OUTCASTS premire on bbca disscussions and comments

[Temis the Vorta]

Spoiler: Berger

Poor man's Baltar......

Spoiler: just speculation based on spoiler

It's too bad they blew a chance to make him a fascinating character. The writers tipped their hands too quickly by making it so obvious Mabius was up to no good. They should have made it seem like he was just the thing the struggling colony needed - set him up as a Bill Adama type, an inspirational leader who can hold it all together. And then start doling out hints that all is not as it seems. Build up the dramatic tension, don't just dissapate it from the very first scene (where they showed Mabius in the escape shuttle looking bwahaha sinister).

There's a reason when a story is "boring" and everyone tunes out, and it's usually because the writers are not working hard enough to build dramatic tension. These writers seemed to think, all they need is to shove some people at us and we'll find them innately fascinating. I found them all boring because nobody had put any effort into making them fascinating.

 

[Angel4576]

Spoiler: just speculation based on spoiler

It's too bad they blew a chance to make him a fascinating character. The writers tipped their hands too quickly by making it so obvious Mabius was up to no good. They should have made it seem like he was just the thing the struggling colony needed - set him up as a Bill Adama type, an inspirational leader who can hold it all together. And then start doling out hints that all is not as it seems. Build up the dramatic tension, don't just dissapate it from the very first scene (where they showed Mabius in the escape shuttle looking bwahaha sinister).

There's a reason when a story is "boring" and everyone tunes out, and it's usually because the writers are not working hard enough to build dramatic tension. These writers seemed to think, all they need is to shove some people at us and we'll find them innately fascinating. I found them all boring because nobody had put any effort into making them fascinating.

Completely agree.

Spoiler: Berger

He was the character that I thought might have partially redeemed the writing, but they chose to go down the route of pantomime villain instead. To be honest, his villainy came across as being so obvious that I did suspect (and hope!) that it was a double-bluff. Sadly that wasn't the case. A character like that, you're absolutely right, works best through subtlety, but they hit us with a sledgehammer. There was no doubting his evilness, right from that first scene. My brother and I joked that the only way they could have made him more evil-looking in that shot would have been to have literally painted him red and given him a pitchfork!

I don't regret watching this series. It's not the BBC's usual fare, and to be honest, not British television's usual fare these days, so t'was an interesting experience to see how that went. Ultimately, many mistakes were made, but the series did get better towards the end, if you managed to stick with it, to the point where I actually would have liked a second series.

The problem was that it had managed to turn off way too many people in the first 2/3 episodes. The characters were hit and miss as well - I liked the colony president, and I liked Mabius, even with the scooby doo stuff he was given, but the rest were a struggle.

Oh well, perhaps we'll try again in 20 years or so!

 

[Starkers]

Yeah Berger should have been done way more subtley! But I liked Cass and Fleur, and Irish DJ whose name escapes me at the moment! And the President, and Jack was quite well played as well, Norris had her moments.

As Bob says, in 8 episodes they actually shoved more plot in than you'd get in 22 episodes of many US shows. Mistakes were definitely made though, but I don't think the show was iredeemable, and I think it would have faired better on BBC2 than prime time on 1. The expectations were just way too high.