Caprica, Episode 13

Episode 13: False Labor

• I love these shots of Caprica City's skyline at night; the visual effects are possibly the best thing about this show!
• The music playing over Daniel's "Grace" advert sounded very much like BSG's opening theme; it was certainly at least the same vocalist. And if I'm right, it was a nice touch that Cyrus mentioned that they were still negotiating the rights to the song.
• From the beginning of the scene with Amanda forgiving Daniel it was pretty obvious that it was the Amanda Avatar, and not real Amanda.

Caprica, Episode 12

Episode 12: Things We Lock Away

• The editing of the first half of this episode was a bit choppy and cut between stories at weird moments. It got a bit better as it went on, but I still found it slightly jarring.
• So, it seems that Original Zoe and Avatar Zoe both see a Messenger Zoe, and while it was the first time that Avatar Zoe saw her, Original Zoe had been seeing her since her childhood, which is quite weird since she looks like teenage Zoe. I'm not sure where this is going, but my interesting was piqued by the appearance of a clear Messenger Character (unlike when Amanda saw her brother, which was likely just her mind playing tricks on her).

Caprica, Episode 11

Episode 11: Retribution

Watching this episode felt like something of a chore, and I only had two thoughts while watching. As I've said before, I do intend to get to the end, especially as it's so close now, but I just generally don't care about all these characters. Whatever.

• How did Lacy and the other STO guys get guns and bombs in to a spaceport?
• Daniel's beard looks occasionally fake.
  

Caprica, Episode 10

Episode 10: Unvanquished

• Why is Santa Claus at the meeting on Gemenon with Clarice? Also, this place on that planet looks kind of like Rivendell.
• A religion that removes the need for faith? Surely that's no longer a religion. Anyway, there still needs to be faith in the science behind the technology.
• Tomas Vergis coined the term "toaster", so it would seem.
• Of course Amanda is alive. Boo! I wanted her dead.

Caprica, Episode 9

Episode 9: End of the Line

• That old chestnut of "20 hours earlier" at the beginning. Felt like old season 1 BSG.
• The bed in the water where "Rachel" and Philomon had their date in V world seemed like the kind of place we'd see Head Six and Gaius having a moment.
• Sasha Patel, the Military Procurement lady is played by the same actor that played the Master of Arms on the Galactica.
• I so knew that Emanuelle was Joseph's assistant in the real world.
• Finally some death! Philomon for sure, probably Nestor (one of Clarice's husbands) and potentially Amanda, though I doubt it as she's a series regular. And of course the robot will survive that crash, so it felt a little pointless to make it so dramatic. It worked well with the other climaxes though, but this made it feel a bit cheap.

Caprica, Episode 8

Episode 8: Ghosts in the Machine

Apart from the fact that Amanda may be seeing her brother as a Messanger Character (like Messanger Six and Messanger Baltar), I really didn't care about this episode. There are too many extra characters being introduced in the V world, and not enough shirtless Sam Adama to make me pay attention. I will continue to watch, because I want to see how the series ends and how well it ties in to the BSG universe, but I may be watching it more passively for entertainment value only.

Caprica, Episode 7

Episode 7: The Imperfections of Memory

• So Amanda was a drug addict.
• Kind of lame that in order to have a flight scene to try to get back some of the magic from BSG, that they had Philo and "Rachel" go on a flight simulator for their first date.
• Did Amanda imply she might have lesbian feelings for Clarisse with her answer of "I'm not sure" to Daniel's question about whether he should be jealous of Amanda's friend?
• Why is it funny that Amanda went crazy?
• Daniel worked out Zoe is in the robot because the dog was barking at it? Really?

Quote

Philo: "I work with top secret military robots."
Zoe: "That's really hot!" 

Caprica, Episode 6

Episode 6: Know Thy Enemy

• Looks like the "One Month Later" scene was shot in a Canadian indigenous art museum or something.
• It's Spike with spikes in his arm!
• How can Cylon Zoe type on a computer keyboard with those big fingers?
• How very Clark Kent of Zoe to disguise herself by wearing glasses in the V World for her date with Philomon.

 

Caprica, Episode 5

Episode 5: There is Another Sky

• New Cap City = Bugsy Malone, minus the musical aspect
  The Cylon ripping its arm off at Daniel's request was horrifying
• The architecture of the bank that Tamara and skinny guy disguised as fat guy was pretty amazing. Was that a real location or a set built specifically for the show?
• Tamara pushing skinny guy down to protect him against the security guards shots was reminiscent of Six shielding Gaius from the blast that killed her during the attack on the Colonies
• I love seeing the visuals of Caprica City, especialy at night
• Gratuitous shirtlessness of Sam is always appreciated
• Are Taurons supposed to be analogous to the Jews?
• Another lovely instance of the Adama family theme as Joseph was getting his tattoo

This episode held my attention rather more than the previous ones, and it has given me a new enthusiasm for the show. However, it's nothing close to how I felt about BSG, and I doubt I'll ever reach that level of appreciation for Caprica, but it's positive, nonetheles.

 

Perhaps part of the reason I enjoyed this episode more than previous ones is because there was hardly any Zoe (in fact, I don't think she has any lines), and I'm finding myself completely indifferent to her character.

 

The new direction of Tamara was somewhat more interesting, though it remains to be seen what the point of introducing all these new characters in the V world is. Her walking away at the end, all badass and invincible, was cool, but seemed to do nothing more than to serve as a convenient ending, and I don't really care what happens to her. I find myself currently most interested in the Adama trifecta of Sam, Joseph and Willie, and look forward to more of that, especially if Sam is shirtless.

Caprica, Episode 4

Episode 4: Gravedancing

• Sam has a black bull on the dashboard of his car - a Tauron symbol?
• Finally, a new dress for Zoe in the V club
• "a moral dictator called 'God'"
• dancing Cylon/Zoe was very silly (though nice we got a bite of the Colonial Anthem, aka. the original series theme song)

Can you tell how much I don't care about this series yet? I will continue to watch, because I know there aren't many more episodes, and I'd like to see how it ends, but I'm really not invested, and I may not be moved to blog about it.

Caprica, Episode 3

Episode 3: Reins of a Waterfall

• Who is that guy playing Baxter Sarno? He looks very familiar.
• Joseph's assistant is Dr. Fraiser from Stargate SG-1! Yay!
• Sister Clarisse is totally coming on to Lacey
• Kat is back (as the PR lady)!
• Why do they have a black and white TV in the police office? And why doesn't it have the corners cut off?
• Huzzah for a normal, on screen gay married couple.
• Did Joseph just ask Sam to murder Amanda Graystone?

So far, I still don't really care much about these characters, though I am somewhat interested to see where the story goes. Hopefully we get answers. The best possible ending I can imagine would be that this story ties in to the Final Five's arrival at the Twelve Colonies, and we get some more of their backstory (and of course, appearance) but somehow, I doubt that.

Caprica, Episode 2

Episode 2: Rebirth

• When I started watching the episode, I thought "I don't really care", but I soldiered through, and started to be taken back in to the BSG world a bit more as I watched.
• Lacey looks kind of like Kaylee from Firefly.
• Sister Clarice is so clearly trying to seduce Lacey.
• Lacey mentioned Saturday. This made me wonder, do all Colonial planets have seven day weeks, or is it just Caprica? It would surely not be possible for them all to use the same system because they would surely have different orbits and rotations.
• The title sequence is weird. I don't know if I like it yet.
• Is Zoe going to wear the same purple dress the whole series?
• Daniel plays the piano. More proof that he should be the basis for the Cylon model Seven, who should have been Kara Thrace's father, not some random Head Character.
• Polygamy on Caprica! Cool!
• Sam (Willy's uncle) is gay! Hopefully he doesn't suffer the same fate as the other two openly gay BSG characters (Admiral Cain and Felix Gaeta) and become evil then die.
• We saw Greek and Chinese writing in Little Tauron. I believe this is the first time we've seen other written languages than English in this universe. I guess English is meant to stand for Caprican, and perhaps these others stand for other Colonial languages.
• Willy making his father guilty about there being no family, after his uncle's advice was very sneaky.
• Cylon Zoe sitting on her bed and breaking it was obvious.
• I felt slightly patronised by the writers with how they beat it over our heads that Amanda realised what the infinity symbol meant and that Zoe was part of the STO.
• But then ending with Amanda's declaration of her belief that Zoe caused the explosion at the memorial was a good dramatic ending, despite its slight cringe-worthiness.

Caprica, Episode 1

Hello, and happy new year!

Welcome back to Galactica Watch, where now that I've finished watching and reviewing all the episodes of Battlestar Galactica, I will now move on to its prequel series, Caprica. Unlike with Battlestar, for which I reviewed two episodes every week, I will only do one a week for this series.

Episode 1: Pilot

• I thought the copy of Zoe that she saw down by the stage was going to be a Head Character.
• The Graystone's home looks very much like Gaius Baltar's house. Is it the same place?
• It was pretty cool to see Caprican public transport.
• The fashion looks kind of 1950s. It's probably the hats. I guess they did this to make it feel like this was in the 'past' relative to BSG, which mostly felt very much like the present.
• From Sam, we hear a language other than English being spoken in this universe. Also, is there supposed to be some meaning in the fact that Joseph's brother (therefore William Adama's uncle) is called Sam, like the Final Five, Sam Anders?
• Similarly, is there any relevance to the fact that Daniel Graystone shares the same first name with the eventual Number Seven?
• Willy Adams = William Adama, right?
• There are no flowers on Tauron! Wow!
• When Sam came in to kill the Minister, seeing his blood splatter on his glasses was a really nice (though gross) shot.
• The sister of Athena Academy is clearly evil. Unfortunately, if I'm right, this just propagates the science-fiction convention that evil characters always have British accents.
• Zoe in a Cylon body saying "daddy" was weird!
• It was lovely to notice that the Adama family theme was used when Joseph was telling his son his real family's name.

Quotes

Daniel: "A difference that makes no difference is no difference."

The first Cylon: "Programme completed. By your command."

***

Overall, I liked this pilot. It did a nice job of building up this world that exists within the world we knew from BSG, while it didn't step on its toes too much. I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes, but I'm not overly invested in it. This probably has a lot to do with the fact that I know there are only 18 episodes, and that it got cancelled after those 18, so there won't be any more.

So far, I just don't really care about or for these characters. After having built such an affection for and connection with several of the great characters from BSG, I don't think this show can compare, and characters are really the reason I watch shows like this. So, hopefully it will either show us something amazing about the build up to the First Cylon War, or will make these characters really interesting/relateable/odious/flawed really quickly!