Battlestar Galactica: Did they frack up?

I've just watched the final episode of the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, well the last two episodes since I watched the extended edited together version. I don't really watch that much TV so until I recently picked up a bargain  DVD box set of the entire run, I'd only ever seen the first season. I've watched all four seasons in as many weeks and, by avoiding all online forums and articles relating to the show, it was mostly new to me. So if you've yet to see the series then don't read on because there are major spoilers in this post.

Overall I think BG was a stunning series - the space battles looked superb, the characters were incredibly well written with even the lesser characters being fully fleshed out, and the suspense level was often turned up to eleven. I did think that the final two seasons became somewhat bogged down in its own mystic elements and the final denouncement, although not as bad as some online articles seemed to suggest, was something of a let down - particularly with Starbuck. What was she? An angel? A God? If so then this seems to have been something of a cop out, particularly as we had heard so much about her being this great harbinger of death in the final few episodes. And how did she resurrect from the dead? She wasn't a cylon and this wasn't at all explained. There was one line where Appolo said, 'you won't be forgotten', which ties in to something Starbuck said earlier, about not fearing death but being terrified of being forgotten, but it still feels like a cop out. I don't think the ending solidified things as a cohesive whole, which left the viewer ultimately unrewarded.

I had no problems with the survivors finally settling on a primitive planet and turning their back on all technology to start over again, eventually forming the human race we see today. You see it turned out that the planet the survivors settled on was our Earth and the show suggest that these human/cylon hybrids were our ancestors.But the fact that they kept no ships, no weapons, in case the cylons returned seems a but stupid and the show was anything but stupid. After four seasons of what may be the best TV scifi show ever the climax leaves a lot of open ends.


That said  this was still an amazing show, and perhaps the end was always going to disappoint but Starbuck was such a central part of the show that she should have had her arc better explained - saying that God did it all just seems a little lame.

Battlestar Galactica - The Eye of Jupiter and beyond

God or Cylon?

Over the last few weeks I've become hooked on Battlestar Galactica and have now gone through three seasons and have only twenty more episodes to go before this insanely addictive and clever SF series come to a close. Battlestar Galactica (that's the re-imagined series and not the original disco in space that was the 1970's original) is likely the strangest, most audacious and intense small screen SF series I've ever seen.

The third season ended by revealing four of the final five Cylons to us and what a shock that was - ever since it was revealed that there were twelve humanoid Cylons and that we had only seen seven models, I've been barking up the wrong cyber tree. I never would have suspected two of those revealed (I won't name them here just for those who, like me, had never seen the show) - Those two were the last characters I suspected. Still the identity of the last unknown Cylon model is a mystery and from what I've seen so far it could be anyone - Adama, Apollo, Roslin, even Baltar. Though Balter seems an unlikely suspect since he seems to have become some sort of messianic figure. Will it finally be reveled that Baltar is the son of God?

Like the original Battlestar Galactica which was basically made to cash in on the boom in all things SF following the original Star Wars movie, the re-imagination is based around the survivors of a human/Cylon war and the search for the fabled lost planet called Earth. The computer generated dog fights in space are incredibly well done and look superb on a big screen TV, and sound even better though a good sound system.

There were some filler episodes throughout the three seasons I've seen so far, but the show mostly follows this weird mystical arc with the differences between humans and Cylons becoming increasingly blurred. If you've never seen the show then I would urge you to do so, even if you are not a fan of TV SF. Battlestar Glactica is in a class of its own.