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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Battlestar Galactica Season 2 US Thread (SPOILERS)

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Regrettable Juvenilia

14:22 / 28.03.06

To be clear: I don't think it was so much about Boomer "standing between" Cally and the Chief, as being about "saving" the Chief from the evil Cylon who had hurt and betrayed him...

Regrettable Juvenilia

14:33 / 28.03.06

I don't think I did did I? I'm saying it squicks me out, based on Gina in 'Resurrection Ship'

What you said was:

So, the thing that troubles me most is Callie and the Chief... it reminds me how Ron Moore and the writing team had to be told that a woman abused and raped wasn't going to be about to jump into bed with the first man to show her some kindness.

Then you said:

I'm not having a go at you, definitely the show producers.

I had assumed that you could not possibly be criticising the makers of the show for showing a character get into a sexual/romantic relationship with someone who had physically assaulted them, since I presume we all know that, awfully, this does happen. I therefore assumed that you were criticising the makers of the show for depicting this in a positive light. Again, I'm making a presumption here: the presumption that you're not of the opinion that a television show shouldn't depict unpleasant or messed-up patterns of human behaviour, just because it's unpleasant or messed-up.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

15:01 / 28.03.06

OK, maybe what's unfortunate is it's placing in the season, so that we don't get to explore this before the season outs. I think this is where the 'seasons as chapters of a book' analogy breaks down. The implication I feel we are supposed to leave the season with is that Callie is in a relationship with Tyrrell (it only occurs to me now that she might just be another union leader), she is having his baby and that they are having a happy, stable relationship, which is built on him beating the crap out of her and then apologising for it. Thanks to OYL we don't know whether or not this is the case. But by, at the very least, leaving this to be dealt with next season, if at all, is what troubles me. I would like to know something of where these characters stand, before bring the curtain down for the interlude, because otherwise it makes me speculate based on what the creators have said in the past and, fairly or unfairly, I don't like what that suggests. As I've said all along that this is my own feeling, I don't see what the issue is here? I certainly won't be backward about coming here in a year's time and saying "what I really liked about season three was how they explained and developed the Tyrroll/Callie relationship" if that turns out to be the case.

21:14 / 28.03.06

Oh, it’s *very* likely that this relationship won’t turn out well. I certainly don't think we're meant to automatically take this as being a good thing for Cally. Yes, I can see that she’s been shown to have a crush on Tyrol at various discreet points in Season 2. No, I don’t think he’s once shown any interest back. Yes, we’re assuming that bump is their baby and that they’re now together, based on nothing more than the fact they’re standing next to each other in the OYL scene. But, (yeah, based on only the one scene) there isn't any, er, radiance or empowerment or any standard-issue 'this is a good pregnancy'-ish signifiers to be seen - and god, contrast it with the fuzzy warm glow to the Roslyn/Maya schoolroom/kids/baby/teh future! scene - instead, Cally holds her head down and looks out from under her fringe, and Cally and the Chief look much less 'together' than all the other OYL pairings that we see, who are all much more touchy-feely. So I don’t actually think all the shippers are now meant to be squeeing about these two. And having introduced the whole 'The Chief is fucked up' plot right at the very end of S2, and it seeming a bit sudden and rushed, it'll be good if one year later the chief is still/even more fucked up. Dark Tyrol. yeah.

And the OYL jump is to the very morning that Tyrol's ex-girlfriend lands on New Caprica. That’s the set-up, maybe: he’s got a crazy-man beard and is ranting about how you can’t trust machines or how you have to show the machine who's boss or whatever, and Cally’s got a bump and looks miserable, but I kinda think it's most likely that the bump is there so *his* character has got something to fret about when his ex turns up. I’m not entirely confident this will be our chance to get more of Cally in the show. Although if it is, then yay!

21:24 / 28.03.06

...That’s if the Boomer that has just marched into town is actually the same Boomer that Cally shot/who died in the Chief’s arms swearing her love to him/the one he was so very very fucked up over. I only think it is because the Cylon POV episode seemed to be all about 'Caprica Sharon', and we’ve got a sketchy impression that *her* love for humanity has somehow kinda turned the whole Cylon project around. (Although by the time of that episode, the galaxy-spanning, God-bothering Cylon PLAN had been reduced to chasing the humans off Caprica and then re-planting some trees in the square and then wondering around. And don’t even mention the farms. But anyway)

But they might yet decide that it’s *not* Caprica Sharon and/or Caprica Six who’ve just shown up, after all. Which is also entirely possible. I don’t believe the SWs have actually decided what they’re going to do with this whole ‘factions’ thing yet. Although it does look like that might be Caprica Six in Baltar’s office, and that she might be looking unhappy about being there. Which is to say, there’s maybe been another swing in Cylon opinion over the course of the year. Which I’d quite like, thinking about it. The entire civilisation veering wildly and suddenly, from one extreme position to another. I like it when the Cylons are weird.

Regrettable Juvenilia

07:02 / 29.03.06

Apologies for continually posting in this thread rather than the other one about this - it kind of bugs me that a whole bunch of Barbelith-based BG fans might not be reading that one anyway, but this time I have a specific observation to make in light of seeing an earlier episode with spoilery knowledge about later ones...

In 'Epiphanies' one of the DEMAND PEACE people says that they want to blow bits of the Fleet up to "send a signal to the Cylons, so they'll come and save us" (may be some rough paraphrasing but the specific phrases "send a signal" and "come and save us" were definitely used). Now, this was clearly not meant literally by the character - they mean, "let the Cylons know some of us don't want to fight them" - and indeed the character would certainly not know that at some point in the future "saving" rather than destroying humanity would become the Cylon's agenda. I don't think PegaSix knew that either. But still, the fact that's exactly what happened when she blew up Cloud Nine is interesting, isn't it? There is some planning going on on the part of the writers.

09:56 / 29.03.06

You can't stop the signal. (Runs away...)

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

16:18 / 29.03.06

You can't stop the signal. (Runs away...)

Actually a huge metal spike seemed to do the trick...

14:49 / 15.04.06

The Tyrol thing is interesting to me. Let's put it this way - it's not anti-feminist to depict a confused or a weak woman in a show - it's anti-feminist to depict women as confused and weak. My sense of the chief / Callie thing is that she's had a crush on him, and he's broken and a bit nuts (something else is clearly going on there), and having attacked her he's actually trying to make it up to her by engaging in a relationship that - maybe he gets some comfort from but still - is mostly motivated by guilt and a desire to fix things and look after her. I think it's almost by definition a relationship built on extremely rocky and dangerous territory and a relationship that's pretty much doomed to fail, and probably quite spectacularly, unless the two characters can somehow work a path through it and come out the other side.

I'm not for one minute saying that the scripts don't have some stuff in them that raises an eyebrow - but then this is a script that's about desperate and occasionally broken people under enormous amounts of stress doing things that are clearly not good for them or for the people around them. It's a show that is fueled by this neurotic dangerous and unsavoury element and it's in pretty much all of the characters (apart from maybe Adama Senior). The XO is a weak drunk who is manipulated by his wife, who is a malevolent power-hungry creature who operates through her husband. Rosslyn is the smart and powerful President of her people, who occasionally operates with a ruthlessness that would scare a Cylon. Starbuck is a smart and incredible fighter pilot who also happens to be a borderline alcoholic and scrapper. Apollo is the purer than the driven snow guy who's slowly been worn down into something much dirtier and aggressive. There's such a variety of characters on show (both emotionally and obviously physically - although obviously certain ladies are more overtly on display than most of the gentleman) that on the whole I think it's difficult to argue that the whole thing is troubling in the gender politics stakes. It's much more generally troubling than that - operating by exposing some of the best and worse of people and not letting anyone get off with an easy ride.

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