BSG 2.20: "Lay Down Your Burdens, Part 2"

[annathepiper]

Okay, having slept on it, here's my commentary. Short form, I'm... not happy. Not unhappy enough to bail on the series, but I'm... wary.


Let me talk first about some of the lesser plot details that I liked and didn't like, before I get to the big reset ending.

Stuff I didn't like:

* On Caprica, I didn't like the handling of the attack on Starbuck's rescue party and Anders' people... how it just stopped for no apparent reason. And I didn't like that we only saw Caprica!Priest with Anders' people only at that last minute.

* Tigh and Dualla being involved in the attempt to fix the vote for Roslin. I'm not overall disappointed that an attempt was made, because I think that was a neat idea--just on the grounds that it was dishonest, and the scene where Adama confronts Roslin about it was very, very good. It was simultaneously disappointing to see Roslin tacitly endorsing that kind of behavior and heartening to see her realize at the last minute that letting it happen would kill her inside. Good character development there. But I really didn't like Tigh and Dualla being involved. I can kind of bring up Tigh's motives if I think about it; I can totally see Tigh thinking that Baltar would be an unmitigated disaster as a leader and being bluntly willing to do anything to avoid that. Plus we've had some history of Tigh being less than snowy white in his ethics anyway. But Dualla? Not a peep of why she was involved, and it was really disappointing to see that. It goes back to my prior complaints about how Dualla has become a cardboard character. This is the first time in a few episodes we've seen her doing something besides fawning over Lee, and this was not a good something for her to be doing.

* In the scene where Kara and Anders are all over one another, Kara really is unnecessarily snarky at Lee, especially with the remark about Dualla. I realize that this may be contradictory of me, given that these days I'm not liking Dee much either, but we've also seen absolutely no reason why Kara would be contemptuous of her. And no reason why she would be so petty at Lee about it. It felt like a big backslide of Kara's character, given the signs of maturation she was showing in "Scars". Plus, the whole schtick of "guy walks in on the girl he really loves getting it on with another guy" thing? Way overused.

* Sharon getting all hostile at Helo. I can buy her being hostile at everybody else if she thinks they killed her baby, but what's up with that remark about "do you think I care about you?" at Helo? Was that "I think my baby is dead" depression talking, or is she genuinely hostile at Helo now? Has she ever genuinely loved Helo or has she really been all about the baby all this time? I'm waffling on this, because on the one hand it'd be kind of neat if she's really Cylon to the core and has just been on a long-term mission to get a human-sired baby, but on the other hand, I've lost any trace of sympathy I've had for the character.

* Bill, Bill, Bill. Lose the mustache. Please. For the good of the Fleet.

* Not happy that we didn't get to see any real sign of what Caprica!Six and Caprica!Sharon were doing, whether they really did stage a civil war and are now the ones in power or what. It would have been nice to actually see that. Also, I'm not seeing any real sign yet that they're really doing anything differently than any of the other Cylons, if they're just going to sweep in and take over what's left of the pitiful remnants of humanity.

* Where the hell were Head!Six and Head!Baltar in that last scene where Caprica!Six and Baltar actually laid eyes on one another? We actually get them together and we don't get to see how their respective hallucinations get to react to one another? Baaaah.

* We saw everybody post-year-jump except for Galactica!Sharon. Where the hell did she wind up? We saw Helo on the bridge of the Galactica, with Adama, but no sign of Sharon. Or any sign of the Priest model Cylons, either. So did they just pitch them out the airlock or what?

Stuff I liked:

* I was actually rather blown away and impressed that Starbuck's rescue party turned out to be successful. I was totally expecting that the rescue party was going to be decimated and that Anders was going to bite it on Caprica. I was surprised and pleased that he made it back to the Fleet with her. Adama's being introduced to him was cute, too. I grinned at Adama telling him he was a "Picon Panthers fan", but was happy to see him nonetheless.

* See previous commentary re: the scene where Adama confronts Roslin about the attempt to fix the vote. That was very good.

* The scene with Zarek and Baltar where Zarek is swearing up and down that he smells something fishy about the election results, and Baltar saying that Roslin is many things but not dishonest--deliciously ironic, given that Roslin's campaign manager really had tried to fix the election. And I liked how Gaius looked almost relieved there for a few minutes.

* Okay, even though I didn't like Caprica!Priest magically showing up with Anders' people at the last minute, I thought it was hysterical when they put Caprica!Priest in the brig and then we saw Fleet!Priest being hauled in, making the obligatory protests--until he saw his counterpart there, at which point he just bailed completely on pretending he was human. Very funny. ;)

* The one thing I did like about the Kara/Anders/Lee scene was Anders' wry line, "You don't have to get me drunk. I will sleep with you."

* The scene where Gina tells Gaius she won't be going to New Caprica and then gets him to stay with a single word--and what happens after--very powerful. I physically flinched at the sight of her scarred, bared body, and at the same time, was riveted by her offering herself to him. That their lovemaking was interposed with Gaius' being sworn in as President--and then with Gina sitting naked by the bomb just before it blows--very, very good.

* Post-year-jump Kara with long hair? Looking good.

* That last bit where Caprica!Six and Caprica!Sharon come in and confront Baltar, and he learns that that bomb he gave Gina not only resulted in the destruction of several of the Fleet ships and the loss of many, many lives, it also threw up the flare that let the Cylons find them again. Maaaaan. The look on Gaius' face, the look of absolute devastation as he realizes he's doomed humanity twice, was extremely powerful.

And now, about this ending.

I'm... not pleased at the jump of a full year. I've been seeing several references on my Friends list to Ron Moore describing this as a "reset" episode, and all I can think of is my experience with various MUSHes deciding to completely reset themselves to try to revitalize their playerbase and roleplay and plotlines. It never worked for long, and I can't see necessarily that it'll work on BSG either. The lesser jumps we've had throughout the second half of this season were jarring enough to me--and now we've jumped ahead by a whole year. While on the one hand I can appreciate an attempt to achieve an epic broadening of scope here, on the other hand, it makes me feel like we've lost any real connection to the characters we've come to know and love. In those last few minutes after the jump ahead, it was rather disorienting to see all of these people who vaguely resembled the cast we've had all this time, and who yet seemed like totally different people.

Part of me can see why they did it. If they want to keep some conflict going, there's only so long you can do the "Fleet on the run with the Cylons chasing them" thing before you either have to have them find Earth, or you have to have some other huge change in the situation. So at least in principle I don't mind this as a plot change concept... it's just that I'm not happy about a lot of the details of how it's getting implemented.

I've seen some theorizing in posts linked to off of 13th_colony that this might actually be some sneaky twist to the overall Cylon Plan, and it would be nice if that's the case, because otherwise, if the Cylons are really going "sorry about the whole destroying your civilization and taking over your planets thing, whoops, our bad", I feel like I've been cheated. And that the writers are resetting things because they don't know what else to do.

Here's hoping I'm wrong. I'm going to check in again in October just to see what they do, but at this point I'm actually relieved that it'll be a while before we see season three. As mamishka has often aptly observed, one does not so much enjoy Battlestar Galactica as survive it, and right now, my overall feeling now that this season has wound up is one of being rather drained.

And here's hoping season three has more focus than this one did.

Comments

[firni.livejournal.com]

Maybe the mustache is a secret sign that this is all a Bobby Ewing moment.

[llachglin.livejournal.com]

30 minutes was too short a time to set up the new change, but everything we did see made perfect sense to me. Yes, the characters had changed, but in consistent ways. Adama, freed from the imminent cylon attack and weary from months on the run, relaxes his guard a bit but remains on the Galactica (and regrows his ridiculous mustache). Helo's still on the Galactica, presumably keeping an eye on still-jailed Sharon, despite her attempts to push him away. Lee is still being the good soldier, playing things by the book even as his crew abandons him. Kara, having lost the threat of the cylons and back with Anders, takes her only option and tries to make a new life of it, and her relationship with Lee gets more remote because she's not the type willing to do the work to undo her past mistakes. It makes sense to me that Tyrol, always popular among the low-ranking crew members, would become a leader of the same people down on New Caprica. It makes sense that Calley would go with him. Gaeta is known for competently and loyally following orders, and it makes sense that he'd accept a position as adviser to Balthar when asked. Tigh remains loyal and only leaves the Galactica when Adama pushes him away.

Dualla's move to the Pegasus makes sense if you accept her relationship with Lee and the fact that she's not the type to leave military service, and neither is he. I don't really accept their relationship, but that's not the fault of this episode.

While the withdrawal of the cylons from the Colonies was abrupt, I think the rationale stated by the priest cylon made sense. Really, what good was a radiation-devastated set of planets anyway? I'd like to see more explanation of the internal divisions of the cylons that led to the decision, but the final decision rang true to me. Now why they would come back? That could just be a sign of a different faction taking control, or a more complex set of motives that we don't know about yet. I think it's fair to leave that a mystery at this point, because it's really not the cylon motives that drive the show, but the human motives and how they react to the cylon terror. Those human motives make sense--people wanted to settle, despite it being the wrong move from a logical point of view, because they were exhausted after so long on the run. People can only be in crisis mode so long.

Going on with individual character motivation, it makes sense that Roslin would return to her first passion after finding the political avenue blocked for her, and realizing that Baltar's government had no place for dissent. It makes sense that Baltar would fall apart and govern with complete incompetence and egomania.

So, it's really a matter of pacing and not where they ended up. The question is, did we really lose opportunities for good short-term stories by flashing forward? I suppose I would have liked to see the cylon divisions, but again, the cylons are the foil for the human characters, and I don't think that's really the focus of the show. I would have liked to see a slower unfolding of Baltar's incompetence, and some scenes of early settlement of New Caprica--but without the ongoing cylon threat, and given the state of other character relationships, I don't think there would have been enough else going on to sustain that arc. So a fast-forward was inevitable. I assume next season will allow opportunities to show interesting scenes from that period in the context of what's happening in the current storyline, which in the long run is going to be more effective.

As for this season, I think there were major mistakes in pacing and plotting in the second set of episodes (2.1), and this fast-forward will help them put a lot of that behind them. I really think the last two or three episodes overcame my huge problems with the4 middle episodes (roughly 2.13-2.17). Given the extra production time and a continuous 20-week air schedule (with only short breaks) means they'll be able to plot our a coherent full-season plot and hopefully avoid some of the narrative corners that they ran into during that run.

[llachglin.livejournal.com]

That would be even more stupid than the "Roslin cured of cancer miraculously" moment that was my least favorite of the season.

[llachglin.livejournal.com]

And, because I'm wordy and had one more paragraph to go on that comment but exceeded the maximum character length:

I'm left with one big question for next season, about the cylon motives in changing their plan and then changing their plan again. But I'm going to enjoy seeing the characters responding to the cylon occupation and (presumably) eventually heading off on the run again. I also hope to see Adama shaving his mustache in one of the early scenes of the season.

[annathepiper]

*snicker* Uh, probably not.

I'm hearing via 13th_colony that on the podcast that goes with this episode, Ron Moore is saying that the events depicted therein are in fact real, which would seem to shoot down the "it's all a dream/delusion" theory. Despite the fact that I thought widget285's theory that it was all a delusion of Kara's after she was captured on Caprica and thrown into another of the farms was pretty neat, I think I'd actually prefer to avoid that sort of thing anyway.

[wrog]

Two points:

• Given how much we know about how much the various Sharons+Sixes share knowledge, it's not obvious to me that that's Caprica!Six and Tyrol!Sharon in that last scene with Gaius.
• DeanModel's explanation of why the Cylons changed tactics, abandoned Caprica, and left the fleet unmolested for a year needs to be taken with a huge grain of salt; the very fact that they've come back to take over New Caprica undermines a goodly chunk of it.

[firni.livejournal.com]

In that case, it sucked even MORE than I thought possible. The writers were on crack.

[firni.livejournal.com]

I wish now that I hadn't started watching the damn show. This was just craptastic.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

er, something dumb happened with my cut and paste, there, so i'm deleting my previous comment and dropping a new one in.

Where the hell were Head!Six and Head!Baltar in that last scene where Caprica!Six and Baltar actually laid eyes on one another? We actually get them together and we don't get to see how their respective hallucinations get to react to one another? Baaaah.

i'm really curious what's happening with the hallucinations/visions for those two.

I thought it was hysterical when they put Caprica!Priest in the brig and then we saw Fleet!Priest being hauled in, making the obligatory protests--until he saw his counterpart there, at which point he just bailed completely on pretending he was human.

yes. he's just a wonderful actor, and they're clearly having fun writing his character.

Post-year-jump Kara with long hair? Looking good.

oh, i'm going to have to disagree on this one

Re: ...

[annathepiper]

Oh, I totally agree that it's a gutsy maneuver. I'm just hoping that it'll work, and that this new scenario they're setting up will be as compelling as the previous one. As I was telling kathrynt in IM, as an overall concept I don't have a problem with it--it's just that I'm having some noticeable quibbles with the details of how they are implementing it. Things that are making me rather cranky about the situations of certain characters (such as Lee and Dualla)--and if I'm spending more time wanting to bitchslap characters in the main cast than I am actually liking them and sympathizing with them, then I start to lose interest in what's happening to them.

I'm all for characters that have flaws, but I also want to see some strengths out of these people as well, and with some noticeable exceptions (say, Roslin), several of the principal characters have been lacking in that regard for me lately.

I'm willing to give this a shot, though. Jumping ahead a year does open up a bunch of new possibilities for our various principal characters, and I will still be coming back to see what happens. :)

Re: ...

[annathepiper]

And oh yeah, I kind of went "er" about the explosion too. It wasn't at all clear to me exactly how that was supposed to work--if Cylon tech only picked up the radiation signature/light from the blast a year later because it travelled a light-year, I suppose I can kind of buy that, but it seems scientifically iffy somehow. (I'm not exactly sure how. This is what I get for never taking physics!)

um, hello, they have FTL

[wrog]

not to mention the thingies that help them track the fleet through "hyperspace", so the whole thing is scientifically iffy.

On the other hand in terms of their own rules, the whole point about that planet was that it's surrounded by Convenient Ionization Shit or Something that blocks the usual modes of detection, but that a nuke could somehow punch through. At which point I say, sure, why not?

On the other hand commercial AM radio goes a long way (Earth looks like a monster blue giant star when viewed at those frequencies).

Also, presumably, this planet has a star (otherwise it's not going to be very habitable). And a star is nothing more than a continuous hydrogen bomb, so... buh.

[starsongky.livejournal.com]

Or any sign of the Priest model Cylons, either. So did they just pitch them out the airlock or what?

Right at the end of the scene with the two priests in the brig, Roslin did give the order to throw them both out the airlock. No clue on Helo!Sharon, though Helo's still on Galactica in Gaeta's old job.

And I can totally see Gaeta resigning his commission and working for Baltar after he found the rigged ballots and Adama covered it up.

And I can't help but wonder how Caprica!Sharon (the reincarnated Tyrol!Sharon) will think when she finds out (apparently) he and Callie are expecting a kid Any Day Now.

[smeehrrr.livejournal.com]

Particularly since Callie is also a cylon.

[seattlesparks.livejournal.com]

The friend I watched it with had that same theory, that it was all a dream/hallucination moment. I bet it wasn't, simply because BSG is one of the few shows I can think of (for good or ill) willing to so drastically change their premise. Then we listened to the podcast.

He had to pay up. (The bet was only $1, though.)

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[seattlesparks.livejournal.com]

I figured it being that a hydrogen bomb would have a different signature than a star. (And we know the star's radiation and the presence of the planet is masked by the nebula anyway.) And that the radiation from the explosion dispersed over the course of a year, to the point that eventually it drifted out of the nebula, and some Cylons went, 'er, hey, what's this over here?'

[seattlesparks.livejournal.com]

Dee's involvement in the election fixing doesn't surprise me, actually. She still has some unresolved issues over a certain death earlier in the year; it made perfect sense to me that she'd get involved kind of as a 'Baltar is wrong, this is what Billy'd do if he were here still to help Roslin.'

[annathepiper]

I could totally buy that as an explanation, but it would have been nice to see it happen on camera, you know? Not even in a big scene, I would have been happy with a brief exchange between her and Tigh, maybe. And I would mind less having to guess at character motivations if I thought that this would ever be explained, but in this case I'm doubtful that it will.

[annathepiper]

Yeah, if the mustache is symbolic of when Adama's in active military mode, it definitely needs to go early on next season. ^_^

I would expect that most of next season is going to be involved with trying to deal with the occupation, yeah... since I'm having a hard time coming up with good explanations for how they can get nearly 40,000 people out from under Cylon rule. Two battlestars or not, they're really badly outnumbered and outgunned!

[annathepiper]

Yes. Though part of me would kind of be relieved if it were all a dream/delusion on someone's part, I much prefer that the events be real.

[annathepiper]

Oh, I totally think that that was Caprica!Six, because she shot Baltar an extremely eloquent look before she told him that she knows very well who she is. And if that's Caprica!Six, the Sharon has to be Tyrol!Sharon, because some other random Sharon model wouldn't make much sense.

And it wouldn't make much dramatic sense to me if they were some other models, with the commentary coming out of Caprica!Priest about how those two particular war heroes' voices now carry great weight among the Cylons.

I'm totally with you about the necessity for a grain of salt, but the overall impression I have right now is that Caprica!Six and Tyrol!Sharon are trying to launch what they perceive to be a benevolent occupation. There was something in that little blurb for what's to come about how the Cylons are going to "take care" of humanity. A kind of "because we love you, we have to dominate you completely" thing.

But at the same time I acknowledge that that might just be the "obvious" answer, so yeah, grain of salt. Mmm, salty! ;)

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[annathepiper]

Yeah, it was the very fact that they have FTL that made me initially go "huh"?

The way my brain was trying to play it, I thought, "Now wait, they detected the explosion and that was a year ago, so why the hell didn't they just jump in when they sensed it..."

But then I thought, "Now wait, that assumes that they picked up immediately on the explosion... but if they're only picking up trace radiation/light signatures after they've travelled a light-year, in which case they didn't detect it until a year later..." And that made a bit more sense.

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[annathepiper]

Yeah, that's about the only way I can make this play out in a sensible fashion in my brain... that they only picked up on the residual traces of the explosion after they had gone a light-year away. So it took them a whole year to actually find those traces.

[annathepiper]

Heh! I guess I should maybe consider subscribing to these podcasts, since they seem to be chock full of interesting information.

[annathepiper]

So you won't be tuning in in October, then?

(Serious question. I'm curious, since from what I'm hearing there's a lot of polarized reactions--people either being really upset with the finale, or really liking what happened. And I'm wondering how many of the "upset" contingent will not be coming back for season three.)

[annathepiper]

Yeah well... I'm not thrilled about this direction for the plot, but I'm willing to give it a bit longer to see whether or not it actually works. We'll just have to see.

[firni.livejournal.com]

I'll probably end up watching if only because P has a season pass for it on our Tivo. That's why I watched it in the first place... I was bored.

[firni.livejournal.com]

A bit longer being seven months. This is worse than when HBO prolonged the agony on season two of the Sopranos.

[annathepiper]

I'm hoping we'll see more of the hallucination/visions thing, though I'm wondering if we will now that they're together.

Cylon!Al. Hee hee hee. I saw someone posting somewhere in one of the posts linked off 13th_colony, wondering if the various models were numbered by (apparent) age... and whether therefore the Priest models are Ones or Twos.

And heh, well, the long hair worked for me. Though I think I do like her better with a ponytail. We'll have to see if she whacks off her long blonde mane once any interesting resistance fighting gets underway, and/or when her poor ailing moron of a husband bites it. ;)

[annathepiper]

Ah. :)

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[firni.livejournal.com]

I forget, did the naked model six blow up the nuke before or after they'd jumped into the cloud of cosmic goo around the planet?

[annathepiper]

I do remember the order to pitch them out the airlock, yeah. I really do wonder what happened to Helo!Sharon, though. I kind of hope they haven't kept her locked up in the brig all this time--I can't imagine that prolonged confinement, where she has nothing to do but stew over the loss of her baby, will result in anything but her getting progressively crazier. O.o

And yeah, I can totally buy Gaeta assisting Baltar.

And yeah, it'll be interesting to see how Tyrol!Sharon reacts to his hooking up with Callie, indeed.

[annathepiper]

Hee! I'm personally hoping she isn't, just because I think it would be kind of repetitive to have the Chief hooking up with two Cylons in a row, but on the other hand it WOULD be very funny. ;)

spazzkat mentioned part of your reasoning to me last night on why she may well be a Cylon, and I can buy it, though. So we'll see!

[annathepiper]

I don't dispute any of your interpretations for various character motivations--and certainly for some of the stronger characters like Roslin, they made absolute sense. I really did love seeing her teach the children. But in some of the other cases, I would really have liked to see a bit more fleshing out of what was going on. I'm willing to see if we get critical bits of such data early on next season, though.

And I too am hoping that this long break will give them plenty of time to get us a full coherent season three.

[annathepiper]

*grin* Eh well... I can bear the time if it means season three will be more solidly plotted than season two.

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[annathepiper]

After. solarbird confirms.

[smeehrrr.livejournal.com]

After this last episode, I think they punted the Callie-is-a-cylon thread. Which is disappointing, because I was SO right about that.

[backrubbear.livejournal.com]

Another comment was that they had gone beyond trying to emulate humans and needed to be better machines. So, dealing with humanity like a broken machine seems rather in line with that idea.

I think probably my funniest moment out of the whole thing was the comment by the priest in the previous episode, "Well, I haven't seen you at any of the meetings!"

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[wrog]

The spectrum of a bomb is random noise (blackbody radiation at some temperature, I suppose...)

And for "continuous hydrogen bomb" read "very, very big continuous hydrogen bomb" or really "a whole lot of hydrogen bombs continuously going off one after the other". The extra odd nuke in there would be indistinguishable from a really tiny solar flare, which is to say not enough activity beyond the usual to qualify as a solar flare in the first place.

Or if you like, imagine somebody clapping their hands once in the middle of an outdoor rock concert and trying to listen for it a mile away against the general roar of the audience. If the Cylons are able to notice that, they're seeing lots of other things as well.

Whereas a coherent radio signal with a few hundred thousand watts behind it can stand out like a sore thumb 100 light-years away...

... even if it takes 100 years to get there, which is the other big problem. Meaning unless this is all taking place within the Firefly System, you need some kind of Magic FTL Detection anyway, at which point they can make whatever rules they want.

[backrubbear.livejournal.com]

To some extent, I can see three things happening here.

The first one is that they needed an excuse to settle things down and move to a "occupation" versus a "pursuit" mode. Given the actions of the cylons, ostensibly to stop trying to be like humans and more like the "best machines they can be", this gives the writers the ability to spend more time comparing and contrasting the two cultures. IMO, the best SF happens when you're working through the implications of trying to live amongst the truly alien. Hopefully that's a thread that gets explored here.

A second thing would be yet another betrayal of the human race by Baltar. This is another homage to the original series where he betrayed humanity and yet ended up ruling them to some extent. This makes me wonder whether or not we shall see him in some sort of leadership role under the cylons.

The third thing is it potentially frees the remainder of the fleet for the opportunity to go to earth and potentially seek out Earth. Perhaps they'll return with help.

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[seattlesparks.livejournal.com]

I admit I was also assuming that the BSG-verse bombs were different than ours in some way, enough so that it could be picked up. I.e., 'nuclear bomb' doesn't necessarily mean 'hydrogen bomb,' so the elements involved could be different than those in a star in some way. Heck, for all we know, they have some different unique elements beyond ours.

Though I suppose it could even be just the debris field from Cloud 9 spreading out, and bits finally getting outside of the nebula for Cylons to find. Or that they knew all along where the humans were and just wanted to mess with Baltar's head. :)

[annathepiper]

I can totally buy the necessity of getting out of pursuit mode, that's for sure. There's only so far you can go with that without actually making it to Earth.

I would not be surprised if we get to see Baltar set up as some sort of puppet ruler, given Caprica!Six's presence now... and it'll be fun to see whether he gets progressively loopier and perhaps even finally throws in his lot with the Cylons for real.

I'm not sure I want to see the remainder of the Fleet scamper off to Earth and come back, though... I'd prefer Earth not come into matters at all until we're coming to the end of the series.

[annathepiper]

Yeah, I caught that "be the best machines we can be" thing too. And I LOVED the "I haven't seen you at any of the meetings" line. ^_^

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[annathepiper]

Getting back to this since I have a few moments to try to get caught up...

Thanks for the hand-clapping analogy; when you explain it like that, yeah, I can see how the whole thing is scientifically shaky. Meh.

I'm not sure if that detail bugs me all on its own, but it sort of links up with all of the other little details in the latter half of Season 2 that, taken as a collection, make me uncertain about the direction the show is taking.

Guess we'll see what happens in October.

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[annathepiper]

"They knew all along where the humans were" strikes me as the best damned explanation of the lot. I half-hope we'll find out that's the case, come October!

[annathepiper]

Yeah, I think Callie being Huge With Spud of Chief is a pretty good indicator of "not a Cylon". Not a dead certain one, but a pretty good one!

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[wrog]

the problem with all this is that space is really big. With solar systems spaced tens or hundreds of light-years apart, there's no reason for anyone to even be within a light-year of the place unless they were already going there.

And, by the way, particle emissions will be slower than light and debris will be way slower than light (assuming it even gets to escape velocity). If they're not noticing the light, the wait is much longer.

Granted, one could imagine the whole series taking place within a globular cluster (lots of stars real close together) -- which is what they should have done for Firefly, but I digress -- but then that means they're never going to find Earth.

And if the idea is that the nuke triggered some previously-placed detector, then why place a detector a light-year away when anything that's going to be happening will happen in the system where the planets are and where there should be plenty of asteroids and junk to hide stuff on? Rather like hiring somebody to spy on Seattle and putting him on a boat 100 miles out in the Pacific instead of renting an apartment in Fremont.

Never mind that if you've visited the system already, then you know about the cloud.

Anyway stuff like this is why I gave up a long time ago on having my SF be totally accurate.

Re: um, hello, they have FTL

[annathepiper]

Rather like hiring somebody to spy on Seattle and putting him on a boat 100 miles out in the Pacific instead of renting an apartment in Fremont.

Heh, yeah, I see your point. And it just reinforces my earlier impression, I think--that this by itself doesn't bug me necessarily, but when taken as a whole with the other little nitpicks I have with the second half of season 2...

Anyway. Scientific inaccuracy doesn't bother me to a certain degree, if nothing else because I acknowledge that my own scientific education is somewhat lacking and I wouldn't catch things like this unless someone spells them out to me like you have done here. But even before you did that, this was noticeable enough to me to put a hitch in the story and make me go "now wait, how did that work?" I figure if it's enough to throw me even briefly out of the story, it's a problem.