On Friday, January 16, the first of the final ten episodes of BattleStar Galactica aired on SciFi. As some of you may know, this is one of my favorite shows of all time. Considering the cliffhanger that the last episode left us on back in June of 2008, and how SciFi feels the need to split these “mid-season breaks” into huge 6-month gaps, the anticipation was high. This is going to just be some quick impressions, not a detailed review.

Overall, I thought the episode was very good. Yes, we find out what’s up with Earth and why it’s so desolate (not a huge mystery), as well as who used to be there (that was more surprising). There were lots of new twists in this episode, good ones I think, that will be explored through the final nine shows I’m sure. Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell are amazing dramatic actors, and they really carry the emotional weight of this show. The Adama/Roslyn scenes were always so powerful. In contrast, the scenes with Lee and Dualla, in which they’re rediscovering their romantic attraction to each other, were less enjoyable. They felt forced and campy. I never liked that matchup.

Although the mix-in of the newly discovered cylon allies with the regular colonial crew — and the members of the crew who were just outed as cylons — provided a different and quirky “elephant in the room” kind of atmosphere, this show did in some ways represent a return to roots for several characters. Baltar was being a scientist again — no more creepy followers and weird religious rants. Laura was being herself — a strong presence around others yet emotional and fragile in private. Even Tigh seemed to have gotten over the fact that he’s a cylon and tried to be his old self again — his old self when he wasn’t drunk, that is. In that respect, one of the most powerful scenes was when Adama was the raging drunk and Tigh had to talk him down. For all the times that Adama was there for Tigh, now the roles became reversed. It was a very interesting reflection.

Among the many new pieces of information and surprising twists and turns, the most shocking was the sudden — and graphic — loss of a major character that has been with the show from the very beginning. We don’t even yet know why this character died.

Most important of all: we now know who the 5th cylon is.

Battlestar remains excellent television and, I think, one of the best stories ever told on the small screen. If you haven’t watched it and you like human drama, give it a shot. Start with the 2003 miniseries, then move to season one and watch it in order. The DVDs can be had from Netflix or any other video rental store.

The mid-season movie/long episode of Battlestar Galactica aired over the long Thanksgiving weekend. Fans of the show may be interested to read a review of Razor I wrote for Indy.com.

Overall, it was pretty good. A somewhat different feel than the episodes in terms of pacing (it felt like producer Ron Moore might not have gotten all the time he wanted in the editing bay), but very entertaining and a fascinating look at, for the most part, what made Admiral Cain tick. Great writing, of course, and cinema-level special effects, as always. The quick homage to the 1978-80 show’s very classical robotic Cylons (complete with the voices) was pretty cool. And of course the scene where Cain deals with her XO’s refusal to obey an order is every bit as chilling as you’ve imagined. Razor is disturbing, gritty, and intense — all the things we love about this show. Check it out.

Despite the agony of waiting nearly 10 months between seasons, there’s good news for fans of what is perhaps the most fascinating and dramatic show ever to grace the small screen. From a press conference about the upcoming season 4:

The brain trust behind Sci Fi Channel’s Battlestar Galactica on Friday announced plans to wrap up the critically acclaimed cult series after its upcoming fourth season.

“This show was always meant to have a beginning, a middle and, finally, an end,” executive producers Ronald Moore and David Eick said in a statement.

“Over the course of the last year, the story and the characters have been moving strongly toward that end, and we’ve decided to listen to those internal voices and conclude the show on our own terms. And while we know our fans will be saddened to know the end is coming, they should brace themselves for a wild ride getting there: We’re going out with a bang.”

This fall, to soften the blow of having to wait until January of 08 for new episodes, there is going to be a direct to TV release movie which is to encompass the events surrounding Battlestar Pegusus several months prior to the Battlestar finding Galactica.

Once again, as I always do, I urge anyone who has not watched the show to rent the DVDs and give it a chance. Start with the miniseries, and then get a few episodes into season 1 and see if you can quit.

WARNING: I’m going to try not to be specific, but there might be spoilers in here.

At the end of the most recent Battlestar Galactica episode, Maelstrom (which is a hugely significant moment in the storyline of the entire series), a main character is killed. Edward James Olmos, the amazing actor who plays Admiral William Adama, has the final scene alone in his quarters, and he is reacting to the death of the character. The actors and crew of the show were all incredibly upset when they read this script and found out one of their family would be gone after Maelstrom, so it was somewhat easier for Eddie Olmos to portray the incredible emotion he did in that last scene.

The interesting (and funny) bit comes from the last few seconds, when Adama, who had been crying, suddenly snapped and utterly destroyed a beautiful model sailing ship we had seen him working on over the course of several years. That in itself was not funny; it was an amazing display of rage and frustration, and conveyed how angry and tortured Adama was at the death of someone so close to him. According to Ron Moore (executive producer), that was not scripted! Olmos has done things “in the moment” before, things that weren’t on the page, but this was quite an explosion. He was sad and upset, in the moment, and completely destroyed the model ship.

Now, here’s the punchline: that ship, Moore said, was on loan from a museum and was worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Oops.

Obviously, Eddie didn’t know where the ship had come from — he thought it was a prop — and fortunately it was insured. But the faces of the prop masters off camera were apparently, as you can imagine, completely white when that scene was shot. No word on how Olmos reacted when he found out what he had destroyed, but I wouldn’t have wanted to be the one to tell him after seeing what he did to that ship.

This one was too good to pass up: an artist has remade most of the main characters from Battlestar Galactica within the Simpsons archetype. Pretty amusing, even more so if you ever watch the (best) show (ever).

And just in case some of you still aren’t watching BSG, let’s sum up the awards they have so far (from Wikipedia):

* 2005 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form. “33″ (Season 1, Episode 1)
* 2005 American Film Institute’s Top 10 Television Shows of the Year
* 2005 Time Magazine’s Best Television Show of the Year
* 2005 TV Guide’s and TV Land’s The 100 Most Unexpected TV Moments for “Kobol’s Last Gleaming, Part 2″
* 2006 George Foster Peabody Award
* 2006 American Film Institute’s Top 10 Television Shows of the Year
* 2006 Time Magazine’s Best of 2006: Television (Position: #7)
* 2006 Scream Awards, Best Television Show

Read this. Yes, you. The one who doesn’t even watch the show.

Let’s get something out of the way: this isn’t a sci-fi show. It’s not driven by technology or special effects or gadgets or technobabble that no one understands. It’s a drama. It’s the most human, gritty, imaginative, stunning, beautifully written drama ever to grace the screen, in my humble opinion, and in the less humble opinion of a few other people. The show was also the winner of the 65th annual Peabody Award, the oldest electronic media award, which recognizes distinguised achievement in electronic media.

You can find tons of reviews about the first two season all over the web. You’ll consistently hear terms like “powerful,” “gripping,” “gritty,” and read endless paragraphs extolling the quality of the writing and the incredible way the show makes you think about real world issues, and the complexity of characters and the emotion of identifying with those characters when no one’s perfect and there’s not always a good guy and a bad guy. So I’m not going to spend more time on that — just get the miniseries, and then get seasons 1 and 2 and watch them. It just gets better as it goes on. I promise you won’t be disappointed. Even Amanda loves this show.

Which brings us to season 3. The horrendous cliffhanger we were left with and the end of season 2, combined with the extended break (the show ended in March and isn’t on again until October 6th), has whipped the fast-growing fan base into a frenzy. Lately, the cast and producers have started to do interviews about the upcoming season and have said some interesting things, Edward James Olmos (William Adama) in particular:

And Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune, who got to see the season 3 opener already:

This show is truly stunning, and what we have heard about the upcoming season only whets the appetite even more. I have yet to meet a single person who — having actually given the show a chance by watching a few episodes to really get into the story — does not like it. It’s moving. I think most viewers will think, many times throughout the show, “What would I do in such an impossible situation? How would I feel?” Because on BSG, there’s rarely black and white, rarely definitely right and definitely wrong. And the show can surely be taken as an interesting slant on a slew of modern issues. As my roommate watches the series for the first time (so far he’s done almost the whole two seasons in about five days), I have been catching episodes here and there with him, and I still sometimes pick up subtle meanings I didn’t see before, and still get shivers during certain scenes (especially toward the middle of season 2 — I’m sure some of you know which ones I’m talking about).

To get ready for season 3, you might want to check out the “Story So Far” recap special on SciFi’s web site. But if you can, watch the episodes. Rent them, buy the DVDs, download them, whatever you can do. Stop wasting your TV time with half-baked sitcoms and crappy reality shows. Get your news from the Daily Show, and get your dramatic entertainment from Battlestar Galactica.

UPDATE: There’s lots of links to YouTube videos of the season 3 previews on Galactica Sitrep.

It has been revealed that the Sci-Fi channel will produce a prequel to the wildly successful Battlestar Galactica, set 50 years prior to the current series at the time when the humans of the Twelve Colonies are about to make a breakthrough with the first Cylon. The new series is to be called “Caprica” and will feature the Adama family — ancestors of Lee and William Adama on the current show. This is an incredible development, and I would be skeptical of its success — spinoffs can dilute a television series — except that it’s being executive produced by Ron Moore and David Eick, the same guys at the helm of Battlestar Galactica. There’s no word on it yet, but I fully expect “Caprica” to feature the first Cylon War. This could be an incredbily cool look at how it all began.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Battlestar Galactica is the best show on television (Time Magazine thinks so too!). If you haven’t seen it, you owe it to yourself to at least see the miniseries (which you can rent at the video store).