The million-dollar controversy.

brightfamouscucumber

Like many of its viewers, when Battlestar Galactica (BSG) aired on the third weekend of my Eighth Grade year of school, I found myself both loving it and hating it, all at the very same time. And I had no idea why... for a very long time.

Even before it aired, I loved it, because, as a Seventh Grader, I had ordered the book which corresponds with the first five hours of the show, and even though I wound up having to share it first with each of my four siblings, and was the last to read the book I had paid for with my own money, I found the story to be utterly compelling.

Similar to previous Sci-Fi TV series, BSG is steeped with social, moral, and political scenarios, pertinent to the era in which it was aired: Those were the years of the heights of the Cold War, where EVERYBODY was HOPING for some sort of peace agreement between the CCCP and the USA, lest there be a nuclear holocaust bestowed upon the whole world. In fact, it was during the airing of the one episode that the episode was interrupted with a news report of a Camp David peace treaty being reached and signed, which, while it wasn't a peace treaty between the USA and the CCCP, but between Israel and the Palistinian Liberation Organization, it spoke untold volumes of how much the whole world wanted peace. So, BSG's warning that overtures of peace might not actually be what they appeared to be, became a very controversial stance to take at the time.

The pilot episodes for one of BSG's well-known predecessors, Star Trek, contained a notion so controversial that when Star Trek aired, it's creator, Gene Roddenberry had to leave it behind: the concept of a woman being in the role of a military leader. BSG's creator, Glen A. Larsen, revisited this theme in a completely different manner: the first three hours of the series had nothing but men in complete command of all situations.. and then, in the fourth, most of the men fell ill, leaving their whole civilization left in the hands of some unexpected heroes (who, by other characters, were bemoaned as being lowly "SHUTTLE PILOTS", but, who, on camera, were clearly all of exactly one gender, and not the more masculine of the two), who clearly came out to save the day (but not the series).

This theme resurfaced from time to time throughout the rest of the remaining short-lived series, when the commanding combat pilot of another battlegroup happened to be a much-better, albeit lesser-ranking woman, who wound up having to demonstrate her own capabilities of fitting in to the more male-dominant battlegroup, but from then on remained a firm character in the show.

That's when I, a barely-adolescent male, decided forever and firmly, that given the choice between a capable female or a higher-ranking member of my own gender, who wasn't nearly as capable, I would choose to go to battle with the woman at my side.. which of course, was NOT a very popular notion in the late Seventies, nor throughout the whole decade of the Eighties, for that matter.

And then, of course, there is the VERY overt matter of religion. The creator, Glen A. Larsen, being a member of a pretty controversial church, to begin with, of course began sharing some of his church's more controversial beliefs, as part of the story lines of this show, which can be seen in every single episode, thus earning him the accusation of forcing his beliefs upon anyone who watched the show, despite the repeated caveats that beliefs are for those who CHOOSE to believe them, and not the other way around. Having myself studied his church's beliefs to no small extent, I can tell that he didn't even share the most controversial forms of those beliefs, but watered them down quite a bit, yet, still, they stirred so much controversy.

Again, every single episode of BSG is laced with multifaceted socio-political problems, to which the show's creator, directors, and producors provided a very plausible solution, not only for that day and age, but for any day and age to come, for those who are at least willing to think about it.

In my opinion, however, this is what doomed the show from the beginning, is that although people are very willing to seek out topics of a controversial nature in small doses, Larsen's ability to present multiple controversies in each and every episode, was a bit more than the average viewer was willing to take, so ratings fell, and the series ended.

Or did it? It was revived in an even shorter-lived spin-off, two years later, and it has become the background of much-longer-lasting series which, to my knowledge, is still going strong, even as I type.

That, to me, if more than ample proof that that Gary A. Larsen's idea was nowhere near as bad as some people think it to have been, but were both entertaining and enlightening, despite the popular opinion of the day.

score /10

brightfamouscucumber 17 January 2008

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1801683/