The Royal Heffernans


Quite possibly the best family ever

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Frakking awesome!


The last ship in the fleet is no more.

In its spectacular 2-hour finale, BSG (as it's known to us die-hard fans/nerds) delivered. Not only did it answer the above questions, but it had arguably the best battle sequence since the original mini-series that started it all back in 2003. The series finale answered all the questions that I had about the show - a solution to the Cylon question, an answer for where the colonies originated, is Baltar crazy for seeing Caprica Six, is Starbuck alive or dead, and the greated question of all: where are the human survivors going to settle?

Too many shows fall victim to having a great premise with excellent pilot episodes, only to fail miserably once they try to extend things. Look at the Fox show Prison Break for an example of this. BSG had a great premise and the original mini-series was simply fantastic. But it followed up the original premise with 4 seasons running over a period of 6 years. It managed this great run because the writing of the show was extremely good, the acting was as good as the best dramas on TV (much better than David Caruso!), and the storyline kept me engrossed long after the original premise had been dulled by several seasons. But the producers were true to their word and said that the show would last only 4 season.

There have been many shows that simply don't know how to conclude. The X-files jumps out at me, as does The Sopranos. But Battlestar Galactica completed its run, and in such a way that I don't even have to think about sequels or spin-offs. I'm fully satisfied in the conclusion of this great show, and I love that I can say that. For those of you who are interested in renting or buying the past episodes, I suggest doing so. You won't regret it.

4 comments:

ian said...

Well, you only have to think about the 2-spinoffs that were already being advertised during the finale. I'll give it about 2 episodes before original cast members start making guest appearances that turn into full-time roles.

BSG would have been 100x better if they had condensed it to two seasons rather than stretching it to 4. It got a little Lost midway through it's run with time-travel and ghost shenanigans and other improbably plotlines - "Oh shit, we just got signed for another season! How're we going to undo that?"

As for the acting and writing - I guess it's okay for a SciFi produced show. Overly melodramatic, military and political leaders (not to mention robots) that drop TV f-bombs every other word, lots of staring into space and spitting out silly soliloquies... I don't know, I tried and I tried and I just could never get into this thing. The only thing I found satisfying about the finale was the fact that it's now over...

Kevin said...

I hate you Ian.

Teddy said...

Just wait until July and the entire series is coming out on Blu-ray. As for the battles, I have a hard time ranking them:

Episode "33" had a battle every 33 minutes.
The episode where Lee took command of Pegasus was maybe my all-time fav.
The episode where Galactica jumped into the atmosphere on New Caprica on a sneak attack was unbelievable.
The episode where they blew up the Resurrection ship was also cool.
In the finale, jumping in point blank near a singularity was pretty damn cool.

Joy + Tom said...

Read a book called The God Game by Andrew M. Greeley, if you can find a copy. It explains who "God" is in BSG.