@LurkyMcLurkerson:disqus I would say it depends on the nature of the mystery. If the mystery pertains to the fundamental nature of the setting ("Do mystical forces exist?" "What is the nature of the Cylons Plan?") then I think you need to have an answer from the start as the answer has such far reaching consequences…

I've never seen the original Tomorrow People but I can't help but be pessimistic towards the notion of a mainstream TV series treating transhumanism in any kind of coherent or positive way. It wouldn't surprise me to see the subject framed in "playing God" or "there are things Man was not meant to know" terms.

Even more impressive/baffling is episode 14 of Twin Peaks, where Maddy is beaten to death right in front of us. Still one of the most brutal murders on TV. I guess the censors were busy that day.

They make a point early on of establishing that Audrey is 18. Yes, that would make the relationship still very creepy (though more creepy than Billy Zane? I dunno) but it would make the ending far more powerful. Of course it would also change the rest of the series substantially, so who knows if we would've got the…

It's debatable whether this counts or not, given that it's not technically an episode of the series, but End of Evangelion is pretty awesome. Asuka's fight against the MP Evas and the Third Impact sequence are really, really impressive.

As others have said, it comes down to how serialised the show is. And it does work both ways; the finale of The Shield, for example, retroactively improves the entire series.

I don't think it's much of a secret these days. When a genuine case can be made that the Davies era is not as bad as the Moffat era you know he messed up somewhere (to be perfectly honest I stopped watching after The Wedding of River Song, but everything I read about what's transpired subsequently doesn't make me want…

While I think your invective is a bit misplaced I will agree with your opinion on BSG.

Right, they could have easily had the Prophet/Pagh-Wraith conflict be some sort of debate on the merits of interventionism vs. isolationism (which they sort of touched on IIRC) and given the Pagh-Wraiths a halfway reasonable justification for their actions. But no, they had to be literal fire monsters. One thing that…

Which scenes seemed out of character to you? I will admit that the prelude to the lodge stuff is a bit rushed, but that's a structure problem, not a character problem. And everything inside the lodge can only really be judged on a symbolic level.

@E.Buzz Miller I actually think Deathwish (the first Voyager Q episode) to be one of Voyager's best episodes, and certainly the best Voyager Q episode. But yeah, the subsequent ones were crap.

I'd say Lexx had a completely satisfying finale, with some surprisingly genuine emotion for the series. Of course if you don't like Lexx in the first place it won't do much for you, but as someone who likes the series a lot I found it very satisfying.

The Twin Peaks ending is one of the most terrifyingly awesome things ever put on TV. It's baffling how this, along with episode 14, ever got on TV in 1990/91.

He always seemed to be a terrible teacher, ranting about vague philosophical mumbo-jumbo instead of, you know, teaching chemistry.

Yeah that'll keep a lid on it…

They had to put the bowling alleys there to make room for the whale tank.

@avclub-b3d29f8f22c60a4b2c5fc2b1691c1d62:disqus Also, the TNG warp scale is supposed to be asymptotic, with warp 10 being ludicrinfinite speed (which gets explicitly mentioned in Voyager's Threshold). This is silly, as it means that continuous improvements to warp technology will lead to increasingly cumbersome warp…

You're entirely correct @avclub-bca3531762af8a993c4f60c48fd5e33b:disqus , I mis-remembered, it was the entire war, not merely the occupation that the PTB wanted wrapped up in a 2 parter.

I'm pretty sure the lack of shields is to cut down on CGI rendering times, and not for any in-universe reason. It's always bugged me.

The physical models weren't "scanned in" as such (or at least, any "scanning in" wasn't the entirety of the process). I believe the CGI models were created manually using 3D modeling software.