What, no Lloyd Bridges?

Dear Jane,

Sorry, I know it’s been a while since I checked in with you about BSG. This is not because I haven’t been watching the series, but because I don’t feel I really have much to add to what I’ve already said about it. You know, the fact it’s basically an Iraq-era allegory first and a piece of genuine SF second, the fact I don’t actually like the Starbuck character (sorry), the occasionally awkward tone of the thing (the mixture of pulpy tropes and plot devices and very serious subject matter).

Well, anyway, I’ve watched the first half of season two now and I thought I would fill you in on what I thought of the individual episodes. I think this is a mixed bunch, for all sorts of reasons. (I am going to do the thing where I list the episode name and give a few pithy comments, I’m afraid.)

Scattered: Yeah, well, I have to say that new BSG is increasingly reminding me of Babylon 5, except with perhaps less of a sense that the writers know where the story is actually going. The first episode of every season of B5 after the first was mainly concerned with catching all the pieces that got kicked up in the air in the previous season finale, and this is much the same. I suppose there is an element of laying in new plotlines going on, too. Missed Adama.

Valley of Darkness: Filler. At least, that’s how it seems to me now. I know we are told on a regular basis that ‘the Cylons have a plan’ but the Cylons themselves show little sign of it. How does boarding Galactica and running amok help with this mythical plan? If the plan is simply ‘kill all the humans’ they usually go about it in a peculiarly convoluted way. Missed Adama.

Fragged: Liked this one. Possibly this is because of the absence of ace pilot/instructor/tactician/sportswoman/interrogator/Cylon wrangler Starbuck. I find it very easy to dislike Colonel Tigh mainly due to his strong physical resemblance to a particularly objectionable English government minister. I seem to recall the climax, where Doc Baltar does the thing to the other person, was genuinely surprising. Missed Adama.

Resistance: One of those episodes which hasn’t really registered much with me, despite the fact that some fairly memorable stuff happens in it (primarily Boomer-1 taking a bullet and Apollo and the Prez skedaddling off to hide out with Old Apollo). Adama came back! Woo.

The Farm: the sociological imperative to procreate in a post-apocalyptic context is a potentially interesting and powerful theme for a drama, but, you know, this is a Starbuck-heavy episode so I found it hard to warm up to it, I’m afraid. Again, there is rather more noise than signal when it comes to the Cylon ‘plan’. Was deeply disturbed by the sight of Adama crying.

Home: Inevitably I found myself comparing this one to the equivalent episode of Disco BSG, which I believe was called Lost Planet of the Gods or something similar. As an attempt to pull all the plotlines of the previous five episodes together and establish a new status quo, I suppose this is quite successful, and some of the incidental drama in this particular episode is quite engaging. Even so, some of the stuff from a while back (characters sticking guns in each others’ faces, betraying each other, sticking each other in cells, and so on) gets forgotten about a bit too quickly. But I am probably just nitpicking. You know, the series’ format needed a bit of a reset at this point, so scratch that last criticism.

Final Cut: Might not have recognised Lucy Lawless with blonde hair. I’m sorry to bang on, but this one did remind me of the Babylon 5 episodes And Now For A Word and The Illusion of Truth (I’ve never seen the BSG writers discuss B5 as an influence, but it surely was). Not quite as good as either of those, though. The conclusion, where stirring music (hang on, that’s the Disco BSG theme!) plays while someone declares how wonderful the military are, turned me off a bit. Kneejerk idolisation of people in uniforms makes me nervous. I suppose you could argue this is intended as satire of Bush-era, but I got no sense that this was the intention.

Flight of the Phoenix: One of those episodes which strained my credulity more than most, as the Chief and his friends build a new starfighter in their garage (effectively). I was reminded of that episode of Top Gear where they built their own hybrid car, the Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust. Funnily enough the Blackbird even ends up looking a bit like the Top Gear car. The stuff with Boomer-2 rewriting a computer virus by sticking wires into her veins was less memorable for me. (If the Cylons can productively plug wires into various parts of their anatomy, and have vertebrae that light up like neon tubes during moments of whoa-ho-ho, exactly why does Doc Baltar need to muck about with blood tests and suchlike? Are there honestly no more obvious signs?)

Pegasus and Resurrection Ship (because these episodes are essentially one long story): Liked the Airplane! in-joke. I have to say that very little about this story genuinely surprised me as it was unfolding, given that this is (to some extent) covering basically the same ground as the Voyager episodes Equinox (there’s another ship, but this is not good news as the people on it have turned into bastards). Nevertheless I thought this was gripping stuff. A little uncomfortable with the ‘Need gravitas? Just add rape!’ formulation of the plotting, I have to say. And I thought the end was kind of a cop-out: not necessarily with the way Cain was killed off, but the big eulogy she got saying what a good leader she was for taking ‘tough choices’. ‘Tough choices’ in this case meaning condoning rape and tortute, and executing civilians. More apologetics for neo-Con extremism, if you ask me, and the blonde Cylon’s incredible vanishing trick is starting to get a bit wearisome as a plot device.

But, perhaps most importantly, prior to Pegasus I was beginning to get a bit indifferent to the series, and not making an effort to watch episodes as regularly as I did when I started off. I found myself watching these three episodes on the spin, which is almost unheard of for me. So this is still a series which is capable of getting things absolutely right.