Saturday, October 16, 2004
So, I've finally seen the pilot episode of Stargate: Atlantis. I liked it. However, that's because it's pretty much like a good episode of it's parent show, so if you didn't like that you won't care for this. I wonder whether there's any specific plan for this series other than the do a show each week and see if a theme suggests itself, we hear of but don't get to see any of the Wraith, the bad guys for this show, but will they do anything more than fulfil the same function as the Go'uld do? Whilst shows like Deep Space Nine and the last series of SG-1 have shown that you can create an ongoing story through little more than making sure that you don't close off any ideas until it's absolutely necessary, it leads to a less satisfactory story telling experience for me. Take the first two episodes of the latest series of SG-1. Again with the Replicators. They were quite interesting, four years ago, but they're continually brought back, the threat is completely ramped up a bit higher and then they are dispatched. Until the next time they come back. It's like comics, the Fantastic Four defeat Doctor Doom but a few months later he's back with some new idea.
And while we're at it, could we have a bit more variety than that same Canadian forest outside Ottawa or wherever it is that they land in every week? This week they were supposed to be going to the planet that the Asgard mine for the metal they use to build their ships. Strangely, this planet looks suspiciously like a forest in Canada. When the Stargate: Atlantis crew decided to check out a nearby world, it too looked remarkably like a densely wooded area somewhere north of the United States. If you're getting tax breaks from filming there, couldn't you use the money to go a bit further afield?
Sky One have also shown the new Battlestar Galactica mini-series, as a prelude to the proper series next week. I was impressed, it was a lot better than it had any right to be. I was slightly distracted by the highly edible James Callis (the photos really don't do him justice). I also kept thinking that I've seen him somewhere before but I suppose all British actors in American TV shows seem the same after you see enough of them. Playing Baltar he does therefore fall in to one of the two traps of British actors, he's playing a baddy. However, the first thirty minutes or so prove that he's not in the second stereotype of being sexually repressed in any way.
As to the changes between this and the original, though I liked some aspects of the original I was never in love with it, so I don't particularly mind that Starbuck is now a Y-chromosome-free character, just so long as there isn't some ridiculous sexual tension written in between her and Apollo. I must admit that I do regret the loss of the storyline from the original that the Cylons were created by the devil, but as this show is rebooting from scratch it would hardly be surprising if they repeated it again. But how they're going to contrive to keep the Cylons in the game after escaping them in the mini-series I wait to see. Bringing in 'human appearing Cylons' (and I hope Callum Keith Rennie's character gets to stick around) is an obvious cheat and money saving device but at least the Galactica does look genuinely old and low-tech, unlike the titular ship in Enterprise where you can feel the designers champing at the bit to be flashy. And considering nothing happens in the mini-series except everyone who's not on Galactica gets killed by the Cylons (and a few dozen rabid fanboys have coronaries) it's a surprisingly uplifting experience. This is generally down to it's superb cast (especially Edward James Olmos, the new Adama). Whether they necessarily have great parts to play we'll have to wait and see, Baltar is a nice mix of arrogance, cowardice and intelligence, but Starbuck is little more than a butch dyke who isn't into girls and Apollo a rich kid with an attitude problem towards his father. But there's plenty of time for this to change, and things might just get better...
And while we're at it, could we have a bit more variety than that same Canadian forest outside Ottawa or wherever it is that they land in every week? This week they were supposed to be going to the planet that the Asgard mine for the metal they use to build their ships. Strangely, this planet looks suspiciously like a forest in Canada. When the Stargate: Atlantis crew decided to check out a nearby world, it too looked remarkably like a densely wooded area somewhere north of the United States. If you're getting tax breaks from filming there, couldn't you use the money to go a bit further afield?
Sky One have also shown the new Battlestar Galactica mini-series, as a prelude to the proper series next week. I was impressed, it was a lot better than it had any right to be. I was slightly distracted by the highly edible James Callis (the photos really don't do him justice). I also kept thinking that I've seen him somewhere before but I suppose all British actors in American TV shows seem the same after you see enough of them. Playing Baltar he does therefore fall in to one of the two traps of British actors, he's playing a baddy. However, the first thirty minutes or so prove that he's not in the second stereotype of being sexually repressed in any way.
As to the changes between this and the original, though I liked some aspects of the original I was never in love with it, so I don't particularly mind that Starbuck is now a Y-chromosome-free character, just so long as there isn't some ridiculous sexual tension written in between her and Apollo. I must admit that I do regret the loss of the storyline from the original that the Cylons were created by the devil, but as this show is rebooting from scratch it would hardly be surprising if they repeated it again. But how they're going to contrive to keep the Cylons in the game after escaping them in the mini-series I wait to see. Bringing in 'human appearing Cylons' (and I hope Callum Keith Rennie's character gets to stick around) is an obvious cheat and money saving device but at least the Galactica does look genuinely old and low-tech, unlike the titular ship in Enterprise where you can feel the designers champing at the bit to be flashy. And considering nothing happens in the mini-series except everyone who's not on Galactica gets killed by the Cylons (and a few dozen rabid fanboys have coronaries) it's a surprisingly uplifting experience. This is generally down to it's superb cast (especially Edward James Olmos, the new Adama). Whether they necessarily have great parts to play we'll have to wait and see, Baltar is a nice mix of arrogance, cowardice and intelligence, but Starbuck is little more than a butch dyke who isn't into girls and Apollo a rich kid with an attitude problem towards his father. But there's plenty of time for this to change, and things might just get better...
