NYT & “Magical Thinking”

January 26th, 2007

I’m confused why NYT countenances such illogic, unless it’s their effort to balance their oft-castigaged ‘leftward-leaning’ Op-Ed pages.
I deconstructed a similar article here.

Here we go again. First off, the circular reasoning fallacy is repeatedly evoked. The author presents a scenario of “magical thinking”, then tacitly labels it [ridiculous]. Next they state that there’s ‘brain structures’ which somehow must create MT, but that can’t be evolutionary, can it [ie, denying physical evidence]? Then they show that we can fool ppl into MT-based behavior [a similar test, "can we fool tax experts into giving wrong answers", is done each year by Better Business Bureau; they call IRS & ask 20 Agents the exact same question, & get 20 different, usually wrong answers. Oh wait-- is this MT too??].

Then they move right into the perfect example of circular reasoning: “The question is why do people create this illusion of magical power?””. Sorry, did we accidentally neglect how Tiger, Jordan, Lance, Jenner, & etc top peak performers all swear by visualization? And that there’s been multiple double-blind tests confirming that visualization not only helps, but is *essential* to peak performance?

Funny– we all recognize false choice fallacy when Fox News rigs one of their frequent polls (cf. Colbert’s lampooning): “Question: Are you for Supporting the Troops, God, & Country, or Treasonously Retreating from Iraq?”

So why aren’t suitable options made visible here? Perhaps “Magical Thinking” and/or “Magical Power” do in-fact work, but these psych’s & shrinks aren’t very good at measuring it? Not to mention, that psych’s & shrinks have historically been labeled ‘fuzzy science’, & thus are particularly antagonistic to intuitive paths to knowledge.

But it’s particularly jarring when these same ‘clinical psychologists’ and/or university researchers pretend to be objectively studying the matter. Fer crying out loud, wouldn’t the very topic they’re studying (ie, how belief affects physical world), be potentially undermined if they’re starting-out w/ the assumption it doesn’t work?

By the logic they’re using, it’s not implausible to say they’re actually undermining their own experiments. By ‘believing’ MT doesn’t exist, they affect both their test-cases, as well as their logic itself.

I’m esp. amused that they finish-off the article w/ a list of psychiatric disorders which “MT could lead to”, coupled w/ discounting evidence as “coincidental”. First illogic, then ‘you’re crazy”.

And note they carefully distinguish MT from religion, ie “These habits have little to do with religious faith, which is much more complex because it involves large questions of morality, community and history”. What silliness; the average fervent church-goer isn’t thinking of any of those things when they pray… they just want their prayers to work (& the lectant usually gives praise the next week if/when they did).

Hmmm. Closed thinking, hostility, & church-banner waving. Since when did the neo-cons care about ‘magic’? You’d think they were on shaky ground; “faith” in their not being “left behind” sorta sounds like MT to me.

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Scorsese’s Oscar

January 18th, 2007

Man that guy can bitch.

For such a self-titled scholar, you’d think he’d somehow forgotten this little list of genius auteurs who never got an Oscar… Charlie Chaplin, Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock, Stanley Kubrick and Orson Welles. What true filmmaker wouldn’t kill to be listed in their company?
Scorsese absolutely, no-question, should have got his Oscar for “Raging Bull”. Or before for “Taxi Driver”. But you know what? That’d never happen– directors never get the gold for their early films, unless they’re an ‘actor-director‘, or writers who had help or had famous fathers). Instead, like some kind of interminable macabre high-school prom/homecoming court, the “most important award”[sic] in filmmaking is really just a popularity contest. With a couple of guidelines: the film(maker) must be popular. The film can’t tank. The film must never cover new territory, but rather (re)do something that was done before, w/ a bit more opulence, and/or a somewhat edgy twist. And oh yeah, killing Jews never hurts; after a lifetime of making popcorn movies, it’s telling to note that when Spielberg decided he wanted that golden statuette of his own, even he pulled-out the ovens.

So there’s the quandary– Scorsese hasn’t made a decent film in 25yrs. He tries re-make after remake, getting progressively more ostentatious & blood-thirsty. But at least he kept to remaking old films.

But now comes “Departed”, or its real name: “Infernal Affairs“.

Remaking an old film is not at all like making an original film… just like adaptation is nothing like working from an original script. The adaptation already has a built-in audience; we already know that the characters ‘work’, that the story is moving, & the ending is solid. And similarly with a re-make, we know the entire film works, from story to casting to the shots & the music(!) Really, all you have to do is “not f*** it up”. So why re-make? (I mean, other than for the $$, which I’ll give Scorsese the benefit of the doubt about). Usually, it’s b/c the film has been forgotten, the actors on screen aren’t familiar, &/or the setting/milieu looks anachronistic on video.

But “Infernal Affairs” was none of these things.

The film was made in 2002. It starred a virtual “Who’s Who” of top actors in Southeast Asia. It boasts the talents of Christopher Doyle, one of the best cinematographers working today (consider: “Hero“, “In the Mood for Love“, etc, as well as most of the best of War Kung-Wai’s films). The story is very contemporary, layered in shades-of-grey, while exposing-from-inside facets of asian culture other films promise but never deliver… & for all that is edge-of-your-seat thrilling from start to finish. Like an asian “Heat“, but with even more interesting supporting characters.
So why remake? Simple- Scorsese was looking for a ‘paint-by-numbers’ win, & he landed it. Yet, there must have been part of his (now slumbering) auteur sensibility, if not pride, leaking thru– when questioned about lenses by Doyle, Scorsese blew him off, saying “I’ve never watched the film you made”. Funny, in the “Departed” trailer alone I counted 5 exact duplicate shots from “Affairs”. Or how about when Andy Lau, star of “Affairs”, asked Scorsese for a bit part? You-know, give him 2 lines for his SAG pass & help him cross-over into the H-wood market? It’s not like he can’t act or something; he only carried the picture head-to-head w/ Tony Leung, one of the best actors working today (in Asia or West). Nope, Scorsese blew-off Lau completely, as well. I guess Mr. S couldn’t fit-in an Asian in his Irish New York gangland drama (boy, that sounds familar; I wonder if there were any butchers or planes involved).

You know what? Scorsese already got the highest filmmaking award– the Palme d’Or for “Taxi Driver”, & well-deserved it was. Scorsese already has the words “eminent film authority” wallpapered on his forehead, popping-up as he does in every single retrospective for the past 10yrs, like some kind of demented Ebert who actually once made a watchable film (unlike Ebert’s own contribution to filmmaking). So how many more accolades does the guy need?

All I can say is– for God’s sake, give him the damn thing already. He’s no longer an auteur, no longer has taste, & doesn’t even have originality. I can’t imagine what he’d do if he loses… maybe steal re-make “It’s a Wonderful Life”, in black & white w/ extra blood, a la “Sin City”.

Fellini once noted “you only get 8″, but he was able to scrape-out an extra “1/2″. Scorsese should quit pretending he cares about ‘film’, & go bask in adulation teach in some hoary film academy which churns-out Sundance-wannabes. Or produce Michael Bay & Bret Ratner explode-a-fests. But for the love of God, quit stealing true auteur’s work… it’s beneath you, Mr. S. Please don’t leave me w/ a bad taste when I pull-out your old work; you really were something, once.

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A Thought for the New Year – A pitch for Clear Thinking

January 14th, 2007

Hey y’all. Long time no see. I’ve good reason: new house, new job, new teaching assignment(s). But I haven’t been completely buried; I’ve notes a’plenty, so stay tuned for a few words coming up soon.

In the meantime, I’d like to make a pitch for “clear thinking”.

Whaddya mean by that? Simple– the mind is so easily trumped[sic] by emotional, if not egoic, behavior, that it becomes very easy to spew illogical nonsense. Which is fine, really… if you’re at a bar with friends, but not if you’re in a leadership position, eg. publishing in an erstwhile ‘Respected Publication’.

In spiritual pursuits, many disciplines encourage a de-emphasis of the mind, calling it the home of the ego, ie that part of ourselves which believes “everything revolves around me”, & thus makes prettily-turned rationalizations of very self-centered pursuits. The “I meditate so I’m sooo cool” one was termed the ‘golden handcuff’ by Chogyam Trungpa, for example. Similarly, mind-body pursuits such as t’ai ch’i & acting often emphasize “get out of your head”, ie. re-identify yourself with your ‘heart’, if not ‘gut’, rather than ‘mind’. Or my favorite Yogi Berra’ism: “I can’t think & hit at the same time”.

All this is great if you tend to over-analyze (um, guilty). But! “Going with your gut” 100% of the time has its own issues… Essentially, a complete de-emphasis of Mind can sometimes be ‘throwing the baby out w/ the bathwater’, as it were. If nothing else, the mind is good at ‘making sense’ of things, parsing thru lots of different choices, & is pretty good at choosing the right words when you’re talking. Intuition, otoh, is better at ‘jumping’ to the right solution… but not great at explaining why, or helping explicate patterns, let-alone “how can I do that for myself”. IOW, a teacher who tries to completely de-emphasize their Analyzer will find themselves resorting to “just because” or “that’s the way I learned it”. Which is fine enough for many students, but will be lacking calories to those students who are seeking a deeper understanding of the material. Generalizing the larger case from a single example is the hallmark of inductive logic, & is an analytical endeavor… & one which isn’t very common, or rather– not very common using clear thinking.

So on to the story– I drifted over from NYT to WeeklyStandard & NationalReviewOnline.
Ugh! …& i’d thought NYT was ‘pretty liberal’, esp. in their op-ed’s… unabashedly hurling invective w/o rationale. Okay, you think Bush is an idiot. We get it. Now, why not give w/ some hard data to unravel his logic, if not explode that mythos of “My President is Always Right b/c I Am a Patriot!” It’s pretty hard to use logical argument for many neo-conservative stances; add “Texan Oil-Business” mores to Dr. Dobson & you have a refined, completely self-reflexive world-view impervious to outside influence. My philosophy 101 prof. Searle had a great argument against types like these: “you cannot call yourself rational, if there are no grounds under which your [thinking] could be wrong. If you were to say to a Freudian, ‘I’m not sure about Penis Envy’, s/he would reply, ‘You’re just repressing Penis Envy’”.
So, first step to clear thinking: have you considered the opposite case of what you say/think, & can you describe that perspective w/o resorting to invective or moral judgement?

Or here’s an easier determinant: Classical Fallacies.

So there I am at NYT: Op-Ed, Maureen Dowd, etc. And in an effort to see how the ‘others’ think, I slid over to neo-con central. Perhaps they would respect logic more? Egad– I spoke too soon: Inbred, self-aggrandizing, (even-more) over-analytical, & experts all in ‘attacking via irony’; ie. not attacking the character of the proponent, per se, but rather snidely ridiculing their thinking… usually copiously tarred with the ‘liberal’ moniker or its ‘hip variant of the day’ helpfully provided by Fox News.
Must all Op-Ed pieces (liberal, conservative, or whatnot) be oh so very much more satisfied w/ hearing [writing] the sound of their own words than with making a statement based on clear thinking? Or even– perish the thought, logical thinking?

It’s almost like both they & their audience, posit [& need] constant reassurance of their own superiority, both moral & intellectual. They have Spoken; you may agree, or else be ‘unthinking’.
What silliness.

I recommend:

  • go with your gut, sure;
  • follow your Path with Heart, of-course;

…but keep every-so-often testing what you hear vs. the standard list of logical fallacies. It’ll expose much more than you’d expected, both in bias, & in willfull ignorance.

Now excuse me while I go watch Iron Chef. Some things are simply self-evident, & as long as the Chairman picks a suitable Secret Ingredient, Clear Thinking (or at least Stomaching) will be arrayed for all to see. :-)

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4 Pretty-Great Recent Action Films

September 28th, 2006

Wow… for whatever reason, just right about the time I completely give-up on H-wood… out comes something pretty excellent to watch. Last time that happened to me was ’93, & when out came “Tombstone” & “Carlito’s Way”… which I watched in a single afternoon, sneaking from theatre to theatre, & basically walked-out amazed.

This time, it’s:

  • District B13
  • Crank
  • The Protector
  • Fearless

…which, you must admit, only includes a single US film, but hey.

What makes a Great Action Film?

Fantastic action is an absolute must. Stuff flies around, main guy has a passion that is pure, & leaves no stone unruffled gettin’ to it.

Reason for action. Anyone can drive a car fast or knock someone silly; our guy has gotta be ruffling shit for a purpose. “You killed my father” is not-bad… but how about spending some time reflecting on ‘what it means to be’. Dare we say… ‘profound’?
-and-

The Take-Away. If you’re walking-out going “whoa, that rocked”, that’s good. If you’re walking-out going “whoa, that rocked”, but inside you’re quiet… & the next day you’re still ruminating… that’s great.

Truly Great Action Films:

  • Apocalypse Now
  • Blade Runner
  • Runaway Train
  • Heat
  • King of New York
  • Seven Samurai
  • Hero
  • City of God
  • Bullet in the Head
  • The Killer
  • Terminator
  • Alien
  • For a Few Dollars More

Basically, it can be done, people. And why bother? Because faaar more ppl will watch City of God than ever watched Seventh Seal… & I’ll bet were profoundly moved by it more. B/c writing a densely-symbolic allegory is one thing… but to do the same, w/ real-life, living, breathing characters… that’s mastery.
Films aren’t just sausages, & ‘deep meaning’ doesn’t have to be imponderable & subtitled from the French. Jeesh– I dare you to read the subtitles in District B13… you won’t have time. :-)

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“Reel-time Death” in film

August 30th, 2006

It all began so very easily to understand– life moves at 24fps, & that life is Good.
But then “Bonnie & Clyde” happened, & we got to see death in slow-motion… repeated, from various angles, in overlapping action. We got to wallow in it, & it made it ‘hyper-real’. So much so that riots happened, & the film was nearly banned.
But, of course, soon every film did that. Until the ‘slo-mo’ death scene became not just a hackneyed, expected effect… but it actually became the opposite of what it intended. Instead of emphasizing, ‘punching-up’ death, it instead became a distancing mechanism. By slowing-down, circling-around, seeing the action in repeating layers… we were pulled-out of the diegetic world, & instead were essentially reminded that we were watching actors on a screen, “covered in ketchup”.

So how to make Death meaningful again?

Play it at full-speed.

Anyone who saw Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket” in the theatres remembered the stark end of Part1– fatty salutes, whips the M1 into his mouth, pulls the trigger, his head flies back, & fades-to-black. All 1 continuous motion, boom & he’s gone. I remember a nervous shudder running thru the theatre seats… “did that just happen? holy shit”.

Mann takes that one step further in “Vice”. Crappy film, completely lost-touch with what made the original series great (attitude, clothes, & fast vehicles were secondary to a passionate sense of Sisyphus’ian morality)… but Does Action Right:

Death comes point-blank, no-hesitation, & no slo-mo or repeat/overlapping shots. Lady cop wastes the baddy; Foxx gatts the Big Boss.

And better– Mann does the same thing to sound. No ‘cannon-hit’ enhanced pistol shots; no fuscillade of machine-gun fire. Instead, the final shoot-out has the sporadic, quiet pop-pop which real M16′s & AK-47′s make.

And you know what? Since it’s so rarely seen or heard, reality actually is more impressive than Hollywood glamour.

Nicely done, Mr. Mann. But please– from “Heat” to “Collateral” to “Vice” is a precipitous drop; can we have a more “Heat”-like film already? Please?

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Screenwriting & Structure…

August 30th, 2006

My screenwriting teachers have always practiced ‘tough love’, & my fave writer-on-screenwriting is Goldman.
What they suggest is Asking:
1) What’s Happening, &
2) Why [should] I Care?

…& keep asking that, from the first page on. Flip it open to any page, & if the 2 answers aren’t immediately obvious, then there may be issues in need of attention.

Classic Structure is:
Act 1 ends w/ “Hero up a Tree” (with a tangible Want he must achieve… & best if it leverages the idiocyncracies of his Character)
Act 2 ends w/ “Point of No Return” (he’s already overcome increasingly impossible hurdles; but now he has to *truly* commit)
Act 3 climaxes w/ “He got [the tangible something], or He Didn’t”.

* Anything that doesn’t fit that thruline must be ruthlessly purged, or morphed into one that does.
* Any scene which has only 1 purpose must be rewritten
- (eg, backstory PLUS plot setup PLUS character-dev PLUS ‘something important happens’ PLUS *surprise*).
- My fave example: the final confrontation between Rutger Hauer & Harrison Ford in “Blade Runner”. But damn near every scene in “Silence of the Lambs” does multiple things too.
* & the Ending must be a Surprise, but Justified. Which means to me: Yes the guy gets the girl, but Not the way we expect, & she’s Not quite completely what he had in mind. Kinda like getting “3 wishes” in Dungeons & Dragons– wish for gold, & you get it… in the form of a avalanche that suffocates you.

Finally– “complex characters, & simple story. Or the reverse. But never both complex at once”.
Which is why “Something About Mary” or even “Dumb & Dumber” work; very straightforward/simple characters, in a world increasingly complex. Mary can be (accidentally) creative in her hair products, or even have a ‘heart of gold’, but she can’t have an emotional transformation. And neither does our hero… what he ‘succeeds’ at is steadfastness. Whereas “Annie Hall” has some funny set-pieces, but overall leaves tons of room for Woody to have an emotional transformation… his ‘pitfalls’ are all in his head, not in the scenery.

There– 1 yr of Screenwriting Classes, in 1 ‘post :-D

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Notes on the ‘life-sucks’ moment…

July 15th, 2006

Here’s a little something I worked-up for a workshop some years back:
Ever have that moment when ‘life sucks’? When everything seems just ‘too-much’, when you just wanna give-in?

Sure you have. it’s normal; it’s a valid part of the human condition (“human”, b/c you can spend a whole heckofalot of time futilely waiting to see a cat ever act this way :-P ).

And if “life-sucks” is part of the human condition, so is its opposite — ie, getting out of that state-of-mind, & [back] into “life-is-great”.

Let’s start w/ a reality-check– why not stop, take a second, & check which side of the ‘classical divide’ you’re in right now:

  • is the glass 1/2-full? -or-
  • is the glass 1/2-empty?

Or if that seems too silly or arbitrary, try instead to see if you can say “5 nice things” right now. Doesn’t matter about who, & you don’t have to ‘share’… but if you can say them aloud that can help a lot to make them more ‘real’.

So what did you get? ’5 Nice Things’, ‘Glass is 1/2-full’, everything great? Well then, off with you! You’re doing great, so go grab some sun, or catch a movie… The rest of us here are going to explore this a little further.
Okay, where were we? The first thing to realize about the ‘life-sucks’ frame-of-mind, is it’s just that– only a frame-of-mind, & a temporary one at that.

How’s that? Well, it’s literally impossible to always stay in a ‘depressed’ state-of-mind… for example, if you shove your face in front of a butterfly, a giggling baby girl, or a clown, it’s very hard to stay depressed. Similarly, if you practice ‘Inner Smile’… ie, ‘fake it’.

Which is why, when you’re depressed, you often [unconsciously] try to avoid those happy things… some part of you wants to sit in that unhappy energy, wants to wallow in it, b/c it’s getting something from it, some kind of validation from it.

Well, that’s all fine, & even ‘normal’ as well!

However– I submit to you, the part of you that’s getting validation for wallowing in depression, is not you.

Here’s a reality-check– what do you ‘sound like’, when you say (or think) negative things, eg. when you’re depressed? Er, maybe sounds like that person who was depressed when you were a kid? Or maybe like that parent who always gave you a hard time? Billionaire Larry Ellison told an interviewer once, that even in the midst of some of his greatest successes, he always keeps hearing his dad’s voice in the back of his head, telling him “you won’t amount to anything”. Funny how that works.

Next question: Are you pretty certain “things will work-out fine”, or are you spending [lots] of time delineating all the various ways it won’t? Don’t be like George in “Grey’s Anatomy”– walking-in, he already knows he’s going to get the short end of the stick. So he brings that ‘losing’ face forward, & thereby literally encourages everyone to say “no”. Basically, a ‘self-fulfilling negative prophesy’.
I had a martial arts teacher once who literally would say, “if you beat up a masochist, you’re doing them a favor”. Er, not to say that this isn’t being completely amoral, or even psychotic, but there is a bit of useful truth in that– namely, the Victim is actually setting-up a world-picture that the world really does suck… & so they are very validated when it turns-out they’re ‘right’.

Consider a classic portrait of frustration– a perennial victim, amidst a string of [good] luck. Listen to them, & what do you hear? Not, “Ohmigod this is sooo terrific!” Nope, you’re going to hear “this won’t last” or even “I’m going to have to pay for this later”.

Again, funny how that works out.

Don’t confuse this with saying “blame the victim”–
Instead, realize that you [and only you] have the power to change your mental state.

And so if you know all this, & yet still keep playing the ‘victim game’, then there’s obviously some major validation happening for you, in that game.

  • maybe you get lots of attention, ie. sympathy.
  • maybe it makes you feel ‘free’ of responsibility for your actions.
  • maybe you don’t want to feel guilty about being happy, when your family all [act like] victims too.

…whatever it is, you’re letting these ‘victim positives’ outweigh the ‘true positives’ of walking-around w/ an actual smile on your face.

Or perhaps staying in a victim-game is just inertia– like how getting your ‘body in motion’ can be quite a trick, when you’ve just let it sit for years & years.

So let’s try some leverage on the ‘victim game’:

Ask: “how good would it feel, to wake-up happy? free?”

& some reverse leverage:

Ask: “how terrible it would feel, laying on your deathbed, & realizing, ‘oh man, I lived such a depressed life, & i didn’t have to!!’“

…Whatever you do, don’t keep playing the ‘Victim Game’… unless you’re enjoying it. Or rather, enjoying not enjoying it. :-P

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married life

July 5th, 2006

Praveen (10:40:25): Thanks a lot and any tips and tricks for a successful married life ;-)
danselmi (10:41:26): heheheh
danselmi (10:41:32): 1) say “Yes, Dear”
danselmi (10:41:34): -and-
danselmi (10:41:36): 2) “I’m sorry”
Praveen (10:41:46): hahahahahha thats what i hear from all
danselmi (10:41:48): …& buy flowers ocasionally
Praveen (10:41:53): sure sir
danselmi (10:42:22): :-D
danselmi (10:42:49): (1) and (2) are very tiny ‘payment’ for the happiness you get in ‘exchange’
Praveen (10:43:05): :-)

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Shoot for a Living…(?)

June 23rd, 2006

Wow!

It’s been far too long since I’ve last shot a production, lemme tell you.

So, I’m just back from shooting a live concert, my first in months (at The Avalon w/ an HVX200 in DV50 mode & 2x 8GB P2′s… Yeah!)… And I hadn’t realized just how much I’d missed shooting.

So why’s that? Turns-out, shooting touches-on a terrific constellation of skills–

  • creative: where are you gonna point the camera
  • analytical: how do you maximize your effectiveness on-set
  • leadership: how do you get everyone pointing in the same direction
  • communicative: how do you get the picture across w/ a minimum of confusion
  • intuitive: how do you ‘fix’ stuff that could/just/might-happen, before it happens?

-and-

  • kinesthetic: how do you schlepp all that gear, then shoot all those hours, & not be bed-ridden for a week? :-)

…& then when you’re done, w/ any luck, you’ve got something that looks cool, & entertains (& maybe even inspires) others.

Ah yes… so someone remind me why I schlepp code for a ‘living’, again?

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Why is “Galactica” sucking so bad??

May 16th, 2006

hey– why is Galactica sucking so bad? they even pulled the “Alias
Error”: Season Finale– “…One Year Later…”, ie. completely jettisoning the previous plotlines, not to mention character development (love that the ‘nice sweet schoolteacher’ has become a ice-cold “throw ‘em out the airlock” b*tch. Nice move there for a ‘prophet’).

The miniseries was so incredible.. & now each character is in a rut, & the only ‘humanity’ anyone is displaying is by those 2 Cylons (but they’re hot… hmmm).

I suppose i can stand the character inconsistencies,
fragmented/discarded storylines, low-tek special effects (hey Zoic: low-res cgi shaky-cam & cheesy models looked really cool in ‘Firefly’… b/c the show’s entire look was low-rent & cheesy– the frickin ship was supposed to look like ass! But here in ‘full-on polyester uniform’ville of Galactica, those super-saturated & blown-out crispy digital effects just look like bad circa-80′s Video Toaster)…

…or how about the utterly underutilized character-actor cameos, such as Bill Duke & Dean Stockwell. This is unconscionable– just watch “Predator” (the Sarge) or “Blue Velvet” to see what those two gentlemen in particular can do, when given great scripts & excellent direction. Instead, they’re brought-in, get to ham it up a little, & are then summararily blown-away. You got these guys to play throw-away parts in throw-away plotlines? What were you thinking?!! Just think of Bill Duke as a Cylon overlord… or Dean Stockwell as a mad prophet whose madness eerily parallels the Prez’s. These would be memes that resonated across the entire series, let-alone multiple episodes. Instead, each are whacked, & even that is poorly-written. Consider: a den of thieves, hardened criminals loyal to their boss, & they get cowed by Daddy’s Boy ships away from his backup? Are you kidding me?? Or better– let’s casually destroy the balanced characterization of the prez, & make her a cold-ass killer by whacking Stockwell… w/o even grilling him for information!What a waste.

…or how about all the deus-ex machina’s? Poof, exeunt prez’s cancer. Poof, let’s find habital planets (& worlds chock-full of tillium), just when we need them! Er, I suppose the writers don’t read their own previous scripts, eg. when both habital planets & tillium reserves were described by Adama as “extremely rare… like a needle in a haystack”… & Tie grunts “like a needle on a beach”. I guess it was a beach of needles…

But anyway– I’ll let all that go, or try to… but how about all the huge technical oversights? Excuse me– isn’t this a frickin’ science-fiction series???? Can’t they even get the geeky bits right? Do they think their core demo (dorky, bespectacled geeks w/ photographic memories for myriad, inchoate, parsnickity details) won’t miss a little something like: HOW THE FUCK CAN A BRAND-NEW BATTLESTAR & VIPERS MANAGE TO NOT GET INFECTED BY CYLON VIRII?!!! Especially when every other one was waxed w/in 1hr at the start of the war?! Has anyone ever ‘explained’ that? Don’t tell me “Pegasus” doesn’t have huge networked computers; their control room is like 1/10 the size of Galactica’s. ARRRRGGGH!!!
Let’s imagine The Writers: “Er, um, look-away, look-away; let’s have Starbuck screw-around & get drunk again.” (Which, as a friend pointed out to me, is quite an effective plot-device. But anyway…)
On a more positive note, Number Six has posed naked all over the web, which is very good advertising. Remind me, when i Run a Show, to cast hot ladies willing to get naked. It’s called “Production Value” :-P

I think my v. fave sci-fi ever is “Firefly”. Get the dvd’s from Netflix,
& watch in the correct order (ie, not the Fox-broadcasted mis-order)… Because: “Joss Whedon Knows Character Development”… & he even includes his obligatory “Hot Teen with Superpowers”(TM).

I’m not a rabid fan, ‘browncoat’ or whatever… but I’ve seen the series 3 times now (the film ‘Serenity’ is not that great), & still like it… whereas i don’t ever plan to watch Galactica again.

What a shame… all those Wasted Opportunities… all those wasted dvd-r blanks…

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