SCI-FI fans are strange animals. Their natural habitat is their parents’ basement and their traditional pastime is watching their favourite shows on DVD. But on December 1 all this changed. Now we can watch our favourite shows on Foxtel too. That’s right, my pasty-faced friends, we have finally caught up with the rest of the world with our own Sci Fi channel, which plays everything from Battlestar Galactica to Stargate SG-1 to the various incarnations of Star Trek. If it has "star" or a number in the title, it’s on pay TV channel 132.

Selena Crowley, head of acquisitions and programming for Sci Fi is excited too. "I think viewers can benefit from more and better strong programs, and there are a lot of great programs that are just dedicated to sci-fi," she says. "A lot of other countries in the world have sci-fi channels and it shows that people do love sci-fi as a genre.

"And Sci Fi’s not just battle ships," Crowley assures. "One of the shows we’re showing is actually Medium, which, as you know, is a more a paranormal show about someone who knows and can see things."

It’s true; the Sci Fi channel’s schedule isn’t all about futuristic adventures in space. It also has dead people, undead people and people who can communicate with dead people. Its more established shows include Mysterious Ways and Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Incidentally, seeing as Channel Seven has now lost the rights to Buffy, unless you have the DVDs, the Sci Fi channel is the only place to catch the adventures of Buffy and the Slayerettes.

Crowley says there aren’t just old shows on the Sci Fi channel. "Cleopatra 2525 is a new show; we’ve got Odyssey 5, which is from a couple of years ago. We’ve got Tripping The Rift, which is a little animation we bought from Canada and we’ve got some Anime titles which have not played in Australia."

Crowley says the channel will not affect stations such as TV1 and Fox8. "We’re saying, here’s a channel where you can find only sci-fi and some of the other channels are still going to be offering a variety of shows that dip into the sci-fi genre."

Some shows, such as Star Trek and Stargate, will be migrating, but don’t worry; they will continue from where they left off, rather than starting at the beginning. Sit tight, Amazons, Xena will be staying on TV1. And it’s not just Xena’s absence from the sci-fi channel that is surprising. Despite there being 18 episodes of Buffy a week, Angel has yet to make an appearance. Also, Firefly has been pushed back from the opening week to July.

Although Crowley isn’t exactly a sci-fi geek, she finds herself drawn in by the genre. "I’ve got my favourites. I’m a big fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I like Battlestar Galactica, The 4400 is great. I think people will be surprised to find they like sci-fi, because they don’t necessarily associate something like Medium with sci-fi. Medium attracts a very general audience across a number of demographics, so I think you’ll find it’s quite broad."

So grab your Klingon costume, put up an "I believe" poster in your parents’ basement and veg out. The truth is out there.

Click on the link :

http://www.scifitv.com.au