BSG JFC
Mar 06 2009, 22:10 EST [updated Mar 06 2009, 23:33 EST]
Two minutes into the 3rd-to-last episode [pen-penultimate?] of Battle Star Galactica and it was all exposition. It is a hoary fact of writing that when you have to have a character look at the camera and explain things you have failed.

I only expect it to get worse; Too many threads, not enough time left. Theoretically they planned out the entire plot arc from day one. Realistically that can't be true or at least can't be accomplished in any sane way.

I liked the show in the beginning. Now I just watch because train wrecks are their own kind of fun.

[+15 minutes] Hey, there is a new council. The old one might have been gunned down in a massacre last week but the new one (which was assembled somehow between episodes) has complaints about air quality. Oh, and they want a neglected character to have a say because that would be neat.

[+18 minutes] And let's kill off a 2nd tier personality because that solves that.

[+23] The writers give up on "it has happened before and it will happen again" by having the protagonists explain (to the camera) that it has kinda happened once before and it doesn't have to happen again.

[+28] The previous expositional all-star is now hooked up to the deus-ex-machina machine .. and manages to further explain things, despite being in a coma. Soap operas aren't this bad.

[+35] A pause and a nod to the fandom shippers.

[+44] 2nd tier character has been reintroduced. He's getting a bit uppity and genocidal. This smells a little bit like plot (congrats!).

[+50] Ooh, a plotlike betrayal. I'm not sure how stealing a baby helps, but they have two episodes left to explain it.

[+55] Good and convincing character bit. Some minor plot.

[+57] .. and scene.

If the final two episodes solely consist of exposition it won't tie everything together. This was evident a couple years ago so I have no idea what the writers were thinking.

0.10 seconds
jackdied.com 2003-2007