If you’ve been keeping track of my current activities, you may have noticed that I recently finished watching Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda. After five seasons of this show, I’ve got a new appreciation for the various themes and plot points. Also, I have a whole new appreciation for just how fun this show is. Details and possible spoilers after the jump.

Early in the series, Andromeda establishes what it will do for the rest of the show’s run – It is a space romp. While it deviates a little bit from this in the last season, I would argue that it still holds true to the main points of a space romp. The crew of the ship goes various places, gets into trouble, kicks butt, takes names, and ends up one step ahead of where they started.

Honestly, it’s difficult not to compare Andromeda to Star Trek* – for starters they both bear Gene Roddenberry’s name, and both stick to the space romp formula. However, I felt that Andromeda was a lot more character driven than Star Trek. Where Star Trek seemed mostly about things happening to the Enterprise, Andromeda seemed about things happening to Andromeda’s crew. Most of the encounters in Andromeda had, in some form or another, some personal impact on the crew. This is especially poignant for Becca and Shamus. For Becca, this typically focused on the fact that she isn’t military, but rather someone from the underground who finds herself working for the government. The underground is always a draw for her, and it’s that conflict that makes her very interesting to watch. For Shamus, it’s much more obvious. In particular, his fears (especially of the magog), and his past shapes so much of how he deals with life both on and off Andromeda.

Beyond that simple comparison though, Andromeda managed many times to keep an epic story arc going, while still doing the thing-a-week. I really liked how Andromeda did this even moreso than a show like Stargate: SG1. In particular, Andromeda didn’t have “thing-a-week” episodes and “story arc” episodes – most episodes played into both categories simultaneously. In each episode, it might be something very subtle that was tied in at the end, or it could be something that is very obvious like fending off a magog invasion. However, even in the obvious episodes, it never took from the enjoyment of the show – you could always just enjoy the space romp.

That, I think, touches on what I liked best about Andromeda – it never took itself too seriously. Even when the world was coming to an end, there was never a moment where the show said, “this is too deep, you can’t have fun”. In fact, there were a number of times when it did the complete opposite (such as when Dylan Hunt pulls a Hercules sword out of a foot locker on the Andromeda). This, above anything else, made the show very enjoyable for me. However, looking back, I think this is why it was mocked so heavily by SFFU. Yes, it has its inconsistencies, its stereotypes, and, occasionally over-the-top acting, and there is plenty for someone to mock here. However, taken in stride, it makes the show fun, and at the end of the day, very enjoyable for me.

*Note: It should be noted that I’m talking mostly about Star Trek: The Next Generation here, since that’s the Star Trek I like the best, and have seen the most.