BLOG I Like Outcasts

It’s slow, but is it moving? SFX blogger John Cooper defends the citizens of Carpathia

After a couple of slightly uneventful episodes Outcasts is picking up. With no space opera on telly at the moment or in the foreseeable future, the Beeb making cuts left right and centre and moving the show to a late night slot on Sundays, I’ve made a conscious decision – I like Outcasts .

Four episodes in and it's still finding its feet, but after this week’s episodes I'm prepared to stand by it and say it’s a show with loads of potential and I want to see more.

I'll be honest, this wasn’t my first reaction. Reading the interview in SFX #205 the creators saying “we prefer the word futuristic to sci-fi” was like a red rag to a bull and the cause of much angry chin rubbing with my mate in the pub. Sci-fi fans are an incredibly loyal collection of literate consumers, and any attempt to cheapen or belittle my favorite genre puts my back up and is met with a sneer of Kerr Avon proportions. You are scf-fi Outcasts , get over it.

I was ready to poke fun at Outcasts, like quipping that the mind-reading device in Stella Isen's office is the “anti-Tardis” – a plot device designed to quickly eliminate dramatic tension from its cast of characters. Instead, the conclusion I’ve come to is that rather than poke holes in the show it's more reason to show Outcasts some love, so perhaps it can come out of the terribly overly-serious closet it’s got itself into, and out itself as science fiction.

Liam Cunningham is always watchable and appears to be developing kind of telekinetic special powers and Daniel Mays is great too. Visually it’s a great-looking show with a decent budget you can see on screen, and produced by a company regarded as a safe pair of hands, so it would be a crying shame if a premature demise tainted the telly landscape, and chances of other proposed adult sci-fi ideas.