tv show thoughts: BSG and Dollhouse
Feb. 14th, 2009 06:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
orangerfulWow, what a night of television last night! I mean, Battlestar Galactica and Dollhouse, both kicking ass in their own unique ways. Here are my reactions to what we learned last night about both of these shows:
Battlestar Galactica: No Exit
Okay, I need a graph of the BSG timeline now. So, let me get this all straight - there were 13 tribes. 12 of them stopped to build colonies, 1 of them frakked off and ended up on Earth. The 13th Colony was all Cylon, but skinjob cylons, not centurion style. And they lived happily there, working on how to pro-create without using resurrection machines (talk about your sexual education, lulz). They figured out how to make babies, so they stopped worrying about resurrection and eventually lived a very similar existence as their 12 colony bretheren light-years away. But, they made their own robots, which turned against them. Luckily, 5 of the skinjob cylons figured out that it would not end well and began working on how to resurrect themselves, should the attacking slave Cylons decide to get rid of them. Which they did - they nuked the planet. But the 5 resurrected and decided they should fly back to the 12 colonies and warn them that if they decide to make robot slaves, they should treat them nicely. But, because they didn't have FTL drives, by the time they arrived at the colonies, the first Cylon war had already begun.
In an effort to save humanity, the 5 offered the promise of skinjobness and resurrection to the warring Centurions. The 12-Colony-Cylons said okay and disappeared, ending the first Cylon war. The 5 worked on making the new models, making them in their own image of - the cranky one, the sexy one, the artistic one, the Xena one, the freaky religious one, the slow-to-catch-on one, the receding hairline one, and the black one (you can guess which is which). But, the cranky one decided he didn't like all this touchy-feely stuff, poisoned all of the artistic ones, and then managed to trap the final 5, knock them out, and send them to the 12 Colonies with no memory of their pasted lives as Cylons. So they just woke up somewhere and went about their business...somehow...?
Is that right? Half the show was explaining all of this, but most of it came out of Cranky's mouth and brain-injured Sam. So I'm not sure how much I'm missing.
Perri threw out an interesting theory - Starbuck's father was Daniel. Maybe the last Daniel...perhaps one model managed to escape and arrive on Caprica. After all, the one time we do hear about her dad is when she is listening to the music when sherescued Helo was back on Caprica getting the arrow of Athena. Hm...if one of the Daniel's managed to survive, perhaps he's the one that set up the Final 5 when they arrived on the colonies...maybe he somehow gave them fake identities and paperwork or something...
Nice to see Galen as the Chief again. Happy that Adama got over his cylon-technology-phobia. LEE ADAMA FOR VICE PRESIDENT! w00t!
Not sure how I feel about Ellen going back to Galactica, especially after that sweet moment between Tigh and Caprica Six. Maybe she'll make it back but Cavil will bump her off shortly after. Or Boomer will poison her or something...she's not the brightest machine in the basestar. Are they going to try to get Boomer and Chief back together again???? They hinted at it a little bit but perhaps they are just big teases.
I need to see if the podcast commentary is up yet, I didn't listen to it for last week's episode due to the internet issue....
Also, did anyone else find John Hodgman's presence to be very distracting? It yanked me out of the show for a bit because I'm so used to seeing him on Daily Show. I'm sure when I watch it again it won't be so bad but it's hard not to snicker at everything he says. He posted on his twitter that they took out the scene where Starbuck told him to "SHUT THE FRAK UP" because she made him cry. ;-)
Dollhouse
YAY JOSS IS BACK!
Okay, as premieres go, I thought this one was pretty good. It felt like a first episode, like everyone was still getting used to their characters, that Joss was trying to figure out how to get all of his plot threads set up and then deciding he'd worry more about the people rather than the main arc this week.
Eliza looks really thin. I guess I'm just used to seeing her as Faith, and I'm sure that was all baby fat on her cheeks then. She's a hottie but who, so tiny. Like, pocket sized. She can still kick my ass though, which is why she works in a role like this.
I like the nerdy guy who is the main brainwasher. I know, he's clearly evil, but still. He's sorta adorable...(wait, blonde, skinny white boy? I had no choice!)
The idea that their personalities are not just computer programs but created from real people will clearly play a large part in the program. I had no idea what the "dolls" were. At first, I assumed they were some sort ofCylon robots, but the fact that they are people that have opted to be erased is intriguing. And, from what Helo says (sorry, I totally missed his real name...he'll be Helo for the first few episodes), perhaps not all of them do it willingly.
So, the new girl will clearly be a nemesis/BFF for Echo...relationships will be a bit tricky to build on a show where the main character gets wiped clean after each mission. But, as we saw in the show, Echo was retaining some information from when she was in the Dollhouse.
Oh, andFRED AMY ACKER! Even though she was all scarred up, it was good to see her. But she was only listed as a "guest star" which makes me think 1 of 2 things - she will only pop up every few episodes...or Alpha will kill her early on in the series. (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
faeriesfolly & I believe that Alpha is the one that scarred her face).
It felt like it should have been longer...maybe 2 hours, maybe at least a full hour of TV.
From all the reviews I read online, it sounds like the second and third episodes are the ones that get the show going. I'm looking forward to them! It just feels good to have a Joss show to watch each week!
Can't wait to read what everyone else has to say! How many episodes of BSG do we have left?
Battlestar Galactica: No Exit
Okay, I need a graph of the BSG timeline now. So, let me get this all straight - there were 13 tribes. 12 of them stopped to build colonies, 1 of them frakked off and ended up on Earth. The 13th Colony was all Cylon, but skinjob cylons, not centurion style. And they lived happily there, working on how to pro-create without using resurrection machines (talk about your sexual education, lulz). They figured out how to make babies, so they stopped worrying about resurrection and eventually lived a very similar existence as their 12 colony bretheren light-years away. But, they made their own robots, which turned against them. Luckily, 5 of the skinjob cylons figured out that it would not end well and began working on how to resurrect themselves, should the attacking slave Cylons decide to get rid of them. Which they did - they nuked the planet. But the 5 resurrected and decided they should fly back to the 12 colonies and warn them that if they decide to make robot slaves, they should treat them nicely. But, because they didn't have FTL drives, by the time they arrived at the colonies, the first Cylon war had already begun.
In an effort to save humanity, the 5 offered the promise of skinjobness and resurrection to the warring Centurions. The 12-Colony-Cylons said okay and disappeared, ending the first Cylon war. The 5 worked on making the new models, making them in their own image of - the cranky one, the sexy one, the artistic one, the Xena one, the freaky religious one, the slow-to-catch-on one, the receding hairline one, and the black one (you can guess which is which). But, the cranky one decided he didn't like all this touchy-feely stuff, poisoned all of the artistic ones, and then managed to trap the final 5, knock them out, and send them to the 12 Colonies with no memory of their pasted lives as Cylons. So they just woke up somewhere and went about their business...somehow...?
Is that right? Half the show was explaining all of this, but most of it came out of Cranky's mouth and brain-injured Sam. So I'm not sure how much I'm missing.
Perri threw out an interesting theory - Starbuck's father was Daniel. Maybe the last Daniel...perhaps one model managed to escape and arrive on Caprica. After all, the one time we do hear about her dad is when she is listening to the music when she
Nice to see Galen as the Chief again. Happy that Adama got over his cylon-technology-phobia. LEE ADAMA FOR VICE PRESIDENT! w00t!
Not sure how I feel about Ellen going back to Galactica, especially after that sweet moment between Tigh and Caprica Six. Maybe she'll make it back but Cavil will bump her off shortly after. Or Boomer will poison her or something...she's not the brightest machine in the basestar. Are they going to try to get Boomer and Chief back together again???? They hinted at it a little bit but perhaps they are just big teases.
I need to see if the podcast commentary is up yet, I didn't listen to it for last week's episode due to the internet issue....
Also, did anyone else find John Hodgman's presence to be very distracting? It yanked me out of the show for a bit because I'm so used to seeing him on Daily Show. I'm sure when I watch it again it won't be so bad but it's hard not to snicker at everything he says. He posted on his twitter that they took out the scene where Starbuck told him to "SHUT THE FRAK UP" because she made him cry. ;-)
Dollhouse
YAY JOSS IS BACK!
Okay, as premieres go, I thought this one was pretty good. It felt like a first episode, like everyone was still getting used to their characters, that Joss was trying to figure out how to get all of his plot threads set up and then deciding he'd worry more about the people rather than the main arc this week.
Eliza looks really thin. I guess I'm just used to seeing her as Faith, and I'm sure that was all baby fat on her cheeks then. She's a hottie but who, so tiny. Like, pocket sized. She can still kick my ass though, which is why she works in a role like this.
I like the nerdy guy who is the main brainwasher. I know, he's clearly evil, but still. He's sorta adorable...(wait, blonde, skinny white boy? I had no choice!)
The idea that their personalities are not just computer programs but created from real people will clearly play a large part in the program. I had no idea what the "dolls" were. At first, I assumed they were some sort of
So, the new girl will clearly be a nemesis/BFF for Echo...relationships will be a bit tricky to build on a show where the main character gets wiped clean after each mission. But, as we saw in the show, Echo was retaining some information from when she was in the Dollhouse.
Oh, and
faeriesfolly & I believe that Alpha is the one that scarred her face).It felt like it should have been longer...maybe 2 hours, maybe at least a full hour of TV.
From all the reviews I read online, it sounds like the second and third episodes are the ones that get the show going. I'm looking forward to them! It just feels good to have a Joss show to watch each week!
Can't wait to read what everyone else has to say! How many episodes of BSG do we have left?
