I had heard that the old series had been revived but
I had never seen any of the new episodes, until last night. I stumbled
across it while channel surfing the other night and it hooked me enough
to watch the entire episode. Gone are all of the Mormon overtones, gone
are the cheesy effects, and gone are the goofy characters. The thing
that impressed me the most was that I didn’t quite understand the
episode. Granted, I think I was watching the season finale and I had
zero backstory, but I was happy to see a network show that made the
audience think a little. No, this is no Bergman or Goddard work, but
for network TV it’s awfully good.
This version is darker, dirtier, and more violent
than the original. There is some sort of wild polytheism thing going
on (possibly with the Greek gods of all things), Starbuck is a woman
(that took me almost 10 minutes to figure out), and the cylons look
like beautiful asian women apparently. They have kept the egalitarian
vision of women as equals in the future. When there was an important
mission for a crack pilot, a woman (Starbuck) was the first choice.
When she flaked and did something that was important to the plot (I
think, I have no idea what the character is up to), the next crack
pilot in line was another woman. Still, the unrelaibility of
these women would cause a gender studies person to go crazy (the
successful crack pilot came back and shot the commander for an
unspecified reason). The chances of me being able to watch this series
as it happens is almost nil. Maybe I’ll go rent it when it comes out on
DVD, so if an of you watch it, don’t tell me what happens… It’s nice
to see sci-fi that is story (and dare I say it action) driven instead
of relying on FX to carry the show.
Isaac
6 replies on “Battlestar Galactica”
Yeah, it is really good. It kindof sucks that you saw the finale first, because it was definitely a cliffhanger. It’s worth while to watch it from the beginning.
And, it’s the same writer that did the first season of Carnivale on HBO, and that was excellent.
I don’t know…
… if cliffhanger is the right word for that episode. Instead of wondering, “What will happen next…” I was left wondering, “What just happened?” Like I said, I’ll prob. rent the dvd sometime later, looks better than most sci-fi films…
Isaac
Re: I don’t know…
Trust me, it was a cliffhanger if you know the backstory.
Is the whole season already available on DVD?
Re: I don’t know…
I have no idea… I assume that if it isn’t, it will be at some time. No matter, I have no tme for that sort of thing anyway. Too many books to read, prints to make, amps to build, etc…
Isaac
Yeah, its a great show! Season 2 premieres on the sci-fi channel July 15th at 10 p.m.
Hey you!
Not that big a deal, but who are you? Brian is my best guess…
Isaac