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« Needing More than Sammy | Main | Our 'Friends' in Government » December 11, 2003Battlestar NeuroticaAs a youth, I was a huge fan of the original Battlestar Galactica TV show. We watched the film when they released it in theaters, we eagerly awaited the airing of each new episode on ABC, and we even watched the godawful "Galactica 1980" run. So there was no question I'd be tuned in for the SciFi channel's release of their own version of Battlestar Galactica, even knowing going in that the series creator, Ronald Moore, clearly didn't think very highly of the original series or its fans. Warning: the extended entry contains spoilers about the miniseries. Sadly, my fears were confirmed in short order. Moore says he wanted to tell stories about human beings instead of caricatures, but what he's created is a cast of lunatics, none of whom interesting enough to pull me into the story. Moore seems to think that a collection of personality quirks is more interesting and 'complicated' than good characterization. And the story suffers as a result. Every character is saddled with a host of issues that makes the viewer wonder if the fleet will simply bog down when they realize the survivors don't have enough psychologists left to treat them all. It is my opinion that good fiction is character-based; the characters on the original Galactica made me want to know what happened to them, even when some of the Galactica plots were silly or even bad. Yes, some of the characters were exemplars; Apollo's goodness and Adama's near-infallibility were hallmarks of the show. But even they had their moments of weakness, and credit is due the actors for still making them fun to watch. Worse yet, the new Galactica builds on a series of boring old saws. The Cylons are no longer an alien race bent on exterminating humanity because humanity came to the aid of other races the Cylons invaded many centuries before. Now they were built by humans, but they have rebelled and are now bent on exterminating humanity because all artificial intelligence created by humans will inevitably turn on their creators. (Leon Kass doubtless would agree.) And what would a Hollywood series about a military organization be without conflict between the civilian government and military leaders? In the original, while the military often disagreed with the civilians, they almost never went so far as to actually disobey their orders (and Adama even went so far as to chide his officers when they complained about the civilian leadership at one point, noting that it was their duty to submit to civilian leadership). In the new version, Adama basically tells the civilian leadership to get bent when she disagrees with what he wants to do, and even after he has agreed they should do what she advocates, he makes it clear that he is still in charge. And, naturally, like all Hollywood productions, the creators obviously have no idea how life in the military really is, resulting in a crew that can't decide whether they're hypermilitary robots or civilians wearing the same clothes. And, finally, in the new version Adama once again proposes the fleet seek out Earth as a new home. But this time, he knows that Earth doesn't exist and is simply using the legend to keep up the spirits of the troops, because it's better to have people chasing a lie than to tell them the truth. What a depressing view of life. Battlestar Galactica was no Babylon 5. But it was a fun show that deserved better than to be remade so poorly. Ronald Moore clearly had little interest in telling the Battlestar Galactica story again; he just wanted to tell his own story, but couldn't get anyone to produce it. So he piggybacked on Galactica, resulting in a product that should have been left on the cutting room floor in its entirety. Posted at December 11, 2003 04:47 PM
Trackback PingsTrackBack URL for this entry: CommentsCable tv not presently being in my budget, I can't see the new BG (hey, loan me a tape when our Will Happen Sometime get-together takes place, if you like, if you made one). I'd certainly have watched it, including because I have more respect for Moore than for any other script-writer to come out of modern Star Trek. But while I watched every episode of the original BG, plus the sequel, several times in fact, that's just because I'm very very sad. Let's say that I don't share your positive view of the show. There were some useful elements in the original concept, and an occasional adequate execution of a bit. Certainly Dirk Benedict was a spritely presence. But the acting defined wooden, save for the cliches of John Colicos. The writing was horrible. The ideas idiotic. The motivations one-dimensional. The plots consisted of ripping off other movies and cliches. The Cylons were stolen from E. C. Tubb's Dumarest series, in which the lone survivor of Earth was chased by the cybernetic folk known as "the Cyclan." (Major change there, eh? But, heck, he only wrote science fiction for books, so no one in Hollywood or viewerdom will notice the theft, and thus it was.) The space battles were physics-defying episodes consisting of "zap! zap!" The science consisted of astrology. The whole thing was simply an attempt to make money after Star Wars suggested there's Big Money In "Sci-Fi." I would have liked to have liked BG, but wanting wasn't enough. Sorry. I have no idea what I'd think of Moore's remake, but it doesn't have to go far to go up. Posted by: Gary Farber at December 11, 2003 08:04 PM I forgot to make clear that in Tubb's series, published by DAW, the last survivor of Earth was on a lone crusade to find the mysterious lost planet of Earth. Posted by: Gary Farber at December 11, 2003 08:05 PM To each his own, Gary. Regardless of the merits of the original series, this remake was absolutely terrible for my money. Your mileage may vary. Posted by: Andrew at December 11, 2003 08:08 PM Still have to give credit to SciFi Channel for making it. There is a place for 'B' movies/series. It's a dirty job and *SOME*one has to do it. I'd like to see them take on Haldeman's Forever War, or Gerrold's War Against the Chtorr. Wife watched BG while I played an old game 'X-Com'. Posted by: JSAllison at December 12, 2003 02:34 PM You've got a good point, JS, and I'll confess that I was very happy to hear that there was going to be a new version. But that only meant I had farther to fall when I realized just how thorougly they'd blown it. Of course, I've got no one to blame for that but myself. Posted by: Andrew at December 12, 2003 03:22 PM I'm still hoping that someday there will be a movie of Heinlein's Starship Troopers. :-) (A 4 or 6 hour mini-series with sufficient budget would be best.) Posted by: Gary Farber at December 13, 2003 05:25 PM No argument here, Gary. That would be absolutely fantastic, but I'm not holding my breath. Posted by: Andrew at December 13, 2003 05:33 PM |
