Disintoxication…

…from Battlestar Galactica

Two weeks without it. more in fact. and I am not feeling the lack of it

I’m going to celebrate buying or downloading “The Good Life“, a BBC series which I adored when I was in the UK, where it’s constantly re-aired…

Cant’s stop the signal…

That’s Serenity’s tagline, I know… But I’m writing this post just to inform you that, yet again, can’t finish the 13th episode opf BSG. I just can’t. I started it. But there’s no way… I got to the point where Atena and Helo have a meaningless discussion, then one of them shoot the other. So lame.

I can’t even start watching again Ally McBeal, since Billy died. I am too afraid of such a big change… or may be I’m afraid that nothing will change for the people in the firm… mah…

But I still have some episodes left of The future is Wild, thank God (thanking someone who doesn’t exist doesn’t really help, uh?) Anyway, this series is just great. Although the ecosystems presented are somehow too simplified… No background noise, if I can make myself clear. It looks like every region only hosts 3 to 4 animals. and a bunch of plants to provide a nice backdrop.

And as I said, the plant’s evolution is grossly underestimated. Still, as good as any BBC “The world of…” series.

I can’t / I can’t I / can’t stand watching…

Battlestar galactica anymore. The last two episodes have been sitting on my harddrive without me even pretending to care about them. bah… let’s face it, “The Future is Wild” is much more entertaining…

I mean, instead of cardboard spaceships looking for a silly planet whose inhabitants aren’t even intelligent enough to remember they were part of a whole civilisation only three thousand years ago…

We have the tale of continents colliding over great lenghts of time, the closing of the mediterranean sea and its evaporation, the death of the life which it did harbor with the exception of few adaptable and ultra-specialised species. We follow the hundred-million-year-long voyage of Australia to collide with Japan; the analog travel northward of Antarctica and its blloming from frozen desert to temperate forest to tropical jungle, and the evolution and diversification of its few bird species in thousands new varieties each occupying its own special niche. We ave insects as big as hawks preying on small colibris descended from albatrosses, we have colibris who defend themselves spraying a noxious liquid the drink from a flower, and insect who mimic that flower so that they can trick the bird in getting closer to them just when he’s defenseless. This is REAL science-fiction, where science plays the most prominent role, and not unlikely love-triangles between petty officers and fighter pilots. bah!!!

Booh! for Battlestar Galactica, Kudos! to “The future is wild”!!!

ps: I am not inhuman, mind you. I also did watch an episode of Ally Mcbeal, third series – that pretty much fulfill my need for unlikely romance

I’ve given Up on BSG

It’s happened. with the last episode where they go to great length to cross a stellar cluster instead of going around it, I’m just through with it.

I’ll keep a good memory of the first two series, and forget it’s been continued.

I’m now going to start watching Lost, hoping that it’ll be a bit better. but there’s a space-opera vaccum in my heart. That is, until F Heter hamilton does publish The Dreaming Void.

I have to admit…

There are some things of Science Fiction TV series which I don’t understand.

Why, whenever a situation of danger arise, the most important person on the ship/station take the scouting role? I mean, Capt Kirk is always the first to descend on a planet, so is the commander in chief of Babylon 5 station, who in three episodes has already gone out ona fighter jet twice, once just to grab a spaceship out of control. I mean, it’s not like in a station full of pilots he can be the best one…

I mean, this people are often old, kind of, like in their fifites, surrounded by twenty-something years old top-gun pilots, yet they go on the first line…

May be it has something to do with American history? Did Patton advance at the head of its tank divisions? What did McArthur did? what about Gen.l Grant? mah…

The only nice exception to this is BattleStar Galactica, where Admiral Adama stays in C&C Centre whereas those who do the dangerous flights, and dogfights are Starbuck and (once) his son Apollo. Except when Adama went down to explore a planet with Boomer, and most opf the important characters in the saga, I can’t remember another time when he did steal the scouting role to who was supposed to perform it.

That’s nice in BSG, I must admit. Every person has its role, and that’s enough to flesh out the character, without having to resort to jack-of-all-trades captains which smell more of fantasy than science-fiction to me…

just my two cents.

However, I’have seen the latest episode (9) of BSG series 3: revolves around the boxing matches organised on board the battlestar to ease the tensions. if you have someone on your ass, you just call him up on the ring and pummel him like a potato bag. Not very practical, as someone at GalacticaBlog pointed out, if you’re a fighter pilot, since having bruises and broken ribs when performing high-G maneuvers can be a real pain. but what the hell… Anyway, in this episode, for a reason not very clear, the old Adama is angry at chief and call him up on the ring. then starbuck and apollo beat each other up and re-fall in love… lame lame lame…

BattleStar Galactica

I’ve seen Episode eight. I believe I’ve seen enough of the whole series, to draw my conclusions now.

and in essence they’re negative. The original idea was good, with the sudden shock of almost total annihilation of Humankind, and the merciless hunt of the survivors by the cylons…

I could endure the little stupidities, and pretend that some things just didn’t happen, fill in the plothole with my imaginations, the same way I pretend to mentally improve the environment where the characters play. I can imagine a properly built spaceship, and not something where the only difference with a nimitz-class air carrier is that doors are slopy… :-\

I did enjoy the humanity of the characters in the first series, and forgave the bad sides thinking that it would get better and better with time. But no, oh no, it’s gone down the other way…

frankly, the only thing I’d save of the whole new series is the dogfighting scenes, but there’s way too little of them to make up for the rest.

in this episode, just to stay on the detail, we see how the cylons are not only intelligent, and vicious, they seems to have a kind of supreme simulation power. How could they possibly know that BullDog would end up trying to kill the old Adama, when the reason for that (i.e. that adama itself shoot him up) was unknown to anybody but himself?) and even so, it’s kind of a far fetched attempt at assassination, from an enemy that has shown that they could get rid of humanity once and for all, if only they wanted. I mean, they should have just nuked the humans while they were grounded on new caprica…

bah…

and the science in the series, purposed by Gaius baltar, is tacky and fake like, I don’t know. just fake… unbelieveble. the guy is an idiot, and his only skill seem to be a mutant power who makes people around him think he’s a genius, humans and cylons alike.

I much better like The 4400, where with some little exception like the mutation of episode 11/12, the science is treated a bit fairly, and even when it’s not it’s easy to see through it and just get along with the story… and most of all, they manage to keep me on the edge with just a good use of the story, and revelations, not with pointless space actions…

pity third season has ended, and I can’t find ep 13 anywhere. but never mind…

tonight, it’s Desperate housewives night.