Battlestar Galactica [2004]
Miniseries Part 1 (of 2)
Miniseries Part 2 (of 2)
Here I go, at last -- only 6½ years after it was first on and 9 months after buying the Blu-ray, I'm finally commencing perhaps the greatest TV series ever made. Does it top The Wire? And/or Everything Else Ever Made Ever? Based on the evidence of these opening three hours -- which play more like an epic movie (albeit with series-launching cliffhanger) than a two-part miniseries, if you ask me -- there's a good chance it might.
Luther
1x06 Episode 6 [season finale]
So, that's that then. Not sure if another series is a good idea; even less sure if it's going to happen. We'll see I suppose.
One thing I did rather like about Luther, by-the-by, is how they cut their "next time" trailer (and, in the finale, the episode's closing moments) in amongst the end credits, thereby circumventing the BBC guidelines that are designed to allow that irritating shrinking thing that means you can't see everyone's names. Well done, Luther production team, very clever. I bet the BBC modify their guidelines to stop anyone copying.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]
2 comments:
"Perhaps the greatest TV series ever made"???
Have you finally cracked and gone insane?
It was just like numerous other political themed shows. Oh look, politicians and their shifty power-plays, lots of Gritty political crises and Tough Decisions(TM). Slow and plodding, hoping that you care enough about a bunch of thoroughly detestable characters ("They're not detestable, they're Gritty and Realistic!") to sit through hours and hours of them moping about. It's like a spaceship full of Mark Benfords.
Some of the space battles were cool, but they are few and far between. There are some interesting characters; most are just annoying. The few likeable characters quickly join the others in being irredeemably irritating.
It has good episodes, and a number of epic "now that's just cool" moments scattered throughout the series. But likewise some episodes are mind-numbingly dull, and the vast majority are average at best.
If you like to watch a bunch of arseholes doing their Political Wranglings, while all the other characters mope around for four/five years worth of episodes... well, you'll enjoy it immensely.
It's a passable time-killer, with some interesting stories, but the interesting parts progress slower than if Lost were being reenacted by snails in a stasis pod.
There's no way on this Earth it comes close to being the greatest TV series ever made. Never Ever EVER.
I should say, it's not me calling it "perhaps the greatest TV series ever made" -- I've only seen the miniseries & first 3 episodes -- but it has been called that various other places (as it ended around the same time as The Wire, often as a blow back against all the people saying that was (i.e. against the Guardian)).
So far (so far, of course) I haven't found it to be slow or plodding. It's not fast-paced actiony-adventurey, but then not everything has to be -- Mad Men is one of the best shows on TV now or ever, and some episodes of that nothing seems to happen at all. When most SF, especially on TV, is actiony-adventurey, it makes a change to have one that can be more political, especially as there aren't many overtly 'political' shows post-West Wing (other than 24's simplistic world view, perhaps).
The worst I have to say about it so far (and will on my TV post tonight, probably in exactly these words now I've written them) is that you can sometimes tell the writers' background is in genre/Star Trek rather than 'proper' drama; as if (as may be the case) a bunch of Star Trek writers put all their efforts into making a 'proper' TV drama instead of just another space opera, rather than some 'proper' drama writers choosing to use sci-fi as a medium for social/political comment (like, for example, David Milch was aiming at with Deadwood, which was originally going to be set in Ancient Rome before Rome turned up).
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