As someone who never had read Watchmen when it came out as a series of comic books, I approached the 2009 film Watchmen completely fresh and unbiased.  I watched Watchmen as a movie and knew nothing in advance about the story or the characters.  To me, this film is a pop culture product that tries very hard to be cool and impressive.  It should come as no surprise, therefore, that this film uses well-known music.  Most notably, Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’” is put to very effective use as the backdrop for one of the most ambitious and unforgettable opening title sequences of any film of any era.  But, the use of “All Along the Watchtower” in the 2009 Watchmen film seemed to me to be primarily of service to the fans of the Watchmen comic books and graphic novel.  The fans likely would go into the film expecting that song to appear on the big screen because it appeared in the original print versions.  The relevance of using the song in the original print versions back in the 1980s is clear not only because the song has the word watch in it, but also because the themes advanced in the song directly related to the Watchmen themes.  I didn’t sit there with a stopwatch, but when you get right down to it, the amount of time that the Watchmen film devotes to the Dylan song is very limited especially compared to other songs that appear such as the lengthy use of the icon Dylan ballad for the film’s opening title sequence. 

In contrast, Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica uses Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower” in a more eery way to advance an essential storyline.  This, I think, is a much more effective use of the Dylan song compared to how it was used in the Watchmen film.  Without a doubt, we’ve had the chance to hear that particular song before on the big and the small screen. Just look at the Wikipedia page and you will learn how often the Dylan song has been used in other films and other television shows. 

Since Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica has not yet concluded its final run of original episodes, it is not possible to know if the importance of “All Along the Watchtower” to the storylines will be explained.  I suspect that it would be terribly wrong if some explanation were not provided by the end of the series as to why that song was considered so important to Cylons on Battlestar Galactica.  Are we to expect that Bob Dylan was somehow connected to the Cylons?  Did Bob Dylan reincarnate thousands of years into the future as a Cylon balladeer so that his song would be relevant in more than one era?  Clearly, that song was not used as casually in Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica as it was used the 2009 film Watchmen. 

But, this first of the final ten episodes was almost too sad to bear.  On one level, I felt a strong sadness that soon this series will no longer be.  But, as I was pulled into the story being told by this episode entitled “Sometimes a Great Notion”, I was overwhelmed with the sadness that the characters were experiencing.  For this is a story about the loss of a dream.  It is the end of a journey.  Any hope of an upbeat resolution to the various plotlines of Battlestar Galactica dating back to the first hours aired on Sci-Fi in 2003 seem dashed to bits, completely and utterly.

Simply put, the intense struggles to find the legendary lost planet of Earth have paid off.  But, while the crew of the Galactica has finally found Earth, they also have found a horrible mess.  The planet is lifeless after nuclear weapons devastated Earth two thousand years before the Galactica arrived.  As viewers, we all felt hope that Earth would be a welcoming place for the exhausted people from the Galactica fleet who so long have searched for a home.  Now it is clear that this journey to find a home is not quite done.

Part of the fun of watching Battlestar Galactica since 2003 has been trying to figure out whether the writers and producers intended for the civilization represented by our real-life Earth to have some connection to the fictional stories and characters on the series.  We wondered whether the Galactica would ultimately arrive at planet Earth at a time many centuries in our own past.  As I watched this series, I often felt that the plot would resolve in its final episodes one way or another such that the humans from the Galactica fleet would land on prehistoric Earth and then seed the development of the societies like ancient Greece and Rome.  The polytheist religion that the Galactica fleet brought with it seemed to call for some final plot development in which Earth’s religions would be directly affected by the arrival of these human colonists from distant places in the stars. [On Friday, March 20, 2009, the final episode of Battlestar Galactica revealed this very connection just as I had speculated in the original version of this blog post on January 19, 2009.]

Perhaps this particular plot resolutions will turn out to be what happens as we watch the final ten episodes.  Perhaps not.  After seeing “Sometimes a Great Notion”, I believe that we are in for a very rough ride to the end of Battlestar Galactica.  We know about a two-hour television movie entitled The Plan directed by Edward James Olmos, which will air in late Spring or early Summer 2009 shortly after the last episode of Season Four.  We also know about how the sets and props from the production of Battlestar Galactica episodes and television movies (such as Razor) have been auctioned off or destroyed.  We know about how Ron Moore has said clearly that this is really going to be the end.

So, here we are.  All of us who have followed Ron Moore and this unique and compelling series are heading decidedly into a clear finality of Battlestar Galactica with eyes open.  I suggest that none of us should hope for Battlestar Galactica to provide us with a Hollywood ending where there is a sudden turn towards the light just when the darkness seems so pervasive.  More appropriately, we really need to prepare ourselves for a shock of an ending like The Sopranos on HBO handed us in 2007.  For me at least, I feel that no matter how dark of an ending this turns out to be, the Battlestar Galactica ride has definitely been worth the years and the tears. 

“There is no God but God” is the English translation of what is arguably the most famous Arabic Islamic phrase from the Muslim religion.  The phrase in Arabic, Assalamu `alaykum wa rahamatullahi wa barakatuhu, is found prominently inscribed on The Dome of The Rock in Jerusalem but more importantly, that phrase is the first and foremost thing that Muslims believe about God (Allah).

Should viewers of any faith be surprised to find the phrase “there is no God but God” uttered in episode 3 of the third season with crucial prominence in the story?  The phrase was spoken by an alien leader whose organized religion holds a single deity as central to her life and to the lives of her fellow aliens.

Note that the word aliens in this context must be understood to mean the Cylons on Battlestar Galactica.  The Cylons are frequently referred to by human beings as machines, and sometimes even Cylons refer to other Cylons as machines.  But, this is not accurate.  The most accurate term is synthetic life form--that is, Cylons are a life form that was created by human beings deliberately; Cylons most definitely do not occur, and would not occur, in nature without being manufactured by someone.  Cylons, of course, learned how to manufacture additional Cylons because they have not (yet) learned how to sexually reproduce.

Due to their industrial origins, the humans have a nasty habit of referring to the Cylons as toasters.  This pejorative term originated from the fact that the first Cylons manufactured by humans looked decidedly like shiny and silvery robots whose outer skin is reminiscent of how a toaster looks.  When a human calls a Cylon a toaster, it is a very prejudicial thing.  It is meant to convey great disrespect.  Yet, the word toaster has come to be interchangeable with Cylons, both the humanoid variety and the shiny, silvery robotic kind.

Despite the fact that these alien life forms were created by humans, the Cylons nevertheless developed their own organized religion that differs substantially from the organized religion of the humans.  Does it follow that the one held to be known as God by the Cylons is also a toaster?

How can a machine, or, excuse me, a synthetic life form, have its own organized religion?  Does is not seem at first glance that the synthetic life forms merely created their own deity?  Did the Cylons invent a toaster God?

Not surprisingly, the humans on Battlestar Galactica mock the organized religion of their creation, the Cylons.  In contrast to the Cylons’ one true God, the humans on Battlestar Galactica believe in many gods as did the ancient Greeks and Romans on our planet.  The humans on Battlestar Galactica scoff at what they do not understand, so it follows that they would mock the one true God as well.  And they do.

But, it seems true that Battlestar Galactica is saying to us that the synthetic life forms most likely had to create their own God, who most likely is going to turn out to be as synthetic as they are.  How can life forms create their own God?  And why would they do so?  Why do sythetic life forms need a deity at all?  Does it not make the whole concept of deity rather suspect?

Equally puzzling is why do the humans on Battlestar Galactica, who are shown to be smart with advanced technology, insist on believing in many gods instead of the one true God?  How smart or advanced can someone be who insists on believing in many gods?  On the other hand, how smart or advanced can Cylons be since they apparently had to create their own God?

These are all deep and troubling questions that season three of Battlestar Galactica started asking the viewers to ponder. 

Sex with Toasters

One of the most important plot points in Ronald D. Moore’s Battlestar Galactica series is sex between human beings and humanoid Cylons. Although human beings deeply fear and disrespect their enemy, the Cylons, and even refer to them with extreme prejudice as toasters, it was inevitable that human beings would have sex with toasters.

This is so because the Cylons had a plan to bring it about. The motivation for this Cylon plan to entice human males to have sexual intercourse with female humanoid Cylons was to give the Cylons the power of sexual reproduction of their species.

The honor of being the first human male enticee into this liaison goes to Lieutenant Karl “Helo” Agathon (played by Tamoh Peniket).

The female enticee is Cylon Sharon (played by Grace Park).

The happy couple are thrown together by circumstance on Cylon occupied Caprica, one of the home planets of the human race that was nuked by the Cylons.  Helo did not realize that he was being tricked into spending time with Cylon Sharon on Caprica to fulfill the Cylon plan for him to start having sex with her.

He was manipulated by Cylon Sharon into enjoying his interactions with her on the planet Caprica. He grew comfortable with her and enjoyed tender moments of laughter, for example.

Before too much time had passed, however, Helo and Cylon Sharon were drawn together emotionally, and, as planned, he started to show that he felt sexually attracted to her.

He lights her up.  On Battlestar Galactica, whenever a humanoid Cylon female has an orgasm, her spine glows red.

In 1973, the animated series premiered on Saturday mornings on NBC, with episodes that featured the voices of the original series cast. Roddenberry got creative control of this series. There are 22 animated half-hour episodes that featured a collection of highly credentialed writers, such as Samuel A. Peeples, D.C. Fontana, Marc Daniels, Margaret Armen, and David Gerrold, who never before had written scripts for a Saturday morning animated network series. Yet, an animated series was insufficient to satisfy a growing audience demand for more Star Trek on television.

Paramount Pictures then decided to do a Star Trek motion picture for theatrical release instead of producing a new television version. In the 1970s, Paramount was considered creating a fourth television network and a Star Trek reborn on the new network certainly must have given the studio executives at that time visions of dollar signs. United Paramount Network (UPN) ultimately was launched in 1995, but plans moved forward in the 1970s to produce Star Trek as a movie for worldwide theatrical release instead of a television series. In 1979, ten years after the NBC cancellation of the original series, Paramount Pictures released Star Trek: The Motion Picture, directed by Robert Wise, produced by Gene Roddenberry, and starring all of the original series cast members.

The film’s plot is built upon themes of death and rebirth, which can be evaluated as a metaphor for the entire Star Trek franchise. Although produced by Gene Roddenberry, this film marks a departure from the clear idea content direction for Star Trek that had first been fixed by Roddenberry in the mid-1960s. Also, since the movie ran over two hours in its original release in 1979, a change of pace compared to the television series was necessary in how a story is told on screen. While visually this movie was a delight for Star Trek fans, the story seems at times bloated and not very focused.

This writer concludes that the Star Trek franchise was changed in fundamental ways starting with this movie. Then, throughout the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, the total output from the entire Star Trek franchise only occasionally lives up to the original ideological vision upon which Roddenberry and other producers and writers had initially won an intense audience following and loyalty in the 1960s.

Star Trek has always had an innate ability to embed idea content to persuade an audience about religion, politics, sexual behaviors, and other controversial themes. But, has this proven power been used as deliberately or as effectively after the 1960s?

This is a complex question, but the simple answer is no.

Once Paramount Pictures chose to go with the production of a major motion picture in the late 1970s, it was inevitable that sequels would follow. The first of many sequels was released by Paramount Pictures in 1982 entitled Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. It was followed in 1984 with Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, with Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home in 1986, and Star Trek V: The Final Frontier in 1989.

The production and release of major motion pictures for a business such as Paramount Pictures is a very expensive proposition. So, Star Trek as a franchise of major motion pictures out of business necessity had to be shifted to a focus on getting a return upon investment rather than focusing on the use of science fiction in movies to put forth ideas for adults to ponder.

Compared to all subsequent Star Trek productions, the original series in the 1960s had been produced without a lot of money, and the original intent in the 1960s was to get away with controversial ideas by embedding them witin science fiction characters and stories. All of that changed starting in the 1970s. Star Trek was shifted because of business priorities from a primary focus on presenting controversial or provocative idea content to presenting spectacular action and adventure on screen. And who can blame Paramount Pictures for doing this, especially when everyone in those days could look at how financially successful the James Bond motion picture franchise was.

Creator Effect

There is also the important matter of the man with the prime idea, Gene Roddenberry. He created Star Trek and guided its development and production personally at the outset. He was involved--in varying degrees--in the production of the first six Star Trek motion pictures for theatrical release.

He also created Star Trek: The Next Generation, which premiered in 1987 as a syndication Paramount release, giving Roddenberry a “second chance” with a Star Trek television series.

The studio intended to keep producing Star Trek also as major motion pictures with the cast and characters from the original series. Roddenberry also was involved with Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, the last motion picture to feature the cast and characters from the original series.

Roddenberry reportedly felt that certain elements of the fifth and sixth Star Trek movies were not true to his original creation. But, it should not surprise anyone that other creative influences inevitably would change Star Trek over the decades. One person cannot retain control over an entire television and motion picture franchise as decades pass, unless they start their efforts at a very young age. In 1964, Roddenbery was in his 40s when he first developed ideas for what would become Star Trek on NBC-TV in 1966. He was in his 60s when Star Trek: The Next Generation debuted. He died at age 70 in October 1991. In his final years, Roddenberry remained involved in the production of the first four seasons of his creation, Star Trek: The Next Generation, but others took over after his death, and the series ran a total of seven seasons until 1994.

There have been three other television spinoffs of Star Trek in the post-Roddenberry years. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ran for seven seasons (1993-1999). Star Trek: Voyager ran for seven seasons (1995-2001). Star Trek: Enterprise ran four seasons (2001-2005).

There also have been four post-Roddenberry Star Trek motion pictures. Star Trek Generations (1994) features a time travel story in which both Captain James T. Kirk and Captain Jean-Luc Picard appear together. Three other Star Trek movies complete the set of ten, including Star Trek: First Contact (1996), Star Trek Insurrection (1998), and Star Trek: Nemesis (2002), the last movie to feature the cast and characters from Star Trek: The Next Generation.

When I was working in Los Angeles radio in the early 1970s, I produced a documentary series about the original Star Trek on the occasion of the debut of the Saturday morning animated spinoff on NBC-TV.

I first met Gene Roddenberry in 1973.  I somehow persuaded him to agree to an interview for the radio documentary that I was producing.  You can hear one segment (less than 3 minutes) from that multipart radio documentary featuring comments from Gene Roddenberry here.  Another segment from my radio documentary series presented surprisingly honest comments from actor Walter Koenig, who joined the crew of the starship Enterprise as Pavel Chekov in the second season (1967-1968) of the original series.

At first, Roddenberry did not want to talk with me. He told me that he had been “burned” by the media previously. So, I came up with the idea of using two tape recorders simultaneously while interviewing him at his office in Burbank.  I assured him that if I used those two tape recorders, I could then hand him his own copy of the taped interview before I even left his office. And so he agreed to talk with me!  Only small portions of the recordings I made of Roddenberry’s comments in his own words were ever broadcast on Los Angeles radio, but you can hear everything he told me right here. 

He wrote me a letter to say how much he liked the radio documentary that I produced about Star Trek:

Into The Next Decade

In 1982, when Roddenberry was on the college lecture circuit, he came to New Haven, Connecticut, where I was a college professor. That night I was honored to introduce him to the crowded auditorium. He gave a speech in which he explained the power of Star Trek, and showed the original pilot, “The Cage,” which was rare in those days since it was not yet available to the public as it is today.  Hear what Roddenberry said in this rare audio excerpt from his comments that night in Connecticut.

A New Haven newspaper covered Roddenberry’s appearance and my research interest in him and Star Trek:

Professor studies ‘Star Trek’ impact
By Randall Beach, Staff Reporter
New Haven Register, March 19, 1982

“If anyone has a hero, Gene Roddenberry is mine. I really respect what hes done.” Woody Goulart (pictured above) was honored and a little frightened to be introducing his idol, the creator and producer of “Star Trek,” Thursday night (March 18, 1982) at the University of New Haven. Goulart, an assistant professor of communications at UNH, has practically made a life study of the TV series and the man behind it. He even did his doctoral dissertation on the subject.

“But I’m not a ‘Trekkie,’ he emphasized. “I’d be the last one to wear Spock ears, even in private. I’m more of a Star Trek researcher. I’ve read all the Star Trek books, and I really believe that no one has come up with a complete explanation of why the formula worked.”

Goulart hopes to be the one to do this, by writing a book on Roddenberry. Last year, aided by a $1,440 grant from the UNH faculty research fund, Goulart bought video equipment and studied the show’s episodes (he has seen all 78 of them.) While engaged in this, he expanded his theory of “disguised mass persuasion.”

“Roddenberry admits there are hidden covert messages in the show. There’s an anti-war message, with the United Federation of Planets as an ideal United Nations. The series was made from 1966-69, during the Vietnam War. But you couldn’t just come out on TV and say we shouldn’t be imperialistic. He did it in an allegorical way with science fiction. This is the legacy that Roddenberry made possible: TV is a producer’s medium, and you don’t have to resort to explicit violence and sexuality.” Goulart conceded “Star Trek” did have its share of warfare.

“But they (the starship Enterprise crew) dealt with the enemy from the standpoint of protecting society: defensive, not offensive. “The show was basically optimistic service to one’s society, learning to get along with all different kinds of people and not have constant prejudice. It was also pro-feminist.”

Goulart said Leonard Nimoy’s character of Spock embodies “all those values worth emulating.” He is calm, peaceful, decidedly non-violent. But he’s always in a struggle to fight his alien nature. He’s like all of us, fighting our animal instincts.That’s why he was the most popular character.” Indeed, Goulart considers Spock “the most unique character in television. Who did you have before? Ben Cartwright (Lorne Greene of ‘Bonanza’)? TV producers think the audience would rather watch characters who are shallow. The people on ‘Dukes of Hazzard’ are talented, but John Schneider’s acting is just secondary. That credibility is missing. You know these people don’t really exist, but you knew Captain Kirk could exist.”

“Roddenberry knew his audience. He decided to appeal to that audience, and he assumed people were intelligent. Other TV producers thought people would not sit still for messages, ideas. So they made ‘The Beverly Hillbillies’ and ‘Gilligan’s Island.’ ‘Dukes’ proves that this hasn’t changed.” Goulart, now 31, came by his obsession gradually. He was 16 when the show was first aired, and he only watched it then because his teacher assigned it as a project. His interest really took hold when he pursued his Ph.D. at Indiana University. It was then that he first developed his theory on disguised mass persuasion. But the faculty there didn’t consider a TV science fiction show fit material for a doctoral dissertation. “They thought I was absolutely bonkers. But when I got to them on the level of disguised mass persuasion, they were more receptive.”

Goulart went on to write and produce a 22-part documentary series on “Star Trek” for a Los Angeles radio station in 1973. That was when he first met Roddenberry. “He believed the United Federation of Planets was a model of what we could become. He told me, ‘We’re not very advanced. We’re not like the characters in “Star Trek,” who are 200 years in the future. That’s a model of how things could be in the future. We’re only in our adolescence now.’”

Goulart said if he goes forward with the book, “I’ll try to show that television is not mere entertainment. Even accidentally, you can persuade people.” Meanwhile, Goulart is anxiously awaiting the second “Star Trek” movie (due for release this summer) though he was disappointed by the first. “It wasn’t as well-conceived as the TV show. But I have HBO, and whenever that film is on, it’s irresistible. I want to spend time with the characters. But that’s absurd. I’m a grown person and I’m spending time with TV characters. I guess I shouldn’t be embarrassed. A lot of people feel that way about characters.”

Despite this affection, Goulart is not concerned about the rumors that Spock will be killed off in the second movie. “I’m sure it’s a promotional thing. It’s hype, like ‘Who shot J.R.?’ If you thought there was a furor when they cancelled the TV show, this would be incredible. Trekkies with Speck ears storming Paramount Studios. That’s the formula--don’t do something the audience would reject.”

I interviewed Roddenberry once again in 1982 and he told me several things I had never seen attributed to him before.

During my 1982 interview of Roddenberry, he told me, “I think the three things that made Star Trek different from other things that have been done are, first, it said we have a future, and an optimistic future. Secondly, we had very much old-fashioned heroes, who believed it’s not necessarily the coolest thing in the world to rip other people off. And, third, were the comments Star Trek made on humans in society.”

Roddenberry noted that he wasn’t convinced that 1980’s Western civilization would necessarily survive for hundreds of years into the future. He told me that he fully expected very tough times for humanity in the coming decades, but explained, “I think the human creature will survive.”

Roddenberry also explained that he believed humanity’s values systems and attitudes and ways will so change in the future that it would “frighten today’s audiences probably no less than twentieth-century humanity would frighten an eighth or ninth-century audience.”

Roddenberry told me that he believed although the 1960s were over, many of the aspects of American society that the original Star Trek television series had commented on were still evident in the 1980s. “Our public life is full of thieves,” he said, and added, “Religion is full of con men. We have enormous problems with crime.”

Roddenberry gave me his perspective on how he thought aliens who visited Earth would view humans: “I suspect if aliens visited us they would see us as infants, who do a lot of destruction as infants will. They would see us as infants who are sometimes cruel, but with a sort of ‘divine spark’ too, very precocious infants that are really going to be something when they grow up!”

Later that night in 1982, Roddenberry and I shared a quiet steak dinner together--just the two of us--where we talked about his work and plans for the future. At the time, I was a 31 year-old college professor. Even though I was a professional and not “merely” a fan of Star Trek, I certainly was blown away by the fact that Roddenberry (who didn’t know me well, personally) would offer to take me to dinner and spend time talking with me. I knew that Roddenberry could have as easily opted for some quiet time on his own, away from everyone, where he didn’t have to think or talk about Star Trek.

I shared with Roddenberry my dream of writing a book about him and his creation. He made it clear that he was very disinterested in having anyone write a book about him.  He said he would help me get the necessary approvals.  That could have been a polite way of telling me that this book would never happen.  But, Roddenberry eventually gave his full cooperation to David Alexander, who wrote <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Star Trek Creator</span>, the essential biography. Other books about Roddenberry have subsequently been published, though not all remain in print.

Although my interest in studying Roddenberry and his creation remained strong through the years, I ultimately set aside my dream of writing a book about him.  Gene Roddenberry died in 1991 and during that same decade I produced this site to share with you what I learned over the years. Writing a book about Roddenberry and Star Trek is no longer a professional interest of mine, and besides, the Internet now makes it possible for writers to reach a far wider audience than most books can.

His son, Wesley Eugene Roddenberry, Jr., writes and produces Roddenberry.com, which contains material that any Star Trek fan will want to see.

For me, researching and writing toward what would be the final version of the chapter was sheer joy. I loved every minute that I spent returning to the research tradition regarding science fiction in which I had first ventured when I worked in Hollywood during the 1970s.

Ronald D. Moore obviously learned the “tricks of the trade,” so to speak, that were pioneered by Gene Roddenberry’s Star Trek for injecting or embedding discernible themes and messages about politics and religion for the audience to ponder. Moreover, the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks on the United States and the subsequent U.S. invasion of Iraq provide the political and social context for Battlestar Galactica producers and writers to inject urgent and controversial questions of military and political significance. Since the word battle is in its title, nobody is surprised that this series explicitly deals with warfare and conflict between political and cultural opponents using the science fiction format. What may be surprising, however, is that Battlestar Galactica attempts to compel viewers to evaluate difficult and challenging questions about their core beliefs and values.

That is the subject of the “Inverted Perspectives” chapter that examines the controversial choices to employ religious and political themes in Ronald D. Moore’s Battlestar Galactica.

One of the most compelling aspects of science fiction–and what initially attracted my interest in the genre when I was a teenager–is science fiction’s ability to pull so effectively from the worlds of politics and religion to make persuasive points about real life. Such an injection of politics and religion into a science fiction television series required a deliberate intent to do so and great courage to face the consequences from both the network and the audience.

Moore succeeded in using politics and religion as a powerful rhetorical platform for Battlestar Galactica so that he could challenge the audience. He clarified what he was attempting to accomplish with Battlestar Galactica as far as embedded idea content and messages in a 2007 interview on Salon.com:

“One of the mistakes TV often makes is that it tries to tackle complicated moral and legal issues and wrap them up in an hour and give you a neat, tidy message by the end: ‘And here’s the way to solve Iraq!’ I don’t think that’s helpful, and I don’t think that’s good storytelling or great to watch. Our mission is more about asking questions, asking the audience to think about things, to think about uncomfortable things, to question their own assumptions. I like the show best when you get to a place where you’re not sure who you’re rooting for anymore, you’re not sure whose side you’re on. And you’re confused and you might even be angry about what we’re doing but at least it’s forced you to a place of trying to define your own point of view on something.”

During the writing of our chapter about Battlestar Galactica my writing partner Wesley Joe and I discussing lofty subjects as extraterrestial gods and politics as we dined in a Vietnamese restaurant near the Pentagon. We both discovered during our work on that chapter how exploring such thinking would certainly require more space than one chapter in a book would allow. But, our chapter is a good start, even if it’s only one small step.

The excerpts on this page from the “Inverted Perspectives” chapter. Copyright © 2008, University of South Carolina. This material is used with permission from New Boundaries in Political Science Fiction, edited by Donald M. Hassler and Clyde Wilcox, published in June 2008 by the University of South Carolina Press. You can read the entire chapter online at no cost here.

The Power of Distortion

The terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, and the subsequent war in Iraq provide the political and cultural context for the producers and writers of Battlestar Galactica to pose urgent, controversial questions about military and political issues for viewers to ponder. Battlestar Galactica challenges its audience’s core perceptions, beliefs, and values in ways that one rarely finds in commercial television programming.

Ronald D. Moore, Battlestar Galactica’s showrunner, manages, controls, produces, and often writes or rewrites the series’ episodes. He has stated that he uses a “different prism” through which stories and characters are “twisted” from the expected or anticipated norm in ways that few, if any, other television shows ever attempt.

Moore’s storytelling technique deliberately distorts what viewers may deem as “normal” or “expected” perspectives on people, politics, organized religion and moral issues. The specific purpose of this distortion is to serve a rhetorical process that aims to convince Battlestar Galactica’s audiences to look at individual political, religious, and human moral issues from a variety of perspectives.

By bringing the ambiguity of these issues into the foreground, Battlestar Galactica challenges average citizens to think about the potential merits of perspectives they oppose and the drawbacks of perspectives they embrace. In commercial television–the dominant entertainment medium in the United States–this is a relatively recent development.

The chapter entitled “Inverted Perspectives on Politics and Morality in Battlestar Galactica” examines how the Battlestar Galactica producers and writers defy the conventions of directly allegorical stories to push viewers outside of their comfort zones and upend their abilities to pass quick moral judgments about pressing contemporary questions of war versus peace and right verses wrong. The chapter considers how effectively Battlestar Galactica tells human adventure stories of a military and political nature through a bold challenge to audience opinions on three essential points:

**Battlestar Galactica provides commentary on deeply held U.S. beliefs about contemporary politics and the military.
**Battlestar Galactica questions the connection between organized religion and political and military actions.
**Battlestar Galactica compels viewers to accept that during political and military conflicts, despite any idealized standards of right and wrong, fundamentally decent people can behave in uncivil and immoral ways.

The rhetorical process in Battlestar Galactica using the “inverted prism” to distort what is depicted on screen strips away the audience’s sense of comfort about television characters and the fictional situations in which they exist. Battlestar Galactica then asks viewers to compare and contrast these characters against their own expectations of human nature and behavior. The comparing and contrasting leaves viewers with no choice but to reflect on persuasive depictions of the characters’ behavior in times of military and political conflict.

Battlestar Galactica characters are unlike the typical characters in science fiction television series. Instead of following long-standing traditions of character development for commercial television, Ron Moore intentionally creates personalities that more closely resemble real people. When viewed through Moore’s “prism” of rhetorical distortion, his characters can be illogical, deeply flawed, and often exhibit unpredictable behaviors based on their intense emotional and physical drives, much like genuine people.

Battlestar Galactica Characters Differ From Star Trek Characters

The deeply-flawed characters approach in Battlestar Galactica differs substantially from how science fiction television characters have more commonly been construed for decades, especially following Star Trek’s influence on science fiction television and motion pictures. Ron Moore worked on Star Trek and he acknowledges that Battlestar Galactica continues to be informed by the optimistic and heroic characters of Star Trek. But, he clarifies his intentions for the characters on Battlestar Galactica:

“My characters may not have all the answers (sometimes they’re not even aware of the questions) but they contain kernels of both good and evil in their hears and continue to struggle for salvation and redemption against the darker angles of their natures. Their defeats are many, their victories few, but somehow, some way, they never give up the dream of finding a better tomorrow.”

The Power of Sex as a Weapon

Battlestar Galactica characters are also unlike commonly created science fiction characters in terms of their sexuality. Ron Moore maintains one core strategy in the depiction of human beings throughout Battlestar Galactica: Each human’s gender, tribal or planetary origin, and race are completely irrelevant in the Battlestar Galactica universe.

The series is, if nothing else, a complicated, interconnected story about humans at war against their mortal enemy, the Cylons. But unlike in the real world, where both politics and the military are male-dominated, the Battlestar Galactica audience encounters a completely gender-blind political and military infrastructure.

The life-forms on Battlestar Galactica known as the Cylons are explained as having originally been created by humans “to make life easier”–a sanitized way of saying that the humans created the Cylons to be their slaves. Of course, ultimately, the Cylons get smart and decide to kill their masters. They attempt payback using nuclear weapons against human race, but fail to wipe out all human civilization. So, the Cylons bring in a secret weapon in the service of their military strategy–sophisticated and highly intelligent beings who look outwardly indistinguishable from human beings. And, they use sex as a weapon against humans.

The power of Cylons over human beings is thus vividly established. The sexual dominance of a human male by a female Cylon–one of the most stunning storytelling aspects employed by Battlestar Galactica–symbolizes the military and technological power that the Cylons exert over human beings. This theme of a female’s use of sex to dominate and control a male, both literally and figuratively, serves as the lynchpin of the Cylons’ political and military campaign to wipe out their human enemy. Sexual control of males by aggressive females driven by often intertwined political and religious agendas is reinforced consistently throughout Battlestar Galactica.

On Battlestar Galactica, nudity and sexuality are depicted without any apparent prurient significance, shame, or moral consequences. Male and female crew members live in close proximity, sharing not only living quarters but toilet and shower facilities within a military environment that affords little or no individual privacy or separation of the genders. There is also the depiction of attractive females who are sexually dominant over males.

This may certainly serve the purpose of attracting and maintaining both female and male audience interest in Battlestar Galactica, but the more crucial reason to portray sexually dominant females is to establish an effective rhetorical storytelling process that catches the audience off guard. Ron Moore has chosen to disregard stereotypical portrayals of males and females on commercial television and instead calls viewer attention to well-defined characters that can serve a persuasive purpose as models of less commonly valued roles and attributes in a universe where race and gender distinctions do not exist. He calls upon Battlestar Galactica viewers to focus on the critical issues of personal behavior and individual decision-making.

What is “Good” and What is “Bad”?

As exemplified by highly sexual characters, who are young and attractive, Battlestar Galactica employs Ron Moore’s “different prism” for storytelling which consistently violates audience expectations about human behavior. Moore twists the typically expected central characteristics such as heroism, courage, selflessness, devotion, and moral behavior of the best characters, presented instead off-centered traits to keep viewers on their toes and invert their perceptions about what is versus what should be.

The series demands an emotional response from its viewers, especially in the context of the rapid, ongoing changes involving the U.S. military and the U.S. political landscape since the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the subsequent war in Iraq. The audience is compelled to decide for itself whether the asymmetrical nature of the warfare on Battlestar Galactica between humans and Cylons can be or should be used to justify behavioral choices that frequently appear to disregard basic morality, democracy, and civility.

At the outset many viewers may readily and easily identify the “good guys” (the human race) as they fight against the “bad guys” (the Cylons), and the audience is likely to expect the human good guys to be portrayed as people who behave heroically and even admirably in defense of their civilized society and its essential morality. But instead, Moore’s “different prism” depicts the “good” humans as choosing to behave in ways that in today’s world would be considered immoral if not evil. A most controversial human choice is suicide bombers who attack Cylons. Since the series does not shy away from depicting immoral and violently uncivil attributes and behaviors in what are obviously “good” people, the audience is left with no choice but to confront the difficult questions of why these fundamentally good people frequently behave in an immoral manner and the extent to which context informs moral judgment.

What is “Fair” in War?

Nowhere is Battlestar Galactica’s use of the “different prism” rhetorical device more evident than in several stories that raise questions about the use of otherwise illegal or extralegal emergency measure to address threats to the safety of the political community. Governing authorities and political and legal theorists have grappled with various forms of these issues for centuries. But in the United States, at least, commercial television rarely engages public audiences in such nuanced, multidimensional considerations of these issues or contemporary manifestations of them.

In the immediate aftermath of the cold war, within the U.S. once commonly discussed manifestations in popular political discourse of these issues temporarily faded. They returned with a vengeance, however, after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. One of the most controversial manifestations is the Bush administration’s effort to reduce legal constraints on executive-branch prosecution of military and domestic antiterrorism operations. The administration has claimed rights to detain individuals, including U.S. citizens in the United States (as opposed to on a foreign battlefield), in solitary confinement almost indefinitely without charges and without access to legal counsel, an assertion of powers that alarmed civil libertarians and was never adequately addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court.

How should ordinary citizens react to a head of state’s assertion of broad discretionary emergency authority? Does it represent a kind of legalized lawlessness, and, if so, should be care? Are civil liberties, the separation of powers, and other pillars of democratic republics inviolable? Or are there occasions for which the “strict and rigid observation” of them, as John Locke wrote, are dangerous obstacles to a head of stat’s capacity to provide for our collective security?

The issues are complex ones with no universal answers. Yet the public debate over these issues, particularly conducted through popular entertainment media, can be a polarized, shrill exchange of highly oversimplified conceptualizations of the problem. A genuine contribution of Battlestar Galactica is its use of the science fiction context and the “different prism” device to highlight important complexities and invite viewers to think about some basic aspects of contemporary U.S. national security issues free from at least a few partisan perceptual biases.

Battlestar Galactica presents the viewpoint that military governments have a limited capacity to govern and are sometimes less functional than regimes that enjoy democratically grounded legitimacy.

Why Do Religions Drive Political Behaviors?

Ron Moore has embedded a deeply reverential love of democracy into the fiber of the human characters in Battlestar Galactica. “More than a little of the politics of Battlestar Galactica can be traced back to Abraham Lincoln’s passionate views about freedom,” Moore wrote. This creates a powerful rhetorical context that is easy for viewers to understand and embrace: Just as in Lincoln’s era, when the outcome of the American Civil War was dependent upon an unwavering dedication to preserving the Union, so too will the outcome on Battlestar Galactica’s Cylon-verus-human war depend upon humanity’s ultimate defense and preservations of its freedoms and its democratic society in the the galaxy. To this mix Moore adds the controversial element of theocracy, and in so doing the forces his audience to consider difficult questions.

For instance, why would artificial life-forms (the Cylons) created by human beings evolve to such an extend that they would have their own extremely fanatical religious beliefs? In turn, why would those beliefs drive the Cylons to engage in a divinsely inspired, bloody war against the human race? Although Moore cautions not to perceive of the Cylons are directly allegorical, he admits that the Cylons “have aspects of Al Qaeda, and they have aspects of the Catholic Church, and they have aspects of America.”

Although mainstream science fiction typically has chosen to avoid the subject of religion, Battlestar Galactica defiantly challenges this tradition. Moreover, incorporating two opposing organized religions and various deities into the series challenges the audience to ponder the controversial idea that perhaps gods are created by believers and not the other way around.

But more important, it is the religious dichotomy between humans and Cylons that defines and shapes the military and political clashes between the two sides. At the heart of Battlestar Galactica’s life-and-death struggle between religions are deeply complicated questions that viewers must grapple with: Can the human race retain its political system based on liberty and freedom of religious beliefs after having created the Cylons to serve humanity essentially as slaves; what should humans expect when the Cylons ultimately rebel against their human creators and attempt to wipe out the entire human race? Do humans have any divinely inspired fate to prevail over their creation, the Cylons?

[If you are interested in learning more, including gaining access to the sources used in the writing of the above essay, please consult the chapter in New Boundaries in Political Science Fiction, edited by Donald M. Hassler and Clyde Wilcox, published in June 2008 by the University of South Carolina Press. You can read the entire chapter online at no cost here.]

For example, a young lieutenant with the callsign “Crashdown” (portrayed by the talented Samuel Stewart Witwer) is an electronic countermeasures officer that has an integral part in the story told in Season 2, Episode 3, first aired July 29, 2005 on Sci-Fi.

His innocent, youthful face is marred by recent wounds received in deadly field encounters. Yet, he is portrayed as valliant and unrelenting in completing his military mission.

Nobody watching Battlestar Galactica could view this depiction of battle-ready valor while remaining neutral about “Crashdown” or his importance to the lives of the people around him. This fighter pilot demands attention from the audience because, although he appears to model heroism and courage, in truth he has fatal flaws because of his youth that cannot be glossed over.

We see the lieutenant as aggressive and tough, creating a false impression about his apparent determination to win in battle. He certainly looks like a man who is in charge of himself and his unit. Plus, he is especially handsome in his uniform. This guy could be a poster boy of military readiness--an icon for the red, white, and blue all-American fighting man.

Is Battlestar Galactica serving a function as a not-so-subtle recruiter for the United States military by portraying such a fine young figher on the field of battle?

This might be true were it not for one detail: Our handsome military poster boy gets killed in action rather shockingly. This Battlestar Galactica episode is entitled “Fragged,” which means the assassination of a member of a military unit by someone who is in that unit.

The tragedy of this lieutenant’s death, and most especially the unflinching look at how and why he was murdered by someone within his own unit, is an emotionally difficult thing to watch. Just when you expect a heroic and happy ending from such a rugged and seemingly unbeatable man, the rug gets jerked out from under you so suddenly. Being caught off guard like this emotionally teaches you to expect the unexpected from Battlestar Galactica. You learn that the military role models in Battlestar Galactica--especially those characters whose lives are violently ended right before your very eyes--must never be underestimated nor taken for granted.

The youthful and passionate appearances of both male and female fighter pilots alike are emphasized in Battlestar Galactica for their high audience appeal. Just don’t expect the typical and cynical “live fast, die hard, and leave a good-looking corpse” theme that you can easily find elsewhere in television shows and in major motion pictures. Battlestar Galactica is not unsophisticated like that. However, the camera lingers on the face of the assassinated lieutenant. These images probably will remain with you for awhile. That’s deliberate to force you to remember how and why “Crashdown” lost his life at such a young age.

This is but one example of how there is a deeper message under the skin of the visually appealing characters on Battlestar Galactica. How characters live--and sometimes how they die--especially when juxtaposed with their visual appeal, is a powerful way to stimulate the audience. Because characters are visually appealing, the audience just might pay closer attention to them. This makes it possible for the producers and writers to jar an unsuspecting audience with surprising and emotionally powerful stories. What Battlestar Galactica strives to accomplish with its characters is the pinpointing and showcasing of individual and collective motivations as to why human beings
keep fighting against the enemy Cylons, who always are smarter, more powerful, and are the most likely to prevail militarily.

After viewing episodes such as “Fragged,” one cannot help but ask some difficult questions:

1--Even though they have been well-trained in the military service, how can young people in a violent wartime situation be expected to behave as though they are completely civilized and have complete self-control?

2--Can the killing on the battlefield be willfully and deliberately contained or restricted to specific and limited targets such as the enemy exclusively?

These are crucial, yet unanswerable moral questions for the citizens of the U.S. regarding behaviors during wartime, especially when Battlestar Galactica and its military role models are viewed in the context of the war in Iraq.

--------------------------------------------------------

posted on iTunes.com:

Great Escape While Deployed in Iraq
* * * * * (five stars)

Battlestar Galactica is my favorite show and was very disappointed when I had to deploy to Iraq in the middle of the second season. When I found out about iTunes having downloads of your favorite TV shows I just had to see if they had Battlestar Galactica. Myself and one of my soldiers thank you for this wonderful opportunity that allows us to follow the series and virtually not miss a beat. The show is awesome. Thank you.

Bob on the FOB

Go ahead and reshuffle the DVD boxes, stacking these science fiction movies so that you put the easiest, simple ones first in the stack, and then the complex, textured ones go last. Near the top you would find Primer.

Reshuffle again. This time, stack these science fiction movies on DVD so that the most mentally rigorous science fiction films are on top of all the rest. Near the top you will find Primer.

This silly little stacking game can only be attempted by those who not only have a lot of time of their hands, but who also have little common sense along with sufficient wealth to enable them to own every movie with a science fiction theme that is available on DVD today. But, ultimately, this is only a mind game.

If you are someone who owns any science fiction movies on DVD, you will want to own Primer. But, don’t attempt the stacking thing at home. We are professionals. We know what we’re doing and we only did this virtually in our minds.

So, what’s Primer about? Fair enough. The simple (but, sadly, wrong) answer is: Primer is about two highly intelligent guys who accidentally invent a time machine.

What we know is this: David Sullivan and the film’s writer/director Shane Carruth play the two guys in Primer. But, there is more going on in Primer than merely their accidentally inventing a time machine and then suffering the consequences.

True, the two guys do, in fact, figure out how to travel in time using their invention, and true, they do suffer the consequences. But, thankfully, Primer is not about going back in time to prevent the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy, or other such grandiose stories that you’ve already seen elsewhere in those other science fiction movies that end up at the bottom of any DVD stacking scheme regardless of the sort criteria.

Primer was filmed with hand-held cameras using the familiar documentary style that creates a high credibility. It is as if we are watching a nonfiction account of what the two guys did. Various competing emotions of this science fiction story are contrasted very abruptly to serve the purposes of the narrative. Visually, this is accomplished with very effective usage of lighting and how people are framed within the shots.

You will choose to believe that what you are seeing in Primer is true and credible because writer/director Shane Carruth made this film deliberately to do so. You will also find yourself pulled into the story of Primer so intensely as you attempt to process in your mind what happens to the two guys and why. Few science fiction movies have accomplished this.

Time travel as a theme in science fiction films often can be difficult for the audience because of the logical and mathematical complexities involved. What if you could go back in time and you could interact with yourself when you were younger? Primer expends very little, if any, energy attempting to make sense of such paradoxes regarding time travel. Instead, using only 77 minutes running time, this film submerges you deeply in a tight and engaging story about the unintended consequences of consequences.

The purity of the science fiction storytelling in Primer is downright astonishing. Most science fiction films are shallow and superficial in comparison to Primer. This film is so textured and nuanced that you likely will need time on your hands because you will definitely feel compelled to view the DVD more than once.

One significant (if unusual) aspect of Roddenberry was that even though he was a television producer, he much preferred books.

And he was sure that his appetite for reading directly influenced his writing and producing of Star Trek.

He credits starting out at Lucille Ball’s studio, Desilu (later sold to Paramount Pictures) because the studio was willing to spend “more than an ordinary amount of money” to make Star Trek work.

When he was writing the original format for Star Trek, when he did not have science fact to rely upon, he improvised.

Roddenberry created the basic concept of Star Trek from the ground up, but wanted to share credit with others, including Shatner, Nimoy, Kelley, and others, saying it was ”a creation of many people.”

A woman was second in command in the first version of Star Trek, Mr. Spock was fourth in line, and none of that survived the development of the series because of NBC demands for changes.

The economics of mid-sixties television production today seem more implausible than faster-than-light space travel But the original Star Trek pilot the one that didn’t sell--cost a little over $600,000.

He explained how he worked as a producer, fostering joint contributions from everyone on Star Trek.

And he gave a clear picture of how the writing on Star Trek was carefully crafted to give the storytelling a high degree of believability.

Because of censorship restrictions, Star Trek producers and writers hid intended messages within stories of action and adventure in space.

He explained that he promoted an atmosphere of practical joking to relieve the pressures of production on Star Trek.

He declined naming his favorite episodes.

In what would be the final season of the original series, Roddenberryís world changed.

Roddenberry backed out of producing the third season (but he got screen credit as executive producer) after failing to convince NBC not to schedule Star Trek in an unfavorable time slot.

Roddenberry says NBC made a business decision to cancel the marginally-rated series in 1969 and noted it was ironic that the network discovered too late the demographic power of Star Trek.

And he insisted on maintaining the quality of the original Star Trek series when he produced the 1973 animated series for NBC because he did not want to insult viewers.

He did not think Star Trek necessarily had any long-term value in predicting how life may actually be in the future. But, he pointed to the exceptional value of the idea content of the storytelling that persuaded people ”there is a tomorrow.”

Roddenberry said he would hate for mankind to go “barging around and getting involved in other societies and civilizations” in the cosmos because humanity does not, in his view, yet have the wisdom to handle extraterrestial contact. But he did not “hate mankind” and believed our species is ”beginning to reach out of childhood now.”