That's one of things you'll learn the meaning of from this enjoyable Joss Whedon ( Buffy, Angel) production. Throw out your concept of a Science Fiction series, because it isn't about the alien of the week or big space battles, heck it only has one episode with a laser gun. It's a well written, character driven, thought provoking tv show about people who are just trying to make ends meet, not rule the galaxy, nor explore strange new worlds...even though there's nothing wrong with that. Bottom line is you'll love this series and wonder what momentary lapse of judgement occured at Fox to let this gem of a series go down the tubes.