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I searched back a ways and didn't find a current thread, so I made one, because we started watching this. I haven't seen this show in almost 15 years since it ended, so I remember the characters and some broad strokes of events, but a lot of the details are going to be fresh again. I don't think I ever saw much of season 1 originally, either, beyond the premiere. If you're not familiar with Farscape, in short, John Crichton is an astronaut from approximately the airdate of the pilot, 1999, who during an atmospheric gliding experiment gets sucked through a wormhole to somewhere else in the universe, accidentally kills a Peacekeeper (the local authoritarian force), and meets up with a few alien escapees on a living starship as they are conducting a prison break. The show is a Henson Workshops production and features advanced puppetry, including two of the main characters. As I go through I'm going to post brief impressions, and you know what, here we go. Season 1, Episode 1 "Premiere" Couldn't they come up with a better episode name? Also I'm about 6 episodes in as I make this thread and I don't think I've seen any episode titles in the show itself, these are all coming from Wikipedia's episode list. Anyway, a serviceable pilot episode, not much more I can say beyond the synopsis above. Episode 2 "I, E.T." Role reversal where Crichton, newly exposed to really weird aliens, becomes the alien to a culture much like his own. I kind of liked this one, gives you a bit of breathing room to ease you into the weirdness to come. Episode 3 "Exodus from Genesis" Moya is infested by an insectoid swarm for nesting purposes. Very Star Trek yet, at least in plot, if not characters. Episode 4 "Throne For a Loss" Rygel is captured by some pirates. Good episode for him; I liked his dialogue with the prisoner in the next cell over. Speaking of which, the voice actor for Rygel is tremendously good. I'd forgotten how much I like him; easily my favorite character so far. Our 2-year-old likes watching with us and already by this episode she was saying "Rygel funny." Sometimes all he has to do is appear on screen and she'll start giggling. Episode 5 "Back and Back and Back to the Future" Crichton gets flashes of the future and tries to prevent everyone from dying. While the show has been watchably OK up till this point, I'd say this is the first actually decent episode; I think the characters are starting to gel and the actors are becoming more natural. Episode 6 "Thank God it's Friday, Again" Name That Dystopia. The planet's leader was like a morph slider set halfway between Tilda Swinton and Alice Krige. I was a little surprised at the end how easily everyone was able to be broken free of the drugged contentment.
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Dec 1, 2017 20:24
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:I searched back a ways and didn't find a current thread, so I made one, because we started watching this. I haven't seen this show in almost 15 years since it ended, so I remember the characters and some broad strokes of events, but a lot of the details are going to be fresh again. I don't think I ever saw much of season 1 originally, either, beyond the premiere. If I recall correctly, for the first season they just used the working titles for every episode because originally they weren't planning on putting them on screen(and I could've sworn they did, but I could be wrong. Maybe that was later). It stills looks great for something shot 18 years ago, being on film helps I guess. I would say the latter half of Season 2 through all of Season 3 is the peak. Season 4 is still good but kind of messy and it's infuriating the show got canned at that point. They did their best with the Peacekeeper Wars movie but it was clearly a case of "get everything wrapped the gently caress up because they're never going to let us do this again." I suspect the fact it was so expensive to make is also one of the reason's it's never been revived, unfortunately. Those muppets don't come cheap.
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Dec 1, 2017 20:53
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Maelstache posted:If I recall correctly, for the first season they just used the working titles for every episode because originally they weren't planning on putting them on screen(and I could've sworn they did, but I could be wrong. Maybe that was later). Is it on film? I think at least all the mastering and rendering were done at SD PAL resolution, so even the Blu-rays are pretty soft looking. I'm sure even if it were on film, a remaster would be an insane project that will never be done for similar reasons to B5 and DS9. That brings up another question I have, is the weird slightly warbly quality to the voices an intentional choice, or is it an artifact of frame rate adjustments or something? It seems like all of the alien characters have that, although I can't recall off the top of my head if I've noticed it with Crichton, and I wondered if that's a subtle reminder of the
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Dec 1, 2017 21:00
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:Is it on film? I think at least all the mastering and rendering were done at SD PAL resolution, so even the Blu-rays are pretty soft looking. I'm sure even if it were on film, a remaster would be an insane project that will never be done for similar reasons to B5 and DS9. It was all shot on 35mm originally, but at some point the masters were lost or destroyed, so no "real" HD upgrade will ever happen sadly  (the blu-rays are upscaled from SD I think?)Odd about the voices, that's not something I've really noticed. I know that Pilot's voice is pitched up with probably some kind of filter over it to disguise the fact it's the same actor that plays Crais.
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Dec 1, 2017 21:14
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D'Argo and Aeryn both have it to some extent too, at least to my hearing in these first episodes.
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Dec 1, 2017 22:27
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This show has the best fictional swearing in all of fictional swearing. All the meanings are deducable from their usage, and each character and race has distinct but overlapping sets of swears. They also have such a great mouth feel to them, they're fun to say, they feel faintly obscene and like something you'd say in anger. The only misstep is when John uses "hezmana" early on, and it sounds so wrong in his accent. The characters are great, and theres some seriously ballsy storytelling, but mostly I watch it for the swearing.
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Dec 1, 2017 23:09
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Episode 7 "P. K. Tech Girl" Maybe I'd notice the flaws more if they were on screen all the time, but these one-off sets look better than Moya's interior, which is seriously made from gold-painted cardboard as best I can tell. Not that that bothers me particularly, and I'm sure on an analog SD cable broadcast on a screen less than 1/4 the size I have now, it was fine. The starship CGI is also pretty impressive. The derelict Peacekeeper dreadnought floating in the planetary ring was a great shot; stuff like that is bread and butter to me and a great example of what I like space shows to do.
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Dec 2, 2017 04:44
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Season 3 episode 16 is garbage.
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Dec 2, 2017 05:46
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Duck and Cover posted:Season 3 episode 16 is garbage. Spoiler tag that poo poo, son!
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Dec 2, 2017 05:54
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I'm not sure why exactly, but Farscape has always been my favorite space opera TV show, and that's despite only seeing a smattering of episodes and Peacekeeper Wars back when it ran on Sci Fi. Maybe it was their character-first approach to writing, or all the effort they put into the alien designs and universe building. Whatever the reason, it's one of the few shows I own in its entirety on DVDs. It's also the reason I can't help but think of Guardians of the Galaxy as a cinematic reboot of Farscape. I remember watching a making-of documentary that's part of the DVD set, and it explained how the Jim Henson Company made a deal with American, Australian, Canadian, and British TV channels to all run the show at the same time. The idea was to get money from multiple sources to pay for the expensive show, although Sci Fi wound up volunteering to foot the whole bill. But the show managed to turn having multiple masters to their advantage, because each network would come to them and say "make the show more like this" or "make it more like that," and since the requests contradicted each other they ignored them and did what they wanted. And in the end the execs would come back and say "Good, keep doing what you're doing."
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Dec 2, 2017 06:29
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:Episode 5 "Back and Back and Back to the Future" Interesting. I've always thought this was by far the worst episode the show ever produced. Like, so good it's bad territory. I think me and my friends have watched it the most of any Farscape episode though, because it's kinda amazing. Just, everything about the aliens is completely spare. turn left hillary!! noo posted:Episode 6 "Thank God it's Friday, Again" I have always thought this, and I agree, it's uncanny. Strom Cuzewon posted:The characters are great, and theres some seriously ballsy storytelling, but mostly I watch it for the swearing. "That's not just Farbotz! That's MAGRA FARBOTZ!" Literally my favourite made up silly swear ever. ...I love this show so much. It is the best.
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Dec 2, 2017 08:20
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Woohoo page 1 gif parking space... Coming in the next quarter cycle.
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Dec 2, 2017 08:41
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Bobbin Threadbare posted:I'm not sure why exactly, but Farscape has always been my favorite space opera TV show, and that's despite only seeing a smattering of episodes and Peacekeeper Wars back when it ran on Sci Fi. Maybe it was their character-first approach to writing, or all the effort they put into the alien designs and universe building. Whatever the reason, it's one of the few shows I own in its entirety on DVDs. It's also the reason I can't help but think of Guardians of the Galaxy as a cinematic reboot of Farscape. It's possibly my second favorite, behind only Babylon 5 because of the latter's depth. I made the Guardians of the Galaxy comparison when describing the show to my wife, too. Open Source Idiom posted:Interesting. I've always thought this was by far the worst episode the show ever produced. Like, so good it's bad territory. The aliens were pretty whatever, I agree. But the main characters are starting to come around, and the disjointed plot and directing are maybe so bad it's good, but in a way kind of like a foretaste of how crazy the show gets later on. At least as I recall it.
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Dec 2, 2017 14:17
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I know it's controversial, but I enjoyed S9 and S10 of SG-1 Farscape is also good but I nearly destroyed my television when I got to the finalie
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Dec 2, 2017 14:31
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I've never even seen much of SG-1.
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Dec 3, 2017 05:30
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Bobbin Threadbare posted:I'm not sure why exactly, but Farscape has always been my favorite space opera TV show, and that's despite only seeing a smattering of episodes and Peacekeeper Wars back when it ran on Sci Fi. Maybe it was their character-first approach to writing, or all the effort they put into the alien designs and universe building. Whatever the reason, it's one of the few shows I own in its entirety on DVDs. It's also the reason I can't help but think of Guardians of the Galaxy as a cinematic reboot of Farscape. HUGE SPACEKABLOOIE posted:I know it's controversial, but I enjoyed S9 and S10 of SG-1
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Dec 3, 2017 05:40
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Rigel was definitely my favorite character from Farscape. I think my favorite Rigel moment is the Halloween epsiode where he he gets all cracked out on candy. "I don't know how legal this stuff is Crichton, but you have to get me more."
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Dec 3, 2017 17:50
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:I've never even seen much of SG-1. You sir, are missing out.
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Dec 4, 2017 08:11
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HUGE SPACEKABLOOIE posted:You sir, are missing out. Confirmed Get some... you missing out on great characters like Harry, Ba'al, Senator Kinsey, Bra'tac, and the USAF.
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Dec 4, 2017 08:18
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Rocksicles posted:Confirmed "IN THE MIDDLE OF MY BACKSWING?!"
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Dec 4, 2017 08:27
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Humans are superior.
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Dec 4, 2017 08:36
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indeed.
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Dec 4, 2017 10:28
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My wife likes it, so after I got to introduce her to DS9, B5, and Farscape, that may be next. Lord knows if I watch Lexx again it certainly won't be with her.
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Dec 4, 2017 15:39
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Maelstache posted:It was all shot on 35mm originally, but at some point the masters were lost or destroyed, so no "real" HD upgrade will ever happen sadly The masters are lost but presumed not to be destroyed from what I recall; they're just locked away in the archives of the production companies and they would have to spend real money to find them (and then re-release them). The current transfers are taken from the PAL broadcasts from what I remember because they had slightly higher quality than the US versions due to the increased resolution. Remember, at the time Farscape was still broadcasting the DVDs were sold by ADV at the nice price of something like 40 bucks per 2 episodes Party Plane Jones fucked around with this message at 21:13 on Dec 4, 2017 |
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Dec 4, 2017 21:11
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Party Plane Jones posted:The masters are lost but presumed not to be destroyed from what I recall; they're just locked away in the archives of the production companies and they would have to spend real money to find them (and then re-release them). OK, so the first $100 million I earn will go toward a remaster of B5; the second $100 million will go toward Farscape. Got it.
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Dec 4, 2017 21:15
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Open Source Idiom posted:
I'll see that, and raise you: "Harpooda! You dare to call me harpooda!" "And I'll bet, not a very good one" After an exchange like that you know exactly what a harpooda is.
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Dec 5, 2017 00:32
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You're all a bunch of frelling lunatics.
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Dec 5, 2017 04:00
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Episode 8 "That Old Black Magic" Straight outta TOS with the incorporeal being that feeds on negative energy. I sort of got the impression that Maldis was played by the voice actor for Rygel, or at least the jester form in the street that lured Crichton. But it appears not. I also thought the guy working with Zhaan was Maldis in disguise a la Loki trying to unleash her dark side, but I was also wrong about that. Episode 9 "DNA Mad Scientist" Enhanced lab creature gets so smart and capable it takes over, and keeps improving itself so it's nearly invincible. It feels like I've seen this plot before, but I can't think of where. I guess it's more usually an AI/robot kind of thing, which as I type this leads me to Ultron or the Borg. Now that I think about it, it's also close to Cell from Dragonball Z. Zhaan's newly reawakened dark side is evident; for some time I thought Nam Tar had some influence over her, as well as D'Argo and Rygel, although those two were more or less in character. My wife was shocked they actually cut off Pilot's arm. Like, she didn't think the show or the characters would go there. You ain't seen nothing yet, babe.  Episode 10 "They've Got a Secret" Was not expecting the baby Leviathan to begin this early. I remember Talyn being born right as, or not long after, I resumed watching back in the day, so maybe I didn't miss as much of season 1 as I thought. This is fun.
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Dec 5, 2017 05:37
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:Episode 8 "That Old Black Magic" You doing the martyr watch order, or the "i ain't got time for this poo poo" watch order?
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Dec 5, 2017 10:46
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wtf kind of question is this? If I watch a show I don't skip anything.
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Dec 5, 2017 14:00
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:wtf kind of question is this? If I watch a show I don't skip anything. The first season is half-hosed in terms of viewing order; you have the correct way to see it through using the production order rather than broadcast. After you get into later seasons the only one you have to worry about is the Dream a Little Dream originally being the Season 2 opener.
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Dec 5, 2017 15:58
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Party Plane Jones posted:The first season is half-hosed in terms of viewing order; you have the correct way to see it through using the production order rather than broadcast. After you get into later seasons the only one you have to worry about is the Dream a Little Dream originally being the Season 2 opener. Also there is so bodgey filler episodes in season 1, couple in season 2. Rocksicles fucked around with this message at 21:23 on Dec 5, 2017 |
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Dec 5, 2017 21:21
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How was season 2 supposed to start? That episode where zhaan was having crazed hallucinations?
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Dec 5, 2017 22:31
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Arcsquad12 posted:How was season 2 supposed to start? That episode where zhaan was having crazed hallucinations? Yes. Dream a Little Dream is the Season 2 opener that they thankfully moved till later. Jeremiah Crichton is the low point in season 1. I, ET is also pretty slow, but it's early in the run so it gets a break. Farscape really is Guardians of the Galaxy the TV Show Athanatos fucked around with this message at 22:51 on Dec 5, 2017 |
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Dec 5, 2017 22:49
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Athanatos posted:Yes. Dream a Little Dream is the Season 2 opener that they thankfully moved till later. I enjoyed seeing Ben Browder's cameo in the 2nd Guardians movie, James Gunn is a fan https://www.instagram.com/p/BXVvY3oDAOj/ The only episode I can remember actively hating in the whole series is "I, E.T." The slow speed of the episode is such a contrast after the premiere, and the music is off in it; the whole first season has a lot of music that I can only describe as "scifi tones" which doesn't get fixed until the second season.
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Dec 6, 2017 00:53
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I loved that Ben Browder and Claudia Black both show up in the later seasons of SG-1. Especially the episode when Vala is trying to pitch ideas to that alien tv writer, except their all ripoffs. He tells her that if she's going to rip something off, she should at least pick something more obscure. So, she pitches the idea for Farscape, and he says "You've got me, I have absolutely no idea what that is."
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Dec 6, 2017 01:42
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I lost track of Farscape for a while around the point where Talyn was born. When I checked back in it seemed like I missed a helluva a lot and let the series go. It may be time to add this to the queue in the age of binge watching. HUGE SPACEKABLOOIE posted:I know it's controversial, but I enjoyed S9 and S10 of SG-1 There was a lot of bitter and sweet in seasons 9 & 10. However, my controversial view is that the series needed Ben Browder/Cam Mitchell at least a season or two earlier. Also, Richard Dean Anderson had stopped putting both cheeks into it long before the end of season 8. I thought he was a great character. I just wish they made Mitchell a Major and left the team with Carter as the CO.
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Dec 6, 2017 05:05
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Episode 11 "Till the Blood Runs Clear" Crichton: "We'll split it, seventy-thirty." (perfect comic delay) Rorf: "Seventy-forty." (another perfect delay) Crichton: "Eighty-forty." Now that's a I seem to remember Furlow the mechanic, so either she shows up again later or I really did see most of season 1 after all. On the other hand, I don't think I ever saw when Crichton begins to get a handle on wormholes, and had to fill in the blanks, so I don't know.
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Dec 6, 2017 05:28
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turn left hillary!! noo posted:I seem to remember Furlow the mechanic, so either she shows up again later or I really did see most of season 1 after all.
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Dec 6, 2017 06:42
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PlushCow posted:I enjoyed seeing Ben Browder's cameo in the 2nd Guardians movie, James Gunn is a fan https://www.instagram.com/p/BXVvY3oDAOj/ I, ET suffers from being the second episode produced with some rather large plot holes (none of these aliens are going to have translator microbes) and character elements they were trying to nail down still (it's one of the early episodes where Simcoe is wearing colored contacts). For me it's either the tandoori chicken episode or Jeremiah Crichton. Even the cast views the latter as one of the worst episodes they made. Edit: or also Coup by Clam, which is similarly dogshit.
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Dec 6, 2017 14:16
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