Category: Battlestar Galactica
Last article published: 25 January 2019
This is the 31st post under this label
"So this is New York."
SO SAY WE ALL: The Cylons try to phone home with Wolfman Jack's help.
REVIEW: The Cylons have found Earth, so the tension should be sky high, right? Nope. This is an episode that decides turning a microwave oven on will disable a Cylon Centurion, no problem. The humanish Cylon fares a little better, firing a beam from its hand to destroy the kitchen implement, by which point we're in a cartoon. So why not throw in Troy and Dillon jumping up an elevator shaft like supermen and some cartoon dogs and bears dancing? It fits this kiddified version of Galactica. The Centurion is so badly programmed, it won't allow Andromus to complete his mission - I guess he's damaged - preferring to "save" his master by jumping off the off-brand World (sorry, INTERNATIONAL) Trade Center and conveniently, into a garbage bin (this is very badly staged). A garbage truck soon carries them away under the authorities' noses, and there's a promise of a return. Spare me. For all the hand-wringing, I don't think their plan would have even worked. It's clear throughout that their misunderstanding of Earth lingo and society leads them to mistakenly think a radio station has enough power to beam an instantaneous message to the Cylon fleet across light-years. The plan is based on someone's hyperbole, but I guess neither the Cylons nor the Galacticans know any better. But WE do! So no tension. Look, even when Troy and Dillon ramp their escape car into the Hudson River, they edit in the same joke twice to make sure the kids at home know the characters aren't worried, so they shouldn't be either.
While the Cylons are screwing things up or hanging out at a Halloween party where the patrons are mostly interested in talking about meatballs, our heroes do what they always do. Run from cops. There's a LOT of padding. AGAIN. This was a one-parter, guys. The cops and military UFO tracker (who should have been Sydell, but I guess the actor wasn't available) get a lot of scenes where they recap what we just saw. It's quite tedious. And then the boys get to an off-Broadway show for kids - uhm, should there be so many kids up at this hour, both at the show and the party? The Cylon ship crashed at 9 PM, at least an hour's drive away from New York City - steal glitzy white tuxedos, and get caught up in a dance number they can't follow. Oh, the comedy! While they're holding the singer up, Troy says "time to put on a vanishing act" and they turn invisible, leaving her floating in mid-air... I dare say this is NOT the time for a vanishing act. Quite the opposite! But so it goes... What follows is a meeting mugger in Central Park, the leader of which provides us with the worst bit of acting ever used on Galactica (and I think that's saying something).
More bad writing: Special guest star Wolfman Jack, as himself, given all the education lines and so expounding about Marconi for no damn reason. He also talks about solar flares and their effect on radio transmissions, as if that was going to be the heroes' solution to the Cylon plot, but nope. It's just this weird thing he says without provocation, something Andromus thinks is really interesting, and which doesn't come up again. They missed a good opportunity for Troy to comment on his Boxey days when he saves a little boy and his dog from a fire. I mean, that stuff happened to him as a child! Nobody remembers. And though I don't talk about it much, I have to mention Adama's role in this program before it comes to a crashing end. I feel bad for Lorne Green who obviously loved the show enough to return to it, and I know loved working with young actors, but making Commander Adama subservient to Dr. Zee neuters the character completely. Adama seems incapable of making ANY decision and just seems tired and worried all the time. If he's so addled by age and the grief of losing his children, then why hasn't an opportunist like Xaviar ALREADY taken over? You get ONE of your original stars back and this is how you use him? For shame.
DISCO/1980: Wolfman Jack plays Billy Joel's "My Life" (1978) and Linda Ronstadt's 1974 cover of "That'll Be The Day". Meanwhile, in the Halloween kids' show off Broadway, while some of the mascots are cartoon characters from the past Scooby-Doo, Hong Kong Phooey...), the Berenstain Bears are period-appropriate (their first TV special came out in 1979, only a few months before this episode did).
VERSIONS: In the script, Troy and Dillon never see cartoon mascots, but instead talk to a costumer who gives them the tuxedos. Because the star of the show is an egomaniac, she's very angry with them for screwing up the dance number and they throw her in a giant cake. Shirley is the one who is worried instead of Norman, at the party; she tells Norman, etc. so there's no meatball-centric conversation with Arnie (who is called Danny). It's made clear they're only dating, not married. Arnie-Danny has a fight with his wife because he thinks she's sleeping with Centuri. Oh all the "laughs" we were denied, amirite? Troy also extinguishes the fire by causing an explosion with his fun and sapping the oxygen out of the air.
REWATCHABILITY: Low - A complete misfire on all levels.
Last article published: 25 January 2019
This is the 31st post under this label
"So this is New York."
REVIEW: The Cylons have found Earth, so the tension should be sky high, right? Nope. This is an episode that decides turning a microwave oven on will disable a Cylon Centurion, no problem. The humanish Cylon fares a little better, firing a beam from its hand to destroy the kitchen implement, by which point we're in a cartoon. So why not throw in Troy and Dillon jumping up an elevator shaft like supermen and some cartoon dogs and bears dancing? It fits this kiddified version of Galactica. The Centurion is so badly programmed, it won't allow Andromus to complete his mission - I guess he's damaged - preferring to "save" his master by jumping off the off-brand World (sorry, INTERNATIONAL) Trade Center and conveniently, into a garbage bin (this is very badly staged). A garbage truck soon carries them away under the authorities' noses, and there's a promise of a return. Spare me. For all the hand-wringing, I don't think their plan would have even worked. It's clear throughout that their misunderstanding of Earth lingo and society leads them to mistakenly think a radio station has enough power to beam an instantaneous message to the Cylon fleet across light-years. The plan is based on someone's hyperbole, but I guess neither the Cylons nor the Galacticans know any better. But WE do! So no tension. Look, even when Troy and Dillon ramp their escape car into the Hudson River, they edit in the same joke twice to make sure the kids at home know the characters aren't worried, so they shouldn't be either.
While the Cylons are screwing things up or hanging out at a Halloween party where the patrons are mostly interested in talking about meatballs, our heroes do what they always do. Run from cops. There's a LOT of padding. AGAIN. This was a one-parter, guys. The cops and military UFO tracker (who should have been Sydell, but I guess the actor wasn't available) get a lot of scenes where they recap what we just saw. It's quite tedious. And then the boys get to an off-Broadway show for kids - uhm, should there be so many kids up at this hour, both at the show and the party? The Cylon ship crashed at 9 PM, at least an hour's drive away from New York City - steal glitzy white tuxedos, and get caught up in a dance number they can't follow. Oh, the comedy! While they're holding the singer up, Troy says "time to put on a vanishing act" and they turn invisible, leaving her floating in mid-air... I dare say this is NOT the time for a vanishing act. Quite the opposite! But so it goes... What follows is a meeting mugger in Central Park, the leader of which provides us with the worst bit of acting ever used on Galactica (and I think that's saying something).
More bad writing: Special guest star Wolfman Jack, as himself, given all the education lines and so expounding about Marconi for no damn reason. He also talks about solar flares and their effect on radio transmissions, as if that was going to be the heroes' solution to the Cylon plot, but nope. It's just this weird thing he says without provocation, something Andromus thinks is really interesting, and which doesn't come up again. They missed a good opportunity for Troy to comment on his Boxey days when he saves a little boy and his dog from a fire. I mean, that stuff happened to him as a child! Nobody remembers. And though I don't talk about it much, I have to mention Adama's role in this program before it comes to a crashing end. I feel bad for Lorne Green who obviously loved the show enough to return to it, and I know loved working with young actors, but making Commander Adama subservient to Dr. Zee neuters the character completely. Adama seems incapable of making ANY decision and just seems tired and worried all the time. If he's so addled by age and the grief of losing his children, then why hasn't an opportunist like Xaviar ALREADY taken over? You get ONE of your original stars back and this is how you use him? For shame.
DISCO/1980: Wolfman Jack plays Billy Joel's "My Life" (1978) and Linda Ronstadt's 1974 cover of "That'll Be The Day". Meanwhile, in the Halloween kids' show off Broadway, while some of the mascots are cartoon characters from the past Scooby-Doo, Hong Kong Phooey...), the Berenstain Bears are period-appropriate (their first TV special came out in 1979, only a few months before this episode did).
VERSIONS: In the script, Troy and Dillon never see cartoon mascots, but instead talk to a costumer who gives them the tuxedos. Because the star of the show is an egomaniac, she's very angry with them for screwing up the dance number and they throw her in a giant cake. Shirley is the one who is worried instead of Norman, at the party; she tells Norman, etc. so there's no meatball-centric conversation with Arnie (who is called Danny). It's made clear they're only dating, not married. Arnie-Danny has a fight with his wife because he thinks she's sleeping with Centuri. Oh all the "laughs" we were denied, amirite? Troy also extinguishes the fire by causing an explosion with his fun and sapping the oxygen out of the air.
REWATCHABILITY: Low - A complete misfire on all levels.
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