![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meddow1 miniseries, 1 movie and 73 episodes in five weeks. I am done. I have made it through the entirety of Battlestar Galactica.
Anyway, my thoughts on the finale are a well over week late…
I really liked it for the most part. Everyone deciding to live horrible short lives struggling to learn to farm and hunt was lame, but I can live with it. The open questions like what the hell Starbuck is, I don't mind.
I totally got teary at the end. Okay I was teary most of the way through it and pretty much balled at Roslin's death, inevitable as it was. I was actually surprised at how low the body count was. I was certain Athena and Helo wouldn't make it through, and for a while I feared for Lee.
One thing that really bugs me and that I haven't seen discussed much is that the Dying Leader didn't really learn the truth of the Opera House. First of all, what was the truth of the Opera House? I figure it was something a bit more than that the CIC is the Opera House, more that for humanity and cylons to have a future everyone had to be where they were in that sequence, and the choices that the characters made along the way that got them or others there – such as Baltar choosing to be selfless for once in his life, to Roslin forgiving Baltar rather than murdering him back in The Hub – combined with destiny and ensured that there was a future and that there was an earth. So the truth of the opera house was that there was something out there guiding them, putting things in place, but they had to earn their survival making the right choices along the way. And they did make the right choices.
I write that having recently watched The Hub in which there is a conversation between Roslin and Head!Elosha about chose to save Baltar rather than kill him.
Roslin: You lied to me.
Elosha: Did I?
Roslin: I thought I was earning humanity's right to survive
Elosha: It's not a celestial vending machine, Laura. You don't save a life and cue the celestial trumpets, 'here's the way to Earth'
Roslin: I know
Elosha: Disorienting, isn't it? All these little limping steps back.
I think that kind of sums it up. Their survival was made by tiny decisions.
Anyway, thing is, did Roslin learn that? We didn't get any follow up on her after that besides her death. It's just bugging me because most characters had their stories tied up – Starbuck completed her mission, Baltar became a better person etc – but it seemed that Roslin went to the grave still with regrets about leading people on the quest to Earth, which she shouldn't have had because in the end, she was right to do what she did. If you look at the grand sequence of events of this show, they'd never had made it to Earth 2 if they hadn't gone on the quest for Earth 1 and they'd not have Hera if they hadn't gone on the quest. For example, if Roslin hadn't sent Starbuck on a mission to Caprica to receive the arrow of Apollo back in season one, Helo and Athena would never have made it back to the fleet. There's a scene missing in which Roslin should have realised it.
Yeah, anyway. That's my major gripe.
Finally I'm torn between thinking it should have ended with the vista shot of Adama at Roslin's, which was just epic, and actually liking the coda despite of the religious stuff purely because it had robots dancing to Hendrix, which I loved.
I suppose now I just have to sit back and wait for Caprica. I was initially a bit sceptical about it because I'm not a fan of prequels and it's hard for me to like spin-offs. The whole 'set in the same universe but without all the characters you love' aspect really doesn't appeal. But then I found out Polly Walker's in it, as in Atia of the Julii, and I am so very there. (Strangely, BSG reminds me of Rome, and I can't quite put my finger on why).
Anyway, my thoughts on the finale are a well over week late…
I really liked it for the most part. Everyone deciding to live horrible short lives struggling to learn to farm and hunt was lame, but I can live with it. The open questions like what the hell Starbuck is, I don't mind.
I totally got teary at the end. Okay I was teary most of the way through it and pretty much balled at Roslin's death, inevitable as it was. I was actually surprised at how low the body count was. I was certain Athena and Helo wouldn't make it through, and for a while I feared for Lee.
One thing that really bugs me and that I haven't seen discussed much is that the Dying Leader didn't really learn the truth of the Opera House. First of all, what was the truth of the Opera House? I figure it was something a bit more than that the CIC is the Opera House, more that for humanity and cylons to have a future everyone had to be where they were in that sequence, and the choices that the characters made along the way that got them or others there – such as Baltar choosing to be selfless for once in his life, to Roslin forgiving Baltar rather than murdering him back in The Hub – combined with destiny and ensured that there was a future and that there was an earth. So the truth of the opera house was that there was something out there guiding them, putting things in place, but they had to earn their survival making the right choices along the way. And they did make the right choices.
I write that having recently watched The Hub in which there is a conversation between Roslin and Head!Elosha about chose to save Baltar rather than kill him.
Roslin: You lied to me.
Elosha: Did I?
Roslin: I thought I was earning humanity's right to survive
Elosha: It's not a celestial vending machine, Laura. You don't save a life and cue the celestial trumpets, 'here's the way to Earth'
Roslin: I know
Elosha: Disorienting, isn't it? All these little limping steps back.
I think that kind of sums it up. Their survival was made by tiny decisions.
Anyway, thing is, did Roslin learn that? We didn't get any follow up on her after that besides her death. It's just bugging me because most characters had their stories tied up – Starbuck completed her mission, Baltar became a better person etc – but it seemed that Roslin went to the grave still with regrets about leading people on the quest to Earth, which she shouldn't have had because in the end, she was right to do what she did. If you look at the grand sequence of events of this show, they'd never had made it to Earth 2 if they hadn't gone on the quest for Earth 1 and they'd not have Hera if they hadn't gone on the quest. For example, if Roslin hadn't sent Starbuck on a mission to Caprica to receive the arrow of Apollo back in season one, Helo and Athena would never have made it back to the fleet. There's a scene missing in which Roslin should have realised it.
Yeah, anyway. That's my major gripe.
Finally I'm torn between thinking it should have ended with the vista shot of Adama at Roslin's, which was just epic, and actually liking the coda despite of the religious stuff purely because it had robots dancing to Hendrix, which I loved.
I suppose now I just have to sit back and wait for Caprica. I was initially a bit sceptical about it because I'm not a fan of prequels and it's hard for me to like spin-offs. The whole 'set in the same universe but without all the characters you love' aspect really doesn't appeal. But then I found out Polly Walker's in it, as in Atia of the Julii, and I am so very there. (Strangely, BSG reminds me of Rome, and I can't quite put my finger on why).
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-04-02 09:21 pm (UTC)I was also skeptical about Caprica when it was announced, but I love BSG enough that I'll definitely be giving it a chance.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-02 10:19 pm (UTC)I've been reading some reviews of the Caprica pilot, and it sounds good. So long as it doesn't turn into 'Bill Adama - the whiny brat teenage years' (because particularly after the Star Wars prequels, I really don't need to see that) I think it could be quite good.
Actually, I'll probably end up watching even if it's crap just in case other characters from BSG and/or their parents show up.