Today's required reading

[yendi]

Emma Bull on the new Battlestar Galactica and female geeks.

Note that I've yet to watch the series, and have no opinion about it. But it's a damned fine essay on its own.

Comments

[amokk]

Good article, and I haven't seen it, either. No desire to, either.

[yendi]

I'd heard enough good stuff about it (aside from this one article) that I'd been interested, but short of someone gifting me with the DVDs, I'm not likely to start on it anytime soon, as I don't like jumping on board mid-series.

[amokk]

I don't like trying to jump in mid-season either. You always miss something. And the last DVD series I bought was Rescue Me, and I just don't buy a lot of scifi, so someone else would have to get it for me to watch.

[litch.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

Gee she found evidence to support her pet axe grinding. Her reaction says a lot more about her than about the series. The fact that she is still stuck there and unable to rise above it.

Increadibly hot women exist, they have an inordinate amount of power in human society because of their looks and an intelligent species is not going to ignore that power.

I really wonder what she'd make of the Admiral of the pegasus.

[kyburg.livejournal.com]

Hawt, powerful, evil and dead. Got what she deserved, etc.

*sigh* She'd have had more fun with Enterprise.

[yendi]

No one had any fun with Enterprise. Ever.

[montykins.livejournal.com]

No one had any fun with Enterprise. Ever.

I liked the Mirror, Mirror episodes they threw in at the end. The whole series should have been in the evil universe.

Actually, my theory was that they were in the evil universe, but the audience didn't know it. Archer's policies seemed more likely to lead to the Evil Federation, didn't they? The last episode could have involved an official order directing all officers to grow goatees, and then you'd have one of those incomprehensible last-second twists that everybody seems to enjoy so much.

[yendi]

Ha! That would have appeased so many fans. Or at least me.

[litch.livejournal.com]

She was not evil, they pulled her back from that precipice and in the end she was no evil, just hard. Hard to the point of sickness perhaps, but arguably a reasonable reaction to the circumstances she lived in.

[dustyskinandall.livejournal.com]

She also missed out on the fact that Starbuck has about as much sex as the other female characters...

[asim.livejournal.com]

I want to like this article. Goodness knows we need more writing about the horrid condition of fandom (esp. comics) wrt to the "fairer sex". The problem is that she pins a number of good points on a shallow reading of a good miniseries that turns into a great series.

Suffice to say, I only watchdownload 3 pieces of television a week. BSG, the series, is as "feminist"* a work as the first season of VERONICA MARS, and far stronger a work in that regard than the miniseries. I would not waste time/energy on watching a jiggle-fest, period; any weekend of belly dancing will get me that, and with real women, to boot.

To your other comment: I'm also not a "jump in the middle" sort of guy by nature, but it was easy with BSG -- frankly, I've never seen the first season save the last episode (which was/is free online), nor the mini, and don't feel any need to run out and buy/download them. The story is extremely well-contained in that regard.



* For various values of "feminist", of course...

[yendi]

That last is good to know. I'd still rather see the backstory unfold, but I might give it a chance once Tivo space clears up a bit.

[ketzl.livejournal.com]

I love Emma Bull but she's dead wrong about BSG, the best scifi series since Firefly... although, hold on a sec, Firefly's really fantasy isn't it? OK, the best scifi series since Babylon5... well that's not saying that much, I mean I love JMS and loved the series but the acting and dialogue were usually so wooden they could feed an African termite colony for a year. Let's just say it's the best scifi series in a long time.

The thing that really baffles me is that it's a Scifi Channel Original. How could the network that lays out such choice cuts 'Mansquito' and 'Dungeons & Dragons 2: Wrath of the Dragon God' also have given birth to something so deeply intelligent, original and beautiful? It is a mystery to me.

[dustyskinandall.livejournal.com]

I am a feminist and I love the new BSG.

[fiddledragon]

I didn't have time to finish reading Emma Bull's essay...but what I did read...well, I agreed and disagreed. I think that women still have a ways to go in SF/Fantasy - but that it's come a long way. I think that we're there in print media, and IMO, film usually does come in later. It'll get there :)

As far as BSG goes. I got bored with the series - and probably because by the time I have time to sit down and watch tv (either tivo'd, or DVD series), I just want to be entertained. I don't want to have to think. Buffy, Angel, Smallville, Dancing With the Stars, CSI...those are about my speed. That being said, BSG *was* well written, IMO...and yeah, I had the same initial reaction to Ms. Hottie Cylon...and I *hated* any scene with her in it - but her character is very well developed, and there's more to her than her looks. I found myself thinking about a 1,000 times what her real motivations were throughout.