Pajiba

Sorry, but as much as I wanted to like this I couldn't. I watched the first season in its entirety and aside from the daughter-cylon, no one interested me. Not even Eric Stoltz or Paula Malcolmson** which surprised the hell out of me. And don't get me started on Esai Morales. It wasn't his fault but, boy, he became a less interesting Michael from Lost. I half expected him to scream "WALT!!!" in about every episode.

I bailed on this season. Apparently I wasn't the only one.

**I did listen to a podcast or two from the creators including one with Malcolmson who was a totally awesome cursing c*nt. If they had let through some of that onto the screen it might have been worth watching.

FRAK.

Arrgggghhh.

they never even gave this show a shot. If they air the last 5 episodes, they will have stretched 18 epsiodes over three years, in random slots and batches.

how was it supposed to build an audience. especially as it had a dense continuous story.

the combination of religious, cultural, ethnic and transhumanist themes made such a fascinating and unique story.

It sounds almost idiotically obvious to say it, but i need to forget tv and go back to books when i need a sci-fi kick.

All four seasons of BSG are currently available on Netflix Instant Watch.

Except the super-awesome 4 hour pilot. While 33 is probably one of the best episodes, it's not a good introduction.

I fucking hate the SyFy channel.
Cancel the good stuff, but keep the freakin' wrestling. Buncha idiotic twats.

I'd be lying if I said I was heartbroken. I mean, Sci-Fi's "track record of show mismanagement" really amounts to their shows not being very good. BSG was vastly overrated, and Caprica's just as bad. There's not an ounce of triumph or happiness in the show, just endless misery, betrayal, and moral failure. And who the hell wants to watch that?

Wholeheartedly agree with Paul Southworth. i faithfully watched every episode, but didn't look forward to or enjoy any of them.
Furthermore, Caprica was not as intelligent as it wanted us to believe. Dull and slow moving does not equal high minded.

One word: Pterodactopotamus.

Don't you tease me fucker.

To answer Todd, I do. I enjoy watching a show that makes me think about things that are vital to the world we live in. I can't think of another show, besides it's parent show BSG, that digs into thorny issues like religion and terrorism and the ugly things that grief makes people do. This was a Big Issues show, and people aren't comfortable with that. People get touchy when you try to tell them about The Sopranos' engagement with capitalism and patriarchy--they only want to think of it as a gangster story. And the failure of Caprica tells me that a larger part of the audience for BSG than I would like to admit watched that show for the space porn, not its treatment of identity, gender, war, etc.

I understand people's impatience with the pacing, and I actually wasn't terribly invested after the pilot. In fact, I purposely waited to watch it until just before the series aired, because I knew I would have checked out in the long interim. Sci Fi (I'm refuse to recognize the new spelling) treated the show atrociously. But I was hooked by the third episode. And honestly, how can people call a show boring when a father is so determined to smoke out the dead daughter living in his robot by LIGHTING HER ON FIRE?! I mean, besides the Big Issues, I was very invested in the characters. This show is the only show I can think of (aside from Mad Men) that gives so much of the story to dynamic women characters. Even Lacy, who always seemed to be a fan whipping-post. I mean, c'mon--a teen girl is supposed to become an effective terrorist in like a week?

I've rambled enough. I just wanted to even out the balance of detractors v. defenders. This is going to sound really elitist, but I know five other people that watch this show, and they are all people, like me, that are in the midst of or have finished getting graduate educations in various departments of the humanities. Maybe this was never a show that appealed to people that don't do textual analysis as a part of their everyday lives. And to be fair, a show that appeals only to a very specific type of egghead who pores over narrative detail for a living could be justifiably judged as a failure. But I'm simply tired of people who say that this show wasn't as smart as it thought it was. Because it was. I'm already writing a dissertation, so I don’t have time to get into it in detail, but Jacob's recaps over at TWOP do a great job of teasing out the sophistication of this show. I'm honestly crushed that the first season is all I'll get. So congratulations, fellow nerds! Your complaining netted you the splosiony prequel you always wanted, with a title that basically announces itself as "BSG: Spartacus." Have you seen Spartacus? Pretty naked people, but boy is it dumb. I hate everything.

I'm disappointed as Caprica was finally feeling like it was finding out its own voice and identity away from Galactica.

Part of the problem is that, without the space drama elements -- battles, explosions, frakking -- the show seemed to lack the more immediately gratifying moments that allowed Moore's abstract concepts the chance to slip through.

My concern for this new show is that it'll be the other way around: nothing but gratification in small bites without any of the deeper questions and ideas being sought or challenged.

You know, like most of what SyFy produces.

Before there was Frack there was Frell, and the dumb channel frelling fracked that up....Clot!

Still, Caprica...Stargate Universe...they are all trying to appeal to a demographic that in reality does not care. They will never get a majority of young girls from 10-15 or Jocks and they need to realize it and move on.

Eureka is successful because nerds like it. Warehouse 13 is the same. Even BSG drew nerd love. Caprica and Stargate Universe are closer to the Vampire Diaries than to science fiction. They would have been better off revifying VIP or the Total Recall series.

Or better yet...Farscape.

Idle: While I cannot argue with your criteria, I would with all due respect argue that Caprica and SGU tried too hard to emphasize soap opera elements over the speculative fiction aspect. In fact upon further contemplation I would actually suggest that SGU does not fulfill your definition.

Eureka actually includes Science and Science Fiction elements in most of their episodes. Warhouse 13 is kinda Steam Punk, I'll grant you that, but as I said SGU could just as easily be about a ship on the seas in the 1500's trying to get home. Sanctuary is pretty much straight fantasy, but even that has more tension to it than Caprica. I would rather watch Andromeda reruns than Caprica. Hell, I would rather watch the Logan's Run TV series than Caprica.

Personally I think that SYFY is actually a front for laundering illegal drug money. That would explain their consistant incompetence with getting even the appropriate reruns for their channel. Maybe they get sometype of write off for consistantly losing money which allows them to blend drug proceeds in with the legit cash.

I mean I hate Vampire Diaries, and Smallville, but you know what? The CW is more of a Science Fiction/Fantasy channel than Syfy. Where Syfy seems to go out of their way to make their demographic, science fiction fans hate them, CW tends give science fiction/fantasy shows a lot of time before cutting them. Supernatural had a 5 season arc and a loyal fanbase, Syfy would have cut them in the beginning of the first season.

Of course, as I said, if they want to fail and are laundering money...it all makes sense.

I feel like RDM probably got the second season on his reputation. He said, "But just wait, I have something really cool in store for you." That surprise was the Angel what's her face and that truce between the 'Deadwalkers'. To me, that was the high point of the speculative fiction that didn't have much legs to go on unless we were going to see the Final 5 get stupid money on what ultimately would be a gamble for SyFy, not worth the risk when you consider it has no gauge for what makes good ratings.

Personally, I'll give you that season 1 was uneventful up until the last episode. And I'll give you that season 2 doesn't let you just jump in without sitting through the first bit. But how many of you watched it on cable instead of online? I know we just capitulate and accept ads as a fact of life, but I do not enjoy watching this show on TV because the pacing of the show is irreversibly disrupted by the loud, frenetic commercials. After the pilot, I never watched another one through cable.

I'm sad to see it go, but I kinda thought we were going to see a death opera about faith and family. I would have liked to see Lacey, the real Amanda, and even the real papa Adama go away, even if it was into the Rez world. I would have rather seen more holodeck scenes similar to those wildlife documentaries, or the Lady in the Red Dress Scene from the Matrix, only this time the Lady is the one whose actions are observed. That's how 6 eventually came about, if indeed the Cylons from our BSG were not based on real people.

How cool would it have been to see the final 5 working on these projects even if the actors were different. Or Eric Stoltz go Dr. Moreau on heads refragmenting them into his own creations. Or how exactly sentience would be given to the machines? The show itself is not spectacular, but I imagine I enjoyed it for the same reasons people like the Stargate. I like what else it makes me think of.

Caprica lost me with the religious cult, and the mid-season new episode (10) with the "Blessed Mother" bullshit really got under my skin...I gave up after that episode.

Where are the f'n toasters already??? Sounds like Blood and Chrome may be what we were expecting in the first place.

@bravesjade

"And honestly, how can people call a show boring when a father is so determined to smoke out the dead daughter living in his robot by LIGHTING HER ON FIRE?"

Easy. Because nothing happened.
That scene ended with all the characters in the exact same state of mind as when it began.
Zoe still pretending to be a emotionless cylon, and Daniel still skeptical.
No resolution. No advancement of the narrative.
It's a symptom of Caprica's boring nature as a whole. A story that refuses to move, peppered with manufactured emotional non-events.

This season's arc is a prime example.
Daniel Graystone's getting in over his head with organized crime via the Adamas.
Wait. Didn't we just leave this party?

Actually, John G., I would say the lack of Anne Cofell Saunders is a much better indicator of why Caprica had issues over Jane's involvement. Where's this hate coming from?

But both are dwarfed by the need for SyFy fanboys to see explodey things - some of whom are here in this very comment thread.

So, in other words, American TV viewers have the aggregate taste of idiots and no patience.

Here's a quote from Jacob's recap of the BSG finale...

"Tory Foster is not Slytherin, she's Ravenclaw -- Ellen's Slytherin -- Tory is Air, Mind, the Invisible Girl, Thinking, taunted and haunted by dark emotions she can't see directly or ever explain, shooting out dark roots into Intuition and Sensation in order to stabilize herself against these shadow emotions and fears."

If that is not pretension I don't know what the hell would be.

So basically what your saying is that scifi channel ( I refuse to say syfy), took a show that had amazing potential, and pretty much f'ed it up. If I didn't know any better I would think that the management didn't have a clue. Oh wait, they don't. For reference see pretty much any show on the network, that they had a hand in creating.

Plus, why the hell were they mucking about in virtual reality when the insanely rich world of BSG lay right outside the damn door?

I'd suspect that it had something to do with Ron Moore trying to incorporate things he hoped to explore in Virtuality.

I really enjoyed the pilot, but didn't have access to the show when it started airing on TV and never had an opportunity to catch up with it. Although, the negative comments from the people who watched it wasn't really much of an incentive.

As for blaming Jane Espensen, I enjoyed the episodes she did on BSG. And obviously she recognized that she wasn't the right person to be the front-runner, which is why someone else took over for the second half. It always seemed to me that SyFy had no real intention of supporting this show.

@bravesjade

i'll concede that those are some interesting points you've laid out up there about the plot and character development. But unfortunately i think they exist more in your head than in the actual show.

This is not an issue of investment in the characters, unless you're referring to the writers.

Caprica could have delved into Zoe's motivations NOT to reveal herself to her father, why she's headed to Gemenon, or what drove her to join a monotheistic terrorist cell in the first place ("because she's a bratty teen who hates her mom" is lazy writing).
Why do the monotheists resort to terrorism anyway? Did they lose a war? Is Gemenon under a trade embargo or territorial dispute with the other 11 colonies? Is terrorism a reasonable extension of evangelism?

We don't know because they bailed, and chose to focus on Zoe's cyber date with the cute lab technician, and some boom kablooey-ness with a Massively Multiplayer Online video game.

i absolutely agree that there are some damn intricate ideas at work here. But it is foolish to believe that Caprica has actually explored any of them.

There were many different intriguing stories in Caprica. The problem is that they set the stories up and then just seemed to completely underplay (I don't know if that's the word I'm looking for. I'm not awake yet.) some of it and completely abandon other parts.

I LOVED BSG, but Caprica sucked sorry. I tried, I really did, but I just couldnt. Like somebody had said, it was a chore to watch.

*these characters

I am not surprised at the cancellation. I blame a bunch of things for the demise, most notably the use of Jane Espenson as the executive producer. I am a huge fan of her work (with a few exceptions) in Buffyverse, but her BSG episodes were very disconnected and the weakest episodes of the series. Her Caprica stint merely acknowledged it. Perhaps Jane's bad luck was all Ron Moore...Don't know, but I don't lay all blame on Jane. Moore's egotistical approach to BSG, in the end, was exhausting and ruined what could of been a great series to the end. The fact that Moore did not hold weekly meetings with all the writers, that the writers were not really made aware of everything going on throughout any given season created disjointed episodes that ruined continuity from a viewer's standpoint. Caprica was worse. Add to this the sub-par acting of Eric Stoltz and all the youngsters, with the notable exception of Paula Malcomson, the series didn't reach the heights and magic of BSG - both the writing and acting were not worthy of the universe of BSG. And so it got cancelled. Let's hope the next one is better.