Unqualified Offerings

BSG 2.20

29 Responses to “BSG 2.20”

1. Comment by Jim Henley —
   March 10, 2006 @ 11:33 pm

   Say this for them: we didn’t see THAT coming.

2. Comment by Derek Copold —
   March 11, 2006 @ 3:24 am

   Season finale: Dude.

   Liked the animation at the end, too.

   I don’t want to think too much about this because I’m going to start finding unpleasant plotholes. For one thing, the whole idea that the fleet would be allowed to deteriorate so quickly seems a bit, well, incredible. Still a great episode, and I was sorry to see it end.

   And let the record show that Sharon 2 did not set up the Fleet with Raptor.

3. Comment by Species 8 —
   March 11, 2006 @ 8:07 am

   Excellent episode.

   Though: October until new episodes–Frak!

4. Comment by Hesiod —
   March 11, 2006 @ 8:30 pm

   Season 3 opener:

   Just as the Cylons are about to nuke the colonists, he wakes up from his dream.

   Admit it. You all were wondering whether it will be one of those ”it was all just a dream” things.

5. Comment by Thomas Nephew —
   March 11, 2006 @ 9:10 pm

   I’m sensing a disturbance in the BSG force.

6. Comment by Atrios —
   March 11, 2006 @ 9:31 pm

   Obviously the ”let’s leave open the possibility it was a dream” was done deliberately, but if they really do make it a dream I think the fans may lynch them.

7. Comment by Laertes —
   March 11, 2006 @ 10:28 pm

   Holy shit.

   I’d been complaining for some time that they’d chickened out–that they were shutting down every element that drove the plot forward (Roslin’s cancer, Sharon’s baby.) That they were putting away all the breakables and settling down for a nice long X-Files type run of throwaway episodes and character pieces, with just enough hints of story arc thrown in to keep the fans watching.

   So I was wrong.

   This is exciting. It’s a whole new series now. Different setting, different pace, with the same old characters in lots of new roles. I love it.

   Extra bonus: Dean Stockwell is, without question, the coolest Cylon ever. Hope they’re going to use him a lot.

8. Comment by Laertes —
   March 11, 2006 @ 10:46 pm

   Let’s go over the things we knew for certain were going to happen in this episode:

   1. Anders would die.

   2. Helo’s Sharon would defect to the cylons.

   3. Chief’s Sharon would hook up with the fleet.

   4. The six-and-eight-on-caprica storyline would be a big chunk of the episode.

   I love being wrong like that. That was the series finale, IMO. What comes next is a new series. It had been a war picture. Now it’s about a tyrant and a resistance. Totally new setting, with old characters in new roles.

   They have acted boldly. I approve.

9. Comment by Jim Henley —
   March 12, 2006 @ 12:30 am

   Thomas: I disagree. Unless it really was a dream, in which case Atrios is right – I’ll lynch them.

   Time will tell if they’ve written themselves into a hole. But this was a bold move.

   This was a great actor’s episode. McConnell’s scenes just after stealing the election (while getting all the congrats from here and there) were first-rate work. Sackhoff’s face and tone when talking about the Farm were the culmination of Angry Starbuck, then she flips it like aikido once she and Anders are back on the ship.

   The episode was held back from advancement in genius school because the Cylon about-faces were . . . undermotivated. I suppose it’s the kind of thing George RR Martin (in Song of Ice and Fire) and Gene Wolfe get away with all the time radical offstage shifts in the narrative; but I don’t think they quite pull it off. (”And they have a plan. I mean, had a plan. Well, *have* a plan, but a different plan.”)

   The proof will be in what they do with it. If they realize the *science fiction* – that is, if the Cylon’s attempted stewardship of humanity is *about some idea*, then it was all worth it. Given that Moore appears to be allergic to ideas, that’s a risk.

10. Comment by Jim Henley —
    March 12, 2006 @ 12:37 am

    The show has a pattern that bears discussing. Or, say, it has one of two patterns, and that’s really what there is to discuss. It either holds past events very lightly when it comes to present behavior, OR, it recognizes that people don’t like to discuss difficult things. For instance, CALLIE SHOT THE CHIEF’S GIRLFRIEND DEAD AT THE BEGINNING OF SEASON TWO. Now she says she loves him and within three months (timing by her belly swelling) they’re betrothed/wed. Adama deposed Roslin by force, then they became best buds, then, when she pulls an undemocratic power play, he talks her out of it by appealing to ideals he himself previously flouted. Starbuck and Tighe are at each other’s throats most of the series; suddenly at the end of Judgment Day they’re glad to see each other.

    All these things are difficult to swallow, and yet I can just about buy all of them. Because, like I say, people don’t like to talk about stuff.

11. Comment by Eric Scharf —
    March 12, 2006 @ 1:52 am

    October until new episodes–Frak!

    Alternately: October to speculate where the series is going, because it can go just about anywhere.

    My twin reactions to the season finale: underwhelmed and relieved. Underwhelmed because so many subplots got blurred by the ”One Year Later” jump and essentially deferred to Season Three. Relieved because the writers kept their options open and no major characters were killed off or unmasked as cylons just for shock value. I fully expect the writers’ indulgence in flashbacks and flashforwards to continue next season, despite the increasingly unfavorable comparison to ”Lost.”

    Things I liked:

    1. Dean Stockwell as the Brothers Cavell (what a name!).

    2. Gina’s pre-suicide tryst and vigil, which never remotely approached the salaciousness of the kind of gratuitous quasi-nudity* that one might expect from a season finale. I was going to throw my weight behind an Emmy nomination campaign for Katee Sackhoff, but I’m not certain Tricia Helfer doesn’t deserve it more.

    3. Cottle continuing to be a complete shite.

    4. The Admiral convincing Roslin to do the right thing without indulging in either self-righteousness or false optimism.

    5. Baltar facing down the Admiral in public and private, without Virtual-Six cueing him. The lovely thing is, we don’t need Six there because we can see her influence in the furrow of Baltar’s brow and the stiffness of his spine.

    6. The ’Stache.

    Things I didn’t like:

    1. Dualla inexplicably participating in election fraud.

    2. Starbuck’s Force Recon on Caprica ”coincidentally” encountering the pursuit of Anders’s raiders, then fecklessly being cut off from the Raptors, then inexplicably being permitted to escape. Even if we’re going to admit that the cylons are riven by competing factions and agendas, this smacked too heavily of ”human husbandry.”

    3. The year-old ”permanent” settlement on New British Columbia looking less comfortable than camping on Galactica’s hangar deck.

    Things obscured by ”One Year Later” which I really want(ed) to see:

    1. Tyrol and Callie separately examining their jealously, guilt, and anger, and then re-discovering each other.

    2. Lee Adama making Pegasus his ship.

    3. Baltar crying out for Virtual-Six to talk to him, and getting no response.

    4. Tory, Tigh, and the designated fall-guys(/girls) taking their lumps for trying to steal the election.

    5. Where’s (my) Sharon?

    So much has happened over the mini-series and first two seasons that it seems pointless to compare the BSG to ”The Original Series,” but I think President Baltar’s confrontation with the cylons in the cabin of the grounded Colonial One raises an interesting perspective. The Original Baltar sold out the human race just so he could be the cylons’ head Kapo. Whether we interpret the new Baltar’s collaboration with Six as willing/conscious/venal/treasonous, there is no doubt how Adama, Roslin, and the Fleet would interpret it, and the threat of exposure (and Baltar’s variously self-serving re-examinations of his complicity) has been one of the more juicy subplots of the series.

    With the cylon occupation of New Caprica, Baltar’s administration has been thoroughly discredited and Roslin has been vindicated (of course, we don’t know how much the public knows about her role in the stolen election). The vulnerability of the New Caprica settlement is attributable to Baltar’s political expediency, but no one (other than perhaps Roslin herself) could or would accuse Baltar of deliberately inviting the cylon occupation. When Baltar offered his surrender, many would argue that he was acting in the best interest of humanity. In short, Baltar has been ”promoted” from Quisling to Pétain, and my faith that the writers will find this complexity as rich as I do pretty much guarantees that I’ll stay with the show.

    I’m sure we shouldn’t read too much into this, but Zarek wasn’t present at Baltar’s inauguration and we haven’t seen him since before Gina’s nuke went off. Given the mischief he got into the last time he went dirtside, Zarek should have founded Galt’s Gulch on New Caprica by now…

    * Not that there’s anything wrong with that.©

12. Comment by Jim Henley —
    March 12, 2006 @ 2:02 am

    1. Dualla inexplicably participating in election fraud.

    Ooh, I’ll defend this one!

    Remember back to the coup at the end of Season One? Billy called Dee and was all ”How can he do this?” and Dee was like ”How can she make him do this?”

    Dee has a trach record of having no problem with the military fracking with the civilian leadership.

    Great post, though.

13. Comment by Eric McErlain —
    March 12, 2006 @ 4:49 am

    Sure, nobody saw this coming, but it retrospect, shouldn’t we have seen it coming?

    Because the original BSG lasted only one season, we never got to see how the writers could possibly hold the interest of the audience over the long haul with the fleeing the Cylon tyranny storyline.

    In other words, while this might seem like a massive risk, it ought to be seen as a necessary one.

    Whether this story arc of resisting the Cylons/liberating humanity lasts just three episodes or for the entirety of season three, it was undoubtedly the right move.

    New setting, new ideas, new issues to explore.

    Then again, I could be wrong. Too bad we’ll have to wait until October to find out.

14. Comment by Eric Scharf —
    March 12, 2006 @ 11:36 am

    Jim: Remember back to the coup at the end of Season One? Billy called Dee and was all ”How can he do this?” and Dee was like ”How can she make him do this?” Dee has a trach record of having no problem with the military fracking with the civilian leadership.

    Perhaps I was too quick with ”inexplicable,” but I think that Dee’s support of the coup was out of personal loyalty to Adama rather than an Ollie-North-esque contempt for due process. If we’re lucky, maybe the writers will give us a flashback to Dee and Gaeta confronting each over their roles in the election (say, on the occasion of Gaeta resigning his commission).

    Eric McErlain: Because the original BSG lasted only one season, we never got to see how the writers could possibly hold the interest of the audience over the long haul with the fleeing the Cylon tyranny storyline. In other words, while this might seem like a massive risk, it ought to be seen as a necessary one.

    I agree. Wasn’t Star Trek: Voyager initially derided as a retread of the original BSG? That didn’t work out so hot.

    If you like sausage or respect the law, don’t listen to Ron Moore’s podcasts. The writers are clearly impressed with their own boldness in dealing with the competing challenges of exploring fresh territory, respecting the integrity of the characters, and keeping the show accessible to ”people who just read about the show in Rolling Stone or The New Yorker.”

    On balance, I don’t think the season finale represented as great a departure as many people seem to be declaring. After all, Baltar has been discredited and Roslin’s quest for Earth has been demonstrated to be the only viable plan. The fleet is intact (if undermanned), and none of the major (human) characters has died or undergone a radical shift in motivation. The beginning of Season Three promises to deal with the liberation of an unusually large prison camp, and then we’re On The Road Again.

    Where the writers have committed themselves is that they now have to put up or shut up regarding the cylons’ (intertitled) Plan, their theological grievances with humanity, their breeding program, and their guilt over the holocaust. This is a major (if not the primary) theme of the show, and they had better get it right. As far as I’m concerned, if I have to wait seven months for them to give it the attention it deserves, fine.

15. Comment by Laertes —
    March 12, 2006 @ 12:33 pm

    Who is the guy that appears before a befuddled Anders and asks where Starbuck is?

16. Comment by Jim Henley —
    March 12, 2006 @ 12:39 pm

    Dude, that’s a Loeben, presumably the resurrected version of the one Starbuck tortured in the landmark first-season episode, ”Flesh and Bone.”

    That moment is the most hopeful of the episode esthetically. Over on the scifi channel boards everyone assumes that the Cylons are going to start up a new Farm and try to breed hybrids. That would be a terrible squandering of potential, IMHO. A Loeben-Starbuck ”reunion” suggests that they’ll pay more attention to the spiritual themes attending the human-Cylon relationship.

17. Comment by Eric Scharf —
    March 12, 2006 @ 12:53 pm

    That moment is the most hopeful of the episode esthetically.

    I thought that was Tigh’s hat.

18. Comment by Jared —
    March 12, 2006 @ 1:04 pm

    I was a bit underwhelmed. First of all because of what a number of people have already mentioned: skipping a year means they miss out on a lot of potentially interesting developments. Those that haven’t been mentioned so far: how will everyone deal (emotionally and practically) with life on an inhospitable planet? With the possibility that they’ve escaped the Cylons forever. How did Caprica-6 and Chief’s Sharon fare with their mission, and why did that mission appear to have failed? Was Lee really that mad at Starbuck for that one stupid comment that they stop talking? etc.

    There’s enough material in that year for an entire season, although even another half hour would have been satisfying (why not do what 24 does and have two eps to end it, instead of one and a half?) I suspect a lot of this will be dealt with in flashbacks, which doesn’t give me much confidence, considering how awkward that ”two days previously” habit is.

    To be clear: I like the shift in story arc from ”cat-and-mouse” to ”overthrowing tyranny.” I just wish it hadn’t happened quite so fast.

    Second reason I was disappointed is the Baltar character. Everyone keeps saying he’s a genius, but he’s never once acted like it. Fine if they want to make him a petulant, sex-mad genius. Even a traitorous genius. But they’ve given us absolutely no evidence he’s actually a genius. This was fine when he had little power, but now that he has (or had, for a year) control of the colonies, it becomes much more important for the show to have some respect for the ideas it’s hinted at. But it still doesn’t.

19. Comment by Eric Scharf —
    March 12, 2006 @ 1:33 pm

    Everyone keeps saying [Baltar]’s a genius, but he’s never once acted like it. Fine if they want to make him a petulant, sex-mad genius. Even a traitorous genius. But they’ve given us absolutely no evidence he’s actually a genius.

    Baltar was a scientific genius when his sociopathic narcissism shielded him from having to worry about such adult concerns as personal responsibility, compassion, family, and love. James Callis’s performance is an ongoing testament that the emotional consequences of a thermonuclear holocaust pale in comparison to those of a late-developing conscience.

20. Comment by Mike —
    March 12, 2006 @ 1:38 pm

    Dee has a trach record of having no problem with the military fracking with the civilian leadership.

    I actually have no problem believing various characters reactions (Adama’s coup, Tigh’s martial law, Roslin’s attempt to steal the election). Remember the basic driving force for everyone is that they’re on the brink of extinction. Putting control in the hands of an incompetent leader could be suicidal. Baltar’s election proved that pretty quickly.

21. Comment by Mr. Obscura —
    March 12, 2006 @ 11:07 pm

    Well, I for one didn’t see this coming

    I was glad to return to the show that suprised me with sweeping themes and big arc movements. I was disappointed with some of the plot holes. What the heck are the Cylon’s doing? 1. We’re exterminating humanity (except for a few breeders). 2. That was a bad idea, we’re leaving humanity to their own devices. 3. We ”heard” a large boom, so we came back to see what the fuss was and to save you from yourselves?

    I have more or less stopped listening to the podcasts for the reason mentioned upthread. To tar Ron Moore with George Lucas’ brush, he’s making this up as he goes along.

    Derek: Sorry, but it is not established that Boomer didn’t send the Raptor to ”discover” New Caprica. Nothing was done or said that absolves her. What happened to her, BTW?

    The early part (at least) of Season 3 will have to be two shows: one about the humans under Cylon domination and another about the ragtag fugitive fleet. If they’re going in this direction I hope they go all the way, and not have the humans on New Caprica rescued in episode 3.03 via deus ex machina.

22. Comment by Derek Copold —
    March 13, 2006 @ 10:21 am

    Unfortunately, I’ve spent time thinking about it, and there are things I don’t like about the direction this series is taking, and the finale only confirms that. In the first season, we saw a show that featured a character-driven plot. This last half-season, we’ve seen a show with plot-driven characters. It’s funny when you think about it: All three of the scifi series (the Stargates and BSG) ended on pretty much the same damned note: evil alien fleet arrives to threaten humanity.

    Now the Stargates do this almost every year, and that’s fine. That’s their thing. With all the campy illusions and self-deprecating humor, you know they see it as only so much fun, which it is, if you put your brain in neutral.

    BSG, OTOH, is not meant to be that kind of a show. It was supposed to question and challenge certain philosophical assumptions. The fans were hoping that G-Sharon would be able to resist her cylon programming, but she didn’t. Nature won out over nurture. Something we Lockean Americans don’t like. On any other show, Tigh is someone you would hate, but here he has a number of qualities that just do not make it that simple. Even Baltar could elicit some amount of sympathy. The whole puritanical idea that people are either irredeemably evil or good is challenged.

    The finale still had some of these elements. The whole of idea of democracy is under severe challenge. Clearly, the ”people” can be fools, and the protagonists recognized it, some even tried to thwart their will. The idea of stealing the election was obviously bad, but I had just as much a problem with Roslin’s secret pow-wow with Baltar, saying the issue should be decided after the election by ”experts.” Say what? If a democratic election is supposed to mean anything, the people should be voting on the issues, particularly one as critical as that. If not, then you really don’t have much a democracy.

    Still, this twist and the others didn’t have the same claustrophobic feel of Season 1, where the scope of view was limited to a few characters. Now these kinds of debates are lost in the larger mess of things like open settlements and strangely fickle cylons. None of the conflicts have the same urgency. At the end of Season 1, I couldn’t wait for July to arrive. The same thing with the mid-season cliffhanger. Now, I take the idea of waiting until October with a shrug. I don’t feel half the involvement.

    None of this means I’ve given up on the show. I still enjoyed the episode, and will probably rewatch it tonight. However, I hope that the writers take advantage of their scenario to move it back to the more organic, character-driven storyline we saw in the first season.

    Mr. Obscura: The Cylons said they found the planet completely by chance, because of the nuclear detonation. They had no reason to lie about it at that point. It pretty much eliminates C-Sharon as a culprit.

23. Comment by Jared —
    March 13, 2006 @ 3:58 pm

    Derek-

    Re: C-Sharon and the discovery of the planet: we don’t know where she is at this point. I’d guess the logical place would be still in the Galactica brig, so if she’s in cahoots with the other Cylons, they’d want to keep that secret. (That is, in case any human on the planet still has contact with the fleet.)

24. Comment by Derek Copold —
    March 13, 2006 @ 5:16 pm

    To buy into this at this point, we have believe a number of things:

    1. The Galactica allowed Sharon to tamper with the Raptors.

    2. Gaeta and the other techs did not check her work–even though she’s under all sorts of security checks.

    3. All the Galactica people missed these tamperings when they went over the Raptor’s logs after it got back. That, unlike us, they wouldn’t be suspicious of C-Sharon setting up the planet.

    4. C-Sharon has some secret as yet undisclosed means of communicating FTL with the other cylons.

    5. The cylons have been on top of this despite having some change of heart.

    This is a little too much to buy into, particularly point #3.

25. Comment by Camera (aka Mrs.) Obscura —
    March 13, 2006 @ 6:40 pm

    Meh. Not feh, but meh.

    While I will not go so far as to make book on a Dallas-style ”it was a dream” plot-twist when we start back up, I will say I won’t be surprised if it happens. Nor angry. Just a little disgusted that they’ve wasted my time. I spent the first five minutes of ”380 days later” waiting for Baltar to wake up.

    The Adama-and-Roslyn as All-Father-and-Mother-to-the-fleet schtick is getting saccarine. I liked it better when they were tossing each other in the brig (or some equivalent). Even the Greeks and Norse knew that having the gods fighting made for better entertainment.

    Hubs has already stated most of my other thoughts. We have time to chew this over together pretty well before we can wrest the computer away from the children.

26. Comment by Mr. Obscura —
    March 13, 2006 @ 6:52 pm

    Derek: You win. Finding this new, habitable planet was a complete accident. By some random chance the error in coordinates put the Raptor into exactly the right place to find the planet. In that case, I like the plot a whole lot less than I did when I thought Helo-Boomer (not in general usage, but how I keep them straight) set the fleet up. See my reference upthread about deus ex machina. I had enough trouble with the whole ”Cylons decided to quit” device; I can’t swallow two zillion-to-one random chance occurences in one long episode. I therefore change my opinion from ”the humans are too stupid to survive” to ”the writers are clueless hacks”.

27. Comment by Derek Copold —
    March 13, 2006 @ 11:59 pm

    Improbable coincidence is important to any drama. Still, I can understand your objections, as the writers have been abusing it so much in this past half-season. I’m not sure what’s driving the writers. They’re certainly talented and can write some decent dialogue. Someone at the top (Moore) is making some sloppy decisions and calling it ”being risky.”

28. Comment by Mr. Obscura —
    March 14, 2006 @ 8:35 am

    I agree. There’s a fine line between ”willing suspension of disbelief” and ”you’ve got to be kidding me”. The BSG crew has been on the wrong side of the line far too often this year. Fans (like me) try to make plausible reasons for these howlers because we like the show and want it to be something more than Stargate BSG. I suspect the production staff laughs all the way to the bank.

29. Comment by Bruce Baugh —
    March 15, 2006 @ 10:02 am

    I loved it. But then I find that the older I get, and the more tired I get of clashes with a certain kind of fan over on my turf (roleplaying game creation), the less I actually care how much is planned and how much is made up as they go. I’m enjoying the ride. When I saw the episodes that there was much complaint about, I could see what folks were bugged by but didn’t really feel it myself – I enjoyed the zooming-in looks at different parts of the situation, and I had a feeling that something would come up to change the status quo in a big way. It has. I’m satisfied, and very much looking forward to what comes next. All that an unsatisfactory-to-me resolution could do is be a resolution I don’t prefer; it won’t dim the fun I’m having at the moment.

    Oh, and there’s no FTL involved in bringing Cylons to New Caprica. They picked up the signature of the bomb a year after it exploded, a light-year away.

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