Galactica
With the Galactica premier less than 2 hours away in my time zone, I realized I never posted my looney theory about the identity of the final Cylon, so I’m going to do that now (just in case it’s revealed tonight). I should note that this is really “out-there”, and I don’t actually think this person will be the final Cylon. It’s more like, “I think it could be interesting IF…” thing.
Soooo….
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… spoiler space …
… (I mean, it’s not a spoiler, but…) …
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I think it’d be interesting IF it were Kara’s mother. It’d make Kara a hybrid, which would explain things like why Kara’s “special”, why she has a destiny, why she drew the mandala, why she could “feel” the path to Earth, etc., and possibly why Leoben is obsessed with her (if he’s somehow drawn to her, due to her hybrid-ness (although the “significant seven” Cylons don’t seem able to recognize the final five, so why would they be drawn to a hybrid?))… all without Kara herself being a Cylon.
So, that’s my looney theory. 
I have several equally looney theories about Lost and Wheel of Time, if anyone were curious. 
I also noticed the D’Anna stated that the final Cylon wasn’t in the fleet? But she didn’t say WHEN. “Now” is assumed, but what if she were telling a lie of omission? “The 5th isn’t in the Colonial fleet — or at least was apart from it for a really long time…” (So perhaps it’s someone who came over from the Pegasus?) *shrug* Or, “The 5th Cylon isn’t part of the fleet — because he/she feels alienated…”
Otherwise, the only legitimate ideas I can come up with aren’t very original: Gaeta, as it would tie in with his participation in the resistance, and Dualla, as it would tie in with her involvement with Lee. I sincerely hope it is NOT Baltar or Roslin (but especially Baltar), as I think their stories are a lot more meaningful if they are human.
I do hope it’s a woman.
For shame!
One of my pet peeves is when people don’t return their shopping carts to a store’s designated cart return area. It’s so lazy and inconsiderate. Is it really THAT much effort to walk a few extra steps to put the cart away? Do people really not care that the cart, at best, is clogging up the parking lot by taking up a space, and at worst, could damage someone’s car? Not to mention that having the stores’ employees wander around the parking lots gathering carts is time that the employees could be spending doing other, more constructive things, like stocking merchandise, helping customers, etc. In other words, this costs the stores money, which in turn gets passed on to the consumers.
The other day, Mr. Entity and I were in a parking lot that had been frequented by several extremely lazy people. I decided it was time for a public shaming, of sorts, so I whipped out my camera phone. Not that any of these people will read this, of course, but going to the effort of annotating the pictures and posting them online has given me a thrill of righteous indignation.
I mean, really! In two pictures, the cart is literally TWO parking spaces away! In another, there are at least two cart returns nearby! Truly, these acts of laziness are a sight to see.
Heroes: I’ve got a theory… (episode 303)
Spoilers for Episode 303:
Question/Issue: If Tranessica were “created” (presumably in a lab), why would a creation that valuable be raised by the likes of Hal Sanders?
Possible Answer (that leads to more questions): It was a nature vs. nurture experiment. Would clones, with the same genetic makeup but in different circumstances, manifest the same superpowers? Would the circumstances themselves matter? Is it a coincidence that someone who grew up around physical abuse has great strength as a superpower?
Stargate Universe: Are you kidding me?
This is old news, but I found a page online that supposedly lists the character descriptions for Universe. I don’t know if this is authentic, but if it is, it is horrific.
http://stargate-sg1-solutions.com/blog/?p=1619
Character Breakdowns, Stargate Universe 03/09/08
Colonel Everett Young. 40’s handsome, capable, former SG team leader. Like the Jack O’Neill of ten years ago, but Young’s edges have tended to sharpen over time. He requested permission to serve the remainder of his commission on Earth upon marrying his wife, Hailey, two years ago, but for now he’s temporary commander of a secret off world base. The loss of two members of his team several years ago has taught him never to take anything for granted, and be prepared for anything. He stays on top of his team so they stay alive.
Tamara Johanson. 20-25. SGC Field medic, Captain grade. Off world experience. Beautiful, tough, smart, capable. Paramedic level training. Able to triage serious injury. Modest background. Dreamed of being a doctor but couldn’t afford medical school and the Air Force was her best option. She ends up being the most medically inclined person on the ship but is overwhelmed by the lack of knowledge and experience treating seriously wounded and ill patients. She also lacks the medicine and supplies and has to make do.
Cloe Carpenter. 20 ish. Stunning and sexy. Daughter of a U.S. Senator. Silver spoon upbringing and a little spoiled but not stupid either. Politically and socially savvy. Dreams of following in her father’s footsteps but for now she’s a bit of a party girl in her first year at an Ivy League school. Her father’s tragic death and the dire circumstances of being trapped on a spaceship seriously tests her character.
Eli Hitchcock. 20-25. Total slacker. Utter genius. Mathematics, computers, anything he puts his mind to. Acerbic sense of humor. A social outcast. Comes from a broken home. Lacks confidence because his true intelligence has never really been recognized like Matt Damon’s character from Good Will Hunting with a little Jack Black thrown in.
Lt. Jared Nash. 20-25. Junior SGC team member. Officer material but green and rough around the edges. Every teenage girl’s fantasy. Like a college quarterback thrown into his first pro game, he is thrust into the role of leader well before he’s ready for the responsibility and must learn to take command, earn respect through action, and manage the diverse personalities on the ship to keep everyone alive. Like Jason Bourne, he is skilled and well-trained but mentally unprepared for the urgency of the situation.
Ron “Psycho” Stasiak. 20. Marine. Big, strong, silent. You want him on your side. You don’t want him mad at you. Lacks control over his temper in non combat situations. His emotional expression ranges from sarcasm to anger. His past is a mystery but it’s clear something dark formed the hard shell around him. Yet, there must also be some moral center because otherwise he’d kill everyone around him. Think Eric Bana’s character “Hoot” in Blackhawk Down. Adam Baldwin at 20 could play him.
Geez, where to begin. The first character, the one in his 40s, will basically be a parent chaperoning a bunch of kids? *eyeroll* I could understand 1 or 2 of them being young (e.g. taking some recruits on a training mission with some mentors, something going wrong, etc.), but ALL of them? The characters also sound like stereotypes: the sorority girl, the male slacker genius, etc. Would it be too much to ask that they shake things up a little? Like if they HAVE to have a slacker genius, that it be female, for once? Or have the guy be the spoiled brat? I am also offended that 100% of the women have “beautiful” and “sexy” as their character requirements, but only 1 out of 4 of the guys do. (However, one of the guys is described as “Every teenage girl’s fantasy”, so I suppose that physical attractiveness is implied.)
This is not to say that I am opposed to trying to attract younger fans to Stargate. It’s probably good long-term business for Stargate to hook fans when they’re young, so they can grow up (sort of) with the show. Also, I am not opposed to having some younger characters on the show, for variety. But given the level of technical and military expertise that is needed to work on a Stargate mission, and given the level of clearance that someone would need to work on a program like Stargate, young people who are qualified to work on the team should be somewhat rare. Will the mission that strands these characters consist of ALL of the young people in the ENTIRE Stargate program? Also, as Mr. Entity said, this character sounds like Wormhole X-Treme. In 200, they even joked about replacing the main characters with younger versions, and it was portrayed as a really bad idea.
Given the quality of episodes in Season 5 of Atlantis, and given this as a starting point for Universe, I am not excited about the new show at all.
Stargate Atlantis: Tracker (Season 5)
Finally, here’s my review of Tracker!
Given the quality of the previous two episodes Whispers and The Queen, and given the preview of Tracker (Keller gets kidnapped…again[1]?), I had extremely low expectations of this episode.
Anyway, here are some notes I took while I watched the episode.
- While it’s understandable for Sheppard to be surprised that Rodney would volunteer for a humanitarian mission on his day off… in the alternate timeline he experienced in Season 4, alt-Rodney told him that he and Jennifer were in a relationship. So why would Sheppard act surprised, if he should know that Rodney would fall for Jennifer?
- So, Ronon asks why the people on the other planet are sick, and she tells him it’s like an Earth disease, influenza. How does that help Ronon?
- Didn’t we see this episode before? Wasn’t it Missing?
- Did Keller ACTUALLY think she could outrun her captor?
- We’re almost halfway into the episode, and so far, it’s been a lot of walking and chasing. Wow, it’s so exciting and interesting.
- So, Keller has been kidnapped to save the life of a dying child. Again I say, didn’t we see this episode before? Wasn’t it Miller’s Crossing?
- Hmm… a Wraith wandered into the child’s cave. This must be where Ronon shows up. … … … Oh, Keller killed him. My bad.
- Geez, Ronon’s tracking ability borders on a psychic power.
- Umm… Keller is attempting to fight Wraith? With a stick?
I’ll give this one a back-handed compliment: It wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it’d be, and towards the end, it got fun. Granted, the first half of the episode, when Keller and her captor, Kiryk, were en route to their destination, was boring. Once Kiryk started opening up, things got more interesting. Kiryk seemed like he has potential to be interesting, and he and Ronon could’ve had some character growth by teaching him how to be “human” again. But we probably won’t see him any more. Alas.
Some people on Usenet pointed out that given the high rate of kidnapping on these missions, Rodney and Ronon absolutely should not have wandered so far away when Keller was treating her patient in private. They also noted that the Wraith seem to be getting easier and easier to kill, if Keller can take one out (referring to the one she stabbed in the cave). However, as the discussion progressed, someone pointed out that a doctor would know a good spot to drive in the knife.
The Rodney/Ronon/Keller situation was a little interesting, although I think Ronon might be exaggerating his interest in Keller to give Rodney a hard time. The episode could’ve been a little more interesting if, when Keller was trying to break up the fight between Kiryk and Ronon, Ronon had accidentally injured Keller. I know that is kind of a cliche. But during the episode, I had no concern for Keller’s well-being at all. I don’t think Keller should’ve been in mortal danger, but I wish the writers had done something to shake things up a little, like putting the characters’ psyches and relationships with each other in danger. Given that Ronon may have some romantic interest in Keller, that certainly would’ve affected their dynamic.
[1] Amusingly, Jewel Staite complained at Comic-Con about getting kidnapped in the woods for a second time.
Snark Attacks: Heroes 303 (One of Us, One of Them)
This post contains SPOILERS regarding season 3’s episode One of Us, One of Them, which aired in the US on September 29, 2008.
As usual, the real post is in the first comment.
Stargate Atlantis Reviews: Whispers and The Queen
I’ve got (belated) reviews of Whispers and The Queen, and I’m not happy. Since my review of The Queen degenerates into a lengthy rant, I’ll put the bulk of my post in the first comment.
Whispers (507): Not awful, but not great. I was disappointed that the characters fell prey to horror movie cliches, like splitting up, wandering off at the peak of danger, and refusing to follow orders when sternly told to stay inside and lock the door. Also, there was a Pegasus human civilian whom they met upon arrival, he disappeared for a while, showed up later, and then died horribly. How did he survive in the interim? I think it would’ve been funny if the tough solder, Sgt. Dusty Wells (Mr. Entity called her “Rambette”), developed a crush on Dr. Beckett. Imagine him squirming uncomfortably as she hit on him. Heh.
The episode’s biggest flaw was that it was dull.
I have one small gripe: I find it completely out of character that Sheppard didn’t know he had all-female team. My first thought was that Sheppard would’ve noticed all those attractive women in one place. But the more I thought about it, the more it bothered me that Sheppard was ignorant about his teams, in general. First, given the high (government) classification of the Stargate program, there “should” be only a small pool of people to draw from, so it’s not like there’d be a lot of unfamiliar faces. Second, given the various threats that Atlantis faces, it’s important to know who both is and ISN’T supposed to be there; unfamiliar faces, teams, etc., should raise red flags. Ahh well…
The Queen (508): Let me put it to you this way. Mr. Entity, who is much more tolerant of less-than-great episodes than I am, said several times, “This is dumb.”
This episode had numerous problems.
(See the comments for more…)
Snark Attacks: Heroes 301 and 302
[It should go without saying that this post contains SPOILERS about Heroes episodes 301 and 302.]
Maybe I will make “Snark Attacks” a regular “feature” on The Boringest Site. As the inaugural (and perhaps final?) Snark Attacks entry, I present a snarky critique of the premier of Heroes Season 3.
Before I begin, I should clarify something: I don’t dislike the show. I’m not a huge fan of it (I don’t care for its the soap opera aspects and general campiness), but I don’t dislike it. I kid because I care! However, if Mr. Entity didn’t watch it, I would not watch it either.
I should also disclose that I saw episode #1 when it premiered at Comic-Con, so I’ve had all summer to sharpen my snark.
Now, with that out of the way… I’m going to include my snarky review in a comment, to ease the eyes of tag surfers, since this post is really long.
Bloglets
Check out this Daily Show Video.
This is a great example of why I hate partisan politics and so-called “news” shows. So, when Jamie Lynn Spears gets pregnant, her parents are pinheads, but when a Republican politican’s underage daughter gets pregnant, it is a family matter? And Tim Kaine would’ve been less qualified to be a vice presidential candidate, given that he has been governor for more time than Palin and was mayor of a town that is larger than the town Palin was mayor of? Riiiiight.
On the drive home… both Rock 105.3 and 91X were playing the world premier of the new Metallica song on the “Metallica radio network” (ugh). I retreated to the Jack FM station, which played Googoo Dolls’ “Name” (mmm… 90s angst) followed by Poison’s “Unskinny Bop” (mmm… aqua net).
Stargate Atlantis: Cancellation and Season 5 so far
I heard last Friday that SciFi has canceled Stargate Atlantis.
I am definitely not going to say that I am glad the show was canceled, but I am not surprised. Season 4 had some good episodes (Adrift, Lifeline, Be All My Sins Remember’d), some real stinkers (Quarantine and Harmony; IMO, Harmony is runner-up to “worst Atlantis episode ever”, behind season 3’s Irresistible), but overall was bland. Colonel Carter was both underused and misused: she was hardly there, and when she was, rather than being the brilliant scientist we loved from SG1, she was a bureaucrat. Seeing the writers treat the charater this way was very disappointing. The overall quality of the season left me with a feeling of uncertainty at each new episode (would it be good??), rather one of feeling of excitement.
Season 5 didn’t get off to a great start. First, the aforementioned Col. Carter is unceremoniously dismissed. Sure, Amanda Tapping’s web series Sanctuary got picked up by SciFi, making her unavailable for Atlantis, but that didn’t mean the writers had to make the character leave in such a disrespectful manner. Carter’s exit from the “Stargateverse” deserved fanfare, trumpets, a ticket-tape parade, a 21-Jaffa-staff-weapon salute…the works.
And then there was also the Weir/Higginson situation.
In short, the past two seasons, the writers have been on cruise control with rehashed and scifi-cliche storylines (e.g. The Seed, discussed below), and they have not treated many of the characters with respect. Cancellation is not a surprise.
Regarding the episodes themselves, Search and Rescue was good, The Seed was cliched and awful (wow, an alien parasite invades a character we’ve barely met? oh, the drama and originality…), Broken Ties was decent but pointless, and The Daedalus Variations had potential to be interesting but ended up falling flat. Given that there was no concern whether the characters would come back, they should have written something far more interesting than…whether or not the characters would come back. For example, did they do anything interesting while they were lost? Since it was one of the better episodes of the season so far, what does that tell you?
Ghost in the Machine was pretty good, but it definitely had flaws. The Replicators’ threat of sinking the city if the humans didn’t cooperate was stupid. Surely the Replicators knew that if the humans die, the humans couldn’t help them…right? (Right?) I also, in general, dislike the scifi cliche of how entities possessing computers end up displaying text on the screen. Why do the letters show up one by one in a terminal-style font? Do they invoke a text editor and then “type” into it? Why not just manipulate the pixels directly, instantly showing a screenful of information, while, say, displaying their message in a flowing Edwardian script? Nevermind; that is a discussion for another time. The best part of the episode was how Michelle Morgan, who previously played the Replicator character “FRAN”, portrayed Repli-Weir. She did an excellent job of imitating Torri Higginson’s Weir’s body language and vocal style. Also, since Higginson was not going to be back as Weir, the reason for Weir’s appearing as Fran made sense and was a clever idea.
I have one major grievance with that episode. I am getting really, really sick of the following conversation template:
*crisis occurs; team is about to meet their doom*
Ronon/Sheppard/Teyla: Rodney, figure out what’s wrong or we’re all dead!
Rodney: I’m working on it! Just give me a minute!
Ro-Shep-Tey: We don’t have a minute! Figure it out now! My yelling at you will force you to think faster!
That behavior was understandable in season 1: after all, the characters were in crises and were panicing, but now, it’s just old. And annoying.
The latest episode, The Shrine, obviously brought back memories of season 3’s Tao of Rodney, as it pretty much used the same formula: Rodney, the most arrogant and inconsiderate person on the expedition, gets an affliction which, at first, causes a personality change that is amusing but will ultimately kill him, and along the way, everyone realizes how much they care about each other. I went into both episodes not expecting them to be good, and both times, I was pleasantly surprised. Regarding The Shrine, seeing Rodney and Jeannie together is always fun, and Rodney, Jeannie, Sheppard, and Keller did a great job presenting a dramatic and emotional situation. (I was getting a bit misty-eyed towards the end, even though I expected a Star Trek ending.) My only serious complaint is that Zelenka needed to be in the episode more. I mean, if Rodney is going off to have one final day with the important people in his life, Zelenka should be there. And it would’ve provided a great “Rodney moment” at the Shrine, after he gained lucidity: he could’ve made a snarky comment about why, out of all the people in Atlantis, they thought they should bring Zelenka?
