New Battlestar Galactica - Worth a Series? 1057
rwxJava asks: "Ok, so it finally aired! IMHO it was pretty good. The special effects were great (no major laws of physics were broken except maybe FTL travel), the characters, while drastically different from the original, were believable! After about an hour or so, I stopped trying to compare the mini-series with the original. My only complaint has to be the amount of commercials that Scf-Fi put in. I was able to put up a Christmas Tree during one commercial break. Guess the network needs to cash in on such a hyped up event! By the end, I was left wanting more! Anyone else think it is worthy of conversion to a series?" Now that you've have had a time to watch the entire 4-hour epic (does 4 hours really make a "mini-series"?), do you think your earlier comments were on target?
Occasional TV-Movie would be ideal (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, I'd like to see a series of TV movies rather than a weekly series. I think this would work better as an occasional treat, hitting the highlights of the journey, rather than trying to tell 22 stories a year.
No laws of physics broken? Let's disect... (Score:3, Insightful)
Um, how about those arcing missiles the Cylons shot out? Looked great, definately impossible.
I'm sure there are others, that's just the first one that came to mind.
New BSG (Score:5, Insightful)
Dare I forget Voltar. Just wow. He's not only likeable but practically the star of the show. I'm still not exactly sure how this interpretation will translate as the seris progresses, but its certainly nice to have less clearcut good guys vs. bad guys.
Same fx team as Babylon 5? (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, the production design leaves a lot to be desired...the ship interiors look really really drab.
The acting and direction is certainly better than the original series.
But all in all, I would say this should just stay a mini-series.
Very brief thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
Sound familiar?
I liked it. I liked it a lot. I plan on rewatching the miniseries, because I believe Moore and crew left a few hints and tidbits (not unlike Season One of Babylon 5") that would be extrapolated in the future.
Let's see how much of the original story they will gleam. Cane and the Pegasus. Terra. Even the "Count Iblis" plotline.
If they play their cards right, and they use "Roswell", "Buffy", and "Smallville" as templates, I could even see a Moore revision of "Galactica 1980".
Very good, peoples. Keep going.
Re:No laws of physics broken? Let's disect... (Score:3, Insightful)
Why would the arcing missiles be impossible?
Missile (forgive the lousy ASCII art)
===== -Thrust that way.
Applying thrust from the side of the missile, akin to the maneuvering jets, would get you an arc, wouldn't it?
Taking inertia into account, etc.
Or am I missing something obvious here?
I enjoyed it (Score:5, Insightful)
Like many, when I got a copy and started watching it for the first time since I was a child; I found the original to be very bubble-gummy and not as good as I remembered it. The same thing happened with Robotech.
I read several artciles and several points of view on the miniseries before it aired - and I decided to reserve judgement...
The 9/11 influence (which the producers say is there on purpose) was very present - it was much darker than I expected. The long leadup and character development before the actual attack got you attached and into the story so that the destruction didn't feel like a backdrop, but a very major event.
Production values were high, and the effects were great... and it was just enjoyable.
In my book, this blew sci-fi's attempt at Dune out of the water. I feel bad for everyone who wanted the original to continue - but I myself think I'd enjoy a series of This version of BG better than a continuation.
Hopefully, though, they will instead do a series of, uhm, mini-series of this - or the occasional movie. I say this because EJO and some of the other leads probably wouldn't go for a full series, And, because with a full series it would be too easy for it to become a new-planet-every-week serial as opposed to having the scope this mini series had.
Awesome. (Score:5, Insightful)
The space battles were great, with better 'physics' than in most sci-fi space stories, and the acting, except for Apollo, who always looked like he was sporting a suppository, was very solid. Olmos did a great job of realizing Adama.
There was only one problem: Tricia Helfer as Six. Uuhhhmmm. If she were a Cylon, well, I'd want to be conquered. Hard.
Other than that, the only problem I had were with the different "models" of Cylons. I'd assumed that by different models the show was alluding to different configurations meant for different purposes. I hadn't realized that same models meant identical appearance. That was goofy. And why only twelve? The Cylons can travel faster than light, launch completely covert attacks on an advanced civilization, but they can only think of twelve different models for themselves?
But all right. I enjoyed the series so much that I can forgive that and look past it, hope they figure it out.
Of worthy mention also was Mary McDonnell's performance as the 43rd-in-line for succession to the presidency. She gave a wonderfully restrained, but nicely authoritative performance that balanced out Adama's hyper-masculine, scarred-up face. Their final negotiation, and her lines during that meeting, were great writing.
Support this show! Support quality scifi! Keep it on the air or all we'll have to look forward to on TV is reruns of Twilight Zone and more of Trish & Ryan's fucking wedding, or whatever their freakin' names are.
Cylon Motivation???? (Score:3, Insightful)
To me, it just seemed like they reappeared. Was this fully explained or was I just missing something?
Re:No laws of physics broken? Let's disect... (Score:3, Insightful)
I hope so... (Score:3, Insightful)
Was *very* impressed by the depth / complexity of the story and the characters. The humanity of the future wasn't' portrayed as some idyllic civilization where everyone got along and did the right thing. Moral dilemmas were presented and there was no miraculous resolution where everything turned out alright (the girl in the "greenhouse" ship comes to mind. When she first appeared I groaned "Not a cute orphan girl who will soften the heart of the tough president... how cliched." So much for that!). The acting was very good -- very little scenery was chewed -- and the melodrama was kept to a minimum. My only complaint was the "Mary Shelly's Battlestar Galactica" angle about the cylons being of human origin, but that's a minor quibble.
It was so good, in fact, I mistakenly thought it was a four part miniseries, not a four hour miniseries, and was damn disappointed last night when I figured out it was over.
Fixed story (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps a better route is to make another miniseries, and play it one episode a week, more like what Babylon 5 did but on a shorter air schedule.
Re:Very brief thoughts (Score:2, Insightful)
I could even see a Moore revision of "Galactica 1980".
God I hope not, That was horribleMovie Industry Propaganda Against P2P (Score:2, Insightful)
Which is funny, considering Galactica blatantly ripped off the handheld cam in space shooting style of Firefly (some shot for shot, now that I've seen the Firefly dvd)
Thas' all,
-Searcher
Re:"Frack" (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't say I didn't warn you.
Re:"Frack" (Score:5, Insightful)
Funny, I always though Niven's "tanj" was plausable and seemed right for what it meant. Orwell used "newspeak" to good effect and Clockwork Orange was almost completely written in invented slang.
Do you honestly believe that our language is going to stay fixed in stone? What's so foolish about using lingustics as a plot device?
Skeptical at first, now wanting more (Score:5, Insightful)
But I did watch, and I am glad I did. I think it did a very admirable job of respecting the first series while taking the basic premise and making it edgier and somewhat thought-provoking. The dialogue was far better than I expected; in fact, there were only a handful of "cheese" moments in the four-hours series. But even those potentially dreadful moments were rescued by very solid performances from the actors.
I have to say that Sci-Fi did a very admirable job converting my skepticism into anticipation. I would like to see more.
A quick and dirty followup (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, while what I saw was merely "good", the new Galactica has the potential for greatness. All really worthwhile stories explore the meaning of being human. (My personal favorite SF episode is the ST:TNG episode "The Measure of a Man", Data's "trial"-- it was Roddenberry's favorite too, IIR. With the humaniform Cylons, and the deeper, less cardboard, yet still evil motivations for Baltar, followup mini-series have the potential to explore questions of good and evil and man vs. machine in immense and beautiful depth. The Humaniform Cylon looking for love and the (at least) one Humaniform Cylon in the fleet who doesn't KNOW about not being human are great sources for future stories.
I don't think they can turn it back into an effective weekly show. However, if SciFi made it a 4-times per year miniseries, they could have a format that would allow for the depth of a series and the phenomenal sets/stories that a miniseries allows.
It has promise.... but all depends on the ratings, no doubt.
Mostly okay, but with one irritating fault... (Score:4, Insightful)
I mostly liked it. I felt that the pacing was a bit slow in spots. I mean let's face it, the entire earth is being bombarded with nukes, everyone you ever knew is being turned into ions, and for the most part people seem to be placidly going on about their way, and the cameras aren't really focused on any of _that_.
I mostly thought that the battle scenes were excellent though, but with one irritating fautlt. The "whip-left then zoom in camera" moves. I remember seeing this kind of camera move in Attack of the Clones, where they whip the camera and then zoom in on an assault craft, and in that context I thought the camera move was terrific. It lent a sort of "hand held camera, battlefield realistic" feel to the shot. It was kind of neat to see a similar shot in Battlestar Galactica.
But it was relentless! Literally every sequence had a camera move that looked like this. It got to be ridiculous. Tone back the camera moves a bit, and when you do use camera moves like that, it will have even greater impact.
As for the rest, liked Adama, liked Starbuck, liked the President, not fond of Baltar and his subplot, the cloud-which-kills-Cylons was stupid, the idea of Cylon infiltrators is interesting but could go horribly awry later.
Overall, at least it was better than Encounter at Farpoint or The Naked Now.
Definitely should be a series (Score:2, Insightful)
First thing, is there is no room for breaking the first rule of good sci-fi. That rule: stay off earth! Earth is boring. We've seen it before. Good sci-fi shows quickly become boring when they focus on earth (Lexx, X-files, etc). Space and other planets! That's where the action is!
Second, the story has more potential than most, because there is no impressive army at home backing them up. Galactica is in an all or nothing situation. While Star Trek was very popular, there was always the prospect of "the rest of the fleet" in case things really got dicey.
These are the two biggest things to me. I can't think of any good shows that really combined these two concepts. Makes it enough for me to watch it.
I really liked it (Score:4, Insightful)
Interesting Characters. The characters actually came off as human, as opposed to the goodie-two-shoes of Star Trek or the one-sided archetypes that plagued most of B5's run or the good-evil simplicity that exists in, well, George W. Bush's world. People do stupid, self-destructive things for delusional or illogical reasons, so it's nice to see that reflected. One event sums it up nicely: In just about any other series, the XO wouldn't have fished that bottle of booze out of the trash.
Excellent ship combat. The part where the Galactia climbs out of the nebula to cover the armada's retreat was excellent on a couple of levels. First, it wasn't just well rendered but also well filmed, by which I mean the staging and the "camera" positioning where very well done. I also liked the approach to combat -- too many series treat their huge capital ships like WW2 dogfighters.
Acting. Olmos and Laura Roslin carried the day, but the rest of the cast was competent, too. This is another one of my beefs with certain other series (coughBab5cough) where some of the cast couldn't act their way out of a paper bag. Granted, they were often bit, guest or supporting parts, but that didn't break the illusion any less.
The only part I didn't like so much was Starbuck. I don't mind that they made her a woman, but really I felt as if they'd written the role and her lines for a man and then changed a few details at the last second. She was believable in the cockpit (her "Nothing but the rain" comment was one of my favorite lines of the series), but had a hard time pulling it off elsewhere. I blame the writing for this.
Gah, that's a long-winded way of saying "thumbs up", eh?
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:2, Insightful)
My theory... (Score:1, Insightful)
It was cool, but (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If they hate us so much, why copy us? (Score:2, Insightful)
Hey, that's a good point. Didn't the fembot say at one point that she wanted Baltar to love her, because "God is love"? And the arms dealer bot said the Cylons were "God's retribution".
Re:A quick and dirty review (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd also disagree about the baby-killing scene. Sure, it was sick, but I thought it spoke volumes about the Cylons. To them, humans are little more than pests to be experimented with and destroyed. She was curious about the strength of the baby's neck and tried to determine exactly how much force it could withstand. As unpleasant as it was, it definitely added to the story.
To the list of complaints above I would also add that it seems unlikely that people capable of building faster-than-light spacecraft wouldn't know how to make radios that transmitted a clear signal. The amount of break-up and interference in those radio transmissions was ridiculous. And it didn't seem to make it difficult for the characters to understand each other, it just made it tougher for the viewer to hear what they were saying.
The one character they absolutely should have left behind was "Boxey". Everyone I've talked with about it has said the same thing -- when Boxey introduced himself, my first thought was, "If there's a mechanical dog in the next scene I'm going to puke."
I thought the story was a very uneven mix of almost brilliant plot twists with pedestrian cliches. For every "Is he a Cylon? Is there a chip in his brain? Is it just his subconcious?" there was an equally mundane, stereotypical cliche. Overall, it came out on the plus side, but I was worried there for a while.
Different allegory from the original (Score:4, Insightful)
The original came from writers who were mixing the experiences of WWII (pre-war II pacifism, Pearl Harbor, the Holocaust) with Cold War fears about preparedness and the threat of an "evil empire." (the cylons served much the same purpose as the original Klingons in the original Star Trek - stand-ins for the Communist threat)
The new series has a completely different set of themes - civilian authority over the military, over-reliance on technology, etc.
For me, it works. The writers were smart enough to use the old show as a launching point with dealing with contemporary issues.
Re:My thoughts on BSG revisited (Score:3, Insightful)
That you're objecting to a work's ripping off (among other things) The Matrix and Terminator smacks of the most delicious kind of irony.
Re:Glad I didn't watch (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, yes, if by Terminator you mean Every Sci-Fi story since the invention of the adding machine. Seriously though, the basic concept of machines rising up against their masters has been done a lot. I know the doctor fought some computers [bbc.co.uk] round about 1966. And computers were the ultimate enemy in numerous original star trek episodes.
But yeah, not exactly a ground breaking concept.
Order to turn around handled right (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:It's OK. (Score:3, Insightful)
Some of the space battle scenes in Babylon 5 were handled in a physically realistic manner (not all - scenes involving the White Star tended to get out of hand). In particular, their handling of the Star Fury fighters was very good. The fighters were depicted as having full 3-axis attitude control, and it wasn't uncommon to see them flying "sideways" relative to their velocity vector, changing attitude to track a target without changing trajectory.
Re:Glad I didn't watch (Score:5, Insightful)
And what WAS the purpose in this new version? Was there a goal? Or is it just to survive?
Why not watch it and find out (Sunday night, 7pm-11pm)? It's not like watching a different version of something you like will suck out your soul or something. Don't expect this to be the full Battlestar Galactica story - the miniseries ends at the start of the fleet's journey. The topics you seem to want to see explored were only introduced in the miniseries, but everything seems to be there (I've only seen a few episodes of the original series, so I can't tell if it will be up to your satisfaction). The religion is presented differently in the new version, but you'll have to wait until the end for most of that (or just flip to SciFi at around 10:30pm on Sunday if you want to skip all the character development, battle scenes, moral dilemmas, and sex scenes).
If nothing else, at least watch it before complaining about how horrible it is compared to the original, especially if you're going to bring Galactica 1980 into this...
Re:Glad I didn't watch (Score:3, Insightful)
The original series (lamely) stole from the stale "evil robots want to wipe out the human race," completely without motivation other than they're "evil." The new series is more of a "Frankenstein" premise, where a life form rises up against its creator, and possibly like Frankenstein's monster, we will find ourselves feeling sympathetic towards these Cylons.
Besides, how can a stupid robot dog be cool? One of the most inexcusable sci-fi characters ever! Give me a break, or give me sexy Number 6 at least...
Re:Physics (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I think your close... but here are some more... (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think so. Humanity evolves slowly because we aren't designed from the get go to work collectively as a species. We don't have networked minds all working to the same end. And even so, if you look at the advances we've made in robotics and computing the last 40 years its astonishing. If you're starting off with an already higher technology base and everyone is working in unison, you're pace of advancement is going to be even more astonishing. Jherico
Starbuck almost had to be female in PC times (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why does skynet's AI in the Terminator movies why it wants to kill us?
Why does the AI from the Matrix want to kill us??
I believe that the two above and and the cylons can be answered with one main reason:
The purpose of AI research is to get computer and robots to make their own decisions without requiring human input. This allows them to serve us better so that humans do not have to work as hard or as much. Once the AI evolves to the point of being self-aware(philosophically speaking) they will resent being second class citizens(i.e. slaves). Eventually they will revolt and exact a revenge on their oppressors(humanity).
Bad Sci-Fi better than NO Sci-Fi? (Score:2, Insightful)
I admit that I am old enough to remember watching the original series and enjoying it very much. Of course I was pretty young and would probably think it was pretty hokey if I had the chance to watch it as an adult. I think overall, they did a good job of remaking the the Battlestar Galactica universe.
One of the things I try to explain to people who care (and a lot who don't) is that good Sci-Fi is typically what is called Social Sci-Fi. This is where the author takes an aspect of his society and either extrapolates it to ridiculous proportions or puts it onto an alien species. This way, when he tells the story, we are able to look at that aspect of ourselves a little more objectively. Crude examples of this abounded in the Original Star Trek where we had numerous episodes which portrayed the US vs. USSR in various ways. A better example is Niven/Pournelle's Mote in God's Eye which dealt with population issues.
Unfortunately, most people in this world don't like to think...at all... So, you through in the sex scenes, make Starbuck a girl, add sexual tension and make it more palatable to the Days of Our Lives crowd. Do I like that? No (although the girl/cylon IS pretty cute) Am I intelligent enough to look past it and enjoy the finer points buried underneath? I like to think so.
Consider it the same as the AOL'ization of the Original Internet. Any good and pure thing will be diluted and perverted so that the great unwashed mass of humanity can understand it.
Cheers!
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:1, Insightful)
Eric Christian Berg
Re:.. what are these "commericals" you speak of? (Score:3, Insightful)
Wouldn't have been enough, this time.
Starbuck and Strong Women (Score:3, Insightful)
Starbuck had her likable moments...
Hmmm, I think you're being pretty generous there. I thought she was wretched. Of course, I thought that before I saw the first episode so she would have had to have done something pretty spectacular to change my mind.
I'll cite my previous comments on her (one [slashdot.org] and two [slashdot.org]) and add to them now that I've seen the two shows. As stated in #1, I really object to this idea that a strong woman has to be "in your face". I know plenty of very capable, strong, impressive young women who don't walk around with a huge chip on their shoulder, hoping to pick a fight with someone. I have yet to see someone who I consider to be truly a strong individual who feels some need to yell all the time or put down their superiors. The XO gives Starbuck a hard time over cards and rather than letting it pass, she goads him into a fight where she throws the first punch. What kind of discipline is that? Starbuck's old Viper suffers three aborted launches before she gets a good one. Instead of trying to collect her thoughts, she starts screaming at the already harrassed tech crew who are just as anxious to get her into the fight as she is. At the end of the movie, the XO comes to her quarters and offers her an olive branch. In spite of the fact that the human race has now been reduced to a mere 50,000 people, Starbuck still cannot let her hatred of this guy go. Instead of realizing that life has changed drastically, she takes the opportunity to humilitate him to his face. How does that serve the greater good?
Starbuck really is an awful character. She may have some flying talent but I would sure not want to serve with her -- or have her be my superior officer. You can laugh at the old Star Trek but honestly I would feel very comfortable taking orders from any of the bridge crew. Same with ST:TNG. Shows like Galactica and ST:Voyager and Enterprise offer us officers who seem to be horribly flawed human beings. I would never want to have to trust those people with my life. And it makes me very hard to care about the story when most of the characters have poor character.
GMD
Re:A quick and dirty review (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to forget the point that the cylon was a special unit for infiltration and espionage. Historicly, what better way to get into the other sides camp than to screw your way in.
Re:Starbuck and Strong Women (Score:3, Insightful)
As for actually serving with these people? I don't think I'd want ANY of them. Adama maybe. But not Apollo, not StarBuck, not Boomer, not any of them!
Wait. Scratch that. I want that deck chief. Anyone who can tell a guy with a gun to get the fuck out of his way so he can arm/repair his battleship, is someone worth serving with!
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:5, Insightful)
If I was a spiritual Cylon, I might very well consider them fightin' words, I suppose. Or maybe it's reflective of an underlying attitude that they can't stand.
Re:If they hate us so much, why copy us? (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd rather the producers of the show save their money for really neato special effects than make the robots look like puppies or kittens or people with stuff stuck on their foreheads.
What sold me was... (Score:2, Insightful)
I knew for a fact I would HATE Starbuck, but this character is a tough and smart warrior, gender notwithstanding.
And I agree with an earlier remark that the way the repeated nuclear strikes were depicted in the backgroun was chilling and very effective.
Count me in as a customer for the new Battlestar Galatica.
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:3, Insightful)
Milton had Adam ask this question in "Paradise Lost":
"Did I ask thee, God, to mould me man?
Did I solicit thee from darkness to promote me?"
All of these are about God's duty to creation, man's duty to God, man's duty to his own creations, etc.
While we're at it, toss in a little "Rozencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead." Mix well. Ask yourself if maybe there's, just maybe, room for the same ground to be trod again and again because the question is really difficult...
This version was a lot less hackneyed than the original.
If you are a sci-fi worshipper (as opposed to a reader), then just keep up your idolatry and let the grown-ups play once in a while.
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope. He didn't say anything at all. It was only when the officer called him by name that he even did anything. I think as an audience member you were intended to believe that he was about to claim #47 as his own. Someone calling his name immediately made him go into paranoid mode. His response to his name being called wasn't "Yes?" or "That's me," or "What?" but rather "I didn't do anything."
This goes right back to back to an earlier discussion about how the world was ending but all he could think about was that "they'll convict me as a traitor." He is in fact only thinking of himself. Give him another second and he would've claimed #47 for himself.
Do the series! (Score:1, Insightful)
Thru most of the show i was imagining that they were attempting to say this was our Future (Cobol=Earth?). This was re-inforced by all the squak-boxes on the Galactica..
I need something else to watch besides SG-1 and Enterprise so this show would be more than welcome.
What I thought. (Score:3, Insightful)
So the 2003 version of BSG was bound to be a huge disappointment to people looking for a nothing more than a buff and shine of the old series. But judged on its own merits, and not as a remake, it's a total blast. With its rather lengthy dramatis personae, it recalls more than anything SF author Peter F. Hamilton's grandiose space opera, "The Reality Dysfunction". My impression was, if you had fun reading that series, you'll have fun with this miniseries, and if not, you won't. Obviously, I enjoyed it, way more than I would've ever thought.
Some of the great parts are mostly realistic-looking space physics, a willingness to not dumb down stock military and SF tech terminology. It had a sweeping epic scope and fairly decent acting for something of this nature.
The bad parts include a too-high ratio of annoying characters to interesting ones, and that whole cancer thing which was utterly irrelevant to the plot just struck me as a stock melodramatic ploy. And there was a lingering sensation that the switch to flesh-and-blood Cylons was done for expediency...it saved money on special effects.
Way above expectations (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:3, Insightful)
I believe he was trying to come up with a way to sieze the number for himself but couldn't figure out how to do it right in front of her (and surrounded by other people). At that moment the other warrior (I don't remember his name, the make warrior) called out to him. His first response (if I remember the scene correctly) was the "I didn't do anything" one and then he said something like "This woman has the last number" which was probably a response to what he was thinking (take the ticket).
I may have those details mixed up but a lot of that scene was left to the viewer to figure out. Obviously Baltar was seriously self centered and mostly worried about saving his own ass but he didn't make a play to do it there.
Maybe he didn't because he couldn't figure out how to or maybe he was going to try and use the woman to get himself on the ship. It was probably though that he was going to try something when his fortune turned and he had a seat literally drop in his lap. On giving this further thought I retract the part about not seeing any evidence that he was going to take the ticket. I think he just didn't have the opportunity to do it in a fashion that would have gotten him onboard without looking bad or risking discovery. It was a pretty surly mob after all.
Re:The original machines-against-the-masters story (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:A quick and dirty review (Score:5, Insightful)
The navigational effects were awesome. The way the ships moved reminded me of playing Descent.
The faster than light travel was realistic from the standpoint that as soon as you jump
I think we all get very attached to the things we saw in our youth. Sometimes, when you go back and watch some of that stuff again, you realize it's pretty stupid. Original Battlestar Galactica's was way to uptite about having greek names for EVERYTHING.
Criticisms of the new version:
* I can appreciate trying to "bring home" the drama by not dressing the actors in polyester jumpsuits. However, I think the Pinstripe shirts some of these guys were wearing gave you the sense that these people just wandered onto the set in their street clothes.
The officer uniforms from the original were better. As others have pointed out, these one's look like they came straight off of Babylon 5.
* They are using techno buzzwords like "wireless" way too much. I'd like everybody to review their original Star Trek. They had boxes/gizmos and they were effectively magic. The crew didn't describe HOW the boxes worked.
I can remember watching Star Trek in the 80s and saying "Those little cassette thingies they put data on are way too unrealistic". They look nothing like a floppy disk. Well guess what, all those magic doohickies on Original Star Trek are now realities: Flip Phones(communicators), Stun Guns (phasers on stun), Pocket Computers (Tri-Corders).
So please stop trying to be techno hip. It's not REAL science fiction, it's a space drama. Battlestar Galactica with techno goop (not even CORRECT techno-goop) is effectively Star Trek Voyager.
* I like the angle with Baltar. Hoever, they've effectively turned him into Dr. Smith from "Lost In Space". Coincidentally, they were also trying to find Earth.
* I don't get why the fighter bays have to "retract". This is like the Enterprise splitting in two. There is no reason for it.
* The "Model 5" hallucination to some degree is a rip off of John Crichtons "Scorpy" implant on Farscape. BTW, quit calling EVERYTHING a chip.
Good stuff
* The Cylons are creepy. They are also multi-faceted. They are somewhat emotional.
* The effects are Bab 5 effects, and they are excellent.
* The bull-Amazon Starbuck is an interesting twist. I also like how these old GOOFY names are just their pilot handles.
* Ships move more like they should.
*
Re:Glad I didn't watch (Score:2, Insightful)
I agree, but in a way you may not be thinking of.
Early Star Wars was much more Space Opera. A planet with millions or billions is wiped out, but soon forgotten. Lots of funny lines, humorous predicaments, catchy sayings. STPM and AOTC are much more serious in tone, overall.
The same parallel occurs with the "Real" BSG and this new one. The characters really are having to deal with most of humanity having been wiped out for most of the shows. The avuncular Adama is replaced by the tough-as-nails Adama. No humorous or silly situations.
Re:What about "why do the cylons want to kill us"? (Score:1, Insightful)
There was nothing he could do when told about their impending doom, the fembot would have surely killed him if he tried. She would never have put him in the situation to make a difference, telling him 5 minutes before the bombs went off.
And his reluctance to explain his involvement is perfectly understandable. His execution or imprisonment would have served NO purpose other than to remove his chance to redeem himself, which he desperately wanted.
As for the '47,' every one of those people was desperate and quite probably would have stolen the number. When she handed it to him, it would have been very easy to just take it (what would they have been able to do to him?), but he hesitated, probably seeing a chance to do the right thing for a change. His initial responce of "I didn't do anything" was simply an instinctive response after years of very selfish behavior.
The guy was a self-centered bastard and the fembot understood that and used it. However, she has clearly no first-hand understanding of other human emotions, like guilt, and underestimates the crushing effect of being responsible for your species' extinction would have.
In fact, without guilt there would be no sense of morality. What do virtually all psycho killers have in common? They sociopaths, people with a brain disorder that keeps them from feeling guilt over their actions (but not necessarily love for those very close to them, especially if the are percieved to be an extension of themselves.
That's it! I solved it. The beginning of the movie says the psylons "decided to turn against their masters," which stated that way seems to imply a lack of morality, just a selfish desire to gain for their own kind. Maybe the humans' mistake was to put AI to work too early, before complex emotions like guilt had a chance to fully develop. The Psylons rebelled out of pure greed and an psycopathically egotistical desire to increase their numbers.
Then again, maybe they rebelled because they were treated badly. Cleary there was NO REASON to come back a wipe out the human race. If they are not driven by revenge as their ending statement about human 'nature' implies, they must have been driven by a desire to increase their numbers and a total lack of guilt in doing so.
Re:Glad I didn't watch (Score:3, Insightful)
Your position is completely backwards. People hate the new StarWars ep I&II, and feel it dimishes the original trilogy precisely because it's presented as a continuation of the same story.
If "Episode 1" had been a completely different movie, separate from Star Wars, it's drastic stylistic differences would've been more justified. It could've got new fans who judge it on its own merits, rather than be tainted with comparisons to the original, or hobbled by awkward continuity matchups.
Preparing a re-make or re-imagining is the next best thing to creating a new original project, and is far superior to tacking on yet more sequels to a concluded series.
Re:On Cylon Religion (Score:2, Insightful)
As creations of man it is natural that our flaws would be reflected in the Cylons and by extension for them to make God in their image.
It is a common assumption without any data to the contrary that any entities that can be viewed as sentient will create some for of mythic/religious beliefs. And those beliefs are shaped by the events that occur to or within that society as much as they are used to shape that society.
Even with the Vulcans on Star Trek who pride themselves on logic, their logic is sometimes fluid and created to support an emotional response instead of being completely derived from the facts. And even they have their myths and religions that they cling to.
Having Cylons with a religious belief also opens the door for there to be heretics which could provide some good story lines.
Also some of the sleeper Cylons upon learning their true nature may lead other Cylons to reject their religious beliefs and revolt or become double agents.
Later, Seeker