BSG Season Finale - The Spoiler Talk
(Reminder, this was all originally written as an email to Weezie. It's basically a response to Weezie's second comment - about expecting one of the character changes. I also edited a character name misspelling that I didn't catch in my original email)
So I'm guessing you're talking about Callie hooking up with Chief Tyrol as the change you'd been waiting for? I was fine with that, was expecting it to happen for a while as well. Ever since Tyrol hashed things out with Helo it's been time for Callie to make a move.
Now, it would have been MUCH more interesting to see Tyrol decide whether take a chance on Callie under military hierarchy - after he got busted for messing with a superior officer he would switch gears to a direct report. So in that sense I'm a little disappointed at a missed opportunity, but no big deal.
So as for changes I thought were unsupported the absolute biggest one is Starbuck becoming some sort of Russian tent-wife character. It's out of character for her to muster out and become a civilian, it's out of character for her to just tool around the surface, seeming idle except for trying to take care of her man. Ugh. There was some sort of implied fight between her and Apollo, so perhaps they will later explain that, but I generally won't buy it. She wouldn't have gone groundside until forced to, and even if she pissed Lee off, she should be stationed on Galactica.
Having her lead the resistance will be interesting - but they could have gotten the exact same thing by having her visiting the surface on leave, and not had any dissonance on her character.
I don't think it's in character for Tyrol to be a union organizer. I don't have a major issue with him being on-planet although I'd contend he should be part of Adama's skeleton staff. He's already escaped punishment once because he was too critical to replace, why wasn't that true now? But perhaps Callie's pregnancy forced him dirtside . . . I'd give them benefit of the doubt on this if he was my worst objection.
Much of the same is true of Gaeta turning civilian and working for Baltar (he's what - some sort of Chief of Staff now?) He had seemed to be disillusioned with Baltar over recent episodes, and seemed fiercely loyal to Adama. OTOH, he had expressed some dislike of being in the military, so maybe he'd take the out.
I think it's impossible that Baltar wouldn't have taken a more substantial revenge on Rosslyn.
In general I think they had built a FASCINATING crisis point up with the Rosslyn rigging the election and being caught by Gaeta & Adama. Rosslyn was in the wrong, but at the same time knew the survival of the Fleet was at stake. Dualla and Tigh were both guilty of complicity and betraying everything they fight for - it was a very charged complex situation. Which they then threw away to jump ahead a year. Dualla seemed to escape any sort of censure. That post I linked to described Season 2 BSG as "a show that constantly walks right up to the line, looks at it, looks at the viewer, and backs away again." I think the election is exactly that. They walked up to the line, looked at it, and backed away from addressing what happened in any meaningful way. Exactly the same way they backed away from the line after setting Cain and Adama at each other's throats.
Even if they go back and revisit the aftermath next season it won't be as powerful. I like the resistance idea somewhat (although it seems a lot like a rehash of the Caprica storyline), but I think they rushed through a powerful and unique plot to set up boilerplate Sci-Fi plot trope #38 - human resistance versus alien occupation. Hang on, I think Tom Cruise and the Scientologist are on line one with that story. Oh, and don't forget it's fused with pulp boilerplate #15 - Mars Needs Women!
What. The. Frack.
Battlestar Galactica cannot be trusted, it seems, to actually push the envelope. I was very disappointed by 2.11 and 2.12 (the Resurrection ship episodes); I thought it would push the show into an interesting moral place if the "good guys" actually did "bad" things in pursuit of their goals. The speech about "deserving" to survive from Adama, despite a stellar (as usual) performance by Olmos, rang very hollow. BSG has become, to me, a show that constantly walks right up to the line, looks at it, looks at the viewer, and backs away again.
alg: Hi, interwebs. The problem with my laptop
I've been fighting this analysis for most of season 2, but I give up. I just watched the season finale of Battlestar Galactica, and it was terrible. Awful. Like "Let's take everything that makes this character who she is and ball it up and throw it away." bad.
I've been unhappy with several episodes in the second season (especially the "second half" of the second season - and what was that about anyway?) - I think they've begun to focus on syndication and making each episode a single capsule that stands on its own - which is very different from season one where each episode was a beat in an overall dramatic arc. But I still thought it was the best TV running right now. I don't have much confidence in season 3 right now. They can redeem it, but that was just . . . bad. I can't explain what I didn't like without getting into spoilers, but as you watch the finale just ask yourself - is that the same Kara Thrace we've seen for two seasons now? I don't think it is, I don't think the whole episode holds true to the rest of the series.
Very disappointed.
technorati tags: Battlestar_Galactica, TV
Battlestar Galactica cannot be trusted, it seems, to actually push the envelope. I was very disappointed by 2.11 and 2.12 (the Resurrection ship episodes); I thought it would push the show into an interesting moral place if the "good guys" actually did "bad" things in pursuit of their goals. The speech about "deserving" to survive from Adama, despite a stellar (as usual) performance by Olmos, rang very hollow. BSG has become, to me, a show that constantly walks right up to the line, looks at it, looks at the viewer, and backs away again.
alg: Hi, interwebs. The problem with my laptop
I've been fighting this analysis for most of season 2, but I give up. I just watched the season finale of Battlestar Galactica, and it was terrible. Awful. Like "Let's take everything that makes this character who she is and ball it up and throw it away." bad.
I've been unhappy with several episodes in the second season (especially the "second half" of the second season - and what was that about anyway?) - I think they've begun to focus on syndication and making each episode a single capsule that stands on its own - which is very different from season one where each episode was a beat in an overall dramatic arc. But I still thought it was the best TV running right now. I don't have much confidence in season 3 right now. They can redeem it, but that was just . . . bad. I can't explain what I didn't like without getting into spoilers, but as you watch the finale just ask yourself - is that the same Kara Thrace we've seen for two seasons now? I don't think it is, I don't think the whole episode holds true to the rest of the series.
Very disappointed.
technorati tags: Battlestar_Galactica, TV
Snap To It!
Magic's October 2006 large set, code-named "Snap", is called Time Spiral.
Hurrah! For those keeping score, this is not my novel. Time Spiral is the first novel in the block trilogy (codenamed Snap). My novel is the second in the trilogy, and the name has not been announced, thus I will continue to call it Crackle when I'm out with my homies keeping it real, yo.
But this is the beginning of the block, so anybody who plans on reading my novel will want to pick up the corresponding book for Time Spiral. I give it a hearty recommendation anyway, it's a good read!
technorati tags: Magic:TheGathering
Magic's October 2006 large set, code-named "Snap", is called Time Spiral.
Hurrah! For those keeping score, this is not my novel. Time Spiral is the first novel in the block trilogy (codenamed Snap). My novel is the second in the trilogy, and the name has not been announced, thus I will continue to call it Crackle when I'm out with my homies keeping it real, yo.
But this is the beginning of the block, so anybody who plans on reading my novel will want to pick up the corresponding book for Time Spiral. I give it a hearty recommendation anyway, it's a good read!
technorati tags: Magic:TheGathering
Well Hello There!
OK, so yeah it's been a while. Partially because I've just been super-busy on the wordsmithing front, and part of it was once I skipped most of February, it seemed to make sense to skip all of February. Don't ask me why.
But anyway, yeah I'm back. I have a few things to talk about. Buckle in!
technorati tags: journal
OK, so yeah it's been a while. Partially because I've just been super-busy on the wordsmithing front, and part of it was once I skipped most of February, it seemed to make sense to skip all of February. Don't ask me why.
But anyway, yeah I'm back. I have a few things to talk about. Buckle in!
technorati tags: journal
OS X Users Take Note
What matters is this: an application, in and of itself, should never install an extension that modifies the system or otherwise diddles the runtime environment of other applications, without the express permission of the user. There are no exceptions to this rule.
Daring Fireball: Smart Crash Reports
This article is long, and it's sort of technical. But read it anyway, it's good to understand. But if you can't follow it at all, I'll cut to the key bit:
1) Open a terminal window (it's in Application/Utilties if you live in the dark ages. If you run Quicksilver open Quicksilver and type in "Term" or so until you find it. Or put it on your dock and aspire to be a real Unix weenie someday. :-))
2) Enter the following: cd ~/Library
3) Enter the following cd InputManagers
4) If 3) doesn't work you probably need to create the folder. mkdir InputManagers will do it. If 3) worked then skip to 5)
5) Enter the following: ls
6) If 5) returns this text "Smart Crash Reports" you already have it. If you know what you're doing at the command line, then delete the folder. (Full disclaimer - that's what I did - a rm -rf command. If you don't know what that means, I'm not going to tell you. If you do know than you don't need my help - RTFA beeyotch!) If you don't, let me tell you the safer way to trash it (using the Finder). Open the Finder. Go to your home folder, open the Library folder, and then inside there is the InputManager folder. Drag the folder named Smart Crash Reports to the Trash. This will junk it, but the next time you run whatever really ill behaved app it will reinstall it. Continue on to lock your system down. If 5) did NOT list the folder then continue to 7)
7) Back at the Terminal window enter the following: touch Smart\ Crash\ Reports
8) If you didn't do step 6 open the Finder window and navigate as described. Once you have a Finder window in Library/InputManager then select the file there named "Smart Crash Reports". Hit Apple-I (for Info). Click the "Locked" check box. Close the Info window, the Finder window and the terminal app. Now you are protected from "silent" installation of Smart Crash Reports.
Bonus note: If you have anything else installed in the InputManager folders you've got some other crazy thing running about. Apparently this is the same mechanism that PithHelmet uses. It sounds pretty clunky to me, but I Am Not A Mac Programmer. If you have something else in that folder and you don't recognize what it is . . . well that's bad. Drop me an email and we'll see what we can find :-)
What matters is this: an application, in and of itself, should never install an extension that modifies the system or otherwise diddles the runtime environment of other applications, without the express permission of the user. There are no exceptions to this rule.
Daring Fireball: Smart Crash Reports
This article is long, and it's sort of technical. But read it anyway, it's good to understand. But if you can't follow it at all, I'll cut to the key bit:
1) Open a terminal window (it's in Application/Utilties if you live in the dark ages. If you run Quicksilver open Quicksilver and type in "Term" or so until you find it. Or put it on your dock and aspire to be a real Unix weenie someday. :-))
2) Enter the following: cd ~/Library
3) Enter the following cd InputManagers
4) If 3) doesn't work you probably need to create the folder. mkdir InputManagers will do it. If 3) worked then skip to 5)
5) Enter the following: ls
6) If 5) returns this text "Smart Crash Reports" you already have it. If you know what you're doing at the command line, then delete the folder. (Full disclaimer - that's what I did - a rm -rf command. If you don't know what that means, I'm not going to tell you. If you do know than you don't need my help - RTFA beeyotch!) If you don't, let me tell you the safer way to trash it (using the Finder). Open the Finder. Go to your home folder, open the Library folder, and then inside there is the InputManager folder. Drag the folder named Smart Crash Reports to the Trash. This will junk it, but the next time you run whatever really ill behaved app it will reinstall it. Continue on to lock your system down. If 5) did NOT list the folder then continue to 7)
7) Back at the Terminal window enter the following: touch Smart\ Crash\ Reports
8) If you didn't do step 6 open the Finder window and navigate as described. Once you have a Finder window in Library/InputManager then select the file there named "Smart Crash Reports". Hit Apple-I (for Info). Click the "Locked" check box. Close the Info window, the Finder window and the terminal app. Now you are protected from "silent" installation of Smart Crash Reports.
Bonus note: If you have anything else installed in the InputManager folders you've got some other crazy thing running about. Apparently this is the same mechanism that PithHelmet uses. It sounds pretty clunky to me, but I Am Not A Mac Programmer. If you have something else in that folder and you don't recognize what it is . . . well that's bad. Drop me an email and we'll see what we can find :-)