bigscary | Post of infinite hate

So the grand finale of the show is a handful of white guys, mostly old, looking at the "Natives" and joking about breeding with them. And again, when the decision is made to abandon their physical culture, technology, and displace the current inhabitants of ReallyEarthThisTime, it's still a mostly male planning-group. Yes, tell me again how this show is arguably non-racist, non-misogynistic, or non-ageist.

Oh, and as to the interminable denouement? Fuck it. It's a litany of the bad choices everyone made before the apocalypse, and it's not explanatory, just embarrassing -- for the characters, the actors, and the creators.

I'm honestly trying to come up with my usual post-BSG-I-actually-watched attempt-at-comedy post, but nothin' doin'. The thing fucking makes fun of itself, and what little isn't second-to-second self-parody is just so infuriating as film making and politics that I can't seem to bring myself to engage with it in any mode but angry disdain.

As it actually ends, the one ray of hope is that given the hominids we saw, they're SO FAR BEFORE the agricultural revolution that they obviously all die out within a decade or two, century at most, and the non-invading hominids actually get their chance, rather than being replaced by obnoxious space-perverts.

OK ACTUAL ENDING IS AN ANTI-ROBOT MONTAGE!

ANTI-ROBOT MONTAGE!

Current Mood: aggravated

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From:

manwe-iluvendil.livejournal.com

Racist? I don't know. I mean, if Tory and Dee were still alive, they'd likely be right there, but they left the scene with characters we knew and I think to throw in a random black guy or something would have been even more insulting, smacking of tokenism. One could argue that Sharon coulda been there, but why would she? This, to me, falls under the category of unfortunate connotations. It was the scene that made sense. Take characters we know, have them scope out the indigenous life -- which at that point were Cro-magnon in Africa -- and note their development. What else were they going to do, pontificate upon their evolutionary potential?

And as for sexist... what show are you watching? Even when Kara is in a dress, she still thwarts like fifty female stereotypes a second. Without losing her vulnerability. The only real girly girl I can think of is Cally, and even she is a mechanical specialist who is willing to kill for her family. Not that I'm a Cally fan, far from it, but I'm just saying.

As for interminable denouement... I'm sorry, I actually liked all the wind-down. I thought it was cool. I was relieved when the Cylon action was done and there was still fifty minutes left. You've got like twenty characters to send off. Better, I think, to give everyone their room to breathe. I mean, I'm a little miffed about Starbuck's unresolved nature. WTF? But Baltar's comment about knowing about farming was a great touch and really drove his arc home. I could ask for a few more answers, but I'm more than happy with what I got.

You're an esteemed fellow geek, Dave, and an astute fan and viewer, but on the matter of the BSG finale, I find I have to respectfully disagree.

From:

bigscary.livejournal.com

The show is racist because the white men, mostly old, are the most reasonable people to have there. Tokenism is not required, but that little shot summed up the makeup of the show.

And as for sexist -- by the lights of the show, Kara is awesome when she is displaying stereotypically masculine virtues. Similarly throughout the show, stereotypically feminine acts and virtues are loci of madness and betrayal, stereotypically masculine acts and virtues are loci of salvation and success. Kara succeeds by being more manly than the men, which is something, but no one is able to succeed by being womanly, or anything other than a big ole manly-man. Tyrol's vengeance-murder of Torie is a good example which I may post about later.

From:

manwe-iluvendil.livejournal.com

Gotta disagree with you there too. Kara's ass-kicking "masculine" traits, though cool and sometimes helpful, are also a large part of her self-destructive cycle. Conversely, some of her gentlest, most "feminine" moments -- the caretaking of that little girl Casey, her unwillingness to abandon Sam in Season 2 or to just let him die in Season 4, and her compassion for Kat as she lay dying -- are some of the best examples of her strength as a person.

As for the racism, again, it's just where the chips fell. There were plenty of non-white characters at the show's start, but many of them, as well as many of white characters, died. And for my money, when you start making all your narrative decisions on what's going to be the most politically inoffensive move, you're fucked dramatically. I have an agenda like anyone else, even when it comes to my writing, and there are certain things I try to avoid, but at the end of the day, if I have to do something shitty to a Black Jewish Lesbian, I sleep soundly, because if that character had been a straight white male, I would have done the exact same thing. Trying to maintain diversity is all well and good and something to strive for wherever possible, but in the end, a writer's obligation is to go where the story and the characters go.

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