See the link below for pretty good-fun piece by Antonio Lopez on the final BSG (one among many – though I think people are holding back so as not to SPOIL it for others) – anyway, linking shamans and Hendrix and media and Dylan (but a pity the whole thing with the subterrainean cylons routine is lost)…
But really, the ending of the final episode was shit. I admit I loved the idea of a Lampkin Prez, and as someone suggested his mutt was going to have a great time munching antelope in Africa (see here). But you gotta agree the last half hour was awful. Yes, as expected they land on real earth …. gnnng… So, hunter gatherers who do not have language is anthropologically absurd. But hooray, the fleet will offer them language and sex – like some sort of twisted overseas aid program. Many set out to build bourgeois homes – Helo and Athena are going to start an Ikea store. Anders for no reason destroys all the floating mecano set – despite the Lego TM functioning FDL drives. Starbuck disappears right out of the film – does she join Bilbo Baggins and the Elves after leaving middle earth? Gaius becomes a film producer on sunset strip, not and angel, and though he hangs around till the 20th century, he has a job as an ad exec for Sony and is killed by double agents pretending to be anarchists protesting the G20 summit. Tyrel is just forgiven for killing his ex – and lives alone forever rewriting the chord progressions for cover songs by Nirvana, building another invisible viper and eventually becoming head of Exxon. Tigh and Ellen are what – going to live together on earth forever, making highland single malts or something? Adama is going to become Daniel Boon, selling stims to tourists outside Frontierland in Florida.
After all that death, what a surprise. Up till that two-thirds point I thought the last episode was superb. But then they end up in, I dunno, Happy Valley or something! Antonio is right to note ‘the ridiculous coincidence that the scenery looks like Window’s XP’s desktop pastoral landscape’ – see his screed on Reality Sandwich, and stay tuned for my chapter with Laura King, called ‘The Eighteenth Brumaire of Gaius Baltar’, on which we recently did the final edit, and which will appear in a US book next year.
Trinketization 
Edward James Olmos, aka. Admiral Adama from Battlestar Galactica, speaking at the recent panel held at the United Nations. He fucking rocks.
Just before the clip starts he takes to task the UN Human Rights rep on the panel (Craig Mokhiber) for his use of the concept of race.
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Thanks for linking to my article and for your great comments. I agree that the ending was a bit of a let down. Frankly,I think the series should have ended midway with the Planet of the Apes ending on the other “earth.”
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I must admit that I was glad to see BSG end, as the tension was killing me! My partner and I went to bed after watching every episode buzzing it was so intense…the first epiosode (33) set the adrenaline level very high.
I found the ending a bit unsatisfying though. I would not like the task of writing the ending, as it would never satisfy everyone. The idea of technolgically savvy people ditching everything and hiking off across the veldt just did not do it for me. Likewise the lack of resolution of the ‘spiritual’ backstory was frustrating, but I suppose in keeping with how cryptically it was presented. Maybe I just wanted some narrative closure on that, though poor old Stardoe disappearing in to the thin but bracing African air was a nice touch i thought.
I will never look at my toaster the same again, and i can’t say anything else on television has had that affect on me!
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Hi Gary
Yep, the toaster does not seemthe same anymore, even its metallic stare seems to plead for equal status. And you just know these appliances come awake at night…
I would have though Michael Leunig’s sister (or is it his cousin, can’t recall) would have made a good job of the ending of BSG if she’d been let loose on the set with her disturbingly animated households. Her cartoons would have taken us in a whole other direction.
J
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Hmmm, I still don’t know what to feel about the ending. It was emotional, but several of the resolutions were perplexing. I’ve been meaning to watch it all again, but its a long slog. I did watch the mini-series again though and its a lot tighter, even with the ambiguity and mystery. The stuff in NYC was kinda clumsy although the Jimi was a great musical send off.
The end of Anders was poignant, but did he decide to euthanise himself, or was he programmed to? Might’ve been nice for him to wander the universe with the ships in tow, or heck, if the red-stripe Cylons showed a little fraternity and adopted him as their cybrid.
I did like the giving up the heavy tech idea, and love even more how its really pissing some people off. Kevin Kelley of WIRED has an interesting, though unrelated post here on a world without technology: http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archives/2009/03/the_world_witho.php
And we can infer from the Mitochondrial Eve story that Hera died young. Windows XP background aside, it may have been a ‘happy ending’ on a racial survival basis, but possibly nasty brutish and short on the personal level. Wasn’t one team supposed to land in the searing heart of the Outback?
Still, the colonial themes crept in – “We could give them language” – please. Say, doesn’t this jibe with Louis Farrakhan’s idea that white men are an alien race??? ;-) Maybe this explains the lack of brothers and sistas on BSG…
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