That ep of BSG made me talk out loud to myself, or out loud in vain hopes that someone could answer my boggled queries of "wait what WHAT?!?!" Thank God that SG1 "200" came on afterwards--a tv ep that made sense. (HA)
(I'm scrolling past your TSSC review as I'm still behind, but I do go back to read as I go along.)
I love your TSCC thoughts and have nothing to add because they are so very awesome.
But how meaningful can it be when Topher pushes the reset button at the end? It's not development, it's a plot point. Echo can't have any character development, because Echo is not a character.)
Exactly! This is one of the big problems with the premise. We are meant to care about Echo (or Caroline), but we don't know who she is. I feel manipulated. I'm simply supposed to care about Echo because, 'Oh, look at the poor girl getting her mind wiped every week and servicing the will of others!'. Wasn't a big point of Buffy having this young girl fight to have agency over herself and not bow to the will of the Watcher's council? They sort-of established Echo was forced into this position, but, still, ick.
Sadly, I think this episode of Dollhouse actually portrayed the Dollhouse setup as much more clearly problematic; but I'm so paralyzed with not caring about any of the characters that it didn't matter by then. Even if they tack on a girl power ending, I have no interest in tuning to see, basically, a new character fight her way out of a victim scenario every week.
I think it's the first real information we've gotten that links Catherine Weaver to SkyNet; and clearly, whatever they're planning to do is already well underway.
Yeah, I'm... still not sure. What did Weaver do, anyway? She heard the unsecured radio call, she killed everyone at the plant, she sent Max Perlich to find ... someone. Presumably Zoe's father.
But Zoe's father was clearly revealed to be working with Skynet, and Zoe's father killed Max Perlich. So if Zoe's father & Skynet are in opposition to Weaver, I think we still don't know what Weaver's relationship is.
So if Zoe's father & Skynet are in opposition to Weaver, I think we still don't know what Weaver's relationship is.
Oh, and just when I thought the disparate pieces were lining up! Thanks for pointing this out--this does seem to indicate that perhaps the connections are rather more complex than I was seeing initially. Or at least potentially are: we don't know what Zoe's father was trying to do. He may be working against Weaver, but without knowing the relationship between Weaver and Skynet, it's hard to know whether he's with Skynet or against it. Is the flying robot thing "Skynet" (in whatever sense)? Or has he stolen it from them? What does Weaver know about the flying robot thing?
There was some appearance of answers here, but perhaps ultimately more questions.
Weren't there also clear ties between Weaver's corporation and the shipments of minerals that make the terminators to the factory, too? I'm not convinced that Catherine Weaver = SkyNet, but I do think there's some kind of tie there.
Huh. I liked BSG a lot more than you did. Unusual.
Maybe I was just so happy to see issues like civilian unrest and food shortages getting screentime that I gave it a pass. What characterizations did you find unrecognizable?
I think you have a much better ear for dialogue than I have, because there was nothing in Roslin's exchange with Caprica that pinged false for me.
I hear what you're saying about Caprica being passive, but she did do some bodily harm to those guys who attacked her physically. I don't really have a problem with her passivity when dealing with Ellen and Saul, for a number of reasons having to do with her spiritual beliefs as tied to her pregnancy, and to what they (Final Five!) represent. I can see her fighting back if she thought either of them were directly threatening the baby, but beyond that, I really do think she'd wait and see. Which is what happened. Now that the baby's lost (and no, I don't think it's because Tigh's love wavered: I assume two Cylons still cannot produce a child), I'm curious to see where she's going to stand.
And I loved the soap opera part. They're three of my favorite characters. (:
With you on the missing information about the food shortages, though.
I think you have a valid point about Caprica Six's behavior. I think I also could have gotten behind the love triangle if it hadn't veered so far into melodrama and repeated showing instead of telling, because there is the kernel of an excellent drama there. As it was, though, everything just felt so off and unbalanced and overstated and wrong that I hated it all, pretty much. It's interesting what pings for us, and what doesn't.
It's good to know that someone else found that last BSG episode incoherent and I'm not just an idiot. I've been trying to figure out where Helo and Hera were for the entire episode. That was Athena, wasn't it, talking about going off without them to found a pure Cylon race? Did Helo get killed in the uprising and I missed it? And even if he did, would Athena leave without Hera? Or was that some other Eight in the conversation and Athena was offscreen somewhere?
I do like the idea that Ellen is really a scientific genius, as well as a crazy drunk. Also that there's still a spark of feeling between the Chief and Boomer.
I had a really cool dream last night that explained the whole Starbuck mystery, but I don't remember it all and it's not particularly coherent in the light of day anyway.
That was Athena, wasn't it, talking about going off without them to found a pure Cylon race?
I think that was actually Boomer; she would have arrived with Ellen Tigh at the beginning of the episode, and would be pretty invested in keeping apart from the humans, whereas Athena definitely wouldn't.
It certainly sounded more like Boomer than Athena. But didn't Boomer get sent straight to the brig after she arrived? And if it was Boomer, were they leaving Athena out of the discussion, just assuming she'd want to stick with Galactica and therefore didn't deserve a vote?
I have to confess I watched this episode while (a) knitting and (b) sleepy, so I probably missed some context clues. Guess I'll have to watch it again.
Oh, you're right! So it must have been a third, er, Eight. I was watching the episode while going WTF repeatedly with asta77 on chat, and tried to forget all the details as soon as it was over.
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(I'm scrolling past your TSSC review as I'm still behind, but I do go back to read as I go along.)
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But how meaningful can it be when Topher pushes the reset button at the end? It's not development, it's a plot point. Echo can't have any character development, because Echo is not a character.)
Exactly! This is one of the big problems with the premise. We are meant to care about Echo (or Caroline), but we don't know who she is. I feel manipulated. I'm simply supposed to care about Echo because, 'Oh, look at the poor girl getting her mind wiped every week and servicing the will of others!'. Wasn't a big point of Buffy having this young girl fight to have agency over herself and not bow to the will of the Watcher's council? They sort-of established Echo was forced into this position, but, still, ick.
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Yeah, I'm... still not sure. What did Weaver do, anyway? She heard the unsecured radio call, she killed everyone at the plant, she sent Max Perlich to find ... someone. Presumably Zoe's father.
But Zoe's father was clearly revealed to be working with Skynet, and Zoe's father killed Max Perlich. So if Zoe's father & Skynet are in opposition to Weaver, I think we still don't know what Weaver's relationship is.
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Oh, and just when I thought the disparate pieces were lining up! Thanks for pointing this out--this does seem to indicate that perhaps the connections are rather more complex than I was seeing initially. Or at least potentially are: we don't know what Zoe's father was trying to do. He may be working against Weaver, but without knowing the relationship between Weaver and Skynet, it's hard to know whether he's with Skynet or against it. Is the flying robot thing "Skynet" (in whatever sense)? Or has he stolen it from them? What does Weaver know about the flying robot thing?
There was some appearance of answers here, but perhaps ultimately more questions.
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Maybe I was just so happy to see issues like civilian unrest and food shortages getting screentime that I gave it a pass. What characterizations did you find unrecognizable?
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I think you have a much better ear for dialogue than I have, because there was nothing in Roslin's exchange with Caprica that pinged false for me.
I hear what you're saying about Caprica being passive, but she did do some bodily harm to those guys who attacked her physically. I don't really have a problem with her passivity when dealing with Ellen and Saul, for a number of reasons having to do with her spiritual beliefs as tied to her pregnancy, and to what they (Final Five!) represent. I can see her fighting back if she thought either of them were directly threatening the baby, but beyond that, I really do think she'd wait and see. Which is what happened. Now that the baby's lost (and no, I don't think it's because Tigh's love wavered: I assume two Cylons still cannot produce a child), I'm curious to see where she's going to stand.
And I loved the soap opera part. They're three of my favorite characters. (:
With you on the missing information about the food shortages, though.
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I do like the idea that Ellen is really a scientific genius, as well as a crazy drunk. Also that there's still a spark of feeling between the Chief and Boomer.
I had a really cool dream last night that explained the whole Starbuck mystery, but I don't remember it all and it's not particularly coherent in the light of day anyway.
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That was Athena, wasn't it, talking about going off without them to found a pure Cylon race?
I think that was actually Boomer; she would have arrived with Ellen Tigh at the beginning of the episode, and would be pretty invested in keeping apart from the humans, whereas Athena definitely wouldn't.
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I have to confess I watched this episode while (a) knitting and (b) sleepy, so I probably missed some context clues. Guess I'll have to watch it again.
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