Farscape/J

Jack Crichton
Jack Crichton was a retired astronaut and colonel for the International Aeronautics and Space Administration and the father of astronaut/scientist John Crichton. In his heyday, Jack was a contemporary of Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. Yuri gave Jack a puzzle ring, which he later gave to his own son, John. Jack is known for having gone on extra-vehicular activity (EVA) missions and even walked on the moon.

Jack visited his son on that fateful day at Cape Canaveral when John was scheduled to test fly the Farscape-1 space module. He told John how proud he was of him and encouraged him to get out from living in his shadow. He gave Gagarin's ring to John as a memento and told him "Each man gets a chance of being his own kind of hero. Your time will come and when it does, watch out. Chances are it'll be the last thing you ever expected."

John Crichton
John Crichton was an astronaut and scientist working for the International Aeronautics and Space Administration. One of John's best friends while growing up was Douglas Knox, aka, "DK". The two graduated high school together and entered the IASA program at about the same time. John and DK developed a theory about using the gravitational pull of the Earth as a means of giving space vessels added propulsion while circumnavigating the atmosphere.

In 1999, John had the opportunity to put his theories to the test. Having already gone through two shuttle missions, John was scheduled to test-fly the Farscape-1 space module out of Cape Canaveral. During the flight however, the Farscape-1 was pulled into an unexpected wormhole and he was thrust into another galaxy. John's ship arrived in the middle of a fire-fight between Peacekeeper Prowlers and a fleeing Leviathan prison ship named Moya. A veering Prowler accidentally clipped the wing of the Farscape-1 and crashed into an asteroid. Another Prowler was likewise damaged. The crew of Moya, which at this point consisted of the Luxan warrior Ka D'Argo, the Delvian priest Pa'u Zotoh Zhann, and the Hynerian Dominar Rygel XVI, saw Crichton's ship and pulled it into Moya's hangar along with the other damaged Prowler. Unable to identify the classification of ship, they were hoping that it might contain technology that would help them in their escape from the Peacekeepers. John was in a state of shock upon seeing his first extraterrestrial life forms. Unfortunately, he was unable to offer any benefit to the crew and so they placed him into a cell. John met the pilot of the other Prowler, an officer named Aeryn Sun. It brought him some comfort to know that although Sun was a Sebacean Peacekeeper, she also looked relatively human.

Before long, John learned that the Prowler pilot that was killed after colliding with his ship was Tauvo Crais, the younger brother of Bialar Crais, captain of the Peacekeeper Command Carrier charged with recovering Moya and her crew. When Crais saw video footage of the incident, he convinced himself that Crichton killed his brother on purpose and devoted himself to bringing John Crichton to justice. Because of this, John was now a fugitive of the Peacekeepers just like the rest of Moya's crew. D'Argo, Zhaan and Rygel reluctantly allowed John and Aeryn to stay on Moya as they took refuge in the Uncharted Territories.