GWC Podcast #90

Podcasts Galactic Watercooler
#41

A couple of thoughts on Tyrol’s strike…

  1. I don’t think that the Tillium ship is a military vessel. It may have been conscripted that way, but pre-war I would assume that Tillium mining was a corporation that sold it’s product to the military, so while Tyrol is acting as Tillium operations manager, the argument could be made that he is not under military influence, so the strike would fall under Roslyn’s control rather then Adama’s.

  2. Tyrol screws the first point up by involving the Deck Gang and Callie. This seemed odd to me both times I watched the show. By doing this he forces Adama’s hand, and that seems counter-productive, and this where i tend to agree with Audra on this episode’s writing. Tyrol is smarter then that and I don’t think he would have made a strategic blunder like that. I believe he would have left the strike on the Tillium ship and dealt with it from a non military viewpoint.

Thoughts on Chuck and Sean’s reaction to Adama killing their spouses. I completely agree, IF Adama had gone through with it, then he would HAVE to die. I don’t think that the simple threat of death is enough to take his life, after the fact. My personal reaction would be to exit the situtation. As soon as I got Callie and Nick back in my grasps I would be packed and off Galactica in a heart beat. I don’t think that Adama could force them to stay at thier posts, and if he could or tried, it would be easy to disappear into the fleet, and that would cause Adama more troubles and regret then taking his life, and at the same protect my wife and child (which I couldn’t do once i was arrested, tried, and executed for the murder of Adama).

One other thought that I don’t think anyone mentioned the first time through or this time either.

Did it bother anyone else that Tyrol was allowed unrestricted access to Baltar and during that unrestricted, unmonitored access spilled the beans about the book being out in the fleet. I would think that that was huge psychological aspect to what Roslyn was trying to do to Baltar, especially by making it a point to tell him that it was not getting out. I would think that a) Baltar would be a lot harder to visit then just walking in a talking to him, and b) any visits would be monitored and information being given to Baltar would be restricted.

#42

Just to add another twist to this discussion:

  1. Was this maybe an empty threat? Would Adama maybe have backed down, was he really serious about shooting her or did he just pull off a very good acting feat?

  2. I’ve said this before, it’s not “the” military anymore, it’s HIS private army.

  3. I totally understand Adamas predicament, it’s a real catch-22, he can’t cave to demands forced upon him by a strike because that would set a precedent but he also doesn’t like what he thinks he has to do to resolve the situation. But the person who really frakked up is Roslin. It was her responsibility to never ever let it come this far. And it should have been on her agenda to have some kind of representation for the working class so that there would never have been a need for military personal to get involved and further complicate the situation.

  4. Now, about the guy who held the gun to Cally’s head: would he have been required to carry out the order to shoot her? I’m certainly not an expert on the military code of justice, but I know for a fact, that for example soldiers in the present-day German army are specifically instructed not to follow orders that are clearly amoral or cannot be executed with good conscience. This, of course, stems from my country’s dark past when there were all kinds of soldiers refusing to take responsibility for their actions under the pretext of “merely having followed orders.” So, I’m wondering if the BSG universe armed forces want their soldiers to brainlessly follow orders or if they are encouraged to think things through?

#43

Chuck’s doomsday scenario about the arrival of Ragnarok between Seasons 4.0 and 4.5 rings true. I instantly flashed on the idea of a post-apocalyptic world in which a small group of survivors look for the end of their favorite show.

Then I remembered there’s already something like that somewhere: In some kind of sci-fi thing, a race of aliens have been watching Earth TV shows from the past. And when their favorite show is cut short, they make the long voyage to earth, very pissed, demanding to know how it ends. I think it was a cartoon, maybe?

A friend is a fellow fan of the post-apocalypse genre (Road Warrior and Stephen King’s Dark Tower series are two favorites). As a kid, when he had braces, he went so far as to ask his dentist what he should do if there was some kind of apocalyptic event, and he had to remove them.

What Chuck says is true about the guy-in-a-craft-store/girl-in-a-comic-shop phenomenon. “Oh, you poor thing. You’re lost. Here, let me help you.” And a note from there: I loved how Chuck cut the background about the project at hand story short. Most podcasts, the hosts spend half the podcast talking about how they’re doing the podcast – as opposed to the subject matter. “Uh, we’re here, it’s Tuesday, it’s rainy, I did all this stuff on the way over, we’re drinking Pepsi, bla bla” for half an hour. I think GWC strikes the perfect balance of how much personal info the listeners do and don’t need.

Cheers…

ps. No discussion of comicology is complete without this clip from Chasing Amy…

//youtu.be/hSdzOvk6suc

#44

Chuck’s doomsday scenario about the arrival of Ragnarok between Seasons 4.0 and 4.5 rings true. I instantly flashed on the idea of a post-apocalyptic world in which a small group of survivors look for the end of their favorite show.

Then I remembered there’s already something like that somewhere: In some kind of sci-fi thing, a race of aliens have been watching Earth TV shows from the past. And when their favorite show is cut short, they make the long voyage to earth, very pissed, demanding to know how it ends. I think it was a cartoon, maybe?

A friend is a fellow fan of the post-apocalypse genre (Road Warrior and Stephen King’s Dark Tower series are two favorites). As a kid, when he had braces, he went so far as to ask his dentist what he should do if there was some kind of apocalyptic event, and he had to remove them.

What Chuck says is true about the guy-in-a-craft-store/girl-in-a-comic-shop phenomenon. “Oh, you poor thing. You’re lost. Here, let me help you.” And a note from there: I loved how Chuck cut the background about the project at hand story short. Most podcasts, the hosts spend half the podcast talking about how they’re doing the podcast – as opposed to the subject matter. “Uh, we’re here, it’s Tuesday, it’s rainy, I did all this stuff on the way over, we’re drinking Pepsi, bla bla” for half an hour. I think GWC strikes the perfect balance of how much personal info the listeners do and don’t need.

Cheers…

PS. On the topic of “great but not fun”… a little while back, the Onion AV club made an excellent list of great movies that you never want to watch more than once… Dark, disturbing stuff like Requiem for a Dream. Shudder.

pps. No discussion of comicology is complete without this clip from Chasing Amy…

//youtu.be/hSdzOvk6suc

#45

Futurama! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Aliens_Attack

#46

Whats a Nubian?

Chasing Amy! Classic. Casey Affleck is in there too, in the yellow shirt.

#47

Thank you! Ah, the “Single Female Lawyer” they spoke of! It all ties together…

#48

I got the impression that they did it on their own. I never thought Tyrol had instigated their participation.

Did it bother anyone else that Tyrol was allowed unrestricted access to Baltar and during that unrestricted, unmonitored access spilled the beans about the book being out in the fleet. I would think that that was huge psychological aspect to what Roslyn was trying to do to Baltar, especially by making it a point to tell him that it was not getting out. I would think that a) Baltar would be a lot harder to visit then just walking in a talking to him, and b) any visits would be monitored and information being given to Baltar would be restricted.

Yes, i found that extremely odd. I guess we’ll have to chalk that one up to dramatic license by the writers.

Going by RDM’s poscast of the show, Adama would have done it, he would feel he had no choice.

  1. Now, about the guy who held the gun to Cally’s head: would he have been required to carry out the order to shoot her? I’m certainly not an expert on the military code of justice, but I know for a fact, that for example soldiers in the present-day German army are specifically instructed not to follow orders that are clearly amoral or cannot be executed with good conscience.

That’s really kinda hard to say. As you stated this is now Adama’s private army, through circumstance, not design. However, mutiny IS an executable offense IF they go by military rules. Generally speaking you are shot for it, all personell would be well aware of that ESEPCIALLY anyone acting as an MP. You also have to factor in the assumption that everyone on that ship is well aware that they owe their lives to Adama’s leadership. That’s a powerful incentive.

#49

I wanted to comment on a couple things-

First off, I don’t think Audra sounded at all like she was doomsdaying what childhood has become now. In fact, she’s right on the money. I live in the suburbs and I can’t tell you how many people we know won’t let their kids go play in the park without adult supervision. My kids are 12 and 15 and that rule applies to friends they each have. Parental involvement these days is really scary. I say this because I see parents (and I certainly have been guilty of this) are doing all their kids’ thinking for them. We take them everywhere, we supervise everything, we interfere when things don’t go their way. Sometimes you need to to help, but most of the time they can work out stuff on their own.
I’ll stop here because I could rant forever on this subject.

On the subject of girls in the comic store- what I really find (and love) about the comic store is how well read everyone there is. You can approach ANY employee and they can refer you to a great comic, give you industry news or talk BSG. I love it. When was the last time someone at Barnes and Noble could do that for you?

I would have loved to seen Chuck and Sean as the belles of the ball in Joann’s!

#50

Tyrol is smarter than that! I agree. This is the thing that I don’t like about his marriage to Cally: she does not bring out the best in him. Yes, she made him talk about the inequality issues, but I think that’s something that the Chief would have been thinking quietly about anyhow, while he observed conditions and made his decisions about how to act. I think he would have called a work stoppage when he saw the realities of the Tillium ship, but perhaps without Cally’s counterproductive whining he would have had a better strategic approach than calling a strike and getting the military involved in it. Geez- of course Adama reacted negatively! It does not excuse his behavior, but it puts it in a little bit of perspective. Also, Cally = a ringleader. I know there was some disagreement on that, but considering her role in encouraging the Chief to do it, and acting as his right-hand man, she was a ringleader.

WORD. I am angry but I also sympathize with Adama that he let his fear of repeating his own mistakes cloud his judgment- he’s still using himself as his measuring stick and the well-being of the whole fleet as his moral compass. On the other hand, I do not know if I can forgive Roslin for acting out of the desire for retribution and hatred of Baltar. Throughout season 3 her measuring stick was Baltar’s failures of leadership (so it wasn’t hard to top the competition) and her moral compass was that the opposite of everything Baltar was the right thing to do. I find it to be a more serious failure of leadership than Adama’s.

#51

My daughter is in Kindergarten, and comes home with a 7 page packet of homework every week, in addition to other learning projects.

It’s hardcore, folks, and the teachers are stressed.

#52

ROTFLOL!!!

My great-grandparents had a farm we used to visit in Ottumwa- you just killed me with that!

#53

I picked it up at a bookstore on a lark because I liked the artwork- and was blown away. There is also a second book that brought things up to the date around when it was published.

Art Speigelman also did “In The Shadow of No Towers”. wow. He was also the editor of ‘RAW’.

#54

aite, i can’t believe you guys talked about it.

I was actually thinking about calling you guys to let you know, but I am traveling tomorrow, so I have to settle with posting here.

I don’t know if Hongkong has the awesome Beethoven garbage trucks, but they sure have 'em here in the lovely island country of Taiwan. I only wish that these garbage trucks sound half as good as Chuck and Audra did it on the podcast. I listened to your rendition of the Fur Elise with ear-buds, and it was 100 times more pleasant than those garbage trucks.

Because out here, it’s not just that they sound like old music cards, but they aren’t even in tune. It’s a digital version of out of tune Fur Elise. And it’s not even because the garbage trucks are driving away so it caused Doppler effect or something. They can sit there, having garbage thrown at them, and still be horrendously out of tune. So when it is driving away, it sounds even worse.

They do this as long as I can remember. Even though I have since then lived in Hamburg, El Paso, LA, and the Bay Area, every time I hear that music, I feel the urge of throwing trash and moving vehicles. So, don’t play Beethoven while you are driving, some crazy Taiwanese guy like me might throw some stuff at ya.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=aupSX-TVYYc

there are actually several other clips on youtube on Taiwan’s garbage trucks, but most of the people visiting Taiwan stays in Taipei, the capital, there they had the money to pay for quality cell phone music and thus have songs that aren’t out of tune. But for me, the youtube video above is what I hear. And still is one of the better sounding trucks out there…

#55

2 Things…

Q. Does colonial military want their soldiers to brainlessly follow orders?
A. “hrmm hrrrr … do your job … hmmmm hrrrrmmmm hm”

  1. Responsibility for actions (in time of war, or not, it doesn’t matter)

According to the Geneva convention, iirc, its never been a valid defence that you were ordered to perform an action. As with most things pertaining to legal liability, as a soldier in any military which is a signatory to the convention, individual responsibility is maintained.

As you say GalaxyRanger… events in Germany contributed to this, but iirc the principle had been getting applied at least as early as WWI.

Its all a bit rocky ground in terms of whether Adama’s action would actually be legal, but then again ‘we aren’t in Kansas any more’, and even if we were using Earth rules, I’m pretty sure there’s some of the Scandi countries where it is legal for the armed forces to have unions and go on strike (the memory here is hazy but I recall this from conversation with a Belgian on national service - was about 10 years ago though).

Not that I would have wanted to be in the position of being requested to carry out an illegal order… and at least I am reasonably confident I’d have known a violating order if I’d seen it. Not always the case, the military never has been interested only in brainiacs.

I agree though, in that position if I were Tyrol it wouldn’t be an anger issue for me, it would be a protection issue… although TBH if I were Tyrol then post this episode it would be an anger issue and he wouldn’t want to be walking down any dark corridors by himself :smiley:

#56

Just want to add to some of the great things people have posted on the Adama/Chief situation:

To start with I don’t really agree with Chuck and Sean’s take. I do agree that it is predominantly the result of the President’s recent authoritarian streak as to why they are in this mess. However, I think Adama did as good a job as possible resolving it quickly in the end.

What I think is missing from the discussion is the fact that Adama entered the jail room (where the Chief was held) knowing that he had already arranged a meeting between Tyrol and the President. Adama new the only way out was by getting the two sides talking and he wanted that to happen as quickly as possible. His predicament was that he had a key member of his military crew in an act of rebellion, and he couldn’t let a non-commissioned officer be rewarded while directly disobeying a direct order. Adama new that direct threats on Chief’s life would not have worked nor did he have the time to wait out holding the Chief in jail for very long. Therefore, he made the one threat he knew that would make the Chief give in (and Tyrol was particularly vulnerable to the threat given that Nicky was nearly orphaned the previous week). Now the difference between Cain and Adama is that Cain threatened to shoot loved ones in order to coerce people to act against their own self interest. In contrast, Adama new that he was about to give Chief what he wanted he just needed the Chief to back down first.

Having said that I do think that Cally’s life was in some danger. If the Chief hadn’t had backed down it is a distinct possibility that she could have been shot. If that had happened I would suspect that Adama would also resign, but he would be willing to do that to preserve the chain of command. However, I think Adama had a better read on the situation, and still suspected that the Chief had some respect for him. Thus the threat served to make it clear to the Chief just how important it was to Adama that he followed the order, and Adama suspected that Tyrol still had enough respect of the military to obey. What the Chief didn’t know was that reason Adama as so impatient to have him back down in that moment was because Adama already had the meeting with Roslin arranged. Adama just wanted them to be working towards a solution a quickly as possible. In the end I don’t think this has long standing affects on the Adama/Chief relationship, because the Chief is smart enough to know the situation was once he realized that the meeting was already in the works.

I should add that I make these comments despite being a labor loving leftie in the real world. :smiley:

#57

One quick addition:

I don’t think the self-preservation argument flies for Chief trying to knockoff Adama at a future date. First, the Chief would realize that Callie’s life was in danger only if he refused the order, which he knows he wouldn’t have. Second, the Chief realizes that Adama only made the threat to expedite getting him and the President in the same room working towards a solution. Third, by having had the meeting pre-arranged, the Chief realizes that Adama tacitly agreed to some degree with Chief’s standing on the labor issues involved.

So I guess that’s 3 quick additions…

#58

I can’t believe how young “Randy” from My Name Is Earl looks in that clip. I didn’t even know he was the same guy.

#59

LOL! What’s a Nubian? Heh. Love, love, love that Jason Lee.

On Classical music loving garbage truckers, I’m not sure if that is the case in HK. I’ve never heard that from the garbage trucks around my neighborhood - not even once, though a friend of mine did say that his had Beethoven blasting all over the place. So…

And MAUS is a fantastic read. One of my favorite graphic novels/comic. How about Japanese Anime? I’m curious to know what people in the states like reading?

I think it’s particularly worrisome when BOTH Adama and Roslin act in such an …hm, unchecked?..manner. The dynamic between the two was such that if one person falters/acts in an extreme, the other manages to pull him/her back; I’ve often thought of them as the checks and balances for each other in terms of how they use their positions, which is why they are good as a team. So I think in Dirty Hands, it was extremely alarming to see the top two people in charge of the entire human race to act out of their conscience and/or morality. (tangent) So, as much as I love the relationship between them, I suppose this might be a good indication of things that might come should they be any more closer to each other; it would be a major problem in how they would work with one another, or how it would compromise their judgement.

#60

Sean, you’re right about your contrast between Lost and X-Files. I think it is X-Files failure to eventually pay off with their main story arch that has had so many people skeptical that other shows like Lost or BSG will eventually be able to pay off as well. However, the one off “Freak of the Week” episodes of X-Files could be great.

Speaking of story arcs paying off, a thought just occurred to me. A couple of podcasts ago you mentioned how ST:TNG started off slow in the first year, and how the first episode (Encounter at Farpoint) in particular wasn’t so great. Interestingly, the final episode (All Good Things…) is one of the best finales of any series ever, IMHO. Ironically, it is a direct call back to the series pilot (in a series that had so few story arcs) which bookends the series perfectly. I guess it just shows how well the actors and writers got a hold on the characters.

On that note, I’ll also throw in a positive vote for Nemesis. It got hosed by Paramount insisting on releasing it in a busy holiday season between Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings.