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Who Else Bought Harsh Realm?

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Guest Second Coming

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  • 1 year later...
Guest I Made This

I bought the boxset recently but haven't got round to watching it yet. This is probably the only Chris Carter series I haven't had a chance to see yet, X Files, Millennium and The Lone Gunmen were all broadcast on British television, but sadly Harsh Realm wasn't.

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  • Elders (Moderators)

Of CC's three shows (TLG was really a spin-off and mostly produced by Frank Spotnitz, Vince Gilligan, and John Shiban), I regard MM and HR as in different ways being equally the darkest.

MM was mostly about questions about evil. Does it exist as a separate force, or is it an outward manifestation of individual human minds?

HR, to me, was even more deeply philosophical and was about one individual, albeit through futuristic means, having total control, as in a "benign" dictatorship, and how that really doesn't work. If I were to comment more sensibly, I'd first have to go back and re-read texts such as Plato's Republic and Thomas More's Utopia, both of which I found somewhat disturbing.

If for no other reason, HR is worth watching because of Terry O'Quinn's performance. You'll need to separate Peter Watts from Santiago, because in HR O'Quinn is superb in his portrayal of the dictator of Harsh Realm.

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Guest I Made This

Of CC's three shows (TLG was really a spin-off and mostly produced by Frank Spotnitz, Vince Gilligan, and John Shiban), I regard MM and HR as in different ways being equally the darkest.

MM was mostly about questions about evil. Does it exist as a separate force, or is it an outward manifestation of individual human minds?

HR, to me, was even more deeply philosophical and was about one individual, albeit through futuristic means, having total control, as in a "benign" dictatorship, and how that really doesn't work. If I were to comment more sensibly, I'd first have to go back and re-read texts such as Plato's Republic and Thomas More's Utopia, both of which I found somewhat disturbing.

If for no other reason, HR is worth watching because of Terry O'Quinn's performance. You'll need to separate Peter Watts from Santiago, because in HR O'Quinn is superb in his portrayal of the dictator of Harsh Realm.

This, right here, makes me want to run and watch Harsh Realm right now. Wow.

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I ended up liking Harsh Realm, but it took me awhile to get to that point with a show that I considered Millennium's replacement. I was unhappy for awhile, to put it lightly. Needless to say, I was able to grow beyong my anger and say nice things about Harsh Realm. Apparently there was some contraversy because 1013 originally did not give credit to the comic book that they based the show on. I think I saw the first 2 episodes in TV. I picked up the set from ebay for a decent price. It made for a cool alternate reality plotline. It was a little unclear how HR would take over the real world, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt in that they basically never got a chance to fully explain that. In shows like this, I find myself putting the "cart before the horse" and hoping early on for an endng worthy of the journey, so to speak.

On a side note, it was cool to see another show based in Vancouver to be able to pick out the actors who were in other 1013 and vancouver based shows, and even try to (unsucessfully) pick out the locations. This was the show that they got "Agent Fossa" from for X Files 2. The actor that played Jim Penseyres also played in Camera Obsecura, and Michael Greyeyes (Joe Reynard from A Single Blade) played one of the native Americans in "Cincinnati." There's a bunch of others I could pick out too, but I'd have to give the set another viewing.

I don't really have a favorite episode, but Pilot, Kein Ausgang, Reunion, and Cincinnati stand out a little bit for me. They could do things like nuke New York City and not have to worry about pressing the magic reset button at the end of the episode. I initially did not like Leviathan on the first viewing, but that was because I thought the music didn't fit well with the tone of the show.

rock2.gif

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  • 1 year later...
  • 2 weeks later...

It had so much potential and so much was left undeveloped, unanswered.

I must put out my box set again soon.

I totally agree. Seeing this topic brought up again makes me want to watch it for the maybe 4th time. So good.

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