ABC’s Sci-Fi Series Defying Gravity Early Look
Defying Gravity TV Series, Sci-Fi Movie News, Sci-Fi TV News — By endymi0n on July 11, 2009Defying Gravity is a 13 hour summer run Sci-Fi series coming on ABCÂ in a two hour start on Aug 2. We’ve got the trailer and the big as holy hell press release detailing the “sexy” Sci-Fi action.
ASTRONAUTS EMBARK ON PROVOCATIVE SPACE THRILLER IN “DEFYING GRAVITY,” A NEW SERIES STARRING RON LIVINGSTON AND LAURA HARRIS, BEGINING WITH A SPECIAL TWO-HOUR PREMIERE SUNDAY, AUGUST 2 ON THE ABC TELEVISION NETWORK
From executive producers James Parriott and Michael Edelstein comes “Defying Gravity,” a sexy, provocative space thriller set in the very near future against the background of our solar system, in which eight astronauts from five countries (four women and four men) undertake a mysterious six-year international space mission covering eight billion miles. The adventure begins on SUNDAY, AUGUST 2 with a two-hour premiere from 9:00-11:00 p.m. The series will air regularly from 10:00-11:00 p.m., starting Sun, August 9 on the ABC Television Network.
Hurtling into the vast challenge of infinite space, the eight astronauts and the ground personnel who support them are on a mission that has a powerful and awesome mystery at its core. The intimate and interconnected relationships among the astronauts and the ground crew, as well as their past actions, have a strangely karmic effect on the present.
Episodes are divided between the present, as the Antares travels towards Venus, and the past, with flashbacks to earlier years when the astronauts were in the grueling selection and training process.
The series’ international ensemble cast is led by Ron Livingston (”Office Space,” “Sex and the City”) as Antares flight engineer Maddux Donner, Laura Harris (”24″) as the ship’s geologist, Zoe Barnes, Malik Yoba (”New York Undercover”) as Antares commander Ted Shaw, Christina Cox (”Blood Ties”) as biologist Jen Crane, Florentine Lahme (”Impact”) as pilot Nadia Schilling, Paula Garces (”The Shield”) as pilot, scientist and on-board documentary producer Paula Morales, Eyal Podell (”24″) as psychiatrist and medical officer Evram Mintz, and Dylan Taylor (”House Party”) as theoretical physicist Steve Wassenfelder. The cast on planet Earth is led by Andrew Airlie (”Reaper”) as Mission Control commander Mike Goss, Karen LeBlanc (”ReGenesis”) as scientist Eve Shaw, Zahf Paroo (”Battlestar Galactica”) as grounded flight engineer Ajay Sharma, and Maxim Roy (”MVP”) as flight surgeon Claire Dereux. Episodic director Peter Howitt also plays the role of BBC journalist Trevor Williams.
Created by James Parriott, “Defying Gravity” was inspired by “Space Odyssey: Voyage to the Planets,” a fictional docudrama produced by Impossible Pictures (”Walking with Dinosaurs”) for the BBC. The series is a co-venture between Fox Television Studios and Omni Film Productions and is produced in association with Canada’s CTV and Germany’s ProSieben.
From the trailer, seen below, it looks like they’ll be tackling the horny people in space problem that has vexed scientists for years now. Sexy astronauts in zero-g makes for fine Summer entertainment. Thanks Aintitcool.
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6 Comments
The hell? It looks like all they do is bonk in space. When I first saw previews for this, I thought for sure it had to be a joke…
this IS a joke right…. right???
this show sucks so much ass it is pitiful
All the soap opera elements are there because the producer is from “Grey's Anatomy”. They're also trying to throw in a bit of “Lost”-like mystery about an unseen force as well.
From the network's point of view, it's all based on demographics: If you can get 17-35 year old males with the scifi thriller elements, and a similarly aged female audience with the chick flick elements, well, you've just doubled your potential audience.
From an artistic point of view, it is a worthy goal to weave these disparate elements together in a cohesive, dramatic whole. After all, life does have mystery and conflict and thrilling parts to it, and people do have human aspects and social relationships. It gives the writers, directors, and actors a real challenge: convey a dramatic narrative and also make the characters real, live, breathing people.
At its best, the richness of the characterization can complement the narrative and vice versa (think BSG). At its worst, it turns into a muddled mess (think Grey's Anatomy).
From the viewer's point of view, it is good to have one's presumptions challenged. A scifi thriller shouldn't just be hardware and space battles with a sexy babe thrown in — you have to care about the characters too. A chick flick shouldn't just be all about emotions and relationships — there has to be a narrative and that elevates it from mere soap opera.
To date, the jury is still out on Defying Gravity, since only three episodes (well, a 90 minute pilot, plus one episode) have aired. The creators seem to have enough talent to be able to pull it off, but we'll just have to see.
Truly horrible writing. This show goes nowhere every single week. A complete waste of Ron Livingston and Christina Cox. This should never have been greenlighted with these scripts.
I love this show! It is my favorite show on television this summer! I also look forward to the fall season of Fringe. I love the combination of real science and and plausible future science in Defying Gravity! I also love the sexiness of the women characters and the personal relationships of all the astronauts and the personality, intelligence, and character of the Indian scientist in mission control and of many of the other scientists. I love how the show deals with ethical issues. I want to see Beta and understand whats it full goals are! Show us what in Hangar Bay 4! Don't cancel this great show! Why is it that nearly all of my favorite science fiction shows get canceled before they even complete their first season? The commercials for Flashforward look good, but if ABC cancels Defying Gravity before airing all 13 episodes, then I won't watch Flashforward due to fear that ABC will also end that series before the end of the first season.