Battlestar Galactica: Season 2 - SciFi US broadcast thread

Here's my guess.

I know who's behind it all! "Stupid Humans!

Last weeks was a good episode but a bit of a let down from last season I thought. As a a computer techie the whole I'll network these computers and whip up a firewall plot had major holes in it. I try to suspend my disbelief on such things but sometimes you can just know too much about a particular subject.

I'd also like to see more of the Starbuck storyline tonight.

I also hope all these cool threads they are creating get resolved and we don't get the X-Files scenario.

I'm not getting the same enjoyment so far that I did in the minseries and Season 1. Edward James Olmos is a big reason I like the show and having him get less screen time isn't helping. We got more Starbuck, but for the life of me, I can't remember a single thing they did other than hang out a bit and get wheels. We got a little more doc hallucinating, but I don't recall anything happening in that storyline either. As near as I can recall... Cylons land, BSG fights back... the end.

Going purely on an emotional level (how it feels to me), it seems as if the miniseries and S1 had a limited time to say what they wanted to say, so they went all out to do so. Now it feels like the series has a bit of success under its wing and it likely to be around for a bit, so it is dragging things out to make sure it has material from week to week. We'll see.

I really enjoyed tonight's episode. Each episode so far has been less jam-packed and important than Season One, but there's been some great character stuff to compensate. In particular, watching the Colonel stand up and take charge is something that's fascinating to watch develop and evolve. With the exception of the botched jump, he's been rigidly competent and the voice at the top people need. The scenes in Starbuck's home were surprising and fascinating; it's the last place I'd have expected her to live. The fall-out for Helo was also fascinating, and the way that Starbuck begun to understand it. Meanwhile, Baltar has stopped even the illusion of sanity. He seemingly drifts further out each episode. The stuff with the chief mechanic, while well-trod, gave his character some added development as well as fleshing out his deck hand a bit more. Without Starbuck hogging the limelight, Apollo's become far more interesting.
By far the best subplot was the Cylon infestation of the ship. That was directed like a horror movie and was at times quite gruesome and shocking. Very atmospheric, very thrilling.
My biggest problem with this season is that having all the characters scattered both geographically and politically means we only get baby-steps for a lot of different characters. Back when you have the Galactica storyline and the Caprica storyline it was alot more focused and dynamically satisfying.

The Battlestar Galactica episode "Valley of Darkness" is, for the most part, a tense and reasonably action-packed episode. The tone of the on-board Cylon hunt is its strong point, in my opinion.

A couple of points:

---Note the decision to "euthanize" Socinus without his permission (i.e., no "informed consent"):

Socinus: "I'm goin' home."
Chief: "Yeah, goin' home."

Is this a moral issue skirted entirely or will it come back to haunt the regulars?

---Lt. "Crashdown" yet again comes off as weak, weak, weak.

---Cara riding her internal-combustion engine through Caprica City; does this make sense in a Cylon-occupied city, where humans are automatically target practice?

Adam Lenhardt wrote (post #95):


The three-theater action in a serialized program like this is to be expected. It does diffuse the story a bit, but the complexity lends itself to a satisfying conclusion if the threads are sewn up cleverly but naturally in the end.

The three theaters would seem to roughly correlate to human eras:

(a) Caprica (departure point [human past]);
(b) Galactica and the fleet (status location [human present]);
(c) Kobol (the source and intermediate destination; the key to their ultimate destination [the confluence of past and future]).



It is not clear---and never has been---to what extent Baltar's visions are pure hallucination. And, since the information from Number Sex gained from those visions has been accurate far more often than not, it is not safe to bet on their being totally divorced from reality.

Is the "evidence" of human sacrifice to which he awakens genuine, an assertion of true human nature ("depravity, barbarism, savagery"), which will always reassert itself? (Number Sex asserts that the scriptures are a lie, yet she goes on to quote them authoritatively: "All of this has happened before. All of this will happen again.") One of the questions hanging in the background about the original departure of the colonists from Kobol is why they left "paradise" in the first place. Number Sex's vision may, indeed, have some validity and bearing on answering that all-important question.

I assume that the vision of Adama drowning the hybrid child is a metaphor for human resistance to the Cylons' version of the "shape of things to come". Of course, it also represents another instance of supposed human savagery and further motivates Baltar to the supposed Cylon cause (to save "his child").

Starbuck's tactical competence needs some work:

1. She goes to her old apartment; Six no doubt IDed her and would know where she lived
2. She turns on a power source (the music player)
3. She leaves in a jeep which is extremely easy to track, and will pose absolutely no problems for a Cylon fighter plane.

Like last week, a lot of (mostly technical) plot holes. If the virus has taken hold, why do the cylons need to go to that auxiliary control room? Why can't the virus turn off emergency power? Why can't the virus fire the guns, or move the ship? The centurians killed a lot of people, then for some reason withdrew, then returned to attack Apollo's party. Were they lost?

I agree with the others who have said this season is slower than the last. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but I hope Starbuck isn't stuck on that planet for the whole damn season! Oh, and while I may be nitpicking here, I'm still enjoying the new Galactica a lot!

Me too, but I do wish it would get going! We get what, ten episodes before BG takes a break until the Winter? I'd just like it a bit better if I felt most of the episodes didn't have that biding time feeling.

Ric

I thought the same thing, and agree with Phillip that turning on music and then nodding off (at least Helo seemed to be) was very tactically unsound in an enemy-occupied city.

Starbuck could be intentionally trying to draw out the Cylons. Maybe she's thinking, "Bring 'em on, I'd prefer a straight fight to all this sneaking around."

Virus takes over computer of ship. Didn't I just see exactly the same thing on Stargate Atlantis in the previous hour? Hey, I wonder if the virus will succeed? Except I didn't. Maybe the Cylons will succeed. Nah. In effect, the episode had no suspense for me, so I didn't feel I needed to watch it to see what happened.

Drunker Tigh as leader? We all step up to the plate and do what we have to do, right? Either that, or we run an oil tanker aground.

Apollo as John McCain, reluctant, but effective, hero. I know who I'd bet on with machine-gun-bearing Cylons on the other side. Oh, and it isn't all that easy to do a head shot if you haven't handled weapons before. In fact, given the pressure they were under, it's pretty difficult period. I'd have preferred they just rig up some kind of explosion that didn't require them to have obscene amounts of luck and greater than reasonable skill. Madame President went positvely Zena.

Power signatures and radios? I'm actually not sure on this one. My first thought was how is she playing the radio with no power, but they covered that. My second thought was, "Will somebody pick up on that?" I didn't know if batteries give out perceptible power signatures. I did think it was a bit dangerous to have the radio playing for any Cylon that might pass in the area to pick up on. Overall, I let it ride.

Wheels. I think this is the moment I kinda went from actively being into the episode to passively watching it. The whole planet is basically empty of people, so Sgt. Lovesick could have grabbed any vehicle he wanted at basically any point. It just made sense that he'd avoid them so he wouldn't be easy to track. What changed?

Still no info on why Boomer did what she did. BTW, Sgt. Lovesick called her Cylon Sharon as if he thinks the one back on the ship is the real Sharon. It doesn't look like he's aware they're ALL Cylons. Starbuck has been on the ship recently enough to know this. I happen to think Boomer will be back to rescue them.

These things don't make the show unwatchable, but I'm hoping it will pick it a bit. Soon.

I don't know what you're getting at. She didn't even have a firearm. All she did was duck and cover, and was lucky that two shots fired at her missed her by inches, piercing only her jacket instead of her.

I think Helo still thinks there was a "real" human Sharon and that she was either killed or captured and "replaced" with this Cylon "fake." That's why he commented to Starbuck about her laugh being the same, etc. He was astounded by how good the copy was without realizing that the only Sharon he's even known has been a Cylon.

Looked to me like the Presidents aide shot someone and a Cylon was covered in their blood yet they never covered who had been shot. I'm sure I didn't imagine that.

I'm also hoping that the expansion in episode count doesn't give us the same story in more episodes with more filler because the intensity is part of what made the first seaon so good.

All these posts and no one wonders what the baby looks like?

I liked it, I did not care for the radio thing either and less for driving the Hummer.

However, at its "worst" its still better than whatever else is on.

I, for one, don't mind the slow pace or breaking the show into three concurrent story lines. Since this season will be a full one, as opposed to the 13 of the last one, the producers have more time to tell the tale and flesh out the characters.

Last night's episode was top notch. I agree with a post above in that the Cylons on board Galactica played like a horror movie. In many ways, it was a military nightmare so why not play it out as such.

This show has taken many of the cliches of sci-fi and war movies and have injected new life into them. Great television.

But BSG had established the storyline of the Cylon computer virus in the miniseries. I suppose it was just coincidence that Atlantis and BSG had that particular plot point in common on the same night.

I loved this ep. It had me on my seat the entire time. Those centurions are some scary mofos and I loved how, when Apollo and company first saw them, they ran like hell - no heroics just pure terror.

I liked how they finally explained why we haven't seen very many corpses on Caprica.

I'm not "getting at" anything. I'm giving some impressions that may or may not be interesting to others.

That said, I just went rewatched my tape to make sure I didn't perhaps zone out. What I see is the President's aide mistakenly firing his gun, the Cylon hears it, turns around, and goes back to an ajoining corridor he'd just passed. The Cylon turns and looks down that corridor, and through open doors at the other end of the hall, sees the President's aide standing there in shock. The camera shows nobody else in the doorway. There is no need for the President to "duck and cover." As the Cylons open fire, the president lets out a Rambo-esque yell and dives at her aide, pushing him to the ground and safety. It might help to know that my comment was a bit tongue-in-cheek.



I'd bet on it being a coincidence. I almost went back and edited my post (before posting it) to say, "Of course that isn't BSG's fault..." but I forgot. Still, I'm only one viewer. I'm attempting to describe my viewing experience, not provide objective commentary on the "goodness" of the show.

I've already said it is a good show several times in recent days. If it weren't, I'd give up on it and move on. But the reality is I haven't enjoyed the first two shows of this year as much as I did previous episodes. It's easy to say, "I didn't like it as much." I'm trying to add a bit of explanation about things that may have added up to a less than examplarary experience for me. I also want to stimulate a bit of discussion about the show because I'm interested in what works and doesn't work (and why) for others as well.

A few more posts responding to other comments in the thread so far...

- I initially was curious what the baby looks like, but they're going to such lengths to keep us from seeing that I've moved on. I'll see it when/if they're ready to show me.

- I love character development, but I just don't feel the time is being used to effectively do that at this point. Most of what I know about the characters I learned in either the miniseries or S1. I have a little more useful background on Tigh now, but that's about all I can recall. The human moment between Starbuck and Helo didn't do much to tell me about either one of them.

BSG is a great show. Why? I'll give you ten good reasons.

Top ten things we will never see on BSG:

1. Kids and their pets stowing away in the trunks of Vipers before they go into battle.

2. A teenage hacker modifying the Cylon computer virus so it can be used to save the day.

3. Cute robots. (That's cute in the fuzzy-wuzzy sense, not in the YOWZA-WOWZA sense )

4. Adolescents seeking valdation for their abominable lifestyle choices in the midst of battle.

5. Cylon Centurions having their heads blow up because they can't solve an unsolvable riddle.

6. The "adoption" or "domestication" of a Cylon Centurion as a result of the regret it feels for taking human lives. (The capture and reprogramming of a Centurion, however, is another matter.)

7. Baltar using phrases like "Bubble-headed booby" and "Oh, the pain, the pain." (Yes, I'm that old.)

8. The Standard Model being modified, for plot reasons, to include new particles whose existense introduces asymmetrical assertions which lead to the tensor matrices resulting in solutions that are infinite in magnitude. (Sorry, but this just really bugs me.)

9. Heros with secret identities. (Cylon sleepers, notwithstanding, of course.)

10. A spin-off series about the zany antics of a Cylon Centurion and a human sharing an apartment in New York City.

Good list, BrianW!

I enjoy the show...But, in what seems an attempt to be different from Trek. They seem to have swung too far with the desperation and hopelessness that people complained was lacking with Trek and most notably Voyager. I understand things are supposed to be grim. And I have no problem with that. But, the Galacitca was supposed to have been traveling with a skeleton crew. I know they restocked at a supply base. But, they are losing trained crew in large numbers each week. How many were killed in this last episode? I have heard the talk of Galactica
Warning Spoiler! Click to show So I hope they address the need for more crew,pilots and marines.
I also agree they need to move the stories along a little more. With a limited amount of episodes we need some story closure.

Probably the same reason no Windows virus I know of can turn on my scanner, start my printer, and start playing the Galactica theme on a media player. Some stuff just has to be manually controlled.

In any case, certain systems are still isolated. Adama wouldn't allow them ALL to be connected. That was established in the pilot.

I still like the show, but I hope things move along soon. Let's get Starbuck and Helo (with the arrow), back to the Galactica already. Let's wrap up whatever they're going to do on Kobol, and let's move on toward finding Earth again. Oh, and let's get Commander Adama back on the Job.

I dont want them to speed anything up. As a big fan of DS9 i loved how even though one small story ended, the overall arc kept going on, and carried into the next. Battlestar is doing that as well but to a bigger extent. I'm glad they are using all of the cast and not putting the lower ranks on the back burner for the five or six mains. Everyone is involved. Every small charector gets time to shine and i look forward to every week

capt

If you listen to the podcast for 201 , Ronald Moore tells you which episode gets everything back together again. I don't know if this would constitute a spoiler so you should probably get the 'cast from SciFi here and listen to it yourself.

Steve, I can't get the podcast to play. Can you tell us what he said? In spoilers of course.

Thanks!

the second episode just aired of a 20 episode season. This is the show. Sure I want Starbuck back but if they want to take their time with her finding a ship and blasting her way off of Caprica in the compelling way they are doing everything else then they can take their time.

Jason, it's just that, especially the stuff on Caprica & Kobol seemed real slow and, for lack of a better word, kinda pointless, in the last episode.

With regards to the podcast fron 201.


Warning Spoiler! Click to show

Personally I think it's a little too long . Babylon 5 stretched some of it's plotlines for seasons but you didn't always know it at the time. The characters were usually back together within a few episodes, interacting with each other.

I agree. Great episode. This is better than most Sci Fi movies and more exciting than the last three Star Wars movies.


I think it is more character building than anything and after the non stop action on the Galactica it was nice to have some quiet moments. This IS NOT (Thank God) Voyager or Enterprise ya know.


Did the President's Aid lose weight?

The virus never took hold.
When the power went out, someone said "must have been the virus", but that was BEFORE they knew Centurions were in the base.

But a virus CAN shut the power off. Have we forgotten that Windows virus from 3 years ago that would shut off your PC whenever it connected to the Internet?

Anything, I thought the episode was great. I wished we learned more, but the interesting things:
1- The skulls, and 6's explanation
2- Baltars dream.
3- Tigh sent the President BACK to prison.. nice

The ONLY thing I didn't like was the "exploding rounds".
They were powerfull enough to blow up the Centurions, yet 2 blew up WITHIN INCHES of Adama, and he wasnt even scratched.

And we still don't know who shot at the landing party. There is obviously a REASON for that. Its kinda like when you don't see a killers face in a horror movie. That ALWAYS means there is some sort of twist involved.

nick