Are all you sci-fi fiends watching Caprica? This is the “prequel” to the Battlestar Galactica saga, taking place some six decades earlier, when the first Cylons were designed to perform robotic labor, mainly military, for the extraterrestrial human colony. So, what was life like? Or, rather, what will life be like? Sex, drugs, violence, anarchy! We get droning electronic music, sweat and blood, bare breasts and ritualistic murder. Fuck, fight, kill, or get high. But then it turns out that’s just the holographic virtual world teenagers like to play in after boarding school and uniforms, entitlement and screaming, overbearing parents and gods called Mars and Athena. In real life a suicide bombing on the skyline takes the life of two girls (among others), namely Tamara, daughter of Yosef Adama (William Adama’s father), and Zoe, daughter of Daniel Graystone. The Graystones live in a house like the Cullens of Twilight. (I believe it also is where Gaius Baltar will live when the Cylons attack Caprica.) Daniel is the head of some artificial intelligence corporation. The Adamas are originally from the planet of Tauron. (All Twelve Colonies are named after a zodiac sign.) Yosef, a well respected defense attorney, goes by the name of Joseph Adams to hide his Tauran background. In their shared grief Graystone and Adama are able to download the virtual “avatar” Zoe had created of herself onto a meta-cognitive processor and insert it in a robot – thus creating the first cybernetic life-form node. (Apologies for the sci-fi nonsense.)
The show’s futurism on Caprica City mostly looks just like New York City, midtown Manhattan and the Upper East Side, with some L.A. and Portland, Oregon, thrown in for good measure. (Actually, the show is shot on location in Vancouver). This is supposed to make it more recognizable and easier to identify with... But there are gadgets: holographic spectacles (“holobands”), touch-screens as thin as parchment, and a Cylon prototype playing paintball. Also remarkably contemporary is the ethnic tension. Taurons especially are the outcasts, who speak a different language (sounding like ancient Greek to these ears). Then we have religious fanaticism in the form of terrorism by the dogmatic monotheistic group called the Soldiers of the One. We soon learn that this believe in the absolute truth, in good and evil, and one true god, is propagated by the headmistress of Zoe’s boarding school, Sister Clarice Willow (portrayed by the marvelous Polly Walker, who we all know and love as Rome’s Atia of the Julii). This monotheism is abstract enough to often resemble Christianity or Judaism, but reminiscent enough of Islamic fundamentalism to be highly appropriate in this day and age. Apart from that, it seems that just about everybody’s voice croaks like a hoarse toad. And unfortunately the camera keeps shaking like it was filmed on handheld... Anyway, it looks sufficiently interesting that I’ll be checking this out regularly and will keep you up-to-date.
The show’s futurism on Caprica City mostly looks just like New York City, midtown Manhattan and the Upper East Side, with some L.A. and Portland, Oregon, thrown in for good measure. (Actually, the show is shot on location in Vancouver). This is supposed to make it more recognizable and easier to identify with... But there are gadgets: holographic spectacles (“holobands”), touch-screens as thin as parchment, and a Cylon prototype playing paintball. Also remarkably contemporary is the ethnic tension. Taurons especially are the outcasts, who speak a different language (sounding like ancient Greek to these ears). Then we have religious fanaticism in the form of terrorism by the dogmatic monotheistic group called the Soldiers of the One. We soon learn that this believe in the absolute truth, in good and evil, and one true god, is propagated by the headmistress of Zoe’s boarding school, Sister Clarice Willow (portrayed by the marvelous Polly Walker, who we all know and love as Rome’s Atia of the Julii). This monotheism is abstract enough to often resemble Christianity or Judaism, but reminiscent enough of Islamic fundamentalism to be highly appropriate in this day and age. Apart from that, it seems that just about everybody’s voice croaks like a hoarse toad. And unfortunately the camera keeps shaking like it was filmed on handheld... Anyway, it looks sufficiently interesting that I’ll be checking this out regularly and will keep you up-to-date.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.