The comments on the last entry are turning into a mishmash of discussion of the show in general while trying to avoid spoilers and some tiptoing around the actual season finale discussion. I sent Weezie an email last night with more discussion but after some thought I want to have it as a blog discussion so others can participate. So I'm going to use a cut here and post my email after the cut. Consider this entire post and comment thread to be spoiler marked if haven't watched all of both seasons of Galactica.
(Reminder, this was all originally written as an email to Weezie. It's basically a response to Weezie's second comment - about expecting one of the character changes. I also edited a character name misspelling that I didn't catch in my original email)
So I'm guessing you're talking about Callie hooking up with Chief Tyrol as the change you'd been waiting for? I was fine with that, was expecting it to happen for a while as well. Ever since Tyrol hashed things out with Helo it's been time for Callie to make a move.
Now, it would have been MUCH more interesting to see Tyrol decide whether take a chance on Callie under military hierarchy - after he got busted for messing with a superior officer he would switch gears to a direct report. So in that sense I'm a little disappointed at a missed opportunity, but no big deal.
So as for changes I thought were unsupported the absolute biggest one is Starbuck becoming some sort of Russian tent-wife character. It's out of character for her to muster out and become a civilian, it's out of character for her to just tool around the surface, seeming idle except for trying to take care of her man. Ugh. There was some sort of implied fight between her and Apollo, so perhaps they will later explain that, but I generally won't buy it. She wouldn't have gone groundside until forced to, and even if she pissed Lee off, she should be stationed on Galactica.
Having her lead the resistance will be interesting - but they could have gotten the exact same thing by having her visiting the surface on leave, and not had any dissonance on her character.
I don't think it's in character for Tyrol to be a union organizer. I don't have a major issue with him being on-planet although I'd contend he should be part of Adama's skeleton staff. He's already escaped punishment once because he was too critical to replace, why wasn't that true now? But perhaps Callie's pregnancy forced him dirtside . . . I'd give them benefit of the doubt on this if he was my worst objection.
Much of the same is true of Gaeta turning civilian and working for Baltar (he's what - some sort of Chief of Staff now?) He had seemed to be disillusioned with Baltar over recent episodes, and seemed fiercely loyal to Adama. OTOH, he had expressed some dislike of being in the military, so maybe he'd take the out.
I think it's impossible that Baltar wouldn't have taken a more substantial revenge on Rosslyn.
In general I think they had built a FASCINATING crisis point up with the Rosslyn rigging the election and being caught by Gaeta & Adama. Rosslyn was in the wrong, but at the same time knew the survival of the Fleet was at stake. Dualla and Tigh were both guilty of complicity and betraying everything they fight for - it was a very charged complex situation. Which they then threw away to jump ahead a year. Dualla seemed to escape any sort of censure. That post I linked to described Season 2 BSG as "a show that constantly walks right up to the line, looks at it, looks at the viewer, and backs away again." I think the election is exactly that. They walked up to the line, looked at it, and backed away from addressing what happened in any meaningful way. Exactly the same way they backed away from the line after setting Cain and Adama at each other's throats.
Even if they go back and revisit the aftermath next season it won't be as powerful. I like the resistance idea somewhat (although it seems a lot like a rehash of the Caprica storyline), but I think they rushed through a powerful and unique plot to set up boilerplate Sci-Fi plot trope #38 - human resistance versus alien occupation. Hang on, I think Tom Cruise and the Scientologist are on line one with that story. Oh, and don't forget it's fused with pulp boilerplate #15 - Mars Needs Women!
(Reminder, this was all originally written as an email to Weezie. It's basically a response to Weezie's second comment - about expecting one of the character changes. I also edited a character name misspelling that I didn't catch in my original email)
So I'm guessing you're talking about Callie hooking up with Chief Tyrol as the change you'd been waiting for? I was fine with that, was expecting it to happen for a while as well. Ever since Tyrol hashed things out with Helo it's been time for Callie to make a move.
Now, it would have been MUCH more interesting to see Tyrol decide whether take a chance on Callie under military hierarchy - after he got busted for messing with a superior officer he would switch gears to a direct report. So in that sense I'm a little disappointed at a missed opportunity, but no big deal.
So as for changes I thought were unsupported the absolute biggest one is Starbuck becoming some sort of Russian tent-wife character. It's out of character for her to muster out and become a civilian, it's out of character for her to just tool around the surface, seeming idle except for trying to take care of her man. Ugh. There was some sort of implied fight between her and Apollo, so perhaps they will later explain that, but I generally won't buy it. She wouldn't have gone groundside until forced to, and even if she pissed Lee off, she should be stationed on Galactica.
Having her lead the resistance will be interesting - but they could have gotten the exact same thing by having her visiting the surface on leave, and not had any dissonance on her character.
I don't think it's in character for Tyrol to be a union organizer. I don't have a major issue with him being on-planet although I'd contend he should be part of Adama's skeleton staff. He's already escaped punishment once because he was too critical to replace, why wasn't that true now? But perhaps Callie's pregnancy forced him dirtside . . . I'd give them benefit of the doubt on this if he was my worst objection.
Much of the same is true of Gaeta turning civilian and working for Baltar (he's what - some sort of Chief of Staff now?) He had seemed to be disillusioned with Baltar over recent episodes, and seemed fiercely loyal to Adama. OTOH, he had expressed some dislike of being in the military, so maybe he'd take the out.
I think it's impossible that Baltar wouldn't have taken a more substantial revenge on Rosslyn.
In general I think they had built a FASCINATING crisis point up with the Rosslyn rigging the election and being caught by Gaeta & Adama. Rosslyn was in the wrong, but at the same time knew the survival of the Fleet was at stake. Dualla and Tigh were both guilty of complicity and betraying everything they fight for - it was a very charged complex situation. Which they then threw away to jump ahead a year. Dualla seemed to escape any sort of censure. That post I linked to described Season 2 BSG as "a show that constantly walks right up to the line, looks at it, looks at the viewer, and backs away again." I think the election is exactly that. They walked up to the line, looked at it, and backed away from addressing what happened in any meaningful way. Exactly the same way they backed away from the line after setting Cain and Adama at each other's throats.
Even if they go back and revisit the aftermath next season it won't be as powerful. I like the resistance idea somewhat (although it seems a lot like a rehash of the Caprica storyline), but I think they rushed through a powerful and unique plot to set up boilerplate Sci-Fi plot trope #38 - human resistance versus alien occupation. Hang on, I think Tom Cruise and the Scientologist are on line one with that story. Oh, and don't forget it's fused with pulp boilerplate #15 - Mars Needs Women!