TV Tyrant

So Say We All: The Battlestar Galactica Blog Carnival, Ed. 4.5.9

March 17th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica, blog carnival, so say we all

Mar
17

Everyone, it seems, felt as if they were in a holding pattern this week, with a really good ep of Battlestar Galactica that was totally just the first hour of the end, and answered really nothing at all.

The biggest question seemed to be what the point of the flashbacks was, though the consensus was that they were quite good, whether or not they were necessary.

I would like to make this comment about the Baltar flashbacks – I think that Caprica Six was so solicitus toward Julius Baltar for more than one reason. I think she saw solving that problem as a way to get on Gaius’ good side, and that was vital. But she was, indeed, taken with Julius, despite his crudeness. Was it a matter of having a respect for one’s parents, parents whom Six did not know but, somehow, deep down, knew she had and had respect for?

Or, and this is TOTALLY speculative and I have no reason to think it other than I’m trying to figure it all out, is Julius some frakked up version of Daniel and Six knows on some level that he’s important and should be taken care of? There’s been some speculation in the blogosphere that Kara and Gaius could be brother and sister, both children of Daniel. I find it hard to believe that Julius could actually be Daniel, but don’t forget that Daniel disappeared from Kara’s life when she was quite young, and there were multiple copies of all the “new” skinjobs.

There are a zillion reasons none of this makes sense, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything in the broader scope of BSG.

Oh, and just one more thing: way back when, Ron Moore told Mo Ryan that the ruined Earth WAS indeed our Earth. Not some other Earth. It’s Earth. There’s no Earth they’re suddenly going to discover.

They have found Earth. This is the Earth that the 13th Colony discovered, they christened it Earth. They found Earth.

And with that, I give you the penultimate So Say We All: The Battlestar Galactica Blog Carnival.

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So Say We All: The Battlestar Galactica Blog Carnival, Ed. 4.5.8

March 10th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica, blog carnival, so say we all

Mar
10

I just realized the other day that I am going to MISS the final two hours of Battlestar Galactica when it airs because I’m going to be on an airplane to Italy.

Yeah, you read right. And the way Hulu’s been airing the last few episodes, they’re not available online for eight days after the original airdate. So what does that mean? Well, it could actually mean no BSG blog from me for more than a week after the LAST TWO HOURS EVER of Battlestar Galactica airs.

It’s like a cosmic joke being played on me. Sigh. I know, I really have no right to complain, it’s not as if I’m going to prison or, say, Des Moines, but still …

Anyway, this episode had mixed reviews, but I really enjoyed liked appreciated it. It’s hard to say I enjoyed or liked something that was so gut-wrenching, but I definitely appreciated it.

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So, after the jump, the entries: Read full story

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Battlestar Galactica: Islanded in a Stream of Stars

March 7th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica

Mar
07

Poor Starbuck. Serves her right for trusting Gaius Baltar.

Oh, did I mention that spoilers abound? Read at your own risk.

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For a moment of night we have a glimpse of ourselves and of our world islanded in a stream of stars – pilgrims of mortality, voyaging between horizons across the eternal seas of space and time.

That quote is from Henri Beston, from his book, “The Outermost House.”

It has such resonance for last night’s episode.

The Galactica is, itself, an island in the sea of stars, and also is islanded – stranded – in the sea of stars, as it has nowhere to go and is about to fall apart.

And they are “pilgrims of mortality,” with Starbuck the harbinger of death and, herself, dead. Or not.

OK, I have to tackle this episode character by character, as I usually do, or else my pea brain might just explode.

Boomer

I knew it. Boomer does actually love the Chief. Her pretend projected world on Picon was not just a ruse to mislead Tyrol. She loved him, dreamed up a whole place where she could be with him.

With no chance of ever being accepted back in the Fleet and no desire to truly be a part of the Cylon world, she created her own world. Eventually, seeing she had no chance to ever be with Tyrol (New Caprica pretty much solidified that for her), she decided if she was going to be a Cylon, she was going to be CYLON. She aligned herself with Cavil.

Still, she loves Tyrol. If she could be accepted as human again, she’d do it in a heartbeat. But she knows it’ll never happen.

And so she sees in Hera the child she never got to have with Tyrol. She didn’t want to, and that’s why she treated her like so much cargo. But in the end, she saw this child, this frightened child. And Hera knows that – so she calls to Boomer.

Cavil

I’m not exactly sure what he wants from Hera. Is he looking for a way to use Hera to unlock resurrection? To unlock procreation? As a tool? As a guinea pig to dissect?

By the way, wtf is that ship/facility that Cavil is in? Was that the ship the Final Five traveled in to find the 12 Colonies? Whatever it was, it was very cool. Read full story

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So Say We All: The Battlestar Galactica Blog Carnival, Ed. 4.5.7

March 3rd, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica, blog carnival, so say we all

Mar
03

And so we move one step closer to the end.

The fandom seems a bit split by Someone to Watch Over Me, with some believing it advanced our knowledge of what, exactly, is going on and others wondering what the frak they were watching. I started more in the camp of the latter, but with time and pondering, I’m more convinced that we learned a heckuva lot, though I’m still not sure exactly what.

OK, so I’ll just let you read what others had to say, in this week’s edition of the blog carnival:

First off, Tru presents BSG – 7 down, 3 to go posted at True Science Fiction. He points out that now Starbuck also has a head person, the piano player who may or may not be her father (but at the very least represents him). Does that mean she’s a hybrid?

Norman Doering presents Battlestar Galactica: “Someone to Watch Over Me” posted at A Blog from Hell. He outlines the two main storylines and has some interesting thoughts about the musical score and links to Bear McCreary’s excellent blog. As usual, Norman has some excellent turns of phrase, such as “exposition dump-itis.”

Ms. SP presents There’s a Somebody I’m Longing to See posted at Ms. Smarty Pants Know It All. She watched the episode a second time immediately after it ended its first run-through, even though she still isn’t quite sure what happened. But Starbuck and Tyrol, she realizes, were both faced with mirages.

Kenneth Hynek presents Someone to Watch Over Hera & Starbuck posted at Kenneth Hynek. All I can say is, wow. Lots of good stuff here, so here’s what he had to say by way of introduction: ” I was reminded, watching “Someone to Watch Over Me,” of an earlier “Starbuck“-themed episode, which (not coincidentally?) came near the end of one of the show’s seasons (its third). Of course, I’m speaking about “Maelstrom,” in which Kara has to confront one of her personal demons — her relationship with her mother — before she can pursue her destiny to its next stage. This episode puts her through a similar situation, albeit without the apparition of Leoben Conoy guiding her through it; this time, however, the demon she’s confronting is her relationship with her father. ”

Erika presents Battlestar Galactica – “Deadlock” posted at Seriality. She hated Deadlock, as did many in fandom, though I actually liked it. Her reasons are well spelled out, though. But one thing: The last 3 (D’Anna) decided to stay beind on the nuked Earth. She’s done. That was the last episode Lucy Lawless filmed.

Roberta presents BSG So Say We All Blog Carnival – I have a new theory! posted at CouchSlobs – A Monument To Human Idleness. Roberta is on the “Daniel is Starbuck’s father” train, and I’m with her.

Nina presents Battlestar Galactica Season 4.5 Epi. 17: Someone to Watch Over Me posted at Blog It Out Bitch. As usual, Nina points out some of the best lines in the episode, including Tigh’s oh-so-appropriate “What the frak?!” when Kara is playing The Final Four Theme (which Bear McCreary describes as pretty much All Along the Watchtower, but different).

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of so say we all using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

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Battlestar Galactica: Someone to Watch Over Me

February 28th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica

Feb
28

I was a bit torn on how I felt about last night’s episode of BSG.

There wasn’t much action, and we didn’t get many answers.

But the more I thought about it, the better it seemed.

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Though it seemed the episode would be All About Starbuck, Boomer was really the focus and the key.

Honestly, until amost the very last, I found the entire storyline somewhat of a puzzle.

Why would she beat up Athena? Why wouldn’t Adama and Roslin take into consideration that Boomer risked her own neck to bring back Ellen Tigh? Why did she want Hera?

See, I’d been thinking the past couple of weeks that the reason Boomer sided with Cavil lay solely with the fact that Ellen was there, and she wanted to ensure nothing would happen to one of the Final Five. She didn’t really break with her line; she did it to save a Final Fiver from the insane Cavil.

Wow, was I wrong.

It all sort of clicked when Tyrol went back to the “home” he shared with Boomer and their child and found it utterly empty, abandoned. Now, there still is the question as to whether it truly was abandoned, or if he just wasn’t able to project his wife and daughter in the same was as Boomer. And she did, after all, tell him that no matter what happened or what anyone said, she did truly love him.

I believe she did love him at one point; maybe still even does, in some sort of way.

But her abandonment by Tyrol after she had shot Adama and he thought he was still human and her subsequent “murder” by Callie (whom, let’s face it, we’d always known loved Tyrol) scarred her deeply.

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So Say We All: The Battlestar Galactica Blog Carnival, Ed. 4.5.6

February 24th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica, blog carnival, so say we all

Feb
24

In blogging last week about BSG, I ignored a huge part of the episode, as I got rather wrapped up in the whole “Ellen Tigh really is as crazy as she seemed, but I love it” part of things.

Don’t worry, lots of Baltar goodness to go around in this week’s carnival, but I thought I’d share some things I’ve been musing on:

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Baltar is crazy. Like a fox. He quickly sees that control of his cult has been all but wrested from him. But the ladies still have an eye for our brilliant, possibly insane, doctor, and he has a last chance to get it back.

All he needs to do is appeal to their inner sense of strength. And if that doesn’t work, their desire to have bigger guns than the bad guys. That should do the trick.

Head Six is still totally in on the game. What does that mean? We know that some of the Final Five had visions that preceded the blowing up of Earth, etc., so what does that mean for Baltar? We know that he has some sort of strange connection to the Cylons, but what is it? Is he perhaps a hybrid? And why does Caprica Six hallucinate Baltar?

And, is Baltar and his merry band of insane women going to become the new militia? Sort of the National Guard, if you will? And I simply must ask this (as did, I think, EVERYone else watching the show): WTF did he say to Adama/Roslin/Lee to convince them to give him the big guns? I mean, really?

Anyway, there’s a lot to get to here, lots of entries, so let me get started:

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Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock

February 21st, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica

Feb
21

I would like to start by saying this:

I always believed Ellen Tigh to be bat-guano crazy and I’m glad that her being a Cylon doesn’t mean that was inaccurate.

Spoilers abound. Read at your own risk.

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OK, I just finished watching and I’m filled with … opinions.

First, this wasn’t the most action- nor exposition-filled of episodes, yet it answered a lot of questions – in my mind, at least.

Ellen Tigh, Cylon or human, loves Saul Tigh so unreasonably so that she is completely unhinged, even without alcohol. Though, of course, she prefers to have some on hand.

Last week left us with the misimpression that Ellen Tigh’s human behavior was simply because she didn’t remember who she was and who Saul was and their thousands of years of history together.

Hahahahaha.

No, Ellen Tigh’s just a crazy lady. And so’s Saul Tigh.

Raise your hand if you thought that Tigh and Adama were going to kiss each other when they were hugging over the death of Liam.

OK, but to be serious:

The reason Hera is so important is that a Cylon-Cylon pairing may not actually be able to produce a child. Maybe the One True God decided that the offspring of two Cylons was too dangerous, because the only way to end the cycle of “All this has happened before and will happen again” was to have a combined race, human/Cylon.

That still doesn’t explain why Hera is so drawn to Six. Is it that she’s supposed to be the mother of the new hybrid race?

OK, I get ahead of myself.

First off, Ellen’s anger at Saul was so insane. Saul doesn’t remember being a Cylon. He had no idea whatsoever when he frakked Caprica Six that he was partially responsible for creating her. No more than Ellen remembered that about Cavil/John when she frakked him.

And Caprica Six’s memory was blocked on that point, too, unlike Cavil/John’s. I mean, that was way creepier than the Saul/Six pairing. Though, with a child in the offing, it’s more … permanent.

I wonder if Ellen was able to make the “intuitive leap” to the resurrection technology in part because she was unable to have children. Obviously, the problem ain’t Saul. And she didn’t get preggers from her liaisons with Cavil/John, either.

I think her inability to have children, way back on Earth, affected her very deeply, and made her believe the only way to ensure her future with her One True Love, Saul, was to perfect the resurrection tech?

Other initial thoughts (I’m sure I’ll have more later this weekend):

• Tyrol and Boomer are going to end up together. If Anders recovers, will he be with Tori, who I believe is the woman he was in love with back on Earth, despite her crazy in love relationship with Tyrol. Whatever the case, Tyrol and Tori are NOT in love, and Tyrol’s always loved Boomer. Now that they’re both Cylon, what’s to stop them? And if Tyrol’s out of the way, mayhaps Anders will feel more at ease going for Tori? What of Starbuck, in that case? She loves Lee, but she luvvvvvvvvvs Anders.

• It’s true that Saul Tigh’s first love is the Galactica and Bill Adama. Adama was actually his first friend, if you think about it. When Cavil/John placed Saul among the humans, Ellen wasn’t there yet. The first person he really got to know was Bill Adama. His current incarnation has known Bill longer than anyone. Perhaps if he were resurrected and regained all his memories, this would be different, but until/unless that happens, it won’t be.

• Best line of the night award goes to Saul Tigh: “My grandfather was a power sander.”

• Besides Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell, Michael Hogan and Kate Vernon SO deserve Emmy nominations, at the very very least. C’mon!

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So Say We All: The Battlestar Galactica Blog Carnival, Ed. 4.5.5

February 17th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica, blog carnival, so say we all

Feb
17

I don’t think I need to repeat how fantastic I thought Friday’s ep was, so I’m not gonna say much here. Let’s just get into the week’s

submissions, no? (I can’t believe there are only five episodes left!!!!!) By the way, if after reading all this, you still want more, head over to Mo Ryan’s blog at the Chicago Tribune and check out her Q&A with the writers. We will find out what Starbuck is and we’ll get more Boomer. Oh, and the devastation on Earth was, indeed, the result of a Cylon Civil War.

Nina presents Battlestar Galactica Season 4.5 Epi. 15: No Exit posted at Blog It Out Bitch. She has a very interesting theory about Starbuck that actually makes more sense than mine. Be sure to check out the pre- and post-episode questions. Amazing how many questions the ep actually did answer.

Tru presents BSG – 5 down, 5 to go posted at True Science Fiction. John/Cavil’s rebellion against the Final Five is very much the stuff of nightmares for every parent of a teenager, he notes.

Norman Doering presents A few Pieces of a Puzzle posted at A Blog from Hell. “In a way,” he says, “Ellen Tigh is our Doctor Frankenstein and Cavil is her monster. The others making up the final five are apparently just a collection of Igors.”

Jayson Peters presents “Battlestar Galactica: No Exit” — It’s all coming together posted at Nerdvana. He points out that Ellen Tigh wasn’t the Final Cylon after all, and that Moore & Eick were all tricky on us, hiding a No. 7.

Ms. Smarty Pants presents Hell is Clunky Exposition posted at Ms. Smarty Pants Know It All. Not a fan of the exposition dump (as Norman, above, called the episode), Ms. SP still found there to be some interesting answers, not least of which is that the Final Five all had “head angels” like Baltar has. Hmmm. What the frak does that mean, though???

Roberta presents BSG So Say We All Blog Carnival – brainfry anyone? posted at CouchSlobs – A Monument To Human Idleness. She managed to pull her frazzled brain together enough to ponder Daniel (and express relief that my urgent cries of WHY IS SHARON NO. 8??? were finally answered) and express rather interesting thoughts about the Cylons’ desire to be more human.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of so say we all using our
carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our
blog carnival index page.

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Battlestar Galactica: No Exit

February 15th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica

Feb
15

Before I get into the meat and potatoes of what may just be the best episode EVAR of BSG, I would like to say, “Thank you Ron Moore and David Eick.”

I have lamented many times that I am totally confused as to why the Sharon model is an Eight, yet there are only seven models of “new Cylons.”

Bless their hearts, there actually was a method to their madness and we got our answer.

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By the way, have I said yet that you shouldn’t read if you didn’t watch? No? Well, I have now.

OK, so I just need to say this: WOWWOWWOWWOWWOW. Just. W.O.W.

My mind is still reeling, having just finished watching the episode on Hulu, so let me just recap to make sure I’ve got the backstory straight:

Humans made the Cylons on Kobol as a slave class. They rebelled. When the tribes  left Kobol, 12 created the astrologically named Colonies and the 13th were the Cylons, who ended up on Earth.

OK, so far so good. Once the Cylons blew themselves up (are we to assume that the current Civil War amongs the Cylons is also something that happened before and therefore is happening again?), Ellen, Saul, Galen, Tori and Anders downloaded to a ship orbiting the planet, because they saw the apocalypse coming and worked furiously to rediscover the resurrection technology.

They didn’t have FTL technology, so it took them thousands of years to reach the Colonies, where they’d planned to tell the humans to be nice to the Cylons (because, I’m sure, that would have worked), and found themselves in the midst of the First Cylon War.

Cylons were having one hell of a time developing hybrids, but the arrival of the Final Five enabled them to gain that technology. So they immediately ended their war against the humans and went away somewhere to get all human. Explains the suddenness with which the war ended, leaving Husker to ponder wtf (frak) was going on.

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Battlestar delay

February 14th, 2009 | by | battlestar galactica

Feb
14

FYI, I’m out of town and my mother-in-law doesn’t have cable, so I haven’t seen BSG yet. I may watch it on Hulu tonight, once the little ones are asleep, but it’s one of those shows I need to watch on a bigger screen, you know?

I’ll recap/review once I get a chance to watch. :-)

Meanwhile, if you just need to know who’s a Cylon and who’s not in your real life, check out the iPhone Cylon Detector app.

My friend over at iSmashPhone sent me the link this morning. Basically, you take a photo with your iPhone’s camera or load another image you already have into the app and it uses facial recognition (plus you have to tel it whether the person is male or female) and it tells you if your subject is a toaster or a native of the Colonies.

Costs $1.99. Nice. Now I just need an iPhone.

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