*** SPOILER THREAD! *** BSG Final Episode

[joeactor]

DANGER!  SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE!

THIS THREAD CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE LAST EPISODE OF BATTLESTAR GALACTICA!

IF YOU DON'T WANNA KNOW, NOW'S THE TIME TO LEAVE!

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Still here?  Ok, then... let's talk!
JoeActor

[joeactor]

Ok, Saturday morning thoughts.

Great episode.  Right up until the end.

Then, (*** fizzle...? ***)

What The Frak!?!?
Seems like a cop out ending to me.

Left WAY too many loose ends and unanswered questions.

Plus I'm sure the whole Gods-n-Angels thing will go over like a led zepplin here.

What'd everyone else think?

[PipeBox]

Wow, can't believe I missed this.  And I actually enjoyed the last episode, right down to Baltar's endorsement of god.  It's a sci fi, I don't hold disdain for Harry Potter just because I don't believe in magic, and force that moves things around amounts to pure plot energy.  Heck, it doesn't even like to be called god.  

[VanReal]

I'm just sad it's over.  What's up with the thing happening in the Fall, I think it's called "They Have a Plan" and what about Caprica?  I didn't see previews for that like I thought we were going to see.

Anyway,  I found it interesting that Baltar and Six ended up being the voyers of "gods" work, or lack of intrusion.  I actually didn't find it to be a promotion of god but rather showing how god is hands off and watches turmoil happen over and over again for its own entertainment.  Hmmm, interesting.

Yes, Starbuck was dead, she came back, she held the memory of the "song" and then disppeared?  Maybe she was Jesus,   .

Being plopped down on new Earth with no technology was freaky, I thought to myself, they'd better plop me on a part of the planet with coffee beans and tobacco plants, hehe.

I'm curious, why did the last standing John committ suicide?

[PipeBox]

As to why John decided to shoot himself right then, I dunno, seemed a little out of line to the character considering what he was willing to do to not die up until that point.  Friend thought they had limited resurrection capacity on the colony, and that it was him pulling back to regroup.  But in that case, it still doesn't matter thanks to the nukes.

As to Kara being the harbinger of death, well, I suppose by taking them to Earth she ensured that only one female-female (Hera's) line of descent would survive, so she effectively brought about the end of the show's humans.  Baltar played his part, too.  In fact, everyone did without realizing it, but only a few had been given hints.  They were so close to breaking the cycle, but the chief and dead racetrack (yeah?) had to frack it up.  

[MommaSquid]

I frakking hated the ending.  :upset:     Baltar and the Six both blew up at the very beginning of the series, so obviously god brought them back just to screw with everyone.  And god brought Kara back to play the piano.   :brick:

[VanReal]

Tell us how you really feel Squid.

I think the backstory was just to give us more information on who the people were and how they ended up in space instead of nuked.  Rosyln spent an evening with a guy she once taught as a kid after her dad and sisters were gone, which ended up changing her mind about going in to politics.  Adama decided against the promotion and went on to "retirement" on the museum battlestar.  Lee and Kara were hot for each other even before Zack died.  And Ty and Ellen were always drunks.

I really didn't get into the Angels thing either, and since Baltar was the one spouting off about it I just disregarded it as propoganda.

I thought Adama was going to fly into the sun, but I guess he wanted to make the cabin Laura wanted and he did so by her grave.  A little morbid but whatever floats your boat.  

It was kind of a let down.  I was kind of hoping for something important out of the final five.  They were pretty worthless throughout.  Kara found earth and "new" earth, the final five did nothing, I guess other than Anders flying the technology into the sun after they turned him into a hybrid, yuck.

[PipeBox]

I frakking hated the ending.  :upset:     Baltar and the Six both blew up at the very beginning of the series, so obviously god brought them back just to screw with everyone.  And god brought Kara back to play the piano.   :brick:

Think they were showing how close it all came to not happening, with the exception of lee and kara, that I can't piece.  But if laura hadn't decided to join adar's campaign, or adama had taken the desk job, it wouldn't have gone down as it did.  People make a lot of inconsequential choices in their lives, but these were of great consequence to this story, perhaps motioning that this had been a long time in the making.  Yes, we could have gathered as much, but in that regard, any starting point for a story is arbitrary, so I'm not mad at them, even if it was filler.

They had shown the baltar in six's head when she was first resurrected, and a couple times while they were rebuilding planet caprica, but they had largely left it alone after that, but baltar also saw head-baltar out of the blue in season 3, so these angels have been running around for quite a while.  And baltar also didn't die in that blast, rather six saved him, and for awhile we all thought he was crazy due to it.  There's no indication he was ever resurrected.

Kara, I dunno.  She was evidently required for them to find the next Earth.  A manifested angel, possibly, since we've no sound proof that the visions of baltar or six could interact with the world in such a way as punching in FTL coordinates.  Why the ruse about her being human kept up so long?  Well, most people who think they're angels and want to play with military hardware, convinced they're doing god's bidding, we keep far, far away from it, generally in padded cells.  But I have no "good" answer for what kara was, the only thing I get out of it is that she finally knows at the end, and I can be happy for the character even if I can't be happy with the hole in the story.

Also worth noting that they didn't fly all the raptors into the sun, they were being used to transport people to their individual locations, and we've seen no evidence that they can be slaved to other ships' controls.  Presumably they were eventually dismantled or otherwise fell into disrepair, much the same as any tools or articles of clothing or camping kits or little bits of whatnot.  Presumably, they still might be discovered on the future Earth.

[joeactor]

I gotta agree with MommaSquid...

I really liked the series, and even this final episode up to the last 20 minutes or so.
Good plot, writing, acting, effects, etc.  Bravo for that!

But, it seems like the writers painted themselves into a corner and had to use the Intelligent Design ending.
"Hey guys!  I got it!  If we can't figure out what's really going on, it must be God!  (harumph, harumph...)"

Here's just a couple of the loose ends that bug me:

1) Daniel.  Ah, Cylon number 7.  Cavil screwed with his amniotic fluid and "something" happened.  Was he Kara?  Was he Kara's father?  Someone else?

2) Cavil's end.  Yeah.  Right.  Suicide.  Gimmie a break.  He had so much anger for the final five and the humans he woud have blown up everyone instead of shooting himself.  Better he get trapped trying to escape than this Perry Mason ending.

3) Kara.  Ok.  Sure.  She just disappears. Cylon?  Angel?  God?  Nope, I don't really need to know, thank you very much.  Just leave it a complete blank when you come to that question in the script.

4) Adama.  A sad ending, but I don't think it's in keeping with the character.  Granted, this one's personal opinion, but he has been all about family (his, the crew, humanity).  To just abandon everyone for a lonely depressing end is... meh.

5) No Tech.  Uh, isn't this the same group of humans that have been arguing amongst themselves since the start?  Why the change now?  Nobody beefs at going native?  And you would think they'd hide the ships somewhere instead of tossing them into the sun.  Heck, keep a few raptors, and park the rest of the fleet near Jupiter.

6) Spltting up.  Good plan.  New world, unknown dangers and diseases.  Let's all maximize our chances of a quick death by splitting up what little remains of us into small groups spread out over an entire planet.  Good luck with that one, sparky.

7) Lee "I always wanted to be a lumberjack" Adama.  Why, I think I'll just go exploring!  Sure, this survival stuff is easy.  I'll just put down all my tech, pick up a rock and find some food and shelter.  Not.  It all seemed too easy (not just for Lee) to cast aside the evils of technology and embrace rubbing sticks together and crapping in the woods.

Moral Assault Ending.  Ok, ok, I get it!  Tech BAD!  Humans going down same path!  Angels good!  "God" not like him own name.  Me get.  Og no make fire.  Or robot kill Og in future.  Me stay natural, free, and ignorant.

9) too many more... gotta stop.  Cavil's cylons.  The cylons Adama freed.  Kara's return.  Baltar gets nuked.  Lameness of the "Final Five".  No point for the Opera House.   Scripture.  Predictions.  Temple.  anon, anon, anon...


... another poster on a different board suggested it would have been a better ending if they just faded to black after showing Earthrise.  I gotta agree.  It may not answer any more questions, but at least it doesn't take a dump on my carpet.

Ok, I'm done ranting.

Good morning everyone!
JoeActor

[SteveS]

In case anyone wants to check this out, here's a post-press-screening interview with Ron Moore:

http://www.nj.com/entertainment/tv/index.ssf/2009/03/battlestar_galactica_ronald_d.html

The thing that really bugged me was all the techno-bashing.  Although, I guess that was the whole point of the show.  But still, Laura gives a heartfelt thanks to the Doc for giving her this extra bit of life, and everyone's okay with just dumping the technology (which includes medicine, BTW) to live like savages?!?

Piecing it all together, I'm sure the Angels/Demons are the beings of light from the first series.  It all seems to fit.

Why didn't Adama fly the last raptor into the sun to destroy it like they did with all the other ships? That would have been a more fitting end for an Admiral than sitting on a rock talking to a dead woman.

Frakkin-A right!  I was ready for him to do it, I was willing him to do ---- it would have been glorious!  Otherwise, why say the permanent goodbye to Lee?!?  That thing should've gone into the sun, man.  We all know it.  

Anybody going to watch "The Plan" or "Caprica"?  I'll probably check them out, but somehow I'm not too excited about them....

[joeactor]

Anybody going to watch "The Plan" or "Caprica"?  I'll probably check them out, but somehow I'm not too excited about them....

Yeah, I feel the same way.  I'll watch, but it's gonna have to grab my interest again after that ending.

Good article.  They reveal a lot of why it went that way, even to the point that they kinda admit they were making it up as they went.  Dean Stockwell chose that end for Cavil?  A shrug and a bullet?  I would have prefered Tigh throwing him off the upper level!

Off for now,
JoeActor

[SteveS]

Hey joe, I hear you man.  For what it's worth, I was cracking up reading your list of gripes.  I think every one of them went through my own head as well, mostly all the Tech points (at least your points 5, 7 & 8  -  sweet rant, BTW

[PipeBox]

The technobashing was over the top, as was cavil's suicide, but raptors don't run vaccum energy and we know atmosphere takes its toll, so it's reasonable that traveling a few hundred or thousand miles away means you're never going to see people again.  Lee's line about how they were going to teach the natives "the best" of their concepts, like language, while leaving behind the baggage of technology and scientific understanding made me want to throw things at the TV, but I reckon they had to explain where all the tech went.

As to everybody deciding to drop down to the surface, that I can see.  Galactica was ruined, so the fleet had no protection.  Last time they came across a barely hospitable world, and were still willing to ditch their ships on it.  This world was the best thing they'd ever come across.  And once enough people leave off, say, the command ships, and fuel refinery ships, supply ships, the infrastructure becomes too mangled and even the people that don't want to to go  have to.  Let's assume you could pack all the people that wanted to continue on into three ships that would somehow remain indefinitely operational.  Where would they go?  I can really see them putting down for good on that planet, just not throwing away all their tech.  Joe, why move the fleet behind jupiter?  Planning on going anywhere ever again?  Not to mention it's be purgatory for poor Anders.  Alternatively, they could have brought him down, but I don't think a comatose guy would fare too well.

As to the goddidit thing, pfft, the whole series from the 1st season finale had a supernatural aspect to it.  What were you guys expecting?  Baltar gets lucky again and again by virtue of his psychosis, Laura's cancer is epically coincidental, the shared dreams and the power outage across the whole fleet at the end of season three were complete flukes?  Come on, short of saying "They've all been under nanite control the whole time and the prophecies were written by people with time portals to look into the future," or it all being a simulation or some even cheesier cop-out, there was no way to resolve everything they'd put out up until then.  I can begrudge the rest of the series for putting out too much junk to deal with, but all things considered, this was a better last episode than I'd hoped for.  But yeah, I don't like that they made it up as they went along, but it still conveyed more of a continuous story than star trek or stargate.

Bah, give me a few days for all the good and bad to sink in, I still want to like it.

[joeactor]

Hey PipeBox,

Yeah, I *want* to like it too... and I do... just not the slipshod, thown together ending.

Why leave ships around Jupiter?  Two reasons.
1) Last time they thought they were safe from the Cylons... and we know how that turned out.  Best to have options.  (but I would have brought Anders planetside).
2) HAL could discover the ships next year XD

... and yes, the goddidit thing was there thru the whole series, but they never relied on it to completely resolve issues.  The writers ended up using god as a "fill-in-the-blank" for actual plot resolutions.  (hey, that's the same thing I can't stomache about Intelligent Design!)  AND, the characters acted in manner that was not consistent with their personalities.  I just see too many "Ok, let's do that" from folks.  All of a sudden everyone agrees and accepts everything.  Might have well ended the show with "Kumbaya" as the closing song...

Meh.  I expected better.  Must be spoiled.  (tthhtthhttpptptptptp!),
JoeActor

[SteveS]

You know, about the time they had Anders on the bridge in a bathtub and then crash landed on Earth and found primitive humans ....... I started thinking they stole the whole idea from Douglas Adams' Restaurant at the End of the Universe.