Finally continuing the LEXX capsule reviews with the second Lexx telemovie, Super Nova. Still pretty good, but this one was lower on the subversive wit, higher on the body horror, and had a shower scene where Stan spies on Zev the love-slave (and gets found out) that I’m pretty sure wasn’t in the Canadian version that I first saw back in the nineties (research indicates it wasn’t, and that the team filmed some too-porny-for-Canada sequences with a view to putting them in video releases and European versions).
Without spoilers: this episode sees the crew trying to fix Kai’s longevity issue (having no fresh protoblood, he’s only got ten days to live) by travelling to his home planet of Brunnis. Since he’s also the Last of the Brunnen-G people, it’s inhabited only by The Poet Man (Tim Curry), a hologram who isn’t going to let a little thing like being dead stand in the way of having sex and reproducing. The story also introduces Giggerota, a strangely charismatic recurring baddie with cannibalistic tendencies. The story does some interesting things with the concept of prophecy and destiny; on the negative side, Giggerota, at this point, just feels like a gratuitous if entertaining Rabelasian side-plot, but her importance to the series does become clearer later on.
I have a DVD copy of this, and there was a fun interview on the extras with Lex Gigeroth and the team in which they explain the terribly-new and cutting-edge concept of CGI backgrounds. These have actually stood the test of time pretty well– a lot better than The Phantom Menace, which had more money thrown at it; I hadn’t realised quite how much of the backgrounds weren’t sets until seeing the behnind-the-scenes footage. Also the giant head surrounded by steampunk electrical pylons on Brunnis is astonishing.
A Doctor Of Many Things 