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Battlestar Galactica Season 2 Premiere
fanblade writes "As if slashdotters needed another reason to stay home on a Friday night, the 20-episode second season of Battlestar Galactica premieres tonight at 10/9C on the Sci Fi Channel. The series, a 're-imagining' of the original 1978 TV series by the same name, made history as the highest-rated original Sci Fi Channel program ever. The first episode of the second season, 'Scattered', won't be televised in the UK until October, but I seriously doubt that will be a problem for the show that 'killed broadcast TV'. There's also excellent coverage on Wikipedia for those eager to brush up or catch up on the first season."
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Lately there has a been a resurgence of classic sci-fi shows, such as this and Dr Who. While it is great to see younger audiences exposed to such fantastic television programming, I have to wonder what effect this will have on new sci-fi shows. Will we just keep rehashing the old (but classig and very good) series, or will new ideas and new series be able to develop? Will enough resources be spent by the networks and studios to promote the creation of new series, rather than just cloning the previous ones?
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
"Starbuck is supposed to be a womanizing man, not a womanizing woman!
I wish these London playhouses would spend enough resources to bring in some truly creative people and get some new ideas rather than just rehashing the same old stories over and over and over again. I mean, really, how many more beatings can this dead horse really take?
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Atlantis is much better if you don't have to sit through all the dreadful acting. You can usually cut out half a show or more and still get the general idea of what happened.
I'm waiting till about season 3, if the crew hasn't gelled by then it will be off my list completely.
Sean
"Hmm. I am to metaphor cheese as metaphor cheese is to transitive verb crackers!"
Also, don't forget the Podcast of commentary that is available for the episode.
It's almost like they want us to download the torrent instead of tuning it to watch.
I can't wait for the "reimagining" of Galactica 1980...oh wait, yes I can.
Geek Of The Day, "A geeky place for geeky faces."
I Won't be happy until I see the new series of Doctor Who premiered in the U.S. Canadians are lucky because they've already seen Doctor Who 2005 series 1 and they're slated for series 2 as well. We have to suffer the crap that our networks spew at us and SciFi is certainly no saviour. They program the worst SciFi (all action masquerading as science fiction) I've ever seen in my life. I mean, come on!!! Mansquito? Give me a f*cking break! Where is the thinking man's SciFi channel? I'm sick of all these macho programs that SciFI puts on claiming to be science fiction. Science fiction is not about wars, and guns and action. It's about using your mind and technology to solve problems in a world that is almost but not entirely like your own. Philip K. Dick did the best science fiction and SciFi repeatedly shits all over his stuff.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
That night in 1978 that Battlestar Glactica premired, they were showing the movie King Kong on another network. It was a very big night for tv when I was kid. But then disaster struck:
They interrupted both shows because Isreal and Egypt were signing a peace agreement. And my mom sent me to bed.
Egypt and Isreal had been fighting for hundreds of years... couldn't they have waited one more day? Think of the children.
Maybe we should try locking any wikipedia pages before actually releasing the news post into the /. wild?
--Excyl
One thing I really like about BSG is that the weapons are realistic and the visual effects are outstanding. The missile salvos are really really cool. Unlike Star Trek, Star Wars and SG-1, the BSG folks use guided weapons. In those other shows, in the future, the engineers have forgotten how to make guided or tracking weapons. They just shoot stuff randomly and most of the time they miss. The Stargate Atlantis finale from last season was a prime example. The marines show up with 'rail guns' that they are so fracking proud of. But then they just spray out into space with no radar tracking or anything else, hitting nothing. Jesus, a 20th century Phalanx is way better than the crap they have.
Oh, Babylon 5 was one of the few good ones also. The way they tracked the beam weapons and sliced things up was believable and cool.
I actually prefer it this way.
I've watched some Stargate Atlantis, but could never stick with it. There's no moral ambiguity in the show; the main character, the Colonel, responds to everything with a clear-cut moral choice. Everything has to be done based on principle - no compromise with reality, and it always seems to work out in their favor.
Battlestar Galactica portrays things in a much more "gray" way, forcing characters to make terrible choices where there's no morally superior answer (i.e. in "33" when they blow up the Olympic Carrier). This, mixed in with the Cylons looking like humans, feeling like humans, makes the entire of the show even more amigious, which is what sets it apart from most of the other shows on TV. There's no clear cut enemy - no clear "us" and "them," and thus, much more realistic. Even with the advanced technology/sci-fi nature of the show, it manages to portray human behavior/moral dilemmas much more realistically than the mainstream shows set in the present time on Earth.
I'll paraphrase a quote I heard from somewhere, "I'd rather watch plausible human behavior in an implausible setting than watch implausible human behavior in a plausible setting."
Don't make me pick between galactica and CSI, that would kill me to have to chose only one or the other.
Good geeks know of this mystical device called "the VCR", which can record one show while you watch another. In fact, just about everyone knows about the mighty VCR, and owns one to boot!
But even better geeks know of "BitTorrent", for those times when you forget to set the VCR. Or for catching up on shows that you didn't clue in on until the second or third season. This is how my wife and I got up to speed on West Wing, Alias, and yes - even CSI! Without BitTorrent to provide the seasons we'd missed (not big TV fans) we'd never have watched the shows on regular TV. We hate jumping into shows mid-stream.
Of course, we didn't bother with BitTorrent until BSG aired in Britain. That was the straw that broke the camel's back for us. But once we took the leap...well, there's really no going back. We watch more TV now than we have in decades. If we happen to miss an episode, so what? We can always catch it with a download and be on track again before the next week's episode airs.
No doubt the network goons will soon be kicking in my door for these public admissions. It won't matter that we watch MORE TV now, only that we've used BitTorrent in acts of "piracy"....
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Good news, everyone! BSG Season 2 will be on in Canada, starting January 14th, 2006.
That'll be just fine, as long as everyone on the internet promises not to talk about BSG on any forum or blog until then... okay?
Arrgh. I think BitTorrent is about to become much more popular in Canada.
Why do I need a sig? I never post.
(sorry, voice work isn't acting)
... _just their voice_.
Uh, as an actor who has done TV, movies, and radio, let me tell you that the people who do voice-only work _well_ are definately acting.
In fact, they're often far better than people who don't do VO work. why? because the people who do it are used to telling the entire story, and showing the entire range of the character with... get this!
Hard to believe, but it's true!
Just ask some real actors...
Support FSF: Stop thinking with your wallet, and think with your imagination. (cc/non-commercial)
Many of the more thoughtful notes that come under the heading of 'I hate BSG because...' seem to revolve around issues of not understanding certain basic concepts that were laid out in the mini-series. THE MINI-SERIES IS REQUIRED VIEWING! If you're willing to give it another shot, check out the mini-series on DVD first. It explains a lot of things. Also know that this is really complex TV. Some episodes leave me mentally exhasting when I think of the things they are talking about and how they relate to today's world. If you are looking to be spoon-fed, you might want to go elsewhere.