f13.net

Caught the miniseries and series premiere on the Space Channel.  It's more drama than sci-fi, and is very good

As long as there's a thread about new tv shows, let me put my vote in for "Tilt." It's a show on ESPN set against the backdrop of the poker championship qualification/tournament. Starring Michael Madsen. It's a winnar!

The commercials for that show make me want to drop kick terrier puppies.

I'm assuming you mean Battlestar Galactica. There are no puppies in Tilt. Only losers.

I saw the last 15 minutes of Tilt. Wow. Clown shoes.

Yes, Tilt.  I'll supply the puppies.  That whole Matador/"young bulls" analogy must die.

I have to concur that the "Battlestar Galactica" miniseries was surprisingly good. Then again, it could be that I was just surprised that it didn't match my bottom-of-the-bottom-of-the-barrel expectations.

Because it appeared on the SciFi channel, otherwise known as the Sewer of Basic Cable That Makes Even SpikeTV Look Like PBS, I had to be browbeaten into seeing it by a friend who swore it didn't suck walrus cock. (I had to wait until it came out on DVD, though, because those goatfuckers at SciFi plaster their stupid logo in the corner of the screen for THE ENTIRE FUCKING FOUR HOURS of the broadcast version.)

I had to admit, though, that my friend was right. Now I'll wait for season 1 to come out on DVD and check out the series itself.

Needs more Erin Grey.

It is good, and it only gets better.  Aside from the original Apollo's guest appearances, everything about the show has been terrific.  Best sci-fi since Firefly.

Edit: and to sidetrack the thread s'more, the first episode of Carnivale was incredible.  Almost makes me forget how much the first season dragged on.  Second episode wasn't too bad either.

Yeah, I'm enjoying the new Galactica, too. It has its flaws, but overall it's the best sci fi I've seen on television in a long time.

Sidetracking: can you elaborate on what sort of program Carnivale is? Can you compare it to anything else? I've read the series description on a few sites, but it doesn't especially aid me in deciding if it's worth a rental.

It's a depression era story of a battle between an avatar of Good [nominally designated as Ben Hawkens, kind and ignorant southern trash with the proper amounts of pride and violence] and an avatar of Evil [Brother "Justin Crowe", priest troubled by conflicting desires and the dawning feeling that he might not actual be a good person, or any type of person, at all] that takes it's name from the traveling Carnivale that picks Ben Hawkens up in the first episode.

It's....not really like other shows in feel. You can say it has elements of this and that, but anyone that tries to sell you as "Oh, it's in blank in the thirties" or "It's like blahblahblah but darker" is crazy. It starts out simply enough, knowing our leads aren't exactly normal, and builds along the way as the true impact of what they are starts to take shape. But the first season was 13 episodes, and while you do get a better idea of what is going on there are still more questions than answers. The second season is starting to answer them, but to say more would be to ruin a great deal of the first season.

All of that though is secondary to what makes it a good show. All that good and evil crap is more the push that keeps the show going. What makes it a great show are the production values and the characters. Great actors playing well written parts in well designed stories is what makes good tv, and it has it in spades. The midget strongman that runs the show, the ex-pitcher with the bum leg who is his right hand man, the fortune teller who never moves and predicts the future for clients by telling her daughter through telepathy, the strip show girls who whore on the side run by their doting father/husband [which is to say he has girls with his wife that dance and whore, not that he's married to his daughters. The show isn't quite that wrong...yet], Justin's sister who feels more like Justin's wife and knows more than she lets on, the amoral reporter wanting to make a buck off Justin and his fame, Ben's father and one of the greatest mysteries of the show, and behind the scenes unseen by all lies Management, the owner of the traveling Carnivale. Stories start off fast paced and quiet both, and the only constant is they all turn dark eventually. It has moments of humor, but it never has a comic relief episode. This is not a happy bumpfuzzle show and it doesn't pretend to be.

There really isn't....hell there really hasn't been anything else like it on tv before. You should give it a shot if you can. It's worth it.

Fairly sure we already had a thread on Galactica.  Sky One in the UK is just finishing off the series (second to last episode last night) and I've enjoyed it.

However, the writing of the political episodes are waayy off - that, coupled with the fact that Hatch stars in those same episodes makes them the worst of the bunch.  That said, two slightly poor episodes in a season hasn't been enough to stop me enjoying it.

I particularly love the new Baltar.  He's a weak man at first and you wonder how the hell he's ever going to fit the classic series mould of 'cardboard truly evil villian'.  That all becomes clear as his character progresses;  in last nights episode he had quite clearly gone batshit insane.


The wife can't stand the series though.

I finally checked out the Galactica series on the Tivo last night. I popped through it very briefly, and as I suspected, the shitheels at SciFi put their intrusive logo in the corner of the screen for every single second of the show.

I'll be waiting for DVD. Fuck the SciFi channel, fuck them in their rancid orifices.

I think any channel owned by Viacom does that logo thing (BET, VH1, CBS, MTV, Comedy Central, Showtime, etc., etc.).

Useless info, I know.

Actually, SciFi is now owned by NBC/Universal.

So, they are not the regime of morons that replaced "Farscape" with "Scare Tactics", but their channel is still terrible. And I know other channels do the logo thing, but none of them are as stupidly intrusive and blatant as SciFi.

Yet another reason to love HBO.

I'm really enjoying the new Galactica as well. And now that Starbuck is a hot chick there's easily 300 percent less homoeroticism!

Truly excellent series.  Best-written sci fi I've ever seen on television (disclaimer: didn't see Firefly on television), and easily the best acted.  The plot is complicated and 'plausible' in that perverse way that fantasy/sci fi has to be plausible.  The Steven Bochco-style camera work in the space combat shots is great, as are the combat special effects (note to 'there's no sound in space' geeks: die).

All Sci-Fi needs more Erin Grey. I think I have my old Wilma Deering action figure in a box somewhere.

Earl Grey? Wilma Darjeeling? What tea fuck?

Wow. That was terrible.

A vain attempt at staying topical: 99% of the shit broadcast on the sci-fi channel makes me cringe. At one point I had hoped they would pick up Veritas: The Quest - but they let me down. Most of their shows involve muppets or muppet-like characters and the writers for all of their shows are still hung up on the idea that "campy sci-fi" is good sci-fi. Sorry SG-1, Farscape, and everything else - but you suck.

Edit: I may download the first episode of Battlestar Galactica just to see if it's like the rest or actually Good. Oh, and Earthsea. That sucked as well.

How much of this show is story arc vs episodic?  If I've seen the movie am I missing anything by having missed the premiere?  I thought for some reason it would be starting this week with the other season premieres.

You say that like it's a good thing.

I'm planning on popping disk one of Buck in the dvd tonight... Long live 80s cheeze and skintight jumpsuits.

As to Battlestar Galactica, I quite enjoyed the production dvds I have of the miniseries - its nice having a good friend who does craft services. I'm just waiting to see who picks up the series in Canada.

I don't care how well done or how much of an improvement on the original it is. Anything called "Battlestar Galactica" will never be viewed by me. Just the name itself tells me all I need to know: For Geeks Only. I mean, "Star Trek" and "Stargate SG-1" are bad enough, but I gotta keep some self respect (what little I have at least).

Well you're missing out. I think Galactica is better than any of the Treks since DS9 and superior to SG1 as well.

what Reg said.

People with 791 posts on a video game website judging other people for being geeks is, truly, hilarious.

More than that - this labeling people as too geeky has been happening a lot lately. I think I should just buy the domain "potmeetskettlegames.com" and forward it to here.

I only stumbled across Galactica for a few minutes while browsing, but I liked what I saw.

<massive hijackage ensues>

I also stumbled across Star Trek: Enterprise.  What a cluster fuck that series has become:  it seems even returning Brent Spiner to the Star Trek realm cannot pull this farce from the abyss of UPN programming.

What is it with modern sci fi?  It seems that conflict is all that writers have to fall back on for plot lines these days:  cheesy fight scenes, bad acting, running gun fights, and CGI space scenes (mostly battles).

I yearn for a return of 'topical' sci fi, like what classic ST:TNG was doing.  It's ok to deal with issues like slavery, freedom, justice, capital punishment, etc, but it seems modern sci fi has shied away from this.

Every issue worth being dealt with was dealt with by "Sliders" 8 years ago. Everything else is just rehashing old tv.

*POSSIBLE MILD SPOILERS*

I totally agree. While the first seasion left me feeling like it was all build up, and then kind of skimped out on any answers or real "wow" factor that it felt like it was building to (this pissed off a bunch of my friends and they refuse to watch any more) but the second seasion has already answered a bunch more questions, and had a little more of the "wow" factor. Since Boog already stated that Brother Justin is the badguy (sorry to anyone who hasnt seen the first season) you dont really even find this out until the very end of the first seasion, and he does a GREAT job grappling with who he is, and what he is destined to do. Also, even though he is seeming to be a badguy, you can tell he still wants to do good.

If you missed the first seasion, the second will defenetly not have the impact it should, and well, suck to be you, cause the second seasion is great so far.

Well.....

Watched it, thought it was pretty good.  It's character driven,  with some damn interesting characters,  and not a shred of modern trekieness about it.  

It's the first sci fi I've seen where the characters look like they have to do something,  and don't just spend their time walking around looking futuristic.

As to sci fi....

Their main problem is budget, it seems.  They have none,  so end up showing alot of straight to video movies and failed syndication runs.  The failed sydication runs are generally a lot more of their campy/shitty stuff.  

When they get something decent,  or at least novel/interesting,  they don't have the money to support it.  That's why you have the glut of pseudo-reality shows on the channel.  They cost nothing to make.

Meanwhile,  the bills for Farscape, if I remember correctly, were in the range of several million an episode.

Why hold a grudge?  It's not sci fi's fault they're dirt poor.  They still manage to showcase the occasional diamond in the rough,  as well (Dog Soldier's, for instance).  It's not like sci fi is cheap to produce....

Comedy Central, on the other hand,  is everything good and right in the world of cable television.  Even more so than HBO.  Comedy doesn't have the subscription revenues to support its business.

Daily Show and South Park are the big names,  but they pump out alot of decent entertainment that tends to run for a few years, than fade away.  Win Ben Stein's Money,  Politically Incorrect (cherry picked by ABC), Dr. Katz, Upright Citizens Brigade, Insomniac, etc.  These shows had a life span of 3-5 seasons,  and then faded away,  to be replaced by something equally as engaging for the same time period.

Still waiting to see if Chappelle Show will be a 3-5 year blip,  or one of the network's new anchors.

Your dedication to crappy TV is amazing.  

I have a feeling I'd probably like Battlestar: Galactica (almost as bad sounding as Babylon 5), but it's hard to get past the name.  There are some of us geekier individuals, that still have a hard time going the full 10 yards.  I still count ST:TNG as one of the best series I've ever watched.  I just couldn't get into any of the following Treks, and the first season of DS:9 was painful to watch.  But still, I'm hesitant to dive into a lot of the less socially acceptable sci-fi shows.

Then people talked up FarScape.  I was hesitant, but it's not bad at all and quite fucking good when it's not being hampered by having one of the worst acted protagonists in the history of TV. It does recycle just about every common sci-fi plot, but I guess that's what your comment was touching upon.  Hell, there really isn't anyone can do to really truly innovate in sci-fi or other TV otherwise. Every story in the history of the world has been told at some time.

Maybe I'll torrent this, if I can every find the energy to find new torrent sites since mine were mostly shitcanned.

Not much to say about ST:TNG; it started a new era of sci-fi.  And it had Picard.

ST:DS9 sucked for the first season or three.  It wasn't until they started to try to actually tell a story that it became any good.  And whoever greenlit having half the cast wear skin-tight leotartd-ish pants with little booties needs to be fucking shot.

Enterprise actually had a fairly decent 3rd season, until they ended it was alien space nazis.  Not that anyone was left watching it past the first two seasons.  Or the theme song, for that matter.

Farscape was great for the first two seasons.  Talk about going downhill fast.

Stargate sucks.

Firefly was great, but I have a hard time lumping it in with traditional sci-fi shows, like the ones listed above.

The new BSG is character driven, and more about the journey than the destination.  It's about how the characters cope with the situations they're put in.  That, along with very good acting, has made the story itself that much more interesting.  Aside from a few nitpicks, which I'm quick enough to get over, the series has been great.  If I block out the last episode with Richard Hatch, it's probably been the best single season of a sci-fi show I've ever seen.  Even better than Firefly.

And as for the poster who asked if he could get away without seeing the first episode: you probably could.  Of couse, I'd think that sci-fi would replay the hell out of it since it's the first good seriest they've had in the last however long.  And if you can't catch it there, you can probably snatch it off a bittorrent site.

Socially acceptable? Dude, watch what you want to watch. Do you really base your TV watching decisions on what other people will think of you? Honestly ... nobody else in society gives a shit.

You're one of my favorite posters here, Rasix, so I'll just pretend you didn't make such a bizarre statement.

I learned everything I know about being a man from watching Dirk Benedict's characters on TV as a child.

A quick question about the first season of the series, do we get to find out more about the Cylon's pseudo-religion? I found the hints in the mini-series fascinating but also was left with alot of questions.

What Rasix said...Some people are "geeks", while some just have geekish tendencies. I'm not saying one is better than the other, except as it pertains to me. I believe that whatever you do, you should be happy and proud of it. So don't think I'm trying to throw out insults or anything. Yeah I'm a little rude, but all I'm really saying is it isn't me.

I'm pretty far on the scale as a film geek, a music geek, and a gamer geek, but I know fuck all about half of the stuff a lot of geeks are talking about. I may have 700+ posts on f13, but I haven't read one Dragonlance novel in my entire lifetime, I think Tolkien sucks, and only have sat through like 3 anime cartoons. God knows what else. Everyday I stumble across weird ass shit that only the real geeks seem privy to -- I'm totally uncool as far as geeks go.

Besides, the reason I have settled on f13 (or Corp, Lum, etc., etc.) is because they tend to be the least geekiest (and dare I say "mature") of gamer sites. I like reading about games, but really, what's my alternative? You may have the occassional Furry, but everything else is a pretty good diversion from work.

Where else am I going to find a Boog, a Haemish, or a Lum, and not a thousand fanboi's frothing at their mouths over Lara Croft pr0n or how much Halo 2 "roxxors"? And God forbid I even gauge these people for ideas. God forbid that I mention, say...that Infinium Labs is a hoax. God forbid even more that _random dev_ would even post there and try to have a real discussion with other gamers. God forbid I tell these people how much Battlestar Galactica is "geeky". I'm almost sure I'd take a heavier beating there.

EDIT: Damnit. I may not concede to being a geek, but I am a jackass. We've had this conversation before, Ardent. I shouldn't have written any of that.

Oh well, sorry for the derail people. Consider it my tribute to f13...or something.

Yes there's a Baltar focused episode that brings up the Cylon religion and a few other references to it as well.

One of the main guys in this new BSG was a major script writer/producer for both S:TNG and DS9.

Ronald B. Moore (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0601822/)

Bio (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0601822/bio)

To tie in with Boog's post, he also is an exec. producer and wrote an Ep of Carnivale.

No, I don't. That was mainly just me making a distinction between mostly mainstream sci-fi like Firefly or ST:TNG and more geekish sci-fi channel stuff like FarScape.  There is a distinction, some are more socially acceptable, but, I don't really care one way or another.

In case anyone's interested http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/ has added BSG to its lineup. Hopefully, they'll be adding in recaps for the first season over the next few weeks.

Are they covering Tilt? That show should make for some fun recappage.  Although it might take someone conversant in poker to properly skewer it.

Interesting review of Tilt here.

I haven't seen it yet.  Apparently everyone's afroth over whether or not the poker is realistic or not.  Lovinger suggests there have been 3 hands of consequence, and all of them involved the protagonist(s) beating huge odds with crap hands.

This falls under - who gives a shit. It's a TV show. With Michael Madsen. Isn't that enough?

After seeing Species based on Madsen's appearance, AND watching both volumes of Kill Bill, no, no it isn't.

You do know, I had completely blocked those 3 movies out of my memory. You're sick. SICK I tell you.

I am a complete bastard and proud of it.

I love TWOP, but sometimes their choices of shows to recap mystify me. They choose to recap BSG and Enterprise, but not Farscape? Desperate Housewives and American Idol, but not The Wire or Deadwood?

It's amazing to me that Michael Madsen has stretched one scene of cutting off a guy's ear into a career that refuses to die.

They have a lot of female recappers, not a lot of male ones. You tend to get a lot more of coverage and more willingness to stick with the more female oriented/friendly shows.

I think they run on a shoe-string budget too and since they actually pay their recappers can only afford to cover so many shows.

I also get the impression that the poor Enterprise recapper is praying for the series to be cancelled at this point. And after the latest episode I can't say that I blame him.

I love poker, and I can't think of anything more boring than a fictionalized poker-based TV show.

"Lucky" was a much better series than "Tilt" will ever be.

Agreed. But we have Tilt now. Lucky's gone. Suck it up.

I'll just go back to staring at Rose McGowan's chest on "Charmed".

Yeah, that actually whiles away the hours for me too.

There were some parts of Species that were worth remembering.  They had nothing to do with the plot though.

I'd try to catch that first episode though, it's one of the better ones in the season. Not that the rest isn't good, but it really hits home the whole "lost and alone against impossible odds" thing. Then hits it home some more. Then clubs you in the head with it repeatedly. But in a good way.

I just finished watching "33" and "Water" and although it isn't the most active television out there, it was interesting and worth watching. At this point I still prefer "Firefly", but then I have a man-crush on Adam Baldwin.

Wow.  The finally episode hit the net, and it doesn't disappoint.  I had a genuine "oh shit!" moment at the end, which doesn't happen for me often.  Heads should roll if the series doesn't get picked up for next season.

That's for sure. I just finished watching the download myself and they totally caught me by surprise. To say anything more would be spoileriffic. :)

Heh.  Don't you guys have TV's ?  I think the producer or director wrote an open letter to the fan community asking them to stop bloody downloading and watching these things, since he needed the ratings...

Anyways, I watched the final episode on Sky last night and, as Lum pointed out, the whole 'shit, things just keep getting worse don't they ?' tone was carried right to the very end.

What a finale.  The usual plotholes that you could drive a bus through, but nothing that detracts from a damn good episode.  Oh, and naked chicks.  End of Season episodes should always have naked chicks in em.

I haven't watched it in detail (caught it on NBC while also playing WoW) but it seems to me that SciFi in this case was able to tone down its tendency to pander to the worst geek stereotypes.

At least some characters are conflicted, and the space scenes somehow benefit from the jump-cut and zoom methods they use.  The fighters also move in ways that one might move in space, not like the airplane-like physics that pretty much all space shows to date have used.

So yeah, it's no DS9 so far, but there is promise.  Anyone who remembers the story arc of the original - does it follow, or are they going a different direction?  I really can't remember personally.

Unfortunately, the idiots at Sci-Fi changed the theme music in the intro.  The original UK version sounded sad and depressing... which matches the apocolyptic theme of the new Battlestar Galactica series....

the new US theme has a military drumbeat and just sounds out of place.

If you have broadband,  click on this address to watch the original UK entrance.

http://www.galactica.tv/index2.shtml

I've only caught the first four episodes, so maybe you guys can help me out here...

Now don't get me wrong, there is no one who hates Star Trek (space hippies is basically what that series amounts to) more than me, so I was happy to see how relatively low tech everything was.  However, why are they still using white boards?  Why when they were searching for water were they forced to use the ice instead of the saltwater?  What, you've got FTL travel down pat, but a desalinization unit is just beyond your scope?

Doesn't make sense to me.  Other than that, yeah, great series so far.

1)  I would assume they are using whiteboards because whiteboards are not as messy as blackboards.  (Trust me,  as a teacher,  I MUCH prefer the whiteboard compared to the blackboard).   Also,  they keep everything on Galactica low tech because they don't want the Cylons to be able to control their technology

2)  They probably can't desalinize the water on Galactica, since they got caught with their pants down when the Cylons attacked.  Galactica was being decommissioned,  and was understaffed and underequipped when the Cylons attacked.  Also,  desalinization on ships was probably not practiced or even thought of.  Ships probably just restocked on water when they returned to the colonies.

Re the water thing - I didn't think they were looking for FRESH water as for just any H2O in general, which would be fairly rare in the cosmic scheme of things.

Re the low tech, here's Ron Moore on the subject from his blog:



Also promisingly, he all but promises we'll see the Pegasus in a future episode. Gogo Lloyd Bridges!

Yeah, I bought the explanation of the low-tech from the miniseries. It made perfect sense and it does give you the feeling that people are working a bit more than they were on Enterprise D.

It would be difficult to follow it anything other than strictly loosely. They find Kobol at the end of the season. Not much of a spoiler there, since the final eps are called "Kobol's Last Gleaming" - trust me, there's much TO spoil that I'm sure will be grist for the forum mills when they finally arrive in the US. NONE of which was in the original series, or frankly any TV to date with the exception of Ron Moore's other cable series, Carnivale. Suffice to say that there's some serious questioning of religion and not very veiled commentary of our post-9/11 world going on. It's refreshing to see scifi asking Big Questions.

Anyway. Back to the original question - about the only thing that's the same is that they find Kobol (and I haven't seen the finale yet). There's no sign of Imperious Leader or the Terrans or the angels and devils or whatever the hell they were or the SPACE KIDS from Galactica 80 or Boxey's daggit. All these things are for the better, in my opinion. They definitely are going their own way, and this show is very, very character driven. People wanting to watch things blow up get a few episodes, but not every episode has a space battle.

I should watch the US version just to see what they did to the opener, the UK version was pretty good. However, I've done more than my share of evangelizing the show at work, so I think I've karmically repaid watching it early. Plus I'll be first in line to buy the DVD and we all know that's where the money is. :P

In Toronto the local scifi cable station has only just picked up the series. It broadcast the miniseries a few months ago but for some reason decided it would be fun to run the full series 3 months after everyone else.

So screw 'em. I just downloaded them as they showed up.

IMO, not following the plot of the original is a damn good thing. Let's face it, the original series was terribly stupid.

There are some shows like Star Trek:TOS that hold up pretty well over time. Battlestar Galactica is not one of them.

So just saw the last ep of Season 1.

Uh... woah.

Some SERIOUSLY heavy metaphysical imagery going on here. The writers have definitely done their homework regarding Greek mythology (specifically the oracle of Pythia) and also have the whole Lucifer thing going on (one scene made it ridiculously obvious).

And that's just subtext. Actual plot? Woah. There wasn't a spare moment of exposition in this one at all, it was WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM for 40 minutes. And now they're so divergent from the original series it's ridiculous. I almost think Moore purposefully wrote himself into a corner just to see if he could write himself back out again.

Told ya.

I just got done watching episode 13 too. WOW, except there should have been some actual azn porn instead of the teasy stuff they did. This is a really, really great show, with great acting, great writing, and great effects. On Sci Fi Channel. So it's doomed. Not quite as doomed as it would be on Fox, but it's still pretty damn doomed.

There is a rumour that NBC is going to pick up the series for primetime.  Maybe something to replace ER... which is getting pretty stale.

Lol, yeah right. ER may or may not be stale, but it still probably has 10x as many viewers even at it's lowest point. They sure as hell aren't going to replace it with "Battlestar Galactica". No matter how good it is.

"Getting" stale? It's been stale for 8 years. You can only top yourself with another absurd disaster for so long.

Next week: An earthquake rattles the hospital, all the power goes out, sharks with lasers attack and everyone gets the plague!

Heh, as long as it was Sharks with lasers fighting Dr Carter, the wife would be there.

They had an episode where smallpox broke out, the ER was evacuated, and a doctor lost an arm in a tragic accident. Because just getting smallpox in the hospital isn't enough, you also need a totally random attack against a doctor too. At that point you realise that they really are running out of shit to throw at them. Although yes, as long as John Carter was fighting the sharks people will continue to tune in.

I personally believe the influx of British people heralded the death knell of ER.

But, to get back to the topic, I think the new BG is luv.

Thanx.

Didn't everyone on ER get the plague already? You can only go back to the same well so many times.

I think the only medical condition the staff haven't encountered is a spread of disease from Rage infected monkeys.

But that's only because I haven't really ever missed an episode of ER.  I just like medical programmes;  especially dumbed down ones where I can diagnose the patients about half an hour before the staff do...

Um... of course it does.

ER is on Network TV,  Galactica is on Cable.  It's supposed to have 10x more viewers by default.

I don't mean put Galactica in ER's timeslot, when I say replace ER.  I was thinking more along the lines of Galactica in the Friday Night 10:00 time zone, and move Medical Investigation over to ER's Thursday Night time zone to phase ER out.

Well, that could happen, sure. Friday slots don't pull the biggest numbers (but still large enough to dwarf it's current Sci-Fi slot), and it's usually reserved for shows with less broad appeal. If it's as good as you guys say it is, then it's probably the perfect place for it.

I could see it happening.   NBC owns the network rights to the new BSG series.    The BSG miniseries put up some pretty decent ratings when NBC re-aired it, considering they were going up against the NFL playoffs...

NBC is kinda struggling in the drama department...  all they really have now is Law and Order....

I liked Corday until she got involved with Dr. Greene and they turned her character into a screeching harpy.

Other than her what other Brits are even prominent on the show?

Monkey pox, infidel.  And actually I thought that that was a pretty decent episode.

Of course, I also think that Carter is just about the only person worth a damn to watch on that show any more, since Clooney left, Greene died, and Romano got killed off in a fucked up Wile E. Coyote helicopter incident.

Noah Wyle's really the only thing keeping that show on life support at this point.

But didn't NBC heavily edit the miniseries when they showed it?  I was lucky enough to catch it on Scifi when it first aired.  Overall this show is probably the best thing on TV right now.  24 got silly, ER had helicopters fall on people and got rid of everyone I really liked, Six Feet Under got too depressing and only has a season left..  just not much good out there.  BSG 2.0 is smart, character driven, and so full of gooey plot and character development I can hardly stand it.  I get mad when an episode ends.  I have to wait a week for the next one.  Im not sure it would make it on Prime Time though.  Its actually smart TV by and large.

24 lost me in Mexico last year, but this season is really, really good.

I would be very surprised if something like the "Flesh and Bone" episode (which is a not-very-well-veiled slam on the US's issues with terror-war prisoners) would be shown on network TV.

Yeah, it was heavily edited because the miniseries was 4 hours long.  They got rid of some of the character development stuff, but the story remained intact.   The only questionable edit in the NBC broadcast was that they cut out the stuff about Roslin getting diagnosed with cancer... which was kind of an important plot point.

The NBC broadcast did flow pretty well though and overall, it was a better cut than the miniseries

Umm (http://www.adultswim.com/shows/venturebros/index.html)....No (http://www.adultswim.com/shows/athf/index.html) ? (http://www.adultswim.com/shows/sealab/index.html)

Seriously though, I think I'll give it a shot. Where are you guys getting episodes from anyways?

That's, um, strange.  The Cancer proves to be quite important in almost every episode.  It's also a MAJOR part of the build of that character.  It's almost her 'strength' in places.

That's an unusal change - and one they may regret.

Big fan of 24 here.  Last season was less-than-spectacular, but this season!!  This weeks episode when the marines invaded the terrorist compound, damn fine action sequence.  They don't do any better in multi-hundred million dollar movies.  How much are they spending on this show anyway?

Good stuff!  However, 24 hours/episodes is plenty of time to mess it up, I'm keeping the faith though.

I Fucking hate ER with a passion.  I also hate that my professional orginization (Emergency Nurse Association http://www.ena.org/ ) went off on ER in our journal...look I know it is fucking television and I hate the show too, but quit wasting my time on articles about a tv show.  I mean it would be awesome if NBC would let say the real Doc's, Nurses, Paramedics, and Tech's actually come on say for 5 to 10 mins and tell people were to go to look up and support real Emergency Medicine issuses it would be great.  But chances that the NBC doing something like that would be slim to none.

As to the new BSG 2.0 it's awesome!  I wish I didn't have a screwed up scheduel so I could watch it every Friday night.  The kid's (8 and 6 year old boys who love sci fi) didn't get into it, not enough action for them.  But I like how they really develope the characters in the series so far.  About the only thing I didn't like was that they changed the Cylons to having been created by humans instead of how they were from some reptilian civilization in the first series.

So, the episode that has the Commanders son trying to convince the prisoners to work in melting the water (I don't really care or keep up with episode names)... did anyone else feel the ending felt kinda Asmiov (see: Foundation series)?

It kinda went into a buildup of the problem for awhile which was enjoyable, but it all gets settled by a 2 minute speech to convince the villian to stop, which ended up being the way it was always going to be. Long development...... BAM, everything fine, as you were. Almost as if the climax of the episode was missed.

Not at all, as it leads to him having a great deal of power which he leverages in a later episode. It's not like everything goes back to the way it was at the beginning of the episode.

So, the series has already aired from the beginning through the finale overseas?  

I was fairly well captivated by this weeks episode, while the wife thought it was "boring".  Whatever.  I'm ready to see what happens this week.

Yeah, there's another Tom Zarrek episode later that builds on the last one.

There's a TON of continuity that streteches through the entire series, to the point where the last ep of the season is literally nothing but resolving the various threads. The whole "marooned on Caprica" thing even made sense finally, although I think they spent WAY too much time on that particular strand.

If they pick up the series they can always have it come out in one of the many times she explains it to disbelieving subordinates. That may actually have been why they cut it. It would be impossible to remove it, since as you pointed out it's a critical plot point.

Boog and Lum point out the later signifigance of the character.  (I haven't seen those epis)

I think you should view the episode from the perspective of Apollo.  How he wraps up the situation establishes him as someone not in the party of either the President or his father.  

The first 2 episodes pointed out the politics between the military/civilians,  and Apollo just pushed himself in as a player by establishing his own objectives with the settlement.

Let's be honest,  the character really came off as a puppet in the mini/first 2 episodes....  right down to repeating exactly what is father said to him to the Pres in the first episode.

My cable company doesn't have Cartoon Networks so I can't really say anything about Venture Brothers or Sealab.  However a friend let me borrow  
Aqua Teen Hunger Force.  It did very little for me.  I can't even really see why it's so beloved.  Meatwad is cute but otherwise its kinda.. meh.  Sort of like Family Guy.  I wouldn't turn it off in horror or anything, but it doesn't excite me in any way.  Its better than Buffy or Angel, shows some people all but deify for reasons I totally don't see.

But if it makes you feel better BSG2.0 is possibly the best drama show I have seen this year on TV stations I have access to.  :)  I hate taping TV shows because I am TiVo less and work evenings, but BSG 2.0 not only has me taping it, but watching it as soon as I get home even though it messes with my bedtime.  Its THAT good.

I just have to be strong and not go get it through filesharing.  Its almost better that I have to wait a week in between episodes.  Almost..

Well,  I love dramas,  but the only other dramas I still like are Law and Order and Law and Order: SVU

BSG 2.0 is now my favorite drama...  to me, it's not really a sci-fi show.  It's a drama that just happens to be set in a futuristic setting....  I look at it this way.   If this show were to come out 300 years from now,  people would consider it a drama rather than Science Fiction.... whereas if Star Trek 300 years from now would still be considered Science Fiction, even though technology would have caught up to Star Trek.  (Maybe)

A modern comparason would be 20000 leagues under the sea or Journey to the center of the Earth.   Those novels are still considered science fiction, even though our technology has caught up to those novels.  

Anyways, back to BSG.... when I saw the season finale.... I was left speechless....  that hasnt happened to me in a while.   The last time might have been when I saw The Sixth Sense for the first time and when they told you that Bruce Willis was a ghost.   Didn't see that coming....

Wish I had the willpower to do that. eMuled and watched them all in one day. Now I have to wait, what, a year for season 2...

Will definately be buying the season 1 boxed set when released though.

Well I don't think I could go quite that far myself (I just finished the first season of The Wire on DVD, and I think that scores top for my year of TV), but the new BSG is definitely my favorite science fiction series to date. And, yes, it makes for a good drama.

We're provided with what is an otherwise fantastical story of humans on the run from killer robots, but they don't tell it as a cheesy, satirical or campy tale; they're passionately serious about it all and try in earnest to make us believe in what we're seeing. It's something I've not really felt in science fiction or fantasy very often -- not that I actually believe what is happening, but I do find myself swept into the story and characters like few other sci-fi shows or movies have been able to do to me.

Oh, and another big plus is the lack of quantum phasers and tachyon missiles and the rest of that stupid fantasyland shit. It's all kenetic energy weapons and nukes here. Hits me square in the demographic.

Edit: And thanks for the good words on Carnivale. I'm eager to check it out now.

I downloaded season 1 of Carnivale. I found it unbearable after 4 episodes. If it got better, I'd be incredibly surprised.

This is coming from a guy who actually enjoyed season 3 of Six Feet Under - even though it was utter shite.

I guess thats why there are different things for different people. I never got what people liked about Six Feet Under. Watched some episodes, but was bored by the meaningless problems of uninteresting people that should be shot in the head for being stupid drama queens.

Yet I like Carnivale. Do I miss what the two have to do with each other?

They're both very slow, very boring premium channel dramas. You'd think there'd be a cross section. But all my friends that like one hate the other.

Shite?  Well, blimey, gov'nah!

Affectation, the sad attempt at making oneself interesting.

From  this article (http://jam.canoe.ca/Television/TV_Shows/B/Battlestar_Galactica/2005/01/23/907508.html) in the Calgary sun

OK -- finally got to see the miniseries and first episode today.

Wow.

Count me in on the side that finds this one of the best sci-fi drama series -- scratch that -- one of the best *drama* series, period, on television today. On all levels, truly outstanding. I have the rest of the first season on DvD's a friend made for me, and if the rest of the season is as good as the miniseries and first ep, then I'm going to savor each one while glued to the screen.

IMHO, they've done what the LOTR folks did for Middle Earth -- made this look and feel as though it really happened. There is a lot of attention to prop, set and character detail that goes a long way toward bringing a sense of realism. Added bonus is the hand-shakey-camera photography and slighlty more accurate space flight physics of the ships. This is what I had hoped for when ST:TNG first aired -- a sci fi tv show for adults. I don't think TNG really ever delivered this, but that's fine. Just glad this show has.

Side note (apologies if this already came up -- I didn't pore over all the pages in this thread). Having, like many of us, watched the second plane hit the WTC, followed by news reports and the whole mass chaos/shutdown of airspace that followed, the scenes in the miniseries dealing with the bombings of the homeworlds unnerved me a bit. I was briefly thrown back into the feelings I had that day in 2001, and I think the show deserves credit for not sugarcoating or glossing over the reality of such destruction nor the emotional impact.

Again, kudos to whoever was brave enough to make this sci-fi series emotional, tense, dramatic, and for adults rather some kind of exercise in product marketing for miniature ships, dolls and plush toys.

The first season is almost over here in the US and people elsewhere have already started seeing the next season.

While I enjoyed the first few episodes, I'm not as head over heels about the series as other people.  You haven't seen all the episodes yet, but you're quite right in calling the series a DRAMA.  In fact, my main complaint about how the 1st season has gone is that there's very ltitle sci-fi going on and a whole lot of sturm and drang.  The series is certainly not afraid to take risks, though.

Bruce

I've seen the entire first season (thanks to BT, I downloaded the whole thing before I ever knew it hadn't all been shown here yet). The season finale really pays off the whole season. I like the fact that it's a drama first, sci-fi show second. That's what makes it good, and was the same thing that made Babylon 5 great, it's all about the people. The fact that they fly in spaceships and fight robots is secondary to the fact that they are people.

The season finale was one of the first shows in a long time to make me exclaim, "DAAAAAAAMMN!"

I disagree.  I recognize the underlying value of what you are saying, and it's quite true; good sci-fi stories are just as much about people as non-sf stories are.  But I watched Babylon 5 too, and to me, there was a lot more sci-fi in B5 than there has been in BG so far.  Perhaps these are simply different points on a specture of drama.  Perhaps it's just a matter of taste.  But to me, BG has far too much drama and not enough sf.  That doesn't make it bad, just not as good as it could be for me.

Bruce

That would be Ronald D. Moore, one of the best sci-fi writers/producers working in Movies/TV today.

Is he the guy that did Space Above and Beyond? For some nerdy reason I really liked that show

Also, if I may ask. What do you guys use for a torrent site to download stuff? I found one site called umm..torrentspy.com. Is this a good site?

Not according to IMDB:

http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0601822/

Bruce

Wow.. some good TNG and DS9 episodes in there Yesterday's Enterprise, Chain of Command, Trials and Tribble-ations   And G vs E, which I thought was a great series and was dissapointed to see it go.  I might just break my boycott of Sci-Fi and catch Galactica.

I didn't realize he wrote some for Carnivale (HBO) too. That's a really interesting/wacky show, I need to pick up the whole first season here soon.

I found the stuff at this site (http://www.tvtorrents.ws/).

Carnivale is currently rocking my world. I'm just at the beginning of season 2. What do Carnivale, B5 and BSG have in common? Assloads of character development, which is why they are all such good shows.

Thanks! I found a site but the torrents never seemed to work. It made the folder and the file templates but never seemed to start downloading. I could kiss you. Except that whole, you're a guy thing and I'm not in the mafia soo...

The question is, is Carnivale's finale going to trump BSG's?

And is ABC ever going to air a new episode of Lost?

not until the 13th

Thanks shockeye

I also liked Space: Above and Beyond. Maybe it was just good, nerdy or not.

I liked aspects of it. It was done by some guys who worked on the X-Files if memory serves. I liked the "Grunts in Outter Space" aspect, the exploration of the casual racism against the cloned and the one tough-ass colonel dude.  Could have developed nicely if given time.

I wished they had more episodes in their fighters vs epsiodes on the ground. But oh well. I like space combat what can I say? Oddly, my two favorites characters were both clones, the colonel and Hawk. I also wondered if they were going to develop the AI storyline further had the series continues.

As for Battlestar:

I've now got the first two episodes downloaded. I Really enjoy the writing and the characters. I am not real fond of the epileptic seizures the cameraman seems to have quite often. (I despise the recent trend in action movies and TV of jerking the camera around. I like to actually follow what is happening on my screen and I don't care if the new market is kids with ADD or not.)

Watched the Carnivale finale.  How dissapointing.  They should have left Carnivale at it's 9pm timeslot, and put Deadwood on at 10.  That way a person would have a comparable experience when watching the Doc pass a metal rod up Sweringen's urethra.

Everything felt heavy-handed and forced, just like the previous episode.  I liked one or two scenes, then it was straight down contrived alley.  By the time the inevitable plot-twists popped up, I wasn't even very interested.

At least the Pacquiao vs Moralas fight was good.

Heh, thinking about that episode continues to make me want to curl into a little ball and protectively cup my genitals.

Just to glom on this thread:

Crichton leads the new SG-1? Wtp?

I was pretty sure they were wrapping up MacGuyver/Tapping/Friends...but I didn't see that one coming, I thought they would just bury the show and go on with Atlantis.

Beau Bridges is the new head of the SGC.

That's because McGyver gets promoted to homeworld security and has minimal screen time next season.

Louis Gossett, Jr. is also going to be on SG-1 next season.

Wired Magazine catches on to Battlestar (http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,67044,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_4)

Galactica 2.0 is the best thing to hit TV since B5. Nice and edgy. Space Above and Beyond was great while it lasted. And Andromeda showed much promise in it's beginning but then lost it's way. SG-1 had a strong start, but it's floundering. I love Galactica 'cause it confounds what could be construed for common religious belief (this coming after my horrible Pope post). To imagine that 'God' may prefer another race/religion/culture/species than one's own so flies in the face of any major religion... it's just delicious. I love it. My only complaint is the deviation from the original series in that the original Cylons were once humans who literaly sold their souls to the devil for eternal life. Back in the day I thought that was a great plot twist.

SCTV is coming on TV-Land. I'm locked in for the next hour.

I have watched the last five episodes of BSG, and the whole Baltar thing confuses me very muchful.  Can anyone do the tiny print on who the woman is supposed to be, what side she's on, etc.?

Maybe the current Cylons will be somethnig similiar. I find it interesting that the humans are polytheistic while the Cylons are monotheistic.

She's called Number Six. We're not 100% sure on the how, but she appears to be the Cylon agent that Baltar formed a strong relationship with prior to the destruction of civilization. Baltar contracted for the Colonial military, and that allowed Number Six to gain access to all the details the Cylons needed in order to conduct a complete and total takedown of humanity. After the fleeing the planet Caprica, Baltar started to see Six in hallucinations, and she has been guiding him (or stalking him) since.

Her end goal seems to be the religious conversion of Baltar, a selfish narcissist who believes in a logical, ordered universe with no place for an all powerful creator, and to bring him fully to the Cylon side for some purpose that has yet to be made entirely clear.

While Baltar was on Caprica, before the Cylon attack, he was making it with that woman, whom, it turned out, was a Cylon agent.  She used him to get inside the Caprica mainframe to compromise their planetary defenses for the assault.  In this way, Baltar unwittingly betrayed his people, although he didn't know it at the time.  The woman also saves Baltar from certain death and helps lead him to a rescue ship to get off Caprica and joint he refugee fleet.

Baltar believed she was dead, although we subsequently learn that Cylons have several copies of each human agent and their consciousness supposedly gets transferred to another when they die.  So everything she knows or knew lives on in another Cylon.

Since then, Baltar seems to be uniquely experiencing manifestations of this woman again and again in his mind.  She seems to be completely beyond his control, and can force his body to do things.  It's unclear if Baltar is just insane, or if the Cylons actually have some sort of mental link or implanted device in him that allows such "communication."  If Baltar is insane, he seems to have discerned an awful lot about the motives and beliefs of the Cylons in his hallucinations, which seem confirmed by scenes of the Cylons on Caprica, so it seems more likely they have some actual mental link to him.  However, why they aren't using that link to track the fleet isn't clear, either.  Perhaps she's some sort of "virus" inside Baltar, and thus she can communicate with him but not others.  But then, her copy on Capirca seemed to know things in the finale that contradict this notion.  Another possibility is Baltar, himself, is a Cylon agent.

The Cylon's motives at this stage are quite unclear.  Their new "human" bodies seem to think they are, indeed, superior to humans, which is why they decided to exterminate all the inferior Colonies.  But they also seem driven to "prove" themselves to the humans, to prove that their emotions are indeed real.  They believe there is one God, not the many Gods the Colonials have, and that all of this was part of God's plan.  If Baltar's "hallucinations" are in fact real, and the Cylons aren't lying to him, then they seem to be keeping him alive in order to accomplish some purpose.  We see hints of it in the Season Finale.  As you can see, the Caprica storyline has similar overtones.  But it's not really clear why the Cylons decided to wipe most of humanity out, but spare a few for some very strange reasons.

The Season Finale suggests the possibility that the Cylons are simply using the fleet in order to locate Earth, but there would seem to be far less complicated ways of going about it.  They have what seem to be a variety of Cylon agents in the fleet, yet their sabotage is haphazard, and then when they succeed, they don't succeed in a way that makes sense.  If they need Baltar alive, why compromise the water supply?  If they need the fleet to continue, why make it hard for them to find fuel?  Perhaps different Cylon factions are working at cross-purposes.  Frankly, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, and I don't think whatever the "Truth" is can ultimately be completely logically consistent with what has appeared on screen so far.  Not that this has ever stopped some sci-fi writers before.

Bruce

Ah, thanks.  Bruce, I had a lot of the same questions you raised in the last paragraph running around in my head as I saw the last half of the season, hence my confusion.  I hope some of it gets cleared up in July.

The thing I fear most is the series going Angel on us.  That whole Caprica storyline just seems destined to go down the "vampire with a soul" road with Sharon.  SHE REALLY FELT LOVE.

Well, supposedly Baltar really feels love for Number Six. :)

The Caprica storyline made no sense to me at all until she became pregnant (which was aparrent a few episodes back), and that she was trying to prove that a human could really care for her, but again the entire motives behind that whole experiment are less than clear.  It would seem that with the arrival of Starbuck they will close out that part of the story in the second season.

Bruce

Well, it's fairly obvious why the Cylons aren't just blowing Galactica out of the sky - because they too believe in the prophecy and are actively guiding the remaing humans towards it, to whatever end. It's never really explicitly stated until the final episode, but the Cylons knew that the humans were headed for Kobol, and could have just as easily parked 30 basestars there if they were halfway motivated to.

If that's so, why continue to attack them for days on end at the beginning?  To put on a good show?  Okay, but then why sabotage their water supply?  Why defend their fuel dump?  Why have a fleet at Kobol?

Bruce

I think it's fairly obvious that the Cylons are herding the humans, although to what end I'm not entierly sure. 

Religion is most likely the answer.  It seems as if perhaps the Cylons base some of their religion from their human creators, as they've seemed to express common beliefs.  At the least, they seem to believe the Capricians have some sort of role to play, which intertwines with their own role.  I'm guessing the reason why they've made contact, are having human babies, and are driving the Capricians is because they believe it will help them become closer to God in some way.  They see themselves as carrying out God's will.  They're just causing things to finally come into play.  Murdering billions of people can't be wrong if it's Gods plan.

There's also some questions as to why the females are the ones having children with humans.  It would be easier for a man to impregnate dozens of women, rather than having their females impregnated by a human.  So, along with any other reasons, I'd say the male cylons are sterile.  Perhaps a flaw in their creation.  Maybe they feel their children will contain the best of both races, and probably serves some religious purposes as well.  They also seem to want their children to be born out of love.  It also explains why they don't just kidnap someone and force them to have sex in order to procreate.  Maybe they see humans as more spiritually connected to God, since they themselves were just the creations of man?  Maybe this is a way to put their beliefs in a worthy vessel.

There are plenty of ways to rationalize why they are doing the baby thing, but very few that can explain all the various sabotages, assassination plots, mind games, obstacles, etc.

I like the theoretical idea of different Cylon factions, like Gods, who rather than kill each-other work their schemes at cross-purposes among the humans.  I have no idea if this is what the writers have in mind.  In any case, you'd still have to explain a lot of other things that contradict that notion.

Bruce

That was where my thinking was heading.  The only two motivations I can think of for why the Cylons would keep Galactica et al alive is (a) to find Earth (b) for religious reasons, or some sort of strange mix.

Far as the Cylon religion goes, there seems to be something "real" to it, and it overlaps with the Colonial religion even though one is monotheistic and the other polytheistic.  Both talk about the "cycle of time", and both Humans and Cylongs make predictions about what is to come, and both seem correct beyond coincidence. 

It seems clear though that the Humans are not pulling the strings of fate, but the Cylons very well may be.  If not that, then they are far more in tune with the source of the prophecies than the Humans are.  There are a few more things we know; that the prophecies do appear to come true, that the Cylons are purposefully keeping the Humans alive and herding them along, and that the Cylons want the Humans to find Earth. 

Some things we may not know; Cylons have apparent disregard for Human life, but that may be because of a hatred for Humans.  one of the Cylons stated as much when he said something to the efect of the parents needing to die before the children can be on their own.  Then again, they also have apparent respect for Human emotion and a desire to be "alive".  It may be that the parent/child relationship referred to isn't Human/Cylon.  It may be that Cylons blasted the 12 colonies for a "greater good", at least in their mind.

Still a lot of "if"s though.

There's also the thought that this Series is playing with Cyclical time - which means that everything that happened has happened before.  Which may mean that the humans we know were once Cyclons too and that the current Cyclons are just trying to ascend.

Or is that far too Matrix for everyone ?

Six said as much to Baltar.  And just to throw fat on the fire... (http://www.proaxis.com/~sherlockfam/art5.html)

Well..I saw the season finale last night. WoW. Just..WoW. I can't wait until July now.

I'm starting to seriously wonder wtf is the deal with Adama.  It certainly locks in Madame President as the Moses figure if Adama bites it... ;-)

It's doubtful that they'd kill him off, it would screw up the character dynamics too much.  And having the XO in charge would probably annoy the viewers as much as he irritates the crew.

Besides **SPOILER ALERT*** gutshots aren't necessarily instantly fatal; infection is typically more of a danger than the bullet wound.  Presumably Galactica's medical staff is up to dealing with that.

I'm wondering whether the Presiden't having legitimate visions, or if this is another case of the Cylons messing with brains to make someone see what they want them to see.

Edit for AOFanboi:
(http://www.f13.net/images/necropost.gif)

Herbert Schild, Re-animator.

This thing starts up for Season 2 in a couple weeks, right?

Caught a Stargate commercial too.  Guess it hadn't sunk in that they were bringing in Crichton AND Aeryn Sun.  I take it Sci Fi is regretting cancelling Farscape?

New season of BSG and the two Stargates start on July 15th.

And yeah, both of the Farscape leads in SG-1, this could give it some hope of not sucking so much this season.

Yep, Sci-Fi Friday restarts on July 15.  I'm badly jonesing for my sci-fi fix.

The two leads on Farscape were the only things I liked about that series.  Didn't like much of the writing, hated the rest of the cast, but I always liked the two of them and their chemistry.  Don't know how well they'll make the transition into Stargate, but I think they'll both do well.  I was a bit worried how the change in leads would affect the show, but I'm thinking they can pull it off.

Either way, I like BSG and SG:Atlantis more than SG1, so long as they don't royally screw it up I'll be happy.