S04.E06: Final Hour

[Cobb Salad]

If not a gun, perhaps something that's routine for us but looks like magic to the natives. Plus, depending on how far back he was sent, the natives may not have met any explorers like the British yet.

[ketose]

It's kind of funny that most (all) of the Liber8 six were non-white and the hero was Caucasian. Of course, that's a little simplistic because Julian is White and Carlos is Hispanic / Latin.

[TVSpectator]

It's kind of funny that most (all) of the Liber8 six were non-white and the hero was Caucasian. Of course, that's a little simplistic because Julian is White and Carlos is Hispanic / Latin.

I am not sure what your point is and what is your point?

[ketose]

No real point. But I was thinking about how there weren't any White people in the original configuration of Liber8, especially if Garza is also Hispanic.

[tessaray]

That's a standard part of any near future scifi story, Caucasians are the minority and people of color are in the majority. Even Time Trax, almost 20 years ago, had the main character - a Caucasian - succeed in spite of being a minority. 

[sjohnson]

Kellogg and Jaworski were very white. The name Kagame doesn't sound caucasian but the character was. Garza may be a Spanish name but if Bernardo O'Higgins can be a great liberator in Chile, Garza can be a Liber8 in Vancouver. Verta, Ingram, Chen and Valentine make fifty percent. Or less if you count Valentine as off-white. 

[TVSpectator]

No real point. But I was thinking about how there weren't any White people in the original configuration of Liber8, especially if Garza is also Hispanic.

 

I assume that the actress is white (Luvia Petersen), and since Garza is  Italian, Spanish, and/or Portuguese surname, then we can assume that she is at least has European descent. 

[TVSpectator]

That's a standard part of any near future scifi story, Caucasians are the minority and people of color are in the majority. Even Time Trax, almost 20 years ago, had the main character - a Caucasian - succeed in spite of being a minority. 

 

Well, at least we had a female lead. Usually, the lead in a sci-fi series is a male. 

[ketose]

Plus, Kiera had a compelling reason to return. In Time Trax, Darien liked it better in 1993.

[tessaray]

Plus, Kiera had a compelling reason to return. In Time Trax, Darien liked it better in 1993.

 

Yeah, there wasn't much in common with the 2 shows, other than the launch point of criminals escaping back into the past.  Well, maybe Darien and Kiera had the true blue law enforcement persona in common.  Kiera's evolution re: Liber8 and the corporate future was much more interesting to watch though.  SF storytelling has come quite a way since the mid 90s. 

 

ETA:  I wasn't even thinking about Babylon 5 - which I loved.  It certainly influenced the shows that came after. But when it comes to time travel, there really isn't much to compare Continuum against. 

Edited October 25, 2015 by tessaray

[ketose]

Time Trax also didn't have causality. If someone died in the past, they (or their descendants) still existed in 2193. That show ended up a lot like Renegade with future tech.

 

I liked the way Continuum turned out, especially after seeing some stuff with Simon Berry. I don't think he could have told that story for 3-4 more seasons and still have an audience. It's an unfortunate reality of the genre. Even Lost Girl on Showcase is bowing out after 5 seasons and that barely had a story line.

[TVSpectator]

Time Trax only had two seasons before it was canceled. So, I don't think that it had been on long enough for it to have something like a long running and complex story arc, but then again, shows back in the 1990s, tended to be their worst in their first and/or second seasons (just look at how awful TNG was in their seasons 1-2). 

[ketose]

Due to the way many non-network media produces programming, they also run shorter seasons now. Continuum was on for four season, but only had 42 episodes. Time Trax was on for 2 seasons with 42 episodes plus a 2 hour pilot movie.

Some of the worst Time Trax episodes were part of the Dr. Sahmbi story arc. Some shows are more stand-alone in nature, others are massive story arcs. The big example from the 90's is Babylon 5. That story was pre-written by Joe Straczynski and it still took a couple of half season delays and a network change to finish the story line.

TNG was awful in the first seasons because they literally had no writers. There was a writers' strike, reused scripts and a second season finale that was composed of mostly incongruous flashbacks.

[TVSpectator]

 

TNG was awful in the first seasons because they literally had no writers. There was a writers' strike, reused scripts and a second season finale that was composed of mostly incongruous flashbacks.

 

I have also heard that Gene Roddenberry was also a factor as to why early TNG sucked. Every heard of something called "Roddenberry's Box"?

 

 

A writing assignment for a Star Trek movie would certainly attract all sorts of good writers with credentials in feature films. Why then wouldn’t the studio and Rick Berman seek out “new blood” to write the next Star Trek movie instead of giving it to another old television warhorse like me?

 

The answer can be found in Roddenberry’s Box.

 

I happen to like the box. A lot of writers don’t. In fact, I think it’s fair to say, most writers who have worked on Star Trek over the years would like to throw the box away. It may surprise you to learn that when I took over as head writer, the entire writing staff of Star Trek: The Next Generation was so frustrated and angry with Gene Roddenberry they were counting the days before their contracts expired (and indeed every one of them left at season’s end.) He wouldn’t let them out of the box and they were suffocating..

 

My first time in Roddenberry’s Box was during the very first episode I worked on as head writer. We were already in production of season three, four shows were finished, twenty-two still to do. There were no scripts and no stories to shoot the following week. Desperate, I bought a spec script that had been sent in from an amateur writer named Ron Moore who was about to enlist in the U.S. Navy. It was a rough teleplay called “The Bonding” and would require a lot of reworking but I liked the idea. A female Starfleet officer is killed in an accident and her child, overcome with grief, bonds with a holographic recreation of his mother rather than accept her death.

 

I sent a short description of the story to Rick and Gene. Minutes later, I was called to an urgent meeting in Gene’s office. “This doesn’t work” he said. “In the Twenty-Fourth Century, no one grieves. Death is accepted as part of life.”

 

As I shared the dilemma with the other staff writers, they took a bit of pleasure from my loss of virginity, all of them having already been badly bruised by rejections from Gene. Roddenberry was adamant that Twenty-Fourth Century man would evolve past the petty emotional turmoil that gets in the way of our happiness today. Well, as any writer will tell you, ‘emotional turmoil’, petty and otherwise, is at the core of any good drama. It creates conflict between characters. But Gene didn’t want conflict between our characters. “All the problems of mankind have been solved,” he said. “Earth is a paradise.”

 

Now, go write drama.

 

https://artiewayne.wordpress.com/2007/06/16/exclusive-star-trekrodenberrys-box-michael-piller-chapt-2-download-now/

 

Basically, some fans believe that the show got better when Roddenberry started to let go a lot of the responsibilities (due to illness), which happened gradually over the first few seasons. 

Edited October 25, 2015 by TVSpectator

[tessaray]

^^^^^  This is why I think today's shows are so much better.  The Star Trek utopia and its big red reset button, where very little from any episode has consequences, makes me crazy as a viewer.

[ketose]

This goes kind of off-topic for me because I despise Ron Moore and I think he wrote some of the most nonsensical stories for the various Star trek incarnations, then proceeded to blame everyone else for not letting him spread his wings.

 

Back on topic, Simon Barry cited "Star Trek" as his influence for Continuum. That's a little ironic, because when Star Trek went back in time, there was always causality.

[sjohnson]

I have also heard that Gene Roddenberry was also a factor as to why early TNG sucked. Every heard of something called "Roddenberry's Box"?

 

https://artiewayne.wordpress.com/2007/06/16/exclusive-star-trekrodenberrys-box-michael-piller-chapt-2-download-now/

 

Basically, some fans believe that the show got better when Roddenberry started to let go a lot of the responsibilities (due to illness), which happened gradually over the first few seasons. 

If conflict is drama, then every boxing match and horse race is a drama. You'd think a professional writer would know this. Even in the example he cites, there's no drama, just emo. What's the kid going to do, live in a holodeck? It's worse than petty, it's kind of nuts even today. I suspect on one level even this guy knew this had nothing to do with the main characters. 

 

As to how this relates to Continuum, for me Kiera choosing to break with her corporate overlords was the big drama. The script finessing it so that she by the value of her self-sacrifice inspires the corporate overlords not be be corporate overlords and inspires Liber8 not to revolt, well, I liked the character. But this was a little too wish fulfillment for me to be wholly satisfied.

[zxy556575]

...inspires Liber8 not to revolt.

 

They still revolted, didn't they? Keira just ended up believing in their cause rather than her own.

 

I dunno. If I try to figure out all the history/future/present backstories and multiple timelines too much I need an Advil.

Edited October 25, 2015 by lordonia

[xaxat]

Finally got around to watching the last two episodes, and I enjoyed the finale.

 

Given the the short season and the fact that time travel stories are always messy plot wise, I thought they did a good job in wrapping up the series by focusing on the people. Although I wouldn't go as far as calling it resolution, every character got a moment. Especially Kiera, who had good scenes with pretty much everyone.

 

(I have to admit, I laughed when Garza's "moment" was appearing out of no where and breaking a guys neck.)

Edited October 25, 2015 by xaxat

[sjohnson]

They still revolted, didn't they? Keira just ended up believing in their cause rather than her own.

 

I dunno. If I try to figure out all the history/future/present backstories and multiple timelines too much I need an Advil.

No, no revolt. Alec was so inspired he didn't do the corporate takeover. I thought Escher/Piron and Dillon had started the takeover but somehow Dillon being inspired to do whatever it was he did to get himself killed (I'm shocked to discover I've already forgotten!) reversed that. Don't ask me to explain. 

[TVSpectator]

No, no revolt. Alec was so inspired he didn't do the corporate takeover. I thought Escher/Piron and Dillon had started the takeover but somehow Dillon being inspired to do whatever it was he did to get himself killed (I'm shocked to discover I've already forgotten!) reversed that. Don't ask me to explain. 

 

I think that was because Alec time traveled to saved Emily, who was hired to kill Esher, before he could finish his takeover. I think that was why Alec time traveling a week or two, caused a major shift while Kiera and Liber8 didn't do any massive damage, well before season 2 & 3 and most of the Corporate Government was still on the right path (well, some of that was thanks to Kiera for letting that one woman walked away from murder because she will invent some kind of massive new alternative energy). 

 

 

This goes kind of off-topic for me because I despise Ron Moore and I think he wrote some of the most nonsensical stories for the various Star trek incarnations, then proceeded to blame everyone else for not letting him spread his wings.

 

Back on topic, Simon Barry cited "Star Trek" as his influence for Continuum. That's a little ironic, because when Star Trek went back in time, there was always causality.

 

I can support you with your Ron Moore hate (and yeah he did totally drop the ball on some of his major projects), but to be fair Star Trek was one of his better writing sci-fi legacies. As with the story that I posted, Michael Piller wrote it about him trying to adapt a Moore story into an early TNG episode (and even that episode was lame), not Moore. Although, if you asked any other writers about Roddenberry's ideas and behaviors, at the time of early TNG, they usually say the same thing, but they never outright insult him. 

Edited October 26, 2015 by TVSpectator

[ketose]

I think that was because Alec time traveled to saved Emily, who was hired to kill Esher, before he could finish his takeover. I think that was why Alec time traveling a week or two, caused a major shift while Kiera and Liber8 didn't do any massive damage, well before season 2 & 3 and most of the Corporate Government was still on the right path (well, some of that was thanks to Kiera for letting that one woman walked away from murder because she will invent some kind of massive new alternative energy). 

One of the things that became clear to me by the end was that the future was set in stone until there was a time jump involved. In Season 1, everything in the history of Liber8 was unfolding the way they knew it would (Kagame bombing the building) and Escher was slowly grooming Alec while Julian headed underground. The future didn't change until Alec went back a week and made it so that Liber8 would weaken corporations enough to cause the world's governments to collapse. Even with all of Alec and Julian's good intentions toward their futures, it took Kellogg jumping into the time stream to cancel out the warlord future and replace it with the Roddenberry paradise of the finale. In other words, the only free will worth a damn is the decision to time travel. Kind of like the movie Predestination.

[AudienceofOne]

Actually, when Kagame blew up the building it hit that statue in a different place and the damage to the statue represented a new time stream created. That was a new time stream to the one created when Liber8 went back. Obviously Kellogg killing his grandmother created another one where Kellogg was never born. And Liber8 being established decades early also did. The reason why the Alec change was so stark was because it was Alec. Other actions had already created different timestreams.

[AllyB]

Kellogg and Jaworski were very white.

Kellog is not white, he looks like someone with middle-Eastern/South Asian ancestry and as Stephen Lobo is Goan-Iranian that's presumably exactly what he is.

[sjohnson]

Sorry, Kellogg still looks white to me, as do Jaworski, Garza and Kagame. And to my eyes Valentine is a little tan but doesn't look like any identifiable ethnic group. 

[ketose]

Actually, when Kagame blew up the building it hit that statue in a different place and the damage to the statue represented a new time stream created. That was a new time stream to the one created when Liber8 went back. Obviously Kellogg killing his grandmother created another one where Kellogg was never born. And Liber8 being established decades early also did. The reason why the Alec change was so stark was because it was Alec. Other actions had already created different timestreams.

This goes back to the quantum universe thing. The building and Kellog's ancestor were all related to the time jump from 2077. What I mean to say is that free will seems to be an illusion with the exception of choosing to travel in time. That's when the whole world changes.

[gazebo]

Kiera does go back to the future and see her son again, but can never ever be
with him!  I think I was crying along with Kiera right there!

What a great but bittersweet ending! 

 

I like this show, but to be honest it did give me a bit of a headache with its' incredibly twists and turns.  This last season was so suspenseful and well written!  It was a blast!

 

It's a shame that this is the end.  I grew to love the characters and wonder what will happen to them after the Show is over.  But hey, this was an awesome ride!

 

Thanks!

Edited November 1, 2015 by gazebo

[TVSpectator]

What a great but bittersweet ending!  Kiera does go back to the future and see her son again, but can never ever be with him!  I think I was crying along with Kiera right there!

 

I like this show, but to be honest it did give me a bit of a headache with its' incredibly twists and turns.  This last season was so suspenseful and well written!  It was a blast!

 

It's a shame that this is the end.  I grew to love the characters and wonder what will happen to them after the Show is over.  But hey, this was an awesome ride!

 

Thanks!

 

I was surprised that they showed heads literally exploding!

[blueray]

Finally got to watch the last season on Netflix. Wow that was a good finale, but did leave me wanting a bit more.

 

Kiara finally returns to 2077 but it's an alternate utopia future, but it doesn't say where she goes from there. I mean he has to do something other then stalk her alternate family. It's bittersweet that she gets to see Sam again but he already has his mother.

 

I loved that Carlos survived the series because there were many times I thought he was going to get killed. And that he ended up having a park dedicated to him. And that Kellog ended up in some ancient time lol.

 

I wonder what happened to Gazia, because she was the only liber8 left standing at the end. I can kind of see the police end up hiring her as she has a lot of skills but isn't much of a team player ;). And I guess if Alec stayed with Emily than Jason was never be born :(.

 

Over all, great mini-series, I just wish that it wasn't cancelled.

[blueray]

 

(I have to admit, I laughed when Garza's "moment" was appearing out of no where and breaking a guys neck.)

I did too because at the moment I was thinking where did Garza go, oh there you are.