I particularly like the way one academic, Eugene Holland, described the ‘paranoid tendencies’ of Guattari in his refreshingly comprehensible Deterritorializing “Deteritorialization”: (Note – when i say Guattari i’m also talking about Deleuze, as you can’t separate their work in these texts.)

I doubt there are many academics/humans out there who really get Guattari.

If you’re struggling to digest their wacky, invented language and schizoid theorizing don’t worry… you definitely aren’t alone. Namely in their two key works, A nti-Oedipus and a Thousand Plateaus, which share the underpinning concepts (and title) of ‘capitalism and schizophrenia.’

For our purposes, we can look at Farscape to relate Guattarian concepts of Deterritorialization and ‘becoming nomad’ (John Crichton) sound/language de/reterritorialization, the territorial assemblage and viral (translator) machines (Peacekeepers and the unchartered territories) psychological deterritorialization, the rhizome and BwO.īut first some words on Guattari and Deleuze – our favourite incoherent French philosophers…įelix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze form much of the theoretical basis of our screen machine subject.

Interestingly, the text not only alludes to Guattari, but also extensively to Buffy in its gender studies perspective.

The first critical analysis of the show was written by a massive fan and academic, Jes Battis, entitled Investigating Farscape: Unchartered Territories of Sex and Science Fiction (2007).

it was dropped after Season 1 by YTV (youth television) in Canada, where it debuted, because it was deemed too ‘adult’, even though it was promotionally pitched at children because of its use of muppets!.

it is inherently sexual, and its key themes relate to gender, race and inter-species sex.

It is concerned more with dialogue, relationships and language rather than action, explosions and intergalactic warfare (although it does have elements of this).

It is unique for the sci-fi genre in many ways: Firstly, in that it has a very high female following – around 48% (Battis:2).

Hence, the cast and crew are mostly Australian.

Farscape was produced in Australia with the help of Channel 9, who accounted for around half the funding.There was massive protest from the particularly dedicated fan-base and so a miniseries wrap-up, Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars was run in 2004.Farscape ran 4 seasons between 1997 – 2004 until it was abruptly cancelled before season 5 could be produced.Farscape: wormhole deterritorialization and becoming Nomad The wormhole – John Crichton’s deterritorializing elementĪn introduction to the sexiest half-Australian Sci-Fi show ever:

Investigating Farscape by Jes Battis