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When the negative press started to pour in about SciFi Channel's newest remake, "Flash Gordon," executive producer Peter Hume said he was affected by the comments, but instead of letting it get to him, he worked to make the show better.

As "Flash Gordon" enters the second half of its first season, Hume says he's confident that the show has finally found its groove, and if fans have tuned out, it might be time to tune back in.

"The two big complaints were Ming isn't strong enough or mean enough, and that it's not enough Mongo," Hume told reporters during a recent conference call. "We're all Mongo all the time now. This show just gets more complex and actually a little bit darker, and it's still fun and rompy, but there's a gravitas that comes into teh second part of the season that wasn't there" in the first half.

Hume admitted he stays on top of the opinions the media and fans have the show, which has about one-fifth the budget of SciFi Channel's signature program, "Battlestar Galactica." Being on the same network as such a show does sometimes present a lopsided perspective when it comes to "Flash Gordon," but that doesn't mean the show was perfect and fans were off their rocker, Hume said.

"You can't compare us to 'Battlestar Galactica.' That's not fair," he said. "It's not fair because you're going to judge a show on the show. And so you could compare us to 'Chuck' [on NBC], but what we're doing is with so much less than they have. I'm not asking for that as an excuse. I'm just saying that there's a reality of what we have to operate in and there's only so much visual effects we can do."

When you can't depend on flashy special effects or even the grand sets like its "sister" shows of BSG and "Stargate: Atlantis," Hume says you have to attract fans through writing ... the true staple of science-fiction on television.

"In a weird way, it's good because it forces you to tell like really good stories," Hume said about the lower budget. "You can't just throw it all to visual effects and say, 'Oh, make a cool battle scene which would be awesome,' but it forces you to be really clever in the writing and make something that's sort of character-based and interesting."

It's not all just on the writers, however. The production designers have been working more and more since the story has shifted primarily to Mongo. And being on top of their game is important to bring the whole story together, Hume said.

"We're creating this really complex world that you just don't see in any other shows," he said. "Every week we write stuff and we get stuff back from production and we're like, 'Damn! This looks amazing!' And they're just doing extraordinary work for us."

Hume said there is a new tribe being introduced in the second season that will definitely get viewers to turn their heads, and also some serious homages to the 1980s movie is on its way as well.

"Flash Gordon" airs Fridays at 9 p.m. ET on SciFi Channel. At the same time, minisodes from the "Battlestar Galactica" telemovie "Razor" also will be aired during each week's broadcast.