Battlestar Galactica 1x1 - 33
Mar. 20th, 2005 07:48 pmOh, my. Why did I put off watching this for so long?
Admittedly, having not seen the mini-series, I have No Idea Whatsover what is going on. I remember vaguely from the original that the Cylons are the bad guys and can resemble humans if they want to. Beyond that, I am bemused. I have learned something what is going on - namely, that there is a fleet (what does the title actually refer to? the ship, the fleet, or what?) of ships with a crew who have been going without sleep for five days because they're being attacked by the Cylons every thirty-three minutes.
Character-wise, there is a rather cool and morally conflicted fleet leader type guy named Apollo, who has a whole bunch of pilots but two in particular named Boomer (who is a Cylon? is that what the "previously" montage was trying to tell me?) and Starbuck (who is suddenly a woman, and a rather sexy-dykey woman at that), along with a President (of what?), who is a woman on board a civilian ship along with an interesting character named... something. Not Guy, possibly Gaius, who is either Lady-Macbeth-guilty about something, extremely tired or suffering from onset-loopiness (or possibly all three) and is having hallucinations of a Cylon woman who is in her turn apparently capable of being in several places at once, judging from an on-planet scene with a mysterious bloke called Helo. Who is assisted by Boomer, who is also capable of being in two places at once.
So, yes, I'm terribly confused. But enjoying myself hugely, I must say. The whole package is, frankly, Teh Sex; it exudes style and substance and layers upon layers of characterisation. The way it's shot is vaguely reminiscent of Blair Witch, but in a good way. It's got a certain gritty realism that is nothing less than compelling. The end of the episode, where the President is informed about the birth of a baby on one of the civilian ships, is saccharine and trite. In theory. But somehow it works so well and has such a real effect, and in short, I'm liking this. And at this rate will have watched the other eleven episodes by tomorrow afternoon.
In other news, I'm rather ill. My head and ears are hurting and I feel just about as crappy as I did over Christmas. And now it's Easter. I wonder if that means something.
Anyway. I think this week holds a whole lot of fannishness and not much else.
Admittedly, having not seen the mini-series, I have No Idea Whatsover what is going on. I remember vaguely from the original that the Cylons are the bad guys and can resemble humans if they want to. Beyond that, I am bemused. I have learned something what is going on - namely, that there is a fleet (what does the title actually refer to? the ship, the fleet, or what?) of ships with a crew who have been going without sleep for five days because they're being attacked by the Cylons every thirty-three minutes.
Character-wise, there is a rather cool and morally conflicted fleet leader type guy named Apollo, who has a whole bunch of pilots but two in particular named Boomer (who is a Cylon? is that what the "previously" montage was trying to tell me?) and Starbuck (who is suddenly a woman, and a rather sexy-dykey woman at that), along with a President (of what?), who is a woman on board a civilian ship along with an interesting character named... something. Not Guy, possibly Gaius, who is either Lady-Macbeth-guilty about something, extremely tired or suffering from onset-loopiness (or possibly all three) and is having hallucinations of a Cylon woman who is in her turn apparently capable of being in several places at once, judging from an on-planet scene with a mysterious bloke called Helo. Who is assisted by Boomer, who is also capable of being in two places at once.
So, yes, I'm terribly confused. But enjoying myself hugely, I must say. The whole package is, frankly, Teh Sex; it exudes style and substance and layers upon layers of characterisation. The way it's shot is vaguely reminiscent of Blair Witch, but in a good way. It's got a certain gritty realism that is nothing less than compelling. The end of the episode, where the President is informed about the birth of a baby on one of the civilian ships, is saccharine and trite. In theory. But somehow it works so well and has such a real effect, and in short, I'm liking this. And at this rate will have watched the other eleven episodes by tomorrow afternoon.
In other news, I'm rather ill. My head and ears are hurting and I feel just about as crappy as I did over Christmas. And now it's Easter. I wonder if that means something.
Anyway. I think this week holds a whole lot of fannishness and not much else.
no subject
on 2005-03-20 08:16 pm (UTC)I could tell you the vital bits if you want.
Knew you would like it!! :D
no subject
on 2005-03-20 08:23 pm (UTC)http://www.sadgeezer.com/html/Reviews+index-req-showcontent-id-533.html
Gives the whole plot for the miniseries with some pictures... there are no spoilers for any other episodes on those pages. Can't believe they squeezed so much into three hours! :)
no subject
on 2005-03-20 09:26 pm (UTC)(and, fuck it - my favourite of the characters so far is the villain of the piece!)
Explain to me one thing. Are the twelve colonies twelve separate planets? Have they all been destroyed? Those 50,000 people - are they the ones who happened to be in space at the time?
no subject
on 2005-03-20 10:02 pm (UTC)The twelve colonies are separate planets, which have not been destroyed exactly, but the people on them (most of them, anyway - Helo injects himself with anti-radiation meds every so often) are dead because of the nuclear attacks.
The 50,000 people are the people who were in space at the time, Apollo and the President (she was then the Secretary of Education) went back to round up as many survivors as possible. They had to leave behind thousands of people on ships which didn't have FTL (faster than light) capability when the cylons showed up.
A few may have been rescued from the ground - Helo and Boomer had to land to make repairs and took as many people back with them as possible, and Helo gave up his seat for Baltar to survive (what an idiot!). This is why Helo is very confused about Boomer being on Caprica, he thought she flew back to the ship with the refugees.
no subject
on 2005-03-21 12:16 pm (UTC)I am now happy. Do you want explanarions? Very very briefly, erm, yes, Boomer is a Cylon but does not know (hell of a shock at the end of the mini-series, that one), the President is the President of the Twelve Colonies (twelve nifty little planets populated by humans) as when the Cylons nuked all of the aforementioned planets, she was the only politician left. She used to be an education minister
and I have a slightly and worrying Librarian folly involving her.The Cylons - it's important to know this - have the human models. But there's only twelvw of these models, so they're copied many times. The only in Gaius's head is Number Six. She's going to be at C7. OMGSQUEEYAY.