REMINDER: Battlestar Galactica Series Finale Airs Tonight
By John DeNardo |
Friday, March 20th, 2009 at
4:20 pm
Just a reminder…
Battlestar Galactica‘s series finale airs tonight at 9PM (8PM Central) and runs 2 hours and 11 minutes.
If you watch it, come back here and tell us what you thought of it…
Related posts:
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- See Battlestar Galactica on the Big Screen…For Free!
- Reminder: Battlestar Galactica Season 3 This Friday
- Battlestar Galactica: Razor – To Watch Or Not?
- Thoughts On Battlestar Galactica Season 4.5 So Far
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Well, O.K. then. I think they could have done better. Way better. The whole thing felt like “Damn! We have to wrap this up! I know, deux ex machina! Vague philosophical stuff! And a mind-trip thing like in 2001: A Space Odyssey! Mysticism! The fans love mystical endings and that way we don’t actually have to resolve anything!”
Bleeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhh…..
Maybe it would have been better just to stop on a high point (end of season 2) in quality, instead of going here.
I expected far worse!
The “god” thing was awful and reduces the whole thing to fantasy.
BUT!
I thought of this:
Not God:
At the end six says to angel/Baltar “God, such and such,” then he interrupts and says “It doesn’t like being called that.” So, the “god” here doesn’t believe it is one.
Super AI:
In the Culture novels by Iain Banks (good stuff)there’s these god-like Artificial Intelligence, sometimes as big as a planet, who manipulate everything to make their plans come true. So, it could be the “god” here is a machine like that.
The idea would be that during some previous cycle of the whole AI (cylon) situation it was created and now follows the events happening over and over. The angels could be the result of some technology that’s beyond our understanding.
My idea returns the story to science fiction instead of religious fantasy.
Which is well and good…if that is what Moore & Co. came up with. We’ll have to watch the post-series interviews and deconstruction.
Me, I’m thinking of buying the original series just to counter-balance the mystical cheese with plain Velveeta cheese.
It was amazing. I have seen it, and I have to say that it blew me away. It is how you wrap it, and I am the first to criticize seasons 3 and to a part 4, but they made up a lot of ground in the last ep and finished with a bang. I really liked it, I guess is what I want to say.
I’m afraid that in the original series, the “mystical cheese” was far more overt. The angels were there all right (all powerful beings of light showed up from time to time) as well as the devil himself (Count Iblis) who it was hinted was the force behind the Cylon Empire. And Lorne Greene played Adama as if he was starring in a Biblical epic and not a Star Wars knock-off.
I really digged the finale, but I could have done without all the flashbacks. I don’t think they added much to the story; they just seemed self-indulgent (and would have fit better in a cutaway “prequel” episode).
Original BSG:
It was supposed to be science fiction.
All the “religious” creatures were supposed to be advanced creatures, not supernatural ones. It was the Star Trek, “we’ve stopped using our bodies and turned into energy” concept at work. The show was trying to use “realistic” explanations as to why humans believe in supernatural beings.
I still think that if the camp was removed from the original it would’ve been great.
The religious creatures in the original were actually meant to be exactly that. Glen Larson is a Mormon and he put many references to Mormonism in his BSG. It was very different from Star Trek in that regard.
Lots and lots of good especially the battle.
Some bad as I prefer the scientific to mytical explanation, but it’s BSG … there was always talk of religion and gods.
My biggest beef was the completely insane decision to go native and split up the survivors and the idea that the majority of the fleet would agree to it. Stupid. Maybe go lower tech but to give up medicine and indoor plumbing. The land may be lush, but people who work or travel on spaceships are not going to be the people that know how to hunt and farm with primitive tools. And it’s not like the natives are in any way smart enough to suddenly pick up language and join the culture. Culturally the only inbreeding that will occur will be if the colonials go native and become primitive, uneducated people ( which is what we are led to believe happened). No way I believe that any number of the fleet and the cylons would think that this is a good idea.
The best part: The battle at the beginning. Then again, they always did create sweet battle sequences.
The bad: As said by others, the entire fleet saying “Who needs high-tech? Let’s go native!” And sorry Anders, you get to dive into the Sun. It’s for the good of the fleet. Or something.
Also, the writers apparently went to The Lord of the Rings school on how to extend the ending. Geez, just get on with it already. The flashbacks felt forced and gimmicky. It would have been much better if those scenes were things we had seen several seasons ago, rather than in the “oh! We have to end this now so let’s retcon in some character development!” mode. Lame.
As for the whole ‘angels’ thing. Baltar and Six just don’t seem like ‘angels’ to me, at least not the Christian variety. Of course they helpfully explain that ‘it’ doesn’t like being called ‘God’ so now it’s unclear whose plan was being followed. Certainly not the Cylons’ plan or the writers’ plan.
Can we now put to rest the ‘Galactica is the best SF series ever!’ talk?, because it isn’t. Last night was just the final nail.
I thought the finale was okay, but nothing stellar. The writers’ strike may be partly to blame. In season four interviews, cast and crew stated that the midseason arrival at the “real” Earth would’ve served as a series finale if the strike wasn’t resolved. The writers needed to give the audience Earth in a finale. It’s the motivating force behind the show. Personally, I think dumping the cast on an irradiated post-nuclear Earth would’ve been a ballsy way to end the show.
I was okay with the mystical themes in the show and finale. This series riffed on many episode-specific plot elements of the original BSG, and the ‘Beings of Light’ were part of that. I also liked the idea of the eternal return. How can they break a cycle of violence when said cycle appears to be sanctioned by God (or higher being, or whatever)?
But the finale… The strike ended in time and for some reason the creative staff felt compelled to give the audience an Earth finale… again. This is what killed it for the hard SF fan in me. Two planets with identical continents (we saw the Baja Peninsula and Florida on bombed out Earth) and constellations (finale Earth (ours) and bombed Earth both have Zodiac constellations)!? Eternal return all well and good, but the previous planets of the cycle (Kobol, the colonies, bombed Earth) weren’t that, similar. For a show that prided itself on its hard (or ductile, as Reynolds might say) SF, this was a jarring twist that kept me from really appreciating the ending.
Count me in on the alright but not great vote.
Some great character moments, and the battles were definitely cool.
That being said, I could have done without the mysticism or the abadonment of the fleet. I also thought the Colonial victory was too complete. Way too much of a happy ending, regardless of the Baltar angel’s grim mutterings in the closing shots.
Ronald D. Moore in 2003:
”Story. We will eschew the usual stories about parallel universes, time-travel, mind-control, evil twins, God-like powers and all the other clichés of the genre. Our show is first and foremost a drama. It is about people. Real people that the audience can identify with and become engaged in. It is not a show about hardware or bizarre alien cultures. It is a show about us. It is an allegory for our own society, our own people and it should be immediately recognizable to any member of the audience. “