# The new Battlestar



## Krug (Dec 4, 2003)

http://www.wired.com/news/games/0,2101,61436,00.html


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## Mercule (Dec 4, 2003)

*sigh*

Okay, this review has finally gotten to me.  I'm not longer psyched to see it.  I'll still watch, but my expectations are pretty low.


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## Mallus (Dec 4, 2003)

I can't wait to see it. It sounds like a glorious trainwreck, which is probably my favorite sub-genre of art.

The time-honored fear-of-technology cliche served up with glow-y sex robots, space battles, and Edward James Olmos? I fail to see why some folks fail to see the appeal of this...


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## Ranger REG (Dec 5, 2003)

They don't. They were raised on _Jerry Springer._ Only the most refined and cultured genre fans appreciate the talents of Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell.

P.S. countering your sarcasm with sincerity.


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## jasper (Dec 5, 2003)

saw the preview show tuesday or monday night. It looks to have better writing and less cardboard characters.  It was nice to see Richard whine "how dare they put flaws in my character" etc. And then he says it a 3 generation of fan loving it. yea him, his kids, and that special grand kid of his. 
Hope they do have better writing and acting than the original.


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## nharwell (Dec 5, 2003)

What's fascinating to me is that the Wired News review is so positive, and yet totally convinces me that I would not like this show. I'm afraid special effects and oversexed characters simply aren't enough to get me to watch ... I've got many better shows to "waste" my time on.


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## Hand of Evil (Dec 5, 2003)

I will watch it, at least the first show but so far I am rather disappointed by what they have done.  Then again, I am not the demographic they are hoping to pull in with this version.


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## Ranger REG (Dec 6, 2003)

What demographic do you represent?


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 6, 2003)

I'll watch it, but I'll be looking at it as though its a completely different show. It won't be the BSG I remember from when I was a kid, but that's alright. If its good I'll watch the series (assuming there is one). If it sucks, I won't, but I will give it a chance.


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## Aaron L (Dec 6, 2003)

I think that I'll watch a Farscape episode or two on DVD when this is on, just out of spite!


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 6, 2003)

Aaron L said:
			
		

> I think that I'll watch a Farscape episode or two on DVD when this is on, just out of spite!




OK, but if you don't watch it you won't have any ammo when Wednesday rolls around, the miniseries is over, and you want to go around posting about how bad it sucked.


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## Aaron L (Dec 6, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> OK, but if you don't watch it you won't have any ammo when Wednesday rolls around, the miniseries is over, and you want to go around posting about how bad it sucked.





I'll let others assume that priviledge


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## Heretic Apostate (Dec 6, 2003)

So could anyone who actually has the Sci-Fi channel please record it for me?  I want to be able to join in the whole mocking phase!


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## fusangite (Dec 6, 2003)

Is this version also going to be a Mormon show? Will there still be Mormon producer and various allusions to the quorum and other Mormon institutions? If so, I'll be more inclined to watch it.


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## Ranger REG (Dec 6, 2003)

Either that is a joke or something that I cannot answer. Does it have to be ... err, Mormon-influenced?


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## Azlan (Dec 7, 2003)

Hmm... I happened upon an episode of the original Battlestar Galactica, on the Sci-Fi Channel, the other day ago. You know, the original Battlestar Galactica was not all _that_ great to begin with. So, really, this new series doesn't have all that far to fall from.

When I was a teenager, I thought the original Battlestar Galactica was awesome. Now, decades later, it seems vapid and insipid to me. (But, then, most television sci-fi seems that way to me, nowadays.)


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## jdavis (Dec 7, 2003)

nharwell said:
			
		

> What's fascinating to me is that the Wired News review is so positive, and yet totally convinces me that I would not like this show. I'm afraid special effects and oversexed characters simply aren't enough to get me to watch ... I've got many better shows to "waste" my time on.



 You should read the Ain't it Cool News review, they hated it. Of course they seem to hate everything. I'm going to give it a chance, it doesn't really deserve one but I'm going to go into it with as few preconcieved notions as I can and watch it for what it is. The one think that really bothers me is that everything I have read or seen on the show so far makes the producers seem very arrogant about this show, that just sort of bugs me.

AiCN review:
http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=16490


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## Black Omega (Dec 8, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> OK, but if you don't watch it you won't have any ammo when Wednesday rolls around, the miniseries is over, and you want to go around posting about how bad it sucked.



Why would not watching it stop some people from saying it sucked?


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 8, 2003)

Black Omega said:
			
		

> Why would not watching it stop some people from saying it sucked?




I don't really have to answer that, do I?  



			
				Jdavis said:
			
		

> You should read the Ain't it Cool News review, they hated it. Of course they seem to hate everything.




Yeah, everything's cool to them until theuy've pumped everyone's expectations up for several months or years. At that time it doesn't really matter what the final movie/show is like, it will still be a let down after all the hype. They should rename the website _Aint it teh Suck!_


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## Ankh-Morpork Guard (Dec 8, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> I'm going to give it a chance, it doesn't really deserve one..




...you know, in all truthfullness, while I LOVE the original and such...it doesn't deserve a chance either.


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## Olive (Dec 8, 2003)

Ranger REG said:
			
		

> Either that is a joke or something that I cannot answer. Does it have to be ... err, Mormon-influenced?




The original show was filled with religious references to do with lost tribes etc. I thought it was Seventh Day Adventists myself, but it could have been Mormons.
I just did a google on Battlestar Galactica +mormon and got heaps of info.


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## William Ronald (Dec 8, 2003)

Olive said:
			
		

> The original show was filled with religious references to do with lost tribes etc. I thought it was Seventh Day Adventists myself, but it could have been Mormons.
> I just did a google on Battlestar Galactica +mormon and got heaps of info.




Olive, as I recall Glen A. Larson, the producer of the original series, was a Mormon.  The original series had some Biblical references, but I am not familiar enough with Mormonism to comment on any specific references.

Unfortunately, I do not have cable so I do not know whether to be glad that I am missing this or not.  (Ironically, I don't have time for a miniseries this week.)


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## trancejeremy (Dec 8, 2003)

Hmmm. I always thought it was more something of a copy of "Chariots of the Gods" which was sort of popular back then.

You know, the Pyramids were built by aliens. 

The show sort of had an Egyptian theme to it. 

(Not unlike Stargate, actually)


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## jdavis (Dec 8, 2003)

Ankh-Morpork Guard said:
			
		

> ...you know, in all truthfullness, while I LOVE the original and such...it doesn't deserve a chance either.



In the 70's it was really something else, but it didn't really hold up to the test of time that well. (sort of like the Ford Pinto and my lower back  )

As far as the new one goes I'm just getting tired of all the quotes I see from the producers where they basically say "_were making all sci fi better here and if you don't get it that's your fault_." That may not be what they are meaning to say but that's the way the quotes are sounding, they seem to be very defensive to the criticism they are getting and come accross as very arrogant in interviews (and to some extents even in the Lowdown special). They had to expect some flack with all the changes they made and lets face it in general remakes normally have a big hill to get over with the original audience. They would of been better served if they had changed the character names, changed some of the ship designs and called it something else. It will get lots of flack just because it's called Battlestar Galactica, the core fans of the show have a preconcieved notion of what the show was and should be that they will have to overcome. Were they suprised with all the flack they got for the changes they made? Sci Fi fans are a fickle and unforgiving bunch (just ask George Lucas  ).


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 8, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> As far as the new one goes I'm just getting tired of all the quotes I see from the producers where they basically say "_were making all sci fi better here and if you don't get it that's your fault_." That may not be what they are meaning to say but that's the way the quotes are sounding....




I think they knew that they were going to alienate a good number of the fans, and I don't think they care so much. As far as I'm concerned there are two ways that a franchise can go. You can start making it for the fans, or you can keep the control in some other place. In BSGs case, I think the control is spread out a mile wide and two inches deep, but they are insisting that that's where the control is. The producers aren't as interested in making the TOS fans happy as they are in drawing new viewers into the fold. With this miniseries, they're targetting the B5 fans, the Farscape fans, yes the Star Wars fans, and then the fans of the other minor space operas like Andromeda, etc. They're baiting the hook with a known brand name (Battlestar Galactica), and the promise that this is going to be some really kick butt, action packed science fiction. They're definitely more interested in making money that satisfying the few die-hard loyal fans that are out there

Now, I really don't see that as all that bad, to be honest. The fact is that if you made a series (mini-series, movie, whatever) designed to appeal only to the loyal fans of the original, it would be a ratings flop. In order for this to succeed, it has to find a new audience, and that involves changing some things. Did they change too many things? Possibly, but I'm still willing to give it a chance, Ultimately it all comes down to business, and this is the business of entertainment in the 21st century. Love it or leave it (hmm, why is it that I don't watch much TV anymore???)


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## Brown Jenkin (Dec 8, 2003)

The thing that struck me most in the Lowdown show was when the writers(?) stated that they had no problems changing everything around. Their rationalization was that the important thing was in the concepts, not in the details. They then went on to compare this to Shakespeare saying that the Bards works have be changed and reinterpreted over and over and that they had seen some wonderful reinterpretations of his material. 

While I feel that they have something of a point I disagree with it too. Yes there have been many good interpretations of Shakespeare but this is not the same thing. This is changing such things as the sex of Ophilia or making MacBeth English. When these kinds of details are changed it often confuses or alienates viewers. Sure you can keep the concepts but change things radically but then you normally rename the play/movie as well. West Side Story is a great reinterpretation of Romeo and Juliet but it would not have been nearly as well recieved if they hadn't changed the name(s). How many of these radical reinterpretations but keeping the name have worked? (And no I didn't like Romeo + Juliet with Leonardo).


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## Ranger REG (Dec 9, 2003)

I admit I am an unforgiving _Trek_ fan since Braga keep producing less-than-impressive episodes. Then again, the _Trek_ franchise have been the longest running entertainment venture with 400-plus episodes/stories and at least 10 films, so the chances that you'll revisit a story already told in an original format is higher than trying to make a completely original story.

Of course, when our criticism grow, Braga at one point defended his works and accused us of being "continuity pornographer."

At least Ron D. Moore was upfront and honest when he says he is doing a re-imagination of _BSG,_ not a continuation nor a re-telling of the original (with just updating the props and stage elements more appealing to today's audience).

Any _BSG_ fans, devoted or not, should at least give the series a chance before criticizing it, already knowing it is a re-imagined story. After all, even a _Trek_ critic like me have to do the homework (the one painful hour every week just to re-iterate Braga's sub-par leadership).

The same goes for the Tolkien fans, regarding Peter Jackson's adaptation of _LOTR._


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 9, 2003)

Brown Jenkin said:
			
		

> They then went on to compare this to Shakespeare saying that the Bards works have be changed and reinterpreted over and over and that they had seen some wonderful reinterpretations of his material.




Actually I think that what they were saying is that Shakespeare himself would re-interpret other stories of the time or even make changes to history on his historical plays. In many cases when he took existing plays by other playwrites and changed them, his version became the "definitive" versions.


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## LightPhoenix (Dec 9, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> I think they knew that they were going to alienate a good number of the fans, and I don't think they care so much. As far as I'm concerned there are two ways that a franchise can go. You can start making it for the fans, or you can keep the control in some other place.
> 
> Now, I really don't see that as all that bad, to be honest. The fact is that if you made a series (mini-series, movie, whatever) designed to appeal only to the loyal fans of the original, it would be a ratings flop. In order for this to succeed, it has to find a new audience, and that involves changing some things. Did they change too many things? Possibly, but I'm still willing to give it a chance, Ultimately it all comes down to business, and this is the business of entertainment in the 21st century. Love it or leave it (hmm, why is it that I don't watch much TV anymore???)



Man, I think I agree with you 100%.

Sci-Fi fans also tend to believe that they are the center of the entertainment world, and the fact is that they're a _very_ small minority.  For all that Star Wars is a cultural phenomena and LotR is kicking butt in the box office right now, the number of people that have watched even _Star Trek_ is abysmally low in comparison.  The fact is (unfortunately) that sci-fi shows cost a lot to make, and need good numbers to make back money spent on the show.  The original BSG _probably_ would not have brought in those numbers.

Do I think they changed too much?  Yeah, I do.  Do I have high hopes?  No, I don't.  I like Ron Moore's work a lot (especially on _Carnivale_), but fembots?  Come on.  I agree with a lot of what he's said in interviews, but I don't think you need to make the Cylons look human to make them seem human.

Then there's another point no one's mentioned here (and I apologize if you did and I missed it).  Moore's probably working with an extremely small budget - hence human-looking Cylons.  SFC has been known to "request" changes to appeal to the rapidly shrinking male 18-35 audience.  And as someone _did_ mention above, there's too many fingers in the pie.  So blaming this on Moore or the writers may be pointing the finger at the wrong place.  Maybe they thought they were going to have the opportunity to make the show they wanted to make, and it got lost in the shuffle.


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## jdavis (Dec 9, 2003)

I think you are drawing too close of a line between Battlestar Galactica fans and Sci Fi fans here, I mean lets face it Galactica started as a Star Wars rip off, it's not all that different a beast from Sci Fi in general, matter of fact it is space opera science fiction. They aren't trying to broaden their audience from the Galactica fanatics they are trying to pull in the 18-35 male demographic by using a Victoria Secrets underware model as a Cylon. I mean do you really think there is all that much difference between somebody who likes Galactica and somebody who likes Babalon 5? The only reason to call it Battlestar Galactica is to get publicity from the name, then you turn around and upset the people that the name recognition would draw in. I really think they would of done much better if they had just called it something different instead of playing off that name. I'm not going to call it good or bad (at least not in the next 15 minutes here, It's about to start) but I was just pointing out the name may bite them in the ass.

One thing I will call stupid right off was the decision to air this show on a Monday night. Good grief your going up against Monday Night Football and WWE Raw for a piece of the 18-35 male demographic? They have cut their own throats with the scheduling here for that demographic.


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## Aaron L (Dec 9, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> They have cut their own throats with the scheduling here for that demographic.




I don't think anyone has ever accused the Sci-Fi channel executives of being geniuses.


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## LightPhoenix (Dec 9, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> One thing I will call stupid right off was the decision to air this show on a Monday night. Good grief your going up against Monday Night Football and WWE Raw for a piece of the 18-35 male demographic? They have cut their own throats with the scheduling here for that demographic.



Well, I'll be the first to argue SFC's programmers don't know what they're doing.

That said, now that it _has_ been shown, I didn't think it was terrible at all.  The parts with #6 were a bit extraneous I think, but it made sense why she looks human (infiltration).  I'm not really sure how she was supposed to have access to the defense network... you think that'd be pretty high security.  

In fact, the only part I really minded was Starbuck - not that she was female, but that the actress didn't really convince me to her being the character of Starbuck.  She just didn't seem the part.


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## Silver Moon (Dec 9, 2003)

LightPhoenix said:
			
		

> I didn't think it was terrible at all.



Well you did better than me.  I didn't make it beyond the first commercial break.  There's just something about innocent babies getting murdered that I don't find all that entertaining.   

(Just my opinion, please don't read the above as an invitation for a flame war.  I'm sure there are lots of people who enjoyed the show.)


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## jhallum (Dec 9, 2003)

Silver Moon said:
			
		

> Well you did better than me.  I didn't make it beyond the first commercial break.  There's just something about innocent babies getting murdered that I don't find all that entertaining.
> 
> (Just my opinion, please don't read the above as an invitation for a flame war.  I'm sure there are lots of people who enjoyed the show.)



Yeah, I hung through that part.  I thought once you got past that, it was decent.  There wasn't much character development, but it did an adequate job of plotting and keeping things interesting once you got past the gratuitous sex scenes *blech*.  

Still not sure what to make of the camera movements during the space battle scenes.  The camera effects of "locking on" to a space borne target were a bit odd.  

Still, I'll watch tomorrow night.  I'd give the first part a 6/10.


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## Psion (Dec 9, 2003)

> In BSGs case, I think the control is spread out a mile wide and two inches deep, but they are insisting that that's where the control is. The producers aren't as interested in making the TOS fans happy as they are in drawing new viewers into the fold. With this miniseries, they're targetting the B5 fans, the Farscape fans, yes the Star Wars fans, and then the fans of the other minor space operas like Andromeda, etc.




Yet (from tonight's viewing) they deliver something that seems more suited to Independance Day, Deep Impact, and Terminator fans.

The cylon ships and the new (soldier, not "hot babe") cylons are cool, but from a plot standpoint, I found it very tiresome and all too familiar.

It just occurs to me that a lot of the cinematography and graphics are reminiscent of Andromeda... the cylon ship shapes, the drop-out missiles, the "missiles eye view" shots...


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## Psion (Dec 9, 2003)

Silver Moon said:
			
		

> Well you did better than me.  I didn't make it beyond the first commercial break.  There's just something about innocent babies getting murdered that I don't find all that entertaining.




That turned me off too. I saw it as totally unnecessary. I'm guessing that they are trying to show how heartless she is and we will continue to see her incarnations though the series, and either they are setting up a redemption scene or a warning not to trust.


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## jdavis (Dec 9, 2003)

Well where to start at. (note these are only my personal opinions, I'm not a doctor nor do I play one on TV.) 

Warning: Spoilers ahead.

1. The first 5 minutes of the show were pure crap. Lusty Cylons are just goofy, and why did the Cylons even stop there to start with? Just shoot the thing as you fly by, why do we need a scene with a Cylon french kissing a old guy for no apparent reason?

2. I hated everything about the Cylons except for the two CGI ones in the above mentioned first scene. And by everything I mean every stinking little detail about them, I especially hated when she told Baltar that she couldn't die, that she would just wake up in a new body somewhere else. Maybe they will do better with the cylons tomorrow night.

3. Some of those actors just were not very good actors. Some of them might not of had decent parts to work with but some of them just were not that believable. I liked Adama and I liked Baltar and...... well none of the rest of them really stood out at all.

4. Set design sucked for the most part, I did like Caprica, I liked Baltar's house too. I liked the vipers (old and new ones) and I liked the ship that took the soon to be President to the Galactica. I didn't care for the Galactica inside or out though and that was the main set for most of the show.

5. Wardrobe stunk, It really wasn't memorable at all and it didn't look all that official or military either. Civilian wardrobes were ok if a little uninspired, they just didn't stand out as anything special. Apparently they felt the need to dress Cylon 6 as a hooker. 

6. The CGI work wasn't all that impressive and I hated their way of filming the space battles, what little footage of space battles there actually was. I understood the point they were trying to make but sometimes *cool looking *is more important than *Realistic *in space fighter combat. The fight scenes looked uninspired an unremarkable as a whole, even as bad as the original shows effects look today, they were cutting edge and exciting back then, heck they don't even look that bad compared to the effects in the new show. They never showed any of the rest of the fleet getting attacked, heck they never showed any of the fleet at all. They never showed the planets getting attacked either, just far off scenes of atomic bombs going off (I did like the one effect when Baltar was watching the reporter get blown away on his TV.) Maybe this is something they will do better on tomorrow night too, but so far I'm less than impressed by their "cutting edge CGI" (their words not mine).

7. I didn't like the "*Computers=Bad*" storyline either. Yes man's overeliance on computers will one day lead to his downfall, I've seen the Terminator movies and the Matrix movies please stop preaching to me about the evils of technology. I mean really they navigate space and control huge space fortresses but they can't have cordless phones? They sent messages with something that looked like a old form feed printer and a teletype machine. They created a sentient AI system and fully moble robots, but they can't shield a onboard ship network cable. Man if the cylons had had more than two fighters this would of really been a disaster. The "smartest man in the colonies" Baltar had to have help with a computer program, yet over 50 years ago they managed to build indepenant thinking robots that have the ability to send their full programming and AI light years away to new bodies if they are destroyed? Maybe I should log off the internet here before my reliance on technology destroys the world  I mean really is that the best they could come up with?

8. By this point your probably thinking I hated it but over all it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be and I did see a couple of glimmers of hope in there. A lot of the problems I am faulting it for can be attributed to a low budget and with the exception of how moronic the _evil computers_ storyline was the rest of it was watchable. Ok I take that back I still hate the cylons and how they took really cool genocidal robot troopers and turned them into baby killing oversexed Victoria Secrets models from outerspace (I changed the channel when I realized she was going to kill the baby, that's just not something that I want to see). The old cylons were robotic soldiers broken down into a strict cast system, singleminded and unfeeling, they never once tongue kissed a Colonial officer. 

So to sum it up they hooked me enough that I will watch part 2 but not enough that I would watch a series based on what I have seen so far. I will give credit for it being better than I thought it would be going in (which wasn't hard to do as low as my expectations were set) but it still was a mess. I'll give them a second chance to wow me and hope they were saving all this cool stuff for part 2 but so far I am not all that impressed.

Edit: I forgot one.
9. Where did all the laser guns go off to?.......


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## Psion (Dec 9, 2003)

> So to sum it up they hooked me enough that I will watch part 2 but not enough that I would watch a series based on what I have seen so far. I will give credit for being better than I thought it would be going in but it still was a mess.




Glad to see I'm not the only one, jdavis. On NKL, they seem to be wetting themselves over this...


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## 2d6 (Dec 9, 2003)

Random thoughts.......

I went in with no preconceptions, I thought it was OK. The creators could have mauled it far more then they did.

I agree about about the whole computers=bad thing, they are even worse with nukes! it is a sad, tired, little theme. 

I thought the pace was kinda slow, I imagine a potential series is the reason for that, it really does strike me as a supersized pilot. 

The woman didn;t bother me that much, I can see the part she plyed in tonights portion. The whole she can't die thing kinda bugs me though.


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## LrdApoc (Dec 9, 2003)

If there was one thing I guess I came away from it feeling it was a lack of empathy for the humans and no clear understanding of the cylon plan. Possibly the latter is intentional, but I could care less about these petty, bickering people.. Adama and Apollo fighting.. no sense of hope or family.. no struggle to survive a holocost while maintaining the integrity of the human race.. none of these elements.. which I think are the core of Galactica.. were in the first part.

I didn't think we needed any of the sex scenes.. they were extraneous.. especially the Boomer and Chief one..

Something I noticed and commented on to my wife.. while they reimagined many of the people they eliminated a lot of the multi-cultural aspects of the original.. in this show Colonel Tith is an alcoholic drunk white guy, Adama is latino with a white son, Boomer is an asian female.. I am all for diversity.. but the original Galactica had strong female characters, strong minority characters and while not perfect in any sense had an underlying message of hope and the indomnable determination of the human spirit int he face of overwhelming defeat by an alien enemy..

This on just seems like a rehash of Terminator without the time travel.

Had it been a new series I might have given it a chance, but to hang it on the coat talils of Galactica and call it a resurrection of the series is rediculous.. aside from the vipers, battlestar and the old props they set in the museum for fans of the original there is very little here that will draw me back for a weekly.

Like all relaunches, when this one fails the suits in charge will issue a statement to the fans, you know the people they set out to piss off, saying that in fact no one wanted Galactica to come back because of the poor ratings.. when in fact all they wanted was a new set of stories in a familiar world they glimpsed for one short season way back in the late 70s.

Joss Whedon should have called Firefly Battlestar Serenity if it would have gotten an intelligent and interesting show like that on the air at Sci-Fi.. lord knows I would have watched that with no qualms.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mal: "Jane, those damned space toasters are attacking again..prep the Vipers for launch!"

Jane: "What the hell are you talkin about captain.. I'll be in my bunk" (Jane walks off the bridge.)


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## Skade (Dec 9, 2003)

#6 is a Victoria's Secret model?  The only thing I liked about her look was the vaguely unnatural palor of her skin and the platinum blonde hair.  She, as she said, did not quite add up in the usual way.  I didn't like the outfits she wore after initially arriving in Capria, they were unnecessarily revealing, and no sexier than the red outfit she wore at the beginning.  We don't know yet if the majority of Cylons now look like humans, but she did indicate that the original models still existed and had their purposes.  I think, from the surprise at pilotless fighters, that the Cylons have spent a great deal of effort in specializing their forms for this conflict.  So while there are certainly a number of these infiltration (Victoria's Secret) models, there will hopefully be many more.

I'm probably alone in this, but I did not really get that she actually meant to kill the baby.  She voiced curiosity at how the neck could support the weight, and then simply tested the thought.  Once realizing she had killed she walked away quickly, obviously to avoid a scene, but the expression was strangely pained.  I say strangely because the actress may not be good enough to fully express that emotion, but it was not one of satisfaction certainly.  

As to her gaining access to the defense systems?  She chose Baltar not only for his access but also for his libidinous weaknesses and extremely craving ego.  She offered him sex, and intelligence and a means of promoting himself more than he already had.  He was more than willing to share his security clearance for all that, I would wager.

I liked Starbuck.  She is not the original character, rather like most of these characters, a deeply flawed angry individual whose only release is in the one thing she does well - fly a viper.  

I could bear the Galactica's technological level, created as it was in a time when humanity was quite willing to go too far to preserve itself.  The phones and the message system was a little extreme, but otherwise an acceptable plot device. 

Was the theme of man's indomitable spirit lost?  Maybe.  This 2 hour episode accounted for what, 20 minutes of the original pilot?  Let's wait and see what develops.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 9, 2003)

Well here we go.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 1. The first 5 minutes of the show were pure crap. Lusty Cylons are just goofy, and why did the Cylons even stop there to start with? Just shoot the thing as you fly by, why do we need a scene with a Cylon french kissing a old guy for no apparent reason?




No argument. The cylons had no reason to go onto the station. The new terminator style cylons are way cool and I hope we see more of them if this goes to series.



> 2. I hated everything about the Cylons except for the two CGI ones in the above mentioned first scene. And by everything I mean every stinking little detail about them, I especially hated when she told Baltar that she couldn't die, that she would just wake up in a new body somewhere else. Maybe they will do better with the cylons tomorrow night.




I have a feeling that this will come into play in part 2. That was pure exposition. #6 was a human infiltrator and was designed with the necessary attributes to get the job done.



> 3. Some of those actors just were not very good actors. Some of them might not of had decent parts to work with but some of them just were not that believable. I liked Adama and I liked Baltar and...... well none of the rest of them really stood out at all.




I actually think they did a good job of portraying military personnel. They aren't expected to show a lot of emotion. The military is all about suppressing emotional responses and getting the job done. I think they pulled this off pretty well and I felt that the characters that mattered showed just enough humanity to keep me interested.



> 4. Set design sucked for the most part, I did like Caprica, I liked Baltar's house too. I liked the vipers (old and new ones) and I liked the ship that took the soon to be President to the Galactica. I didn't care for the Galactica inside or out though and that was the main set for most of the show.




Again, I don't share this view. I thought the set designs were excellent. They reminded me of the original, but a little less relaxed, more like a military vessel should be. No arguments here.



> 5. Wardrobe stunk, It really wasn't memorable at all and it didn't look all that official or military either. Civilian wardrobes were ok if a little uninspired, they just didn't stand out as anything special. Apparently they felt the need to dress Cylon 6 as a hooker.




The military uniforms were kind of blah. I would have prefered the ones from the original show, but oh well. I can live with it. #6 was supposed to look like this.



> 6. The CGI work wasn't all that impressive and I hated their way of filming the space battles, what little footage of space battles there actually was. ... Maybe this is something they will do better on tomorrow night too, but so far I'm less than impressed by their "cutting edge CGI" (their words not mine).




I actually liked it. It was a new way of showing a space battle. Actually not entirely new. It wasn't too much different than Wing Commander. Still I thought it was a refreshing change from the typical laser beams. Seeing shrapnel flying through someone's leg and watching decompression is a detail that most scifi shows leave out entirely.



> 7. I didn't like the "*Computers=Bad*" storyline either. Yes man's overeliance on computers will one day lead to his downfall, I've seen the Terminator movies and the Matrix movies please stop preaching to me about the evils of technology. ...The "smartest man in the colonies" Baltar had to have help with a computer program, yet over 50 years ago they managed to build indepenant thinking robots that have the ability to send their full programming and AI light years away to new bodies if they are destroyed?




The computers = bad storyline is straight from the original. That's one of the conceits you have to make it you're going to enjoy the show. As for the cylon waking up elsewhere after death, we don't know how it all works or how their tech works. It could have been an analogy that the last saved version of the cylon's consciousness wakes up elsewhere. She did make a hasty exit from Baltar before they started nuking, so its possible that she uploaded her personality at that time.



> Ok I take that back I still hate the cylons and how they took really cool genocidal robot troopers and turned them into baby killing oversexed Victoria Secrets models from outerspace (I changed the channel when I realized she was going to kill the baby, that's just not something that I want to see).




As a writer in the gaming industry and someone who is working on starting a fiction writing career as well, one of the things I swore not to do was bring children into it - at least not in the context that they did in the show. I agree that this was completely uncalled for. Completely! I understand what they were trying to accomplish with it, but that still doesn't make it any more acceptable. So far this is the one point that I fault the writers for. Obviously after the bombing starts all kinds of babies die, but the murder of a helpless infant is not something I want to see, read about, whatever. Period.



> Edit: I forgot one.
> 9. Where did all the laser guns go off to?.......




Yeah, I hear you on this one. Although like I said earlier, I think it comes off OK without them. Did you see what that handgun did to the guy who jumped on the wing of the ship as it was taking off? It didn't just punch a hole in him, it ripped him in half.

Finally, the one thing that was particularly poigniant was the same scene I just mentioned where the officer agreed to stay behind in order for Baltar to escape. He sacrificed himself for the traitor that sold out humanity. I didn't think much of hi character until that point, but that was good.

Anyway, I'm willing to give part 2 a shot and the series as well. I think it has a lot of potential and overall, I liked the look and feel of the show.


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## jester47 (Dec 9, 2003)

For the last week I have been catching a few of the original series.  

And overall, I think this one is a pretty darned good scifi flick and that they have preserved the things that make it BSG.  

Some things I noticed:

The facial expressions of the new Starbuck and the old one are almost right on.  She did her homework on that bit.  

As for the Cylons-  I like the idea of the human looking cylons.  Only because Baltar in the original series was assisted by Lucifer, a cylon that looked more human than the others.  As she said there are only 12 of her, so thats not so bad.  Also, in the original series Baltar really had no reason for going traitor, here he does.  Lust and ego.  

I like how they did the space fights.  The fact that they used more spacelike physics was very cool.  I like the shakey camera technique.  I also like how they did the fire on the deck.  A bit of realism is pretty good.  I noticed some serious similarities between the fights in this and in Space: Above and Beyond.  I also like how the nukes give off EMPs.  

As for the baby... I don't know.  I think that she crushed the trechea.  But in truth she is not someone to be trifled with and I think this showed it.  

As for the machine paranoia- I think it fits better tha the original plot.  It gives the cylons reason to be going after humanity.  What is their motivation in the original?  I like how they made the Galactica an older ship about to be mothballed.  I like how the reason it does not get taken out is because it is not networked and everything is wired (that is no "cell" style tech aboard).  It gives it a very good reason for it being the last battlestar and the machine infiltration gives good reason for everything else being blown apart.  

The uniforms looked like uniforms to me.  I for one am glad we did not get the quasi-futuristic clothing in this one.  Nomral people are wearing normal cloths!  Go figure!  

Now, about the realism.  My roomate (male) is not one to watch Science Fiction movies.  However, this quickly captured him and my other roommate (female) into watching it.  These are people that ignore star trek when its on, and would not be considered Sci Fi fans.  What attracted them to it (they kept saying it over and over) was the realism and believability.  Also the comment from one (female) about the cloths was "that they didn't look stupid like the stuff the aliens all wear in star trek."

Doing a side by side comparison with the original, I think that this one is darned good.  Also what I like is the fact that they have not thrown out the baby with the bathwater- the "toaster" cylons are still in existence along with the CGI and human ones (if you looked at the papers the officer was looking at you saw the original cylon design).  I like how they gave a reason to use older vipers.  As for the change of the Cylon ships it just makes sense.  If your ships are machines piloted by machines why have the redundancy?  It seems to me that machines would just make the fighters cylons too.  

It seems to me that they sort of looked at the original series andasked questions and then attempted to answer those questions.  Their design was then based on these answers.  

I like thier use of Nukes.

Aaron.


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## tecnowraith (Dec 9, 2003)

Ok I have to jump in on this thread. I just finished watching part and very disapponeted. I agree to alost of disagreements and for the cylons, they screwed up the history from the original which I am the most upset about. In the original, the cylons were made by an alien race to perseve their society and the reason the war was that Humans were the invaders of the Cylons galaxy. Think of the Cylons being native americans and the humans were soliders wanting land. The cool thing about the orinigal Cylons was the mystery of where they come from why they wage war against them. That mystery is now gone and sorely missed.

Thes mess up the design of the new Galaitica on howthe Vipers were suppose to leave the hanger. In the orinigal, the Vipers left the hanger from the end part, not from the sides of the new one.

Camera view was way to shaky for my part, was getting too dizzy and missing alot of the scene.

Baltar is way too much of a coward and how are they gonna have him join the cylons? Take him prison and make part of the Cylons empire by force? I hope not.

The president character has no place for the story, from what I saw.

Had to get this out of my system, by giggest gripe was the Cylon plot and history.


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## Tauric (Dec 9, 2003)

I agree with Skade, I thought the baby killing was an unintentional result of the Cylon not understanding infant physiology.  I still don't like #6, though.

I really liked the space battle scenes, because the sound effects are muted, which is the closest I'm gonna get to my dream of no sound in space scenes (other than theme music).  And the directional jets controlling the movement of the Vipers was very satisfying.  I've never really liked shows that featured acrobatic vehicles but didn't explain how they move.  That was one of the things I liked about B5 and Starship Troopers.

The sex scenes were unnecessary, and worse, uninteresting.



			
				LrdApoc said:
			
		

> If there was one thing I guess I came away from it feeling it was a lack of empathy for the humans and no clear understanding of the cylon plan. Possibly the latter is intentional, but I could care less about these petty, bickering people.. Adama and Apollo fighting.. no sense of hope or family.. no struggle to survive a holocost while maintaining the integrity of the human race.. none of these elements.. which I think are the core of Galactica.. were in the first part.
> 
> 
> Something I noticed and commented on to my wife.. while they reimagined many of the people they eliminated a lot of the multi-cultural aspects of the original.. in this show Colonel Tith is an alcoholic drunk white guy, Adama is latino with a white son, Boomer is an asian female.. I am all for diversity.. but the original Galactica had strong female characters, strong minority characters and while not perfect in any sense had an underlying message of hope and the indomnable determination of the human spirit int he face of overwhelming defeat by an alien enemy..




Apollo does have a sense of family:  he blames his father for his brother's death.  Not a good sense of family, but it is there.

I think Adama does have hope, which is why he's figthing, to let his ship, and the remainder of the fleet, survive the holocaust.  Just because he questions the humanity's worth doesn't mean he won't try to improve on his nature.  His guilt over his sons will drive him to preserve what he can of humanity, and by example, make humans more noble.

Lord Apoc, I am confused about how you see diversity in BSG.  You seem to imply that Adama being Latino and Boomer being Asian are not diverse enough?  While I admit that I didn't notice many non-European skin tones aside from the two mentioned, I think that they are trying to be diverse without having a token member of each minority group.  And IIRC, weren't Col. Tigh and Boomer the only two minority leads in the OBSG?  

You also seem to imply that the new BSG doesn't have strong characters.  I ask, how do you define strength (for female characters)?  Is it the ability to perform the roles of male characters?  Well, what about the new Starbuck?  Is it the abillity to do your duty even though you are scared?  Look at Boomer, leaving her co-pilot behind.  Is it the ability to assert your authority in the face of those who doubt you?  The new President did that on several occasions.  So I just don't see how you can say this incarnation does not have strong female characters.

(I apologize if it seems I am being overly critical, Lord Apoc but of all the criticisms I've read in this thread yours confused me the most, so I wanted to respond to them.)

In general, going into the show with low expectations, I was pleasantly surprised.  If they do make a series out of it, I will watch if they give it a convenient timeslot (say, before or after Stargate), and if they don't introduce wierd robot dogs.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 9, 2003)

tecnowraith said:
			
		

> Ok I have to jump in on this thread. I just finished watching part and very disapponeted. I agree to alost of disagreements and for the cylons, they screwed up the history from the original which I am the most upset about. In the original, the cylons were made by an alien race to perseve their society and the reason the war was that Humans were the invaders of the Cylons galaxy. Think of the Cylons being native americans and the humans were soliders wanting land. The cool thing about the orinigal Cylons was the mystery of where they come from why they wage war against them. That mystery is now gone and sorely missed.




Dude, take a deep breath and repeat after me:

THIS IS NOT A REMAKE. CONTINUITY WITH THE ORIGINAL DOES NOT EXIST. THIS IS A REIMAGINED, COMPLETELY NEW SHOW.


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## Skade (Dec 9, 2003)

tecnowraith said:
			
		

> Thes mess up the design of the new Galaitica on howthe Vipers were suppose to leave the hanger. In the orinigal, the Vipers left the hanger from the end part, not from the sides of the new one.



Actually, this is mentioned I believe. The normal hangar or launch tube had been turned into a gift shop, so the one Starbuck launched from was the only one available.



			
				jester47 said:
			
		

> The facial expressions of the new Starbuck and the old one are almost right on. She did her homework on that bit.



She definitely had his cockiness, just not as much of the playfulness.  One thing I liked about her was her toughness.  Not to say that she was Arnie or anything, but at least in this role she did not come across as a sex object or a girly-girl.  She was a soldier, regardless of her sex.  Maybe not a great soldier (discipline problems seem to be a problem) but certainly not eye-candy.


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## Wycen (Dec 9, 2003)

I should have been playing our weekly game tonight, but it was cancelled.  Instead I watched stuff on CBS, RAW and about 5 scenes of Battlestar.

Meh.

Not enough space combat.

Why don't the fighter ships that were somehow disabled have ejection seats?


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## jdavis (Dec 9, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Well here we go.
> 
> 
> 
> No argument. The cylons had no reason to go onto the station. The new terminator style cylons are way cool and I hope we see more of them if this goes to series.



I loved the CGI cylons, but of course those cost money. I think when it's all said and done my biggest complaint will be the shoestring budget feel to this, I've seen better sets and CG on syndicated shows like Andromeda and Stargate. For a overhyped world premier mini-series they should of done better, I'd except shortcuts out of a series but a mini-series/pilot episode is supposed to draw you in and get your attention. Man just toss in a couple of scenes with the CG cylons, maybe even a 'Attack of the Clones" type scene where they show a whole army of them in rows, something to show they are a actual military force instead of a bunch of horney robot models.

As far as the scene goes I would of even bought it if she went in shot him then left, but to give us a thirty second close up of a French Kiss, come on (in the distance shots it looked like her other hand was between his legs, I'm glad we didn't have to watch the old guy get felt up in closeup too).



> I have a feeling that this will come into play in part 2. That was pure exposition. #6 was a human infiltrator and was designed with the necessary attributes to get the job done.



 I'm hoping that they do make some distinction between cylons in part two. I'm never going to fully buy into their cylons as I much prefer my armies of bad guys to be in the old centurion/stormtrooper type mold rather than underware spokesmodel type mold, but then their cylons haven't been fleshed out yet(ha a joke get it, "fleshed out", see she's a half nekkid model and a baby killing robot  ). 



> I actually think they did a good job of portraying military personnel. They aren't expected to show a lot of emotion. The military is all about suppressing emotional responses and getting the job done. I think they pulled this off pretty well and I felt that the characters that mattered showed just enough humanity to keep me interested.



 They are not expected to be "getting it on in a closet" either. The old show had a kind of seat of the pants fighter jockey feel to it, sort of like "Black Sheep Squadron" for the pilots and the bridge crew was all straight laced and dignified. The card scene tried to show some of this but there just wasn't enough of it, this is a area where they could improve later as they flesh some of these characters out a little bit but as it stands now I don't even know half of their names (even the ones who are supposedly from the old show, this mixing of names with fighter call signs is irritating me as they call the same person by two or sometimes three different names). Once again this is a area where a little *cool *is worth more than a lot of *realism*. Part of my problem here might also be related to the lack of decent costumes (as discussed later).



> Again, I don't share this view. I thought the set designs were excellent. They reminded me of the original, but a little less relaxed, more like a military vessel should be. No arguments here.



 I think one of my problems here was they didn't remind me of the original at all (for instance I loved the giant blast shield on the bridge). You could tell me there on a island or underground or on the moon and with most of the sets that would be believable. It was almost like there was just a door like every other door that led to the bridge, you could get lost and open the wrong door and be in a bathroom or on a hanger deck, it all was just the same dang hallway with the same dang doors. (the hinged doors didn't bother me just the fact that every room had the same door). A good example of what I'm talking about is Star Trek, when you watch a show you know where they are and to go someplace on the ship they have to actually go someplace that looks different, it gives the illusion of the ship being large and laid out into different sections, the new Galactica gave me the impression of a giant round hallway set that they just walked laps around (which is funny because that's actually what it was). Heck the bridge didn't even look like a ships bridge, it just looked like a command center of a base, It was basically round heck you couldn't even tell which way was towards the front of the ship.



> The military uniforms were kind of blah. I would have prefered the ones from the original show, but oh well. I can live with it. #6 was supposed to look like this.



 For one thing they only had one uniform, military dress, active duty, off duty it was all the same, the only uniform change they had was to put on unflattering tank tops over tee shirts. They were all grey or light blue except for the pilots uniforms, which were some kind of padded leather looking thing. They needed a little snap to them, something to make them stand out, something to make me believe these people are different, they are people who live in another galaxy with a different culture and way of life. Good grief give them some hats even just something to make them stand out a little. Another area where *cool* trumps *realistic* in a tv show. It's almost like they are trying to drown you in gritty realism, not something I personally want out of my otherworldy space operas. 



> I actually liked it. It was a new way of showing a space battle. Actually not entirely new. It wasn't too much different than Wing Commander. Still I thought it was a refreshing change from the typical laser beams. Seeing shrapnel flying through someone's leg and watching decompression is a detail that most scifi shows leave out entirely.



 The realism overcomplicated things a bit too much for me, I mean I get where they are coming from here but then you get into the point of why not just make your fighters into brick shapes or balls, heck all those little wings don't mean anything is space and there is no need for sleek and pointy when shaped like a brick will work just as well. I liked the decompression bits although I didn't care for the missles and guns bits. 

Still that wasn't as much my problem as was the way they shot the scenes, I just didn't care for that up close realism type of documentary feel they were going for, it got confusing and akward in some places. They just jumped around too much. Once again I'll just have to see how they deal with it in part two.  



> The computers = bad storyline is straight from the original. That's one of the conceits you have to make it you're going to enjoy the show. As for the cylon waking up elsewhere after death, we don't know how it all works or how their tech works. It could have been an analogy that the last saved version of the cylon's consciousness wakes up elsewhere. She did make a hasty exit from Baltar before they started nuking, so its possible that she uploaded her personality at that time.



 I don't remember there being a problem with cylons being masters of computer networking in the original. I mean the battlestars were top of the line and modern and the vipers were they best they had. They lost the war because they got Pearl Harbored during peace talks not because they relied too much on technology or the cylons jammed all their computers. I don't remember there ever being any talk anywhere in the show about the cylons even being more technologically advanced than the humans, they just had numbers. The big moral to the 70's show was more of a cold war era, never let your guard down or trust your enemy bit. They let their defences down because they actually believed that the cylons wanted peace and they fell into a trap. The new one tends to get preachy on the technology bit, they make it sound like the cylons are all computer hackers and can control any high tech item at a whim, Adama is actually scared of computers, that's not something I remember from the first show (although the original Adama had minor telekinetic powers, but I'm sort of ashamed I'm enough of a geek to actually know that).



> As a writer in the gaming industry and someone who is working on starting a fiction writing career as well, one of the things I swore not to do was bring children into it - at least not in the context that they did in the show. I agree that this was completely uncalled for. Completely! I understand what they were trying to accomplish with it, but that still doesn't make it any more acceptable. So far this is the one point that I fault the writers for. Obviously after the bombing starts all kinds of babies die, but the murder of a helpless infant is not something I want to see, read about, whatever. Period.



 I'm not sure why they even had that in there myself, they could of had the scene then had her walk away after her criptic remark about the baby not having to cry for much longer and left it at that. It added nothing and took away from the family feel this show should of had. It's almost like they were trying to make "Full Metal Jacket" or "Apocalypse Now" in space, they need to drop all the gritty realism crap, it isn't helping the show at all. 




> Yeah, I hear you on this one. Although like I said earlier, I think it comes off OK without them. Did you see what that handgun did to the guy who jumped on the wing of the ship as it was taking off? It didn't just punch a hole in him, it ripped him in half.



 Yea the hand guns are fine, I'm just being whiney on the loss of cool laser special effect, once again in the _*cool*_ vs gritty _*realism*_ arena they went with _*realism*_.



> Finally, the one thing that was particularly poigniant was the same scene I just mentioned where the officer agreed to stay behind in order for Baltar to escape. He sacrificed himself for the traitor that sold out humanity. I didn't think much of hi character until that point, but that was good.



 That would of been more powerful if I had even known who the guy was, but he looked and acted just like every other background guy in the show, on Star Trek he would of been in a red jumpsuit. I thought the fact that for a second it looked like Baltar might steal the old woman's number was more poigniant to showing just what kind of man he is. I'll give them lots of credit on a interesting Baltar (one of the characters I didn't care for in the old Galactica).


> Anyway, I'm willing to give part 2 a shot and the series as well. I think it has a lot of potential and overall, I liked the look and feel of the show.



IT's funny but I didn't like the look and feel of the show but I'm hoping that the first one was just really slow because of all the back story and the next one will be all action and adventure. I'd give the series a chance if they would get rid of the gritty real world crap and tone down the flawed characters bit (every single character had some sort of personal flaw to them) and go with more action and less preaching.


----------



## Doppleganger (Dec 9, 2003)

Great show!  I hadn't seen any previews, and I don't recall much of the original, but this was good.  

There were no cheesy one-liner jokes, no comedic sidekick characters, it's just a plain old drama.  There's a strong military feel to it, ala _Black Hawk Down_, etc.  Very reminiscent of _Independance Day_ too.

I think the "hope" some of our viewers here were yearning for, will come later.  The story starts with a strong sense of total dispair, because this will create contrast and make the "hope" more fulfilling.

The baby killing scene was done to bring the inhumanity of the cyclons down to a personal level, to make the viewers "dislike" the enemy.  Just having distant panning shots of "bombs bursting" followed by casualty announcements wouldn't stir as much compassion for the humans.

I get bored with most mini-series, and yawned through the likes of Dune, etc.  But this I liked alot, and am looking forward to the next episode.


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## Skade (Dec 9, 2003)

Doppleganger said:
			
		

> There were no cheesy one-liner jokes, no comedic sidekick characters, it's just a plain old drama. There's a strong military feel to it, ala _Black Hawk Down_, etc. Very reminiscent of _Independance Day_ too.



That's just cause Mary McDonnell (Laura Roslin the Secretary of Education, now the President) is in Independence Day as the First Lady.    Oh, and the big explosions and end of humanity, and the last ragtag group of fighters... hey, it is like Independence Day!


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## clark411 (Dec 9, 2003)

I'll play Devil's Advocate vs some of jdavis' comments for giggles (and because I actually enjoyed the show, and am looking forward to tomorrow's episode... no accounting for taste ^_^)

I thought the first five minutes of the show were fine.  Is it silly that the Cylons bother to board?  Absolutely.  Would it have been superior in a cinematic sense if they had simply had the guy start to nap and then blow up?  Absolutely not.  It is far more appropriate, looking at the trope of the show, for the Cylons to juxtapose the cold, machine-like execution of murder via space-missiles alongside the  somewhat-primal smoochies of Cylon Slutbot Six.  If they somehow managed to negate the "Gee that's Stupid of them Factor" of blowing up their own resources while still trying to touch upon the various themes they were going for, it would have been better- but they did better leaning closer towards Entertainment value rather than Realism.

Set Design didn't really strike me as a problem so much as the cinematography.  There seemed to be a good amount of potential to make clear the complexity of the bridge environment, or even do a few roaming camera shots through the halls.  The closest they pulled off was doing a moving shot or two during the non-action sequences (Adama and his speech, for instance).  Looking at another of the themes of the show, it is quite clear that the set design was intentionally crude or below what is to be expected- the Galactica is an old ship and they spend at least two exchanges making this point evident (the public relations tour guide spiels, and Adama refusing to allow networked computers onboard).  Whether this is to explain away a low set budget or not, I dunno- but I won't fault the Sci Fi channel for their efforts and struggles with budgetting- they've come a pretty long way in the Originals series.

The CGI was the best that Sci Fi has done in an Original movie, and they went to a good amount of effort to make it somewhat realistic, if not pretty.  Unlike most, they kept the lens flare to a minimum and instead focused on jerky camera action that, admittedly seemed ill-fitting in relation to the camera action in the live shots.  Their attention to inertia (even bothering with it) along with the presence of attitude thrusters gave me a nice Babylon 5 flashback.  The gripe I had with it was the size of the CGI engineers that were blown out of the ship... unless I'm mistaken, they looked to be about 20-40 ft tall, in proportion to the section they were shown flying out of.

While it was sad to not get scenes showing the destruction of the cities, the fleet, or the headquarters, it again seems to boil down to the plot theme of no one knowing exactly what is going on.  News comes in lil slips of paper, and via transmissions.  By not showing the entire situation, they do not allow for the viewer to see beyond the viewpoints of the main characters.  Personally, I would liked to have seen the boom boom, but I appreciate not seeing the action as well (kinda like Wolf 359 transmissions in TNG... I say, opening my Dork Sails to full).

On the whole, I thought it was entertaining- if not a little conflicting.  They had FTL drives but still relied on Nuclear weaponry.  They had Artificial Intelligence that was capable of attempting to overthrow its masters and make sexy Fembots but seemed incapable of advancing technologically in a military sense despite forty years of gearing up for an armageddonish coup de grace.  Cinematics were a hodgepodge, where it was obvious the CGI guys had little to no interaction with the director beyond the basics.  The storytelling was good, and there were several themes to it that, despite being outdated (a given, given the fact that it's Battlestar Galactica), were present... which says a lot in comparison to most the shows out there.  I wasn't asking for much, but got more than I expected and will probably pick it up on DVD when it releases.


(PS.. yeah the baby neck snapping was a little too much, but I suppose it is an acceptable way of showing the Cylons lack of compassion when it comes to children.  It's a pretty big deal that the Battlestar Galactica will be a warship with kids on it, and that colony ships will be endangered.  Perhaps just a blunt scene of what was to come- it's not like the nukes didn't take out a few babies along with the millions.)


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## jdavis (Dec 9, 2003)

tecnowraith said:
			
		

> Ok I have to jump in on this thread. I just finished watching part and very disapponeted. I agree to alost of disagreements and for the cylons, they screwed up the history from the original which I am the most upset about. In the original, the cylons were made by an alien race to perseve their society and the reason the war was that Humans were the invaders of the Cylons galaxy. Think of the Cylons being native americans and the humans were soliders wanting land. The cool thing about the orinigal Cylons was the mystery of where they come from why they wage war against them. That mystery is now gone and sorely missed.
> 
> Thes mess up the design of the new Galaitica on howthe Vipers were suppose to leave the hanger. In the orinigal, the Vipers left the hanger from the end part, not from the sides of the new one.
> 
> ...



It is a reimagining of the story, they wanted to get in some human angst so they had the cylons being made by the humans and then turning on them. Why? we don't know, maybe it was Skynet or maybe they needed humans as batteries but the big thing is that technofear is a much more popular fear these days and they really couldn't get preachy about robots who just showed up in space. They really gave no reason at all for the cylons attack in the new show, but then again they really never gave a good reason for the cylons to attack in the old show either. Lets face it Robots just don't like humans (unless it's to satisfy their robotic sexual desires?). It's not the history change that bugs me (I knew that going in) it's the fact that the cylons have went from genocidal robots to perverted genocidal robots, man I hope they explain that away in the next episode, maybe cylon 6 is the only sex starved cylon, maybe she was specifically designed to be a hookerbot or something and the rest of them are computer swift and electronic precise and don't feel the need to French Kiss humans before they blow them up. But you just got to let the history part go, the old Battlestar Galactica is dead and gone into TV history, this one is so far different I still think they should of called it something else. I do agree on the dizzy camera bit 100% though.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 9, 2003)

clark411 said:
			
		

> I'll play Devil's Advocate vs some of jdavis' comments for giggles (and because I actually enjoyed the show, and am looking forward to tomorrow's episode... no accounting for taste ^_^)
> 
> I thought the first five minutes of the show were fine. Is it silly that the Cylons bother to board? Absolutely. Would it have been superior in a cinematic sense if they had simply had the guy start to nap and then blow up? Absolutely not. It is far more appropriate, looking at the trope of the show, for the Cylons to juxtapose the cold, machine-like execution of murder via space-missiles alongside the somewhat-primal smoochies of Cylon Slutbot Six. If they somehow managed to negate the "Gee that's Stupid of them Factor" of blowing up their own resources while still trying to touch upon the various themes their going for, it would have been better- but they did better leaning closer towards Entertainment value rather than Realism.



Here I'll fix the scene for both realism and entertainment, it will only take a second:
Keep everything the same up to the point where the hookerbot tries to taste the old dudes tonsils, instead of that awkward old man molesting scene have her just walk up and announce that the cylons are withdrawing from the peace agreement, then shoot him in the head and all three cylons leave. Then show the station being blown up. See that wasn't that hard and it didn't force me to watch a cylon tongue hockey game, if they had gotten that camera any closer it would of been inside their mouths.


> Set Design didn't really strike me as a problem so much as the cinematography. There seemed to be a good amount of potential to make clear the complexity of the bridge environment, or even do a few roaming camera shots through the halls. The closest they pulled off was doing a moving shot or two during the non-action sequences (Adama and his speech, for instance). Looking at another of the themes of the show, it is quite clear that the set design was intentionally crude or below what is to be expected- the Galactica is an old ship and they spend at least two exchanges making this point evident (the public relations tour guide spiels, and Adama refusing to allow networked computers onboard). Whether this is to explain away a low set budget or not, I dunno- but I won't fault the Sci Fi channel for their efforts and struggles with budgetting- they've come a pretty long way in the Originals series.



Yea I got the it's supposed to be old bit, that wasn't my problem with the set, my problem was that it was just a one level loop for jogging and any door could lead to any random area of the ship. I don't mind crude and old for the set but it really needs to look like they are on a actual ship and not in Dr Evil's underground lair and it needs to be huge, a Battlestar is a vast ship, you know with more than two levels to it. All this ship had was the hallway and the hanger deck and it wouldn't of suprised me if any of those random doors opened up to the hanger deck from the hallway, for goodness sake put in a elevator or something, or is a elevator too much advanced technology for a spaceship. 


> The CGI was the best that Sci Fi has done in an Original movie, and they went to a good amount of effort to make it somewhat realistic, if not pretty. Unlike most, they kept the lens flare to a minimum and instead focused on jerky camera action that, admittedly seemed ill-fitting in relation to the camera action in the live shots. Their attention to inertia (even bothering with it) along with the presence of attitude thrusters gave me a nice Babylon 5 flashback. The gripe I had with it was the size of the CGI engineers that were blown out of the ship... unless I'm mistaken, they looked to be about 20-40 ft tall, in proportion to the section they were shown flying out of.



 Ok I'll give you that this is the best CGI Sci Fi channel has done but it wasn't to the level of Farscape or Stargate SG1 or Babalon 5 or even Andromeda, the bar on CGI on tv shows has been raised pretty high and you shouldn't go around bragging about your effects if they are not better than the ones on Kevin Sorbo's freaking show. The realistic space bit isn't new or original it's just never caught on, why because in the end most of your fans want *cool* effects not just *realistic *effects. Yes you can have both at the same time but that herky jerky hard to watch without getting dizzy act will wear old, I want to see cool dogfight action not dizzy herky jerky or blurtacular effects. I don't care about the physics myself but it better look cool on screen whether they use guidance thrusters or not.



> While it was sad to not get scenes showing the destruction of the cities, the fleet, or the headquarters, it again seems to boil down to the plot theme of no one knowing exactly what is going on. News comes in lil slips of paper, and via transmissions. By not showing the entire situation, they do not allow for the viewer to see beyond the viewpoints of the main characters. Personally, I would liked to have seen the boom boom, but I appreciate not seeing the action as well (kinda like Wolf 359 transmissions in TNG... I say, opening my Dork Sails to full).



 Not seeing the action is a sign of "we don't got the money to show the action" and that is what this show was lacking the most, funding. Everybody picks on the old show and it really hasn't aged well but you have to remember those were cutting edge effects back then, the only other thing like it at that time was Star Wars. The reason the old show got cancelled was it cost so much to make. I understand Sci Fi's budget woes but come on you have to show some freaking cylons attacking, what were they invisible? Give me a single shot of cylon ships over the planet, heck give me a radar blip showing a actual attack fleet over the planets, anything at all will do. When I watched it it actually took me a while to figure out they were actually attacking with ships, heck I'm still not sure about that, it could of been hookerbots with built in atomic bombs walking into towns for all I know. You got to have enough money in the budget for a single flyby shot or even a fleet on a radar screen. How much money would a shot of a fleet on a radar screen cost? No wonder the Colonials didn't know what was happening, the audience was kept in the dark too.


> On the whole, I thought it was entertaining- if not a little conflicting. They had FTL drives but still relied on Nuclear weaponry. They had Artificial Intelligence that was capable of attempting to overthrow its masters and make sexy Fembots but seemed incapable of advancing technologically in a military sense despite forty years of gearing up for an armageddonish coup de grace. Cinematics were a hodgepodge, where it was obvious the CGI guys had little to no interaction with the director beyond the basics. The storytelling was good, and there were several themes to it that, despite being outdated (a given, given the fact that it's Battlestar Galactica), were present... which says a lot in comparison to most the shows out there. I wasn't asking for much, but got more than I expected and will probably pick it up on DVD when it releases.
> 
> 
> (PS.. yeah the baby neck snapping was a little too much, but I suppose it is an acceptable way of showing the Cylons lack of compassion when it comes to children. It's a pretty big deal that the Battlestar Galactica will be a warship with kids on it, and that colony ships will be endangered. Perhaps just a blunt scene of what was to come- it's not like the nukes didn't take out a few babies along with the millions.)



 I got to wonder about graphic baby murder and their target audience here, I mean who were they aiming to draw in with baby murder? They could of made the point without that in there, it just wasn't necessary to the show at all, her saying that all the humans would die was enough for me to realize she was a killer robot.

Hey I'm picking at it but it actually wasn't all that bad, don't get me wrong it wasn't anything worthwhile but it did have enough to give me hope for the next episode.Just for comparison my friend with the film degree sent me a e-mail about the show, all it said was "*OOF!*"I'm not nearly as down on it as he was.


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## Hand of Evil (Dec 9, 2003)

Was not too impressed 5/10.  

Starbuck change to a macho female with gun really ticked me off, sorry, he is a rogue, a man's man, a buddy, the cool guy, not a ___ (sorry) driven good as a guy woman.  Boomer to a lesser degree.  The 70's BSG had a number of strong women that could have been added, such as Apollo's sister!  

Number 6, well, sex sells and killing babies makes the viewer see how evil you can be, not that you were a cylon and you nuke planets.  It did not brother me that she can't die, wireless downloads, but I do wish she would get off the show!

Space combat, give me some flash!  While they tried to be realistic, they also did a few things non-realistic, ships loose power in space and they go all over the place hitting each other.  Still not sure why missles would have a vapor trail but that is a little thing.

I don't know if I will be catching it, if nothing else is on and I am not out shopping.


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 9, 2003)

I hadn't planned on watching this, but caught it just as it started.  It was entertaining enough, if not particularly great -- and familiar enough that I started remembering all sorts of old BSG trivia.

I like some of the improved attention to detail -- like seeing the reaction motors firing on the Vipers as they maneuver (though this nod toward spaceflight physics is immediatley broken by other things, but heck, it's scifi -- I'll suspend some disbelief).

The nostalgic nod toward the old series was kind of cool in a retro sort of way -- the museum with all the old Ceylon props (though of course they *had* to switch back to the old Vipers).  The anti-technology theme was at least interesting, and I liked the explanation for the Ceylons' existence, even though that immediately made the rest of the tech levels in the show incongruous.  It at least shows they've updated some thinking in 25 years.

Fembot and her related activities I mostly ignored.  My comment to my wife was "They didn't have sex in the '70s -- that's why there wasn't any in the original show." 

We are interested enough to watch Part 2 tonight.  It's not great work, but it kills the time until RotK!

Edit: It did get me thinking about the backstory, though, which I don't completely remember.  There are 12 colonies, right, with Earth the missing 13th?  Where did they come from, originally, and why don't they go back there -- and why do they still refer to themselves as colonies after all those years?  It's like the US or Canada referring to themselves as colonies.  Sigh. *attempts to suspend disbelief again*


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## Psion (Dec 9, 2003)

Bareandur said:
			
		

> Again, I don't share this view. I thought the set designs were excellent. They reminded me of the original, but a little less relaxed, more like a military vessel should be.




I dunno. I didn't think it was bad, but the sets (and the lingo) reminded me a little too much of a modern aircraft carrier and a little too little of a space vessel. I think the often overlooked Space: Above & Beyond did a good job of creating sets that reflected both influences to a spaceborne carrier.



> THIS IS NOT A REMAKE. CONTINUITY WITH THE ORIGINAL DOES NOT EXIST. THIS IS A REIMAGINED, COMPLETELY NEW SHOW.




1) I fail to see how that excuses anything. I roll my eyes everytime hollywood invokes the term (or practice of )  "reimagined". I think the producers DESERVE to be taken to task for "reimagining". It's spin control for following their ego instead of making a show that would have been more appealing to a preponderance of fans. (And a reflection of the all too prevalent malignancy that scripts don't sell unless it can be defined in terms of shows that are already out there.)
2) It seems to me that the plot was almost originally intended to be a "years later" plot with continuity, but they scrapped it halfway through.


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## jasper (Dec 9, 2003)

Wait a minute I originally thought they came from the front of hanger deck too in the original but in some scenes they appear from under the side of the ship. Also in the old one you could see clear through the landing bay open space to open space so why have launch tubes.

Personally I would like to see realism a bit more in scific. After how many times can kirk, spock, luke, Captain Sheridian, etc avoid the blaster light.  They didn’t fall for the laser/blaster moves slower than a bullet.

Good points on the generic corrodor but having nearly got lost on the USS Alabama it did look convincing plus standard scene where civilian/political flunky gets lost on military ship.
Strong female parts. Hmm Starbuck’s blonde nurseie look concern over current wounded guy actor. The only strong woman in the original was Apollo’s wife who took a bullet. The rest were just average stock characters. 

Rating both them I give the original C and the new one C+. Mainly because the new one have flaws which can be plot story lines. The original Baltar would have taken the old lady’s number and mugged for the camera.


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## Assenpfeffer (Dec 9, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> The first 5 minutes of the show were pure crap. Lusty Cylons are just goofy, and why did the Cylons even stop there to start with? Just shoot the thing as you fly by, why do we need a scene with a Cylon french kissing a old guy for no apparent reason?




Agreed.  I didn't see the point in it, nor in the baby-killing scene.



> They never showed any of the rest of the fleet getting attacked, heck they never showed any of the fleet at all. They never showed the planets getting attacked either, just far off scenes of atomic bombs going off (I did like the one effect when Baltar was watching the reporter get blown away on his TV.)




I liked this way of handling it a lot better than in the original show, where the entire population of the colonies is massacred by conventional bombs and vehicular small arms.

And I think it was a decision on the part of the creative tem to try to portray the devastation from a personal viewpoint, rather than panoramic shots of the devastation, or the _huge_ cliche shot of crowds felling from explosions.



> 7. I didn't like the "*Computers=Bad*" storyline either. Yes man's overeliance on computers will one day lead to his downfall, I've seen the Terminator movies and the Matrix movies please stop preaching to me about the evils of technology. I mean really they navigate space and control huge space fortresses but they can't have cordless phones? They sent messages with something that looked like a old form feed printer and a teletype machine. They created a sentient AI system and fully moble robots, but they can't shield a onboard ship network cable. Man if the cylons had had more than two fighters this would of really been a disaster. The "smartest man in the colonies" Baltar had to have help with a computer program, yet over 50 years ago they managed to build indepenant thinking robots that have the ability to send their full programming and AI light years away to new bodies if they are destroyed? Maybe I should log off the internet here before my reliance on technology destroys the world  I mean really is that the best they could come up with?




You'll recall, I think, that the orginal show had at least as strong an anti-machine theme.  I thought it was reltively underplayed, actually, and that Adama's speech at the decomissioning ceremony added a new layer of complexity to the theme.  The problem lies not with machines, but with _us_.


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## buzzard (Dec 9, 2003)

Skade said:
			
		

> She definitely had his cockiness, just not as much of the playfulness.  One thing I liked about her was her toughness.  Not to say that she was Arnie or anything, but at least in this role she did not come across as a sex object or a girly-girl.  She was a soldier, regardless of her sex.  Maybe not a great soldier (discipline problems seem to be a problem) but certainly not eye-candy.




Overall I didn't mind the show much at all. However the Starbuck character was lousy. How could anyone who is that regularly obnoxious to superior officers have lasted in the military for more than a couple weeks is beyond me. She could be the best pilot since chuck Yeager, but she still would have been pitched. They went to far in making her reckless. 

As for the baby killing, I almost see it as 6 being 'merciful'. Remember the line about "soon you won't have to cry any more". Living through a nuclear holocaust is likely worse than a quick painless death (or so 6 might calculate). 

One thing I did like about the show was the commanding of the Battlestar from the bridge and the rather submarine like navigation commands. That was a nice touch of realism IMHO. 

buzzard


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## tetsujin28 (Dec 9, 2003)

None of the new girls are nearly as hot as Maren Jensen was. Hoo boy.


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## JacktheRabbit (Dec 9, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> You should read the Ain't it Cool News review, they hated it. Of course they seem to hate everything. I'm going to give it a chance, it doesn't really deserve one but I'm going to go into it with as few preconcieved notions as I can and watch it for what it is. The one think that really bothers me is that everything I have read or seen on the show so far makes the producers seem very arrogant about this show, that just sort of bugs me.
> 
> AiCN review:
> http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=16490




AICN where the pompus, and arrogant go to feel vindicated. I fail to see why anyone cares what those vapor heads say about anything. They barely enjoy any movie they like but instead whine about how horrible everything is. I would love to see what kind of horrible hack job Mr Internet Tough guy over there would write if given the chance.


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## JacktheRabbit (Dec 9, 2003)

Silver Moon said:
			
		

> Well you did better than me.  I didn't make it beyond the first commercial break.  There's just something about innocent babies getting murdered that I don't find all that entertaining.
> 
> (Just my opinion, please don't read the above as an invitation for a flame war.  I'm sure there are lots of people who enjoyed the show.)





LOL, you didnt mind watching a show where 12 entire planets of people are going to die horribly but when a single child is killed by accident (yes it was an accident the Cylon really did not know an infant is so fragile it cannot hold the weight of its own head) and you turn it off.

Yes the scene was disturbing but it taught you a lot about the Cylons. They are not just pure intellect. Cylons actually appear to have emotions based on her confused upset reaction to the infant dying as well as other scenes.


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## Zenon (Dec 9, 2003)

Ok, I'll throw my opinions in as well:

As someone who watched the original, I'll have to say I was surprised how much I liked this new take on it.

I believe many of the discussions here so far missed what I thought the major point of the show (so far) was: Responsibility.

Adama pointed it out in his speech that humanity didn't take responisbility for creating the Cylons.

Apollo blames his father for not taking responsibility for his other son's death (the whole "he wasn't cut out to be a fighter pilot" scene).

Baltar not wanting to believe and/or take responsibilty for allowing #6 to access the Defense network (her "your capability for self-deception" comment as the Cylon attack started was great).

And I believe the whole "baby killing" scene was meant to show that the Cylons are just like us - IMHO, #6 did not mean to kill the baby. In the beginning of the scene, she seemed facinated by the baby, asked to hold it, talked to the mother about how small and fragile it was, coo'd to it. Not the action of an impersonal machine (remember how she asked the officer on the station to "prove" he was alive? How she claimes to Baltar that she is a woman, not a machine?). But then as the mother is called away for a moment, #6 wonders "how does the neck support all that weight?". Like a child who doesn't know any better she reaches down to play around with it. Snap. Oops. Then she scoots away, not taking responsibilty for it, just like her creators (humans). It's on the look on her face when she ducks away.

I've watched kids do the same thing, break something without meaning to and then try to hide the fact. I mean, what did she care, she told the baby he wouldn't have to cry much longer (because she knew the attack was about to begin to wipe out the colonies anyway), so why kill it on purpose?

Then we start to have a change in the responsibility theme:

The Minister of Education taking charge on the liner. (43rd in line? Wow!)

Adama taking charge of the fleet.

Colonel Tigh making the hard decision to vacc the compartment to save the Galactica. If he would have given the Chief his "40 seconds" the fire may have reached the fuel storage. It was a tough call, 85 dead. But he took responsibilty for it (after not wanting to take responsibility for starting the fight with Starbuck by pitching the table at her, or taking responsibility for his drinking problem).

That's my thoughts at least, I know I'll tune in tonight to check out Part 2.


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## Psychotic Dreamer (Dec 9, 2003)

I agree totally Zenon.  I caught the message of responsibility myself.  Since Zenon's thoughts echo mine, I wont go into detail.


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## Storm Raven (Dec 9, 2003)

jester47 said:
			
		

> As for the change of the Cylon ships it just makes sense.  If your ships are machines piloted by machines why have the redundancy?  It seems to me that machines would just make the fighters cylons too.




Modular design. Having a mobile multipurpose "centurion" unit allows the same "brain" to be used for mutliple functions. A design that is too specialized becomes useless in situations where that specialty is not called for.


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## Storm Raven (Dec 9, 2003)

My reaction to watching the show was this: "So, they just remade _Wing Commander_ with robot enemies instead of kilrathi? And, as a double bonus, they are going to hit every tired worn out military movie cliche character and situation. Color me unimpressed."


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## JacktheRabbit (Dec 9, 2003)

Storm Raven said:
			
		

> My reaction to watching the show was this: "So, they just remade _Wing Commander_ with robot enemies instead of kilrathi? And, as a double bonus, they are going to hit every tired worn out military movie cliche character and situation. Color me unimpressed."





Some examples please?


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## Hand of Evil (Dec 9, 2003)

Number 6 - plot hole or plot point?  While we know there is more than one human looking cylon we don't know how how many versions of her are out there.  We have one asking the officer if he is alive, then in a very short time, one that has been a planet long enough to devolop a relationship with Baltar to work on defense contracts.  



Spoiler



I think they were all different parts of one unit, named Lucifer!


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## Desdichado (Dec 9, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> One thing I will call stupid right off was the decision to air this show on a Monday night. Good grief your going up against Monday Night Football and WWE Raw for a piece of the 18-35 male demographic? They have cut their own throats with the scheduling here for that demographic.



Eh, sci-fi fans are not notorious football watchers, I've found.  They also are often "techie" people and might well have TiVo.


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## LrdApoc (Dec 9, 2003)

Tauric said:
			
		

> Apollo does have a sense of family:  he blames his father for his brother's death.  Not a good sense of family, but it is there.




From that perspective I ceede this point.. Unfortunately I prefer a little more positive in my science dramas.. I guess I am most upset that this is a dark, dreary depressing world with heavily conflicted characters. While that does make them more realistic in a sense I think the drama of the original came as a reaction from these people to the events that occurred on the 12 colonies. Apollo didn't always agree with Adama in the first series either, but I feel like they set up the sub-plot regarding Zac as a pretty big hurdle to reconcilliation. I actually like the actor who plays Apollo and he does a good job of hiding his Brittish accent. Maybe I am being too quick to compare and judge. I will be watching tonight to see how they resolve issues.



			
				Tauric said:
			
		

> I think Adama does have hope, which is why he's figthing, to let his ship, and the remainder of the fleet, survive the holocaust.  Just because he questions the humanity's worth doesn't mean he won't try to improve on his nature.  His guilt over his sons will drive him to preserve what he can of humanity, and by example, make humans more noble.




I guess my problem here is that after his speech I found myself feeling the humanity I saw was not worth saving.. though with more time to process it there are some good examples of people working through the adversity as the show progressed.



			
				Tauric said:
			
		

> Lord Apoc, I am confused about how you see diversity in BSG.  You seem to imply that Adama being Latino and Boomer being Asian are not diverse enough?  While I admit that I didn't notice many non-European skin tones aside from the two mentioned, I think that they are trying to be diverse without having a token member of each minority group.  And IIRC, weren't Col. Tigh and Boomer the only two minority leads in the OBSG?
> 
> You also seem to imply that the new BSG doesn't have strong characters.  I ask, how do you define strength (for female characters)?  Is it the ability to perform the roles of male characters?  Well, what about the new Starbuck?  Is it the abillity to do your duty even though you are scared?  Look at Boomer, leaving her co-pilot behind.  Is it the ability to assert your authority in the face of those who doubt you?  The new President did that on several occasions.  So I just don't see how you can say this incarnation does not have strong female characters.
> 
> ...


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 9, 2003)

Storm Raven said:
			
		

> My reaction to watching the show was this: "So, they just remade _Wing Commander_ with robot enemies instead of kilrathi? And, as a double bonus, they are going to hit every tired worn out military movie cliche character and situation. Color me unimpressed."




In better perspective: _Wing Commander_ was a _Battlestar Galactica_ rip with kitties instead of robots (kitties stolen from Larry Niven), and both stole their military cliches from standard military movies -- _BSG_ itself being a fairly clear _Star Wars_ spin.

Face it, folks, nothing's truly original these days.


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## Assenpfeffer (Dec 9, 2003)

LrdApoc said:
			
		

> From that perspective I ceede this point.. Unfortunately I prefer a little more positive in my science dramas.. I guess I am most upset that this is a dark, dreary depressing world with heavily conflicted characters. While that does make them more realistic in a sense I think the drama of the original came as a reaction from these people to the events that occurred on the 12 colonies.




The other perspective is that conflicted characters are more interesting than flat unchanging ones who represent moral absolutes.

However, I agree that, from the first half, this BG is a lot grimmer than the old one, which had a strong thread of space opera-ish levity running through it.  But it also lacks the camp elements and (so far) the dire continuity problems that marred the original.

I think that was intentional - I think hope will materialize in the second half.



> I guess my problem here is that after his speech I found myself feeling the humanity I saw was not worth saving.. though with more time to process it there are some good examples of people working through the adversity as the show progressed.




Why do you say that?  Do you feel that humanity _now_ isn't worth saving, either?  I couldn't detect much difference between the human society of the miniseries and our own.


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## Storm Raven (Dec 9, 2003)

DocMoriartty said:
			
		

> Some examples please?




Every single "military" character on the show was a stock cliche character, with almost nothing to distinguish them from the bland cliche that spawned them.

The maverick pilot who is too good to discipline for long.
The war-weary retiring captain called back by necessity.
The son of a senior officer with a chip on his shoulder.
The disillusioned drunk officer who rallies in the crunch.
The tough chief mechanic with a heart of gold.
The self-sacrificing officer who dies for the greater good.

How about the multiple situations that amounted to little more than a military cliche?

The "must sacrifice some of the crew to save the ship" routine.
The "newfangled gear just screws up good soldiers" routine.
The "soldiers forced to shoot at panicked civlians" routine.
The "wrong headed politician meddling with military affairs" routine.

The list goes on.


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## Psion (Dec 9, 2003)

> Wing Commander was a Battlestar Galactica rip with kitties instead of robots (kitties stolen from Larry Niven), and both stole their military cliches from standard military movies -- BSG itself being a fairly clear Star Wars spin.




Plot-wise, about all they have in common is the space war thing. BSG has a big undertone /inspiration in the exodus. So yeah, nothing's new.

But that is not to say that nothing is ever trite or overdone. I felt that they hewed this version in plot elements a bit too close too the 80s and 90s wave of SF survival dramas (like Independance Day and Deep Impact) and Holocaust dramas, instead of going with the less well worn path of the original.


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## Storm Raven (Dec 9, 2003)

Olgar Shiverstone said:
			
		

> *In better perspective: Wing Commander was a Battlestar Galactica rip with kitties instead of robots (kitties stolen from Larry Niven), and both stole their military cliches from standard military movies -- BSG itself being a fairly clear Star Wars spin.*





Sure. But why bother to remak BSG if all you are going to do is make _Wing Commander_ with robots? They could have at least come up with something new, instead, they just went back to the same well and trumpeted their innovation.



> *Face it, folks, nothing's truly original these days.*





Certainly not. But there are degrees of originality. The remake of BSG was just more of the same with almost nothing added that hadn't been done a dozen times before (and in several cases, done much better). They could have done hundreds of things that would have shown a spark of creativity and avoided the stock, canned characters and situations that have littered military and science fiction scripts for decades. Instead, they just seemed to take the script off the rack, drop in some stock characters, tinker toy the cliched scenes together, and pat themselves on the back for being creative.


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## KenM (Dec 9, 2003)

One big question, should'nt the nuke that Starbuck failed to get and hit the Galactica have totally vaporized the ship?  It just had a little damage. It was a nuke.


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## Assenpfeffer (Dec 9, 2003)

KenM said:
			
		

> One big question, should'nt the nuke that Starbuck failed to get and hit the Galactica have totally vaporized the ship?  It just had a little damage. It was a nuke.




Well, it's a big ship.  Did they state the yield on that one?


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## KenM (Dec 9, 2003)

Assenpfeffer said:
			
		

> Well, it's a big ship.  Did they state the yield on that one?




 I don't think they did. But the Galactica was at GROUND ZERO of a nuke blast, should have been done.


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## Assenpfeffer (Dec 9, 2003)

KenM said:
			
		

> I don't think they did. But the Galactica was at GROUND ZERO of a nuke blast, should have been done.




It depends on the yield.  Was it a tactical nuke?  If so, there's no way it'd have completely destroyed a target of that size.

There are nukes and there are NUKES, after all.


----------



## Hand of Evil (Dec 9, 2003)

every other nuke they had was 50 mega-ton but I figured double hull, material, impact of blast sends most of the outward, you see it in tanks now but then that is not a nuke.


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## Wycen (Dec 9, 2003)

I didn't watch the whole thing, but I saw the beginning sequence with the paper showing the old design cylons.  People have mentioned the museum showing old show stuff.  All I saw was the vipers which I'm not sure are the original.  Did the museum actually have a stuffed Cylon or something?

I see the parallel with Wingcommander, the sucky tech and shooting "bullets" instead of energy and the "torpedo" attacks, though that also reminded me of Japanese animation, except sucky.

Then at televisionwithoutpity someone mentioned Space Above and Beyond and that is a more direct parallel since they have intergalactic war, war against artificially intelligent machines, and fighter battles using "torpedos".


----------



## jdavis (Dec 9, 2003)

KenM said:
			
		

> I don't think they did. But the Galactica was at GROUND ZERO of a nuke blast, should have been done.



Adama said, "well it looks like the hull reflected most of the blast". See they can make a space ship hull capable of deflecting a nuclear blast but can't shield electronics from EMP disruption (funny that the real military can shield electronics but have absolutely no way to stop a A-bomb). 

I got the whole responsibility theme they were going for, heck every single character was flawed to the extent they should all wish for death and nobody would take any responsibility for any action they had taken ever. But the theme that kept smacking me in the face was the *Computers are your enemies *theme they droned on and on about. Funny but the computers that did the CGI work to create the show were actually more powerful than the computers on the show. I mean in 50 years they couldn't figure out a way to shield a embedded network cable from a outer space disruption? Besides could somebody tell me why the Galactica's computers were so safe, I mean their explination was that the old computers were too dumb to be disrupted? How about this one, why in the world would the design their whole modern fleet to be suseptable to the cylons? They knew the cylons could disrupt computers, they stated that was the whole reason for the Galactica to be like it was, so then they just forgot about that and were suprised when the cylons disrupted their computers? They sort of preached themselves into a corner here. The humans were defeated because they were stupid and they continued to be stupid, in 50 years they never even learned one simple lesson, what happened was entirely the humans fault. In the old show the Cylons pulled a Pearl Harbor attack during a peace treaty signing, the raiders swooping by even looked like the Pearl Harbor attack, the cylons were tricky and ruthless. In the new one the Cylons just took advantage of how stupid and unprepared the humans were, they had 50 years to prepare for this and instead completly sabotaaged their whole defense system by building it with computers they knew the cylons could disrupt.

I got the Wing Commander similarities right off to, seems they also filmed both of them in Blurovision for the space battles, but I'll give Galactica all the credit in the world for not having Freddie Prinze jr. in it.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 10, 2003)

Assenpfeffer said:
			
		

> You'll recall, I think, that the orginal show had at least as strong an anti-machine theme. I thought it was reltively underplayed, actually, and that Adama's speech at the decomissioning ceremony added a new layer of complexity to the theme. The problem lies not with machines, but with _us_.



 The original series problem with technology was that they didn't have enough of it, that's the whole point to the rag tag fugitive fleet bit, it was made up of older and slower ships that couldn't keep up with the Galactica, this convoy of old crappy vessels was the only thing that was preserving humanity, the Galactica had to plod along to protect them (the Pegasus episodes pointed out very well just how superior a Battlestar was, even compared to Cylon Basestars). The Galactica was cutting edge and top of the line, their problem was they needed fuel and parts and and couldn't risk a stand up fight with the Cylons because they were the only warship protecting the rag tag fugitive fleet. Heck they were so unworried about the evils of high technology and robotics that they made a robot dog with it's own working AI as a play companion for a child. The Cylons were not evil because they were robots, they were evil because they were tyrannical aliens. They just happened to also be robotic in nature. This _*Computers=Evil*_ is a independant plot design of the new series.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 10, 2003)

KenM said:
			
		

> I don't think they did. But the Galactica was at GROUND ZERO of a nuke blast, should have been done.




A large amount of the damage done by nuclear weapons on Earth happens because the weapon goes off in an atmosphere.  The atmosphere abosorbs energy released, and then the shockwave and super-heated gases do the nasty work for you.

Set one off in a vacuum, and what do you get?  Lots of radiation, and the mass of the missile vaporized and accelerated (so that it looks rather much like alpha radiation, actually).  If, as they claim, the hull doesn't absorb much of the radiation, not much damage is done.


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 10, 2003)

Wycen said:
			
		

> I didn't watch the whole thing, but I saw the beginning sequence with the paper showing the old design cylons.  People have mentioned the museum showing old show stuff.  All I saw was the vipers which I'm not sure are the original.  Did the museum actually have a stuffed Cylon or something?




The museum had a whole squadron of Vipers in flight-ready condition (  ), a stuffed Centurion from the original series, and models of the Ceylon Basestar and Raider from the original series.  There might have been more -- it was a quick glimpse.

I kind of miss the old uniforms, especially the flight helmets -- I like the "Egyptian" styling to them.

Edit: Is it Cylon or Ceylon?  I have the feeling I'm abusing a poor island just off the Indian subcontinent ...

Edit 2: Part 2 in progress (I *love* wireless Internet).  #6 chick is really beginning to annoy me.  Surely there's a better way to demostrate Baltar is losing it (it he's not, it's the silliest plot device I've seen in a while).


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> 1) I fail to see how that excuses anything. I roll my eyes everytime hollywood invokes the term (or practice of )  "reimagined". I think the producers DESERVE to be taken to task for "reimagining". It's spin control for following their ego instead of making a show that would have been more appealing to a preponderance of fans. (And a reflection of the all too prevalent malignancy that scripts don't sell unless it can be defined in terms of shows that are already out there.)




I fail to see how anything needs to be excused. The producers and the owners of the property are under no obligation to be true to their fans. There is no contract, of trust, or otherwise, preventing them from taking an old idea and transforming it into something new. One of the things that annoys me the most out of so called "fans" is that they think that because something they watched something that entertained them, you are then in debt to them in some way and are obligated to satisfy their wishes. You (or the owners, producers, etc.) aren't. If you want to reimagine it, its your prerogative, end of story, unless the fans want to pay the studios the millions of dollars the property is actually worth and buy the property.



> 2) It seems to me that the plot was almost originally intended to be a "years later" plot with continuity, but they scrapped it halfway through.




I don't see this at all. This is clearly a case where they were actually aknowledging the old show by placing the familliar elements into a historical context. I really don't see this as a problem.


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## Ranger REG (Dec 10, 2003)

Well, they did warned you. If you're a devoted closed-minded, one-tracked, _BSG_ fanatic, then don't watch it.

Otherwise, watch it with an open mind, assuming you *can be.* Let's say I won't hold my breath on that statement.


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## Wycen (Dec 10, 2003)

Maybe the following episodes will explain these things, but considering the whole lame battles, here is something I'd like to know.

Cylons seem to have 2 weapons, at least the fighter pods.  The ability to "turn off" other ships and their missiles.

What the hell were they doing all those 40 years on the "world of their own" if the most sophisticated weapon is a missile?  Not even a smart missile apparently if Apollo can fly in front of one and draw it away from Airforce One.

Yet they can build a sexbot who when destroyed can transfer consciousness into another body far away?

On a related topic I suppose.  Airforce One takes off from the surface of the planet.  I don't recall seeing a huge disposable booster or a large engine flare showing massive thrust to reach orbit.  Then it also manages to reach orbit under its own power and leave the gravity of the planet.  Further, they are walking around the cabins without suction boots, no seatbelts, or rotating centrifugal sections for gravity.

So these ships somehow have anti-gravity?


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 10, 2003)

Storm Raven said:
			
		

> Every single "military" character on the show was a stock cliche character, with almost nothing to distinguish them from the bland cliche that spawned them.
> 
> The maverick pilot who is too good to discipline for long.
> The war-weary retiring captain called back by necessity.
> ...




Did it not occur to you that the reason these character are cliche is because many of them are extremely realistic in military settings and the others are in there so that the rest of us have someone in the cast to relate to? Exactly how would you have rewritten the characters so that they're less cliche?

How about the situations you find cliche? Have people not sacrificed themselves during war time by jumping on a hand grenade to save their friends? Have commanders not given the order to sacrifice the lives of soldiers to accomplish their objectives? Have politicians never interfered in military affairs? If the answer to any of these questions is no, then I suggest you go speak to a few vets who have actually served during war time.


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## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

Night one tells us that computers are evil.

Night two tell us 



Spoiler



beautiful women are evil.



By the end, I figured they would do one of two things with the cylons. But they did them both. 



Spoiler



Made a fighter pilot a cylon, and made the scapegoat really the cylon.



A little less convulted and a little more palatable in the second night. Plot is interesting, but I gotta say, I'm still not warming up to the characters.

FTL jumps make the cameras zoom. Whee!

Re: The space battle. Did anyone else who has played it get a real strong _Homeworld_ vibe off of it?


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

> I fail to see how anything needs to be excused.




Of course not, or we wouldn't be having this conversation.



> The producers and the owners of the property are under no obligation to be true to their fans.




Legally, no. Else (frex) Jorune wouldn't be wallowing undeveloped.

But if you want to make a work that will be appreciated, I do think it behooves you to consider the sensitivies of the fan base.


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## jdavis (Dec 10, 2003)

Man they reimagined the hell out of that didn't they. Oh well here we go for Part 2.

1. Out of all the characters they left out or drastically changed they decided to keep Boxey? WTF? Boxey got a part but every single female lead from the old show was cut? At least he didn't have a robot dog, but come on getting rid of Boxey is one of the few things that even the die hard fans wouldn't of minded all that much.

2. Still don't like the Cylons or anything about the Cylons or anything remotely to do with the Cylons. At least greasy arms dealer Cylon didn't try to French Kiss Adama during their fight. I just didn't buy into them, their technology, their fighters or the new basestars. I did like the new centurions but they had all of two scenes as background, they did nothing but stand there and look cool.

3. So happy they blamed the technology problem on Baltar's navagation program, that works so much better than them being able to control computers at a whim. So score one fix for episode 2. I also liked that after the battle scene at the end they had mixed in the new vipers with the old ones, showing it was Baltar's program and not _*computers=evil*_ that messed them up.

4. Baltar was the best thing about the show, I could almost see myself watching a series just to keep up with his Dr. Smith-like hyjinks. He was the only saving grace of the show for me.

5. Still didn't like the sets or uniforms either. I will give them credit for trying to show more of the Galactica inside though.

6. "Find me some Bullets." come on I about turned it off at that point, after trying to make me believe this is a military operation then they have him say something so stupid? Come on ordinance, weapontry, ammunition, supplies, armaments, shells, heck even provisions would of done, but bullets? It makes him sound like he's going to the OK corral with his six shooter. Bullets are for small arms, the Galactica was firing shells and/or missles and a military commander would of known the difference. I really prefer lasers in space to start with anyway, where will they ever get any more ammo from now?

7. They failed to sell me on the space battle stuff too, it was jumpy and hard to follow and I personally just didn't care for it. Call it a difference of opinion but I found it looked terribly lame in both episodes. I guess I just like my lasers too much.

8. If people were having a fit over Boomer being a woman I bet they will really have a fit over 



Spoiler



her being a Cylon


. 

Overall I'd have to say I was disappointed with it, I gave it a shot and it just didn't do it for me. I really wish it hadn't blown the chance for a continuation story of the old show as that is just the Battlestar Galactica show that I prefer. This was too gritty for my taste in a space opera and I really found nothing special about the writing or the reimagining of the story, except for Baltar. I opened my mind and I gave it a chance and it wasn't as bad as I expected it to be, but I just didn't like it.


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## Tauric (Dec 10, 2003)

Well, I was less impressed with ep2.  If they turn this into a series, I may not watch it now, for two reasons:  Boxey and Sexbot.

I know the kid actor didn't get much screen time, but the whole idea of Boxey is just weak.  If this BSG is going to be grim and gritty, like is seems, then the leads should be adults, with maybe a recurring, but not regular, child character for change of pace episodes.

I was really annoyed by the whole "Scorpius neural chip" (at least the steal from the best) angle that they used with Baltar and the sexbot.  The character of #6 reminds me of Eve on Angel.  She's a flat character played by a wooden actress.

I also thought the bit with the guy at the end was lame (sorry about not being specific, but I don't know how to do the spoiler dealie) .  It would have been better if his protestations had been true.

After seeing part 2, I have to downgrade by opinion to 5/10.  It had some really annoying elements, but it wasn't total dreck, just average, IMHO.


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## KenM (Dec 10, 2003)

I knew that 



Spoiler



They would have someone unexpected turn out to be a cylon. I just thought I might have been someone higher up, like Tighe or Adama, that would have been a twist.


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## Skade (Dec 10, 2003)

Spoiler



I think the whole reason Boxey was left in was to have him be adopted by Cylon-Boomer, so that when she is eventually activated her emotions for the kid and the Chief will somehow cause her to deny her programming and remain loyal to the Galactica.  It's kind of obvious, but not a bad plot device really.


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## 2d6 (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> Re: The space battle. Did anyone else who has played it get a real strong _Homeworld_ vibe off of it?




I've been getting the Homeworld vibe off all the space effects. I love Homeworld.


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## 2d6 (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> Re: The space battle. Did anyone else who has played it get a real strong _Homeworld_ vibe off of it?




Good call! I've been getting the Homeworld vibe off all the space effects. I love Homeworld.


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## JohnBrown (Dec 10, 2003)

Being a huge fan of the original as a child (heck, I even like Galactic a 1980), I have to say that I enjoyed the new BSG.  After reading through all of the posts, some of the negative comments read as if some posters are wallowing in nostalgic feelings of a beloved childhood memory and not really looking at the new show itself.  Not there is anything wrong with nostalgia.  I have been re-watching old tapes of the original all last week, shows I haven’t seen (as sydicated re-runs) in 15+ years, and while they still have a special place in my heart, I just couldn’t believe just how bad some of those episodes were.  I still love them, but gosh some of them were bad.  

Some people were complaining about #6 being eye candy.  Most of the time, so were the women of the old BSG (Cassiopeia, the hooker with a heart of gold. Simultaneously a useless character and a cliché).  Some people were complaining that the new Starbuck is a cliché.  The old one was too.  The production values on the old show were horrendous.  I couldn’t believe that, as a child, I didn’t notice that they were using the exact same shots for the space battles over and over and over again.  Like or dislike them, at least these were new viper scenes.  Some people have also been talking about the BSG fan base.  Color me completely out of touch, but just exactly how big is this fan base?  I am honestly not trying to be coy here.   It has been 20+ years since anybody’s done anything with this property (that I am aware of), so just how big is the “loyal fan base?”  

I am not trying to change anybody’s mind here.  Different strokes for different folks.  I just curious how much of the negative postings were do to remembering the original show being better than it actually was?  I have been running into this sort of thing a lot myself lately.  The other night I stumbled on to an episode of Speed Racer on cable.  Man, I certainly remember that as being much better.  I still think the Mach 5 is cool though.


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## jdavis (Dec 10, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Did it not occur to you that the reason these character are cliche is because many of them are extremely realistic in military settings and the others are in there so that the rest of us have someone in the cast to relate to? Exactly how would you have rewritten the characters so that they're less cliche?
> 
> How about the situations you find cliche? Have people not sacrificed themselves during war time by jumping on a hand grenade to save their friends? Have commanders not given the order to sacrifice the lives of soldiers to accomplish their objectives? Have politicians never interfered in military affairs? If the answer to any of these questions is no, then I suggest you go speak to a few vets who have actually served during war time.



 I think the problem here is not that they are military cliches they are entertainment cliches. In the real military 2/3rds of this crew would of been discharged and several of them would of been courtmartialed. These weren't real military cliches at all they were "The Dirty Dozen" characters, they were the cast of "Top  Gun" cliches their characters weren't realistic they were gritty and flawed, all of them were flawed, every single character in the show was flawed in some way. Their Military disipline was pathetic, they wouldn't even hold up to military dress codes and lets not even get into military personel having sexual contact while on duty (or off duty for that matter). Gritty and dark does not equal realistic it just equals gritty and dark, this is TV entertainment not a documentary on military life. And as far as asking vets about this stuff I got a feeling most of them would laugh their asses off at the suggestion this show had anything at all on real military life during a war. 

After reading all these quotes about how they were going to revolutionize the Science Fiction genre with this show and how new and unique the show will be then you really need to come up with something new and unique and revolutionary, this wasn't.


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## Elf Witch (Dec 10, 2003)

jasper said:
			
		

> Wait a minute I originally thought they came from the front of hanger deck too in the original but in some scenes they appear from under the side of the ship. Also in the old one you could see clear through the landing bay open space to open space so why have launch tubes.
> 
> Personally I would like to see realism a bit more in scific. After how many times can kirk, spock, luke, Captain Sheridian, etc avoid the blaster light.  They didn’t fall for the laser/blaster moves slower than a bullet.
> 
> ...




Excuse me what about Sheba who could fly as well as any of the boys? And dind't have to act like one unloke the new female Starbuck or as my male roomate called her Startramp. Flaws these characters all need prozac and group therepy.


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## RolandOfGilead (Dec 10, 2003)

I'd just like to say I thought the show was brilliant. Today, scifi gets bogged down in trying to be more intelligent than its audience.  I think the producers found a great formula of entertainment for the show:

1/2 part nostalgia
2 parts titillation
1 part kick the teeth in action
1 part human drama

To me, the show reminds me of the original star trek:
HUMANS, with HUMAN MOTIVATIONS. Not UTOPIANS, with UNKNOWABLE motivations (like the next generation and most star trek after that)...

Anyone who faults the producer for not remaining true to the old series had better be kicking peter jackson in the pants for his raping of the lord of the rings series.


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## Elf Witch (Dec 10, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> I fail to see how anything needs to be excused. The producers and the owners of the property are under no obligation to be true to their fans. There is no contract, of trust, or otherwise, preventing them from taking an old idea and transforming it into something new. One of the things that annoys me the most out of so called "fans" is that they think that because something they watched something that entertained them, you are then in debt to them in some way and are obligated to satisfy their wishes. You (or the owners, producers, etc.) aren't. If you want to reimagine it, its your prerogative, end of story, unless the fans want to pay the studios the millions of dollars the property is actually worth and buy the property.
> 
> 
> 
> I don't see this at all. This is clearly a case where they were actually aknowledging the old show by placing the familliar elements into a historical context. I really don't see this as a problem.




I would like to point out the creator of the show Glen Larson was not to happy about Richard Hatch working on a new BSG show and tried to fight that and he was not happy about losing all creative control to the idea that he created to the producers who made this show. So he along with Richard Hatch and the fans who have written thousands of e-mails and snail mails in the last 25 years to try and bring BSG back were all basically screwed without even being taken to dinner first.  

I was not happy with the direction of the new show but I wanted to give it a fair shake I apporached it with the idea that I would not judge it based on one of my favorite shows. And I would base it soley on its on merits. Also one of the producers worked on my favorite Trek DS9 and I liked his work.

I did not like the show very much first of all  so much of it has been done before and done better. Terminator did a much better job with the whole we made machines and they turned on us heck The Forbin Project did it in the 60s. I thought that the graphic sex was not needed it did not feel part of the plot and instead felt like it was added to give little fanboys who will never have a chance to be with a real woman a cheap thrill.  

Also why for the sake of drama does everyone have to be so dyfunctional? I felt like I was watching an afternoon soap.

There was little that caught and held my attention.


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## jdavis (Dec 10, 2003)

JohnBrown said:
			
		

> Being a huge fan of the original as a child (heck, I even like Galactic a 1980), I have to say that I enjoyed the new BSG. After reading through all of the posts, some of the negative comments read as if some posters are wallowing in nostalgic feelings of a beloved childhood memory and not really looking at the new show itself. Not there is anything wrong with nostalgia. I have been re-watching old tapes of the original all last week, shows I haven’t seen (as sydicated re-runs) in 15+ years, and while they still have a special place in my heart, I just couldn’t believe just how bad some of those episodes were. I still love them, but gosh some of them were bad.
> 
> Some people were complaining about #6 being eye candy. Most of the time, so were the women of the old BSG (Cassiopeia, the hooker with a heart of gold. Simultaneously a useless character and a cliché). Some people were complaining that the new Starbuck is a cliché. The old one was too. The production values on the old show were horrendous. I couldn’t believe that, as a child, I didn’t notice that they were using the exact same shots for the space battles over and over and over again. Like or dislike them, at least these were new viper scenes. Some people have also been talking about the BSG fan base. Color me completely out of touch, but just exactly how big is this fan base? I am honestly not trying to be coy here. It has been 20+ years since anybody’s done anything with this property (that I am aware of), so just how big is the “loyal fan base?”
> 
> I am not trying to change anybody’s mind here. Different strokes for different folks. I just curious how much of the negative postings were do to remembering the original show being better than it actually was? I have been running into this sort of thing a lot myself lately. The other night I stumbled on to an episode of Speed Racer on cable. Man, I certainly remember that as being much better. I still think the Mach 5 is cool though.



Actually none of my remarks were tainted by nostalgia, the old show was good for a 70's show, but it was definatly a 70's show. The things I didn't like I wouldn't of liked even if this show had nothing to do with the Battlestar Galactica property and the things I did like I'd of liked in any show too. I've watched the first episode twice now and the second episode three times in a row (I'm watching it right now), good grief I don't think there is any more of a chance I can give this show but I just can't bring myself to like it.

As far as the fanbase goes it is bigger than you think. There has been a Battlestar Galactica revival movement going on for some time now and there have been Battlestar Galactica fan conventions. Richard Hatch made a trailer for a Galactica project he was trying to do and went around building up support, Glen Larson has also been trying to get a Galactica project together too. There was also a Bryan Singer and Tom DeSanto project at one time too. That's why there is so much hostility from this fanbase about the new show, they did a lot of work and put a lot of effort into getting a buzz going about a Galactica revival then they got a show where they were told that if you were a fan of the original show then this isn't for you (statement by Edward James Olmos). Oh and then you get to catch flack like this:


			
				Ranger REG said:
			
		

> Well, they did warned you. If you're a devoted closed-minded, one-tracked, _BSG_ fanatic, then don't watch it.
> 
> Otherwise, watch it with an open mind, assuming you *can be.* Let's say I won't hold my breath on that statement.



Yes actually being a fan of the old show makes you closed minded and stupid. What does a actual fan of a show know about why they are a fan of the show to start with? Fans of the old show are incapable of open thought or making up their own minds they should take what is given and be thankful for it. *No freaking wonder they are not real happy with all of this? *First they work to get a show they like brought back, then they get a show that is nothing like what they wanted, then they get insulted for actually having a opinion on the matter at all. Look sometimes people do take things a little too seriously but how do you think Star Trek fans would react if Star Trek was totally reimagined for the viewing public and the old show was thrown out completly? If people don't like the vast and sweeping changes made to Galactica then that is their perogative, just like it's the producers perogative to make the show they want to make.

Anyway, here is the links to some of the biggest sites:

http://www.richardhatch.com/

http://www.battlestargalactica.com/

http://battlestarfanclub.com/battlestar/

http://www.battlestarpegasus.com/

Interview with Richard hatch where he talks about how Galactica revival started (he's the one who originally approached USA studios in 1998 about Galactica): http://scifipulse.scifiwebs.com/Trek%20Archive/April/Richard_Hatch.htm


----------



## Wycen (Dec 10, 2003)

I didn't like the cylon reveal at the end.


----------



## Darrin Drader (Dec 10, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> Look sometimes people do take things a little too seriously but how do you think Star Trek fans would react if Star Trek was totally reimagined for the viewing public and the old show was thrown out completly?




Ever hear of a little show called Enterprise? Doesn't the temporal cold war pretty much make much of the history we think we know inaccurate?

I feel like I'm on an episode of Point/Counterpoint. Regardless, I felt that the miniseries was excellent on virtually all levels. No, this is not the same show I watched and loved as a kid. Heck, even with this re-imagining, I still love the original. But this show has the potential to be a great scifi. And despite the dysfunctionality of the characters, they were still the same characters. Despite his whining, Apollo was still courageous, heroic, and likable. Despite being female, Starbuck was still a rogue who talks too much and takes too many chances. 



Spoiler



OK, I take that back, Boomer is definitely not the same.



Anyway, this had just the right amount of space combat, grit, and humanity to make me come back for the series. I think it has the potential to be the best scifi TV series ever made. I don't say that lightly since I currently consider B5 to be the ultimate space opera ever shown on television.

Regardless, no one who knows anything about BSG will argue that Richard Hatch and a handfull of fans are probably responsible for creating interest in the franchise again. The problem is that it all comes back to business. If you make a show for the original fans, you will lose money. At 25 years after the original, the only way to get the ratings you need for a show like this is to go after a new fan base and try to take the majority of the old fans with you. You have to make it for a modern audience and you have to take into account that we have a better idea now of how computer technology should work than we did back in the '70s. I think that this series succeeds on all fronts. I suspect that the ratings were good enough for this to go to series, so the question now is where this show will take us.

Anyway at this point the whole question is thumbs up or thumbs down. I give it thumbs up.


----------



## Skade (Dec 10, 2003)

I'm of course waiting to see tomorrows episode, but it gets a thumbs up from me.  I don't know that I would be willing to claim that it could be the best sci-fi show given a chance, but I won't deny it either.  Right now my favorite sci-fi show is a toss up between Babylon5 and Stargate SG-1.  In each of those cases I initially could not stand it.  Oh, I watched cause I'm a glutton for punishment and kept hoping they would get better.  In both cases my hopes bore out beautifully.  I actually like this Battlestar Galactica better than each of those series' intial offerings.  

So, thumbs up and hopes high here.


----------



## Darrin Drader (Dec 10, 2003)

Uh Skade, there were only 2 parts to the miniseries. We'll have to wait for the series now.


----------



## Skade (Dec 10, 2003)

oops.    That felt abrupt then, I really expected something more.  That ending only works if it is a pilot, as a stand alone miniseries I would feel jipped.  I really thought there would be a third episode.


----------



## johnsemlak (Dec 10, 2003)

Have there been any reviews of the miniseries posted anywhere (other than the very imformative ones in this thread of course )?


----------



## jdavis (Dec 10, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Ever hear of a little show called Enterprise? Doesn't the temporal cold war pretty much make much of the history we think we know inaccurate?



 Yes and hasn't that really turned out to be a disaster for the franchise as a whole? It's polarized the Star Trek community and ratings have been less than stellar for the show. 

There really shouldn't be any suprise for these people that Galactica is getting hammered by this fan group, they have been getting hammered on the issue ever since the script leaked out last February. Sci Fi channel started editing out messageboard post of people wanting the old cast last March. Once again Sci Fi channel handled a public perception problem poorly. It really wouldn't of taken much to get these people to give the new show a shot and instead they alienated  and ignored them, the 18 to 25 year old demographic was more important than the shows actual long term fans. 



> Regardless, no one who knows anything about BSG will argue that Richard Hatch and a handfull of fans are probably responsible for creating interest in the franchise again. The problem is that it all comes back to business. If you make a show for the original fans, you will lose money. At 25 years after the original, the only way to get the ratings you need for a show like this is to go after a new fan base and try to take the majority of the old fans with you. You have to make it for a modern audience and you have to take into account that we have a better idea now of how computer technology should work than we did back in the '70s. I think that this series succeeds on all fronts. I suspect that the ratings were good enough for this to go to series, so the question now is where this show will take us.



 How do you know a show more geared to the original would of lost money? There were three different projects in the works geared to a continuation story (Including the Tom DeSanto/Bryan Singer project that was the original Sci Fi miniseries project http://www.cylon.org/bsg/desanto-revival01.html  and the Richard Hatch project: http://www.cylon.org/bsg/bsg-2come-01.html ). The new show managed to leave a large portion of the old fans behind and it remains to be seen how the ratings will go. It wasn't that bad (I didn't like it but I will give it that much) but there is no way of knowing how a continuation story would of done to say it would of been a failure the same goes for a remake of the original that wasn't a complete and total reimagining of the story. Myself I really wonder why they even bothered calling this Battlestar Galactica so much was changed it wouldn't of been that much of a stretch to change the names and a couple of ship designs and call it something else entirely.


----------



## Hand of Evil (Dec 10, 2003)

I like last nights better than the first and we still have not seen all 12 models!  

Boomer issue did not surprise me but I just wonder if Boomer 



Spoiler



is or is meant to be replaced with Cylon Boomer if there is a seasonal show.  Why did it not, she was interesting as a character, her boy friend dealing with the female engineer, and Boxey always was with a robot.  So, it was either she was going to die or be a spy.  



The female Starbuck still was a waste of screen time.  

The sexbot, ah, always love when they take from Farscape, not Harvey by a long shot but made Baltar fun.  

Still waiting for Lucifer to show up!


----------



## LightPhoenix (Dec 10, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> How do you know a show more geared to the original would of lost money? There were three different projects in the works geared to a continuation story (Including the Tom DeSanto/Bryan Singer project that was the original Sci Fi miniseries project http://www.cylon.org/bsg/desanto-revival01.html and the Richard Hatch project: http://www.cylon.org/bsg/bsg-2come-01.html ).



Because after 25 years of toiling, no progress was made.

If the fan-base was as much of a force as you claim it to be, something would have been done with the property a long time ago.

And I'd also point out none of these projects are on the air.


----------



## LightPhoenix (Dec 10, 2003)

My thoughts on part 2... alright, but kind of bleh.

First, they used _another_ kid!  In exactly the wrong way!  At least the first kid's death was an accident (and I think it was meant to be).  This was just dumb.

Baltar and Cylon 6?  Bah, done better in Farscape.  Sorry, but nothing beats Scorpius.

I kind of like the fact that Baltar chose the Cylon on the ship as the fall-guy... rather ironic.  Actually, I think he figured this out subconsciously, and was just convenient for him to reveal the Cylon device.



Spoiler



Boomer as a Clyon spy.  Meh.


 
I really hope we get to see the "old-model" Cylons in action, and not just as honor guard to the human-Cylons.  They really do look neat.

Definitely more of a hope feeling to this second part though, and I liked that.

I also like that the characters aren't perfect.  Perfect characters = boring.

But overall, the second half just kind of made me shrug.  I mean, it wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either... it was just kind of there.  I think the whole thing (both parts) could have used some editting and and been trimmed down to three hours and shown as one block.  The first part had the draw of revealing stuff (for better or worse, depending on your view), but the second had none of that.


----------



## GMVictory (Dec 10, 2003)

LightPhoenix said:
			
		

> Because after 25 years of toiling, no progress was made.
> 
> If the fan-base was as much of a force as you claim it to be, something would have been done with the property a long time ago.
> 
> And I'd also point out none of these projects are on the air.




Probably because they weren't "edgy" or "gritty" enough.


----------



## KenM (Dec 10, 2003)

I think number 6 and other cylon's that look like humans are one model, and the soldiers are another. Also: 



Spoiler



They said some people that are cylon's don't even know it. They are sleepes. I think Boomer is one of those


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

> I just curious how much of the negative postings were do to remembering the original show being better than it actually was?




They had reruns on SciFi, which I enjoyed. I didn't think the acting was bad, I didn't think the story was bad. I like the characters. And the show had a certain mood about it. Special effects were above par for a TV show for the 70's. (And yes, I noticed they tended to reuse shots). 

In short, I don't agree with those who think the original show was crap.


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

RolandOfGilead said:
			
		

> Anyone who faults the producer for not remaining true to the old series had better be kicking peter jackson in the pants for his raping of the lord of the rings series.




Um, nope. They changed _secondary_ characters in LotR. They changed _core_ characters in BSG.

As Colonel Hardisson said at NKL, if you are going to change and adapt a property, change the elements that didn't work (like, um, _Boxey_, not those that did work (like _Starbuck_.)


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

> Ever hear of a little show called Enterprise? Doesn't the temporal cold war pretty much make much of the history we think we know inaccurate?




Yup. But then, I think it's bad. (Worse, in fact, than BSG. Despite my criticism, I think the BSG mini-series has some clever bits and not half bad. But Enterprise, like Voyager, is drek.) Point?

And I am not just "hung up on nostalgia." I loved ST:TNG almost as much as TOS. If that was just nostalgia speaking, that wouldn't be the case.


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

> Still waiting for Lucifer to show up!




I thought of Six/the Reincarnating Cylons as the figurative equivalents of Count Ilbis from the show. After all, she is practically the voice of evil and temptation in Baltar's head.


----------



## Desdichado (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> They had reruns on SciFi, which I enjoyed. I didn't think the acting was bad, I didn't think the story was bad. I like the characters. And the show had a certain mood about it. Special effects were above par for a TV show for the 70's. (And yes, I noticed they tended to reuse shots).
> 
> In short, I don't agree with those who think the original show was crap.



Eh, I think my nostalgia (and my youth at the time) certainly made that show be remembered as better than it actually was.  Still, it wasn't a complete waste.  I still preferred (and prefer today, for that matter) the concurrent Gil Gerard Buck Rogers stuff, though.  _That's_ what I'd like to see "re-imagined" for the new millenium.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 10, 2003)

My nostalgia overrides my sense with regard to the original.  I just went and read some plot synopses on a fan website.  I remember a lot of the episodes based on that -- but what lousy writing and plot ideas!  AH, well, when you're eight you overlook a lot of that.

My question for this show (OK, one of many):  Where are all the people?  There's supposedly 50,000 civilians in the rag-tag fugitive fleet, and we know there are only 40 civilian ships (since that's all that had FTL).  That's an average population of 1250 per ship (actually higher, since you have ships like the prison barge with 500, and fuel ships that likely have a very small complement).

Galactica dwarfs any other ship in the fleet.  Now, we don't know how many people it carries (based on the original series tech stats, it had a crew of 500 plus 200 pilots, but carried 2000 in fugitive mode), but assume the 2,000 figure.  Even though it needs lots more room for fuel, ordnance, armor, fighters, etc, and that accounts for some of the size difference, I'm not sure I buy ships at 1/10th the tonnage carrying 2,000 each across the RTFF -- unless they're packed liked sardines, in which case there's the whole food/water/O2/waste problem that gets handwaved -- if they're packed like that, it's unlikely that O2 scrubbers are designed for that population, for example, and things re likely to break down pretty quickly.

I enjoyed the show, certainly as much as the original, but things like this had my wife and I scratching our heads through the whole thing.


----------



## jasper (Dec 10, 2003)

Let see a million dollar an hour show which may have rated once or twice in the top forty ratings.
Let see
Commander Amanda Hard ass leader who hates politicians but love his kid even when the kid is right. Hmm how has the character changed. Oh Instead of sucking it up and moving on losing Zack. He is upset because he lost one his sons. So far no much change.
Col Tieg step and fetch boy who would occasionally bring the hammer down on both the commander and the good old boys and occasional girl hot shot pilot.
Apollo Up tight flyboy who mostly right. Hmm still the same
Starbuck Cigar smoking hard drinking, poker playing pilot who has a smart mouth. Oh my god he has breastesss. It is the end of the universe.
Boomer backup who tried to keep the main two pilots out trouble. 
Boxey no lines no problem
The President this character has a super heart ache and nice scene on silent running garden ship.
Baltar for no reason I going to betray the whole human race. To keep my skin I am going hunt down BG and his little vipers too. They have changed a 1 dimensional character to two. Plus if they do have a series, the mind chip has nice possibilities as long as don’t over do it.
Seven of nine, number 12, number 5, hugh, Um the babe. Eye candy with double oh dresses and scenes which could not be done thirty years ago. 

The hard core fans remind me of all the bitching that when on the next generation was in its first season. Or Shatner’s SNL get a life clip hate love fest. 

The actors now have 2.5 dimensional characters compared to 2 dimensional ones of 70. Except for sex and sex changes nothing much has been changed. 

How many fans had conventions for the Charlie Angels and they got 2 movies. 
How many Columbo conventions were there and how often has that series came back.
Hey Fan People. Hollywood cares only about the money and the ratings. Don’t care about loyalty to the show or its fans. Don’t really care about your lame letter writing campaigns.
B5 still got the ax in its fourth season even with superior writing, good eye candy both babes, battles and beef cake due to its low ratings.
Face it good people until a Scific show can pull the same ratings as CSI, Friends or ER the Hollywood PTB will still think of us a pimp faced parent’s basement dwelling morons.


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

There a few things I either missed or they didn't explain very well. Can anyone answer:

Where did the note that Adama found at the end come from?


----------



## Storm Raven (Dec 10, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> *Did it not occur to you that the reason these character are cliche is because many of them are extremely realistic in military settings and the others are in there so that the rest of us have someone in the cast to relate to? Exactly how would you have rewritten the characters so that they're less cliche?*





No. They are cliched because they have become easy to write. When all you are doing is rewriting something that has already been written, your job as a writer is easier. Cliches are the lazy writer's crutch. The unskilled writer's crutch. None of them are "extremely realistic", because they are caricatures at best, outright inventions of hollywood at worst (the wrong headed commanding officer/politician being the worst example).



> *How about the situations you find cliche? Have people not sacrificed themselves during war time by jumping on a hand grenade to save their friends? Have commanders not given the order to sacrifice the lives of soldiers to accomplish their objectives? Have politicians never interfered in military affairs? If the answer to any of these questions is no, then I suggest you go speak to a few vets who have actually served during war time.*





It has happened on occassion. However, these things have been rehashed in so many movies that they have become tired, worn out cliches. All cliches were new once. A long time ago. At that point they were interesting plot elements. Then they become stock "off the rack" crutches that substitute for actual writing, as lazy screenwriters reuse the same material over and over rather than come up with something new. At that point, they become boring and worthy of derision.


----------



## BiggusGeekus (Dec 10, 2003)

Elf Witch said:
			
		

> Also why for the sake of drama does everyone have to be so dyfunctional? I felt like I was watching an afternoon soap.




Yes, yes, yes!

OK, I like what they're doing with the new Baltar -- even though I agree the old one could betray the new one's butt six ways to sunday -- but what they're doing with Boomer is a crying shame.  The voice of the everyman caught up in big events has been reduced to a plot twist.  Nurraugh!!!

And the guy with the tie should be shoved out an airlock; it's for the greater good.


----------



## Zenon (Dec 10, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> Man they reimagined the hell out of that didn't they. Oh well here we go for Part 2.




Well, I'll address a few of your points with my opinions:



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 1. Out of all the characters they left out or drastically changed they decided to keep Boxey? WTF? Boxey got a part but every single female lead from the old show was cut? At least he didn't have a robot dog, but come on getting rid of Boxey is one of the few things that even the die hard fans wouldn't of minded all that much.




Yeah, I almost said the same thing. I figured the boy was going to be named Boxy when Boomer had him in the cockpit when they lifted off. It was the bowl haircut that gave it away. At least he doesn't seem as annoying as the old Boxy so far. Some spoilers: 



Spoiler



I should have seen it coming, the original Boxy had a robot dog, this one has a robot mom!


 


			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 2. Still don't like the Cylons or anything about the Cylons or anything remotely to do with the Cylons. At least greasy arms dealer Cylon didn't try to French Kiss Adama during their fight. I just didn't buy into them, their technology, their fighters or the new basestars. I did like the new centurions but they had all of two scenes as background, they did nothing but stand there and look cool.




I was also a little disappointed that we didn't see more of the new centurions. As for them being "human-ized", it's a typical ST:TOS trick to save on special effects - "Wow, these aliens look humanoid, but are blue or have a weird forehead!". For the BSG story, it works because I felt that the Cylons were trying to actually "be" human.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 3. So happy they blamed the technology problem on Baltar's navagation program, that works so much better than them being able to control computers at a whim. So score one fix for episode 2. I also liked that after the battle scene at the end they had mixed in the new vipers with the old ones, showing it was Baltar's program and not _*computers=evil*_ that messed them up.




I didn't feel it was a "fix" per se, we were told that Cylons could infiltrate computer systems 40 years ago. I also figured that they had planted a virus or backdoor with #6's access to the Defense Network.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 4. Baltar was the best thing about the show, I could almost see myself watching a series just to keep up with his Dr. Smith-like hyjinks. He was the only saving grace of the show for me.




Really? To me he was beginning to get a little annoying by the end of the 2nd part. I hope if they do a series they tone it down a little.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 5. Still didn't like the sets or uniforms either. I will give them credit for trying to show more of the Galactica inside though.




At least the uniforms and sets looked functional (if not totally realistic), I didn't mind them. I liked the military jargon and submarine maneuvering more than the old series with the "big window" view. Heck, I liked it much better than the "ST:TNG spandex pajama" look that's so prevalent in scifi shows.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 6. "Find me some Bullets." come on I about turned it off at that point, after trying to make me believe this is a military operation then they have him say something so stupid? Come on ordinance, weapontry, ammunition, supplies, armaments, shells, heck even provisions would of done, but bullets? It makes him sound like he's going to the OK corral with his six shooter. Bullets are for small arms, the Galactica was firing shells and/or missles and a military commander would of known the difference. I really prefer lasers in space to start with anyway, where will they ever get any more ammo from now?




This was a colloquial phrase. I'm sure Adama knows what a warhead is, he was telling Tigh "Get me something to shoot". Also, we saw that most of Galactica weaponry is energy weapons (all their point defense weapons). If I remember from the old show, they did have some huge launchers, but they rarely used them except vs. Basestars. The other disposable ordinace would have been for the Raptors, small arms, etc. The Vipers appeared to be armed with a pulse energy weapon also.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 7. They failed to sell me on the space battle stuff too, it was jumpy and hard to follow and I personally just didn't care for it. Call it a difference of opinion but I found it looked terribly lame in both episodes. I guess I just like my lasers too much.




The camera angle was hard to follow sometimes, but I felt it was a deliberate attempt to show the chaos and confusion that happens in battle.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> 8. If people were having a fit over Boomer being a woman I bet they will really have a fit over
> 
> 
> 
> ...




See Skade's spoiler post, I thought the same thing he did when it was revealed.



			
				jdavis said:
			
		

> Overall I'd have to say I was disappointed with it, I gave it a shot and it just didn't do it for me. I really wish it hadn't blown the chance for a continuation story of the old show as that is just the Battlestar Galactica show that I prefer. This was too gritty for my taste in a space opera and I really found nothing special about the writing or the reimagining of the story, except for Baltar. I opened my mind and I gave it a chance and it wasn't as bad as I expected it to be, but I just didn't like it.




It's ok to be disappointed, not everyone has the same tastes. At least you gave it a shot before you made your decision.


----------



## Gallo22 (Dec 10, 2003)

Silver Moon said:
			
		

> Well you did better than me.  I didn't make it beyond the first commercial break.  There's just something about innocent babies getting murdered that I don't find all that entertaining.
> 
> (Just my opinion, please don't read the above as an invitation for a flame war.  I'm sure there are lots of people who enjoyed the show.)




I'm with you.  That part really bother me.  Their was no reason for it at all.

Gallo22


----------



## Storm Raven (Dec 10, 2003)

jasper said:
			
		

> B5 still got the ax in its fourth season even with superior writing, good eye candy both babes, battles and beef cake due to its low ratings.




Umm, B5 didn't get the axe in it's fourth season. It ran for a full five season run.


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

> Heck, I liked it much better than the "ST:TNG spandex pajama" look that's so prevalent in scifi shows.




Instead beginning a new trend of having every show copy B5.


----------



## Gallo22 (Dec 10, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> Well where to start at. (note these are only my personal opinions, I'm not a doctor nor do I play one on TV.)
> 
> Warning: Spoilers ahead.
> 
> ...


----------



## Zenon (Dec 10, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> I think the problem here is not that they are military cliches they are entertainment cliches. In the real military 2/3rds of this crew would of been discharged and several of them would of been courtmartialed. These weren't real military cliches at all they were "The Dirty Dozen" characters, they were the cast of "Top  Gun" cliches their characters weren't realistic they were gritty and flawed, all of them were flawed, every single character in the show was flawed in some way. Their Military disipline was pathetic, they wouldn't even hold up to military dress codes and lets not even get into military personel having sexual contact while on duty (or off duty for that matter). Gritty and dark does not equal realistic it just equals gritty and dark, this is TV entertainment not a documentary on military life. And as far as asking vets about this stuff I got a feeling most of them would laugh their asses off at the suggestion this show had anything at all on real military life during a war.




I wasn't bothered by the lapses in discipline. From the impression I got, being stationed on the Galactica wasn't exactly the "top spot" or most prestigious posting in the fleet. At one point we are told that 30 Battlestars are destroyed which is 1/4 of the fleet, so say 120 Battlestars, all newer and most likely more effective combat units. IIRC from the old series, the Atlantia was the flagship of the fleet.

So getting posted to a duty station way out in the outer system on a floating museum isn't exactly where you find your best men, especially since it was being readied for decommission. Let's look at the crew:

Adama: washed up old war dog
Tigh: old drunken XO
Starbuck: problem anywhere she is posted, relegated to the "boonies" where she can't screw anything up.

Not exactly the cream of the crop. That explained most of the lapses in discipline to me. And now that most of humanity is gone, we got to see more PDA (public displays of affection) simply because people are happy to still be alive (and have ones they care about still alive as well).


----------



## Storm Raven (Dec 10, 2003)

Zenon said:
			
		

> I wasn't bothered by the lapses in discipline. From the impression I got, being stationed on the Galactica wasn't exactly the "top spot" or most prestigious posting in the fleet. At one point we are told that 30 Battlestars are destroyed which is 1/4 of the fleet, so say 120 Battlestars, all newer and most likely more effective combat units. IIRC from the old series, the Atlantia was the flagship of the fleet.




Except, that if you want to be hardheadedly realistic about things, even on the "worst ship in the fleet", breaches of discipline like the ones shown on BSG would have gotten the offenders tossed out of the service long before the events of the miniseries. You are just used to bad cliched screenwriting that ignores things like military discipline and think that you could concivably get away with this sort of crap and not be drummed out of the service posthaste.


----------



## trilobite (Dec 10, 2003)

I really really like it. 

Production values where very good in my opinion. I LOVED the space combat scenes. Good acting and story. A very stylish update of Galactica in my mind.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> There a few things I either missed or they didn't explain very well. Can anyone answer:
> 
> Where did the note that Adama found at the end come from?




I'm guessing Baltar left it, but who knows?

And you'd think that a civiliation that could invent FTL drive could do witha few letter quality printers, instead of that antiquated dot-matrix stuff.



			
				Stormraven said:
			
		

> Except, that if you want to be hardheadedly realistic about things, even on the "worst ship in the fleet", breaches of discipline like the ones shown on BSG would have gotten the offenders tossed out of the service long before the events of the miniseries. You are just used to bad cliched screenwriting that ignores things like military discipline and think that you could concivably get away with this sort of crap and not be drummed out of the service posthaste.




Particularly since the war has been over for a long time (they weren't remotely expecting a Cylon attack).  Military organizations tend to get more hidebound and regulation-focused the longer they go without fighting -- a "peacetime" military wouldn't tolerate a Starbuck-like cliche for a minute (not that a wartime military would likely tolerate some of the egregious displays off ill-discipline shown, either).


----------



## Zenon (Dec 10, 2003)

Storm Raven said:
			
		

> Except, that if you want to be hardheadedly realistic about things, even on the "worst ship in the fleet", breaches of discipline like the ones shown on BSG would have gotten the offenders tossed out of the service long before the events of the miniseries. You are just used to bad cliched screenwriting that ignores things like military discipline and think that you could concivably get away with this sort of crap and not be drummed out of the service posthaste.




True, but since it's a story and not a "reailty TV show" I find I don't have to be "hardheadedly realistic" about it. I approach watching it the same way I approach gaming, that is to say with a moderate level of "suspension of disbelief".

I do understand how this can bother some people, I'm just saying I am not one of them that it does. I can stretch my belief to accept it as part of the story, realistic or not.


----------



## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

> And you'd think that a civiliation that could invent FTL drive could do witha few letter quality printers, instead of that antiquated dot-matrix stuff.




Heh. You'd be surprised at what our military still uses...

That said, I just sort of assumed that the 12 colonies have great space propulsion tech, not so great computer tech.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> Heh. You'd be surprised at what our military still uses...




Not really ...


----------



## Dahak (Dec 10, 2003)

Well, thankfully it was better than I was expecting it to be. Most of the Saga of Star World episode was kept in, in altered form. There are analogies to most of the key points of the original. It almost seems like a Marvel Ultimates retelling of the same story.

That said, my only real gripe is that it is a remake rather than a sequel. Considering the museum pieces they had of classic centurions and basestars, it would have made sense to me to have it set a few generations after the original. Earth could have been destroyed instead of letting Caprica get it again. Flight names could have been taken in honour of the former holders. The Cylons made by humans (instead of by "true" cylons) could have explained away with some hidden text found on Earth after the colonial landing, still making humanity responsible. Plus, the surviving Earthlings could have a real beef with the Colonials for bringing the Cylons there. Wouldn't have taken that much of a rewrite, IMO.


----------



## RatPunk (Dec 10, 2003)

tecnowraith said:
			
		

> Thes mess up the design of the new Galaitica on howthe Vipers were suppose to leave the hanger. In the orinigal, the Vipers left the hanger from the end part, not from the sides of the new one.



I just want to point out that this is absolutely incorrect. The Vipers in the original series were always launched from tubes in the sides of the landing bays. If I were at home, I could even include photographic evidence.


----------



## RatPunk (Dec 10, 2003)

Joshua Dyal said:
			
		

> Eh, sci-fi fans are not notorious football watchers, I've found.



Almost everyone in my gaming group are football fans. There are a good number of football fans here at ENWorld and over at RPG.net as well. If not for the fact that I wasn't that interested in the Rams/Browns game on Monday night, I would have been forced to wait until Tuesday night to catch Part 1.


----------



## Storm Raven (Dec 10, 2003)

Zenon said:
			
		

> True, but since it's a story and not a "reailty TV show" I find I don't have to be "hardheadedly realistic" about it. I approach watching it the same way I approach gaming, that is to say with a moderate level of "suspension of disbelief".
> 
> I do understand how this can bother some people, I'm just saying I am not one of them that it does. I can stretch my belief to accept it as part of the story, realistic or not.




But you miss the point of my comment. I pointed out that the characters in this version of BSG were basically stock military cliches, pulled off the "hollywood movie screenwriting" rack, with nothing interesting about them.

The response was that they were cliched becase the "cliches are realistic". My response concerning hardheaded realism points out that the cliches are _not_ realistic, hence trying to prop up the use of worn out military cliche characters with the defense that "they are realistic" is silly, and counterfactual.

You know what _would_ have been innovative and interesting? If the script had called for _actually realistic_ military characters to fill the slots on the Galactica. That would have been a new take on the idea. Instead, we just get rehashed cliches that people think are realistic because they have seen too many John Wayne movies.


----------



## Hand of Evil (Dec 10, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> Heh. You'd be surprised at what our military still uses...
> 
> That said, I just sort of assumed that the 12 colonies have great space propulsion tech, not so great computer tech.




Plus I think they want the viewer to think this was an older model ship and old tech provides that visually.  As far as having the tech for FTL drive, well we have had nuclear engines a lot longer than we have had small PCs and if we put forth the effort in the space race of the 60s we could have better space tech too.


----------



## Elf Witch (Dec 10, 2003)

jasper said:
			
		

> Let see a million dollar an hour show which may have rated once or twice in the top forty ratings.
> Let see
> Commander Amanda Hard ass leader who hates politicians but love his kid even when the kid is right. Hmm how has the character changed. Oh Instead of sucking it up and moving on losing Zack. He is upset because he lost one his sons. So far no much change.
> Col Tieg step and fetch boy who would occasionally bring the hammer down on both the commander and the good old boys and occasional girl hot shot pilot.
> ...




Did you watch the same show as I did. Because you are off on a lot of this. First BSG was often in the top 40 it was not canceled due to low ratings if it had not been such an expensive show to make the studio would have been overjoyed over its ratings, shows with less numbers were not canceled. To justify the cost the show needed to be shown on Sundays where the big bucks were for ads at the time ,it did not come in the top ten which is what it needed.

Adama did not hate politicians he had been a member of the council of 12 for a long time he was good friends with the president. He believed in the system if he had not he had the power to do something about it. As for Zac he sucked it up he had to there was not a lot of time to grieve but there were scenes a great one with Athena where he talks about the pressure of playing god.

Col Tigh was also Adama's old friend and wingman and he was the one who hated  politicians.

Apollo was never uptight what he was, was an honorable man with a sense of duty a loyal son father husband and friend. Willing to lay down his life for the people he swore to protect. If this was DnD he would have been a paladin.

Starbuck sure he was all that but as the show progressed you saw why he was like that he was afraid of losing people after all he was an orphan. Dirk Benedict brought charm to the role this new Starbuck has not done that as of yet.

Boxey I never had a problem with the kid I thought he added charm to the show. Showed what it was like from a childs point of view. I loved how well he adapted. Muffit was another story but it was a product of its time.

Baltar had a reason for his betryal POWER plain and simple the agreement he made with the cyclon's was simple the other colonies destroyed his colony spared and all humanity to be under his rule that is hardly no reason.

As a hard core Trek fan I loved Shatner's get a life but then I have a sense of humor. I didn't like Next Gen but not because it was not TOS but because I often found the characters to be smug and sanctimomious. But I also realized the fact that the show was a success made it possible for the show I loved to have more movies made about it.

Sorry since I did not find the 70s show characters to be 2.0 I disagree with this. I found a lot of these characters to be 2.0 because they were just sterotypes been there seen it a nd seen done better.

Of course Hollywood only cares for ratings it is a business and they don't want mine I am the wrong sex and age so my opinion does not count. Charlie's Angels was not the same type of show it is apples and oranges comparing them. SF shows tend to have more of a devoted following. 

And since this America I have the right to bitch moan and complain all I want to  about them changing my favorite show.


----------



## Simplicity (Dec 10, 2003)

Well, I thought it was a great show, and I hope SCI-FI goes on to 
produce a series out of it.  Sure the Cylon Centurions were not shown
much.  Good.  Save it for the series.  It'll just be all the more impressive
when they do get shown.

The miniseries has a heck of a lot more potential than most of the other 
SCI-FI series pilots I've seen.


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## Psion (Dec 10, 2003)

Good observations, Elf Witch, and I agree with most of them.

I think the one character I came away liking more was Baltar. He seems much more three dimensional in the mini-series. In the original, he was well acted, but a stock scummy villain.


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## Storm Raven (Dec 10, 2003)

Hand of Evil said:
			
		

> Plus I think they want the viewer to think this was an older model ship and old tech provides that visually.




I think you give them too much credit. This style of printer was used on all of the ships, including the ship the Education Secretary-to-President was tooling around in.


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## jasper (Dec 10, 2003)

Storm Raven said:
			
		

> Umm, B5 didn't get the axe in it's fourth season. It ran for a full five season run.




BUZZ  It got axed then picked up for the fifth season. That is the reason the war was wrapped up in fourth. And the fifth was left floudering in water.

witch is right the original started in 11th and ended 24th for the season.  oops.
I still say both series are 2 dimensional. you could took apollo to the black sheet squardon and he would fit in a little. Star buck on the other hand would just blend right in.


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## RyanL (Dec 10, 2003)

I absolutely loved the new Battlestar Galactica.  It really drew me in.

I only have vague memories of reruns of the original show.  I don't even usually like sci-fi all that much.  When I saw "Battlestar Galactica" in the channel guide, it triggered my memory, and I figured I'd give it a shot.  I'm glad I did.

-Ryan


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## NewJeffCT (Dec 10, 2003)

it wasn't bad, but the baby killing in the beginning and the little girl in the stranded ship that got blown up as they faded to commerical were a little too dark for me - you just don't kill babies like that in a movie or TV show.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 10, 2003)

jasper said:
			
		

> BUZZ  It got axed then picked up for the fifth season. That is the reason the war was wrapped up in fourth. And the fifth was left floudering in water.




BUZZ. If it got axed, it was only because the Prime Time Network (a cable network that would show on a variety of smaller cable channels) itself went under. TNT, in their one kind act that defies reason and logic, saved this one show from that network while all the others disappeared. And then they turned around and killed Crusade a year later.


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## Hand of Evil (Dec 10, 2003)

Storm Raven said:
			
		

> I think you give them too much credit. This style of printer was used on all of the ships, including the ship the Education Secretary-to-President was tooling around in.



I know I do.  

I was also making jokes today that the cylons secret weapon was an universial remote controller.


----------



## jester47 (Dec 11, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> Yes and hasn't that really turned out to be a disaster for the franchise as a whole? It's polarized the Star Trek community and ratings have been less than stellar for the show.




Like the Star Trek Community wasn't polarised before?  Come on, its been polarised since Trekkie and Trekker; TOS and TNG; and the advent of slash fiction.  I mean scifi fanbases built around long running materials are by their very nature polarised because one segment of the population always thinks its more pure and knows better than the others.  This mirrors a lot of religious squabbles that happen because one group just knows better or are more pure then the rest.  The BSG fanbase was never "united," and neither was the Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Star trek, Space 1999, Dr. Who, Conan, Blakes 7, The Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Dune, and any other program, game, book or whatnot with a cult following.  Its the nature of the beast, and the pattern goes back into history for thousands and thousands of years, with science, religion, history, and whatever subject that attracts human interest.  The "Franchise"  is fine.  The new material may not take a form you like, but hey, if we don't like it, we can go back to the original stuff and shun the new ways.  

Aaron.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

LightPhoenix said:
			
		

> Because after 25 years of toiling, no progress was made.
> 
> If the fan-base was as much of a force as you claim it to be, something would have been done with the property a long time ago.
> 
> And I'd also point out none of these projects are on the air.



Actually the toiling got started in late 1998 with Richard Hatch making a trailer with personal funds to try and convince Studio USA to do a new Galactica (which is the studio who did the new Galactica). There were tens of thousands of letters and crappy online petiton drives and such and in the end Universal (who ownes studio USA and the Battlestar Galactica rights) decided a new version might work, enter Bryan Singer/Tom Desanto (of the X men movies), then they did X2 instead and Studio USA got the guys who did this new show. There was some hinkey stuff in there but then there is always hinkey gossip stuff when Sci Fi channel is involved. Richard Hatch had finacial backing (I believe it was around 40 million) but Universal owns the rights to the show, so you will only see their version. Do you really think Universal would let three different versions of Galactica be done? The reason we got this one was because it was the version the Sci Fi execs wanted (the same ones who wanted Tremors the series and axed Farscape. Not that I'm bitter or anything ). If Hatch had the tv rights his would of been made, if Larson had the movie rights there would of been Larson's movie, but Vivindi Universal has the rights so we got the Studio USA version.


----------



## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

Why do so many people put faith in Larson? The guy has an established track record for bad TV and being a hack in general. In fact, I would argue that Battlestar Galactica and Magnum PI are the two shows that Larson actually did right. That said, why do people think that he could do any better than what we were given? Personally if I were to choose anyone else to helm BSG, it would be Richard Hatch. The problem there is that he would probably use the show as a vehicle to advance his celebrity status by deemphasizing other characters and placing Apollo at the center of everything.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Zenon said:
			
		

> It's ok to be disappointed, not everyone has the same tastes. At least you gave it a shot before you made your decision.



By some of my post people might think I'm mad or fanatical or something here but actually I'm not loosing any sleep over this, it's just fun to dig into the trenches of a good discusion. My main gripe for the whole thing is that they took off their normal Stargate Monday schedule for this, besides it's a good way to practice my goggle-fu techniques. 

I really wanted a decent Galactica series because I really want something decent on tv to watch, it's not like I wanted to dislike this show, I was digging for reasons to like it.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Why do so many people put faith in Larson? The guy has an established track record for bad TV and being a hack in general. In fact, I would argue that Battlestar Galactica and Magnum PI are the two shows that Larson actually did right. That said, why do people think that he could do any better than what we were given? Personally if I were to choose anyone else to helm BSG, it would be Richard Hatch. The problem there is that he would probably use the show as a vehicle to advance his celebrity status by deemphasizing other characters and placing Apollo at the center of everything.



It's funny but Larson and Hatch were fueding over Galactica's future before this all started, Larson's ideas were not really liked, but he got credit from the community for doing a continuation story instead of a re-imagining (that's about it). I found some references to his story, it revolved around the Battlestar Pegasus finding earth and had the vipers becoming like the Veritech fighters from the Macross anime. If sounded pretty darn lame to me, but he had started pre-production work, he just couldn't get the movie rights. I've also heard rumors he is working on a new Knight Rider movie, I hope he can't get the rights to that either. I was just using him to point out that there were other ideas with a lot of backing out there. I'm not sure what happened between Richard Hatch and the woman at Sci Fi (whose name escapes me right now, it's the exec everybody always talks about) but he was the one who got his foot in the door, then Singer/DeSanto got it (and I think DeSanto wanted Hatch and Dirk Bennidict involved with his version too) but I never saw why he left the project (Singer left to do X2). Larson's project was completly separate from Universal and he was going to finance it as a independant film.

edit: I was trying to find out more on the timeline bit here and it looks like the DeSanto/Singer project may have involved Glen Larson and was meant to be a Fox TV series. It also looks like the Sci Fi version may of been pushed because the show rights were about to revert back to Larson. Once again I could be mistaken as I have only been looking for background info for 2 days now and there is so much more than I thought out there, some of it contradictory.


----------



## Zenon (Dec 11, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> By some of my post people might think I'm mad or fanatical or something here but actually I'm not loosing any sleep over this, it's just fun to dig into the trenches of a good discusion.




I never got the impression you were being fanatical, and it has been a pretty good discussion so far. Everyone's being pretty civil about it (and granted, BSG doesn't have the following of something like LotR that can really wind up fans of it).

Trust me, I know your disappointment. I was actually prepared not to like it after hearing about all the changes they were going to make in the "re-imaging" of it, but they won me over.


----------



## MaxKaladin (Dec 11, 2003)

I am cautiously optimistic.  

There were things I didn't like.  Starbuck, for instance, just didn't seem right.  It isn't because she is a woman but rather because the performance seemed forced.  Like the actress was trying too hard to be butch.  I just wasn't convinced.  I wasn't real crazy about the uniforms either.  The officer's uniforms were ok, but I hate that stupid muscle shirt over t-shirt thing they kept doing.  Like everyone else, it seems, I wanted to see more of the metallic cylons instead of just the "human" ones.  I also hated how everyone seemed to be _too_ flawed.  The whole show was rather darker than I really like, but that's to be expected given what was going on at the time.  It's hard to make the destruction of a civilization seem bright and cheerful.

I liked things too.  I really liked Baltar.  

As I said, I really liked Baltar.  It seemed to me that they were being very subtle with his character.  You got the impression that he didn't intend for anything bad to happen and was not a traitor in the least, but also that he certainly looked out for himself before thinking of others.  You got several scenes where you wondered about his actions and what motivated him such as the scene on the bridge and afterward.  They've really set up an interesting conflict with him.  I can see people watching any series just to see what goes on with Baltar not unlike the following Lex Luthor has on Smallville.  

The new Boxey doesn't bother me, but the old one didn't either.  Then again, I don't generally get annoyed by kids so take that as you will.  I will note that this kid is older than the original Boxey.  The old one was about 7 or 8 in the old show and this one looks maybe 11 or so.  That can make a big difference in the character.  Interesting sidenote:  When looking at the IMDB entry for the show, I discovered that the officer on the station at the very beginning was listed as "Boxey's Father".  You hear Boxey later mention his father was in the colonial fleet and that he was told he was missing but he thought he was dead.  

Another thing I noticed was a very short scene where Col. Tigh was lying on his bunk (not too long after the fight with Starbuck) and he started burning a picture of a woman who I presume was his wife.  It was a picture of number 6.  

I do have to wonder how they're going to do a series out of this.  If they have gotten away from the cylons, where is the conflict going to come from?  I hope it won't be "alien of the week" scenarios.  I doubt they could pull off earth very well either.  I hear the miniseries exceeded ratings expectations, so I guess we'll see.  

ps:  Remember when a "mini-series" was ten or twenty hours of television over several nights, not a long movie?


----------



## MaxKaladin (Dec 11, 2003)

My votes for favorite quotes:

Tyrol(?): "We have to move them [vipers] over to the port tube"
Starbuck: "Why can't we use the starboard tube?"
Tyrol: "It's a gift shop."

and

Adama (looking away from a planning session to watch the president's aid talking with a woman working on the bridge): "They better start making babies."
Tigh:  (after a long silence where everyone looks to see what Adama is staring at) "Is that an order, sir?"


----------



## LightPhoenix (Dec 11, 2003)

MaxKaladin said:
			
		

> Another thing I noticed was a very short scene where Col. Tigh was lying on his bunk (not too long after the fight with Starbuck) and he started burning a picture of a woman who I presume was his wife. It was a picture of number 6.



Interesting, and missed.



> ps: Remember when a "mini-series" was ten or twenty hours of television over several nights, not a long movie?



_Roots_!

"My name's Kizzy, K-I-Z-Z-Y!"


----------



## Zenon (Dec 11, 2003)

For those that missed it in the credits, I found it interesting that Glen Larson was a consulting producer on the new BSG.

From SciFi.com's blurb about the BSG Crew:







> SCI FI PICTURES, USA CABLE and ACES AND EIGHTS PRODUCTIONS
> 
> BATTLESTAR GALACTICA
> 
> ...




Does anyone know how much input he had into the new BSG?


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

jester47 said:
			
		

> Like the Star Trek Community wasn't polarised before? Come on, its been polarised since Trekkie and Trekker; TOS and TNG; and the advent of slash fiction. I mean scifi fanbases built around long running materials are by their very nature polarised because one segment of the population always thinks its more pure and knows better than the others. This mirrors a lot of religious squabbles that happen because one group just knows better or are more pure then the rest. The BSG fanbase was never "united," and neither was the Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Star trek, Space 1999, Dr. Who, Conan, Blakes 7, The Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Dune, and any other program, game, book or whatnot with a cult following. Its the nature of the beast, and the pattern goes back into history for thousands and thousands of years, with science, religion, history, and whatever subject that attracts human interest. The "Franchise" is fine. The new material may not take a form you like, but hey, if we don't like it, we can go back to the original stuff and shun the new ways.
> 
> Aaron.



As far as Trek goes I never liked Star Trek all that much to begin with. But last I saw the Enterprise ratings weren't that good, was the whole temporal cold war a good idea? Was upsetting the fanatic fans (the ones who always watched no matter how bad it got) a good idea? eh, I didn't like Trek anyway. The whole Galactica thing could of been avoided so easily, just don't be rude to the fans. The Franchise will live or die (to early to say it's fine yet) and I'm fine with that, but did Sci FI channel really need another PR black eye with a group of science fiction fans? Statements were released that basically told fans of the old show to not watch the new show, how freaking retarded do you have to be to insult your most vocal fanbase like that, were they trying to get lower ratings? Give these people a little attention and maybe throw them a bone or two and your garanteed a extra 20 to 30 thousand people will tune in every week like rabid fanatics. Tell them they are unimportant and don't know what they are talking about and you not only hurt this show you hurt the entire network that is supposed to cater to Sci Fi fans. These people just wanted a new show they could watch and enjoy and they were told 6 months ago to not even bother tuning in.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Zenon said:
			
		

> For those that missed it in the credits, I found it interesting that Glen Larson was a consulting producer on the new BSG.
> 
> From SciFi.com's blurb about the BSG Crew:
> 
> Does anyone know how much input he had into the new BSG?



By what I have seen was that he had very little to do with this (posibly nothing at all) it was just a credit for his original story. He had his own Galactica project and was unhappy with Universal not letting him go ahead with it. Of course Larson is responsible for lots of old shows that they may want to remake too (70's Buck Rodgers, Six million dollar man, and many others: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0488991/ ). He's not listed at all on the iMDB crew list either: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0314979/fullcredits . I could be wrong but I think that was mainly just a credit for what they were basing this on.


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## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

some older articles on the show I ran across.
Review of the script from Filmjerk.com from last February: http://www.filmjerk.com/nuke/article354.html

Nixflix review of the show: http://www.nixflix.com/reviews/battlestar2003.htm

Edward James Olmos quote: http://us.imdb.com/SB?20030711#7



> In one of the oddest promotional appearances ever before the TV Writers Summer Tour, Edward James Olmos, who is starring in a new Battlestar Galactica miniseries due to air on the Sci-Fi Channel, gave this advice to fans of the original _Galactica_ series, which aired on ABC between 1978 and 1980: "Please don't watch this program," Olmos said. "Buy yourself the new DVDs that they're putting out of the old episodes, and whenever we come on, just put that one in. ... Trust me. Don't watch it. If you're a real, real staunch Battlestar Galactica person, please don't watch it."



IGN.com tv review: http://filmforce.ign.com/articles/444/444434p1.html?fromint=1

post.gazette.com review: http://www.post-gazette.com/tv/20031207owenp1.asp

eclipsemagazine.com: http://www.eclipsemagazine.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=806&page=0

southsound.com: http://www.tribnet.com/24hour/entertainment/v-southsound/story/1077821p-7528475c.html

Page with several links to articles on new Galactica: http://tv.surfwax.com/files/Battlestar_Galactica_TV.html


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

I remember that quote. It was then that I decided for sure that I was going to treat it like an entirely new show rather than expecting something that would serve as a continuation.

Last I heard Larson does have the rights to do a movie and is still moving forward with a film project. I hope this doesn't turn into New BSG (lighter and more bubbly) and BSG Classic (the same taste everyone remembers, except that they switched to a different sweetener).


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Ok I may of nailed down what happened to the Singer/DeSanto project back in Nov 2001: http://www.trektoday.com/news/161101_03.shtml

There was also a quote by Ronald Moore where he basically said his purpose was to completly reinvent how Science Fiction series in general looked (or something like that, I'll see If I can run across it again). Changing the entire genre is a pretty big task (or a pretty arrogant statement). I don't know what to think about a Larson movie (the old plotline ideas I read sounded lame, maybe it's been changed now though).


----------



## trancejeremy (Dec 11, 2003)

I missed the first half because of the Rams game on Monday (this is also why I haven't seen many episodes of SG-1)

But I watched the second half.

I dunno.

It wasn't horribly bad, but it could have been a lot better. But admittedly, I was somewhat irked about the whole "re-imaging" thing. It's like instead of Star Trek: The Next Generation, we got a whole new Original series, with new actors playing Kirk, Spock, Bones, etc.

Battlestar Galactica was a big thing when I was a kid - I don't really like my childhood memories jerked around with. It's bad enough Lucas is #%@#%ing around with Star Wars.

So, that was actually a big problem for me.

However, beyond that, the real main problem was the bad acting/casting. Starbuck looked about 12 years old, I thought. She actually reminded me of Peri from Dr. Who. More perky than anything else. Gah.

Apollo was about as bland and dull an actor (and character) as I think I've ever seen on TV.

I like Edward James Olmos, but as I watched him, all I could think is "My god, he's gotten really fat". He was also very bad in his speeches, especially the pseudo religious stuff. Lorne Greene was much better at that in the old Battlestar. Anyway, I know he can act better than this. 

The president lady seemed to be on valium or something. 

I found the whole "6" character to be a complete rip off of Star Treks 7. Gah. If you're going to have a robot bimbo, why copy the robot bimbo from another SF show almost exactly, right down to her name?

Also, I don't understand the low technology level of these people. Even if a Cylon looks like a human, can't they x-ray them, or do a cat-scan, or look at their DNA? Obviously, they can't be exactly like humans, inside, otherwise they would be humans. 

I also though the new cylon ships looked suspiciously like the Kilrathi ships from Wing Commander. Did they save money using clips from that movie or something? 

I also miss all the female characters from the old show. And black characters. Space is apparently awfully male (except for Starbuck and the bimbo bot) and awfully white (except "Boomer", I guess). Even Edward James Olmos, while hispanic, is basically playing a white guy (unless his son Apollo is supposed to be adopted).

I also didn't like the sets and the clothing. The new Galactica has too many wide open spaces. It looked more like a cruise ship than a military vessel (though a cruise ship with 1930s technology. I kept expecting to see Hercule Poirot pop up). And the clothing - some of the people looked straight out of wall street, what with their button down shirts and neck ties. 

The show was also awfully slow moving. Until today checking the TV guide, I didn't realize that this was it for the series. In something like 5 hours, they've accomplished what it took the original series to do in 1 hour (if that).


----------



## Krieg (Dec 11, 2003)

> Originally Posted by jasper
> BUZZ .../snip/...







			
				Baraendur said:
			
		

> BUZZ.../snip/...




BUZZ!!

I just wanted to say it too.


----------



## Skade (Dec 11, 2003)

I really find the various comments about Adama being hispanic, and his son being white pretty amusing.  Adama probably is not supposed to be any more Hispanic with Olmos playing him, than he was with Lorne Green.  It's just a character, and it happens to be a hispanic actor is playing the role.  As to having a white son?  I'd almost consider posting pictures of my family to give you a good indication of the variety of skin and hair tones present in many hispanic families.  Even discounting this, if you saw the picture of the boys (Apollo and Zak) with their mother, you'll notice she was very anglo, with red hair.


----------



## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

I find it interesting that the main complaint everyone has about virtually every movie or show out there (unless it happens to be one they actually liked) is bad acting. I mean, could you find a more subjective thing to slam something for? Its easy to say that an actor didn't display emotion, or act in accordance with a given situation, but who the f%^$ are you to tell someone how they should react to something? Some people are naturally deadpan in real life. Does that make their real life behavior unbelievable? 

Granted, some performances are easily judged as just plain bad. I can think of an entire genre of movies that is known for abysmal acting, yet still make lots of money, if you know what I mean (**cough** Jenna Jameson **cough**).

Come on people, if you want to slam a piece of entertainment, you really shouldn't base your entire argument on someone's acting unless they're acting like your typical door greeter at Wal-Mart with their aching feet, fake cheer, and the ticking timebomb in their psyche about to go off, driving them slowly over the edge of insanity. Pick something that is actually measurable. Maybe the dialog wasn't up to par. Oh, but that's clearly not the case here since there have been numerous quotes from this show that people loved. Maybe tear it apart because there are so many all-too-real military situations that crop up through the course of the movie causing it to fall back on clichés (personally I think death is cliché. People should stop dying in battle because that's gotten too cliché).

The funny thing about this is that every review and comment I've read on messageboards either absolutely loved it or absolutely hated it. Anything that can elicit that sort of reaction is noteworthy considering the blasé reaction that most scifi shows get these days with their over the top special effects and high budgets. Lets face it, scifi fans have gotten spoiled ever since the advent of digital effects.

But to each their own. While I disagree with a lot of the mud that's being slung, I don't disrespect people's right to dislike it.


----------



## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

For those that missed any of it they are showing the whole thing again Sunday night.


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## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> I find it interesting that the main complaint everyone has about virtually every movie or show out there (unless it happens to be one they actually liked) is bad acting. I mean, could you find a more subjective thing to slam something for? Its easy to say that an actor didn't display emotion, or act in accordance with a given situation, but who the f%^$ are you to tell someone how they should react to something? Some people are naturally deadpan in real life. Does that make their real life behavior unbelievable?
> 
> Granted, some performances are easily judged as just plain bad. I can think of an entire genre of movies that is known for abysmal acting, yet still make lots of money, if you know what I mean (**cough** Jenna Jameson **cough**).
> 
> ...



Eh it's going to get flack, that's garanteed. If next generation got flack, just imagine how much flack it would of gotten if Picard was called Kirk, Data was called Spock, Worf was called Uhura, Riker was called Sulu, Dr Whatshername was called Mrs Bones and they were a reimagining of the first Star Trek, which no longer existed in the Star Trek world. That's pretty much what they have done with Galactica, they have changed the fundamental nature of the show, the new characters share very little with the old characters except for names and positions (and they changed most of their names to callsigns), the villians are complety different (change name of the borg to the klingon), the ships are different (as different as OG trek Enterprise to next gen trek Enterprise), and the feel of the show is different. Then tell all the fans of the original Star Trek that it was a 60's show so it wouldn't translate to the 80's, so it had to be completly reimagined or nobody would watch it (the Star Trek movies were updated and translated real well, as a continuation story with the original cast, but that wouldn't work for Battlestar Galactica?). Gee think there would of been a few people a little ticked? The new Galactica show has gotten off pretty light (Next Generation was a good show but if you make the changes I did and call it a reimaging then it would of been lucky to make it through the first season). That's why there is such a polarization here, the changes were so drastic and there were lots of people with strong feelings about the first series.

So instead of saying the acting seemed flat can I say that Starbuck was a little on the chunky side? How about that I had a hard time buying the fact that Colonial Tigh was a vertabrate (or a actual drunk either) or that it should of been obvious that Boomer was a 



Spoiler



soulless robot devoid of true emotion


just by the characters interaction with other characters  Have you seen Wayne's World 2, I like the part where Charton Heston plays "the good actor". 

Yea I'm being a real jerk but It's finals week and I'm pulling my hair out (I got a Ventilation test tomorrow, it's got one problem on it, the example of the problem is 11 pages long.)


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

Star Trek is its own little ghetto these days. Oh by the way, have you caught the announcement that Enterprise is cutting 2 shows this season and may be getting cancelled? http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/art-main.html?2003-12/10/11.30.rumors If that happens, I predict that will put the final nail in the coffin of the once mighty Trek franchise. Its unfortunate, but people are tired of seeing the same old drivel rehashed an infinite number of times.



> So instead of saying the acting seemed flat can I say that Starbuck was a little on the chunky side? How about that I had a hard time buying the fact that Colonial Tigh was a vertabrate (or a actual drunk either) or that it should of been obvious that Boomer was a
> 
> 
> 
> ...




I don't know, I actually bought that Tigh was a drunk, but not so much that he was a vertebrate. But that was kind of the point. I like that they put some tension between the characters and that there's some human drama. I've been complaining for a long time that if you strip away the special effects, scifi relies too much upon the effect new technology has on a culture. Some of it without the special effects would be nothing at all (see SW episode I). Much of it is completely dry and devoid of any emotion whatsoever. I've been hoping someone would make a human story as opposed to a science story within the genre of science fiction for a while. It should therefore come as no surprise to anyone that I loved Solaris.


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## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Star Trek is its own little ghetto these days. Oh by the way, have you caught the announcement that Enterprise is cutting 2 shows this season and may be getting cancelled? http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/art-main.html?2003-12/10/11.30.rumors If that happens, I predict that will put the final nail in the coffin of the once mighty Trek franchise. Its unfortunate, but people are tired of seeing the same old drivel rehashed an infinite number of times.



No I hadn't heard that, but it doesn't suprise me, I only watched two episodes of Enterprise, I could never get into it and don't get me started on the Next Generation movies. Trek really needs to go away for 5 years or so and come up with something inventive and new right when fans are really getting the urge for it to return. They've overexposed the property too much and the general public is getting bored with it. 



> I don't know, I actually bought that Tigh was a drunk, but not so much that he was a vertebrate. But that was kind of the point. I like that they put some tension between the characters and that there's some human drama. I've been complaining for a long time that if you strip away the special effects, scifi relies too much upon the effect new technology has on a culture. Some of it without the special effects would be nothing at all (see SW episode I). Much of it is completely dry and devoid of any emotion whatsoever. I've been hoping someone would make a human story as opposed to a science story within the genre of science fiction for a while. It should therefore come as no surprise to anyone that I loved Solaris.



That's why I liked Farscape so much, it was full of character interaction, they were all full characters with enough flaws to make them believable. It wasn't dark and gritty, but I don't care for dark and gritty in my Science Fiction. I'm a true product of my youth, I like lovable rogue figures like Han Solo and the original Starbuck, or the 70's Buck Rodgers. (I loved the 80's Flash Gordon too). For me I like my Science Fiction to be Action/Adventure oriented. It's why I was never a big Trek fan, they sit around and talk too much.


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## Jhamin (Dec 11, 2003)

NewJeffCT said:
			
		

> it wasn't bad, but the baby killing in the beginning and the little girl in the stranded ship that got blown up as they faded to commerical were a little too dark for me - you just don't kill babies like that in a movie or TV show.





See, to me that just came off as lazy and overblown.  We were supposed to be horrified at the awful decisions our good-hearted characters were forced to make.  It was so over the top that it was almost funny.

My girlfriend wondered aloud of the producers couldn't find a basket of kittens for her to play with just before the nukes dropped.  Maybe a Nun could have thrown her body in front to the blast?

It was just weak.

From my point of view, the writers had three characters make live/die decisions for others in part two, and two of the three were immediatly undercut.

*Depressurize the burning part of Galactica - Pretty harsh, but the right thing to do.
*Leave the non-ftl civilian ships to their fate, don't wait for them to x-fer passangers.  Oh wait, they got blown up before we could even leave.  I guess we don't have to wonder if we made the right decision.
*Pick a random guy to frame as a Cylon so I can cover my but while pointing out the cylon thingie (which was never mentioned again).  How big a jerk am I for selling out an innocent?  Oh wait, I guess he really *was* a Cylon so it all worked out.  (OK, so it was Baltar.  But now he has unknowing done a good thing for the wrong reason.  IF you want him flawed, let him be.)


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## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

More on reviews (I posted some of the review links he mentions in a earlier post): http://www.syfyportal.com/article.php?id=1211

If you check out the guy at Syfy portal's review he really loved it (headlines on the side). I figured some positive reviews would start popping up eventually. Looks like the ratings will be enough for it to go ahead too (lower than Dune or Taken but still pretty good, considering their big star was Edward James Olmos). It's going to be a mixed bag for the show but then they should of expected that.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

I've read several good reviews. Most of them were local papers that posted their reviews to the Internet a day or two before they actually aired the show. They seemed evenly split between loving it and despising it. I still find that the most interesting thing about this miniseries.

I'm really hoping that this does go to series and has a few years before cancellation (or shark jumping). I would love to see where the orginal BSG would have gone, and this gives them the chance to answer that question without having to relive the huge, catastrophic mistakes that the original show made.

On the other hand, I would love to see them do a new version of the Gun on Ice Planet Zero. Just imagine what they could do with that now with this cast and these effects. That 2-parter and the season (series) finale stands as probably the pinnacle of Galactica after the pilot.


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## Krieg (Dec 11, 2003)

Jhamin said:
			
		

> *Pick a random guy to frame as a Cylon so I can cover my but while pointing out the cylon thingie (which was never mentioned again).  How big a jerk am I for selling out an innocent?  Oh wait, I guess he really *was* a Cylon so it all worked out.  (OK, so it was Baltar.  But now he has unknowing done a good thing for the wrong reason.  IF you want him flawed, let him be.)




This is the only one that really bothered me. If he had in fact been human, it would have been far more interesting from a story standpoint.

I'm guessing that they don't want to make Baltar too despicable so that it will be easier for him to find redemption at some point in the future.


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## jasper (Dec 11, 2003)

well this thread is creating a lot of BUZZ


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## Psion (Dec 11, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> For those that missed any of it they are showing the whole thing again Sunday night.




Wasn't going, but I wanna see this Tigh scene where there is Number 6 in his picture. Can anyone identify roundabout that was?


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 11, 2003)

Second hour of Part 1, I think.  I recall the scene, but I didn't notice that the gal in the pic was #6.


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## Psion (Dec 11, 2003)

> I find it interesting that the main complaint everyone has about virtually every movie or show out there (unless it happens to be one they actually liked) is bad acting. I mean, could you find a more subjective thing to slam something for?




Well, I'd like to point out that bad acting seems to be the number one complaint of those who are slamming the original.  I rather liked the acting and characters in the original.

Speaking for myself, I am criticizing/expressing my distaste for the writing decisions made. It's too dark, and too many things are too overplayed. It seems to be all in vogue now to be dark and gritty, and I can see the heroes not being perfect, but I think that the baby scene and the fade to white girl scene were too much, and the "character flaws" made it seem like a soap opera at times.

It was enlightening to read a Moore interview over on RPGnet, and I can sort of see where the darkness comes from (it seems to me an overreaction from being held back during the ST:TNG era).


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## Psion (Dec 11, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> That's why I liked Farscape so much, it was full of character interaction, they were all full characters with enough flaws to make them believable. It wasn't dark and gritty, but I don't care for dark and gritty in my Science Fiction.




I think Farscape is pretty dark and gritty. I just watched the episode where the crew were captured by Nebari. That's a pretty dark episode. But I liked it -- it was a great episode.

For some reason, Farscape's dark works for me and BSG's didn't. I can't put my finger on it, but I am guessing its because BSGs dark and gritty moments are to obviously set peices. You can see the screenwriter's hand.


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## Psion (Dec 11, 2003)

> My girlfriend wondered aloud of the producers couldn't find a basket of kittens for her to play with just before the nukes dropped. Maybe a Nun could have thrown her body in front to the blast?




We really need a LOL icon here. 



> *Depressurize the burning part of Galactica - Pretty harsh, but the right thing to do.




But we don't see that. We don't see that he knows that it is the right thing to do. It looks rather arbitrary on screen, which makes it come off a little flat. I don't get that "tough but necessary" vibe from it.

I don't know, however, if this was inadequate writing or the fact that it was cut to ribbons to get it down to 4 hours from 6. It seems like they are missing a few facts. The whole how Baltar caused the doom of the human race never seemed entirely clear to me. Others have mentioned (though I forget if it was here or RPGnet or NKL) that Adama's deception about Earth seemed rather out-of-nowhere, and I mention that the tip left in Adama's stateroom before the end seems to come from nowhere.


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## National Acrobat (Dec 11, 2003)

*Hmm.*

I've been reading the thread with much interest, and have enjoyed it.

That being said, I am a fan of the original series, but went into the viewing of the new one with no preconceived notions and not concerned at all that it was new. I rather enjoyed it, and can appreciate the fact that it is different. A very fresh perspective. I am most likely in the minority, I like both versions, they both have their merits.

The one thing that I did not want was a 24 year break in the action. That would have just been plain silly.


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## Psion (Dec 11, 2003)

> Star Trek is its own little ghetto these days. Oh by the way, have you caught the announcement that Enterprise is cutting 2 shows this season and may be getting cancelled?




Yes, I caught that. Sweet mercy.

Ever since Voyager (and late Braga-dominated DS9, really), Trek has been dead to me anyways.


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## Mistwell (Dec 11, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> That's why I liked Farscape so much, it was full of character interaction, they were all full characters with enough flaws to make them believable.




You had an issue with the acting with BSG.

And yet you hold Farscape up as having "full characters...believable".

PUPPETS. YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT PUPPETS AS BELIEVABLE, FULL CHARACTERS, OVER REAL ACTUAL HUMAN ACTORS?

Good lord you have a confused sense of reality sometimes Jdavis...that's why we love you.


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## Mistwell (Dec 11, 2003)

My opinion of the new BSG?

Fan Friggen Tastic!

I loved it.  I hope and pray they turn it into a series.  

It reminded me a lot of Space: Above & Beyond, which is a series I also loved (and I think it was cancelled for having a crappy name more than anything else).

My fiancee' also loved it, and that is saying a lot (since she is an actress, and fairly critical of people's acting ability).

I was a fan of the old show, and surprised at just how much of the old show they did actually keep in the new show.  Just the right balance of nostalgic references and new stuff.


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## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

Mistwell said:
			
		

> You had an issue with the acting with BSG.
> 
> And yet you hold Farscape up as having "full characters...believable".
> 
> ...



You sure everyone in Galactica was a human actor? The puppets on Farscape acted circles around most of them. (there were two puppet cast members, the rest were actual people.) They hit a whole range of emotions not just angry and depressed. Everyone in Galactica was dark and depressed before the Cylons attacked even, well except for Baltar (maybe why I liked him so much). You would think a society that invented space travel and AI powered robots would of come up with some Prozac at some point. Some of these characters were so freaking flawed they wouldn't even fit in on Days of Our Lives.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

Mistwell said:
			
		

> PUPPETS. YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT PUPPETS AS BELIEVABLE, FULL CHARACTERS, OVER REAL ACTUAL HUMAN ACTORS?




Hey, no dissing the muppets. For what its worth, Rygel was one of the best actors ever, regardless of whether he was a "synthetic" or not.


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## jdavis (Dec 11, 2003)

ratings are in: http://tv.zap2it.com/tveditorial/tve_main/1,1002,271|85110|1|,00.html


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

Yep. Looks like we're going to get the series.

Woot!


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## National Acrobat (Dec 11, 2003)

That's cool, very cool indeed. I am glad it looks like the series will be a go based on that. Good news indeed.


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## Assenpfeffer (Dec 11, 2003)

If this does indeed go to series I will definitely check it out.  I liked the miniseries a ton.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 11, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> Everyone in Galactica was dark and depressed before the Cylons attacked even, well except for Baltar (maybe why I liked him so much). You would think a society that invented space travel and AI powered robots would of come up with some Prozac at some point. Some of these characters were so freaking flawed they wouldn't even fit in on Days of Our Lives.




Since this will likely go to series, give the characters time to define themselves. In the face of an apocalypse, I don't see why being somber is inappropriate. If you remember, Star Trek II was a fairly dark movie and the characters seemed a little less like their usual jovial selves. Nevertheless, this is considered by most to be the best Trek movie.


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## Villano (Dec 11, 2003)

I taped it, but haven't gotten around to watching it.  In fact, I planned on watching it while it taped, but I had to turn it off after the first few minutes because that opening was so awful.  However, the bits a pieces I saw afterward were much better.

It'll probably be awhile until I can finally sit down and watch it since I just bought myself some early Christmas presents (i.e., a whole bunch of dvds).  Plus, a local video rental store is going out of business and is selling its entire stock, including new releases.  I'm kicking myself because they had a Hulk widescreen dvd for $10 and I bought one full price last month.   

My "too watch" movie pile is now grotesquesly huge.  Still, picking up the Tick: The Complete Series dvd was worth it.   

Back to BSG, no matter how good it is, part of me will still hate it soley for the way Sci-Fi (aka, The New USA Network) handled the whole thing.  They seemed to have a "screw the fans" mentality.  Do you really want people who worked on the show talking about how they would only be involved if it had nothing to do with the original?


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## MaxKaladin (Dec 12, 2003)

Psion said:
			
		

> Wasn't going, but I wanna see this Tigh scene where there is Number 6 in his picture. Can anyone identify roundabout that was?




It was pretty quick, so I could be mistaken.  It wouldn't be the first time but I sure thought it was her.  The fact that nobody else has seen it is putting doubts in my head.


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## pezagent (Dec 12, 2003)

Azlan said:
			
		

> Hmm... I happened upon an episode of the original Battlestar Galactica, on the Sci-Fi Channel, the other day ago. You know, the original Battlestar Galactica was not all _that_ great to begin with. So, really, this new series doesn't have all that far to fall from.
> 
> When I was a teenager, I thought the original Battlestar Galactica was awesome. Now, decades later, it seems vapid and insipid to me. (But, then, most television sci-fi seems that way to me, nowadays.)




Hi all,

I've been living in New Zealand for the past three years so I gave up on watching television a long time ago. (We only get four channels, two of which are owned by Canada. There is Sky--our version of cable--but it's very expensive and doesn't have anything worth watching. The movies they release are either way behind the States or old stuff I didn't bother watching when I was _in_ the States.) 

But after reading some of the posts in here, I can see that perhaps I haven't missed much... I never really got into BSG when I was a kid--the special effects really bugged me. Of course, I played with the toys (until they were recalled because kids were choking on the missles when they fired them into their mouths--like duh) and the Cylon voices were cool... but the costumes sucked, the stories were lame, the special effects were lame (the same explosion clip) and I *hated* the damn joystick operated ships. The actual Battlestar looked like a bad Lego™ project, and it was really hard for me to get into it. 

So if they stick more sex appeal and violence into the new miniseries, then maybe it might perk it up a bit. The concept is nothing new--I'd prefer to watch _Star Blazers_ though.

/johnny


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## MaxKaladin (Dec 12, 2003)

Jhamin said:
			
		

> *Pick a random guy to frame as a Cylon so I can cover my but while pointing out the cylon thingie (which was never mentioned again).  How big a jerk am I for selling out an innocent?  Oh wait, I guess he really *was* a Cylon so it all worked out.  (OK, so it was Baltar.  But now he has unknowing done a good thing for the wrong reason.  IF you want him flawed, let him be.)




Ah, but that's the beauty of it.  At first, he talks about using the guy as a scapegoat and the next thing you know, he's explaining to Tigh about how he took skin samples and analyzed them to look for the trace elements they found after the cremation of the Cylon from the station.  They leave you for the rest of the show thinking Baltar is a rat who used this guy as a scapegoat and made up all that stuff about the test.  Then, in the last scene, you find out he really is a cylon.  Now, you have to wonder if it was just blind luck he stumbled on an actual cylon as his scapegoat or if he really did find a way to detect cylons and was on the up and up the whole time.  

There are a couple of other moments like this where you wonder if Baltar did/was about to do something bad or if he genuinely had good intentions all the time.  

Baltar finds himself in a real fix.  He's not a traitor and doesn't want to be one, but his past and present association with "6" puts him in a situation where it would be really easy for people to decide he is one.  He knows he can help out, especially with the info he's getting from "6", but he's trying to do so without revealing the things that would make others see him as a traitor.  Its true that he looks out for himself before anything else and that helping the fleet out is helping himself out, but I don't think that's his only motivation.  I believe he genuinely wants to do the right thing and help people out, just not at the cost of his own life.    

Why does he feel responsible?  We know that "6" was playing him like a piano, but he also knows he broke the rules for her.  Evidently, she wasn't supposed to have the access she did.  Rather, he shared his with her so she could help with his program. Some things were said in one of the scenes on Caprica that lead me to believe that some of it was aimed at helping her secure future defense contracts as well.  I got the impression from his comments about computer technology during his interview on Caprica that he didn't believe the cylons were comign back anytime soon.  He was playing fast and loose with the rules, but I don't think he was an intentional betrayer of humanity.  Rather, what he thought was a victimless bending of the rules to gain financial advantage and get in good with his girlfriend turned out to open the door to apocalypse.  Because he isn't an evil man, he feels immense guilt about that.  

I may have the chronology wrong, but I think the "cylon thingie" was mentioned again.  I'm pretty sure the scene where the bridge officer is explaining how he noticed it and thought it was part of the museum setup was after the cylon was arrested.


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## jdavis (Dec 12, 2003)

Villano said:
			
		

> I taped it, but haven't gotten around to watching it. In fact, I planned on watching it while it taped, but I had to turn it off after the first few minutes because that opening was so awful. However, the bits a pieces I saw afterward were much better.



 The first five minutes of the show was pure crap (except the cg cylons) but it does get better (and I'm even one of the ones who didn't like it).



> Back to BSG, no matter how good it is, part of me will still hate it soley for the way Sci-Fi (aka, The New USA Network) handled the whole thing. They seemed to have a "screw the fans" mentality. Do you really want people who worked on the show talking about how they would only be involved if it had nothing to do with the original?



Sci Fi channel needs to go into group therapy or maybe get a good PR man, they always come out of every situation looking like lowbrow thugs (even when things may work out ok). They have a horrible reputation with the very fan base their channel caters to, somebody get them some Tony Robbins tapes or something.


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## jdavis (Dec 12, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Since this will likely go to series, give the characters time to define themselves. In the face of an apocalypse, I don't see why being somber is inappropriate. If you remember, Star Trek II was a fairly dark movie and the characters seemed a little less like their usual jovial selves. Nevertheless, this is considered by most to be the best Trek movie.



The big thing going for this show is the lack of any other sci fi out there right now, we got Stargate and Andromeda and the Star Trek thingy but two of those three are not that good, Stargate is good but it is on it's last legs as the cast is starting to wear out. It's possible that by 2005 Battlestar of our Lives could be the only game in town for space show fans. If they are smart (this is Sci Fi channel we are talking about  ) they will try and tighten the show up and actually look and see what problems the actual tv critics are pointing out. There were points where I could see promise for the show (the guy who plays Baltar could carry this show on his back, a real network needs to get a look at this guy, he actually has some charisma and some talent)but some things just made me want to pull my hair out (sets, wardrobe, cylon tongue kissing close ups, some poor lines that just didn't fit, dizz-o-rama camera shots, a couple of actors who needed some actual direction, and maybe a acting coach too). The producers come off as egotistical, the writer has tons of talent (and another series on HBO), and the director did Queen of the Damned (which wasn't the title it was a warning to viewers), I just got no hope this will turn out well for me in 2005, but they could suprise me (it suprised me I didn't get up and turn the show off, I watched the second part three times in a row looking for reasons for me to give it a chance).


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## Mistwell (Dec 12, 2003)

> Sci Fi, on the other hand, is ecstatic over the performance of "Battlestar Galactica." Its average audience is the third-best in the channel's history, trailing earlier miniseries "Taken" and "Dune." After drawing just under 3.9 million people for Monday's premiere, "Galactica" averaged 4.46 million viewers Tuesday.
> Tuesday's installment was the most-watched show on cable for the night and also beat broadcast networks UPN and The WB in total viewers. It was Sci Fi's best night of the year in total viewers and all key demographics.




That is just amazing.  Yeah, they would be dumb to not green light a series.  I'm so happy.  

I also like Stargate, Alias, and Enterprise.  Yes, I know, I am close to being alone on liking Enterprise.  But, to me, it is a great show.  If BSG becomes a series while all those others are still going, it will be a great year for sci-fi in my book (and yes, I count Alias as sci-fi). Not to mention Stargate: Atlantis will be coming out as well.

Now if only they would bring back firefly...


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## jdavis (Dec 12, 2003)

I forgot about Stargate Atlantis, I also saw where Stargate SG1 signed for another season, so I guess there will still be Stargate in 2005, anyone know of anything else in the works?


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 12, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> I forgot about Stargate Atlantis, I also saw where Stargate SG1 signed for another season, so I guess there will still be Stargate in 2005, anyone know of anything else in the works?




Other than the possibility of another Babylon 5 show, nothing that sounds good.


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## jdavis (Dec 12, 2003)

I was looking at the 2003-2004 pilot episodes and it looks like wastland for Science Fiction: NYPD 2069...? Kamalot (King Arthur in the future), Future Tense (another future cop show) and a remake of MacGyver (yea it's not sci fi but it's funny). http://www.pazsaz.com/fallplt.html

Looks like Galactica might be able to fill a niche that is severly lacking at this time, gee I might be stuck watching it or watching a remake of MacGyver (that gave me goosebumps, I better stock up on DVDs next year).


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 12, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> I was looking at the 2003-2004 pilot episodes and it looks like wastland for Science Fiction: NYPD 2069...? Kamalot (King Arthur in the future), Future Tense (another future cop show) and a remake of MacGyver (yea it's not sci fi but it's funny). http://www.pazsaz.com/fallplt.html




Wow, its almost like they're not even trying anymore.


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## LightPhoenix (Dec 12, 2003)

Baraendur said:
			
		

> Wow, its almost like they're not even trying anymore.



Well, given the recent events around shows like _Farscape_ and _Firefly_, why would they even bother?

On a related note - SFC doing that _Mad, Mad, House_ - I will seriously castrate myself if I ever think about watching that show.  If I even find it interesting, they're going, because there's just no point to reproduction at that point.


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## Psion (Dec 12, 2003)

> They leave you for the rest of the show thinking Baltar is a rat who used this guy as a scapegoat and made up all that stuff about the test. Then, in the last scene, you find out he really is a cylon. Now, you have to wonder if it was just blind luck he stumbled on an actual cylon as his scapegoat or if he really did find a way to detect cylons and was on the up and up the whole time.




I know people despised this, but it worked for me.

Why? It showed that Baltar is the right guy with the wrong intentions.

He _knew_ that this guy was about the CIC and had access to the place and was in and out of there a lot. He used these facts to find a convenient scapegoat who would have the qualities of the mysterious Cylon and thus fit his scapegoat. But by no coincidence, that behavior is the one that the Cylon spy would have to have. It's not just convenient. It fits. Baltar _deduced_ who the spy could have been; the only thing he manufactured is proof.

Baltar rocks.


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## Hand of Evil (Dec 12, 2003)

LightPhoenix said:
			
		

> On a related note - SFC doing that _Mad, Mad, House_ - I will seriously castrate myself if I ever think about watching that show.  If I even find it interesting, they're going, because there's just no point to reproduction at that point.



I am with you here but I am will be in line if someone ever decides to place playmates and gamers/geeks in the same house!


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## jasamcarl (Dec 13, 2003)

I'm not going to review this entire thread, but I actually caught the last half-hour of the second episode between commercial breaks on NBC. I was impressed enough to want to see the rest in re-runs this Sunday. 

I will admit, nothing about it was particularly original, but, for me, it looked liked the entire production was more than the sum of its parts. It just 'worked'. The tone had that dead on sense of paranoia that was conveyed dropping hints of the human's fugitive status and not through self-conscience dialogue that would have pushed it into 'angsty' territory. The dialogue was appropriatly minimalist and airy, making the cast look like proffessionals looking for some escape from crap conditions..

I will stop now...but i will just say i kinda liked it. The NYT has a good review.


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## Endur (Dec 15, 2003)

Battlestar Galactica was Great!

I just watched it, and I can't wait for more.

I was distressed when I found out it was only two parts.

I saw the original series back in the '70s, and many times since in re-runs.

This re-make was fabulous.

I do agree that Sci-Fi's marketing strategy leaves a lot to be desired.  I saw nothing wrong with the changes to the characters (Starbuck, Boomer, or any of the originals).  Any controversy was a storm in a teacup, really.

Major improvements over the original series: 
Cylons: The origins, the computer virus/networks, the discussions about God, the human looking cylons, Baltar's lover, Especially the part about cylon ships not having crews.  

Starbuck and Boomer: I have always liked Dirk Benedict, but I thought the new Starbuck and Boomer were major improvements over the old.  Likewise,the new Col. Tigh.

Baltar: The new Baltar is also an improvement over the original.


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## Endur (Dec 15, 2003)

I agree with everything you said, except that Baltar feels guilt.  I don't think he feels guilt.  



			
				MaxKaladin said:
			
		

> Rather, what he thought was a victimless bending of the rules to gain financial advantage and get in good with his girlfriend turned out to open the door to apocalypse.  Because he isn't an evil man, he feels immense guilt about that.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 15, 2003)

Endur said:
			
		

> I agree with everything you said, except that Baltar feels guilt.  I don't think he feels guilt.




I agree. My guess is that he's shaken that he let his arrogance and his other weaknesses place him in such a compromising position. He may feel a bit of guilt, but he also feels like he's been manipulated and taken advantage of. More than anything, he just wants the truth about his involvement to remain a secret.


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## Ranger REG (Dec 16, 2003)

jdavis said:
			
		

> Look sometimes people do take things a little too seriously but how do you think Star Trek fans would react if Star Trek was totally reimagined for the viewing public and the old show was thrown out completly?



Heh. Well, how do you think I can tolerate watching _ENTERPRISE,_ much less the latter half of _STAR TREK: VOYAGER_, both of which were produced under the leadership of Brannon Braga?

Every time I see _ENTERPRISE,_ supposedly a prequel series, I have this ritual where I close my eyes and chant my mantra, "it's a reimagined series, it's a reimagined series set in an alternate universe, it's a reimagined series,..."

Because if I had to think this is part of the main _Star Trek_ universe's timeline, it would have been hard to stomach. IOW, I'd lose my evening dinner.

<a href='http://www.smileycentral.com/?partner=ZSzeb008' target='_blank'><img src='http://smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/10/10_2_5.gif' border=0></a>

BTW, I was glad the title was _ENTERPRISE_ but now they had to insult me by renaming it _STAR TREK: ENTERPRISE._

You _BSG_ fans got lucky. You got the better writer AND producer graduated from the _ST_ franchise. You got one who is upfront with you, not one who ignores continuity and to this day continues to pitch that his work is real _Trek._ We veteran _Trek_ fans got crap on our end.


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## Darrin Drader (Dec 16, 2003)

Ranger REG said:
			
		

> You _BSG_ fans got lucky. You got the better writer AND producer graduated from the _ST_ franchise. You got one who is upfront with you, not one who ignores continuity and to this day continues to pitch that his work is real _Trek._ We veteran _Trek_ fans got crap on our end.




Thank you for driving that point home. Somebody needed to.


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## Scarbonac (Dec 16, 2003)

Well, I've seen the whole mini (two-part movie, really).


I'm conflicted; I watched the original during its first run back in tha day, and loved it. I collected the Walt Simonson Galactica comics. I suffered through G80. I tried to keep up with the latter-day comics in the 90s. I wanted a Colonial Warrior jacket and a pulse-laser.


*sigh*

[Edit: Just wanted to note that I'm not blind to the weaknesses of BSG:TOS; I've watched the repeats on Sci-Fi; some eps hold up...some don't; the recycled SFX grate on my nerves from time to time and there are more than a few stilted performances. John Colicos is still delightfull ad Original Recipe Baltar, and Jonathon Harris's Lucifer still has a warm spot in my heart. Hey, isn't that Count Iblis over there...?]


This was...OK...but only just. Adama, Baltar and Boomer made the show for me. "Starbuck" was...OK. Tigh was...OK (and yes, Virginia, I'm pretty certain that was a photo of #6 in which he was burning a hole; I did some freeze-frame comparisons that struck me as pretty conclusive).


I could live with the downgrading of the weaponry from zappers to bangbangs and missiles, but I hated the  crappy shakey-cam used for the space-battles. The lack of robotic Cylons didn't enthrall me, either. I did like the use of RL physics, though.

I liked the baby-killing scene; it brought home the idea that the Cylons were going to _kill_ everyone. Death would come to all, young, old, healthy, sick, weak, strong, whatever. Since most of the deaths would happen almost completely off-screen, mushroom clouds notwithstanding, a few pilots, reporters, a civilian and a baby would have to symbolize them. 

Restrained ugliness.

Sex? Gratuitous?

So? Pile it on.

Baltar is far and away my favorite; a weasel who has gotten in over his head, he has to hope that he can continue to deflect suspicions from himself, preserve the other humans (cos why live if you're the only one?) and root out the 



Spoiler



sleeper Cylons


. I see buckets of cold sweat in store for this character.


I miss Athena & Cassie (although everyone's favorite Socialator could still put in an appearance), am damn glad that there's no goddamn Muffit (poor chimp stuck in a robot dog suit!) and hope Adama gets an episode where he uses the sword on his wall.


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## Edena_of_Neith (Dec 16, 2003)

Caprica City was hit by a 50 megaton explosion.
  I suppose a 50 megaton explosion is pretty big.  But how big exactly?


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## Scarbonac (Dec 16, 2003)

Edena_of_Neith said:
			
		

> Caprica City was hit by a 50 megaton explosion.
> I suppose a 50 megaton explosion is pretty big.  But how big exactly?




I've seen the claim that 50 megatons would be something on the order of the destructive power of 2500 Hiroshima bombs.

Boom, Baby.


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## Villano (Dec 16, 2003)

Edena_of_Neith said:
			
		

> Caprica City was hit by a 50 megaton explosion.
> I suppose a 50 megaton explosion is pretty big.  But how big exactly?




Picture a 1 megaton explosion.  Now, it would be 50 times as big as that.


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## Storm Raven (Dec 16, 2003)

Edena_of_Neith said:
			
		

> Caprica City was hit by a 50 megaton explosion.
> I suppose a 50 megaton explosion is pretty big.  But how big exactly?




If I remember my weapons terminology correctly, a megaton is the equivalent in explosive force to one million tons of TNT. Therefore, a fifty megaton explosion would be the equivalent in explosive force to fifty million tons of TNT.

In other words: a _really big_ explosion.


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## Garmorn (Dec 16, 2003)

Scarbonac said:
			
		

> I've seen the claim that 50 megatons would be something on the order of the destructive power of 2500 Hiroshima bombs.
> 
> Boom, Baby.



It is about 30 more powerfull then the current standard 1 megaton.  One thing about large bombs is that after a certain size the loss effeciency quickly.  Note most N-bombs while very destructive don't have a very large blast radius when compared to a city or a planet.  I remember once reading that it would take four or five 1 megaton bombs (the current city buster size) to destory all of NYC.  Now this does not count all of the secondary affects like fires, fall out and other secondary damage; while doing the same damage with one bomb you needed a 20 megaton weapon.


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## buzzard (Dec 16, 2003)

Garmorn said:
			
		

> It is about 30 more powerfull then the current standard 1 megaton.  One thing about large bombs is that after a certain size the loss effeciency quickly.  Note most N-bombs while very destructive don't have a very large blast radius when compared to a city or a planet.  I remember once reading that it would take four or five 1 megaton bombs (the current city buster size) to destory all of NYC.  Now this does not count all of the secondary affects like fires, fall out and other secondary damage; while doing the same damage with one bomb you needed a 20 megaton weapon.




The current 'standard' is not 1 megaton. It is more on the order of about 200-300 kilotons (the range really goes from 100-500 or so, but 200-300 covers the majority of the U.S. arsenal- foreign weapons use higher yields). Sub based missiles have tended to be more powerful since they are a touch less accurate (thus more like 300 kilotons). Land base would tend to be closer to the low end. 

The Hiroshima bomb, Little Boy, was about 15 kT. The Nagisaki bomb, Fat Mat, was about 20 kT yield. Thus, yes 50 megatons would be 2500 times Nagisaki. 

Keep in mind, though, that destructive power, while of course being related to yield, is not a linear correlation. You see the explosion from the nuke has to fill a volume (or at least the surface of a sphere), thus blast effects will go as the square root( or cube root- I'm only fairly knowlegable, not an expert) of the yield. 

Thus, while your 50 mT bomb entails 2500 times the energy of Fat Man, it will only have a result about 50 times it in terms of the amount of land affected. 

Current state of the art involves the use of MIRV (multiple independent re-entry vehicles) missiles which contain a number of smaller nukes (in the afforementioned yields) which when distributed properly will result in much more ground being covered by blast than a higher yield weapon of the same weight. I believe the highest yield nuke still in service is in the Russian inventory (they might have de-commissioned them), which is the SS-18, which pops off at 18 megatons (this is specifically designed to turn Cheyenne mountain into a crater). Then highest which has ever been detonated by mankind was a 50 megaton bomb set off the the USSR (in the 60s methinks).

buzzard


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## Garmorn (Dec 16, 2003)

Thanks Blizzard, most of my data is more then a couple of decades old,  1 megatons were the standard at one point because of the inacuricies in the missles at that time.


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## Edena_of_Neith (Dec 16, 2003)

I see.  Finis Caprica City.
  I also saw that the Galactica withstood a small nuclear explosion against it's hull.  A rather tough ship.
  But I can't see any starship, without some form of shield (ala Star Trek) withstanding a hydrogen bomb of 50 megatons.  Not unless it's made out of Krell Steel, as per the film Forbidden Planet.  (Now, why didn't the Rebel Alliance use these kinds of things against the Imperial Fleet and Death Stars?)
  That anti-missile flak of the Galactica makes sense.  Destroy the missiles inbound.  I know Real World ships have these systems.

  Incidentally, that small nuke detonated against the Port Landing Bay.
  I see that, in this new Battlestar Galactica, they have decided to abuse the Port Landing Bay again.
  I cannot count how many times that poor Port Landing Bay has been blasted, suicided, burned, and otherwise mistreated.  It's a staple of the old series, and apparently, of the new one!

  We have actually tested a 50 megaton device?
  If World War Three ever comes, I hope to be about a mile down, thank you.


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## buzzard (Dec 16, 2003)

Edena_of_Neith said:
			
		

> I see.  Finis Caprica City.
> I also saw that the Galactica withstood a small nuclear explosion against it's hull.  A rather tough ship.
> But I can't see any starship, without some form of shield (ala Star Trek) withstanding a hydrogen bomb of 50 megatons.  Not unless it's made out of Krell Steel, as per the film Forbidden Planet.  (Now, why didn't the Rebel Alliance use these kinds of things against the Imperial Fleet and Death Stars?)
> That anti-missile flak of the Galactica makes sense.  Destroy the missiles inbound.  I know Real World ships have these systems.




I remeber seeing an article about the effects of a 10 MT bomb dropped on Manhattan. It would basically be leveled. Casualties would be in the millions. Thus your 50 MT would have done up Caprica city quite nicely I suspect. 

As for a nuke on the hull, well as pointed out earlier, a nuke explosion would not be nearly has harsh in a vacuum. The energy would not have a convenient medium availble to heat up for blast and heat effects. Almost everything would be radiation effects (not just ionizing radiation, but a real wicked burst across the whole EM spectrum which would vaporize things nearby. Most of the energy would be radiated into space rather than doing damage to the target (not to say that there should be a shortage of damage to the target). Though just for the sake of argument we have to remember that the U.S. did a fair number of above ground nuke tests in the Pacific (way back when) which tested the effects on warships. Not all of them sank immediately. In fact I think the battleships faired kind of well. Anything not really armored got scoured off, but inside the armored spaces were relatively OK. A Battlestar could be assumed to be armored as well (or better) than a battelship. Mind you, the yields were not nearly up to 50 MT (though we did pop a 10 MT bomb off above ground once- that was Mike- they named all the blasts) but I don't know if they had ships under that one. 

buzzard


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## Endur (Dec 16, 2003)

I didn't have any issue with the BattleStar Galactica surviving a nuke.  I'm a big fan of the old Star Trek Fleet Battles game.  That game had nuclear mines, and even an unshielded ship would probably survive a nuclear mine (although it would be damaged heavily if it lacked shields in the Star Trek "shields are necessary" world).


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## Scarbonac (Dec 16, 2003)

Edena_of_Neith said:
			
		

> I see.  Finis Caprica City.




Yep.




> We have actually tested a 50 megaton device?
> If World War Three ever comes, I hope to be about a mile down, thank you.





1) IIRC (as buzzard indicated), the Russians (Cold War flavor) did.

2) Not me, Baby; Ground Zero all the way; instant vaporization, preferably while asleep or "in the saddle", without realizing what's happening. No lingering slow death due to starvation, radiation or brain-eating punk mutant biker zombies in assless chaps for me, thank you.


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## Altalazar (Dec 31, 2003)

And now the series has been picked up - it will be interesting to see where they go with it.  I wonder if they'll eventually decide / figure out there really IS an Earth or if that will not be much of a focus at all.


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## Qlippoth (Jan 2, 2004)

*"You maniacs!"*



			
				Altalazar said:
			
		

> And now the series has been picked up - it will be interesting to see where they go with it.  I wonder if they'll eventually decide / figure out there really IS an Earth or if that will not be much of a focus at all.



Perhaps they'll find Earth, only to discover apes in power and a large statue half-buried in the sand...


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## Black Omega (Jan 3, 2004)

Qlippoth said:
			
		

> Perhaps they'll find Earth, only to discover apes in power and a large statue half-buried in the sand...




Then it's bound to be worlds better than Galactica 1980.


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## Darrin Drader (Jan 3, 2004)

Altalazar said:
			
		

> And now the series has been picked up - it will be interesting to see where they go with it.  I wonder if they'll eventually decide / figure out there really IS an Earth or if that will not be much of a focus at all.




Not so fast. While I'm all for the series getting the green light, the last news I heard was that Scifi extended the contracts of the actors for another month while they continued to debate whether or not to let this go to series. Sadly, it sounds like its not a sure thing yet.


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## kirinke (Jan 4, 2004)

**chuckles wickedly*

if earth does exist in the galactica continuum. can we say crossover with stargate sg1? that's a real possibility.


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## Darrin Drader (Jan 4, 2004)

kirinke said:
			
		

> if earth does exist in the galactica continuum. can we say crossover with stargate sg1? that's a real possibility.




I'd much rather cross over with Babylon 5. Can you imagine B5 vs. the cylons? The possibilities, are cheesy cool.


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