"Why are you always talking in the past tense?" "This is no time to be correcting grammar. Now, let's do whatever it is we're going to do."
SO SAY WE ALL: Troy and Dillan take Jamie to 1944 to prevent Xaviar from giving future tech to the Nazis.
REVIEW: The first act of Part 2 is merely epilogue to Part 1, taking its time to get to the story it really wants to tell. So we have the boys finally meeting the helpful scientist who jumps to the right conclusions without much evidence, short-sighted journalists who won't see the story that's dangling in front of their eyes (Jamie is just as bad, incapable of accepting the truth, then unable to see the ramifications of what's going on), a gratuitous car chase in which Dillan drives a car for the first time and keeps it on two wheels for most of it, and a kid making a fool of his dad by showing him an un-invisibled Viper that's not there later for the cops to see. It's all a build-up for Jamie joining the cast - she MUST tag along and they CAN'T stop her! Oh ok then.
But while that's all very ordinary 80s TV plotting, what comes next is the real problem. So Adama has this political rival called Xaviar, right? And he thinks introducing higher technology into Earth society today is a foolish enterprise. Instead, he wants to use time travel (which the Colonials have since cracked, which may explain the discrepancy between G1980 and BSG's last episode), and he's gone back in time to give that higher tech to humanity earlier, so they can be advanced TODAY when we need them! Well, sure, but he does this without a whole of historical knowledge, and picks Nazi Germany as the recipients of "superior weapons". Well, gee. Here I thought he already had a face worth slapping. He doesn't realize he's creating a power like the Terran fascists that may not greet the Colonies with open arms, or he doesn't care. Naturally, this makes Jamie useful, especially if the heroes' gut instinct when they learn of the Holocaust is to let Xaviar screw up history as if that were going to solve the problem rather than make it worse. Of course Jamie never really tweaks to the concept that she might never be born if history is changed, so she's not the brain of the operation either. No one is. One gets the impression that the only reason this era was picked was because the production had access to stock footage (from at least three movies from the 60s) to make it "come alive". These cheats make the show feel like Time Tunnel, here taking us to 1944 and the birth of the V-2 rocket (apparently made with Colonial tech), which was the first object sent into space, so I guess it works as a plot device. But then there's also the miscast Allied pilot with his non-regulation haircut who temporarily joins the team. This IS Time Tunnel "Hollywood" History!
Though the show cuts a lot of corners, it does feature a groovy new effect for the time warp, but bringing back the white uniforms after the time jump is just confusing. In the past, these were connected to the Beings of Light, which just makes me think either they're all dreaming, or the angels are behind their capacity to travel in time. Hey, maybe that's why no one thought of going back in time and saving the Colonies from the Cylons (cough). They give some sort of technobabble about magnetic stress loads, but it's nonsense. Even more so once you realize they're going to be easy to spot by the Nazis, but that it of course won't actually make a difference in the actual plot mechanics. Well, at least the episode reveals Boomer made it through the voyage and is now the replacement Colonel Tigh. Not that he's given any kind of entrance, mind you. He's just there, no fanfare.
HUMAN DEATH TOLL: None, which is probably going to be the norm going forward.
VERSIONS: I guess Boomer wasn't originally thought to return, because the original script gives his role to a Colonel Benz.
REWATCHABILITY: Medium-Low - A real sense that they don't know what to do with this program. but here's hoping the show doesn't make THIS its premise. It's even more badly thought-out than Part 1's adventure in the streets of L.A.
REVIEW: The first act of Part 2 is merely epilogue to Part 1, taking its time to get to the story it really wants to tell. So we have the boys finally meeting the helpful scientist who jumps to the right conclusions without much evidence, short-sighted journalists who won't see the story that's dangling in front of their eyes (Jamie is just as bad, incapable of accepting the truth, then unable to see the ramifications of what's going on), a gratuitous car chase in which Dillan drives a car for the first time and keeps it on two wheels for most of it, and a kid making a fool of his dad by showing him an un-invisibled Viper that's not there later for the cops to see. It's all a build-up for Jamie joining the cast - she MUST tag along and they CAN'T stop her! Oh ok then.
But while that's all very ordinary 80s TV plotting, what comes next is the real problem. So Adama has this political rival called Xaviar, right? And he thinks introducing higher technology into Earth society today is a foolish enterprise. Instead, he wants to use time travel (which the Colonials have since cracked, which may explain the discrepancy between G1980 and BSG's last episode), and he's gone back in time to give that higher tech to humanity earlier, so they can be advanced TODAY when we need them! Well, sure, but he does this without a whole of historical knowledge, and picks Nazi Germany as the recipients of "superior weapons". Well, gee. Here I thought he already had a face worth slapping. He doesn't realize he's creating a power like the Terran fascists that may not greet the Colonies with open arms, or he doesn't care. Naturally, this makes Jamie useful, especially if the heroes' gut instinct when they learn of the Holocaust is to let Xaviar screw up history as if that were going to solve the problem rather than make it worse. Of course Jamie never really tweaks to the concept that she might never be born if history is changed, so she's not the brain of the operation either. No one is. One gets the impression that the only reason this era was picked was because the production had access to stock footage (from at least three movies from the 60s) to make it "come alive". These cheats make the show feel like Time Tunnel, here taking us to 1944 and the birth of the V-2 rocket (apparently made with Colonial tech), which was the first object sent into space, so I guess it works as a plot device. But then there's also the miscast Allied pilot with his non-regulation haircut who temporarily joins the team. This IS Time Tunnel "Hollywood" History!
Though the show cuts a lot of corners, it does feature a groovy new effect for the time warp, but bringing back the white uniforms after the time jump is just confusing. In the past, these were connected to the Beings of Light, which just makes me think either they're all dreaming, or the angels are behind their capacity to travel in time. Hey, maybe that's why no one thought of going back in time and saving the Colonies from the Cylons (cough). They give some sort of technobabble about magnetic stress loads, but it's nonsense. Even more so once you realize they're going to be easy to spot by the Nazis, but that it of course won't actually make a difference in the actual plot mechanics. Well, at least the episode reveals Boomer made it through the voyage and is now the replacement Colonel Tigh. Not that he's given any kind of entrance, mind you. He's just there, no fanfare.
HUMAN DEATH TOLL: None, which is probably going to be the norm going forward.
VERSIONS: I guess Boomer wasn't originally thought to return, because the original script gives his role to a Colonel Benz.
REWATCHABILITY: Medium-Low - A real sense that they don't know what to do with this program. but here's hoping the show doesn't make THIS its premise. It's even more badly thought-out than Part 1's adventure in the streets of L.A.
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