Today was devoted to man's inhumanity to man...or aliens...or Cylons. This afternoon, I finally managed to get to the theatre to see District 9. Then, a couple of hours later, I sat down to complete my Battlestar Galactica Season 4.5 rewatch with the extended cut of 'Daybreak'.

Before I discuss the film, I wanted to mention a few of the trailers I saw. Zombieland looks like it could be a fun film. After a rash of slasher flicks and torture porn, it was refreshing to see a film poke fun at the genre and seeming to do so in a smart way. And it took a moment to recognize Abigail Breslin. She's growing up on screen fast! Legion has an intriguing cast, but I also know from experience that doesn't mean it's a good film. And I have to admit, seeing the Avatar trailer on a big screen and in HD does make a difference. I still wasn't blown away. Nor am I eagerly awaiting the film's release. The problem still remains, whereas District 9 did an amazing job of putting CGI creations in our world seamlessly, with Avatar I feel very aware I am watching a world created on computers.

( District 9 (Spoilers Within) )

'Daybreak' I had not watched since March. I worried that my largely positive feelings about the finale may not still be there. I worried I hadn't watched with a critical enough eye the first time around. I worried all the negative reviews and posts I had read would alter my opinion. I worried I would love the show just a little bit less. It turns out I worried for nothing. I liked it more.

Maybe it's that time has passed and absence makes the heart grow fonder. Or maybe I like being contrary. ;) In truth, I think reading all the backlash helped me to focus more on the finale and Season 4.5 as a whole. Not to look to contradict those who didn't like it because, yes, there are legitimate criticisms to be made, but to find answers to lingering questions I had. None of this is to say there aren't flaws. I can watch the finale a hundred time and the damn pigeon will never make sense. And I may have fast forwarded through some of Adama's scenes. But in the end, I asked myself how it could have ended differently and.....I've got nothing.

I have more in-depth thoughts to share. It's a matter of taking pages of notes and dividing them up into easy to digest posts rather than, "OMG, when is this going to end?!" Right now I'm thinking there will be a general thoughts about the finale post, a Kara post (yes, you read that right), and a 'Why Lee Adama is AWESOME and He Was Happy, Dammit!" post.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, movie_recaps
Current Mood: accomplished

Yes, once again, it's been awhile since I've posted to LJ. Well, my LJ. I have been posting to bamber_news. And there is Twitter. And email. So, I have not been non-communicative. Basically, work frustration + some family drama has meant by the time I get home and start to relax I really don't have the energy to or feel at all motivated to post. But, I have some links I've wanted a share and my Battlestar Galactica love is renewed. It never left, but I've spoken of my frustrations with fandom and the break I took was a really good thing. Having new footage to enjoy also helps. The 4.5 deleted scenes for those that haven't seen them yet. And beccatoria recapped what was cut as well. Because she did such an awesome job, I'm not doing my own recapping this time.

For the first time, I did not watch the deleted scenes and feel extremely disappointed that something wasn't included in the aired version of an episode. The majority of the cuts were minor as compared to entire scenes or subplots that have been eliminated in prior seasons. With a few exceptions, what was cut would not have added anything or changed anything we saw on screen. Many of the deleted scenes were merely longer versions of what we saw, with a few lines trimmed, likely for time.

There are a few scenes I'd like to comment on. ( Cut for potential spoilers. )

There's also an edited flashback scene between Lee and Kara in 'Daybreak' that I want to talk about, but I'm saving that for some Lee meta I'm working on. :)

Links!

For another spin on Battlestar, How Neanderthals Met a Grisly Fate: Devoured by Humans. I couldn't resist!

NBC Universal has sealed a new licensing deal with Hallmark Cards that includes the use of the company's film and TV content. If you are thinking you'll be receiving Lee Adama birthday cards from me in the future, you're right.

Have you heard about Bing? No, not Crosby, Microsoft's latest attempt to take on Google. I'm not a fan of the main page. Why do they think I want to see pictures taken in Europe? And I find the main/news search results not as good as Google. However, I will give it the edge in image searches. They put all results on one page that you can scroll rather through and zoom in.

BBC America in HD! Comcast doesn't have it listed as coming up on the new channel lineup they just mailed out. Bastards.

Hulu is set for September launch in the UK. ITV will be a content partner. I'm hoping that agreement will eventually extend to the U.S. and we'll get Law & Order: UK.

Via johnaugust.com, Writer's Guild Event with 'Trek' writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. Some interesting background on what did end up in Star Trek and why Nero's story ended up on the editing room floor.

Now back to my Twitter conversation/mocking of the Tony Award nominees wwith writteninstars and dragonfly0303.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg
Current Mood: amused

Life seems to be rather boring at the moment, so I shall just share some links of possible interest.

Battlestar Galactica

bsg_bigbang is hosting a BSG Big Bang Challenge. I had never heard of such a challenge before, but it sounds intriguing:

The objective: write a piece of fiction that is at least twenty thousand words, set in the Battlestar Galactica universe. It can be any kind of plot, any (or no) pairing. Gen, het, slash, it doesn't matter. Once your piece of fiction is complete, you'll be matched with an artist or vidder who will take your story and produce art for it. The end result is what many people are looking for: longer fan fiction stories set in the BSG universe!

Signups begin tomorrow. I can't commit to writing a fic, but being an artist or cheerleader is a wee bit tempting.

A brave and ambitious soul has decided to right some of the wrongs of Season 4.5 and has created Battlestar Redactica, fan edited alternatives to the mutiny arc and the final episodes of the series, up to but not including the finale. I've watched some of it and it's intriguing and very ell done. And I will always support less of Bill Adama and his emo. ;) Before watching, you may want to check out comments regarding some streaming issues.

Star Trek

Cinematical discusses how the film fails the Bechdel test. (You may like this, no_detective. ;)

And the Huffington Post laments Trek's gender problem along with a mention of BSG.

I have to admit, the lack of female characters, in general, didn't bother me as much as it perhaps should have. Since it's a prequel/reboot and Star Trek was such a male dominated series, I cut the film some slack. Yes, Uhura was, at times, shown to be a sex object, but that was from Kirk's POV and he's strongly depicted as a stubborn, cocky, arrogant, womanizing ass. Or is that just my take on him? ;)

Also mitigating the lack of strong female characters, for me, is the lack of strong male characters. When the men succeed if the film, it's the result of luck, often dumb luck, rather than intellect.

ETA. ComicMix has a really long breakdown of how the new 'Star Trek' reflects previously established continuity. The article helped clarify a few things for me.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg, star trek
Current Mood: chilly

Quick post to let everyone know that the excusemyfrench site has their interview with Mary McDonnell up here. Part 1, in which she talks about Laura's character arc, was of the most interest to me. Part 2 is largely a discussion of the United Nations. And I think she misunderstood the question in Part 3, but she still provides an interesting answer!

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg
Current Mood: blah

Some of you may be aware that, this past weekend, Jamie Bamber, James Callis, and Mary McDonnell were in Paris to appear at a panel and accept an award for Battlestar Galactica at the Jules Verne Festival. Jamie, fluent in French, spoke in the language at the panel discussion and most of the interviews he participated in. But, lucky for people such as I who only speak English, hobbitofkobol at 3xcusemyfrench has posted the video of their interview with Jamie here at their site as well as here at Daily Motion and has provided subtitles for the French portion of the interview (before he grew tired of struggling with the words and caved in and did the rest of the interview in English ;).

I'm extremely grateful for the translation because the first question is a variation on one I left on their post over at battlestar_blog when they were asking for suggestions for questions. His answers to the all the questions helped reinforce my more positive feelings about the finale. But if you hated the finale, his thoughts may make you feel a bit better about it. (Oh, he also addresses the "damn pigeon". ;)

Here is a collection of videos from the panel discussion on Sunday. Mary and James answer the questions in English and I particularly enjoyed hearing their thoughts on their character arcs. James won't cut Baltar any slack. ;)

Edward James Olmos and Kandyce McClure appeared at a convention this past weekend. locker_monster posted a recap of their panel here. I'm pointing out this post because one comment in particular by Eddie that intrigued me - there were some scenes left to shoot between Adama and Tigh and he was never called in to do them. I haven't listened to the podcast for Daybreak yet, has there been any mention anywhere why we didn't get some closing scenes between Adama and Tigh? I thought perhaps we'd see some in the extended cut, but I guess not.

Pilot School is a great collection of pilot scripts for a lot of TV series. Included in the list is the script for the BSG mini series. It's a great resource for writers as well as fans of television.

And non-BSG related and a bit of old news, I stumbled across this article about the Amazon debacle/glitch from several weeks ago. I didn't realize they were blaming some woman in France for what happened. The article also nicely sums up the problems in Amazon's use of algorithms in sales ranking.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg
Current Mood: tired

Battlestar Galactica: The Plan - New Footage Seen.

As the cut states, IGN also recapped a trailer shown for The Plan. If you want to remain spoiler free for that, it's easy to skip that section of the recap, just scroll past until you hit the picture of Ron. Everything after the photo of Ron deals with the series. There are some interesting revelations, particularly about Head Six, the various other incarnations of Six and how Laura's arc changed (some) in the back half of the season. Oh, and Adama's an ass. ;p

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg
Current Mood: hungry

Last night was BSG/Caprica night at the Paley Festival. Either Caprica wasn't discussed much or the people who were there covering the panel are choosing to focus on BSG. For those not caught up on the series, beware of spoilers in the reporting.

The Futon Critic has partial recap of the panel with more to come later today. Ron made at least one comment that might upset some. I'll let you find it.

The Paley folks themselves tweeted the event. So you won't have to scroll through the tweets, I copied and pasted them ( under the cut. )

Details of the 'Battlestar' bonus material on the complete series DVD set. It sounds (and looks) like a repackaging of the DVD sets already released with a few additional featurettes. I'll pass (unless I upgrade to HD).

I enjoyed this week's episode of Castle more than last weeks. But two things irked me. One, ABC inexplicably airing the episodes out of order. Rick is describing his ex wife to Kate who Kate met last week. It makes no sense! And, two, the makeup, hair, and costume people's inability to make Stana Kanic to look good. Week in and week out she has the bizarre eye makeup and everytime they try to glam her up she ends up with fugly hair and unflattering dresses. The dress last night was pretty, but did nothing for her. I still adore the Rick/Alexis relationship. :)

Do you you love Oceans 11 and The Muppets? Than this vid is for you!

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg, castle
Current Mood: working

I had hoped to get back to a more frequent posting routine. That doesn't seem to be going well at the moment. Honestly, I don't have a lot to say about TV this week. I still haven't watched Law & Order: UK. But the April 6th episode will be the end of series 1 which means no new Jamie for awhile and no need for me to rush to catch up. While thirteen episodes have been filmed, ITV seem to be following in the tradition of U.S. cable outlets and splitting the series/season.

Brief (Really!) thoughts on a few other shows:

( ER: And in the end... )

( Chuck: The One with Tricia Helfer )

( Castle: Hell Hath No Fury )

( Life on Mars )

The Mentalist was just too cracktastic to even discuss this week.

Season 2 of 'Pushing Daisies' comes to DVD July 21st. And the final three episodes will air in the UK before the DVD's are even released here.

Anyone interested in rewatching Farscape? Then join farscaperewatch! The rewatching commences this Sunday, April 5th.

There has been a lot of debate and discussion about the Battlestar Galactica finale. I was feeling a little overwhelmed by it all so I've been limiting myself to a couple of posts each day. One of the major topics of discussion at the moment is the role of women on BSG and the fates of those women. I had a bunch of links saved to share, but siljamus has kindly collected them in her post here. Whether you agree with the posts or not, it's some thought provoking reading. Just as with the finale, I find myself somewhere in the middle of the debates.

I still need to listen to the final two podcasts, but I'm torn. Part of me wants to jump ahead to 'Daybreak', the other part of me, the more orderly part, feels I should listen in order which means 'Islanded in a Stream of Stars' comes next. So, I'm going to leave it to you all to decide.

Poll #1377215 Podcast Poll
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 9

Which Podcast Do I Listen to Next?

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, castle, chuck, tv_musings
Current Mood: sleepy

It's been a week since my last post. Miss me? ;) I took a few days of LJ down time after BSG finale weekend. The sheer volume of discussion became draining. Though whether you loved or hated it, I find the discussion it's created fascinating. I still have few discussions bookmarked to catch up on. I'll probably do another post myself down the road after rewatching 'Daybreak' and, hopefully, after I'm able to make all the thoughts swimming in my head coherent to me. I have several contradicting feelings right now. I also have podcasts to listen to and a fic to begin.

I feel I need to mention the fic to motivate myself (or have you all motivate me) to start typing up the damn thing. beccatoria has been my sounding board the last couple weeks. This is an idea I've had since 'Crossroads' (yes, that long). I was beating myself up for procrastinating on starting it, but now I believe the long wait has worked to my advantage. I've gone from fretting how I would deal with certain aspects of the story, and not knowing how or where to end it, to conceiving it as a revisionist version of Season 4. But it's also a little scary to go from what I conceived as just a Lee/Laura fic to something a little more gen.

I've also caught up on quite the backlog of TV this week.

( Law & Order: UK - Unsafe and Buried )

( Castle: Hedge Fund Homeboys )

( Dollhouse: The One That Was Supposed to be Awesome )

( TSCC: Today is the Day/The Last Voyage of the Jimmy Carter/To the Lighthouse )

( Life: 5 Quarts )

I decided to give Kings another shot last Sunday after being lukewarm on the pilot. I did find myself enjoying it more, but it struck me one problem I'm having with the series is the actor who plays David. He's not terrible, but I don't find him particularly interesting and considering he's pivotal to the story that's an issue.

A couple of links:

Several days ago, Ron Moore responded to some questions posed by the fans at the SciFi Forum. I hear the thread has gotten rather long now, but I believe the pertinent stuff is only on the first three or four pages. If you are still rageful about the finale, you may not wish to read his thoughts. Even I found some of his answers frustrating. But apparently my interpretation of Lee's scenes was pretty dead on. ;)

And Jamie appeared on Sky 1's Soccer Am yesterday morning. He didn't talk about the finale and, oddly, the show played a clip from 'The Captain's Hand', but between the 4 and 5 minute mark he does take some shots at Dirk Benedict which I'm sure some of you will enjoy seeing. :) The direct link is HERE.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, castle, jamie, l&o uk, life, tscc
Current Mood: accomplished

This is basically a brain dump of things that occurred to me after my first post or thoughts inspired by other people. This morning, I stumbled upon a link, via Twitter, to a post by avadriel, sharing her thoughts about the finale. She had a mixed reaction, but I really liked how she summed up her feelings:

The 'Battlestar Galactica' finale was not what I was hoping. But BSG as a whole? Everything a show ought to be.

What I was actually hoping for, I got, I do feel the show failed to deliver on some points. Or didn’t deliver enough. But it still remains my One True Show.

( Daybreak, Part 2: More Thoughts. )

Links!

Mo Ryan has her post episode interview with Ron Moore plus a transcript from the March 16th finale screening.

Mo shared some news about extended cuts on the DVD release:

Three episodes from Season 4.5 will have longer cuts on DVD (and Moore doesn't know when the DVD will be coming out, by the way):

• The DVD version of "A Disquiet Follows My Soul" will be about 10 minutes longer.
• The DVD version of "Islanded in a Stream of Stars" will be about 15-20 minutes longer.
• The DVD version of "Daybreak," the series finale, will be about 15-20 minutes longer.

Hmm, wasn’t the mess that is ‘Deadlock’ supposed to have an extended edition as well? And did anyone else catch in ‘The Last Frakking Special’ a glimpse of a scene that was cut between Kara and Adama that I really wanted to see in the episode? It better be included in the additional footage.

TV Guide also conducts a Q&A with Ron.

SciFi has posted a whole lot of David Eick video blogs dealing with the finale. I haven’t watched them all, but the one I’m linking to is my favorite thus far. ( Let me tell you why… )

And I hope all of this makes sense. My eyes are getting blurry at this point. :p

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: accomplished

I spent most of yesterday working on a really long follow up post on the Battlestar Galactica finale. I put it aside last night and decided to take a fresh look at it today. Before I did that, I decided to do a little searching on Wikipedia because of some new thoughts I had.

Whether you loved the finale or loathed the finale or fall somewhere in between (that would be me), I think we can all agree the one scene between Lee and Kara made NO SENSE and Ron Moore is full of crap. As I clicked on various BSG related links on Wikipedia, I think I managed to figure out certain aspects of the finale. We know all along that the original series has influenced the reimagining, going beyond names and ships and robots. I haven't watched the original BSG in years, but one episode always stuck with me, 'War of the Gods, Part 2', and the Ship of Lights it introduced. Call me crazy, but I think that episode as well as a storyline from (GASP!) Galactica 1980 played a major role in the finale.

( Cut for Spoilers )

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: surprised

I’ll have more to say after a rewatch or two, but I wanted to get a few thoughts down now. I know reaction will be mixed, but, overall, I was happy with how it ended.

( Daybreak Part 2 )

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: pleased

I had envisioned this day as a 'Get Things Done Around the Apartment Day as BSG Plays in the Background Day'. Instead, I've paid more attention to BSG then intended, spent the day reading a lot of wonderful posts, and having an unexpected email conversation with beccatoria. When I finished responding to her last email, I clicked on my Flist and saw Ron Moore, too, had posted about today and, like many of us, wishing it was not coming. My favorite part:

There will be reunions and retrospectives, special editions and extended cuts, interviews and seminars. Solace can be found.

Seminars? Sign me up! :)

So, today ended up not being what I intended, but as I dozed during 'Deadlock' (because if you are going to nap that's the episode in which to do it) I realized this day won't happen again and I still have enough clean clothes to get me through the weekend.

ONLY TWO MORE HOURS TO GO!

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg
Current Mood: hungry

I'm at home watching the Battlestar Galactica marathon, waiting for the final episode of my favorite series ever to air. For the record, I didn't just take the day off to watch Battlestar (and hopefully get my laundry done), I have five vacation days to use before April 14th. I've been reading people's posts about what Battlestar means to them, why they love certain characters, and what their favorite episodes are. My plan is to do a post in the near future as I love this show and why it rises above all others I have watched and loved. But, I feel I should say something before the finale airs to commemorate the occasion.

( Cut for long personal ramblings and how they tie to 'Battlestar Galactica'. )

ETA: First BSG post made on the tiny computer. :)

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, bsg
Current Mood: content

I don't see the episode running long reflected on SciFi's schedule, but, according to this article on the Huffington Post it does. The TV Guide schedule seems to concur.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: tired

So, I just saw this SPOILER for Friday's supposedly awesome episode of Dollhouse and...it looks like I have to watch. Grrrrrr. Though, I won't be watching until the weekend because there's a sort of big finale airing opposite it. ;p

The LA Times has short interview with Michael Hogan and Kate Vernon who I did not think I could love more. (No spoilers beyond what has aired.)

Michael: "There seems to be this hidden supply of booze and cigarettes aboard Battlestar Galactica. We're totally out of food, we're on the run, but still we have booze."

And Kate's response to SciFi Channel changing its name to SyFy in hopes of appealing to a less geeky demographic: she scoffed. "It never even occurred to me that we were shooting a science-fiction show," she said. "Never. It's always been just good drama."

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, dollhouse
Current Mood: amused

The podcast for 'Islanded in a Stream of Stars' is up, but I'm putting off listening to it and any others until after the finale. beccatoria just gave me the heads up that it contains a spoiler for the finale. Or, more precisely, it spoils something that won't be in the finale. So, expect snarky recaps starting next week. :)

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: anxious

For the three people who don't know, Katee Sackhoff, at a post episode Q&A Friday night, spoiled the finale. I don't know what she was thinking. My Friends list has been pretty darn good about keeping whatever she said to themselves and those interested in discussing the spoilage. I'm trying my damnedest to stay unspoiled until Friday. Though, I will admit I do know one thing about the finale, but that was something I found out last summer.

Speaking of BSG, Entertainment Weekly posted a history of Battlestar from the original series, through Bryan Singer's reimagining, to Ron Moore's. Geektyrant.com reposted EW's article so you don't have to click through a dozen screens to read it all.

So, I think most of you are aware of my fascination with Narcho. Well, his portrayer, Sebastian Spence, has been working on a half hour comedy, Sophie, the past couple years up in Canada. ABC Family has bought the U.S. rights and it will air next Monday, March 23rd, at 9:30pm est. If it's any good it will give me something to watch while I'm waiting to acquire that show featuring that actor I kind of like. ;)

'Castle' already has a DVD release date, September 22nd. Well, at least ABC waited to announce the news until after the premiere. :p

You know, just when I think my opinion of George Lucas can't get any lower, I discover it can. How George Lucas Almost Made Indiana Jones a Sex Offender. If you think the title of the article is misleading, it's not. A transcript of a conference between George, Steven Spielberg, and Lawrence Kasdan is available for download and Cinematical felt compelled to bring one part of their hashing out of ideas to light. I'm at a loss as to what the hell runs through this mans mind.

I watched Kings this evening. It's an ambitious project, perhaps too ambitious. I felt I was watching four different stories at once. Is it a parable? A commentary on modern America? A political thriller? A Shakespearean tragedy? The actors were good. Eammon Walker, who I really liked on Oz, was a standout for me. Ian McShane could take it down a notch. But, for the most part, the characters left me cold. And, ( spoiler ) It's certainly not a bad show, but I don't see myself caring about it.

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5, tv_musings
Current Mood: awake

Let’s cut to the chase as the episode did.

( Daybreak Part 1 )

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: thankful

Thanks to Mo Ryan at The Tribune for the heads up. The TV Guide hitting newstands Thursday looks to be pretty much all about the end of 'Battlestar Galactica'. There will be two covers - one featuring Eddie and Mary and the other featuring James, Tricia, and Katee.

Mo's included some quotes from cast that appear in the article(s) in her write up. I'm not sure if what Jamie said constitutes a spoiler or not. Hmmmm....

Tags: battlestar galactica s4.5
Current Mood: anxious