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So I found out today that Hulu has the original miniseries once called "Tales from a Parallel Universe", which later developed into a regular four-year series called LEXX. About the semi-fugitive crew of an interstellar ship shaped like, and more or less being, a giant dragonfly. (A really REALLY giant dragonfly.)
The series involves a cowardly fugitive gate guard, a woman who was forcibly shapeshifted against her will from being a very large woman into a semi-traditional looking sexpot (with a small if accidental dose of carnivorous cluster lizard mixed in), Jiggurrata the cannibal woman, Kai the last of the Vroonen-ji who happens to be a reanimated dead man, 790 the robot head, and Barry Bostwick wearing surprisingly little (he doesn't actually live all that long, which is clearly due to the sparkly skirt). In fact, one of the incidental pleasures of this series is that, with the exception of Stanley Tweedle (the coward) and Kai the undead, several of the men in the initial miniseries are considerably more scantily clad than the women. Many of the men wear this really really strange top that does this chest squishing thing that makes it look like the outfit is meant to, as Playtex once said, "lift and separate", only the designer kind of forgot how the "separate" part is supposed to work. (Kai, on the other hand, is dressed head to toe in black lace and leatherette and has a fabulous uplift 'do! ... Sorry. Couldn't resist. He's very very uplifty. Also, the bit where he winds up having to pick up and reassemble his head is kind of priceless. And the updo stays intact!) Thing being the sort of series it is, Kai, being undead, can't get it up, and has no desire to do so even if he could. This being the sort of series it is, Zev the not-quite-loveslave falls truly madly deeply in love and lust with him. Stanley, being alive and able to get it up, falls madly in lust with Zev ... who, being properly repulsed at some of Stanley's past traitorous acts, won't let him touch her. And so on.
It was originally a German/Canadian co-production that got shown on Showtime back in 1998 or thereabouts. The idea seems to be more or less as follows: How many B-movie concepts can we put into one miniseries, but since it is a miniseries, actually do it with something resembling a script and actual production values? Let's see, we got space dragonflies, undead warriors, vaguely heroic cowards, sexbombs, cannibals, gruesome stuff ... what else can we include? The series contains not only Barry Bostwick, but also Rutger Hauer and Tim Curry, so scenery WAS chewed with great relish. Which was more or less the intent.
It's also really wonderfully gruesome and anatomically inaccurate. There's one point where a person's brain gets removed, and he's clearly human, so it shouldn't work the way it does -- the brain isn't attached to anything internal at all. Also, apparently it's possible to talk when your brain has been removed from your head. And brains without bodies can sing wonderfully martial songs and scream in pain. And other fun stuff like that.
(Back when it was first telecast, I may have, every once in a while, wound up randomly saying things like "I worship your divine shadow," or "Gigashadow, gigashadow, rah! rah! rah!" or something like that at random intervals. As one does. Because at a certain point, it becomes impossible for any right-thinking person to do anything but cheer for the Gigashadow, even though you know it can't win. This was, of course, before the Gigashadow was revealed in all its immense gigashadowiness, at which point I pretty much laughed myself sick.)
It did get turned into a regular series. And at some point the actor who played the original Zev the sexpot left the role, but had been so identified with it that instead of recasting, they created a new role that did more or less the same thing. And then somehow they crossed universes and wound up in ours or something like that. I don't remember, actually.
But still.
The intro below, strangely enough, does cover most of the high points, if that's quite the right word, of the miniseries:
In any event, it turns out to be more or less the perfect sort of thing to have on in the background when you've got a bunch of mindless tasks to do. And if you do it quietly enough, nobody needs to hear you cheering on the Gigashadow. (EDIT: It's also acceptable to cheer, "Go, Squish, go!" In fact, technically even more acceptable.)
The series involves a cowardly fugitive gate guard, a woman who was forcibly shapeshifted against her will from being a very large woman into a semi-traditional looking sexpot (with a small if accidental dose of carnivorous cluster lizard mixed in), Jiggurrata the cannibal woman, Kai the last of the Vroonen-ji who happens to be a reanimated dead man, 790 the robot head, and Barry Bostwick wearing surprisingly little (he doesn't actually live all that long, which is clearly due to the sparkly skirt). In fact, one of the incidental pleasures of this series is that, with the exception of Stanley Tweedle (the coward) and Kai the undead, several of the men in the initial miniseries are considerably more scantily clad than the women. Many of the men wear this really really strange top that does this chest squishing thing that makes it look like the outfit is meant to, as Playtex once said, "lift and separate", only the designer kind of forgot how the "separate" part is supposed to work. (Kai, on the other hand, is dressed head to toe in black lace and leatherette and has a fabulous uplift 'do! ... Sorry. Couldn't resist. He's very very uplifty. Also, the bit where he winds up having to pick up and reassemble his head is kind of priceless. And the updo stays intact!) Thing being the sort of series it is, Kai, being undead, can't get it up, and has no desire to do so even if he could. This being the sort of series it is, Zev the not-quite-loveslave falls truly madly deeply in love and lust with him. Stanley, being alive and able to get it up, falls madly in lust with Zev ... who, being properly repulsed at some of Stanley's past traitorous acts, won't let him touch her. And so on.
It was originally a German/Canadian co-production that got shown on Showtime back in 1998 or thereabouts. The idea seems to be more or less as follows: How many B-movie concepts can we put into one miniseries, but since it is a miniseries, actually do it with something resembling a script and actual production values? Let's see, we got space dragonflies, undead warriors, vaguely heroic cowards, sexbombs, cannibals, gruesome stuff ... what else can we include? The series contains not only Barry Bostwick, but also Rutger Hauer and Tim Curry, so scenery WAS chewed with great relish. Which was more or less the intent.
It's also really wonderfully gruesome and anatomically inaccurate. There's one point where a person's brain gets removed, and he's clearly human, so it shouldn't work the way it does -- the brain isn't attached to anything internal at all. Also, apparently it's possible to talk when your brain has been removed from your head. And brains without bodies can sing wonderfully martial songs and scream in pain. And other fun stuff like that.
(Back when it was first telecast, I may have, every once in a while, wound up randomly saying things like "I worship your divine shadow," or "Gigashadow, gigashadow, rah! rah! rah!" or something like that at random intervals. As one does. Because at a certain point, it becomes impossible for any right-thinking person to do anything but cheer for the Gigashadow, even though you know it can't win. This was, of course, before the Gigashadow was revealed in all its immense gigashadowiness, at which point I pretty much laughed myself sick.)
It did get turned into a regular series. And at some point the actor who played the original Zev the sexpot left the role, but had been so identified with it that instead of recasting, they created a new role that did more or less the same thing. And then somehow they crossed universes and wound up in ours or something like that. I don't remember, actually.
But still.
The intro below, strangely enough, does cover most of the high points, if that's quite the right word, of the miniseries:
In any event, it turns out to be more or less the perfect sort of thing to have on in the background when you've got a bunch of mindless tasks to do. And if you do it quietly enough, nobody needs to hear you cheering on the Gigashadow. (EDIT: It's also acceptable to cheer, "Go, Squish, go!" In fact, technically even more acceptable.)
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I'll have to watch it on Hulu now, if only for that faboo hair!
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Also, watching this at work can be highly hazardous. What with the beginning of the second episode featuring Zev taunting Stanley and eventually telling him to "go erupt by yourself." And yes, that means exactly what you think it does.
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