OTHER SCIENCE FICTION SERIES

Is Battlestar Galacitica losing continuity already?

POSTED BY: VETERAN
UPDATED: Friday, September 2, 2005 14:32
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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 9:25 AM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


I don't know about the rest of you but I thought the last ep was disappointing.

First off, how can a vessel in the middle of battle not be prepared for borders? The bots should have been swarmed by marines the second they opened the hatch. Apollo knew they got through, why'd the bridge officers seem so suprised.

Regarding continuity. Helio was able to take out Centurions with his standard issue rounds, all of a sudden you can only take out a Centurion with an explosive round to the head. Bah.

I especially didn't like the bit about a Cylon virus infecting the computers. I thought the Galactica didn't have any networks. In fact they made a point of it in the opening miniseries when Odama and Roslin were arguing about installing a LAN on the ship and again when they had to warm up the computers to calculate a jump, so how is a virus moving through their systems?




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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 9:47 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL


I’d be really interested in hearing some explanations myself. I was thinking the whole time that things looked awfully deserted on Galactica. Why weren’t there huge battles being fought in the halls of Galactica? They get boarded and everyone goes to lunch? Did I miss something?

Someone should have watched last season before writing this one.

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Qui desiderat pacem praeparet bellum.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 9:55 AM

PURPLEBELLY


It felt to me like a disposable episode to introduce faces and characters to a new audience. Better things to come, I hope.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 10:01 AM

EARLYWASLATE


They made a big deal about networking the computers in the first episode so they could calculate the jump coordinates faster.

Remember, they're running with pretty much a skeleton crew since it was about to be scraped, and it's a big ship, so it isn't suprising that many areas could be empty.

As far as the Centurions, I can only throw out that the bordeing party may bave been made up of ones that were beefed up to survive impact.


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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 10:04 AM

MUGTWAINE


Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran:
I don't know about the rest of you but I thought the last ep was disappointing.

First off, how can a vessel in the middle of battle not be prepared for borders? The bots should have been swarmed by marines the second they opened the hatch. Apollo knew they got through, why'd the bridge officers seem so suprised.

Regarding continuity. Helio was able to take out Centurions with his standard issue rounds, all of a sudden you can only take out a Centurion with an explosive round to the head. Bah.

I especially didn't like the bit about a Cylon virus infecting the computers. I thought the Galactica didn't have any networks. In fact they made a point of it in the opening miniseries when Odama and Roslin were arguing about installing a LAN on the ship and again when they had to warm up the computers to calculate a jump, so how is a virus moving through their systems?






I also thought it was strange that they weren't a bit more prepared. Maybe they shouldn't have known that the strange spacecraft was a Cylon troop transport, but it seemed odd that they didn't immediately check out the area of the ship where it impacted.

Ron Moore, the executive producer of the show, actually has a podcast which he uses like a commentary for each episode. I haven't listened to them yet this season because he said there would be spoilers. But I did read somewhere that he said the boarding craft landed in the area of the ship that had been converted to a museum during the miniseries. He also said that that part of the ship is basically abandoned at this point, since it's pretty useless when set up like a museum and they haven't really had time to clean it up yet.

As for Helo taking down the Cylons, I thought he actually did have some explosive rounds. I remember in the miniseries he shot a guy climbing on his raptor and there was a minor explosion involved... I might be forgetting the part you're talking about specifically, though. I remember he set up some kind of bomb as a trap once, but it never seemed like he got away easy on Caprica. (Also, it seems possible that the Cylons were "giving him a break" on Caprica, as it seems like they were having fun experimenting with him and Boomer mk.II).

And as for the network... Did you happen to see the season premiere on July 15th, or did you just see the episode on the 22nd? In the premiere, Gaeta set up a temporary network so he could calculate an FTL jump extra fast. He had security firewalls to block the Cylon virus attempts, but they failed just as the jump calculations finished...

I'm not too sure about Gaeta. They've been doing a lot of subtle things with him that make me think he might be another Cylon...

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 10:27 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL


Quote:

Originally posted by Mugtwaine:
Ron Moore, the executive producer of the show, actually has a podcast which he uses like a commentary for each episode. I haven't listened to them yet this season because he said there would be spoilers. But I did read somewhere that he said the boarding craft landed in the area of the ship that had been converted to a museum during the miniseries. He also said that that part of the ship is basically abandoned at this point, since it's pretty useless when set up like a museum and they haven't really had time to clean it up yet.

That still doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. My understanding is that a battlestar is supposed to be analogous to a carrier. So where were the 5000+ crew? Are we to believe that a handful of individuals is the extent of their defensive capability in the heart of their military infrastructure?
Quote:

Originally posted by Mugtwaine:
And as for the network... Did you happen to see the season premiere on July 15th, or did you just see the episode on the 22nd? In the premiere, Gaeta set up a temporary network so he could calculate an FTL jump extra fast. He had security firewalls to block the Cylon virus attempts, but they failed just as the jump calculations finished...

This I did not know.

-------------
Qui desiderat pacem praeparet bellum.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 10:51 AM

KNIBBLET


The computers were networked temporarily to allow the jump calculations -- something Adama always feared and with good judgement.

The explosive rounds are something we've seen before. I don't consider it a continuity error.

Apollo was going to report the crash of the ship that got through - I wouldn't have waited until landing though. It was important enough to be relayed immediately.

This ship was going to be decommissioned. She's a travelling museum. There are going to be HUGE sections empty of folks. Many folk would have already been tranferred and their billets not be refilled because of the decommissioning. If it weren't for the security problems, I'm sure that lots of civilians could fit into the empty spaces on the battlestar.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 10:56 AM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


I wasn't aware that Gaeta set up a network. In the first episode of the Mini-Series Adama was dead set against any kind of network, eventhough the ship was going to be a museum. His stance was that the absence of a network was a tactically important aspect of the ship which should be maintained to honor those who served on her. It's hard to imagine he'd reverse himself on that point (the tactical part).

Didn't Adama order Gaeta to calculate some huge jump manaually?

I think your right, there is some implication that Gaeta is a Cylon. Maybe they're just teasing us, letting the audience feel a little of paranoia. How many of the 12 Models have we seen? If you count Centurions and Raiders we know of at least 6. Anyways there's 6-8 models outstanding.




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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 11:06 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL


Quote:

Originally posted by Knibblet:
This ship was going to be decommissioned. She's a travelling museum. There are going to be HUGE sections empty of folks. Many folk would have already been tranferred and their billets not be refilled because of the decommissioning. If it weren't for the security problems, I'm sure that lots of civilians could fit into the empty spaces on the battlestar./

I accept your other explanations, but I’m still not sure about this one. They clearly have a number of marines on board, I’m sure there must have been some reason why they weren’t involved in the fight that I must have missed. Didn’t they fully resupply in the miniseries? So why were they short on ammunitions?

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Qui desiderat pacem praeparet bellum.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 11:36 AM

CAPTAINCDC


Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran:
I wasn't aware that Gaeta set up a network. In the first episode of the Mini-Series Adama was dead set against any kind of network, eventhough the ship was going to be a museum. His stance was that the absence of a network was a tactically important aspect of the ship which should be maintained to honor those who served on her. It's hard to imagine he'd reverse himself on that point (the tactical part).

Didn't Adama order Gaeta to calculate some huge jump manaually?




Adama did not reverse himself. He was laying unconcious in the sick bay. Gaeta came up with the network idea as a last resort to find the rest of the fleet. Networking was the only way to calculate the coordinates of where the fleet had jumped before the cylons blasted them to pieces. Gaeta said that without the network it would take like 15 minutes or something like that. The XO (Tigh) was opposed but relented when he saw they were out of options.

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The only sovereign you can allow to rule you is reason!

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 11:37 AM

SNEAKER98


"We have too much work to do, and not enough people to do it"

Those are the words coming from Commander Adama in the episode 33. Yes, there are Marines, but I would assume they're stationed at key locations and in small numbers. I doubt there's a reserve force standing by incase of borders, since none of them had ever seen the likes of a Cylon border ship.

Without power in the CIC and communications cut, how could Saul possibly order any and all marines to attack? Messages were all being sent purely by hand, remember?

"I do the job... and then I get paid. Go run your little world."
-Malcolm Reynolds

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 11:40 AM

XION47


There were numerous fights going on throughout the ship. The two cylons seen at the end were not the only Cylons that boarded the BSG as the others had been destroyed by marines offscreen. However, the marines were no longer able to engage the two we saw at the end after they had decompressed an area of the ship. The only thing between the Cylons and aft damage control were Adama and the group he was leading. It was in fact the other marines on Galactica that had taken most of the rocket ammo from the arms bay. By the time Adama's group reached there, there were only 6 bullets left.

Someone mentioned this earlier, but I'm not sure if you caught it. In the mini-series it was established that there was only a skeleton crew left aboard Galactica. There is certainly not an abundance of marines to help secure every part of Galactica.

Harken: "Seems odd that you would name your ship after a battle you were on the wrong side of."
Mal: "May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."
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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 12:19 PM

SICKDUDE


Just to chime in, I agree with what Xion 47 and others were saying about the presence of firefights and such. In just about every scene onboard, you can hear gunfire in the background. It seems a fairly obvious implication that the cylons were running into a lot of resistance. Apparently, most of that resistance was in vain due to the lack of HE rounds and the relative "imperviosicity" of the raiders. Communication was key, as word was not getting out very well as to where they were or what was need to destroy them.

It seemed to be only about half a dozen in the boarding party.

Also keep in mind that, up until then, nobody on board had ever seen a cylon centurion or shot one.

Now, veteran, I will agree on your point that the cylons took a lot more to kill than in previous episodes.

"Don't say 'ka' until you've tried it." Daniel Jackson

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 1:19 PM

DIEGO


I had the following two thoughts about the skeleton crew deal.

1. Weren't they short on space for evacuees (having to convert cargo holds into living quarters on the civilian ships etc.?). Therefore, wouldn't it alleviate crowding pressure and cut the wear and tear on life support if they allocated some of those passengers to the Galactica?

2. Then I answered my own question. It's a military vessel. The military crew is willing to sacrifice the ship to save the civilian population, but I don't think passengers would like to go along for a kamikaze ride. Also, at best they would be underfoot. At worst, there would be numerous security issues (not to mention the possibility of Cylon infiltrators). Okay, now I've argued myself around so that I can now accept the nearly empty Galactica.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 1:39 PM

HJERMSTED


This is one of those shows that demands your attention.

You can't be off chopping brocolli in the kitchen with the sound turned up.

mattro

PS: Early on, Helio was able to take out a Cylon with standard rounds but... only after ambushing it with explosives first and THEN emptying his entire gun into its head.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 2:00 PM

EMBERS


Quote:

Originally posted by PurpleBelly:
It felt to me like a disposable episode to introduce faces and characters to a new audience. Better things to come, I hope.


well introducing faces and characters in a total snooze fest (speaking for myself here) isn't a very effective plan.
I'll hang in another week or two, but last Friday's was the worst episode I'd seen of Battlestar Galactica.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 2:20 PM

KNIBBLET


Without the network it would take the navigation computer 12 hours - with the network, 15 minutes. Five levels of firewall doesn't seem to me to be Gaeta playing possum and I don't think he's a Cylon.

Quote:

Originally posted by captaincdc:
Adama did not reverse himself. He was laying unconcious in the sick bay... Gaeta said that without the network it would take like 15 minutes or something like that. The XO (Tigh) was opposed but relented when he saw they were out of options.

Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran: I wasn't aware that Gaeta set up a network. In the first episode of the Mini-Series Adama was dead set against any kind of network...It's hard to imagine he'd reverse himself on that point




http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/MN-Firefly/

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 2:22 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL


Quote:

Originally posted by Diego:
2. Then I answered my own question. It's a military vessel. The military crew is willing to sacrifice the ship to save the civilian population, but I don't think passengers would like to go along for a kamikaze ride. Also, at best they would be underfoot. At worst, there would be numerous security issues (not to mention the possibility of Cylon infiltrators). Okay, now I've argued myself around so that I can now accept the nearly empty Galactica.

After reading people’s points I can see that it all makes more sense then I originally thought. I guess I must have been chopping broccoli, but there is one reoccurring point that some of you have made that I still don't understand.

The Galactica had a skeleton crew, which is understandable and makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is that if they did have a skeleton why do they still, if indeed they still do? Why haven’t they conscripted from the rest of the fleet to completely man their only military defense against complete extinction. If there ever was an argument for the draft, this would seem to be it.

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Qui desiderat pacem praeparet bellum.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 2:34 PM

SICKDUDE


I only watch BSG, not tape it, but it seemed like the Cylons from the boarding party were different from the (non human) ones we've seen on Caprica and elsewhere. I think this is why they were so much harder to kill---they were a different, more beefed up model. Can anyone who has the show recorded compare? Surfing the web for image/screencap galleries got me nothing.



"Don't say 'ka' until you've tried it." Daniel Jackson

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 2:59 PM

RICKKER


Well they are aware cylons resemble humans now. it seems that they would rather go undermanned than increace the security risk of opening up the Galactica to the civilian population. Well worst episode yet? I'm not shure I agree. With most others rockin' so hard one will eventually not rock as hard. I thought this was a solid episode.

Bitch stole my ride.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 3:30 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


Quote:

I guess I must have been chopping broccoli, but there is one reoccurring point that some of you have made that I still don't understand.

The Galactica had a skeleton crew, which is understandable and makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is that if they did have a skeleton why do they still, if indeed they still do? Why haven’t they conscripted from the rest of the fleet to completely man their only military defense against complete extinction. If there ever was an argument for the draft, this would seem to be it



Yeah, maybe I was up getting a beer or something.
But your right Finn. I would think they'd have filled a lot of their roster with survivors from the fleet. We know they were recruiting pilots it only makes sense that they tried to fill the rest of their roster.


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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 4:55 PM

LIVINGIMPAIRED


Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran:
Yeah, maybe I was up getting a beer or something.
But your right Finn. I would think they'd have filled a lot of their roster with survivors from the fleet. We know they were recruiting pilots it only makes sense that they tried to fill the rest of their roster.




If I remember correctly, the people they recruited were already in training to become pilots, yet hadn't completed the course.

The problem with drafts is that they take enormous resources to execute. First you have to devise a system to select recruits, and a bureaucracy to implement the system. Then you have to train the troops, which requires experienced soldiers to take time off their duties to teach, and even then you're dealing with a influx of very green soldiers. This is a large reason that the US military hasn't activated its own selective service; by the time the fully trained soldiers would be ready for service, it wouldn't do them any good. And that's not even getting into the political fallout.

________________

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 5:31 PM

ZOIC


I don't believe that Apollo thought that Cylon ship was still in one peace and assumed that it was just debris that hit the Galactica. Also where the Cylon ship hit the Galactica was a Zero G environment, with no Oxygen (this is where the Vipers come into land). So the crew of the Galactica would not have been able to do anything about it until after the battle and the Galactica made the jump, by that time the Cylons had emerged.

With the Cylon Centurions I believe a possible explanation is that they where either a newer tougher model and/or they where designed as a kind of assault model, which are different to the occupation forces on Caprica. To me I would only call this a continuity error, if they do another episode like this one and the Centurions become a lot easier to destroy then it would be a continuity error. It was a new model Cylon ship so, maybe they where new model Centurions.

Personally I like that the Cylons are now tougher to kill, I always thought that the Centurions on Caprica where to easily destroyed. So, no matter what the reason is for it I am happy that they have the change.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 5:43 PM

GUNRUNNER


Quote:

Originally posted by sneaker98:
Without power in the CIC and communications cut, how could Saul possibly order any and all marines to attack?

Aboard a real life warship even without power every major compartment can communicate with each other using sound powered phones. To "cut" communications using these systems you would need to overrun nearly the entire ship since each section can pass on orders from command even if the direct lines to that section from the commander is cut. (IE if the Conn needed to talk to the Engine room but that circuit was cut they could relay the orders to the Galley, and the Galley could relay it to the Engine room.) During battle stations each major compartment would have a “Talker” with a pair of sound powered phones plugged in, all the bridge would need to do is have all the Talkers pass the word “repel borders’ to every compartment.

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Tuesday, July 26, 2005 7:06 PM

JRC


I personally loved this ep, but I have one nagging question: Without power, would Galactica not have gravity? I assume there is some kind of system (electrical?) to generate gravity to keep everyone from floating around.

Everyone dies alone.

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 1:54 AM

MUGTWAINE


Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran:
I wasn't aware that Gaeta set up a network. In the first episode of the Mini-Series Adama was dead set against any kind of network, eventhough the ship was going to be a museum. His stance was that the absence of a network was a tactically important aspect of the ship which should be maintained to honor those who served on her. It's hard to imagine he'd reverse himself on that point (the tactical part).

Didn't Adama order Gaeta to calculate some huge jump manaually?

I think your right, there is some implication that Gaeta is a Cylon. Maybe they're just teasing us, letting the audience feel a little of paranoia. How many of the 12 Models have we seen? If you count Centurions and Raiders we know of at least 6. Anyways there's 6-8 models outstanding.



Yeah, I never thought to count the Centurions and Raiders until a friend of mine started listing off which of the twelve models we've seen so far and she mentioned them. I always assumed that Six meant there were 12 HUMAN-STYLE models of Cylon, and that the more robotic models were above and beyond that number. Because my friend also counted the Base Stars. Actually, let's count...

1. Six
2. Leoben
3. That Kevin-Spacy-Looking Guy
4. Boomer
5. Raider
6. Centurion
7. Base Star
8. That Heavy-Raider/Centurion Transport from the last two episodes...
9. (Possibly) That old-style 1979 Centurion model, if they're still in production (one is seen in the museum section of the ship in a display case during the mini-series).

Okay, so number nine is a stretch. But that puts the count at at least eight. Doesn't give them a lot of room to add more human-style Cylons. Of course, the writers could always just say they've added a model, but so far there seems to be a significance to the number 12 on the show.

Gaeta definitely has some Cylon indicators...

1. He missed the Cylon device on the bridge in the miniseries.
2. When Baltar was suspected of helping the Cylons destroy the colonies, the very moment he gave in and prayed to God, Gaeta miraculously found a way to discredit the evidence against him.
3. He had a very conspicuous handshake moment with Boomer right before she blasted the old man. A weapon handoff? A trigger for her to attack? Nothing at all? They definitely drew attention to it.
4. He forgot to relay the new jump coordinates to the fleet, separating BSG from the civilians.
5. As a continuation of 4, he came up with a plan that required networking the computers, which allowed the Cylons to get a virus into Galactica's computer system. So he was responsible for both the problem situation and the risky solution.

Now, all of these things could just be what they look like - coincidences. And maybe they're just trying to spread paranoia like you said. And even if he is a Cylon, he could be Boomer style in that he doesn't KNOW he's a Cylon, he just keeps doing bad things. But it will be interesting to see how it pans out.

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 2:15 AM

MAJORCLOD




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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 2:15 AM

MAJORCLOD


So far the first two eps haven't been all that spectacular... I really hope they do something different soon, its getting boring.

I really wish they'd kill that Baltar fella already, I'm sick of seeing his lame Cylon visions.



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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 2:45 AM

CALHOUN


Quote:

MajorClod wrote:
Wednesday, July 27, 2005 02:15
So far the first two eps haven't been all that spectacular... I really hope they do something different soon, its getting boring.



I agree with your sentiment, i'm not quite at the bored stage yet though.

The entire first season was great and left me hanging for more, these first 2 eps of season 2 just somehow havent sated me..

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 3:35 AM

ZOIC


The start of this season is majorly different to last season, because virtually all of the main character are out of commission or dislocated.

Adama is in sick bay (Out of Commission)
Roslin is in a Cell (Out of Commission)
Boomer on Galactica(Out of Commission)
Starbuck on Caprica (Dislocated)
Boomer on Caprica (Dislocated)
Baltar on Kobol (Dislocated)
The Chief on Kobol (Dislocate)

I fact every single main character including Tigh, Helo and Apollo are in significantly different roles than they where last season, with the exception of maybe Six, though you could argue that even her role has changed as well.

Personally I have really enjoyed these first two episodes, but I can imagine why having so many main characters out of their traditional roles might be a worry for some viewers. At the moment the show is in a kind of stalemate, which will no doubt sort it self out over the next few weeks.

I'm just happy that they didn't have the false cliff hanger, like so many other shows have, where by the end of the first episode everything is resolve and then the show proceeds like nothing ever happened. At least with Galactica there are consequences, which will take time to resolve, there are no quick fixes like had on Stargate: Atlantis (faking the destruction of Atlantis (with a cloaking devise and real nuclear bomb!), resulting in entire fleet of enemy ship turning around and going home, without even the smallest investigation of the destruction site).

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 3:59 AM

CALHOUN


I hear ya regarding Atlantis. There always seems to be some miraculous resolution to major dramatic events. SG Atlantis is losing me.

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 4:10 AM

JARED


Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran:
I especially didn't like the bit about a Cylon virus infecting the computers.



I didn't like that for two other reasons. Horrible and silly plot devices. Why do they even need to go back to the place they screwed up the calculation to do it again? Knowing the old coords should be enough, physically being there won't change a thing about the math. Second, that whole "network allows Cylons to hack us"-part was complete bull. If their computers can't be accessed from the outside when they are disconnected, then connecting them with each other won't magically create a connection to the outside. Wish it did, then I'd simply network 5 computers and get internet access for free. It made sense for the fancy systems on the other ships that were most likely meant to all communicate with each other, but is just nonsense for isolated networks.

Other than that the typical nonsense Hollywood depiction of computers isn't too new. Doesn't one wonder how Gaeta finds the time for a fancy graphical display of hacking progress, especially one that doesn't tell you any details you might be interested in to do something about it? And don't get me started on software firewalls. Nobody in his right mind that cares about security is running a firewall on the machine he wants to protect. That's what dedicated hardware like routers or cheap computers are good for.

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 4:58 AM

MUGTWAINE


Well, in the miniseries, there was some piece of software that was installed on all ships in the Colonial fleet. Baltar had been on the team that developed that software, and he had given Six access to it, at which point she added some backdoors which the Cylons could use to get into the system. I can't remember exactly what the software did but I remember it was kind of specialized and not particularly high-risk, high-priority stuff. Something involving navigation or fleet coordination.

Supposedly they purged the software, but Six might not have given Baltar enough info that Galactica could have gotten rid of anything she left there.

As far as wireless access goes, you never know. Supposedly there are ways to transmit information or even hack modern-day computers in the real world simply by causing specific fluctuations in the flow of a normal powerline. I'm a software engineer and even I have no idea how that would work, but I'm told it can be done on a rudimentary level.

So when those Cylon raiders open up their ports and those red lights come out, who knows what they're doing? A simple wireless connection shouldn't require anything fancy like that. You're right, Galactica wouldn't provide a traditional wireless access point. My guess is they're manipulating some sort of energy flow within the vulnerable system which triggers access through the pre-existing backdoors Six put in. Add to that a hard-wired local network where each system supposedly trusts the others, and they would have free reign on everything through their connection via an "unimportant" subsystem.

It may sound like I'm stretching, but it makes sense to me and seems like a plausible explanation for what the writers are thinking. Maybe they'll discuss it down the road, but I actually doubt we'll ever get it spelled out like that. Can you imagine how dry a scene would be trying to explain the above paragraph?

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 5:06 AM

HERO


Quote:

Originally posted by Zoic:

Personally I have really enjoyed these first two episodes, but I can imagine why having so many main characters out of their traditional roles might be a worry for some viewers. At the moment the show is in a kind of stalemate, which will no doubt sort it self out over the next few weeks.



I agree, but I still have issues over the gun thing. Bullets work on Caprica, but not on Galctica. My only solution is that the Cylons either fielded an upgrade once they determined a means to counter standard weapons or they are deliberately using inferior troops on Caprica as part of their "plan".

As for the computer network. I find it confusing because none of Galactica's systems are networked. In order to pull off their plan they networked three systems together: fire control, navigation, and the ftl drive. How then did the virus infect inconnected subsystems like main power and communications? Makes no sense unless they got inside help. I'd say at least one member of the bridge senior staff is a Cylon.

I have also noted that all the Cylons thus far are young. Where's the old lady or old man Cylon?

H


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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 6:09 AM

CAPTAINCDC


Quote:

Originally posted by Knibblet:
Without the network it would take the navigation computer 12 hours - with the network, 15 minutes. Five levels of firewall doesn't seem to me to be Gaeta playing possum and I don't think he's a Cylon.

Quote:

Originally posted by captaincdc:
Adama did not reverse himself. He was laying unconcious in the sick bay... Gaeta said that without the network it would take like 15 minutes or something like that. The XO (Tigh) was opposed but relented when he saw they were out of options.

Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran: I wasn't aware that Gaeta set up a network. In the first episode of the Mini-Series Adama was dead set against any kind of network...It's hard to imagine he'd reverse himself on that point




http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/MN-Firefly/




Oh well, I was only off by 11 hours and 45 minutes. That's close enough...right?;)

---------------------------------------

The only sovereign you can allow to rule you is reason!

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 6:40 AM

HASLINGER


I listen to the pod cast regarding this ep. I gotta say Ron did mention the fact that this was an aware decision to let the cylons onto the ship in the way that they did it. If I remember correctly he discussed the possibility of explanation but figured it best just to accept it. He basically said that because so much was going on and so many occurances were happening on the ship at the same time that the cylon raid was interweaved with said events. You also have to remember that with the exception of Adama and Col. Ty most of the crew on board are greener than grass. This because more present when the security guy guarding the Pres. is so aprehensive. He's got firefright. Also on kobol the same sort of panic can be seen from the crew members. This is one major beef I have with the show. It's too skewed against the humans. Yes we are fragile and often weak but their portrayal of us is more often than not, childlike and frankly pitiful. But remember I'm a firefly fan. I like hero archetypes. Mal, Jane, River, ect.


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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 12:48 PM

AMNESIAC


Quote:

I agree, but I still have issues over the gun thing. Bullets work on Caprica, but not on Galctica. My only solution is that the Cylons either fielded an upgrade once they determined a means to counter standard weapons or they are deliberately using inferior troops on Caprica as part of their "plan".



Helo couldn't take out Cylon Centurions with his pistol. They just played dead because they were keeping him alive as part of their secret plan. The Centurions are easily as smart as people, and are perfectly willing to give their lives for the cause. So one gets hit with a regular round and it takes a fall in an effort to keep up the illusion that they are hunting him. Giving their lives, or at least taking a fall to keep the 'Helo experiment' running is nothing to them. After Cylon Sharon goes all rebellious, there are no more shoot outs between Helo and the Centurions. They also search for Helo and Sharon more vigorously. On Galactica, the centurions have a mission and won't take a fall.

Quote:

I have also noted that all the Cylons thus far are young. Where's the old lady or old man Cylon?


Hey if you could grow yourself a body of any age, how old would you make yourself?

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 6:25 PM

JARED


Quote:

Originally posted by Mugtwaine:
Supposedly there are ways to transmit information or even hack modern-day computers in the real world simply by causing specific fluctuations in the flow of a normal powerline. I'm a software engineer and even I have no idea how that would work, but I'm told it can be done on a rudimentary level.



Sounds like something to research, because it sounds pretty far out there, especially with todays methods. So far it was all easy. New ships had Baltars latest Windows (*cough* always considered that a nice statement about internet, windows and how certain worms could spread like crazy), so they could be shut down with the press of a button. The old ships didn't and weren't affected.

But if they can be, and if the cylons can really just get into an unimportant system, why would that subssystem be made a part of the network? Statement on people that rather trust another piece of potentially faulty software like a sfw instead of just disabling the problematic software/service? How much computational power could it have, that couldn't be replaced with another system?

I agree that a useful explanation in the show would have been boring and longwinded, but the way it was done felt like a horribly contrieved plot device to me, just to artificially create more tension. Felt strange for a show that usually doesn't require that far out explanations.

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Thursday, July 28, 2005 5:55 AM

BROWNCOAT1

May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one.


Okay, when I saw the episode, the first thing I said when I saw the ship that Apollo said was a "new" bogie was "APC". My wife looked at me funny & I said "It's a troop transport". She asked why & I told her because it was not immediately engaging the Vipers and it was headed straight at Galactica. Add to that the fact that it was bulky with a bunch of engines & only forward firing weapons (those heavy chain guns it fired @ Apollo).

We see the ship crash into the port hangar bay. So why didn't someone check it out? Damage Control team, Marines, janitor, somebody???

Why was the ship not on high alert? Why did no one seem to know a Cylon ship hit the hangar bay?

Why are Cylons on Caprica destroyed by standard small arms fire, but the ones on Galactica require explosive rounds to the head to take out?

Too many questions.....

__________________________________________

"May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."

Richmond, VA & surrounding area Firefly Fans:

http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/richmondbrowncoats/


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Sunday, July 31, 2005 12:22 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


Quote:

LivingImpaired wrote:
If I remember correctly, the people they recruited were already in training to become pilots, yet hadn't completed the course.

The problem with drafts is that they take enormous resources to execute. First you have to devise a system to select recruits, and a bureaucracy to implement the system. Then you have to train the troops, which requires experienced soldiers to take time off their duties to teach, and even then you're dealing with a influx of very green soldiers. This is a large reason that the US military hasn't activated its own selective service; by the time the fully trained soldiers would be ready for service, it wouldn't do them any good. And that's not even getting into the political fallout.



I'm not even talking about a draft,there should be many volunteers. US Army Basic training typically takes about six weeks. Whatever the Colonial Services training takes I'm sure they could abbreviate due to the situation. This would at least give them people to put into support services for Galactica

As far as the pilots go, I think "Hotdog" was the only military trained one in the class. The rest were civilian pilots.


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Sunday, July 31, 2005 12:28 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


Quote:

Originally posted by BrownCoat1:
Okay, when I saw the episode, the first thing I said when I saw the ship that Apollo said was a "new" bogie was "APC". My wife looked at me funny & I said "It's a troop transport". ...
We see the ship crash into the port hangar bay. So why didn't someone check it out? Damage Control team, Marines, janitor, somebody???

Why was the ship not on high alert? Why did no one seem to know a Cylon ship hit the hangar bay?

Why are Cylons on Caprica destroyed by standard small arms fire, but the ones on Galactica require explosive rounds to the head to take out?

Too many questions.....



This is another aspect of what I'm talking about. These guys were professional enough to keep the fleet moving when the Cylons were showing up every 33 minutes, why are the making these kinds of mistakes?

Doesn't set well with me.

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Tuesday, August 2, 2005 8:53 AM

BROWNCOAT1

May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one.


Quote:

Originally posted by Veteran:
This is another aspect of what I'm talking about. These guys were professional enough to keep the fleet moving when the Cylons were showing up every 33 minutes, why are the making these kinds of mistakes?

Doesn't set well with me.




Agreed.

It is like all of the sudden these huge holes open up in the continuity just to allow the writers some new material.

Hope they don't keep making these kind of errors throughout the season.

__________________________________________

"May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."

Richmond, VA & surrounding area Firefly Fans:

http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/richmondbrowncoats/


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Friday, August 5, 2005 12:26 AM

ECLIPTIC


I just don't see the inconsistencies. There are more than enough logical answers to everything that was brought up here.

Most of them have already been addressed.

On the network systsms. We are talking about systems that weren't typically networked. THey didn't run LAN wire down the halls to connect the computers up. They used already installed wireless networking to network the systems together. When you have wireless networking, anyone with a wireless lan card can try and hack your system.
Sure systems are networked but with line wires and limited bandwidth. They also aren't directly connected which they would need to be to gain any benefit from the jurry-rigged coordinated processing power of the 3 most powerful systems.

People should simply realize that by the term "networking", they are talking about their standard networking. Hardlines were mentioned in the mini series.

Why is Battlestar Galactica deserted? Ofcourse it is deserted. It is a skeleton crew with only the people who were there for the museum and Adama's retirement ceremony. That includes the pilots that were on board as well as those that needed to operate the ship. Most are greens because they don't need battle veterans running a ship that is about to be decommisioned.

Why are the crew that can keep jumping every 30 minutes because of the Cylons attacking repeatedly acting differently? Commander Adama is down. He is the glue of the entire remaining military. I mean how do you expect greens to act? Most of the commanders are off ship and their Commander is dying. Their morale has hit an all time low. All of a sudden the guy that was able to get them out of the stickiest messes is no longer there to issue commands.

The Cylon taken down on Caprica wasn't an easy takedown. He ambushed it by setting up an explosive and then pumped about 12 rounds into its face. Alos take a note that cylons patrolling a planet they already own could be older models. But even if they aren't, we are talking about an explosive charge and an entire clip of ammo immediately after. Armor is the only thing keeping regular bullets from destroying its computerized brain. If the explosive charge didn't outright destroy the cyclon, it certaily would weaken its armor and overall skeletal structure. Allowing for repeated shots into the weakest part of its armor to be penetrated by normal rounds.

If I had a choice between using an explosive charge and an explosive round I would choose the charge.

When talking about the cylon ship crashing into Galactica. People really need to understand that the entire ship is basically in chaos. They are acting without Adama's leadership and they are fighting an immediate fight to get back to the unprotected fleet while greens are fighting an attack on their jurry rigged networking. Alot of things are going on at once. The human factor of the show really shows through. Sure youcan sit back and judge their actions from a couch but what would happen when you are placed in such a position? Where a most like doomed cylon ship crashes into Galactica. It may not even pass through his mind that it is a boarding party. Humans aren't perfect and this series shows that.

On the lack of power gravity question. There are obviously backup power systems. The most important systems would be on it, including gravity.

On the draft. That would have serious political implications. They would be enroaching on civilian government affairs. Now recruitment would be possible, but who would train these new troops? There are very few actual commanders aboard. he commanders need to be commanding their own troops, especially at a time like this.

Civilians on Galactica. You just can't let civilians live on a battle ship that is always the last to jump and constantly putting itself at risk.

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Thursday, September 1, 2005 11:04 PM

MURMURER


Had any of the crew ever seen centurions by that point? Helo was still on Caprica and no one from Kobol had yet returned. This is probably the first time anyone on the ship had engaged Cylons in a firefight outside of their vipers, as decades have passed since the original war.

Even volunteers take time to train. I also think time is fairly compressed on this show: a week passes for us, a few days pass for them.

I'm still fairly impressed with the continuity - a friend of mine with sharp eyes saw that Gaeta's display in the premiere was solid red just before he pulled the plug, indicating that the cylon virus had reached the mainframe. He missed it only because he had to duck under the console to break the connection!

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Friday, September 2, 2005 2:32 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


I would guess that the only ones who had seen a centurion, outside of a museum, were Tighe and Commander Adamma.

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