Lt. Starbuck … Lost In Castration.

Big Hollywood ^ | January 19, 2009 | Dirk Benedict

[EveningStar]

Once upon a time, in what used to be a far away land called Hollywood (but is now a state of mind and everywhere), a young actor was handed a script and asked to bring to life a character called Starbuck. I am that actor. The script was called “Battlestar Galactica.”

Fortunately, I was young, my imagination fertile and adrenal glands strong, because bringing Starbuck to life was over the dead imaginations of a lot of Network Executives...

Witness the “re-imagined” “Battlestar Galactica,” bleak, miserable, despairing, angry and confused. Which is to say, it reflects in microcosm the complete change in the politics and morality of today’s world, as opposed to the world of yesterday. The world of Lorne Greene (Adama), Fred Astaire (Starbuck’s Poppa) and Dirk Benedict (Starbuck). I would guess Lorne is glad he’s in that Big Bonanza in the sky and well out of it. Starbuck, alas, has not been so lucky. He’s not been left to pass quietly into that trivial world of cancelled TV characters...

[Antoninus]

I just read a novel (got it for free, mind you--didn't purchase the darn thing) called The Whiskey Rebels. It has exactly this same trope going on. The main character was a drunken former Revolutionary War spy with a high opinion of himself. But you find out as you move through the novel that he's being manipulated by all the other characters. The heroes were as follows: a Jewish assassin, a black slave, two homosexual frontiersmen, and a woman who happens to be smart enough to nearly take down the early American financial system with no money.

The evil characters are all white males.

Think Hollyweird and big publishing are trying to tell us something??

I don't care how "good" the entertainment value of this stuff is, if you're watching or purchasing it, you're contributing to people who want to destroy you--and you are showing yourself to be contemptible enough to be worthy of destruction.

[Tijeras_Slim]

I think part of the later season improvements in DS9 were due to competition with B5, they had to get edgier and introduce a long term plotline just to not get steamrolled.

I’m re-watching B5 on DVD right now, and it seems even darker given the tilt of politics today.

[GOPsterinMA]

True! And the ladies in original were hot!

I think the cheesy-ness of the original gave it it’s charm, IMO.

[stuartcr]

I bet the original Starbuck misses those swift costumes he got to wear playing that ball game.

[windcliff]

ping

[fr_freak]

Actually, I have to say that the new BSG is vastly superior and fantastically well done.

It was for about the first season, and then it crashed and burned for every reason that Benedict described. The moral ambiguity is the worst. The queers in Hollywood couldn't stand to have clearly defined good and evil, even when one of the sides tried to annihilate the other by way of a nuclear sneak attack. That's what makes that show now unwatchable. They even had an episode where the humans had the perfect opportunity to wipe out all the Cylons at once by use of some kind of virus, but one of the wussy male pilots decided that we just didn't "have the right to arbitrarily wipe out a whole species". Never mind the fact that the Cylons tried to do exactly that to humans and were almost successful and never mind that the Cylons are freaking machines. It's disgusting.

[fr_freak]

Also, Starbuck version 2.0 could kick Starbuck-classic's butt every day of the week and twice on Sunday.

Only in Hollywood can some 5'6" little girl kick a guy's ass in a fist fight. In the rest of the universe, she would get knocked around like a rag doll.

[Tribune7]

The original Battlestar was great. And that's a great essay.

I watch very little TV. I'm into this season's 24 and I liked the first season of Heroes (then it went to crap).

[FreeAtlanta]

They should have just made a completely new series instead of stealing the title, names and loosly the theme. I might have enjoyed it, had they been more original. I am an old BSG fan from childhood. It was light hearted and fun. Something 8 to 30 somethings could watch.

This series was too dark for even my teenagers to watch. sad.

[OL Hickory]

What’s next...

Mr T is recast as Mrs T?

I think he has a point!

[FreeAtlanta]

Special effects have come a long way. This doesn’t make up for story writing. The old stories were better.

[Roses0508]

I like what you just said. It pretty much represents how I feel. Normally I cheer for the “strong woman” concept, but this show is just depressing.

[FreeAtlanta]

A happier bunch. The new BSG was too dark and I couldn’t wait for the series to end.

[OL Hickory]

Part 2.....

He has a point..Look at the awful version of Dukes of Hazzard with knoxville. Re-wrote and trult awful

[Oztrich Boy]

Could the Originals have been gayer?

[TChris]

They will tell you it is (still) about story and character, but all it is really about is efficiency.

Sorry, Dirk. It's about pushing a political agenda now. Making money is beside the point, as the relevant stock prices clearly show. If Hollywood were still about making money, there wouldn't be so many of their movers and shakers lining up to create yet-another-insanely-budgeted-colossal-box-office-flop-with-a-liberal-message blunder.

Yet they do.

The financial success of non-liberal movies is plain to see for anyone who cares to check. Star Wars had no qualms about naming good "Good" and evil "Evil". Non-leftist movies hold the box-office records! The Passion of The Christ, Titanic, Finding Nemo, Gone With the Wind, The Sound of Music, The Ten Commandments... and the list goes on and on. But those kinds of obviously successful films are in the distinct minority today.

No, Hollywood cares about their political message. Even though leftist movies don't make money, in comparison with non-leftist movies, that's where their hearts are. They care about slamming conservatives and the values they hold dear. Hollywood hates America and her bold success. Those in power there long to see us fail.

[Borges]

Purchasing what? Any book/TV/movie at all? Any and all worthwhile culture? I’m supposed to not watch/buy something like say ‘Doctor Who’ because it’s made by the BBC?

[Wiseghy]

The new show is politically neutral, as far as I can detect. The drama is first rate. Even my non-scifi wife likes it, and it is the only show we regularly watch together.

The only evil and stupidity involved in the show is how Sci-fi channel execs are handling it as a “franchise”.

[GOPsterinMA]

You think? With Maren Jensen (HOTTIE) on the set, I would hope not!