The robot Cylons look extremely cool. The opening storyline is: Humans created Cylons and then had a war with them. The War was concluded with a peace treaty and there has been no contact with cylons for forty years. Now they've come back in these new forms and are blowing everything to hell. Battlestar Galactica was being decommissioned but now it is back in action and they are pulling old Vipers from museums and putting them into battle.
Opening scene had a guy looking at cylon specs on paper as they originally were created and they looked like the original TV series, nice touch.
Vipers fly in space with reactionary thrusters, much more believable than the original series. Although they still don't fly quite right as they really should, but it's a start.
Good good stuff so far. If you absolutely loved the original, you won't like it. but if you remember that the original was 1970's space schlock, you will like the way they fixed things.
The various nods to the old series are subtle but cool in a geeky sort of way.
I'm pleasantly surprised. It isn't a direct take on the old series, but it's not quite as hokey as the old series was either.
Just damn.
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I had a love/hate relationship with the old one. One thing I hated, which is also what Star Trek did (the newer versions), was to "humanize" the enemy. They had a couple episodes where a Ceylon robot acted like a humorous human cowboy and helped Starbuck. I hated the show after that.
Shoot, you put an enemy up there for us to hate and have reason for rooting for the home team, then you "humanize" them to show they're just like us when you know they weren't when they attacked us. Just too PC.
Real life isn't like that, is it? The arab terrorists bomb our women and children, and some among us try to humanize them by saying they're like us. But it ain't happening. Battlestar Gallactica is a hint of what's coming in reality, here on our home ground.