Battlestar Galactica

I like the new BSG show. It does a lot of things that haven't been done before, or aren't currently being done. Many of these things really tickle me where I like it.


  • A great cataclysm with the survivors of humanity crammed into some space ships. It's like social science fiction. I have a post-apocalypse fetish. Hasn't been done since... the original BSG.
  • Aircraft carrier in space. Nuff said.
  • The music. OMG, the music. It's a completely weird fusion of contradictory styles that works fantastically.
  • The incorporation of the ancient Earth mythology. It was one of the eerily compelling themes of the original when I saw it as a kid, and it's still cool. Especially when combined with...
  • How similar the fictional culture is to our own. Not talking about the 'human condition' theme or anything... but the speech, dress, technology, etc is very very similar. It heightens the believability of what I'm seeing on the screen, I think. It's also a nice break (for me) from Trek and other extremely science fictional societies.
  • The nice touches of military authenticity. It's like Tom Clancy... in space!
  • Sorry Stargate, I will always love you, but BSG kicks the pants off of your writing and dialogue. Not that there are many of them, but I think the only competition that BSG's writing has from recent space ship shows is Enterprise (OT: ENT consistently had the best opening teasers of any show... ever)
  • Did I mention the music? The music.

It's really an intersection of a lot of good things that add up to a really fun and awesome show. Also, I do not subscribe to the notion that the show is over sexed, too violent, etc. So yeah, that's about it. All the ingredients for (me) really really liking the show with none of the 'it's so intellectual!' argument that has been lampooned in this thread.

EDIT: Welcome to page 3.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
... and the fact that you've said that is why I'm bringing up other series. People feel special because Battlestar Galactica assures them it's being more subtle... but it isn't, at all. Everyone says this about whatever their show is -- that it's the one being clever and everyone else is just being "as plain as can be".

It just isn't so -- heck, look at the original Star Trek's Vietnam episode... it's probably the most fair, most subtle mass media critique of the war... Battlestar Galactica isn't cutting a new path, it's stepping where everyone else has been while yelling that it's special at the top of its lungs.
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Not actually disagreeing with you (perhaps if I'd seen TOS in the last decade I'd disagree about that point), I'm simply saying that doesn't make it poor entertainment. I'll admit a lot of the fans do take it further than the creators ever meant to, but I could certainly show you star trek fans who do exactly the same.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
Let me note that while I have never been able to get into SG-1, I do find its fanbase absolutely wonderful. They're exactly what science fiction groups *should* be... it's just a shame that they exist on so small a scale right now.
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As I have said before I do like the new BSG, but I am a much bigger SG-1 fan.

I'm sure as hell not a better person for liking BSG, but I am entertained

I doubt that any show will ever be viewed as perfect
 
Pedro said:
Not actually disagreeing with you (perhaps if I'd seen TOS in the last decade I'd disagree about that point), I'm simply saying that doesn't make it poor entertainment. I'll admit a lot of the fans do take it further than the creators ever meant to, but I could certainly show you star trek fans who do exactly the same.
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The difference between Trek and BSG is Trek was actually sci-fi.

Some examples:
-In The Wrath of Kahn, Kirk has to use his wits and futuristic training to defeat an arch nemesis who has both a starship and a superweapon. The issue is resolved in a nebula. The next two movies are about bringing spock back to life, and returning to starfleet, using alien rituals and time travel.

-In Battlestar Galactica, Baltar has to worry about everyone noticing that he's really having sex with a virtual sexbot and not actually doing any productive work on his project. The first season is him doing whatever his sex implant tells him so he can get some digital nookie.

-In The Next Generation, there is a continuing backstory where a machine tries to learn how to be human.

-In Battlestar Galactica, there is a continuing backstory where a sexbot seduces and gets knocked up by a human.

-In Star Trek, the government is a utopian republic where everybody is happy, and the only problems they ever have is whale-seeking space probes and Kirk's antics in Klingon space.

-In Battlestar Galactica, the government is a sloppy populist democracy where the head-of-state is a clueless drug-addicted self-proclaimed prophet, and her arch nemesis is a similarly idiotic terrorist, who is a representative. The only problems they ever have are how to keep Baltar from sexing up the election process.
 
t.c.cgi said:
-In Star Trek, the government is a utopian republic where everybody is happy, and the only problems they ever have is whale-seeking space probes and Kirk's antics in Klingon space.
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Yeah, Star Trek has one of the scariest ideas of the future, when you think about it, the federation is really creppy.
 
Not actually disagreeing with you (perhaps if I'd seen TOS in the last decade I'd disagree about that point), I'm simply saying that doesn't make it poor entertainment. I'll admit a lot of the fans do take it further than the creators ever meant to, but I could certainly show you star trek fans who do exactly the same.
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Sure, I said that a million posts ago -- sex robots and spaceships exploding is *fun*. It's when people try to take it beyond that that we run into a problem.

Certainly I agree with you about Star Trek, but in reverse. The hardcore fanbase has always tended to try and move Star Trek *away* from social commentary and towards a continuity that the shows themselves have never wanted.

Some examples:
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You forgot religion! Battlestar Galactica is edgily tackling the most difficult religious issue: Greco-Roman Pantheon versus Judeochristian God! Take that, 23 AD!
 
t.c.cgi said:
-In Battlestar Galactica, there is a continuing backstory where a sexbot seduces and gets knocked up by a human.
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In Star Trek the Original Series, there is a continuing backstory where Kirk seduces every alien female he meets.

Ok to be serious I watch the new Battlestar Galactica but there are a lot of things i don't like about it. I think the biggest problem is i don't really care about a lot of the characters or what happens to them, and I don't feel like i've been given reasons why i should care or like many of the characters. The only two that really interest me are Colonel Tigh and Admiral Adama. Apollo is also starting to grow on me now that he has become less whiny and not trying to rebel against the image of his father at every turn. But the others, Boomer, Starbuck, President Roslyn the captain of the week on Pegasus, whomever, they could all be wiped out next week and replaced by someone new and it wouldn't matter to me.
 
LeHah said:
Blame the writers for a bad script, not someone who has good taste.
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Yeah, I can certainly understand LOAF's position. My initial reaction was the same (to a lesser extent :) )
The miniseries are not of the same quality as the 2 seasons that follow. (you can compare it to the 1st season of ST : TNG wich was also weak compared to the 6 other seasons)
And for a fan of the original series, it must at first seem like they are "raping" the franchise.
I'd advise the following : watch the 13 episodes of the 1 season & if you still think that's not good enough for you, stop watching.
Besides, if it was an exact remake, it would have been too predictable and too simplistic for modern television & it would last long
I must say, I had the same reaction when I saw the WC Movie. The more you love the original, the more you hate it when they change things in a remake/adaptation. (At least I do)
 
Bandit LOAF said:
Sure, I said that a million posts ago -- sex robots and spaceships exploding is *fun*. It's when people try to take it beyond that that we run into a problem.
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The show itself doesn't give it much thought, but we can elaborate. Even Melrose in Space with Sex Robots can provide us raw material for a good conversation. I never saw much BGS, but so far I think that the way it deals with artificial life poses questions in an interesting way. We never got a lot of info on why did the bad AI wanted to destroy mankind, be that the Matrix Programs, Sky Net or whatever. And those cylons that look like humans seem to be very different intentions than the terminators. I don't know, maybe it's just random stuff that looks nice on TV, but it's still interesting. I'm not saying it's well thought, and I just saw a couple of episodes.

Bandit LOAF said:
You forgot religion! Battlestar Galactica is edgily tackling the most difficult religious issue: Greco-Roman Pantheon versus Judeochristian God! Take that, 23 AD!
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Conisder this: the space robots are have the monotheistic religion, so most of the audience relates more with them than with the humans. Wouldn't that be edgy?
 
Delance said:
And those cylons that look like humans seem to be very different intentions than the terminators.
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Humanoid robots had been around for many, many, many years before James Cameron came along. Don't go giving credit where credit isn't due.
 
Delance said:
Of course they have, perhaps they have interesting motivations for a change. Maybe not.
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I don't see how motivations for fictional characters invalidates what I stated previously.
 
Your previous statement had nothing to do with what I said, I was just poiting that out. I was not giving credit to James Cameron for inventing the concept of artificial humanoids.
 
LeHah said:
I don't see how motivations for fictional characters invalidates what I stated previously.
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It doesn't.
Maybe he's A) trying to confuse you, B) stoned, C)none of the above
I vote B ;)
EDIT : oops, a few minutes to late with this post. Should have refreshed the page before entering it.
 
Delance said:
Yeah, Star Trek has one of the scariest ideas of the future, when you think about it, the federation is really creppy.
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You're starting to sound like all of those "the Federation is communist" people.
 
Bob McDob said:
You're starting to sound like all of those "the Federation is communist" people.
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Like Picard, when he explains how mankind has "evolved" beyond the need for personal gain and everybody works for free on a secular utopia?
 
Interesting how the conception of the Federation seems to change from time to time. During TOS, it was established that Kirk was a "soldier", stated out of his own mouth during the Organian Peace Treaty episode. Then later, it seems that the ideas of Star Fleet and the Federation as a whole were anti-military in the extreme. Although, that even changed between seasons of TNG.

DS9 goes as far to say that the Defiant was the first true 'warship' built by Starfleet. Interesting then how the Enterprise during the movie era was known as a Constitution-class Heavy Cruiser. Also, The Motion Picture referenced a 'Dreadnought Entente'. Heavy Cruiser and Dreadnought have a warship connotation to me.

Does the Federation have currency? Is Starfleet a military institution? Is there petty crime and poverty on Earth and the other core planets of the Federation? I would say yes to all of these in greater and lesser extents. I'm sure the official line throughout the Federation depends on which government has been elected to the office of President.
 
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