Battlestar Galactica
Jan. 23rd, 2007 11:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexxkayI finally got around to watching the last two episodes of the last 'half-season'. I think I might be done with it now.
Episode 10 was written by Jane Espenson, one of my favorite Buffy writers yay! Her individual style completely failed to be noticable on this show, boo! They had another story about a basic logistical problem, yay! The obstacles to solving that problem, and the solution itself, were ludicrously contrived, with no respect for physics or basic plausibility, boo! Lucy Lawless gets lots of screen time, yay! Her character's actions and dialogue see to be driven by a random number generator, boo!
The opening credits continue to insult the intelligent viewer. In episode 10, the fleet loses at least two entire ships, plus miscellaneous casualties. Episode 11 still shows the exact same "survivor count" in the opening credits. And, as in every episode, the credit sequence claims that the Cylons "have a plan". This was dubious by the middle of season two, and is clearly false by now. The more we see of the Cylons, the more it becomes clear that they have less planning ability than (...searching for the right metaphor here... 'a typical game company' isn't bad enough...) the Shrub.
The show seems to have abandoned not just the hard SF trappings from season one, but even any basic sense of rationality. Characters (on both sides) are regularly intuiting information in an impossible manner, simply because the plot demands it.
While the end of season two and beginning of season three made it seem like they were willing to embrace some real change and character development, practically all of the changes have now been rolled back. If you skipped from the early parts of season two to, say, episode 10 of this season, you wouldn't feel you'd missed much. This problem is doubly bad, because it also undercuts any tension going forward. Will Adama actually nuke the planet? Of course he won't, there are too many regular cast members down there. And while they are occasionally willing to give a dramatic death scene to a recurring character, they haven't yet had the guts to kill off a regular. I still feel that Roslyn's miracle cure was a copout.
Basically, I feel that this show has gone the way of Lost. There's no evidence of any plan for a story direction, or even that such a thing might really be desirable. It's all about the illusion of change. And that's not enough for me any more.
Episode 10 was written by Jane Espenson, one of my favorite Buffy writers yay! Her individual style completely failed to be noticable on this show, boo! They had another story about a basic logistical problem, yay! The obstacles to solving that problem, and the solution itself, were ludicrously contrived, with no respect for physics or basic plausibility, boo! Lucy Lawless gets lots of screen time, yay! Her character's actions and dialogue see to be driven by a random number generator, boo!
The opening credits continue to insult the intelligent viewer. In episode 10, the fleet loses at least two entire ships, plus miscellaneous casualties. Episode 11 still shows the exact same "survivor count" in the opening credits. And, as in every episode, the credit sequence claims that the Cylons "have a plan". This was dubious by the middle of season two, and is clearly false by now. The more we see of the Cylons, the more it becomes clear that they have less planning ability than (...searching for the right metaphor here... 'a typical game company' isn't bad enough...) the Shrub.
The show seems to have abandoned not just the hard SF trappings from season one, but even any basic sense of rationality. Characters (on both sides) are regularly intuiting information in an impossible manner, simply because the plot demands it.
While the end of season two and beginning of season three made it seem like they were willing to embrace some real change and character development, practically all of the changes have now been rolled back. If you skipped from the early parts of season two to, say, episode 10 of this season, you wouldn't feel you'd missed much. This problem is doubly bad, because it also undercuts any tension going forward. Will Adama actually nuke the planet? Of course he won't, there are too many regular cast members down there. And while they are occasionally willing to give a dramatic death scene to a recurring character, they haven't yet had the guts to kill off a regular. I still feel that Roslyn's miracle cure was a copout.
Basically, I feel that this show has gone the way of Lost. There's no evidence of any plan for a story direction, or even that such a thing might really be desirable. It's all about the illusion of change. And that's not enough for me any more.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-30 06:11 pm (UTC)Now changed, albeit not one of the good guys.
In general, we're going to have to agree to disagree here. While I have my complaints with the show (in particular, it's just too unremittingly dark at this point), I don't agree with most of your core ones...
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-30 06:43 pm (UTC)If you're referring to Lucy Lawless (I read a summary of the next ep), she never made it into the opening credits, but was always a Special Guest Star. That's precisely the difference between "recurring" and "regular".
agree to disagree
I'm cool with that.