I've started watching the more recent Battlestar Galactica series. I watched a bit of the late 70s series when I was a child, which never really grabbed my attention.So far, I've seen the 2003 miniseries and the first episode of the show which began in 2004, and I'm deeply impressed. The worldbuilding is outstanding, and the stories are well-written, acted, and directed.
I suspect that Stargate: Universe (an excellent show in its own right) is derivative of it. Both feature the same shaky-camera documentary style cinematography. And central to both shows is that the characters have been thrown at random into the unknown with minimal resources.
Have you seen Battlestar Galactica? What did you think of it?
11 comments:
I rented the miniseries after reading this post on mental floss, and have been a fan ever since. I've had my brain scrambled at the constant unpredictability of the series, and I truly believe they saw this as a six year stint, and knew where they were going to end up all along.
I'm glad to hear you're enjoying it. My wife just started it, too.
BSG was gods-damn fantastic.
I've watched the whole series, but only once. I suspect that, on a second viewing, the arcs are not going to hold together as well as Babylon 5. I've seen B5 several times, and I'm always impressed at how well the story works. It shows that the story was pretty intricately plotted out in advance. BSG has a very strong continuity, it may be even more serialized than B5 was. But I think it shows that the writers were kind of winging it as they went along, introducing plot elements before knowing how they would turn out, and so on. I don't think it's too much of a problem watching it once, but like I said, I'm interested to see how it holds up on a second viewing. I'll start on that one of these days.
But really everything about BSG is excellent. The stories, the overall arc, the acting and effects... enjoy watching it.
I've seen the first season of BSG, and that was enough for me. I didn't find it interesting enough to do what I would have to have done to keep up with it. When my youngest finally gets it on DVD (if he does) I'll probably watch it with him. I don'y watch much tv.
The first season of BSG was really a good time (even if Gaius was kind of an aggravating character...) I certainly wish I had more time to watch the other (6?!) seasons!
The first two or three seasons were amazing, but the constant doom and gloom started to get me down. And I mean real gloom - much of each episode was hollering in the dark. SGU seems to have taken this approach too.
Marcel wrote:
And I mean real gloom - much of each episode was hollering in the dark.
Well, that's too much like real life for me. I want escapist fiction.
Hey JC, that Mental Floss article looks really good! Thanks for the pointer.
Kirai wrote:
(even if Gaius was kind of an aggravating character...)
Yes, I wouldn't mind for him to have an airlock accident. But I'm also curious just what is happening inside his head.
I really enjoyed the opening miniseries. The first season was still pretty good, but was already showing signs that it was going downhill. I lost interest at the start of the second.
Coming back to this, I see "Well, that's too much like real life for me. I want escapist fiction."
So I may recant my enthusiastic recommendation. If you don't like your fiction dark, then BSG may not be for you. It gets *bleak*. I do like "darker" fiction, and BSG tested my limits.
I will say Stargate Universe gets it's camera shots, especially in space, from Firefly. Watch closely at the shaky, purposefully out of focus shots that occur in Firefly. They are mimicked a great deal in Stargate Universe.
Still have not watched BSG, but will....one day.
PAX
JD
Post a Comment