Battlestar Galactica
January 15, 2005 - Science Fiction - Television
After having watched the miniseries on the SciFi channel, I was interested. After having watched the premiere of the series tonight, I'm completely hooked.
The writing on this show is great, and the special effects style is very realistic - space is cold and silent, and ships have no need to be aerodynamic since there is no air, which leads to drastically different styles of flight.
My only compaint is the blatant over-sexed character called number six. Other than that, I love the show. The new Adama is great, I like the female Starbuck, the new Cylons are like T-2000s, the no-cockpit Cylon fighters are perfectly envisioned, and the design for the new basestars is awesome.
I also like the Cylon tactics - they seem exactly like what machines would do to harry humans, taking advantage of our weaknesses, attacking every half hour, day after day, preventing people from sleeping, knowing that sleep deprivation would eventually cause a mistake.
To sum up, I like the show. Goodnight.
The sets are better, I'm glad to see Starbuck back on cigars (he quit smoking after the pilot in the original) and the story line has possibilities. It is unfortunate that some major blunders were copied from the original, including:
o The lights inside the helmets (I guess there's a bunch of agents out there who scream bloody murder if you can't see the "talent's" faces at all times). If you don't understand why this is a stupid idea, drive out to a spot that is nothing but pitch dark, turn on the interior light in your car, look out the window and admire your reflection. In any fighter squadron I was ever in (three of them), interior cockpit lights were red, to preserve night vision.
o The wondrous ability of spacecraft to maneuver like aircraft. The current effort is better, but someone needs to acquaint the writers with Newton's Laws of Motion - especially number 3. Hint to script writers: "Inertia" is not the same thing as "momentum" and "weight" is not the same thing as "mass." Hire a technical consultant.
o Calling star (or stellar) systems "Solar" systems. Unless, of course, every star in the Galactica universe is named "Sol." The script writers still don't seem to understand that having 12 human-habitable planets in orbit around a single star is probably impossible.
There's a lot more I won't bother to mention, mostly having to do with things like building a warship with the bridge in the most exposed spot (al la Star Trek), decks running in the wrong direction and the total misuse of artificial gravity.
I preferred the character of Baltar in the original over the current incarnation. A smarmy politician selling out the human race for profit appealed to me more than a misguided scientist trying to get laid. And, no one did "smarmy" better than John Colicos. On the other hand, they got the character of Colonel Tigh just right - an old soldier who may help save all their asses if they don't write him out.
Some last words regarding military protocol - if people are going to charge around saluting uncovered and indoors, someone should show them (especially the women) how to do it. Finally, in true TV fashion, 95% of everyone in this outfit seems to be an officer.
As long as the stories are interesting the series should survive, but the script writers need to avoid things they don't understand.
On the plus side, the characters of Adama and Tigh continue to be interesting. Baltar, on the other hand, needs to have a fatal mishap. As a villain, he just doesn't cut it.