(Season 1, Episode 2)

Diversity! That’s a thing, right? While I’m enjoying the Eastern/Western cultural fusion … Where are all the Asian people? I just read that Kaylee was originally written as an Asian character but obviously that has changed. There were some Asian extras wandering around in the dust in the Pilot and, you know, that’s about it. I’m not desperate for some Asian representation in all television shows, but it’s just strange to see a program with strong Chinese/American influences in everything but the main cast.

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(Season 1, Episode 1)

I have a confession to make: I’m not a big fan of Joss Whedon. There. I’ve said it. The way that some people gleefully react to his name is damn near Pavlovian, but I’ve never felt that. I enjoyed Dr. Horrible’s Singalong Blog and I tried watching Buffy … That joyful super-fan feeling never kicked in. I couldn’t even finish the fourth episode of Buffy. I shrugged off his other projects because I figured if I don’t like the ever-popular Buffy, I probably won’t like his other stuff. Later, it seemed weird to call myself a television fan and not have at least one Whedon project under my belt, so that’s where Firefly comes in. This show serves as my first full-on exposure to the world of Whedon and, well, I’ll admit, it didn’t disappoint.

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Yesterday I posted a Guest Clack written by colleague and all-around good guy, Michael Hinman, who runs Airlock Alpha. What some of you may not know is that Airlock Alpha used to be called SyFy Portal and looked quite different than it does today. Mike hinted at Airlock Alpha to me a while back, though I never asked why the name was changing. Now that the site’s up, I know the real deal: Sci Fi, the channel, bought the rights to the name “Syfy” from Mike.

And you know what? Good for him! It couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy, and I like the name Airlock Alpha better anyway. The sucky part of the story is Sci Fi’s reasoning for changing its name to Syfy: to get rid of the notion that they’re for geeks and are, instead, more “human-friendly.” Holy shit — we’re Cylons!

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Much to the happiness of BSG geeks like me, Ron D. Moore has been doing timely podcasts for the remaining episodes of the season, or at least he has for the past two. It’s always interesting to hear what the man has to say on what he was thinking with certain scenes, and the other directions he’d previously considered that got dropped.

Listening to the podcasts is a bit time consuming and calls for free time you might not have, so I’ll do my best to point out some of the highlights for me. Note these are from the first two podcasts, meshed together:

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I caught tonight’s episode at home last night, as I was sent the official DVD screener. As the paperwork I signed forbids me to mention much of anything, I’ll just have to make it quick and let your imagination run wild … for the most part.

I can’t talk about anything “big” that happens — and there are big things that happen. I can’t go into details about the planet we saw at the end of the last episode, discoveries made there, etc. You’re just going to all have to wait to see about that.

One thing that shouldn’t be a big surprise is that the opening scene is indeed the little preview video we got to see — it all starts right from there.

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ABC

(Season 1, Episode 3)

Life on Mars is showing that it’s not going to pull many punches (no pun intended) when it comes to how the ’70s are portrayed, and this episode was a prime example of that. And Sam is finding, more often, that he’s going to have to adjust his own way of thinking to accommodate for those not ready for 2008.

I’m sure we all wondered since the first episode when Sam would eventually happen upon his younger self. You could see it was going to happen as soon as Sam mentioned going to a Knicks game with his dad during the finals. I like that we got that out of the way so early in the series, though I’m sure it’s not the last we’ll be seeing of young Sam.

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www.scifi.com

I know!  I’m totally late to the game, but I have recently discovered Battlestar Galactica.  In my own defense, can you really blame me for ignoring a Sci Fi Channel original miniseries based on some crappy show from the ’70s? I mean, have you seen some of those Sci Fi original movies?  They raise unintentional comedy to an artform … but I digress.

After listening to several friends, and my brother-in-law praise this show for years, I’ve finally hopped on the bandwagon.  I’ve been devouring the episodes on DVD like a bowl of barbeque potato chips and just finished the second season.  I’m so psyched that I have a whole other season and a half to watch before the series gives its final swan song starting in January.

For those of you who were just like me a few months ago, I offer up some of the things that have impressed me in hopes of convincing you to give BSG a try:

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