BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: The Final 10 - Page 6

Agreed. Ellen's just indefensible. The tale of a sad, stupid drunk and his drunk slutty wife isn't an epic love story.

Hey, it worked without problem for Hancock.

It's funny you mention that because as I was reading Moore's take on Helen and Tigh, that movie crossed my mind. So they're really reaching for the stars.

What do you have against drunk sluts?

Nothing. I love 'em. I just think their narratively un-fulfilling.

says you.

I'm still loving BSG, but clearly it's succumbed to the same horrible affliction that hobbles almost every SF property.

At some point in a series (book, TV, Movie) the creator's stop thinking of/treating their characters as characters, and instead treat them as friends/loved ones.

We see it in BSG with the completly unncessary Romo Lampkin episode, Starbuck never ever shown wrong by anyone (oh except that one time Cat outshown her as a pilot, and she got good and dead soon after). Now Ellen Tigh returns, to no affect.

I have a feeling the cast just liked the actress (and why not? She is good enough that I enjoyed watching her episodes even though the character as written is a half deranged drunken harpy) and lobbied for her return some which way.

I think the creators often listein to the fan base as well. Romo got a lot of admiring posts on the Internet after his first two appearances. So the writers say "Hey! They like Romo! Let's bring him back!" with no clear idea of what purpose he serves in the plot.

For other examples see Arnold becoming a Good Terminator in T2, Darth Vader doing a 180 between ESB and RoTJ, etc.

That was a really good idea, actually.
I'd kinda sorta given up on the reveal of the final Cylon being satisfying awhile ago so this doesn't really shit more or thrill me, more makes me curious what the fuck direction they are headed.
A friend of mine has been going on for fucking ever that Ellen was going to be he final Cylon, he put money on it and everything. I always liked the relationship these two had to be honest but if they make something even approaching workable out of this, I'll be amazed.

Meh. I liked it. There were some things I could've done without ever seeing... Like Starbuck's Bitch (yeah, that's what I call him) playing the guitar. Kinda. And singing. Oh the singing!

And I wonder if Starbuck herself ought not to have had that body checked to see if it was even human or not. Actually, it'd be funny if it turned out that everyone was a fucking cylon. Like, the 13th colony was actually the first, and set up the other 12. Or some other batshit insane nonsense like that.

And yet, I still like BSG. Cos, despite what you folks say, it's good.

Can whomever it was what complained about the mystical/spiritual/religious stuff, explain what about that they don't get/like? Cos, it's been a part of the show since the beginning...

/ramble.

ETA:
1) Who would you have liked it of been?
2) The direction in which.... THEY ARE TOGETHER FOREVERS!
3) Of course they will!*



*talk about losing the faith a little prematurely.

Okay, I had a sort of epiphany early this morning, concerning the origin of the seven modern skinjobs.

I started wondering how Earth fits into them being created and why they can't build a new resurrection hub or why they even need one to begin with and don't download themselves directly on a Baseship pod.

I think they found the hub. It was a 13th colony construct and they have no idea how to replicate the technology. My theory is that it all started during the war, with the metal Cylons hooking up humans on their ships and creating the first hybrids. Those hybrids intercepted transmissions from Earth: The location of the resurrection hub and fragments of the consciousness of seven ancient Cylons who died in the holocaust. They would form the basis of the modern flesh-and-blood Cylons.

Now, the "blueprints" of those seven models were incomplete, meaning that the replicas created were also flawed: They had no memory of their origin and could not reproduce with each other. So, when they started asking question about who they are and what's their place in the world, they turned to God. We already know from the hybrid that Kendra Shaw encountered that metal Cylons were inclined to worship deities.

I think the idea of the Colony holocaust survivors traveling all this time towards the source of their culture's doom and thinking they are marching towards salvation is fitting.

Of course, even if the above ends up being correct, i still have no idea how the other five Earthling ended up being reborn in the Colonies or if they were created artificially or sort of reincarnated. Maybe it's a Jungian, collective consciousness thing. Everybody's descended from Cylons and they subconsciously received the ghost transmissions from Earth. And it still doesn't explain the Kara mystery and who led her to Earth. Although, I wouldn't be surprised if it ended up being an A.I. under the opera house.

I think this all fits together rather well, actually.

Life, ladies and gentleman. Life.

Edit: nevermind.

As for the episode: loved D's suicide. The more I think about it, the more I think it fits with her character...where she started, what she's been through, and how all of that informs her decision. They also telegraphed that without telegraphing it obviously. In retrospect, her decisions make sense. That's kind of impressive.

Final cylon reveal? Snooze. I mean, really? Who fucking cares?

They've got me for nine more episodes. We'll see what happens. This isn't the worst the show's been, but it's also not the best. All things have to end. Let's hope the show ends with more grace then this episode showed.

Though at least they had the foresight to reveal it in this first episode instead dragging it along.

If the Final Cylon had been someone really important, do you really think they would have revealed it in the first episode back? I think not. But they realized Ellen is super-anticlimactic, and also requires a lot of explanation to make any fucking sense.

The only part of the first 2.5 seasons as horrific as the shit we're now being fed is the terrible black market episode.

The more I think about it, the more I like the episode itself. It was executed very well, I liked that they took awhile to dwell on the devastation of the Earth reveal, how Dee's arc played out, and that she was the one to take the loss. She's always been pretty boring, but the show continues to give nice exits even to characters that I never particularly cared for (Billy, Kat, and Ellen, although they're working hard to undo the impact of that one).

But ultimately, the episode's individual strengths were struggling mightily against the plot decisions they've made over the last few seasons. They've turned too many main characters into Cylons, undermining too many past storylines and relationships. And they built up the final Cylon reveal too much without a satisfying payoff. And they've had Roslin's faith falter and Adama splinter his relationship with his inner circle too many times to seriously consider that they wouldn't bounce back promptly, as well acted as the scenes may have been.

Glad to have the Cylon reveals out of the way. Curious where they go from here.

Yeah, I suspect I would've had a much stronger reaction to the episode if drunk, depressed and suicidal weren't so common on this show. During Dee's scenes, I was thinking, "Gad, I hope we don't have to endure more boring and unbelievable relationship scenes with her and Apollo", then, "Has this character ever done anything interesting?"... BANG! "Ok, other than that?"

Following that was, "Why are they calling for a medic when her brains are probably on the wall?", "Apollo doesn't know why she did it? Was she really the only person to off themselves after finding out their ray of hope was a lump of coal?" and, "Hmm, how many people have contemplated suicide on this show? No, wait, how many HAVEN'T?"

The problem with making your show so unrelentingly somber and bleak is that when something truly devastating happens, you have no way to depict its magnitude properly. So we end up with a lot of ridiculous overacting and melodrama mixed with a feeling of deja vu. This should've been the darkest moment in the show's history (perhaps leading to an even bigger triumph at the end), but when you're already black, how do you go darker?

I don't see what the big deal is with all this negativity. The episode was well above average. It was well directed, mostly well acted (drunk Adama I'm looking at you) and moved the plot forward significantly. We may not feel enitrely comfortable with the direction it seems to be taking but we won't know for sure for quite a few more episodes. Fucking Black Market got a better reception here.

Hey, Adama got shot point blank like three times and was on his feet again within what, two weeks! Their physiology is many times ours apparently.

The episode by itself was a good one and it contributed to the overall storyline and while better than the first half of season four it could've used some work. As for the episode this week, I hope it doesn't spend the whole time on what was in the previews. I know what they showed is important to the fleet but personally it just feels like a retread to me.

Well, I think having the most level and positive character on the show off herself got the magnitude across pretty well. And Roslin's inability to put a brave face on for the crew was a first, but her book-burning scene and the Adama/Tigh one did seem pretty familiar.

I'm actually looking forward to them getting back to being lost in space, on the run from Cylons that actually want to destroy them, rather than screw them or play house or talk juju.

The problem is all in the characters, as far as I'm concerned. The acting is fine, as usual. The pacing, at least in this episode, was fine. The reveals are just reveals - regardless of their predictability, they'll live or die based on how the characters react to them.

But the writers have stripped all relatability from these characters over the past season or so. I'm not talking about likeability here, but relatability. As in, it's not even clear why they act the way they do except that the plot needs to be driven in certain directions.

We don't really have protagonists anymore, but a bunch of characters who do stuff. We have little insight into their inner lives. How much did Baltar really buy into his newfound spiritualism? Have any of the four Cylon fleetmembers done any soul-searching and attempted to figure out how they got to be where they are (for instance, there's the question of how Tigh was placed in the fleet and how he ages, unlike the others)? And, like Schwartz said, even when we understand the motivation (Roslin's crisis of faith, Adama's solitude), we've been there too many times before for it to even register.

In complicating matters last season and now trying to resolve the loose ends of a plot that's possibly become too labyrinthine, the writers are neglecting character in huge ways. It's a credit to the cast that they're doing as well with the material as they are.

They are doing very well with it, for what it's worth.

Yes, they certainly are, but I thought it telling that so many have mentioned it in this thread. The acting has always been strong on the show, but the cast now has the extra burden of covering for weak writing.

Can't agree with this more. The characters used to feel organic and we could relate with their decieisons (as bleak as they may sometimes may be). In wrapping everything up, they've become machines (pardon the pun) forced to do things to complete a story. Is Baltar's plight into a spiritual guru interesting? It could be if there actually was a plight. Baltar used to be my favorite character. He was interesting and complex on many different levels. Now, I don't know who the fuck he is or why he's doing what he's doing. At some point during the last season/season and a half, I've disconnected from him. And that's the fault of the writers, not the actors.

The episodes spent on the Basestar were a major blow to Galactica. They ruined Baltar as a character, gave us just enough insight into Cylon society to see that it hadn't been thought out very well, and were too much of a break with the aesthetic of the show up to that point. They poisoned the well, and it's been an overdose of dopey mysticism and unrealistic character actions since.

Yeah, part of the reason why the Dee and Adama stuff worked as well as it did was that their actions were based on identifiable emotional responses to their circumstances, as opposed to vague intuitions, "switched on" programming, or blind faith in their special destiny. Hoping they keep on that tack.

Yeah, it was kind of a relief to see Dee highlighted, if only because she's a familiar character who has retained a semblance of relatability. We essentially know where we stand with her, because the writers never managed to put her through the plot-twist wringer. She's that rare human on the show who's not prone to secrecy and hidden motives. We know why she does what she does even up to her final scene.

Although it did occur to me right after Dee shot herself that she'd figured out she was a Cylon and was either putting herself out of her misery or attempting to prove it by prompting her own resurrection. What sucks is that there was little in the way that she was acting to make me even consider this (I thought that perhaps the locket she found had a picture of her in it, I guess) - it just seemed like the kind of dumb plot point the writers have been squeezing out these days, so I couldn't count it out.

I have to agree that they dropped the ball with the Cylons. They are just children. Sexy children but children nevertheless. And they had no plan, no matter what we were promised all these years. Not even the "final five".

The concept of the Cylons was so diluted that they are pretty much non-entities in this final stretch of the show.

The other huge problem that people highlighted is that characters just do what's convenient for the writers at that point. Storylines are abandoned as fast as they were adopted. Apollo becomes a politician and then president and then fades back to obscurity. Baltar becomes a cult leader and them reverts back to being a scientist with no explanation given. Did he really believe that he was chosen by God? Was it a sham? We might never know. Starbuck goes all captain Ahab and then goes back to being one of the boys (for all intents and purposes) and now is a freaked out Lazarus figure. Even poor Callie, one of the most human and decent characters became a whiny little bitch, just to sweeten the pill of her getting thrown out of an airlock.

I liked this latest episode but the problem is that it is quite obvious that there was no masterplan. They've gone X Files on us.

That same thought occurred to me during the premiere when it was revealed that Tigh is apparently still the XO of the ship,* and freely walks through the corridors without anyone seeming to give a shit.**

*Nevermind the whole Cylon thing, the guy was abusing his authority to have sex with a POW. I think that merits a demotion.

**Unless the average Galactica crew member doesn't know that Tigh, Tyrol, Anders and Tory are Cylons. I didn't get the DVDs and can't remember if that became common knowledge at the end of last season.

X Files? They've gone DC on us. Seriously, they've set things back to the status quo so often that many of their storylines have been negated and any major changes at this point will be met with major skepticism. They've also retconned the shit out of their own mythology for the last season and a half.

Well to be anal, they gave them a full pardon when they set up the truce.

Not that this is completely out of character for all the paranoia on display about being cylons.

Boomer seems to get by ok.

Yeah, but it took her several stings at the brink, a season of distrust and nearly rape and some successful suicide missions to gain that trust.

Plus, Cally shot her in the gut.

And the XO killer his wife for being a traitor and lost an eye on New Caprica while essentially running the resistance.

It does seem a little glossed over, but I don't think it's as unbelievable as you're making it out to be.

It's not beyond belief, but it lacks the kind of common-sense approach to human nature that this show used to be good at.

At least pay some lip service to the idea that him walking into the CIC and casually taking up his role as XO is a little weird.

Maybe not unbelievable, but nonetheless it is a lazy way to keep the story going. Especially compared to the way they treated good ol´ Boomer that shot the Admiral into the guts out of nowhere at the end of season 1.

In the webisodes he did have a run-in with Gaeta, for precisely this reason.

Yeah, the current Sharon is a different Boomer than the one who shot Adama (that one's with Cavill). But that's the other problem with the Final Five; they've used that character to demonstrate how Cylons aren't really any different from people. But the reveal is still supposed to be this big deal. But not supposed to affect our empathy for the characters, and somehow make Tigh and Ellen's relationship less contrived.

Didn't Athena murder No. 6 last season? Why is she not in the brig?

So many people have murdered so many others on the show it's difficult to understand who should be where. Gaeta needs to go kick Anders ass for shooting him in the leg though.

That was probably forgiven the mass pardoning that went on when they made the truce with the Cylons.

At this point I really believe that introducing a mysterious third party behind all the machinations and unexplainable things at the end of the 3rd season would've been the way to go. The ship of light, some angels, or highly evolved cylons whatever - anything would've been better than the constant prophecies, self-loathing and final five nonsense.

Maybe they will do it, but the current situation looks like a stalemate to me. Cavill seems to be the only possible player at this small family reunion who could change the dynamics away from the lovefest it's now. But even he is too familiar I fear. The bad uncle if you may.

I don't understand what you're trying to say. Above basic nitpicking as to how you plight into something, I don't understand the question. Did you mean transformation?

I thought his character stayed in character even when he moved to this weird psuedo-jesus/pseudo-crowley figure. He's a guilty, confused, self-serving attention-whore of a man. He fits the psychological profile of a priest pretty well, I think. Before he bought into the idea of there being some significant "Other" out there in space, his God was science, and he preached that shit. Now he doesn't know what God is, but he has an idea, and if that God can get him closer to absolution for his stupid shit, keep him alive, and get him the attention he craves at all times, why wouldn't he have segued into that role as easily as he did? I thought there was a pretty fine point put on that in "The Hub" when he finally apologizes for what he was, but he's only able to apologize because he believes in what he is.

Of course, what that is, is hollow and self-serving still, but that's why I've always believed Baltar more than anyone is the surrogate for humanity in this show.

I think somewhere in season 3, that paranoia got backburnered precisely BECAUSE of Athena and Helo. There were more than a few episodes dedicated to that, and over season 3, there was an effort to make people still sweating who were skinjobs and who weren't marginalized. Deckhands who referred to skinjobs as such got sideways glances. I feel they built to the acceptance of Cylons and Humans banding together pretty well.

They want to have it both ways, though. The more they blur and erase the line between humans and cylons the more trivial it makes all the hoopla over the Final Five and their reveals.

I was getting at this earlier, but if they're going to base an entire season around the ramifications of finding out you're a cylon, those ramifications need to be greater than having All Along the Watchtower stuck in your head.

Even if the humans could get over the idea that Cylons are inherently evil, I'd think there'd still be an awful lot of paranoia about sleeper agents like the first Sharon introduced.

Not to mention there's a big difference between making an allowance for an individual who's proven herself to not be an enemy and a large group who absolutely were the enemy, but now tell you that they want to be buddies.

And what Schwartz said. What are the ramifications of being a Cylon at this point? If it's not the fact that you're going to be persecuted as Sharon was, it should at least manifest in a crisis of identity. We've gotten a sense of the four struggling with it a little, but it seems like there should be a lot more introspection there and a little less shooting Cally out the airlock and worrying about who's going to find out.

See, I didn't think that's what the whole season was about. I don't think season 4 can be reduced to that so easily, or that the ramifications of being a cylon was really a focus. I think they answered those questions with Athena and Caprica Six back in seasons 2 and 3. To have these four go through all that all over again would have been rehashing and recycling.

That said, there were still moments of introspection. The first two or three episodes of season 4 dealt with that pretty strongly, and that dealing with it varied from individual to individual, in interesting ways. And I thought the lingering paranoia played itself out, again, in The Hub, where the colonials, while on a basestar, have to be talked into working with the Cylons. The person who sells them? A Cylon. The mission is successful, and Cylons can no longer resurrect. I would imagine that goes quite a bit towards alleviating the suspicions of people on the fleet.

I've felt the show was building, ever since the 2nd half of Season 2, the idea that the ramifications of being a cylon were less and less until it doesn't really matter. It felt like the show was exploring the same thematic territory that Ridley Scott was poking around in for Blade Runner. It stopped being an "Us vs. Them" story awhile ago, I think, and the last half of season 3 and season 4 are bringing that into sharper focus. The Them become part of Us, and it looks now like we're really finding out that it's an Us vs. Us story, and what it is that makes us, us.

Not to say there haven't been lackluster or poorly written episodes, but overall, the arcs seem to be paying off just fine, and the characterization isn't suffering, for me.

I don't think the entire season can be boiled down to the one aspect either, and if you look back a couple pages, I was actually defending it. But the Final Five storyline has been majorly botched, imo.

Because of this. The show has been building up this idea that the being a cylon is essentially no different from being a human. But it still treats the revelation that character X is one as an earth-shattering event. We got 10 episodes of these characters having a secret to keep from the others, but the tangible reasons for keeping that secret have been steadily eroded. When Boomer was turned on, she struggled against programming that made her commit acts of sabotage. That was compelling, because we hadn't seen it before and there was internal conflict. With the Final Five, it's like they were just handed a note that said "btw, U R robut" and that was it.

Having the last batch of cylons have no idea what their plan or purpose is, or what it means to be one makes the revelation essentially pointless. It could've been you or me or Hot Dog or redshirt #3 for all it matters to the plot. Which would be a fine place for the story to go, except they built it up as this really pivotal mystery for a long time.

See, this is why the free flowing, make-it-up-as-you-go-along approach to series with mythological elements is such a bad idea.