How and Why Television’s Best Drama Got Gypped

Scanning over the 58th Primetime Emmy nominations list last Thursday morning (and delighting in the nod to Steve Carrel), it seemed curious to me that the most engaging drama on television was not recognized in the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences’ “Best Drama Series” category or in any other major category. The show in question was named “Best Show of 2005” by Time Magazine and recently won a Peabody, the highbrow statuette previously bestowed to celebrated series like “The Wire”, “Deadwood”, and “The Sopranos.” And for weeks, this best-of-the-best show’s logo was plastered all over heavily industry-trafficked defamer.com, accompanied by those familiar words “For Your Consideration.” What seemingly scoffed, highly suspenseful, utterly fascinating, purely addicting series could I possibly be speaking of? Why, only Sci-Fi’s “Battlestar Galactica.”

Based on the late `70s series of the same name, “Battlestar” has updated the terms of what sci-fi can be—indeed it’s upped the ante on just what can constitute televised drama. It is every Trekkie’s answer to the socially acceptable sci-fi opera, and every uninitiated, only-saw-“The Matrix” layman’s and laywoman’s introduction to the joys of the geekier genre. The appeal comes from “Battlestar”’s courage to answer every televisual desire and go far beyond it, to confront sex and violence, spirituality and abortion, terrorism and robotics without so much as a single flinch. Whereas “Lost” has failed--especially during their tiresome sophomore season--by over-attenuating the island’s many mysteries (i.e. the hatch and the button, the they-were-there-before-we-were Others, and special effect smoke bats), and whereas “Invasion”, “Surface” and “Threshold” were as second-helping “Lost”s as their one-name titles might imply, “Battlestar Galactica” has pumped up the action-adventure heat and suspended fans’ disbelief from day one. And surprisingly, it continues to do so with some of the most rip-roaring, unthinkable and imaginative storytelling that has graced the small screen. This show’s got it all: a sizzling former Victoria’s Secret model, special effect violence that rages on the apocalyptic, super-high production value, a fun and friendly substitute for the f-word (i.e. “frack”), rich, engaging characters who make confused decisions, and, what so many shows aspire to have but never achieve: a certain sense of urgency. It’s the kind of urgency we might feel, say, if, as in the series, the human race was on its last 97,750 legs (that is 47,875 men, women and children).

Admittedly, palpable endangerment of the species takes a little bit of time to digest. “Battlestar” and its bounty of rewards can only be reaped – and fully understood – if the patient couch potato starts from the beginning. One must devote two hours to the kick-starting mini-series, and, seeing as it’s sci-fi on Sci-Fi, delve right into a universe where you believe that robots are extinguishing the human race. See, Cylons, robots that were long ago engineered by humans, have now molded their robotic bodies into human form and declared full-out war on their Frankensteins’ offspring. Programmed with blood, sweat and emotion, they’ve taken to infesting human-inhabited spaceships, finding ways of planting themselves indispensably in everyday, seriously-space-age human life. And then the episodes spin out from a universe-changing event: Cylons have blasted the human planet of Caprica and its neighbors, and only about 50,000 survivors remain – and they’re all on spaceships, which now form a kind of colony led by the Battlestar Galactica.

While the stakes seem high and inconceivable, they climb even higher as we get to know superb veteran actor Edward James Olmos’s Captain Adama, helmer of the Galactica, and the Secretary of Education-turned-President Laura Rosalyn, played by the seriously endearing Mary McDonnell. (For the record, I’ve never seen two lead characters who parlayed so well, and never, for a second, do Olmos or McDonnell betray the integrity of their characters.) The government and the military have their work cut out for them in their attempt to save the human race. In this endeavor, they are assisted by firecracker Captain Kara Thrace (Katie Sackhoff) and dutiful-but-reserved Commander Adama, Captain Adama’s son, but there are other obstacles to bear: power hungry scientist-politician Gaius Baltar and his Cylon lover, Number Six (controlled and scintillating supermodel Tricia Helfer). The Cylons continuously strike blows in order to crush the remaining, not-so-lucky refugees. The only human option -- now that their home planet’s been blown up – is to look for a much-mythologized orb called Earth.

This is already probably confusing you and we’re not even up to Boomer’s actual identity, ever-loveable Chief, Kobol and The Scriptures, Colonel Tigh and his annoying wife, and the retrieval of Apollo’s arrow! Each episode is thick with “Holy Shit!”-inducing plot, and none in the series’ two-season run disappoints. The writers recognize that smart, labyrinthine storylines can pay off only when unwieldy troubles arise and are dealt with, instead of being cloaked in stale mystery. All the while, of course, BG’s characters and their universe are constantly gilt by a lingering, overarching sense of desperation. For our heroes, this consists of no permanent home, and the series shows us how they dignify their lives with a sense of a normalcy and, most poignantly, how they’re learning to cope.

Now, by awaiting Season Three, we fans are learning how to cope too. BG Followers are so rabid that Ron Moore, formerly of “Star Trek” and “Carnivale,” mans a Sci-Fi.com blog and podcasts about the show and the writers’ room. Sometimes, for personal inflection, he’ll even include his wife, who herself has been known to answer questions on the official website bulletin board. And those boards will attest with their hundreds upon thousands of postings, the community of “Battlestar” watchers is sprawling, inquisitive, and hungering for more.

I imagine that the sole reason why “Battlestar” got shut out in the Emmys is an initial sense of science fiction skepticism. The show was campaigning like crazy – by sending the entire Season Two DVD set in sleek, black packaging to all Academy members – but to no avail. Though every episode begins with a quick run-down of what’s going on in and outside of the Galactica, it’s all a bit overwhelming and clubby for the BG neophyte—and, dare I say it, a bit nerdy. Without knowing what happened in Season One, Season Two can seem like a bunch of nonsense – and more like fare solely for the science fiction fanatic. This is a most unfortunate reversion to type, symptomatic of the running complaint that good television doesn’t exist. When so many bemoan reality-television’s infestation of our boob tubes, and when many good dramas have deflated and lost their steam, the show with the most explosive imagination doesn’t even get a fair high-profile nomination-shake. Are we really supposed to be happy with just a Special Effects nod? Take it from me, one of those laywomen who had never seen a single “X-Files” in her life: this is the show that you didn’t know you’d hoped for when you bought your television set, and it’s the one show you’ll want to keep paying your cable bills for this fall.