Farscape Recap: Out of Their Minds
August 18, 2008

As I mentioned earlier:

"... I finally, finally Netflixed the next two episodes of Farscape in my recap assignment, so I'll soon be getting "Out of Their Minds" and "My Three Crichtons" Farscapped and published right here on The Grub Report. (After which I'll be moving onto my block of season three episodes.)

No, I'm not getting paid for it, because I just feel that bad about not getting my Farscape assignment done and published before the recent changes over at TWOP. The Farscapers over there were always so nice and generous (hello, DVD player!) that I'm really sorry I didn't get a chance to give them their recaps in a more timely manner. Hopefully, this will do just as well."

Okay, let's see if my recapping widget still works. Last time we were in season two, Zhaan was starring in her own personal Spellbound. Except she didn't adopt a new persona as the head of an insane asylum, she just went comatose. And Chiana was her Ingrid Bergman. Which is sort of scary. I guess the real point is, Zhaan was falsely accused of murder, but it all got cleaned up.

Pulling on one boot and insisting, "I'm up! I'm up! I'm up!" Crichton hops into the central chamber and asks what's with all the alarms. Aeryn points out the windshield and says they've been locked and targeted by an unknown craft. D'Argo and Chiana hastily attach more extension cords to Pilot to get the defense shield working, and Crichton asks, "Have we sent the, 'Don't shoot us, we're pathetic' transmission yet?" Heh. The U.S.S. Enterprise never would have thought of that. It was always, "We have no quarrel with you, friend" or "Let's learn about each other, not blow our ships to bits." Meanwhile, Aeryn rolls her eyes irritably at Crichton's un-Peacekeeperly attitude. They have sent the transmission, but the mystery ship is still targeting them, and D'Argo is having trouble boosting power to the defense shields.

Pilot comments that they're just going to have to hope that Zhaan can reason with them. Papa Bear Crichton blusters, "Zhaan is on their ship?!" Sure enough, Zhaan walks around the blue-lit alien ship and comms back that she's reached the command center, but hasn't found any of the shipmates. "I will…never yield," groans a voice from the floor, "You must…destroy me." Zhaan crouches down and assures the…thing that she's not there to harm him. We get a better shot of the…thing and it's -- holy shit! It's totally a Skeksis! Guess they wanted to save on costume labor and also give us Dark Crystal fans a Jim Henson-y shout-out. That movie scared the bejeesus out of me as a kid, but not in the normal way. Not in the way that Friday the 13th made me sleepless in a fully lit room for well over a month. It was a more surreal scare, because I KNEW those beetle-ly Garthim couldn't come to get my in my sleep the way Jason or his crazed mother would. Yet…yet. Of course, I had to watch the movie over and over again. I would rent it for every sleepover, and I loved Fizzgigg but was strangely creeped out by the supposedly peaceful Landstriders and urRu.

Stroking the Skesis', um, beak? Zhaan tells him she can take away his pain, if he wants. The Skeksis asks why she's helping given that her ship attacked them. Oh, this is just all a case of mistaken identity! Okay, I know how to fix this: dress Crichton up like a girl and send him to be a lady-in-waiting on the ship where his female boss will fall in love with him but be scared of her potential lesbianism but then Crichton will fall in love with her as well after which he reveals his manhood, and the stigma of gay is thus side-stepped and everyone goes home and drinks a lot of wine and sings a song in which "verily" and "thee" must be in the refrain.

Zhaan protests skekMo's assertion that Moya attacked until he gasps, "Your smaller ship did -- Captain called it Talyn. Can I get a: "dun-dun-DUN!"? Zhaan digests this and begs skekMo to believe that they didn't send Talyn to attack them. She suggests the skekMo scan Moya to prove their peacefulness. Sure, why doesn't the skekMo just stop dying for half a mo' and jump up and scan them. Shouldn't take more than eight quarts of blood as the crow flies. "No weapons?" the skekMo moans. "Nothing," Zhaan promises. At this, the Skeksis seems ready to take me up on my aforementioned offer, because he leaps to whatever feet he has and yells at a co-Skeksis, "Yo, no weapons! Destroy their ship!" Zhaan, you and your big, blue mouth. Zhaan tries to protest, but skekMo slaps a bony hand across her face, knocking her out. Now that skekMo is on his feet, he looks like he has half-put away wings jutting out of his back, which sort of makes me think he might be part-Tholian. skekYo protests, "Lord, our koi is below pulse -- " Doesn't that just make them sushi? Wait, rewind, mute, closed captioning: "Our core is below pulse --" Razzin'frazzin' accents. Anyway, the Skeksis only have enough power for a single shot, but skekMo says they have no choice.

Over on Moya, Pilot ventures that while he's not familiar with the mystery ship, he thinks they might be preparing to fire one them. Chiana barrels through with more shield extension cords for D'Argo. D'Argo plugs them in, and Rygel fires up the shield just in time to block the mystery ship's fire. Sort of. A few things explode, and Crichton jerks around until a force shoots out of him and hits Aeryn in the chest. In retaliation, Aeryn shakes around and a holographic image of herself embeds in Rygel. Crichton promptly falls down, while Aeryn bugs her eyes and shakes herself like a dog. Crichton stares up at Aeryn, Aeryn stares down at herself, Rygel stares at Aeryn, and Crichton soon becomes fascinated by his own hands.

"Screw me, this is impossible," Aeryn says with Crichton's voice overlaid. "What the frell is going on?" Rygel demands with Aeryn's voice overlaid, "That's my body, I'm Aeryn. Who are you?" Crichtryn twitches and says, "I'm Crichton." Crichton looks up in horror and says, "By the Hynerian gods," cementing him as Ryton. Hm, maybe I should reverse the order of those names. I was thinking that with their soul inside the body, that should be the dominant characteristic -- and therefore the first half of the name -- but since we're looking at the bodies before they speak, it might be less confusing to say that it's really Aerton, Crygel, and Rygryn. Clear as sentient mud?

Lovely credits.

Crigel lunges at Rygryn and tries to throttle her? him? while insisting that she's in his body. Ben Browder is totally doing a British accent to blend in with Jonathan Hardy's Rygel, isn't he? He's doing the same jaw movement that he does when Crichton impersonates a Peacekeeper. Aerton hauls Crigel back and says they need to figure out what happened to them. Crigel then flings himself around the center chamber, completely unable to walk, which makes me wonder (and not for the first time) about Rygel's lower appendages. Yes, he has his Rascal, but what about other Hynerians? Didn't we see an episode with a girl Hynerian who seemed to get around without the hover chair? Do they slither? Hop? Or maybe Crigel just has pins and needles from sitting all his life.

Except that doesn't make sense because it would be Crichton who had pins and needles -- since it's technically his body -- but maybe like phantom limbs, the Rygel part of Crigel has phantom pins and needles. Or the opposite of phantom limbs, which would be phantom non-limbs, which is taking me to that same scary place where the Evil Dr. Mathra tries to teach me how to turn a sphere inside out without breaking planes or poking a hole.

Maybe I could just shut up because some kind soul will definitely email me with the answer and then I can sleep at night.

Crigel bellows for Pilot while Aerton confirms that Rygel has Aeryn inside him. (Ryaeryngel? I'm stopping now, I promise. Also, ew.) Rygryn bemoans a lack of arms. Wait, Hynerians don't have legs OR arms? Aerton suggests that maybe all of this isn't real. "It FEELS frelling real!" Crigel yells and I SWEAR he says "fucking" instead of "frelling." There's definitely a trace of the hard "k" in there. Crigel tells himself that he's dreaming and that he will soon wake up in his royal bed surrounded by his concubines. (Are they also armless and legless? Because that would be one must-see orgy. Just lots of weird rolling around and bumping into each other.) Crigel continues on in this vein while imperiously holding up one hand -- forefinger only slightly extended and the other three curled to follow -- to punctuate his speech. Aerton stalks over and smacks Crigel backside his head, slamming his forehead into a console. "That…was real," Crigel mutters. Aerton grouses, "It's the three-freaking-stooges! I'm hitting myself!" Hee, it's also your older sister smacking you with your own hand and telling you to stop hitting yourself, but the point is there.

Crigel says, "I want my body back!" "We all do, buddy," Aerton says wearily, 100% in Aeryn's voice, albeit somewhat flattened in Claudia Black's attempt to Americanize it. All the actors are using their own voices now with no more overlays of everyone else's, so Ben Browder's British accent thing makes sense now. But I still get to make fun of him. Aerton mutters about billing whoever is responsible for therapy and yells for Pilot.

Down in Pilot's den, Pilot has D'Argo innards, Chiana has Pilot, and D'Argo has Chiana, which equals: Pilargo, Chilot, and D'Ariana. In a slightly less belabored way than the other three, this trio sorts themselves out, and D'Ariana talks in a falsetto. (There's a Huffington Post joke in there, but I'm in too puerile a mindset to source it elegantly for this recap.) Meanwhile, Pilargo can't figure out the voices in his head, and Moya freaks out because she can't hear Pilot. Chilot has to talk Pilargo through multi-tasking with Moya but can't move his Chiana legs, so he asks D'Ariana to carry him over. D'Ariana cocks his head -- Chiana-like -- protestingly until Pilargo insists. (Meanwhile, Pilargo is totally a movie about a war-hardened Crichton visiting deepest darkest Florida to make friends with a dead army buddy's wife -- Aeryn in a circle skirt and pin-tucked blouse -- only to run afoul of squatting mob boss, Scorpius "The Beetle" McPhee, and his drunken gun moll, Sikozu Lane, in the middle of a hurricane.)

Back where there's no invasion of the body snatchers, skekMo tells a now conscious and shackled Zhaan that she lied because clearly her ship has defense screens. "Why lie if not warrior vessel?" skekMo demands, dropping pronouns and indefinite articles all over the floor. Zhaan explains that they scavenged the shield from another vessel, but she was telling the truth when she said they were firing on an unarmed ship. "Then what this?" skekMo asks, showing her a playback of Talyn being all aggressive and shooty. Zhaan looks deflated and explains that Talyn is not them. Didn't we go over this already? skekMo announces that thirty of his crew are dead and he and skekYo are the only two left. Given how he pretended to be injured, Zhaan, I'd take that with a grain of salt. There's probably twenty Skeksis still alive. Zhaan protests futilely that they have been looking for Talyn and mean no one any harm. She offers to bring them over to Moya to prove this. skekMo decrees, "You return to your ship when it is corpse."

Chilot counsels Pilargo on how to deal with all the Moya voices in his head, and it seems to work. Aerton hangs soul photos of everyone around their neck, explaining (with a nasal infection, because that is always the way of doing an American accent) that if the Skeksis attack again, he wants to know who they all are. Pilargo attempts to get comms up in order to reach Zhaan, and Chilot tries to recall what happened before they were hit but has no idea why they body-swapped. During all this, Crigel rummages around in his noise and grunts to himself. Aerton flicks him a hysterical, "Really?" look that is totally lost on him before she turns back to Chilot. Aerton and Rygryn take off to deal with the defense screen, which was only at fifty percent when they were hit.

skekMo has had a change of heart and decides he will visit Moya to see for himself if the denizens are violent or not. However, he will do so without Zhaan and says, "If they betray, you die." I'm getting skekBored with you, buddy.

Pilargo complains about his aching body and is sympathetic to what Pilot goes through daily. Oh, look how much they will all learn about each other! Crichton will soon learn how much it sucks not to be able pee standing up, although that will really only hit home if he's faced with a besmirched toilet seat in a grotty bathroom or a port-o-potty on a hill.

Chilot starts to suffer a bit and thinks she's going to pass out, but before that happens, they get a freak-out comm from Zhaan. (Odd that Pilargo is speaking with D'Argo's voice instead of Pilot's when the rest of them are talking with their body's voices, having their body's vocal chords.) Zhaan brings the two of them up to speed about Talyn's attack, the reasoning for the Skeksis counter-attack, and skekMo coming aboard to give them all a once-over. Zhaan finally notices Pilargo's voice -- or un-Pilotty anger and violence in said voice -- and asks what the heck? During all this, Chilot goes into convulsions and collapses, shaving cream drooling out of her mouth. Ah, Farscape, always with the gross-outs. I guess I should be thankful it wasn't vomit. This time. Pilargo bellows for help.

In his ultra-feminine voice, D'Ariana worries about her body being rejected by Pilot. Chilot, no longer spewing Hot 'n' Foamy, says they need to concentrate on linking up with Moya's memory banks to figure all this shit out. Pilargo growls that he just can't do it; he's tried, and he can't. "Well, you have to -- I don't want to stay like this, you PATHETIC Luxan!" Crigel sniffs. "Crichton -- Rygel -- whoever you are," Pilargo growls back, "I'll rip your head off if you don't shut up!" Heh, Pilot getting violent is as amusing as D'Argo being impotent to do anything physical to relieve his irritation. Pilargo reports that the Skeksis -- I guess they are actually Halosians, for the record -- are on their way over. Aerton orders Crigel to come with him to greet the Skeksis, since they are counting on Crichton to show them around. D'Ariana strokes Chilot's head, which must be weird and slightly narcissistic for her.

Waiting for the arrivals, Aerton asks Pilargo in an undertone if "this guy" is alone. "I have no frelling idea, John, all I know his, he's DOCKING!" Pilargo snaps. Crigel starts to moan a bit, and Aerton gets concerned about his body. It's no big, he just has to pee. Which is a big, I guess, if you don't know what to do. "You can't go now, you have to hold it!" D'Ariana feminines back. Crigel doesn't know HOW to hold it. Aerton orders him, "Just go!" "Where, here?" Crigel asks. "Just -- over there! Now! Go!" Aerton snaps. Ew, over where? In the corner? Man, have a nice day, Moya! I mean, I get that they pee on or in Moya when they use the actual bathrooms, but that feels more sanitary. Like, she's got specific buffers in place to protect herself from all…that.

"There! Now!" Crigel repeats like an old man and goes. I mean, he leaves, he doesn't go. Well, he leaves to go, okay? Crigel gets to a corner and then asks if Aerton can show him "how to do this." Of course because what Farscape needs is watersports. Aerton gets this horrified but resigned look on her face and says, "Oh, my god." She steps aside and glances over at Crigel, but quickly looks away. "Unzip," she directs him. "Right!" Crigel says, doing so. Loudly. "Pull it out," Aerton mutters. Jeeze, oh, JEEZE! So wait, if Aerton were to see, you know, It, would Aeryn -- once she's back in the body -- remember It? Will the brains retain memories of what the physical eyes saw? Or is the soul connected to the brain and therefore, it will only be Crichton and Rygel who know what It looks like? (I mean, for now, because I know Aeryn sees It later. At least, I hope she does, because to do That and not see It would be sort of hypocritically prudish. And not as much fun, right? Land sakes, WHY am I blushing?)

"Point it like a gun," Aerton drones on. Um…hm. All I want to say to that is, Rygel doesn't know how to point a gun. Crigel makes some movements below the waist. "And shoot," Aerton finishes. Just -- just watch your aim, please. "Am I aiming the right way?" Crigel demands. "Yes, that's fine," Aerton says, repulsed after another glance-over. Crigel then gives a goofy smile and mercifully whirls around. I hope he hadn't started shooting yet.

"He's here!" D'Ariana announces as skekMo stumps over. Aerton orders D'Ariana (as D'Argo) to search skekMo, and it takes a moment before D'Ariana knows who she is talking to. skekMo says that a search is unnecessary. "Face the wall and spread your feathers, Big Guy," D'Ariana requests sweetly and pats -- er ruffles? -- him down. skekMo asks for Crichton, "Told he show me Moya." Crigel calls out, "I'm here -- gods, that is GOOD! Yes, well, I'll just put this thing away and -- OOOOUW!" Yes, he zippered himself. And by the loud sound and quick movement, he zippered himself with There's Something About Mary severity. Aerton jerks and winces in predictive pain. "Put it away and be careful, Sparky," she whispers faintly.

Things are getting easier for Pilargo, and Chilot feels better when she's not panicking. She muses about how she never thought she'd be separated from Moya again and that all her senses have vanished. Again, Pilargo is starting to relate to Chilot's daily life. So, now I'm thinking it is Lani Tupu's voice, but it's his Crais voice, rather than his Pilot voice. Pilargo admits that knowing what all Pilot has seen makes him feel his own life is insignificant. Chilot corrects him, "That's not true, D'Argo…I have no memories of love, of friendship, none. You have the remarkable memories, D'Argo." Does Pilot not have memories of all of them on the ship? Or does he not consider them his friends? I mean, I know they sliced off his arm, but who didn't go through that stage in high school?

skekShip. Zhaan prays and meditates, causing skekYo to stick her ugly skekMaw in her face and say that she believes Zhaan when she says they are peaceful. skekYo then shows Zhaan a transmission from Crais saying that he and Talyn are peaceful and just want safe passage. Crais then notes that his ship's defenses are up because skekShip's guns are charged. He repeats that they travel in peace, but an explosion behind him shows that they were fired on. Crais orders Talyn to return fire. skekYo confirms that the skekShip fired first and Talyn reacted defensively. Zhaan is pleased to learn that Crais isn't using Talyn for battle. skekYo attempts to explain their reasoning without using completely necessary words, "Our code. Tek desires to evolve. He must register hostile kills. As many as possible." So in order to evolve, skekMo must make up reasons for violent attacks? Sounds like the George W. Bush School of Evolution to me.

Moya. Crigel royally waves his hands around, demonstrating their lack of weapons, which he admits to finding pathetic, given how well-armed his royal barges were. Speaking of royal barges that puts me the mind of Jabba the Hut, which in turn makes me realize that Rygel is the spitting image of that laughing thing Jabba kept as a weird pet. Did I say that in another recap already? Through his teeth, Rygryn tells Crigel to shut up. "Just making con-vah-sation, RyJUL!" Crigel says imperiously, "So ahr guest can see that we ahr friendly creCHUHS! Crechuhs with no weapons!" That way, when he's finished searching, Crigel goes on, he can change them all back. "Everything will be dealt with," skekMo says. Crigel goes over to Rygryn and whispers that he's making pro-gress with "this idiot" and suggests Rygryn leave them together. Rygryn wants to know what he's up to. "Nothing!" Crigel insists, "And my own body shouldn't be suspicious of me, so rack off." That's way close to "frak off."

Aerton continues to fiddle with the defense shield when she gets an idea. Looking around to make sure she's alone, she flips her facetag over her shoulder, unzips her vest, and looks Down There. D'Ariana and Rygryn arrive on the scene and D'Ariana's womanly sensibilities cause her jaw to drop. However, Aerton hasn't noted them and suddenly flashes her vest wide and open. She sniggers and then jiggles herself. And then she jiggles HARD and FAST. Like, ouch. D'Ariana and Rygryn, completely and silently stunned, stare as Aerton jumps and watches the effect. Suddenly, she stops, grabs at herself, and moans softly in pain, "Oh, mama!" Either that, or she stops, feels herself up, and gets all moist about it.

"Crichton?" Rygryn finally says. Aerton whips around, clutching her vest closed. "What are you doing?" D'Ariana asks. I think it's pretty obvious what he's doing. Rygryn shakes his head. "Oh, come on, man! I --" she looks down, "They're here!" Yeah, but you're talking to two women, so I don't think they'll be that sympathetic, man. "They've been here for a couple of arns and I just had to --" "You are mentally damaged," Rygryn says in wonderment. Aerton corrects that he's a guy and guys dream about this sort of thing. "I'll tell you one thing, Crichton, if I find that you've been 'dreaming' anything else to my body --" Aerton looks down quickly, all, "I didn't think of that!" Which doesn't matter because he'd need a hand mirror anyway. The girls out there will know what I mean and the guys don't need to. "-- I'll break your legs, even if they are mine." Aerton zips up and asks what they're doing there anyway. D'Ariana says he's repatched the defense screen in command and needs him to look at it, "Unless you need more…private time." "Oh, shut up, Chiana -- god knows what you've been doing to that body," Aerton snaps.

Crigel continues with skekMo's tour, who says he believes they have no weapons. Crigel says that means they can be friends and have a feast. skekMo begs off, saying he feels unwell. Crigel pooh-poohs this and lists all the victuals they have on board. skekMo hurls. And THERE'S my vomit! All liquidy and shockingly similar to the glass of red wine I was just about to have. As the Vomitpolicella piles on the floor, it coagulates like gelatin. Mmm, always room for Jell-O! skekMo mutters, "Excuse." Crigel waves it off, "We do that sort of thing all the time here on Moya." He adds proudly, "I just peed in the maintenance bay." Again, poor Moya. Crigel posits that since they're all friendly-like with the bodily fluids, maybe skekMo could switch him back to his own body ASAP, "I don't think I can stand this gangly hunk of flesh much longer." Look, Rygel, if you don't want Crichton's body, I'll take it. Also, I accidentally typed, "gangly hung of flesh," because it's become that kind of recap. skekMo says he'll look into it when he gets back to his ship. The Vomitpolicella creeps, amoeba-like, up Moya. Ah, Farscape, where vomit has so many uses: sustenance, shorting Moya out, hotwiring D'Argo's ride…

Aerton jogs into the center chamber as Pilargo announces that Moya's scared. Something foreign is attacking her internals. Rygryn surmises that skekMo brought something on board, which Aerton negates, saying that D'Ariana searched him. "Well, she must have missed it," Rygryn returns. Not her fault, I mean even TSA wouldn't think to scan for "corrosive barf." Pilargo can't narrow down where the problem is, so Aerton and Rygryn take off to find Crigel.

skekShip. skekMo asks Zhaan, "Your people talk of 'switching back.' What means?" Oh my god, I'm so about to go Lionel Twain on this guy's ass, "What does IT mean! IT! Say your goddamn pronouns!"

Zhaan doesn't know what he's on about, but skekMo doesn't really care and asks skekYo if they're weapons are ready. They are. Good. skekMo trundles off. Zhaan hisses at skekYo to stop all this. "My code forbids me --" skekYo explains. "Frell your code!" Zhaan hisses back. skekYo is surprised by Zhaan's worry over shipmates who are not of her race. The Skeksis, apparently, worry about nothing but themselves. Zhaan offers to help skekYo evolve past skekMo and suggests that since skekMo failed in his duty when he fired and Moya and didn't kill her, skekYo can remove him from duty and replace him. skekYo is intrigued. Zhaan promises to be witness to skekMo's failure and swear it to anyone skekYo wants if she'll let Moya go. skekYo decides against this and says if skekMo fails again, "We talk again." "By then it will be too late," Zhaan whispers, twisting at her one shackle.

Moya. Vomitpolijella (too much?) creeps. D'Ariana cops in a few Chiana twitches before slamming Crigel against a bulkhead and says they need to run. Crigel said he'd do it in a microt except that he wants his body back. D'Ariana gets snuggly with Crigel and purrs, "Why would you do that? This body is much better." "You think?" Crigel asks. "I know," D'Ariana breathes, moving ever closer for the slash fans out there. D'Ariana tells Crigel that it's as good as it gets. "But this body is so…white," Crigel says, grimacing and then complains about the short life span. D'Ariana does…something below Crigel's waist that makes Crigel hoot asthmatically. "What are you doing, Chiana?" Crigel asks. D'Ariana breathes that he wants someone to go with her as it gets lonely out there. "Normally, you have to rub my eyebrows to make me feel like this," Crigel muses from his happy place. "I'll rub you anywhere you like in the transport pod," D'Ariana promises. Apparently, Chiana doesn't want her body back because she'd rather be alive in D'Argo's body than dead in hers. Crigel holds back, saying he can't go, and D'Ariana doesn't understand why he wants to stay. Well, Rygel needs his body to reclaim his Hynerian throne, so there's that.

Aerton and Rygryn arrive on the scene and try to get Crigel to remember what skekMo did to Moya. Aerton and Rygryn hone on the vomit side of things and order Crigel to show them the "pavement pizza." "You want to see vomit! Nobody wants to see vomit!" Crigel protests. Yeah, Farscape! But seeing vomit we are. Crigel points out where the vomit was, and they note that it's creeping up Moya's pipes and shit. Aerton climbs up to find the defense screen mechanism and posits that skekMo barfed up an acid to burn out the conduits. They have to rerun the power cells to avoid the corroded ones. They're also going to have to neutralize the acid, so Crigel goes off to Zhaan's lab to paw through her bottles and jars.

Time passes, and Crigel is holding a bowl of something that Aerton will dump on the acid while she reroutes the power supply. She doesn't know if it will work but she has to shut down the defense screen when they switch over, leaving them open to skekShip for a few seconds. However, they don't have a choice. Crigel dumps the neutralizer on the Vomitpolicella, and Aerton rips out cables.

skekYo notes that the defense screen is down and skekMo gives the order to destroy as Zhaan bleats, "Stop! They're unarmed!"

Aerton rehooks cable and tells Pilargo that she's ready to repower the defense screen. D'Ariana announces that she thinks she's repatched the defense screen. Moya takes the hit and there's more body-swapping. Aeryn jumps into Crichton's body -- which makes no sense because the graphics show that it was Aeryn's body that ejected the soul (which should have been Crichton's) that jumped into Crichton -- Rygel's soul swaps into Aeryn, and Crichton now inhabits Rygel. Crityn, Aerygel, and Ryton. Well, at least Aeryn gets to have her revenge on Crichton.

I really have a headache now. Ryton points out all the good in this. If they made this switch, they will somehow make a final switch. In other places, Chiana is now in Pilot, Pilot is in D'Argo, and D'Argo is in Chiana. Pilana, D'Argot, Chiargo. Wait, no, THAT'S the headache I have now.

Chiargo bellows at one of the Crichton forms to get down there because they think Pilot is dying in D'Argo's body.

I think I need a break.

Okay, I'm sufficiently fed and lubricated with non-red alcohol. Anyway, so skekMo totally doth protest too much that he didn't fail and says he will ram Moya. Lord, if the ships switch personalities, souls, essences, whathaveyou, I am SO outta here. Zhaan keens about their peacefulness, which just makes the Trekkie in me want to say, "We seek PEACEful co-EXISTENCE!" complete with appropriate neck-throbbing, and so forth. Zhaan calls skekYo over and points out that skekMo has failed. Again. Some more. She tells skekYo to stop skekMo, which she does by smacking a bony talon across skekMo's face. Apparently, this is enough to fell skekMo and skekYo finishes him off with a crunchy and fatal hicky. SkekYo announces, "Tak was fool. I will evolve." Zhaan looks worried. As well she should.

Pilana freaks about being Pilot, clearly not being disciplined enough to look for the red light or the rope or the thing that helped D'Argo be Pilot. Meanwhile, Ben Browder gets to continue on with his British-ish accent as Aeryn and tells everyone to calm down while they think of solutions. Okay -- and I might need a map to get back from this one -- so, before D'Argo leaped from Pilot to Chiana, he thought he sensed that the blast was intended to destroy Moya, not make them switch bodies. Why didn't the blast destroy them? Who knows, but it apparently has something to do with some power filtering through the defense screen. Eventually, they realize that the interaction of the defense screen and the skekShip weapon might have something to do with the Freaky Friday effect. While Ryton hypothesizes about powering the screen to sixty-two percent and getting the skekShip to fire on them, Aerygel pulls what looks like a bobby pin from her armpit, sniffs it, and eats it.

Summation time: Crichton is not sure if he's right -- because he's pulling all his hypotheses out of that sweet, sweet ass -- and now the skekShip is closing in on them. Bunch of evasive maneuvers and keeping Moya calm to avoid starburst. Chiargo says they all need to get back into the position they were in the first time around. I know, I don't -- just go with it, please?

skekShip. skekYo prepares to ram, Zhaan sobs and berates at intervals. Zhaan then prays and pulls a vegetable trick as she yanks her hand through her shackles. She then leaps at skekYo and smacks her with what looks like a hubcap across the face. skekYo folds like fresh pasta.

On Moya, Pilana attempts evasive maneuvers but it's not quite happening. skekShip rams them with serious spikes. Moya banks right in reaction. Zhaan is trying to transmit to them. Pilana patches it into a clamshell and Zhaan tells them she has control of the ship and wants to know if everyone is all right. Ryton says it will take too long to explain their status, but they need her to shoot them again. Zhaan thinks he's weird for having a photo of Crichton on his chest and wants to speak to Crichton actual. "But I'm --" Ryton says and slumps in defeat. "She wants me?" Crityn wonders. Yep, she won't believe it from anyone else.

And I know I probably haven't made that much of a point in this episode, but everyone turns to Crichton for solutions here. Like, I know that's the point and the crux, and he's the Horatio Hornblower of the show, but the fact that they are turning to him so early on, given that he's the Outlander, the freak, the alien, well, it's significant. Also significant without even trying? The fact that the greater part of the smash-up names in this show sound more like "Crichton" than any of the other sound like themselves. Yeah? "Ryton"? "Crityn"? I didn't plan it that way.

Ryton says Zhaan won't hear it from Rygel. "I told you! You all say I'm paranoid, but it's true, no one frelling listens to me!" Aergel complains. That's because you eat the spooge you find in your armpits, dude. "Can it, furball!" Ryton orders. "Great! Now I'm getting yotz from my own body!" Aergel whinges. Zhaan is just confused and annoyed. Crityn orders Zhaan to just shoot them already. "Are you sure about this, Crichton?" Zhaan inquires. "Shoot the damn gun, you blue-assed bitch!" Aergel orders testily. Crityn's sure, just shoot, full power. "Trust me," Crityn wheedles, holding up his hands and grinning, "Everything will be all right!" Crityn gives her the thumbs up. Hee. The way Browder acts -- like it's so alien for him to do that hand motion -- is awesome. Zhaan nods, "If you say so, John." Aergel mutters about how disgusting it all is.

They all get ready to take the hit. Chiargo struggles to move the unconscious D'Argot back into place, and Aergel mathematicians exactly where they were standing. D'Argot finally wakes up and stumbles into position as Chiargo screams at him. Chiargo leaps onto Pilot's console and Zhaan fires.

EVERYTHING IS BACK TO NORMAL, HALLE-FRELLING-UJAH! Rygel chuckles in an unmistakably Rygel way, but Crichton mutters British-ly, "Yotz, I'll just crawl back to my royal bedchamber and --" Aeryn looks concerned, which she shouldn't because when has Rygel ever called his quarters on Moya "royal"? They're so beneath his royal standards as to be lower than plebian. "Joke, Aeryn," Crichton smiles, "I'm back." Aeryn shakes her head at him, smiling in spite of herself, "You bastard!" She leaps on him. She…well, she straddles him and they do that fighting thing you did in high school that was all just a precursor to making out. Crichton pauses in the foreploy long enough to ask if Pilot et all are okay. Yeah, yeah, they are, now back to the sex.

"Yes! We did it!" Crichton chortles, wrapping his arms around Aeryn, who is still straddling him and who now wraps her arms around his neck and stuff. "Oh, yes, I'm back, too -- thanks for asking!" Rygel grumps, "Back to being me, back to being ignored." Oh, sad. Doesn't that just kill the mood?

Time passes and Pilot asks the returned Zhaan how much Talyn has grown. "He's not as big as Moya yet, Pilot," Zhaan answers. Yes, he's teething, but he's not recognizing shapes yet. Zhaan goes on that he's fierce and he easily destroyed the skekShip. Pilot retreads and reconfirms that Crais wasn't the one to initiate the attack. Pilot then signs off, saying he has to go commune with Moya and share all the experiences he had when they were separated. Aw, they're just like an old married couple. Zhaan smiles and gets up, wincing at her hand in the sling. Rygel solicitously inquires if her hand will ever get better. Zhaan smiles down at him and says she's reinitiated the internal flow of nutrients but there's a danger that she won't regain full functionality. She must heal it slowly.

Chiana and D'Argo make eyes at each other. D'Argo tells Chiana shyly that his tankas are sore and they've never been like that before, so he's just wondering what she's been doing with them. That's what his face penises are called, "tankas"? I never knew that. And sorry, but D'Argo has the most phallic face since Joe Camel. "Nothing!" Chiana insists, adding instantly, "Hey, have you been speaking to Crichton?" He hasn't but as he looks around, D'Argo confesses that he really, really enjoyed being "inside" her "body." Chiana grins, and D'Argo stutters as he stumbles over the rising sexual tension in the room. "What I meant by that was --" he stammers. Chiana stands up and says, "I know what you mean." "I, uh, I really like your body," D'Argo says. "You like my body?" she repeats, standing over him. They lock gazes and ping their genitalia. But Chiana sometimes knows about timing, so she walks away with an invitation in her smile. She pauses outside the center chamber to make sure D'Argo is following her. He is.

Aeryn and Crichton watch them go. "Well, they certainly seem to be re-adjusting well," Aeryn says. Crichton pays lip service to miles, shoes, and someone else's. "Well, I certainly know what you were doing in my shoes," Aeryn smiles. "Give me a break," Crichton says. Aeryn shrugs and laughs that it's okay, "You were in my shoes. I was in your pants…" She gets up and saunters out. "'Scuze me?" Crichton says. Aeryn turns around and bites her lip at him -- which is different than biting her thumb at him, something that apparently starts fights in fair Verona -- in suggestive invitation. Crichton leaps up after her and then….CREDITS! Because we waited all this time and waded through the ALL body switching and the dinner jiggles and the lack of seeing Aeryn doing ANYTHING in Crichton's pants to get NO SEX!?

ARRRGH!

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