Welcome to Paradox

Welcome to Paradox: Great speculative science fiction, and it's just too bad it only ran for one year.

I watched this when I was living in the US, when it first came out, and was totally amazed. Some of the ideas and story lines were troublesome, yet thought provoking.

A prison without walls, inmates controlled with implants. Being able to force evolution, sentient computers teaching children to behave like machines. Having multiple clones of yourself for ready organ transplants.

What is science fiction in one age/decade can become science fact. It would be amazing if some of the ideas there become reality. Frighteing too.

Some of the episodes were from stories by SciFi greats, Philip K Dick, Asimov, Clarke.

Are we wise enough not to abuse technology? Have we evolved far enough to not resort to basic instincts? Or Will we be seduced by the technology developed and integrated into our daily lives? Many of these questions are explored, and examined.

The answers, however, are up to you.

While the idea is a good one-- individual sci fi stories set in a common city, the stories range from good to rather poorly written.

The episode of "A-10" was sophomoric and illogical. Some of the shows seem rushed and ill-thought-out. Others are fairly good, such as the final episode which leaves the series with a good taste. So this is a hit-and-miss series. It's worth watching, but some episodes will have the viewer face-palming.

The acting is decent enough. It's interesting that props are clearly re-used from episode to episode (such as the wrist-blasters), but then again, this is all set in the same society.

Most episodes are about technology gone wrong and in this it seems (as another user pointed out) somewhat prophetic. The real plus to this series is that quite a number of the plots are fairly original and also believable. And while the focus is on technology, it is equally focused on humanity.

So it's worth a watch, but don't expect rationality in every episode. For the most part it's a moderately interesting series, but there are poor episodes in the mix. Overall I enjoyed the series, but can only give it 5 stars due to the lack of ingenuity in some of the writing.

I realize this is an old series which is why I'm not really disappointed with the special effects. The story line is really good, the writing is too, however, the acting by most of the cast leaves a lot to be desired. I mean, these actors are just horrible. There are a few good ones and those are really the only ones you still see on major networks and movies today. They really should remake this show but this time cast people who can act. I think if they did that it would be a hit and have more than 1 season.

Like all great anthology series not only have some of these episodes inspired now established genre tropes, but Welcome to the Paradox is window into many current societal woes.

Low ratings may be suggested reason why this show was canceled, but with the very first episode being a scathing critique of commercialism and the media, I wouldn't doubt if sponsors didn't approve the content.

Isaac Asimov said "Science fiction is the history of the future."

Not every episode is strong, some have messages I don't agree with, but it's a solid series that deserves recognition.

I'm giving it 10 stars to up its average.

This show was actually a decent SF anthology series, like "Outer Limits" in many ways. The production values were the highest that I've seen in a show of this type ... maybe that's why it went away so soon; maybe its budgets exceeded its revenues. Too bad, because the scripts were generally very good, the talent involved ranged from adequate to excellent, and the sets were EXTREMELY well done. In other reviews, I've mentioned instances where the costumes were so awful that they distracted from the movie; here, the sets where "Paradox" was filmed were so good that they were sometimes better at suspending my disbelief and getting me interested in the story than the scripts or the actors were.

I don't know if "Paradox" still exists in syndication anywhere, since it was, I believe, only shown on the Sci-Fi Channel, which no longer carries it; if you happen to find a listing for it, please let me know, because I'd like to catch some of the episodes I missed.