If you’re a Battlestar Galactica fan, you may remember that as the translation for the Latin-titled episode (8th in season 4.0) “Sine Qua Non.” And if you’re just getting into the series, or ever plan to, be warned – there’s spoilers and bitter commentary ahead.
I have a problem with this episode. A serious problem. And, were it not for the fact that 2 immediate family members would never get over my not finishing the series, I’d stop watching with this installment. Here’s why: midway through this episode, after we’ve seen eccentric lawyer Romo Lampkin discussing fleet business with Lee Adama – all the while with Romo interacting with his cat – suddenly Romo makes a decision, having been talking to said cat, he leaves the room in a rush and finds Lee in the corridor, and puts a gun in his face. Whoa! Audiences reel and gasp, what’s up? It gets weirder, as, despite Romo having just talked to his cat, he forces a duffel bag upon Lee with a dead cat inside it, from which Lee recoils, demanding, “how long has this cat been dead?”
What? Romo had just been talking to the cat. And suddenly it’s been dead for weeks? Or, did Romo have two cats? Or, did I happen to have a damaged dvd and it’s skipped intervening scenes? Maybe I had a petit mal seizure and missed something between Romo talking to the cat and confronting Lee?
After fruitlessly searching back and forth through the episode to try and understand what I’d missed and how I’d missed it, I finally turned to the internet (thus effectively missing the rest of the episode). Apparently, Romo had been imagining the cat and only he and the audience could see it. Okay. Fine. But that’s something that either needs more foreshadowing beforehand, or some explanation afterward. Otherwise, viewers are left wondering what they missed and how they missed it. It’s unfair and irresponsible of the people in charge… and it’s just bad storytelling. I’m only being so critical because, prior to this lapse, the folks being BSG have done a laudable job. Even other abberations (characters coming back from the dead, for example) can be justified as possible plot-related mysteries (cylons come back from the dead, maybe that’s the explanation). But without establishing Romo, before that scene, as a man prone to visual hallucinations or having him explain (either via dialogue to Lee about his guilt-ridden imaginings, or through a flashback where we see him reliving the discovery of his pet’s demise), viewers are left asking themselves just what the hell happened, and how they missed it.
Sure, no story is perfect. But leaving the audience fumbling after already proving they’re capable of proper storytelling signals that the creative minds behind BSG either got lazy, stopped caring, or both. Assuming viewers will intuit that a previously not-seeing-visions person is suddenly having them is a rookie gaff unworthy of a team that produced so many other great episodes. I didn’t have the patience when the X-files pulled such stunts, and I wouldn’t give Lost any consideration at the first sign of this kind of ineptitude. And before anyone comments to say “but Lee tripped over an empty food bowl, wasn’t that clue enough?” – no, it wasn’t. The whole thing started out looking like bad editing and turned out to be bad storytelling. If I had Ronald Moore’s phone number, I would call him and say “dude, season 4.0, episode 8, was there something you wanted to share with the rest of us?” I’m sure some other important things transpired while I was scouring the ‘net for the explanation “Sine Qua Non” couldn’t offer up… but at this stage, I’m only half-ashamed to admit, I’ll be watching not to see what happens next, but to see however else this show’s writers dropped the ball. Maybe they let Chris Carter write this one… or maybe they’re following in his august footsteps with the notion that they’re storytellers and that means they don’t owe anyone an explanation. (In which case they’d be woefully mistaken… it’s nothing but explanations.)
I know, I know. I’m being a jerk, I’m expecting too much. But this is seriously the first time this show has thrown me out of the narrative… and for something that’s otherwise been a fantastic series, the disappointment of an entry-level mistake is hard to accept. (If only it had been Baltar… as unhinged as they’ve painted him, he could be seeing a whole menagerie and it wouldn’t give me pause.)
Tags: bad storytelling, Battlestar Galactica, Chris Carter, Latin, Ronald Moore, X-files
So now I’m posting to my own blog, but another reviewer had exactly my problem, quoted here:
“Extra credit: And now for a very special cat question. We see Lampkin’s insanely cute kitty about a zillion times in this episode, looking perky and zoomy. In one scene, Lampkin realizes Lee has to be president and talks to kitty about it. In the VERY NEXT SCENE, he shows up waving his gun at Lee, and shows Lee his cat carrier. Lee peeks inside, makes a face, and says something like, “She’s been dead for weeks.” OK, WTF here people? Did three weeks pass while Lampkin walked down the hall to shoot Lee? Does he own Shroedinger’s cat, capable of being alive and dead simultaneously? Was the cat he talked to in the previous scene a ghost?”
I’m just saying, I wasn’t the only one really irritated by this bout of bad storytelling. Read the rest of their (even more critical than my own) take here: http://io9.com/393717/new-battlestar-episode-packed-with-plotholes