Battlestar Galactica

Plot synopsis:
Humanity has reached for the stars and populated twelve planets as colonies of their home planet Kobol in a distant part of the galaxy. Scientific advancement has created robots with artificial intelligence, the Cylons, that rebel against humanity and after a war agree to go their own way. But, 50 years later, the Cylons return with 12 advanced models capable of appearing human and quickly dominate humanity wiping out most and forcing some 50,000 humans to flee in ragtag fleet through space. The Cylons are confident that they are superior to the humans supposedly lacking many emotional flaws and possessing an abliity to be reborn into new bodies with memories of their past lives as well as an ability to share memories with replicate models. However, Cylons are unable to reproduce and unable to communicate with their one god that they believe replaces the human belief in Gods, so they are keen to gain these abilities from their human creators. Unable to reproduce among themselves, they attempt to reproduce with humans and insist that reproduction can only be successful if the humans fall in love with them, which is challenging to accomplish in part because the Cylons cannot shut up about how superior they are to humans. The Cylons avoid wiping out the remaining 50,000 humans preferring to chase them back to Earth in hopes of forcing a meeting with their god. The humans initially allow the remaining military to lead their flight but eventually accept that they need to cooperate and put aside past colony specific prejudices in order to survive as a species as their populationo dwindles. Civilian leadership chooses to abandon the quest for Earth and settle on another planet where the Cylons find them and enslave them. This causes a rift among the advanced Cylon models and a rift among the humans forcing new alliances, a civil war among the Cylons and a continuation of the flight to Earth. When Earth is finally reached, it is surprisingly uninhabitable due to an ancient nuclear war. Out of hope, the humans despair but the one god sends angels to guide them to a new planet where the Cylons and humans can co-exist peacefully.

Tags: good versus evil, insanity, violence, mystery, romantic

Review:
Instead we got a bunch of kids movies, littered with some of the most terrible cinematic decisions ever put on celluloid.And then the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica came along, which I must add, I watched from start to finish only after the show had made it's debut on mainstream television.I was initially sceptical of whether this would be any good, but after having reached the finale I can honestly say that this is quite simply the best sci-fi show ever made.
I't does not overstay it's welcome, knows when to stop, and constantly delivers fresh, new ideas as the seasons progress.Series 1 was a great introduction; series 2 built on the initial success and delivered some of the shows highlights; season 3 was awesome for the first half (until the writers strike kicked in just after half way - but still highly entertaining); and season 4 put the icing on the cake with what I consider to be a tremendous and satisfying end to this great series.The only downside was that I wished it could have continued, but I guess it is better to exit on a high and leave the crowd wanting more.For me this has stripped Star Wars of it's crown and raised the bar where although it may one day be equalled, will never be bettered.Awesome.
Whenever any "science" turns up, it's integrated in such a way as to have minimal impact on the plot and, unlike Star Trek, it isn't used as a Deus Ex Machina to simply resolve the "crisis of the week." In fact, I'd go as far as to say the show is closer to 24 or The West Wing than it is Star Trek or Babylon 5, with the focus being much more on the people and their individual actions, rather than a wide-scale "space opera."Performances are all strong, with James Callis being the real star.
As the show went on and more and more plot threads were revealed, the show was shown to be complex, the kind of TV that's been lacking and can only be held up with excellent shows like Dexter and Breaking Bad. Brilliant in every aspect, Galactica is the kind of show that cannot be understood in one viewing, it has to be watched again and again.
The new Battlestar Galactica concentrates on characters, drama, and the human condition and shies away from the fantasy, serial elements of the original and others of the genre.
Battlestar Galactica is more a war/survival series set in a futuresque environment, rather than hardcore science-fiction in a war environment - the latter being what we tend to find in star trek and the likes.---Very solid storyline---The story is very solid.
Now and then I had an episode that I found a little predictable, but this was rare, and even when it did occur, it was not really that deal-breaking, since it was always in the details.---Amazing depth of character---Being the only series I watched twice, still enjoying it the second time, this is one of my favorites.
As a long time fan of the original series of Battlestar Galactica I was apprehensive at best when I heard of the new 're-imagining'.
The new Cylons are cool, the ships are fantastic, the characters are wonderful, the relationships are very interesting and, as it's basis is the original story line, there's an oddly comforting familiarity there too.
The two Battlestar Galactica series both begin in the same way with similar precepts  the end of a civilisation and the possible extinction of the human species.The original chose to be lightweight in dealing with this underlying theme (the first thing they do post-apocalypse is go to a party planet) - the new series actually attempts to deal with the issue in an adult manner.The writing, direction, and most importantly the acting, is superb - each combining to create emotional depth.As a teen I enjoyed the original but (sorry to get Biblical) "when I was a child I spoke as a child, I acted as a child  now I must put childish things behind me".The sex of the characters does not offend  it does not cause grief to find two key characters to be stunningly female.
They call it 'character development', but since this seems to be the hot trend in TV shows right now, I just think it's lazy.People knock the old 1970's version as being cheesy and escapist, but at least the original series knew what it was and didn't try to pass itself off as something it wasn't.I really hope that this show runs out of gas soon and will be replaced by something that hopefully is much better..
The writing on the show is awful: nothing more than an unending attempt by Ron Moore at being seen as a "profound and relevant" writer, when in reality, most of the juice he once had when working on Star Trek TNG is long gone and the man needs a very long vacation to recharge his writing batteries.Of course, the writing is not the worst thing about Battlestar Galactica.
Starbuck is now "the best shot in the whole fleet", and is in good with Adama cause she used to screw his since-deceased youngest son, and of course, has her arch nemesis (another butchered original character who was supposed to be black too, and a fairly nice guy to boot) who doesn't like her cause she's a girl.
The writers completely destroyed the relationship between Adama and Apollo, pitting father against son, and had Apollo hating the military and siding with the President on most diplomatic issues, and the President (who I'm quite sure is newly made up, but I could be wrong) randomly has a cancerous tumor going on which only serves to try and fail at adding drama.The one plus I will give this show is that the idea of Cylons looking like people is interesting..
I've actually paid $45 and bought the entire season 1 DVD set not knowing what to expect, and Ron Moore is the one who wrote one of my favorite Star Trek TNG's episode "Tapestry", so I had no bias in that regards either, but....This series sends negative message to the audiences who may still be at their young and impressionable age.
The visuals of the Gotham City is dark and gloomy, but the people in the story have more optimistic outlook, and are genuinely trying to make matters better, which gives hope that even in a dump there's hope if there are few good people like this.I don't want our youth (and adults) to think that if they acted "angry" and "troubled" people around them will see them as serious, and important person, but this program is filled with this kind of innuendos.
The "new" and much less interesting Battlestar Galactica is an exercise in bad film-making in so many levels it's hard to catalog them.You see, you can't really have an "intelligent" show, when you "film" (on badly lit videotape) the show in a way that interferes with its story-telling.You can say in the press that you're doing it for "grittiness" but all you're really doing is making a show that would shame most first-year film students in its assiduous disregard for the basics of Film 101.And it's not like the original was a masterpiece overall.
Its camera-work and direction are way below average and should have made its network take notice.After all, when your director shakes the camera at everything that moves under the pretense that it's "realistic", you know something is very, very wrong.When your show is shot on video and looks therefore like a home video, you should take notice and demand changes, or at least yank the embarrassment off the air.But in the world of SciFi Channel where wrestling shows and bad creature features rule, the embarrassment that is Battlestar Galactica is what is hyped as "quality".
If you like Science-Fiction these days, the last place you'd look for a good show or a good movie is the SciFi Channel.The new and much derided Battlestar Galactica is a perfect example of everything that has been wrong with SciFi ever Since Bonnie Hammer took the helm.First, there is a complete and total disregard of the audience.
Apparently SciFi Channel thinks Science-Fiction fans couldn't car less about acting and only want to gawk at pretty people.The list goes on and on and the result is that SciFi has been wasting oodles of money on Galactica and numerous other bad shows and has no audience left.Yet, Bonnie Hammer and her staff congratulate themselves on a job well done because they assume Science-Fiction is aimed at a super-small audience.In reality they have antagonized most Science-Fiction fans with awful shows like Battlestar Galactica..
Moore and David Eick continue to run along the same line of badly structured stories, bad acting and horrid photography.Shot on video, for some weird and obscure reason, it featured ridiculous camera movements, best described as "shaky cam", complete with absurd use of zoom lenses that combined to give the overall impression of a home video shot by an incompetent cameraman.How this is supposed to get "acclaim" for a TV show just shows how such 'acclaim" is essentially store-bought by advertising money these days.The audience, of course, quickly learned to steer clear of this film making disaster in progress and the result was a complete commercial disaster that has tarnished the name of SciFi Channel to the point where it is now the punchline of a joke amongst people.Add to that scripting that was mostly distinguished by its pretentiousness and horrifically bad casting of the likes of Tricia Helfer and an assorted band of untalented models selected for their supposedly hip look and you see why this show will be remembered (outside of SciFi Channel of course) as the model of what to avoid if you want to make a good TV show..
It's a tribute to Ron Moore's abilities as a PR man that this show is still on the air.It's also a tribute to the compete lack of taste of the SciFi Channel, after all, until the arrival of eureka, SciFi didn't have anything really worth remembering to watch (at least for a year until SciFi wrung all the creativity out of Eureka too).Shakystar Crapotica was the worst of the bunch.Unfortunately, all that energy that Ron Moore puts into hype, he doesn't put into making a great show, not even a watchable show.The insanely bad camera work (how is shaking the camera constantly anything but pure creative laziness?) coupled with the bizarre decision to shoot on video (and boy is BG a poster boy for how video is not up to snuff!) combine to make an unwatchable show.This is as well, as the pretentiousness of the story lines with their rip-offs of moments in history (surely to show how "deep" and "relevant" the show is) and the mostly horrifying lack of acting talent on the part of the younger cast would be enough to make you lose your appetite for a whole week.In other words, keep on avoiding (yes indeed, Shakystar Crapotica is not the rating behemoth that Scifi keeps on advertising!).
I believe that this show has the potential to replace Star Trek:The Next Generation as the great sci-fi TV show ever (oh yea, the potential is there)....but for some reason this feels more like "The West Wing" in space because almost every episode that I've seen has been centered around the president and all of the political under dealings and so on.
Maybe it's the two good actors (hint - not the empty-eyed pretty models) wasting their time, but this show brings about shudders whenever I have the bad luck to see some of it.Adding to the injury is the relentless ad campaign waged by SciFi (they apparently can't recognize losers when they see them again and again!) and the strange tack they take in insulting the original, which for all its faults, way was better and at least very watchable unlike the new version.I don't know why the creators don't stop shooting on video, buy a tripod, hire a couple of good writers and actors and do a good show instead of spending their time finding new and ever more obnoxious ways of hyping their badly made show..
To read the press, we're supposed to think Battlestar Galactica is "great" because it makes "deep" references to "current events".Sadly, this is just one of the many annoying features of this badly made show.First, whomever told SciFi Channel that video looks just like film should be fired immediately.A lot of SciFi's shows look terrible because they're not filmed, they're shot on video and don't have the budget to make the lighting look even halfway decent (examples are Flash Gordon and Painkiller Jane) Then there' the shaky-cam of course.Again, a lot of hype is written about the "MTV Generation" and how they have no attention span and how they love "documentary style" film-making.Of course, no good documentarian would be happy to make a film that looked as pathetically bad as Battlestar Galactica.It's also insulting to younger audiences to think that they have no taste just because they're younger.All you're left is producers that seem to spend more time trying to think up the next PR release, rather than think about ways to make their show better looking, hire better actor or write better scripts a show that looks terrible and does nobody any favors by remaining on the air..
Season 3 actually started out rather well but as soon as the "New Caprica" storyline ended the series took a rather unexpected sharp turn into mediocre and even downright awful episodes.
The new (and downgraded) Galactica fails miserably on its own terms.You don't have to have seen the original to see how badly made it is.The decision to shoot on video (presumably to save money) made the show look awful (apparently Ron Moore and David Eick didn't realize it takes MORE time to light video well, not less!) and the directors and producers made that decision even worse by hopping on the nonsensical bad-camera-work-as-a-style bandwagon.The "it's documentary-style" excuse for bad direction may fly with network executives at NBC-Universal.
But no, they are too interested in getting awards.That the SciFi Channel puts up with that nonsense is a tribute to how out of touch with its potential audience they are (see all those ridiculous "creature" movies for another example).Oh, and making a remake of a much-beloved, if imperfect, show is not a good idea if you're going to call it "cheesy" every chance you get.Yes, audiences have kept an open mind and they saw that Battlestar Galactica, the new edition is not worth watching.UPDATE: The ratings have fallen even more, and yet SciFi still acts as if it has something special there (and still produces atrocious "creature" movies).
Terminator is about robots not about humans so is and must be BSG too, I wanna see Cylons not some tribal people fleeing for a home.If we don't count the fact that this is not a sci-fi series, I think it's better than most of all, it's quite realistic indeed.
So in spite of all annoying issues I recommend this movie for everyone not just for sci-fi fans.Update: after watching the last episode without spoiling the end I could say that the finale is pretty much what I expected: interesting enough but full with religious and spiritual mumbojumbo and a half conclusion.
This Sci-Fi channel series has some great stories and interesting characters.
I felt almost like the writers had never planned on revealing them, but under pressure just picked some of the shows better known characters and said "you, now you're a Cylon".I did keep on watching, as by this point I wanted to see how the series ended, and there were some minor story lines I was still intrigued by.
The characters and dialogue are so well drawn and so flawlessly and naturally acted that even by the end of the first season, you will feel like you understand, empathize them all even when not fully agreeing with their decisions, No show will make you feel more conflicted than BSG or put you in another shoes, and despite all this it never becomes a story of anti heroes, they really are trying to figure a way out of the mire and be decent people.
The only thing keeping me from giving the series Battlestar Galactica a 10/10 rating is the slump in season 3 in which there were to many episodes that were character background that should have been well established by the time you are 75% of the way through a story and shows making them just plain filler material episodes.
Apparently, "greatness" is defined as "shaking the camera mindlessly"...Of course, it's akin to saying that you don't like the "new and improved" new Star Wars because you were a fan of the old one...It's funny how they chose to call this show Battlestar Galactica and then immediately turned around and tried hard to slap in the face what should have been their base audience.Having done that, it's little wonder that the only place the new BG is a ratings success is in SciFi's and Ron Moore's PR releases and their echoing chamber in the press.The reality is that SciFi is wasting a lot of money on a show that hasn't delivered artistically or commercially, and given the public attitude of its backers is unlikely to ever deliver.Here's to hoping someone with a little bit of taste puts an end to BG and the other low-quality shows on SciFi that give a bad name to Science Fiction..
Serious Sci Fi Fans Must Own. If you think you know this show from watching the original series, you are wrong.