What a lot of fun, you guys have been real swell

[woolly_socks]

Wow, I'm seeing so much BSG-rage on my flist, with tiny little pockets of squee. Fascinating.

So, I have to put my two cents in, for anyone who cares. I fall into the squee camp, with smatterings of WTF? But there is no rage.

Comments

[utterfrivolity]

I'm so happy you enjoyed it! I was actually pretty content. I mean, would I re-write the entire last half of this season if I had the chance? Hell yeah. But I wasn't bothered by most of what happened, and some of it I absolutely loved. I'd been bitching all season about the Gaius/Caprica relationship being neglected; not that I care about that relationship more than others, but I thought it was important, and that it had gone from being central to the series to nearly nonexistent. To see them together again as a key part of the series made me happy enough that I could shrug off some of the most ridiculous elements of the finale (e.g. everyone being super-awesome with giving up all their technology).

I thought Starbuck's ending was fine, aside from leaving poor Lee alone. I just want him to be happy! Sigh. And I absolutely adored Anders's ending. He somehow ended up my favorite character by the end of the series. I would've bet my entire bank account against that when he was introduced, so kudos to the writers for making that happen.

The thing is, as far as I can remember, I've only ever loved one television finale. They're tough to nail even when the show doesn't have a million crazy things going on. What I wanted from this was for most of the plot and thematic elements to be brought together, and I think that happened. If they were going to make the finale brilliant, they would have had to have started setting shit up ten episodes ago, and they didn't. There's only so much they can do in three hours. I'm just glad that only parts of it felt like a frantic race to the finish, as I think the whole episode could've easily fallen into that.

Ok, I realize I've already written as much as you did in your post, but I have to share with someone that this has been a really interesting fandom experience for me. I wasn't in BSG fandom, and while I feel like I missed out on a lot of great squee and discussions over the years, all the rage that's surfaced makes me wonder if I'm not better able to enjoy shows outside of fandom. In this case two of my best friends IRL got me into the show, and I've shared this show with them and my SO. We have plenty of discussions and disagreements, but it never reaches the fever pitch of fandom. Because I didn't watch commentaries or read articles, I didn't develop a feel for the writers or producers beyond what was on the screen, so nothing ever felt particularly personal. I dunno. I like knowing what other people think of episodes, but what tends to happen is that when I don't like an episode, people's positive reactions don't change anything, but when I do like an episode, people's negative reactions affect my enjoyment somewhat. Huh. Something I've got to think about, I guess.

[woolly_socks]

Yes, I agree with a lot of this. I think this show was virtually impossible to end gracefully.

I wouldn't re-write the last half-season though, I've been really enjoying it! Especially on re-watching (yes, I do spend a lot of time watching TV, why do you ask?) I think it's been multi-layered and well thought out. A return to form, to the BSG I loved to begin with. Little things have come together in a way that I think makes sense. To me. It makes perfect sense to me.

I was OK with Lee being left to his exploring. He'll be OK. He'll go and stand on clifftops and brood, and do The Right Thing, and meet a nice girl and die in his sleep. There, I just wrote commentfic. Lee Adama's happy ending. :-P

I've been involved in BSG fandom part-time over the years, so I got pretty invested. I'm fiercely loyal; it takes a lot for me to get disillusioned and abandon something. So the decline in support and eventual rage I've seen in response to season four has made me sad. It has decreased my enjoyment, so I'm kind of reconsidering fandoms with open canon.

Mind you, if the rumours are true about impending Companions on Who, combined with the new Doctor being a 15 year old with bad hair, I may be abandoning that much-beloved show...

I can't trust my judgment right now. I have a severe head cold.

[utterfrivolity]

So I was really just unhappy with the four episodes directly preceding the finale. I'd really enjoyed most of the episodes before that. And it's a fair point that I might enjoy them more upon re-watching. I think a key source of my discontent was my impatience and frustration with the fact that they kept picking up and dropping storylines left and right when they were supposed to be wrapping up the show. And in general I get frustrated with ensemble shows that ignore characters and relationships for whole episodes. It's not so bad when there's some indefinite number of episodes left to make up for the neglect, but it drove me nuts knowing that the series was ending and I had no idea what was happening with certain characters.

Doctor Who is very much a show that I've enjoyed without much involvement in online fandom. I talk about it with some people on my flist, but it's usually a secondary shared interest, and I don't follow any communities. I find the show really fun, and I don't want to lose that. It's probable that starting with the specials, I won't even read any reaction that doesn't seem to match my own. My SO and one of my friends from law school both watch it, and that may be the extent to which I get different perspectives on the show.

I feel really lame for shutting out some discussion, as that can be one of the most enjoyable parts of watching a show for me, but I really am learning that it's hard for me to forget other people's negative reactions, even if I don't agree with them in the least. There are some episodes of Doctor Who that I loved on first viewing that now make me think of someone's dissertation on sexism or whatever. Enough shows are ruined for me by my own opinions that I can't really afford to let other people's opinions spoil the few I do like, you know?

[woolly_socks]

I think a key source of my discontent was my impatience and frustration with the fact that they kept picking up and dropping storylines left and right when they were supposed to be wrapping up the show.

Interesting. I saw it as them bringing all the threads together, the ones I was worried they'd forgotten about, and making them all make sense. I found it really satisfying.

There are some episodes of Doctor Who that I loved on first viewing that now make me think of someone's dissertation on sexism or whatever.

I HATE that. I think it's easy to find sexism in things if you're looking for it. It's easy to find a lot of things if you're looking for them. Some people have their soapboxes they want to get on, and if it's going to dampen my enjoyment of the show, I don't want to play.

Edit: which isn't to say that they're wrong, and that what they're seeing isn't there. It's just that sometimes I don't care. I have strong political views myself, but sometimes I just want to watch stuff instead of making sure it lives up to my lofty moral standards.

[utterfrivolity]

Hey, I'm picking up a weeks-old conversation! Yay me!

LJ has been riling me up a lot recently, even on truly important issues that I agree with like this whole Amazon business, and I've been trying to figure out what's so agitating to me. I think what it comes down to is that it is all about the soapbox; in a rush to be seen and heard, instead of trying to organize a productive response, everyone grabs the pitchforks (in this case, lots of bold and underline and large font). I don't respect that type of response on LJ or in RL politics. It's not like I'm apathetic; hell, I'm probably going to start working full-time as a lobbyist for a public interest advocacy group pretty soon. I definitely recognize that there's a place for incendiary public protests, mostly as part of a greater organizational effort. But there's a certain type of self-righteousness about public protest activity that gets on my last nerve. Particularly when the sum total of the protest amounts to an LJ rant about [fill-in-the-black ism] in [fill-in-the-blank show], which is mostly just preaching to the choir.

Anyway, just following up because it was on my mind. Sorry for cluttering your inbox!

[woolly_socks]

Not clutter!

People love feeling self-righteous. They LOVE IT. I do myself, sometimes. The moral high ground feels so good.

http://woolly-socks.livejournal.com/298069.html