BSG Series Finale
Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 02:15am by GeekBoyHm. So. Okay. (SPOILERS AHEAD)
I’ll probably write a full recap of the Battlestar Galactica series finale later this weekend, but felt like I should just get my general impressions out, and give a few people a chance to say their “I told you so’s”. Because, yeah, bottom line, that series finale wasn’t what I was expecting. The first hour was kick ass action. The second hour was … something. A happy ending, I guess you could call it. But did the happy ending have to be so LONG? I mean, these characters have all been through hell, so I’m perfectly fine with their story ending on a peaceful note. But really … an hour of smiling and hugging and romping in fields and talking about building cabins and delivering trite lines? Wouldn’t half an hour have been enough for that? Maybe even 15 minutes?
So my impression of the episode as an episode — which is usually my primary standard for judging this show, one week at a time — is that it started strong and ended weak … and slow.
As for how the finale wrapped up the series as a whole, I’m afraid my opinion isn’t much better. And it pretty much boils down to one word: Angels. Not metaphorical angels. Not people from the future who have so much knowledge that they appear to be angels. Not a race of beings called Seraphs who travel in a Ship of Lights and are so advanced that they could be construed as angels by humans. Actual angels. From God. Head Six, Head Baltar, and Undead Starbuck were apparently all angels, carrying out the will of God. And the will of God was apparently to … I don’t know … let the Cylons blow up the Twelve Colonies, then torture the fuck out of the surviving humans for a few years, so that by the time Starbuck jumps them to our Earth (which is the fake Earth), humans and Cylons are ready to live without technology and might not make the same arrogant mistakes they made on Kobol, Caprica, and Real Earth. Something like that.
Because God is apparently willing to send angels to get Gaius Baltar’s rocks off, and to tell him what to do, but not willing to talk to somebody else in all of human history (pick your planet) who could actually do something to change the course of things BEFORE they get so bad.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not entirely against a “God ending”. I kind of suspected it would be the case, although I was hoping for something more scientific or time travel oriented. But there’s a smart way to use God in a story like this, and a lazy way to use God. And this was kind of lazy to me.
In the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life” — which, let’s face it, was one step away from a sci-fi story — George Bailey is visited by a guardian angel, who shows him an alternate future, and based on that, George decides to change his future for the better. That story works, because in the end, it’s George who decides his own fate. But in this story, we’ve got Angel Starbuck living as a human for months, actively changing the “fate” of the other characters, and we’ve got Angel Six actively manipulating a very manipulatable Gaius for years. That’s some extremely hands-on “angel” work there, seemingly saved for mankind’s 11th hour, when it can do the least good possible — helping mankind find a new planet where they can possibly fuck things up again, but in the meantime, they get to shit in a hole in the ground, instead of on a toilet.
So. Yeah. There you have that. I still love the series in general for the many hours of great TV it gave me. But color me a little puzzled by Ron Moore’s choices right at the end there.
What did you think?
1. Doug said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 8:51 am )
What did I think of the finale?
Short version?
It felt like, in a lot of ways, they painted themselves into a corner with some of the plotlines.
I’m still very, very much a fan, but it still manages to make me a firm believer in the idea that a series like this should have it’s ending plotted out from the beginning. (Thank you for such a radical idea, Babylon 5)
I’m very disappointed in the Starbuck plotline resolve…yet very happy with Tori getting her due.
Hell, not going to give every example, but it was about 50/50 like/dislike on how the individual plots resolved.
Overall, I’d give it a high C/low B.
2. sandra said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 10:57 am )
I agree that the first hour was pretty cool, a kick back to the first season with all the amazing battle sequences and the big tie-in with the Opera House in the end. I also agree that the second hour was a big let down. I am disappointed that the big reveals really didn’t equal big. The only amazing thing about Hera is that she knew the notes = co-ordinates for a new Earth, which sure is amazing, but I expected her to represent more (other than the scientific significance of being the first cylon-human child). I was waiting for something bigger than that, and for all of them. Finding another Earth just makes finding the first one a big nothing, really. I wonder how much of this was all planned out by Moore and how much of it truly was by the seat of his pants.
Roslynn’s death was done nicely and sad, I thought, although I can’t remember if this was discussed before and dismissed as un-doable, but why, if it worked before, did they not do a blood transfusion with Hera’s blood to kill the cancer? Was that ever brought up? Probably, I just can’t remember.
3. sandra said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 11:20 am )
Oops, Roslin.
4. Maggie said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 11:26 am )
Meh. Totally underwhelmed by that ending. Starbuck saying her work here is done and then, poof? ITA about the “let’s poop in a hole instead of use toilets” thing.
I didn’t feel like things got answered. Cavil eating a bullet was incredibly lame. The fact that the whole knowledge transfer of resurrection technology couldn’t be completed because Galen had to kill Tory immediately instead in five minutes rubbed me the wrong way, particularly as that was the catalyst that caused them to have to jump to Earth 2.
It’s like they gave themselves too little time to finish the story, rushed the ending and then spent an hour with people trying to convince themselves that camping and mating with early homo sapiens would be a swell way to spend the next 50 or so years.
The thing that got me, though, was when Adama put his ring on Roslin’s finger after she died, so sad!
5. ben said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 1:22 pm )
Well, I had some time today and I just watched it for a second time. And I gotta say, the second time around, I found it very, very moving.
Like some other people here I was a little disappointed at the how the Kara plot line ended up, it didn’t feel “real” enough to me for some reason.
Now something I did do before I re-watched it today was I watched that “Last Frakking Special” first. I had it taped and didn’t have a chance to see it yet. And two things stuck out to me from it: 1) Ed Olmos says that this show is something that will probably still be talked about 25 years later, and probably won’t really be understood til years later. (And I have to admit that just by waiting a day to re-watch it over again, that small space of time was enough to help me see it more in terms of a big picture.) And the 2), Rom Moore commented about being upset that he couldn’t come up with the right plot for the ending, and then it hit him that the show is about the characters, it’s always been about the characters, and that’s what the ending needs to focus.
Is that right or wrong for Galactica … I don’t know. But I immediately re-watched the finale after seeing that and you know … watching it from that point of view really had me tearing up in a few spots!
6. ben said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 1:35 pm )
Oh, I had another thought too…. Geek boy was saying that the hands-on “angel” work was saved for mankind’s 11th hour, when it could have done the least possible good. And in many ways it does seem like that. Humanity went through wars, destruction, being tortured and on the run for four years … only to end up pooping in a hole with the natives. As Geekboy says, there was no scientific explanation, and in the end it just seems like God and the angels or whatever were NOT interested in helping humanity to actually change the course of things BEFORE they get so bad.
Even six and Baltar ask their “head angels” if that’s it. Is that all god wanted, for them to end up here? That’s it?
Here’s my thought — this is JUST LIKE the flood. The story from the Bible of the giant flood that wiped out humanity except for the choosen few who survived in Noah’s Ark. If you look at it that way, it kinda makes sense…. Galactica is Noah’s Ark.
Just like the flood story, God has become so disgusted with humanity that he basically throws up his hands and says “OK fine, I’m done here.” The experiment is over, time to empty the petry dish, throw out everything, start over. God sends the rains to flush out and cleanse the Earth … he sets it up for the Cylons to kill off humanity and cleanse the universe. And both times god makes sure that a few survive to start the experiment all over again. Hoping that this time it will turn out better. Maybe so many people in the fleet died because god had in mind all along who he wanted to end up in the new experiment?
Anyway … just a thought!
7. Jack said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 1:54 pm )
Wow, I guess I’m in the minority. I liked the ending.
I thought Cavil eating a bullet was consistent with his character, he’d rather handle things on his terms than have someone do him in. Kara being a spirit – I guess I expected it, so it didn’t bother me, and I liked the final scenes between her and Lee. And assuming Head Six and Head Baltar were some kind of angels or spirits, it said to me that whatever higher power is guiding them isn’t all about peace, love, and happiness.
It wasn’t perfect. Still no resolution on Daniel. The Earth I/Earth II switcheroo seemed a bit contrived. But on the whole, I liked it. The tone of it seemed right to me – I actually didn’t view it as a “happy” ending. Certainly it was for some characters, but not for all, especially when you think of who was lost along the way. For some of the survivors, like Tyrol, it just seemed that there was as much sadness as there was hope in his story.
I was thinking about it afterwards, and I didn’t really have any set expectations for the finale. I certainly do for other series – Lost, for example – but for whatever reason I was more “along for the ride” with BSG. Perhaps that has something to do with my feelings about the finale.
8. GeekBoy said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 4:47 pm )
I’ve still got it on the TiVo, and I’ll probably watch it again. Maybe I’ve been too hard on it. There were many moments I liked, particularly in the first part, which I’ll get into if/when I recap the episode. And I kind of liked the idea of them ending up on our Earth, because that came somewhat close to what I had in mind with my whole “time loop” theory. But overall, the execution — the pacing, the dialogue — left me feeling unsatisfied. And the angels. The goddamn angels.
I didn’t really have any expectations either. I’ve been a fairly strong proponent of just going along for the ride with this series, even as friends would point out inconsistencies from one episode to the next. So I was surprised to not be happy with it.
Ben, the Noah’s arc thing is an interesting way to look at it. But I’ve always thought that story is exactly the reason why nobody should take God seriously.
As our friend Lisa pointed out: “Isn’t what happened pretty much the story of Scientology?”
9. Maggie said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 4:56 pm )
Here’s my thought — this is JUST LIKE the flood. The story from the Bible of the giant flood that wiped out humanity except for the choosen few who survived in Noah’s Ark. If you look at it that way, it kinda makes sense…. Galactica is Noah’s Ark.
I disagree with this because if the goal was just to save humankind and start from scratch, why bother having ANY of that happen? The planet they jumped to in the end (our Earth) had humans on it already.
10. ben said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 5:41 pm )
Well, it is just an idea! I’m trying to make sense out of the few clues I was given on screen!
The final episode is saying that most of what happens is god’s will, yadda yadda. And a lot of it really doesn’t make sense! For whatever reason there is, the crazy hard-to-ponder actions of the BSG “god” really remind me of the way god is portrayed in the Old Testiment: mysterious, a bit jealous, angry at times, punishes on a large scale, sending messengers to warn about inevitable doom, etc. (God seems to become more understanding and loving in the New Test. of course, but Old Test. god is scary!) The Old Testiment has a lot of these stories where god just throws his hands up in frustration and goes all wrathful, everything from the flood to the plagues in Egypt, to Soddom and Gamorra to Jonah and the whale. Why is the god of the Old Testiment like that? Why is the god on BSG like that? Why does god bother saving anyone? Who knows? (Maybe what happens to humanity in the Old Testiment is really “Battlestar Galactica Part 2!!!”) But it all seems to fall in line with the idea of “All this has happened before, all this will happen again.”
But at the end of the day …. meh …. just an idea!!!
11. Maggie said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 6:23 pm )
I’m sorry, Ben, I wasn’t trying to argue with you. I was just pointing out that I didn’t think it was parallel.
The series as a whole had so many themes; mono- vs. polytheism was a main theme, and I didn’t think they ended up going anywhere satisfactory with that, which is a shame. Is there only one true God? Does it even matter? Kara believed in polytheism and she ended up being the angel of salvation, while the cylons believed in monotheism; Angel Six demonstrated the importance of that belief by repeatedly placing Baltar in dangerous situations where trusting in her promise of faith was the only way out (at the beginning of the series).
They went absolutely nowhere with Hera as human/cylon hybrid…the final battle was because of a mission to save her life, yet breeding humans with cylons ended up being a moot point.
12. freakgirl said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 8:24 pm )
They went absolutely nowhere with Hera as human/cylon hybrid…the final battle was because of a mission to save her life, yet breeding humans with cylons ended up being a moot point.
That bothered me a lot. Granted, I didn’t watch much of the series, but I was a bit mystified as to how the whole finale revolved around her, as it seemed she didn’t much matter in the end.
It seemed a whole lot of suffering for no reason. Which is, as Ben says, The Old Testament. Yawn. The one thing that stuck with me was the message that we will keep repeating our mistakes, over and over. Dark.
I do agree with Maggie that the part where Adama put his ring on Roslyn’s finger was really moving.
13. Dave said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 8:53 pm )
Actually, Hera was VERY important – she was the start of the human race as we know it.
14. freakgirl said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 9:06 pm )
What about the natives that were there already?
15. GeekBoy said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 9:21 pm )
Dave, I don’t see how you come to that conclusion. I know that’s what the magazine in the present day said, that she was “Mitochondrial Eve” or whatever. But we know that there were 30,000+ perfectly healthy humans capable of propagating on the planet at the same time as she was. Are we really supposed to believe that none of them survived, and that none of their genes carried through? If Moore wanted that to be the case, the thing to do would have been to have only Hera, or maybe Helo/Athena/Hera, be the only ones to make it to New Earth, instead of those 30,000+ others.
16. Maggie said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 9:41 pm )
The planet was already inhabited; the human survivors of the Galactica fleet just sort of blended in with them, bringing them language and speeding up civilization, I suppose. I was reminded of a book I’d read years ago, Invitation to the Game by Monica Hughes, in which inhabitants of an overpopulated and dirty world are brought to a new planet. Check the Wikipedia entry if you want to read about the plot.
Here’s some information about Mitochondrial Eve, too.
Editing this comment to add that I do understand that the show was trying to take our actual history and add in a bit of Galactica lore to create a new mythology for our present world, but I thought it was clumsily done. The final hour did many elements of what made the show so great a disservice.
17. Dave said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 11:37 pm )
I’m thinking the humans that were there at the time weren’t homo sapiens, but homo erectus. With the blending of the Galatica genes, and Hera’s in particular, homo sapiens sapiens developed. Hera’s offspring, combining human and cylon genomes, would probably be more robust (the way mutts are generally more robust than pure-breeds are), and therefore become dominant after a few hundred generations.
Which leads to the whole discussion of “Would homo erectus be all that attractive to the Galatica crew, especially before the advent of beer?” Discuss.
18. Dave said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 11:37 pm )
And, btw, that was probably the most geeky thing I have ever written in my entire life.
19. Dave said ( Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 11:38 pm )
Here’s an interesting site to inject into the mix:
http://www.bartleby.com/67/24.html
20. GeekBoy said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 12:29 am )
I guess my point is, weren’t the other Galactica survivors already homo sapiens sapiens just like us? After reading a bit more about Mitochondrial Eve, I get that there’s some kind of biological distinction being made about matrilineal lines and what-not that might set Hera apart from a historic genetic lineage standpoint … but isn’t that kind of an esoteric distinction to expect most viewers of the show to understand without more explanation? Myself included? Especially in the same episode where the rest of the plot has essentially been dumbed down for me to: “Because God said so.”
21. Dave said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 10:50 am )
When all’s said and done, I think there’s going to be a lot of agreeing to disagree on the ending of the series. I thought it was interesting that Moore ended the show with a note of there are higher powers out there (God or another, much more advanced intelligence). Given the spiritually of the show (really, how many other shows have examined monotheism vs. polytheism), one could take it as a logical end.
I gotta say, I also liked that a science fiction show ended by saying “there’s more out there than we know,” instead of ending with a Star Trek technobabble explanation. It ended with a bit of poetry, instead of prose. I dug it.
22. ben said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 10:54 am )
It’s cool Maggie, just trying to make it all make sense!
You know , it is possible that the humans who were already there … homo erectus possibly … died out because of the introduction of Galactica’s people. I’m sure they brought along a whole ship-load of diseases, not to mention emotional baggage! Sort of like when the Europeans came to the new world, the native populations weren’t able to cope with their customs much less their germs. And oh yeah …. we sent the only hospital facility we have into the sun. D’oh!!!
I do wonder if a few weeks later the colonists were sitting around their fires going “what the frak were we thinking?!?”
23. ben said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 11:02 am )
Speaking of poetry verses sci-fi cliche, I really really loved the way Baltar said his final line. He says “I know about farming,” and then breaks down into tears. Wow, it was so real. It was genuine frustration, genuine sadness. It gets me every time.
Especially when you think how the line COULD have been delivered, it shows how BSG has been such a gift to us. On other sci-fi shows it might have been played for a laugh, something like “You know, I know about farming”, then a clever little wink to the camera as a trombome plays a few silly notes. Or like on the old Knight Rider or 60s Star Trek, they say the clever line — “I know about farming” and freeze scene! Run credits!
24. GeekBoy said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 11:18 am )
Dave, based on the series’ ongoing spiritual content, I agree — I wouldn’t have been happy with a Star Trek technobabble ending. But I think there’s a compromise between that and what was basically a 90% spiritual ending. The sci-fi genre is loaded with pure science stories that are poetic, and there are many spiritual scientists out there who will tell you that God exists in Science. So I don’t think the two need to be mutually exclusive.
Ben that is an interesting theory, about the diseases. But it’s not the kind of detail I feel I should have to guess at. The episode spent a lot of time explaining the God/angel details — maybe an equal amount of time spent explaining the scientific aspects would have made me feel better about things? All it would have taken is a little exposition on the part of Baltar — “You know, many of these natives will probably die after being exposed to our diseases.” or Angels Baltar & Six at the very end — “It’s a shame that so many of the New Earth natives died of Caprican diseases, and that so many of the Galacticans weren’t able to survive without technology. In the end, Hera — with her hybrid constitution — was the only one left to carry on the human legacy.” Something like that. If you’re going add the device of fast-forwarding 150,000 years, then why not use that to clear up any questions your viewers might have instead of raising entirely new unanswered questions that we have to hypothesize and debate about?
25. ben said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 1:09 pm )
Geekboy, totally agree with you on the lack of explanation. All they needed was a line here or there and a lot of these ponderous things would be put to rest! Like when Romo made the comment about how surprised he was that the entire population was all for getting rid of technology. As unbelievable a concept as it STILL is, at least they addressed it. Lack of that kind of exposition leads us to theories like Daniel is Starbuck’s father!! (I’m still kinda upset about that one … it just seemed so obvious.)
Which … by the way … I noticed could still have been possible if Ron Moore hadn’t flat out denied it! The final episode really didn’t get into Kara’s father at all, it was left sufficiently vague!
26. Maggie said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 1:19 pm )
… but isn’t that kind of an esoteric distinction to expect most viewers of the show to understand without more explanation? Myself included? Especially in the same episode where the rest of the plot has essentially been dumbed down for me to: “Because God said so.”
In a word? YES. On the other hand, perhaps the fact that many viewers would neither understand nor investigate the meaning of Mitochondrial Eve and matrilineality, they’d also not question.
Ben, I like your observation about Baltar and his knowledge of farming. Obviously learned before he went to school to become a scientist, it’s interesting that Baltar is humbled only when he realizes that it’s those earliest skills taught to him by a father he derided that will shape the ultimate role in his life.
27. ben said ( Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 2:04 pm )
It’s also kind of frustrating that no mater what you do, you tend to end up like your parents, or doing what your father did!
28. Greater Czarina said ( Monday, March 23, 2009 at 11:17 am )
I have to watch it again, as the con I was at only had SciFi (or is it SyFy already?) in the bar and it was hard to hear everything. I did hear an interesting thought today, though – that the Six and Baltar we saw 150K years ahead (and throughout the series as “chip” versions of themselves) were the literal Gods. One of the Cylons and one of the humans and more in the style of the Greek gods in that they aren’t good or evil, just powerful and self-motivated. It puts an interesting spin on the whole One God/Multiple Gods concepts at the core of the show, if you take the Six God’s insisting there is only one God as a kind of “hey, I’m the only real God, the right one, the best one, the one that counts,” rather than an argument about whether there is one or more than one. It also adds to the idea that the Cylons and humans are meant to co-exist…just like their Gods.
Interesting.
29. GeekBoy said ( Monday, March 23, 2009 at 11:39 am )
GC – That is interesting, and would actually be kind of cool. But it’s definitely not the way it was spun to us. If that’s what Ron Moore intended, I would have liked to see it in the script. I’m sincerely happy that so many people liked the finale and were satisfied by it, even if I wasn’t. But after reading around a bit, I’m starting to feel as if some of the people who liked it are now creating all these theoretical interpretations that the material itself doesn’t really support, in an attempt to convince the people who didn’t like it that they should. As if it’s so “high concept” that it requires deep thought to appreciate.
In fact Ron Moore probably deliberately left certain things vague for that reason — so that individual interpretation could fill in the cracks that he couldn’t — which was a good tactical move on his part. But it came off feeling like weak writing to me. Like if you met Ron Moore, and asked him, “So explain to me exactly what happened,” his response would be, “Well, what do YOU think happened?” And then I’d punch him in the nose.
30. GeekBoy said ( Monday, March 23, 2009 at 12:37 pm )
Sorry, it occurs to me that I’m probably being kind of an asshole when it comes to entertaining people’s theories about the finale. Obviously, I’ve got a strong opinion about it, but I don’t mean to shut down anybody who liked it and/or their reasons for liking it. For what it’s worth, me not being happy with the finale doesn’t diminish my overall love for the series one bit, and I can’t wait to see “The Plan” this fall.
Along funnier lines, it turns out that Spike and Angel discussed the BSG finale on Angel way back in 2004 …
http://io9.com/5178837/spike-a.....bsg-finale
31. Dave said ( Monday, March 23, 2009 at 1:34 pm )
I had forgotten all about that – I always loved the Angel/Spike relationship. I feel like giving every “Twilight” fan a box set of the “Buffy/Angel” series and say – “Here, you might as well see it done right.”
32. ben said ( Monday, March 23, 2009 at 10:55 pm )
Hey Geekboy, for what it’s worth I wasn’t getting any “asshole” vibes from you!
I mean, this was a HUGE episode, and the entire series has been based on the character’s emotional journeys (rather than the plot at times), so there’s bound to be lots of strong feelings. This episode just had too much riding on it to make everyone happy! Besides, I’ve been popping into other forums here and there to see what people think, and believe me, it’s pretty ugly out there. I appreciate the polite way people here discuss their ideas, even if they don’t agree!
33. Dave said ( Tuesday, March 24, 2009 at 4:49 pm )
Agreed. There be assholes aplenty out there. I appreciate reading and participating in a discussion where the phrases “It sux! You sux!” and “George Lucas raped my childhood” don’t show up.
Well, they just showed up in this post, but that was for illustrative purposes.
34. GeekBoy said ( Tuesday, March 24, 2009 at 5:00 pm )
Heh. I agree, we are a polite bunch around here. We’ve had our share of “trolls” in the past, but I think a vigorous regimen of just ignoring them finally cleared that up.
And for the record, George Lucas DID rape my childhood, and I’ll thank you not to bring that up again … it’s a very painful memory.
35. freakgirl said ( Tuesday, March 24, 2009 at 5:52 pm )
36. Michael said ( Tuesday, March 24, 2009 at 9:11 pm )
I was sitting here wondering how much my BSG experience may have been affected by the fact that I’ve consumed the whole thing in a matter of less than three months.
Then I came over to TMFT, and I find my impressions echoed exactly in GB’s mini-recap. Ugh. Only, unlike you GB, I think that finale really DOES diminish the enjoyment I got from the series. It was a wild and wonderful ride, no question…I adored it….but it seems a bit tainted now. I’ll be honest, I didn’t even GET it, because I thought, “This can’t be what they are trying to say.” The series was so complex (or maybe it wasn’t!), and the finale so simple (dumb?) and incomplete, that I couldn’t help feeling cheated. God and angels?
And I’m not a guy who needs EVERYTHING tied up neatly, but I just can’t get past how they dealt with Starbuck’s story. I’m trying to formulate some questions about that, and I don’t even know where to start. It made that little sense to me.
I kinda wish I’d stopped before that last hour. Or for the first time in my life, I wish for a DVD release with an alternate ending.
37. Michael said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 6:46 am )
So what was the point of the Opera House visions, then? Where did they come from? God(s)? To what end? This is what’s going to happen? It’s all predestined? Or THIS is one spot where you can make a difference? Only you can’t.
And I thought Kara was supposed to be the harbinger of doom? Or posthumous Savior, apparently.
So her purpose, even before the destruction of the 12 colonies, was to find a new place for humanity. Ummm, how about you nut up, God(s) and take a few stronger steps to stop that? Just dumb.
I know the point is supposed to be we’re lab rats in this grand experimental maze, destined to repeat it until we get it right. Or something.
All that said, I LOVE the ride, and I’m really glad some people found the end satisfying. I’m sure my anti-God bias hurt my chances.
38. GeekBoy said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 9:22 am )
This response from Ron Moore just annoyed me all over again …
http://scifiwire.com/2009/03/b.....moor-1.php
Speaking of that bird, you just know the fans are going to have a field day debating the fate of Kara, who seemed to have become an angel. People will ask why, for example, if an angel saw its dead body, it would react as strongly as Kara did when she came across her corpse in the Viper. How will you explain that away to fans who didn’t see it coming or might take issue with it?
Ron Moore: I don’t know that I will. We made a conscious decision to say, “We’re going to leave this opaque.” You can certainly say that she’s an angel or a demon or some other form of life. We know from the show that she died a mortal death, she was brought back to life in some way, and then she fulfilled a certain destiny and guided them all to Earth. What does that mean? And who is she really? It was a conscious creative decision to say, “This is as much as we’re going to tell you, and she’s connected to some greater truth.” The more we try to answer what that greater truth is, the less interesting it becomes, and we just decided to leave it more of a mystery. I am sure that there will be a cadre of people who are angry that they never got a more definitive answer, but we just decided not to do that.
39. Michael said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 10:43 am )
Yeah, bullshit. Like I said, I don’t need EVERY question answered, but when so much time has been spent on foreshadowing Kara’s role in this endgame or whatever, it’s a cop out not to explain things a bit. From way back when she was interrogating Leobon we’ve been hearing about it. Her entire life has been seemingly directed toward this purpose. She’s been drawing that verchacte spiral since childhood.
Alright, whatever. I think I’m just so frustrated by the inanity of this omnipotent, yet shockingly impotent God, that I can’t get past it. Kind of like in my everyday life.
40. Michael said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 10:59 am )
I meant “omniscient, yet shockingly impotent God…”
41. Ben said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 11:42 am )
Oh wow ….
Just had a CAAA-RAZEY thought — Maybe the end of the series leaned so heavily on god and angels and higher powers because Ron Moore was trying to be UNLIKE Star Trek one last time!!!
Think about it — from the earliest days on the show Ron Moore would go on and on about how he had so many rules and restrictions to deal with when he worked on Star Trek. Things like you can’t kill off characters, the stories have to hit the “reset button” every week so everyone is in the same seats by next episode, you can’t have season-long story arcs, you can’t break this or that Trek continuity rule, people in the military and Federation have certain codes of ethics and honor that can’t be tampered with, etc etc etc…..
So when Ron Moore came to develop Battlestar Galactica, he pretty much went the opposite of the way he HAD to do Star Trek. He put in all of these plot and character elements that he always wanted to do on Star Trek but wasn’t allowed to.
And if there’s one theme in Star Trek that’s been there from the very first season of the original series, it’s that a “God” is usually an alien or a super computer!!
I’m not as up on Trek cannon as I should be, but I can’t think of a single episode where the Enterprise encountered some god-like power and it did NOT turn out to be some alien or technology that is SO advanced that it seems like divine power to the mere mortals of the crew. And they always imply that if Humanity can avoid destroying itself, maybe someday it will develop the same technology or evolution.
In fact, the Federation is so afraid of themselves appearing as “gods” to primitive planets that they developed the prime directive!
Bottom line is that the message on Star Trek is that “God = unexplained alien technology.”
So in a way, the final most definitive break that Ron Moore could make away from the shackles of Star Trek-esque thinking is to have the Battlestar Galactica universe actually be affected by real and genuine gods and angels.
OK … let the debate begin!!!
42. Dave said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 11:57 am )
I like it! BSG has always kind of been the anti-Trek since Starbuck decked Tigh during the poker game in the miniseries (a shocking lack of discipline – did anyone actually get transferred off the Enterprise for insubordination?)
Actually, how meta a moment would it have been if, at the end, Head Six and Head Baltar were joined by Q at the end. The geekverse would just implode.
43. Ben said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 12:02 pm )
And remember … the current “Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles” is showing how humanity is once again creating artificial life/Cylons that will destroy us. All this has happened before, all this will happen again …. “Terminator” is just “BSG: The Next Generation”!! The Geek-verse is colliding with itself!!
44. GeekBoy said ( Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 6:05 pm )
Ben, I guess this might just be artistic prejudice on my part. I can deal with a purely non-God explanation, and I can deal with a vague “possibly God” explanation … but I don’t feel comfortable with a fully God explanation. Or at least not for this particular series, for some reason. For instance, I remember not having a problem with the God explanation at the end of “Quantum Leap” for some reason — possibly because with that show, there was always a clear through-line of morality and a higher purpose. But the morality on BSG was so messy that I don’t get the point of having God be responsible for everything that happened. His (God’s) influence was just so random and arbitrary, with no real through-line.
Greater Czarina brings up Greek Gods, and I can definitely see a comparison with the old Greek Tragedies, in which the fickle gods would just randomly screw with the lives of humans because they were bored. But those plays were written in the context of the people reading/watching them actually believing in those gods. And you usually got to see the gods themselves explaining their actions to each other. But all we got was a little chatter in the final episode between Head Six and Head Baltar, which just wasn’t enough for me to buy the overall premise.
It felt tacked on, and left me wondering what Moore’s point was except, “Don’t build robots that are too smart. Although if you do, then you should know that a robot-human hybrid will be better than a sum of its parts. So wait … maybe you SHOULD build smart robots. Except … oh I don’t know …”