A Caprica :( thread

[szycag]

This show is up on Netflix now for anyone that didn't catch it on the effing terrible network that aired it.

If you don't know anything about it, it's the prequel to the Battlestar Galactica reboot. It tells the story of how the Cylons and their AI came into being with lots of winding well-written, well-acted plot lines (Eric Stoltz, the proto-Marty McFly!) That it's more widely available now just rubs it in more that it got axed. They couldn't have managed even one more season? The scriptwriting was just as good as Galactica but I guess the characters were a departure from Adama and crew. And maybe they should have blown their load with the Cylon stuff sooner. But that's just being apologetic for a show on a doomed network that would rather juggle wrestling shows around on the schedule than market it properly. Everything it had to offer wasn't what I expected coming in, and that's what I liked about it. Takes more from William Gibson than anything, without taking it overboard. I guess now I know how Firefly people feel.

[brentsg]

I enjoyed the show, but I was behind (DVR) and knew it was canceled before I got to the really good stuff.

[Raytrace]

I have watched through BSG - all episodes including webisodes, Razor and The Plan twice and I utterly love it - I enjoyed Caprica a bit and I do wish it had continued but some of the middle episodes were a bit wandering and aimless or something, still it's a tonne better than a lot of other shows on TV. I LOVED the final scene with the camouflage proto Cylons in the Pyramid Stadium, and also the possibly Robocop referencing scene with the Cylon in the boardroom was amazing. I do find it difficult to take though that the AI seed of the Cylons is that whingeing emo brat though

Hopefully Blood And Chrome will be amazing, and I would at least like some kinda 'The Plan' style finishing up episode to be made of Caprica, but it is doubtful :/

[Moniker]

I haven't watched this yet. Is there a somewhat satisfying story arc as-is? Like, I didn't mind watching Deadwood despite its abrupt cancellation, because each season was more-or-less self-contained. Or is it more like post-Laura Twin Peaks, and just kinda pisses you off with a cliffhanger?

[szycag]

You will be left hanging at the last episode pretty badly. There wasn't time to tie stuff up, there was just the one season. They even show some stuff that was to happen in later seasons at the end in a bunch of clips. What's there still deserves to be watched though, I think anyone reading this thread will appreciate New Cap City and stuff like that.

[GaijinPunch]

Aren't they going to do a series in the middle, w/ the young Adama?

[brentsg]

Aren't they going to do a series in the middle, w/ the young Adama?

Yeah, Blood and Chrome or something like that.

I don't want anyone to think Caprica was amazing or anything, but it was frustrating if you stuck with the season and right as it was really starting to become worthwhile it was canceled. It was even more frustrating that the idiots at that network that doesn't deserve to be named weren't even planning to air the final 5 episodes in the USA. Eventually they did air them in rapid-fire mode, but I think it was due to complaints. This caused a gap between October and January for the final, and arguably best material.

There was another back-drop here for people who had purchased a season pass on iTunes. Since these were held hostage in the USA, the USA iTunes store could not make them available. Once they did finally air them (in a bizarre way), it took a lot of complaints and time before they were then made available to finish out the pre-paid iTunes season.

Edit: i remembered the other thing that pissed me off. In that October thru January gap, they were selling the un-aired episodes on DVD.

[Raytrace]

'All of this has happened before, and it will happen again...'

[SuperPang]

I felt I was forcing myself through most of Caprica. It was all a bit slow and miserable. I didn't like the main jail bait characters, in fact there was no one I really gave a stuff about. No standout performances. The show was never quite sure who it's target audience was. The nods to BSG were too few and far between. It didn't feel like the same universe. The CGI was quality but there was rarely any action. Ironically it only started to get interesting towards the end. The 30 second montage at the end was the best part of the whole thing.

[GaijinPunch]

So is there anything even close to BSG's calibur on the horizon (other than Blood & Chrome)?

[brentsg]

I think the best bet would be some type of head injury so you could watch BSG again without remembering the secrets.

Spending several hours re-reading all of Skykid's posts might have a similar effect.

[Raytrace]

I felt I was forcing myself through most of Caprica. It was all a bit slow and miserable. I didn't like the main jail bait characters, in fact there was no one I really gave a stuff about. No standout performances. The show was never quite sure who it's target audience was. The nods to BSG were too few and far between. It didn't feel like the same universe. The CGI was quality but there was rarely any action. Ironically it only started to get interesting towards the end. The 30 second montage at the end was the best part of the whole thing.

Connor from BSG's character in it was ok -

I also liked when they spoke Greek all the time though one thing I have to say

'WHERE TEH F ARE ADAMA'S TATTOOS?'

[Obiwanshinobi]

Dunno, man. Star Trek filled me with a great biase against American space opera TV shows. Even James Bond was more likeable than that. I guess the uniforms were too much for me.
Kind of like I've never reconciled myself to the American long johns wearing superheroes (save the Punisher, who is more of an antihero).

[Raytrace]

well seriously you should watch the newer BSG because it is nothing like original BSG/Buck Rogers etc. (although I do love original BSG and Buck Rogers also :p)

[Mortificator]

I think it'd be cool if the original Galactica series had its FX redone, like with classic Trek. The endless recycling of the same few starfighter shots are the only really dreadful parts of that series.

[GaijinPunch]

Dunno, man. Star Trek filled me with a great biase against American space opera TV shows.

I know you guys may take my geek membership away, but I've never watched a single episode of Star Trek, and I think I've only seen 4 of the movies (2 and 3 in the theatres, the whale one on video, and the one where Picard meets Kirk).

EDIT: I think I gave Enterprise a fair go b/c I was hoping to see that chicks nips but that didn't happen.

[Raytrace]

I think it'd be cool if the original Galactica series had its FX redone, like with classic Trek. The endless recycling of the same few starfighter shots are the only really dreadful parts of that series.

yep while I love the original BSGs - the one thing that kinda annoys me is when people try to be harder core than though and go 'oh I hate this and that cause there's too much CG' etc. While I love good models, it is only bad CG which is a problem, and the far more dynamic movement which is achievable through polygonal means is a good thing, while in general I am pretty old skool, that sortof ridiculous luddite for the sake of it stuff I find kinda ridic...

[emphatic]

I know you guys may take my geek membership away, but I've never watched a single episode of Star Trek, and I think I've only seen 4 of the movies (2 and 3 in the theatres, the whale one on video, and the one where Picard meets Kirk).

The original series has some great moments: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1eFdUSnaQM

+ Kirk somehow always manage to make out with some hot alien.

[GaijinPunch]

Indeed he does

[szycag]

The show would have gotten better over time it seems like, just by virtue of what the plot would have been focusing on as the Cylon war progressed. Like Brent said, the final few episodes were the best. A lot of the time was spent on slow character development and dialogue, but that's a staple for modern television it seems like. Too little too late, but build up can be a good thing too, it's just that the guys in the revenue department are pointing at the clock. I think it was hard to get behind anyone in the show too, everyone was flawed and manipulative, but I can see how that too is by design. I just miss a character like Adama who makes mistakes but in the end shows a desire to find higher ground. Amanda Greystone got to be like nails on a chalkboard after a while.

[Deca]

I haven't watched this yet. Is there a somewhat satisfying story arc as-is? Like, I didn't mind watching Deadwood despite its abrupt cancellation, because each season was more-or-less self-contained. Or is it more like post-Laura Twin Peaks, and just kinda pisses you off with a cliffhanger?

I dunno man, even knowing Twin Peaks was supposed to have another season I thought the ending was pretty damn good. It almost made up for all that awful crap between the end of the Laura arc and beginning of the Black Lodge stuff proper.

[DEL]

I used a voucher to buy the feature length pilot of Caprica when it came out and left it there. It was about as sci-fi as desperate housewives. Marty McFly and the emo girl left me comatose and I feared the same fate for this series as the modern BG series -> caught up in personal relationships, religion and politics.
For these reasons I still prefer the 1979 original series. Kitsch as it was, it had the urgency, the sci-fi, John Colicos as Baltar and a Starbuck that I liked.
No surprise that my avatar has been an original cylon for quite a while.

[GaijinPunch]

same fate for this series as the modern BG series -> caught up in personal relationships, religion and politics.

You mean what made BSG so good?

[szycag]

I like em both for what they are

[DEL]

GaijinPunch wrote;

You mean what made BSG so good?

^Its all subjective and I'm happy that you liked their over-indulgence in those themes.
I guess what I'm saying is that TV shows and film reflect the times in which they are made. So if an outsider were to look in and decide which time period they would rather live in based on watching those series......which would they choose?

[GaijinPunch]

I just liked the way it dealt with social issues, and the obstacles they had to climb, like food, water, and planets were simply the setting. It's like the movie Contact. Sure, it's about finally reaching an alien civilization, but the real shit storm is how the assholes (us) behave. RIP Carl.

[blackoak]

I liked the survival stuff in seasons 1-2, but the politics and "social issues" stuff was very poorly written imo. Very little critical thinking or new ideas, just the same tired homilies about democracy, the people, rights, etc etc etc... Later the show just distintegrated into even more poorly thought out religious/mystical stuff, until it became a show I watched for laughs--YOU ARE THE HARBINGER OF DEATH KARA THRACE!!! and all the dramatic posturing in s3/4 made for deep, deep laughs. It was no revelation when I heard the writers admit they were just making things up from week to week...

Critically, my main problem is with BSG even being called sci-fi and the false flag it raises thereby. I mean, my idea of good science fiction, really heady stuff that at least ATTEMPTS to escape War of the Worlds level anthropomorphisms and present-day value judgments is Stanislaw Lem. I've had enough predictable "sci fi character dramas" for a lifetime... trailer posters with faces emerging nobly from the darkness etc... bring on the Fiasco/Solaris/His Master's Voice. Or at least something like the original Alien, in which the concept itself takes center stage rather than it being some inane character drama about Ripley.

[Obiwanshinobi]

When I was a child, I thought I liked SF (and "hard" SF), but nowadays I hear self proclaimed SF fans calling "hard SF" everything with spaceships and explosions in space. Nothing wrong with space opera cheese, but the SF label is being commonly abused. Some time ago I read a volume and a half of that Hyperion cycle and the reek of exhumation coupled with ham-fisted writing ultimately put me off. It's The X Files level of SF as far as I can tell.