THE AREAS OF THEIR EXPERTISE
Last night's Battlestar had my rapt attention. I was very excited by the many and rapid revelations flung my way regarding, essentially, the genesis of the Cylon race and how they got to be where they are.
But...
Waking up this morning, I considered watching it again and that's when I realized that (despite Dean Stockwell's excellent performance which led me to finally understand Cavill and not regard him as two-dimensionally as I had since he broke off with his own redeye faction) I probably wouldn't dig it quite so much the second time around. It was this morning that I realized the missed opportunities that "No Exit" represented. It was this morning I realized that Galactica launched an exposition nuke at me.
"No Exit," looking back, seems very much a case of "tell, don't show." I congratulate writer Ryan Mottesheard for doing so deftly and entertainingly. Aside from Cavill's performance, I also got very into Sam's aphasia and his palpable panic at trying to get out as much information as he can and being hobbled in doing so while Starbuck's worried over the bullet in his brain, the show was extremely well-paced. It's no easy task to just hurl information out for the bulk of the A and B plots and still keep me leaning into the LCD eager for more.
Buy, yeah, missed opportunity indeed. Should not Sam's vocabulous vomit been a framing device for flashback's. Rather than be told of how the final five arrived at their decisions and their escape from Earth's destruction, could we not have seen it? Could we not have lived on the 13th colony as it was thousands of years ago? Could we not have seen Ellen's instrumental role in the design of the Cylons and wondered who this Daniel guy was until the act out reveal that he was the 13th model (which by the way, I'd always thought there should have been 13, being so prevalent a number in Colonial society). We'd see Ellen's interim fate and Galactica's osteoporosis next week.
And I consider the possibility that my enjoyment is not objective. It also occurs to me that objective enjoyment of Battlestar is, at this point, moot. In this final run up to the end, these last 10 episodes, there doesn't really seem to be any need other that to gives the existing fanbase the best episodes they would like. There is no need to try and engage new viewers. I would think the ratings are going to be in a solidly predictable range of 1.3-1.6, with probably a surge for the finale. The people who were gonna watch are gonna watch it and screw the people that aren't. They'll discover it on DVD one day. We're deep in continuity and there's no turning back.
So in that way, I'm just so invested that perhaps I can just sit there and have any random Galactica character just sit and talk directly into the camera and as long as their revealing consistently new information, I just might enjoy it for a solid 42 minutes plus commercials.
But I can't help thinking that instead of "No Exit," there should have been a two-hour special episode. It should have been written by Jane Espenson. It should be called "The Plan."
But...
Waking up this morning, I considered watching it again and that's when I realized that (despite Dean Stockwell's excellent performance which led me to finally understand Cavill and not regard him as two-dimensionally as I had since he broke off with his own redeye faction) I probably wouldn't dig it quite so much the second time around. It was this morning that I realized the missed opportunities that "No Exit" represented. It was this morning I realized that Galactica launched an exposition nuke at me.
"No Exit," looking back, seems very much a case of "tell, don't show." I congratulate writer Ryan Mottesheard for doing so deftly and entertainingly. Aside from Cavill's performance, I also got very into Sam's aphasia and his palpable panic at trying to get out as much information as he can and being hobbled in doing so while Starbuck's worried over the bullet in his brain, the show was extremely well-paced. It's no easy task to just hurl information out for the bulk of the A and B plots and still keep me leaning into the LCD eager for more.
Buy, yeah, missed opportunity indeed. Should not Sam's vocabulous vomit been a framing device for flashback's. Rather than be told of how the final five arrived at their decisions and their escape from Earth's destruction, could we not have seen it? Could we not have lived on the 13th colony as it was thousands of years ago? Could we not have seen Ellen's instrumental role in the design of the Cylons and wondered who this Daniel guy was until the act out reveal that he was the 13th model (which by the way, I'd always thought there should have been 13, being so prevalent a number in Colonial society). We'd see Ellen's interim fate and Galactica's osteoporosis next week.
And I consider the possibility that my enjoyment is not objective. It also occurs to me that objective enjoyment of Battlestar is, at this point, moot. In this final run up to the end, these last 10 episodes, there doesn't really seem to be any need other that to gives the existing fanbase the best episodes they would like. There is no need to try and engage new viewers. I would think the ratings are going to be in a solidly predictable range of 1.3-1.6, with probably a surge for the finale. The people who were gonna watch are gonna watch it and screw the people that aren't. They'll discover it on DVD one day. We're deep in continuity and there's no turning back.
So in that way, I'm just so invested that perhaps I can just sit there and have any random Galactica character just sit and talk directly into the camera and as long as their revealing consistently new information, I just might enjoy it for a solid 42 minutes plus commercials.
But I can't help thinking that instead of "No Exit," there should have been a two-hour special episode. It should have been written by Jane Espenson. It should be called "The Plan."