US blogger Jim Henley has some interesting thoughts about the politics of ace science fiction adventures series Battlestar Galactica. In my typically languid British way, I have just about started munching my way through series 2, which I find rather dark and depressing compared to the excellent series 1, but I am savouring the programmes even so, and looking forward to the third series, already now showing. My addiction to this series is worse even than Babylon 5 or, to roll back the years and to a very different genre, to Blackadder. The acting and the plots are consistently enthralling and entertaining.
It got me thinking about drama and storytelling more generally. If you tell a certain type of person that your favourite television show is Battlestar or Firefly, you are sometimes put in the ‘geek’ category, but it seems to me that in terms of quality and ability to describe the human condition, SF television shows can hold their own with the most pretentious dramas. In some ways, they are the final redoubts of romantic realism in drama.
Now, I wonder if that guy on the Tube was a Cylon…
[Editors note: for some previous thoughts on Battlestar Galactica on Samizdata, see here]
I can’t even click on the link for this post until 4 hours from now when I’m done watching the season 3 premiere, for fear of spoilers. Best show on tv. The political allegories have been obvious and carefully handled since the pilot, though I worry a little that the show will not be timeless but seen in the future as a product of its times.
Thanks for the link to a blog dealing with Battlestar. I’ve been looking for decent online commentary since this blog went offline.
I just wanted to warn you, though, that the show seriously heads south about halfway through season two. There was a hiatus halfway through – right after the “Resurrection Ship” two-parter (they package the two parts of season two separately for the DVDs in the US, actually – as seasons 2.0 and 2.5), and after that you have to wade through about 6 eps of pure crap. I don’t know what happened. Season one was sheer brilliance – some of the most thoughtful and consistent character development I’ve ever seen on television. Season 2.0 was equally good, I thought, though darker, like you say. But then something goes wrong.
The cliffhanger (Lay Down your Burdens) for season 2.5 is a real shocker – clearly the writers were trying to shake things up a bit to give themselves an opportunity to get the series back on track after horrible eps like “Black Market” and “Epiphanies.” Unfortunately, I don’t think the gamble paid off. The season three opener is replete with annoying inconsistencies, as I blogged soon after it aired. I’m sorry to say, but I think Battlestar’s broken and I don’t have much faith they’re going to be able to fix it. Not that I won’t keep watching avidly, of course… It was a superior show in its heyday (and infinitely better than the 1970s version). And there’s one developing plotline that I have to admit has the potential to be very interesting indeed…
I’d heard the buzz about this series and when it came on Sky 3 I eagerly tuned in.
The first thing that put me off was the WWII aerial battles and carrier deck crashes. I’ve seen these scenes in every War in the Pacific movie ever shown.
One incident had me laughing out loud. When one of the fighters is shot down, it descends from space into the atmosphere of a nearby planet and we get the shot of the analogue altimeter spinning like crazy as the hapless Starbuck plummets to earth.
Now I guess this is probably excused as – what’s the buzz word, oh yes – homage, but to me it shows a serious lack of imagination.
When I was younger, I probably looked to science fiction for “eternal truths” that cast light on current political and social affairs, but even then I was more interested in new possible technologies and how they might effect the humans of the future or our interaction with alien aliens.
If Moore and his team are really trying to “illustrate” the GWOT and the War in Iraq, then they’re doing it in a heavy handed and unimaginative way.
Weird. Every time I tell someone I’m an avid Firefly fan I get the stock response of, “Oh, so I bet your’re one of these crank libertarians as well, eh?”
Having addressed a vipers’ nest of BBC scriptwriters last week that the movie Children of Men was, for me anyway, a V for Vendetta for Guardian readers I guess I may well have seriously blotted my copybook for TV credibility anyway so I don’t really care … and yes I do recall the “the notorious terrorist Julian Taylor was caught and executed last night” line from Children of Men.
I’m sorry to say, but I think Battlestar’s broken and I don’t have much faith they’re going to be able to fix it. Not that I won’t keep watching avidly, of course… It was a superior show in its heyday (and infinitely better than the 1970s version).
All things have their times and a new version doesn’t like me
I prefer the 70s version to the new version. BSG puts the stick back up the ass of sci-fi.
There are only 2 characters I even like on the new version, Chief and Colonel Tigh. They are the only real people on the show. Oh, and the president’s aide, so he had to go, can’t have a nice person on the show.
Everyone else seems to be a raging egomaniac with no redeeming features.
Having said that, I’m enjoying season 3 a lot more than the previous seasons. And a lot more than I thought I would.
Add Mr. Gaeta to the list of characters I like.
Almost everyone else I dislike.
I think I would slap every single female on the show.
Some of those females could hit back rather hard.
As an early fan of the 70’s original, I still can’t get used to hot babes as Cylons. Maybe human collaborators along the lines of American leftist and the Islamo-fascists, but machines? Sounds more like some blow up doll freak’s naughty fantasies put on screen.