Daily Pilots Post: Pilots Spam!

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

Hi friends! First of all, I want to thank you all for your participation and wonderful comments --yesterday's essays contributions were fantastic, all of them--, you are absolutely the best! :D So, after a whole week of discussion, thinky thoughts and porn, I’ve just realized that there’s barely been any squee this week! (my fault, I tend to get lost in fic and meta). Tomorrow I will be back torture you with more introspection –sorry, in two days it will be over, heh!--, but today I am going to emulate our dearworkerbee73 and devote this Friday's PPD to…

PILOTS SPAM!!

Bring your questions, general love, musings, squee, pics, gifs -- whatever you want! Let’s have fun because it’s FRIDAY!!!

And here is my first contribution to the party… I was doing some catch-up with all the DDP posts and comments earlier today, and just read this observationlapsedprof  made days ago:

“My husband's theory - based on some commentary stuff and his intuitive understanding of RDM and crew - is that to RDM, Kara is the girl you want but can never have. So there's some lethal resentment projected onto her (slut!) - and on to those who do get to have her (shot in the head and incinerated by the sun; made irrelevant, dismissed, and abandoned). And - it just occurs to me - let's not forget who gets the porch-swing ending - the very man she sexually humiliated in the most cringeworthy way. It's just a theory - but I see it as another way to get at the madonna/whore stuff that innibis has mentioned and that I slapped me in the face during the finale.”

Dudes, this is pretty brilliant and makes perfect sense, right?

ETA. I do actually have a question for today… lol How have pilots changed your RL? What’s been their impact on your life? When did you realize you were obsessed with them? I am curious about stuff like that :).

(Myself, I think the first time it really, really hit me the depth of my emotional attachment to them  was that period after the finale, when I spent a whole week crying and I couldn't tell anyone why I was so down –because honestly, who was supposed to understand the whole thing? Thank God I found my particular self-help group in LJ).

Comments

[jeeshee.livejournal.com]

wow, the words nail and head come to mind with that comment. Kara is not impressed!

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

That comment has been a sort of RDM!epiphany for me... He was jealous of Lee!

[rdave1.livejournal.com]

That comment has been a sort of RDM!epiphany for me... He was jealous of Lee!

Now it makes sense! He hate Lee because he is golden boy and hates Jamie for the body!

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

I never understood some RDM comments like Jamie not being the viper pilot type... Really? And then why did he cast him as Apollo?

[scifishipper.livejournal.com]

I think that RDM started confusing Apollo and Jamie. Apollo the character, fully formed and consistent is present in S1&2 (and bits of 3). Jamie!Apollo took over with the presidential arc (which I live, but is inconsistent in many ways). Again, as has been said many times, RDM lost Apollo's essential nature in favor of writing for Jamie as a person, not Apollo the character.

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

Yeah, your Jamie!Apollo theory makes sense. But you know, the thing is that Apollo was not supposed to be the typical action hero (and that was glaringly obvious from the beginning, hello Bastille Day?), and that's exactly why I --and all of us here-- fell in love with him, I guess. So I can't understnad while RDM changed his mind about the character later. Also, he always said the he never knew how to handle the character, if I remember well --which frankly, I don't get.

[rdave1.livejournal.com]

I agree with you guys are saying! It almost seems like RDM had a personality disorder that he passed onto Apollo. The writing for Apollo/Lee was very strong early on and then we were lucky if he was on screen for more 5 minutes.

The character did such a 180, lost all that made him Apollo.

[jeeshee.livejournal.com]

I think it's telling that their inability to handle Lee started around the same time the serious fail set in with regards to their handling of female characters. Somewhere in the midst of the unravelling plotlines they lost the subtlety with which the Starbuck/Apollo gender role inversion was constructed.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah me neither, he said they noticed Jamie wasn't the action hero type, yet the episode that has him blow up the tylium refinery shows up on so many favourite episode lists. Obviously Jamie could totally pull it off.
I think Jamie worked so well as Apollo because he acted as a counterpart to Kara, he was the more pensive character. I don't think the chemistry would have been as interesting if they'd have cast a tall all American football hero kind of guy.

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

I don't think the chemistry would have been as interesting if they'd have cast a tall all American football hero kind of guy.

ITA. And I believe Jamie did all the action hero stuff damn well --love all his alphaness in "Hand of God" ;)

[rdave1.livejournal.com]

So true! Apollo complimented Starbuck and Lee complimented Kara. Here were two people who were different in many ways yet work the best with each other. What made people love Jamie/Apollo was that he didn't look like the typical action hero with crazy(steroid style) muscles and was close 7foot tall.

Apollo could do that badass super hero stuff and still hold your hand or give you a shoulder to cry on if you needed.

[indigo419.livejournal.com]

RDM comments like Jamie not being the viper pilot type... Really? And then why did he cast him as Apollo?

IIRC, RDM was busy wrapping up CArnivale when they were casting bsG, so he had little input in the original casting. I do remember David Eick saying that he liked Jamie because he was *not* the stereotypical hero build - something like, he was a quiet unassuming English bloke and so he went for the against-the-mold casting. *shrug*

(Personally, I think Jamie said something in private that irked RDM, and so he grew uninterested in exploring Lee's character. That, and RDM had too many projects on his plate and he stopped paying attention to his own show.)

[(Anonymous)]

Not that there is much point in speculating since we'll never find out (and it very well might be totally wrong), but I got the impression that they might have had a falling out or something.
I know that the whole "Katee is leaving the show" lie didn't go down with JB very well, I think he felt a bit manipulated/betrayed by his employers and friends. And that's when they started writing scripts that didn't feature Lee much. So maybe they did have an agruement about that.

I recently read that Mary called producers to let them know Jamie had got applause on set for his court room scene, which kinda strikes me as odd too. Like there wasn't the best atmosphere between Jamie and producers.

However, at the end of the day it's all just a guess.

[http://users.livejournal.com/wisteria_/]

FWIW, the three-hour "roundtable" podcast was recorded while they were filming Baltar's trial, and Jamie seems to be on very friendly terms with Ron and the other actors. He's outspoken and unafraid to be critical, but I don't get any sense that it's a problem -- Ron encourages as much and seems to genuinely like Jamie. I also think that although nobody was told about Katee's supposed disappearance at first, they all knew about it by the time Maelstrom was done filming (which was several weeks before the podcast was recorded.)

I do agree that there was probably some tension, though who knows the cause? Although the tension might've played a role, I suspect it was also an issue of the writers (unfortunately) losing interest and/or not knowing what to do with the character. They'd start a great arc with tons of potential -- I'm apparently the only fan who LOVED Lee going into politics -- but they totally dropped the ball on the follow-through.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh yes that's right I'd forgotten about that podcast. But I still think Jamie wasn't happy about them lieing to him (or making Katee lie) esp. since they seemed quite friendly with each other). It might have added to the tension in the long run, but as I said it's really just speculation. There is also a funny moment in that podcast where Jamie gets all caught up in how he doesn't like intercutting scenes, and tells RDM he shouldn't do it anymore and everyone's like "slow down a bit", I think that goes to show just how outspoken Jamie can be, he definately doesn't hold back.

I do think it's quite jarring that Lee's basically missing from a lot of episodes. Sure the focus of story arcs vary and there are ebbs and flows of character involvement but giving him script after script with hardly a line for him, it must have felt a little awkward at least.

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

I personally believe that there was some tension between RDM and Jamie, but nothing really serious... And the loss of interest certainly seemed to play a role, the writers always admitted that they never really knew what to do with Lee as a character (which I will never undersstand!).

(and I also liked the Lee as a politic story line --the potential, at least--, the politics where Lee's natural place, imo... But I must admit that I am very partial to Apollo because of the epicness involving pilots and all the Starbuck and Apollo thing :))

[nazkey.livejournal.com]

Did you see the Comic Con panel with Kevin Smith hosting where RDM is at one far end and JB is at the other? Something was definitely going on at that time (I think it was after S2) because JB was about as miserable as you could possibly be and he was very short, abrupt and generally didn't contribute anything to the panel. It was almost like he had a sign over his head saying "It's in my contract to be here and that's the ONLY reason I'm here." It got so bad at some point that Kevin Smith started razzing him. So, at some point, I think there was definitely some tension between JB and the show in general, IMHO.

[jeeshee.livejournal.com]

I got so much 'second hand embarrassment' from that roundtable podcast. Is that where JB starts talking about the ep he wrote (and tptb rejected) as well? Cringe.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't remember him mentioning that (thank god), but I fastforwarded through a lot of it. I think they'd had a few drinks!

[indigo419.livejournal.com]

I don't recall now what made me think there was something in the air between RDM and JB. I do recall the podcast, they seemed happy and friendly (and I don't think Jamie mentioned his potential script in there...).

I liked the idea of Lee going into politics, but as it played out it was a weak storyline. It could've been an interesting place to bring back the tension between civilian and military ships, for instance. I would have liked to see more with Lee interacting with ordinary RTFF folks, for one, not just with the Quorum. Campaigning and baby-kissing, even. Who wouldn't want to shake hands with such a charming candidate? *g*

(or for that matter, more scenes with Laura. They could have debated her Madame Airlock style with Lee's, um, President Airlock style? hee.)

But I think we can all agree that as the series went on there was bad blood between Jamie and the hairstylist. That dead squirrel hair, my gods! (okay, okay, I kid because I love, sometimes I liked the long hair... Very occasionally.)

[nazkey.livejournal.com]

also think that although nobody was told about Katee's supposed disappearance at first, they all knew about it by the time Maelstrom was done filming (which was several weeks before the podcast was recorded.)

I saw an interview with Katee where she felt really bad and basically thrown under the bus by the producers about this whole thing. She was saying that they TOLD her to "act" upset that her character was dying/leaving the show and to not let anyone know, etc. and after the general outcry (apparently EJO totally lost it), the prods went back to her with a WTF attitude kinda blaming her for laying it on so thick and making everyone believe that she was really leaving the show.

PS I love Lee in politics too :-)

[lapsedprof.livejournal.com]

I think there are lots of reasons things ended as they did and don't mean to suggest that any of the envy and jealousy I've suggested were conscious.

To the extent that they were always interested in moving beyond typical TV conventions and cliches, it made sense to create an atypical hero and to cast someone who both fit the mold and deviated from it. And to give the "villain" a happy ending and the "hero" a rather bleak one is also consistent with the desire to surprise and shake up old conventions.

And then there are all the mundane complications you mention - limited time, other commitments - that also played a role in the way the series evolved and ended. But we do end up with a diminished hero, with all the human women dead, etc. And in trying to understand I theorize and speculate...

And yeah, I end up spinning theories. And while we're blurring the lines between fiction and RL, JB also wants to write and produce. Wants to write an episode, correct? Write, produce, be the hero and make out with the hot girls? I don't think so! Take that.

Nothing conscious mind you.

[cosetteferaud.livejournal.com]

don't mean to suggest that any of the envy and jealousy I've suggested were conscious.

Yeah, totally. But I find your husband's take an insightful way to read RDM's general feelings about the characters. It's just pure speculation, but it's an interesting theory from a psychological perspective (and frankly, I always thought RDM projected some of his fantasies/kinks/whatever upon Kara --remember that comment about her being a tomcat and his attraction to unfaithful women?).

JB also wants to write and produce. Wants to write an episode, correct? Write, produce, be the hero and make out with the hot girls?

I always wondered what happened to that ep Jamie wrote...