I'm not sure I was amazed or impressed by tonight's Battlestar Galactica episode, but I was still surprised. The show does continue to have a way of thwarting the conventions of the genre.
First, they played on the expectations of anyone familiar with the original series by having the Pegasus actually survive beyond the mid-season cliffhanger wrap-up. But now they turned around and rethwarted expectations by killing off her captain.
This episode sees the "fighter jock hero" character acting out a death wish, having a relationship with a prostitute, and sanctioning black market crime. We're a long way from conventional sci-fi at this point.
Baltar had some good scenes. The "mafia"-style head of the black market organization was compelling to watch. The scene where Lee Adama confronts Colonel Tigh was strong. It was fun to see Zarek back for a bit.
But still, I guess I felt that there weren't quite enough parts to make up a truly great whole. But then, even "less-than-average" for Battlestar Galactica is pretty damn amazing by the average standard of just about anything else on TV -- including several other shows I watch and enjoy regularly.
What a shame we only have six more to go now before we're on another break, waiting for season three.
7 comments:
They increased the number of episodes a season right? Going from 16 to 20+?
Well, last night was a 'filler' episode. And what a great 'filler' episode. The moment Ad. Adama tells Cpt. Adama he's in charge of the investigation, it was clear to me that we had a filler ep on hand.
But they gave us some great character interactions. Baltar and Roslin. Baltar and "his 6." Lee and Dee - glad that was cleared up. Tigh and Lee.
Very intertaining for a filler episode.
"We're a long way from conventional sci-fi at this point."
That's exactly my problem. This was not an episode from a science-fiction television show.
I also don't care for the anti-hero envelope-pushing they're doing with Apollo. Pretty soon, he won't be a hero at all.
There are 20 episodes total in season 2, yes. But there were 10 shown in the "front half" last summer, and now we're already out 4 of the 10 in the back half.
Shocho, you might be interested to know that in his podcast for the episode, Ronald Moore pretty much said "this was a weak episode, and I'm very unhappy with the way it turned out." He goes on in great detail about all the things that he thinks don't work. It's quite insightful, and very different from most self-congratulating DVD commentary.
This episode sees the "fighter jock hero" character acting out a death wish, having a relationship with a prostitute, and sanctioning black market crime. We're a long way from conventional sci-fi at this point.
So, tell me again why the Sci-Fi channel didn't want Firefly originally? Because those all pretty much describe Malcom Reynolds.
The more I watch BSG, the more it makes me pine for Firefly.
I did enjoy seeing Mac from Predator, "you give away our position one more time, I'll bleed you. real quiet. leave you here. got that!?" I could quote dozens of lines from that movie! too bad he suffered a similar fate in BSG.
death-wish Apollo snatching the gun away from the thug was way cool. but the whole substitute family thing had me going "huh?"
a favorite recurring bit is when Baltar is talking to somebody, and Six tells him something, and he has to cover up his reation he said out loud to Six. it's borderline silly but always done really well. lots of it this episode.
the mole
I have to agree that this was pretty weak and next week probably won't be much better. Coming off some pretty big episodes both in special effects and character usage, big-budget shows like this have to resort to the "ship in a bottle" episode to fill. If you go back and look at Trek, that's where the character development came in. Notice that next week is Starbuck's episode so it wouldn't surprise me if these episodes were developed pretty much at the same time.
One thing about this week's episode that would have been neat, would have been if Roslin had realized she unwittingly used the black market to get Adama his Admiral pips. There was a comment made about "it took forever to find a jeweler". Obviously, there is no connection but it might have been an interesting revelation that would have made Ms. Self-Righteous realize that Apollo was right.
Lastly, the problem I have with Tom Z. showing up so much is that there is ALWAYS the face to face close up between "old Apollo" and "new Apollo". It's like they're winking at the audience.
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