Masters of Science Fiction

Occasionally there are shows that make you want to picket network headquarters carrying signs that say, "Why can't you make smart TV like this?" ABC kept this show on the shelf for a year and then dumped in the doldrums (Saturdays in August), which clearly demonstrates a lack of faith in this outstanding series. These shows are worth watching, not only as a means of encouraging the production of more programming like it, but because it demonstrates that intelligent TV can be at least as entertaining as the froth that your cable box otherwise exudes.

Masters of Science Fiction comes from the creators of the Showtime series Masters of Horror. It was developed with the internal mandate to employ quality writing with top directors and actors. This goal the creators have largely achieved.

Apart from entirely superfluous, perhaps because extremely brief (one sentence each at the top and bottom of the show), off-screen host narration by the physicist Stephen Hawking, there is nothing about these shows that was obviously done merely to pander to audiences of sci-fi fans. Each of the four screen episodes (two more were made, and hopefully will appear on the eventual DVD) has an excellent look and feel that recalls other well-crafted shows like The X-Files.

Several of the performances are outstanding. Sam Waterston and Judy Davis are ideally suited to each other as they drive their story, "A Clean Escape," toward a conclusion that's mesmerizing not only for the twist ending but for the envelope-pushing performances of both actors. In "The Awakening," Lost's Terry O'Quinn delivers another variation on his patented everyman philosopher, here to great effect; he's counterbalanced by a progressively more frantic U.S. president, evoked nicely by X-Files's William B. Davis. Malcolm McDowell is delicious as usual in the arch, Heinlein-based "Jerry Was a Man"; as for his co-star, Anne Heche: normally I find her mannered and overdone, but here those qualities are perfect for the larger-than-life character she plays, a unimaginably wealthy woman who goes to see a man about a novelty custom-crafted animal and ends up taking home a doomed android.