BSG: The Plan, and a vid rec
Nov. 7th, 2011 07:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bedlamsbardOkay, so, Battlestar Galactica: The Plan. Ultimate conclusion: some really good bits, SO MUCH FRAKKING WASTED OPPORTUNITY. I shelled out for it because, well, I haven't actually purchased anything else from the BSG franchise, so I might as well buy this instead of acquiring it otherwise. On the other hand, I'd heard basically nothing about it from the fannish community, so I really wasn't expecting much. I was really hoping we'd get an explanation from the Cylon side about the Great Helo/Sharon Deception of Season One, but if you too were hoping for that: ALL HELO AND SHARON FOOTAGE ARCHIVE FOOTAGE. NO NEW FOOTAGE. NO GREAT CAVIL WTF MOMENT FOR SHARON AGATHON. Which is the greatest shame of this, I swear. Probably about half the movie is from the series, which is kind of a shame, really.
The Plan is basically all the proof we needed that the attempted genocide of the human race was Brother Cavil's hissy fit to get the Five's attention. Like, I think they actually say that at one point.
There is way more nudity in these two hours than there is in the entirety of the show. NO REALLY. We first see Ellen Tigh in a topless bar! There is a Six in the Fleet who's a prostitute and she hangs out in her underwear with Cavil on Galactica! There are a bunch of Colonial officers hanging out naked in one of the locker rooms! A Four and his (human!) wife have sex! It was kind of surprising just because I wasn't expecting all the nudity. And it felt...kind of gratuitous.
The absolute best scenes are the Sam Anders and the Caprica Resistance scenes, because it's all new footage until Starbuck shows up. There's the most story there, since it's not building around stuff we see in S1 (it's mostly S1; there's a jump from the end of S1 to the end of S2 which is kind of jarring).
We do get the flip of the Boomer sabotage scenes from S1, which is kind of interesting. A lot of the movie is taken up with the flip side of all the Cylon sabotage in S1, so we get Cavil trying to manipulate everyone to do what he wants, and then it failing horribly, as Hooker!Six points out to him, even when the sabotage more or less succeeded (Boomer blowing the water on Galactica and shooting Adama, Dorrel blowing himself up, the Sixes failing to successfully discredit Baltar). The Boomer stuff is...interesting. It is poignant! Mostly interesting. I'm not sure what to do with it. I think it might work better in the actual show. There is one really good scene, though, the one where Cavil's talking to her while she's in the brig and he takes away the trigger that makes her remember she's a Cylon. (Oh! And the one where she says she's happier when she's human, and he's horrified. So yes. Some good Cavil and Sharon scenes.)
We get another new storyline -- a Simon (a Four) on another ship in the Fleet, who's married to a human. Rather than commit sabotage that would kill his wife and step-child, he airlocks himself. PERSONALITY. HE GOT ONE. (And his poor wife, after finding out much later that he was actually a Cylon.)
And then the Cavils. We get the one on Galactica and the one on Caprica in the Resistance, and they come to different conclusions. Galactica One is the real bastard; Caprica One is only mostly a bastard. (He gets points for not shooting Starbuck, I guess.)
Funniest moment: Caprica Cavil and Resistance Four (as the C-Bucs' team doctor) bitching about Anders sleeping with Starbuck. Cavil: "She's beneath him." Simon, listening: "Not necessarily."
Thing I really liked: Leoben falling in love with Starbuck after managing to listen in on Galactica and the Vipers' radio signals. Not enough Leoben, sadface.
Things which were sort of um, okay: no D'Anna whatsoever. Presumably they couldn't get Lucy Lawless back. Since we actually got D'Anna in the show, this is sort of a glaring plothole. You know what else is a glaring plothole? HOW THEY COMPLETELY FAILED TO TOUCH ON THE GREAT SHARON VALERII-AGATHON BETRAYAL OF SEASONS ONE AND TWO. That could have been amazing, y'all. Perhaps I am just saying this because my love for Helo/Athena is PURE AND TRUE, which is entirely possible, but I would have loved to see one or both of the Cavils reacting to the frakked up plan to fake out a human with a Cylon, which was clearly not their idea. Or to see one of them reacting to Sharon's betrayal of the Cylons -- and since we actually do get them in the same scene in the show, it kind of is a glaring hole. I don't know, maybe they couldn't get Tahmoh Penikett back (since he shows up for about thirty seconds, all archive footage) so they just decided to ignore it and put in the Simon/Giana plot instead. Or maybe it just wasn't part of "the Plan" so they ignored it. Definitely the weakest part of the movie, bah. (Obviously I am prejudiced towards the thing in the show which I love love love, so take that with a grain of salt if you like.) I mean, you could argue that it didn't show up because Cavil wasn't aware of it, except that kind of falls apart during the Caprica Rescue when he and Sharon are sitting across from each other and he...doesn't see her? Please don't tell me that he wouldn't recognize an Eight, because the man clearly can.
In conclusion: lovely apocalypse scenes at the very beginning, some very nice hybrid crazy. Sam Anders: great. Deleted scenes: there is an interesting scene with Boomer and Caprica that doesn't make sense without more context. Would have loved to actually get an inside look at the Cylon side of the Great Sharon Valerii Deception of Season One, or, What The Frak, A Cylon Got Pregnant, Fell In Love, And Ran Away.
Also, why is Head Six so prominent on the cover of this movie, she never shows up. Is it just because Tricia Helfer is more attractive than Dean Stockwell? Or is it just because Head Six is a much more iconic image of the whole franchise?
Frankly I feel that this amazing Boomer vid is probably better than The Plan. (the artist's impression is just like me, only better)
The Plan is basically all the proof we needed that the attempted genocide of the human race was Brother Cavil's hissy fit to get the Five's attention. Like, I think they actually say that at one point.
There is way more nudity in these two hours than there is in the entirety of the show. NO REALLY. We first see Ellen Tigh in a topless bar! There is a Six in the Fleet who's a prostitute and she hangs out in her underwear with Cavil on Galactica! There are a bunch of Colonial officers hanging out naked in one of the locker rooms! A Four and his (human!) wife have sex! It was kind of surprising just because I wasn't expecting all the nudity. And it felt...kind of gratuitous.
The absolute best scenes are the Sam Anders and the Caprica Resistance scenes, because it's all new footage until Starbuck shows up. There's the most story there, since it's not building around stuff we see in S1 (it's mostly S1; there's a jump from the end of S1 to the end of S2 which is kind of jarring).
We do get the flip of the Boomer sabotage scenes from S1, which is kind of interesting. A lot of the movie is taken up with the flip side of all the Cylon sabotage in S1, so we get Cavil trying to manipulate everyone to do what he wants, and then it failing horribly, as Hooker!Six points out to him, even when the sabotage more or less succeeded (Boomer blowing the water on Galactica and shooting Adama, Dorrel blowing himself up, the Sixes failing to successfully discredit Baltar). The Boomer stuff is...interesting. It is poignant! Mostly interesting. I'm not sure what to do with it. I think it might work better in the actual show. There is one really good scene, though, the one where Cavil's talking to her while she's in the brig and he takes away the trigger that makes her remember she's a Cylon. (Oh! And the one where she says she's happier when she's human, and he's horrified. So yes. Some good Cavil and Sharon scenes.)
We get another new storyline -- a Simon (a Four) on another ship in the Fleet, who's married to a human. Rather than commit sabotage that would kill his wife and step-child, he airlocks himself. PERSONALITY. HE GOT ONE. (And his poor wife, after finding out much later that he was actually a Cylon.)
And then the Cavils. We get the one on Galactica and the one on Caprica in the Resistance, and they come to different conclusions. Galactica One is the real bastard; Caprica One is only mostly a bastard. (He gets points for not shooting Starbuck, I guess.)
Funniest moment: Caprica Cavil and Resistance Four (as the C-Bucs' team doctor) bitching about Anders sleeping with Starbuck. Cavil: "She's beneath him." Simon, listening: "Not necessarily."
Thing I really liked: Leoben falling in love with Starbuck after managing to listen in on Galactica and the Vipers' radio signals. Not enough Leoben, sadface.
Things which were sort of um, okay: no D'Anna whatsoever. Presumably they couldn't get Lucy Lawless back. Since we actually got D'Anna in the show, this is sort of a glaring plothole. You know what else is a glaring plothole? HOW THEY COMPLETELY FAILED TO TOUCH ON THE GREAT SHARON VALERII-AGATHON BETRAYAL OF SEASONS ONE AND TWO. That could have been amazing, y'all. Perhaps I am just saying this because my love for Helo/Athena is PURE AND TRUE, which is entirely possible, but I would have loved to see one or both of the Cavils reacting to the frakked up plan to fake out a human with a Cylon, which was clearly not their idea. Or to see one of them reacting to Sharon's betrayal of the Cylons -- and since we actually do get them in the same scene in the show, it kind of is a glaring hole. I don't know, maybe they couldn't get Tahmoh Penikett back (since he shows up for about thirty seconds, all archive footage) so they just decided to ignore it and put in the Simon/Giana plot instead. Or maybe it just wasn't part of "the Plan" so they ignored it. Definitely the weakest part of the movie, bah. (Obviously I am prejudiced towards the thing in the show which I love love love, so take that with a grain of salt if you like.) I mean, you could argue that it didn't show up because Cavil wasn't aware of it, except that kind of falls apart during the Caprica Rescue when he and Sharon are sitting across from each other and he...doesn't see her? Please don't tell me that he wouldn't recognize an Eight, because the man clearly can.
In conclusion: lovely apocalypse scenes at the very beginning, some very nice hybrid crazy. Sam Anders: great. Deleted scenes: there is an interesting scene with Boomer and Caprica that doesn't make sense without more context. Would have loved to actually get an inside look at the Cylon side of the Great Sharon Valerii Deception of Season One, or, What The Frak, A Cylon Got Pregnant, Fell In Love, And Ran Away.
Also, why is Head Six so prominent on the cover of this movie, she never shows up. Is it just because Tricia Helfer is more attractive than Dean Stockwell? Or is it just because Head Six is a much more iconic image of the whole franchise?
Frankly I feel that this amazing Boomer vid is probably better than The Plan. (the artist's impression is just like me, only better)