In the US: Fridays, 10/9c, Sci-Fi
In the UK: Tuesdays, 9pm, Sky One. Starts 15th April
It’s easy to have a love-hate relationship with Battlestar Galactica. On the one hand, if you ever need to cite an example of well executed adult science-fiction, all you have to do is say "Battlestar Galactica" and you’re sorted. Space-faring humanity lives on 12 colony planets, fearing only the return of their own robotic creations, the cylons, who’ve been quiet for the 40 years since their war of independence. The robots come back – looking like humans and convinced they’re God’s new favourites, endowed with souls – and nuke the hell out of the colonies, leaving just a few tens of thousands of survivors who manage to escape, protected by the one surviving military vessel of note, Galactica.
So far, so bleak. And indeed, much of the first season is unrelentingly bleak, as humanity tries to work out how to get food, water and other necessary supplies, all the while chased by the unresting, unrelenting legions of cylons trying to exterminate them once and for all as they try to find the missing 13th colony – Earth.
But if there’s one watchword that defines the series, it’s change. Everything changes. Relationships between people change. Characters die. New characters appear. The whole format changes, with another Battlestar appearing, the humans finding a new world to live on. and characters suddenly finding out that they are in fact cylons themselves.
And not all of these changes have been for the good. In particular, BSG began to suffer from "up its own arse" syndrome. Weighed down by its own mythos and intricacies, it stopped being an accessible metaphor for war and terrorism and became more than a little daft at times. When it was good, it was very, very good, but when it was bad, it was horrid.
So what’s season four – the final season, even though it’s been cut in half – going to be like?
Continue reading “Review: Battlestar Galactica 4×1-4×2”
