I felt disappointed or underwhelmed by it - which seems to be a trend for me on BSG - I pretty much loathed the finale last season.
I never liked the Admiral Cain storyline, but accepted that her character had to be built that way since it was based on the old show. This did nothing to illuminate for me the bad command choices she made. I found her transformation from the first few scenes we see her in to the point where she shoots her XO in the head - the same XO she had been recently joking with and who invited her to join them on vacation- unconvincing. It made no sense to me. Yet there must have been a reason why this woman was an Admiral in the first place, some personal bravery she had exhibited or some brilliant tactical successes. Unless she had just served her time and it was bureaucracy. But that is hard to believe with her offensive, difficult personality. She would have made too many enemies in the course of her career.
And, moreover, the XO was correct. All of the command decision she made from that point out were foolish. Knowing it is a trap and fighting anyway - and then losing half your fighting capacity? And then making more and more desperate choices based on the hole in the fighting force that that left, with no one in your force able to address you with anything like honesty. For what point? If she had a deathwish, we should have been shown it.
So I don't accept the premise that this is the effect of war on human beings. I think that is a ridiculous, overly broad, stereotypical, anti-war POV. I do accept that this is the effect of war on an already twisted personality, who is a committed to a course of making bad command decisions and is thus falling into a darker and darker hole because of it. For contrast, the effect of war on both Tigh and Admiral Adama has been entirely different. Far more clarifying. (That's Tigh before we find out that he is a cylon - who knows what will happen to him now.) And that's been true of Roslin as well. All of them have grown positively over the course of the war. Lee, well, that's been a more mixed bag. He doesn't have his father's stones, and most of the time, his father's correct instincts, and I think that has been haunting him all his life.
Moreover, I found the fact that he was twice willing in about 5 minutes to sacrifice Kara - Kara of all people, given her importance to him personally and to the fighting force where she was so invaluable - to be odd, callow, somewhat stupid and also unbelievable, given his character. And it kind of justified that remark about having been tossed the keys to an expensive new car by his father.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2007-11-25 05:21 pm (UTC)I never liked the Admiral Cain storyline, but accepted that her character had to be built that way since it was based on the old show. This did nothing to illuminate for me the bad command choices she made. I found her transformation from the first few scenes we see her in to the point where she shoots her XO in the head - the same XO she had been recently joking with and who invited her to join them on vacation- unconvincing. It made no sense to me. Yet there must have been a reason why this woman was an Admiral in the first place, some personal bravery she had exhibited or some brilliant tactical successes. Unless she had just served her time and it was bureaucracy. But that is hard to believe with her offensive, difficult personality. She would have made too many enemies in the course of her career.
And, moreover, the XO was correct. All of the command decision she made from that point out were foolish. Knowing it is a trap and fighting anyway - and then losing half your fighting capacity? And then making more and more desperate choices based on the hole in the fighting force that that left, with no one in your force able to address you with anything like honesty. For what point? If she had a deathwish, we should have been shown it.
So I don't accept the premise that this is the effect of war on human beings. I think that is a ridiculous, overly broad, stereotypical, anti-war POV. I do accept that this is the effect of war on an already twisted personality, who is a committed to a course of making bad command decisions and is thus falling into a darker and darker hole because of it. For contrast, the effect of war on both Tigh and Admiral Adama has been entirely different. Far more clarifying. (That's Tigh before we find out that he is a cylon - who knows what will happen to him now.) And that's been true of Roslin as well. All of them have grown positively over the course of the war. Lee, well, that's been a more mixed bag. He doesn't have his father's stones, and most of the time, his father's correct instincts, and I think that has been haunting him all his life.
Moreover, I found the fact that he was twice willing in about 5 minutes to sacrifice Kara - Kara of all people, given her importance to him personally and to the fighting force where she was so invaluable - to be odd, callow, somewhat stupid and also unbelievable, given his character. And it kind of justified that remark about having been tossed the keys to an expensive new car by his father.