No Takebacks

Now THAT'S what I'm talkin' about! I love it! Thanks for starting us off right!

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Cally told me that Helo told her that Lee told him and she says that she is 31. maybe 13.... but left me laughing, really laughing.

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Oh look! A post about Razor!

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Aw, really? I love Kendra. :( I don't think she was a Mary Sue.

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I love Kendra too, but she fits into Canon!Sue category, cemented by the fact that THEY NEVER MENTION HER AGAIN (what a waste, dude).

I still see most of Razor as one awesome fanfic.

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I don't see how that makes her a Sue, though? Wouldn't a Sue have had such a lasting impact on the characters in canon that they bring her up all the time?

Plus I think Kendra's an incredibly flawed character who had to make some really hard decisions at a terrible time, so I can't call her a Sue, even a "Canon!Sue," the definition of which I have always found somewhat troubling.

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Well, Canon!Sue is defined commonly as (thx Wikipedia!):
A "canon Sue" may refer to a character whose canon portrayal itself is seen as a "Mary Sue", rather than a character who has been altered in fan fiction. Typically, this refers to a character accused of being overly idealized or having other traits traditionally associated with fan fiction "Mary Sues", such as being "special" by having a gratuitously tragic past, unrealistic skills, or a seeming inability for the character to do wrong.

I think Kendra, as much as I love her, falls into that description. Additionally, I call her that because she has no lasting impact on anything. She might not be OUR Mary Sue, but damn if she's not RDM's (or even David's).
- she was a nobody that Lee just pulled into being his XO (placing her in the inner circle of main characters), instead of people that were probably better qualified (like, Hoshi).
- she's the perfect foil for Kara.
- tragic past
- amazing skills

I see a Sue in Kendra. Yes, she's flawed etc, but she's almost too good to be true. Maybe I wouldn't think so had she had a longer arc.

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I don't think she really was a nobody, though: she'd worked for the Colonial Ministry of Defense and was apparently well-qualified enough to get a posting with Admiral Cain, pre-war. (And maybe that was nepotism, maybe it wasn't, but that kinda reminds me of Lee, a little.) She got demoted by Garner after Cain died, because he didn't like her. And yes, that certainly supports the "she has unrealistic skills," part of that definition, but I guess there's the rub, for me, with "Canon Sues" in general: I think that with nebulous standards like that, you can make an honest case for the Canon Sueness of every single character in any work. It troubles me particularly when it's applied to women, and more particularly when it's applied to female characters who excel, often (it seems to me) on the basis of their excellence, while their male counterparts suffer less-- and admittedly, that may be because their male counterparts often get the bigger storylines, and we as viewers get to know them better, so we learn about their flaws and their complexities and it makes it harder to make a case for Canon Stu.

Tragic past, amazing skills, ability to get away with things no one else should or could? That sounds a lot like Kara Thrace to me. It sounds a lot like Lee Adama. It sounds a lot like Kat. It sounds a lot like Chief, Boomer, Laura Roslin, Bill Adama. In the context of a post-apocalyptic show, everybody has a gratuitously tragic past. In the broader context of the sci-fi/fantasy genre, I think you find a lot of people with "amazing" or "unrealistic" skills, because that's part and parcel of the genre itself, to me.

I think that an example of a "Canon Sue," to me, is a lot like Justice Stewart's quip about obscenity: I know it when I see it. It's hard to pin it down; it's hard to get people to agree. But obviously it promotes good discussion, right? :)

Here's my thing with Kendra: I think Kendra's kind of a tragic figure. Kendra was a good soldier, but she made shitty decisions, she took orders that I would, objectively, say were not good and were morally repugnant, but she kept trying, right up until the bitter end. There's something so wonderfully, quintessentially human about that, to me, to struggle, to try, even though we know it's hopeless, even though we know that we're wrong, even though we know we've screwed up in ways that we may never be able to forgive ourselves for. There's value in that story, for me. Admittedly, I've got a million biases at play here, and I hope that this didn't sound mean! I think it's an interesting discussion, and one well-worth having.

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Like I said, I think that if Kendra had been around longer and we'd been allowed to see more of her. I see her as a Sue for that reason. They didn't allow her to be anything else but a kick-ass girl. She works really well as a character in a movie, but in an established series, she comes off as a Sue to me and that's not fair.

There are examples of male Sues, but unfortunately they are rare.

I don't think you're being mean @ all! It's a good discussion to have, and I'm glad that we can have it!

*hugs*

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This has nothing to do with anything but:

"Colonial Ministry of Defense"

Seriously makes me think of our BSG/Hogwarts crossover universe. HEE

Carry on!

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Hee. You're so right!

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I agree she was well qualified for the role she was assigned, although possibly that could have had an element of nepotism in it. IIRC though she was assigned as Admiral Cain's Aide. Which in many ways is the equivalent of the Executive Assistant. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it could have explained her precipitous action of being the first one to fire on the Gideon. She really didn't have the combat experience, maybe even not the operational experience that Hoshi did. So for her to be picked by Lee as his XO, still leaves some problems for me, even though being a hard ass is part of the XO's role. If you want to see a real carrier XO in action check out the first episode of the PBS series I mentioned elsewhere in this thread. Someone took too long to report during a Man Overboard muster. We didn't even get to see what happened when the person was actually in front of him, but he still made Saul Tigh look way less fierce.

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Oh there were actually three people who were late. The ship's XO got the enlisted guy who was ship's company. The two Lieutenants were attached to the Air Wing. They would have gotten their asses chewed by the CAG.

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Kendra Shaw: Or How I Went From Cook to XO Without Really Trying

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Well, Garner disliked her and demoted her, though: she'd been of a higher rank before he took over. She had been working with the Ministry of Defense, pre-war, and she'd been assigned to Admiral Cain's ship, which I imagine was a pretty big deal. Plus, quick promotions are obviously not unusual in the BSG-verse during wartime.

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True enough. The promotion was the only part I didn't like about that whole arc. I felt like she was still way to chippy to be XO material, but I really loved her otherwise. And wartime BSG did see many, many promotions and demotions. Lee saw several ranks, some twice. I forgot about her ministry posting. Touche. :)

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We just rewatched Razor the other day, so I think it's still fresh in my mind, lol. (And I stan for Kendra. I'll admit it.)

From what we saw of Pegasus, it looks like it was probably down to her and Hoshi for the job by that point, since Fiske and Garner were dead. It's not the best of the series, for sure, but I liked the look we got at Cain as a consequence of Lee picking Kendra.

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Except I would consider that with crews the size of Glactica's and Pegasus' there were probably many more senior officers that just didn't get shown in the story.

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This is such a pet peeve of mine with the whole series. Especially Lee becoming CAG. A RESERVE OFFICER who just landed on the ship? Wasn't even from Galactica?

Seemed incredibly hard to believe that he would be the one to take on the CAG role because there was no one senior to him left. And even...on a battleship that size, wouldn't they have hundreds of pilots, hundreds of planes? I know a lot got wiped out in that first strike, but... HMMM.

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kdbleu.livejournal.com

I think they do a better job of explaining Lee becoming CAG on Galactica because it's after many (most?) of the pilots have been lost in the attacks.

I also don't find it an unreasonable assumption that many commander tier officers had already been transferred off the Galactica prior to decommossioning. Although I'll be the first to admit that one is debatable and may just be how I justified Lee's becoming CAG instead of someone more senior already on Galactica.

I do find it odd that the Pegasus would have so few senior/comment level officers though.

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Early transferring off Galactica could help to answer the question as to why they didn't have more folks on hand. I wish we'd gotten a wee bit more info about where everyone was going to go after decommisssioning. It's an interesting thought.

I do still wonder though about the prioritizing of a reserves officer over a full time officer. I don't know, maybe that wouldn't matter at all (Anastashial can probably speak to that), but... it just struck me as odd.

Well and that on top of the fact that NEPOTISM AHOY. ;)

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kdbleu.livejournal.com

Also, wasn't Lee being in the reserves retconned after the mini, like S2? So at the time of the mini he was a loner test pilot, not in the reserves and half out of the Fleet?

It's also entirely possible that being the CAG takes some other qualifications that not all senior officers would have, like being a pilot, maybe even specifically a fighter pilot, etc.

Or just being the commanders son and in love with the only other really great pilot left and...

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My own reasoning for thinking Lee didn't go through an Academy was actually because he was a reservist. I've explained that a bit more in another of my posts in this thread. If he just gotten orders to test pilot school, or a billet as one, though there would be little chance that they would let him resign his commission any time soon.

Yes, a CAG would normally be an aviator, pilots definitely. I'm not sure if a Naval Flight Officer (not pilots, kind of the ECO role) would be eligible. I'm also not sure, but would think that those in the other aviation communities (attack and early warning, helo, and logistics) would also be eligible. In addition, the CO of a carrier is also an aviator, not a surface warfare type. Again I'm not sure if they serve on another type of smaller ship in an XO or CO role first, but I don't think so. It would take them out of aviation for too long.

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You do make a point about the command tier officers, they're usually Department Heads, possibly already being gone. I can't say for certain how that works.

I would agree though that Pegasus not having a CAG much senior to a CF Captain is strange.

FYI, a USN Lieutenant is equal to a Marine/Air Force/Army Captain, and a USN Captain is equal to a Colonel in the other three services. So the CF having the ranks Lieutenant followed by Captain really threw a monkey wrentch into things for me because they are the same rank in US services.

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It's not totally impossible it would be a reserve officer, but somewhat. I think what a lot of people don't realize that there are officers on full time active duty who were commissioned into the reserves. In the USN generally it's mostly those who went to the Academy that are commissioned as regular, and I think maybe ROTC scholarship students. If you plan on staying for a while you usually do whats called augmenting which switches your status from reserve to regular. I did that around the four year point. In Lee's case we know he was also planning to get out, although we don't know if Bill did.

A US carrier has between 60 and 90 aircraft with four fighter squadrons and four with other aircraft. The CAG owns all of them and is usually equal in rank to the carrier's CO. My understanding was that the battlestar was much larger. So I'd agree the number of pilots they showed probably would have managed one squadron. There were several squadron plaques in the bulkheads in the ready room, so I would think they would have multiple squadrons. They would most likely have been briefed by their own CO, who would be junior to the CAG. So it would have made sense to me for there to be a number of Majors and Lt. Colonels (who we never saw at all) in the Air Wing who might not all have been out flying.

I've been re-watching PBS' special Carrier (http://www.hulu.com/carrier), which is a multi-episode documentary about life on a USN carrier.

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"The thing is, God, sir," said Mockingbird, the newest of this round of nuggets, "the CAG told me to tell you that he needs to see you in the briefing room, immediately."

Kara slapped her Triad cards facedown on the table and glared up at the young pilot. "What the frak did you do to the CAG to land this punishment, nugget?"

"I shot my mouth off, sir," Mockingbird replied, and Kara raised an eyebrow. "Told him he might want to get the stick out of his ass before it did him a permanent injury."

Kara stared at the young woman for a long moment, then burst into loud, raucous laughter. "Insulting a superior asshole, huh, Mockingbird? Alright, just for that, I'll go. You play my hand. But if you lose my money," she warned, standing up and tucking her cigar into the corner of her mouth, "you're gonna have bigger problems than the CAG, you hear me?"

"Yes sir, God, sir," Mockingbird said, tossing off a neat salute before taking Kara's place at the Triad table. She waited until Kara was well down the hallway before glancing across the table at Helo. "Looks like Operation Frak the CAG is a go, sir," she said, and Helo grinned back at her.

"Let's just hope the other nuggets remember to lock 'em in the briefing room like we planned."

Edited Date: 2011-01-24 05:34 pm (UTC)

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Hurray for Helo-led conspiracies! :)

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Helo is trying to win some money, okay. He picked today on the "When Will They Frak" betting pool, so he's trying to influence the situation.

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Very sly of him. He might also win money from a badly played hand of Triad, while he's at it. :)

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didn't thought about that... nicely played Karl :P

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He's got a plan! His Cylon girlfriend is rubbing off on him. ;)

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Helo-Helo-Helo.... not good man, you are corrupting the nuggets.

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I know, right? Shame on him. ;)

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or maybe not. maybe the CAG is going to give him some free time after this :)

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Very amusing. Poor Lee, he just gets no respect.

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He's gonna be a very happy CAG after Kara's through with him, though. ;)

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This is true.

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