!!! There was the guy in the red suit!!! There’s the robot head!!! Who’s the redheaded chick???–Aleck
hey aleck, long time no see [img]images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]…i was a victim of scifi promotion; i kept seeing ads for farscape and lexx so i tuned in for making of lexx, which i only saw part of…the first episode i recall seeing was [b]wake the dead[/b]…i loved it, the ‘deadpan’ guy with freaky hair, the whiny redsuit and the bitchy robot head…i particularly liked the not too bright space ship with the Hal voice…especially when he became a she and asked lexx if she was beautiful… [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img] i was hooked thereafter and after much netsearching for more info, came to the sadgeezer site…
Lexx initially followed Homicide: Life on the Street on Arena cable television, Sunday nights quite a few years ago. It was part of its cult television programming (8.30-9.30pm). Since I programmed my video as part of my weekly initiation into the cult of Homicide, I inadvertently caught 15 minutes or so of the first episode of season 2. Mantrid immediately made an impression, and I made a point of staying up VERY late for the repeat to see the episode in its entirety. Thankfully, Showtime was also screening the first four movies simultaneosly on different days, allowing me to catch up with the show retrospectively. Thereon I was in contact with Salter Street to keep me apprised of any other seasons in production, and they were kind enough to contact me with the screening details of seasons 3 and 4 prior to their listings in the local cable guide -not to mention, my constant hassling of Arena via email.
Interestingly, when Arena changed its format to ‘women’s television’ after season 3, Lexx 4 moved to TV 1 at a much later time slot. I found this displacement particularly interesting when discovering that the bulk of Lexx’s audience was reputedly female, and informed Arena about the tenabilty of its banishment elsewhere. They responded with the lame excuse that despite its popularity with women, Lexx was too unconventional for their notion of what might constitute female audiences. Doris Day festivals ensued.
[ 09-05-2002: Message edited by: bonnee ]
I think the UK got the luckiest break with Lexx, if I remember rightly it was (the movies) an Anglo/German/Canadian financed movie series.
It had backing from the new to air Channel 5, so I think I got to see Lexx in one of it’s first screenings, long before it ever hit the Sci-fi channel, after (I think) season 2, Channel 5 no longer played a part in it’s making, and that’s when the Sci-Fi channel in the UK picked it up.
I think I’ve seen the movies now about six times since then, and I still look forward to seeing them again.
Squishy
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