What makes SeaQuest such a fascinating microcosm of ‘90s sci-fi, is just how often it was forced to reinvent itself based on the whims of the network, or behind-the-scenes issues with the cast and crew.

Starring Jaws-famous actor Scheider as the Captain of a super-advanced underwater submarine, SeaQuest very clearly sold itself as a “realistic” version of Star Trek set underwater. Michael Ironside and Jonathan Brandis in SeaQuest Season 3. But the weird thing about SeaQuest is that it wasn’t allowed to keep its idealism for long. Cool concept? Naive concept? The answer to both is yes. At that exact moment, school children and activists were (correctly) concerned with what was happening to the oceans of Earth, in a way in which pop culture narratives are seemingly less worried about now.įollowing in the footsteps of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home(the one with the whales) and the huge success of the 1990 animated series Captain Planet, the basic concept of SeaQuest was simply this: take a super-advanced submarine in an underwater future, and have the crew fight for the environment. Why did human beings need to expand into the depths of underwater colonies in the imagined future of SeaQuest DSV? The answer is mostly that the show was made in the ‘90s. Babylon 5 was “the last best hope for peace” while Quantum Leap told you that Sam was just hoping that the next leap “would be the leap home.” SeaQuest, arguably, topped these taglines with this gem from the late Roy Scheider’s Captain Nathan Bridger: “Beneath the surface, lies the future.”

Interestingly, while the various post- TNG Star Trek spinoffs of the ‘90s had entirely wordless opening title sequences (nobody is narrating anything in the DS9 or Voyager credits), seemingly every other sci-fi show of the era has a hilariously heavy-handed voice-over narration that not only explained WTF was going on, but also told you exactly what the show was going for. NBCīack in 1994, sci-fi shows had to have a cool and absurdly detailed opening title sequence. Captain Bridger (Roy Scheider), Lucas (Jonathan Brandis), and Darwin in SeaQuest.

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