It would be bad enough if the gripes I had with the show were just limited to this show, but the same techniques and tendencies I’ve noticed are being used on shows like Caprica and Stargate: Universe. I know I’m going to take flak from the resident SF fan community here, so I’ll put on my flak jacket in advance now. I stand by my statements and opinions though. I never liked the new Battlestar and never can, I tried and failed to get through an episode let alone a season. Let’s see if I can make some sense here…
1)Spastic zoom-ins, shaky cameras, and poor lighting - I don’t know if the directors are doing it for dramatic effect or just to be annoying, but it annoys the heck out of me. I want the camera people to invest in a tripod, and the epic zoom-ins limited to a hundred per episode. While they’re at it, invest in lights and pay for better looking actors. I’m not the most artificial person in the world, but seriously, there must be better looking people in the future piloting starships.
2)Doom and gloom, fatalistic melancholy, wrist slitting imminent - It turns out it’s very easy to tell when the cast and crew are a bunch of sad puppies. It’s not even the look on their face or the stuff they talk about, it’s the music. There is none, except for maybe a few militaristic trumpeting chords during their idea of an action scene or some archetypal sad notes for an apparently sad scene, it is a silent show. It does not communicate with my soul, and certainly does not engage my mind. It doesn’t surprise me that the characters never smile, crack jokes, dance, sing, or show any emotion other than anger, anxiety, and more anger. These people need to hear some music, either that or shove these bastards out of an airlock and put them out of their miseries.
3)This is intense drama, intense drama here! - The show tries way to hard to be a hard core drama. It had tense characters in crowded ships giving each other sideways glances and talking behind each others’ backs. It’s just like my grandma’s soaps but without the good looking women and sex. As it turns out, even with all the sound and fury, very little is actually happening on the show. There is a lot of bark, but little bite. Some shows have mastered the art of drama, they have not, I don’t care about their characters at all and wouldn’t mind seeing them all blown up. If they’re all that represents the remains of the human race we have obviously reached an evolutionary cul-de-sac.
4)Yawn - The show is advertised as an action-packed, space battle filled saga. The show just drags on forever without any action, and when it does, the scenes are depicted poorly and are short or just lame. A show doesn’t need to have action to be good, but a show like Battlestar Galactica, which is meant to be an epic space opera, needs more pew pew and less yap yap.
5)Is this a reboot, a continuation, or what the frak? - I’m all about continuing or resurrecting a series that has been forgotten, but I generally don’t like reboots. As far as I can tell the new Battlestar has diverged considerably from the canon of the original. Because I was never a huge fan of the original it’s a minor issue for me, but it’s an insult to SF fans to just revamp an old series, put a pretty bow on the top, and poop it out for the masses to lap up. The way they advertise the show it’s like “here, here, you love this show, you love this show, it gets great reviews!” I don’t give a frak, and the word frak, by the way, is also lame.
6)Plot? Who needs a plot? - As far as I can tell, each episode is a tightly wrapped little ball of random events, random quotes, and intense close ups on ugly actors and actresses. There should be something intrinsic to each episode, something to tie them together, something central and underpinning. This is why I can’t watch shows like Battlestar and Lost. Their writing plain sucks. From what I hear their executive producer Ron Moore is against the idea of plots and instead cares about characters. I care about characters too, just not his…
I think that six reasons are sufficient, although if I really think hard about it I’m sure I can come up with more reasons why I can’t stand the show. Something very afoul is afoot, and I can only hope and pray that the producers etc. stinking up classic SF shows cease lest they make all speculative prime time programs as disappointing. Let the hate mail come.
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