Break a Leg

Hey, everyone!

Ever wondered what it takes to make a web video? Well, wonder no more!

A new Break a Leg video is out after months of hiatus and boy, is it ever HILARIOUS?!

You can watch it on our front page at www.breakaleg.tv.

Enjoy guys! And tune in tomorrow -- I'll have a full report of how the Streamys went!

Thanks all,

-Yuri

Well, it's finally happened. After 73 episodes, 27 webisodes, and a few TV movies and of course the original miniseries pilot, Battlestar Galactica is finally over. As much as I looked forward to staying up late (I'm a father, 10 PM is late) every Friday just to see what ridiculous plot holes the Galactica's FTL drive would jump the fleet through, I'm actually a little relieved that it's over.

My prior opinions on the show are a matter of public record, so I thought it would be an utter delight to look in retrospect at the show now that it's all over. Almost over, rather: The Plan!

Ron Moore made no secret of the fact that he and the writers made the whole damn thing up as they went along, and although that worked well for Yuri and Vlad in the already ridiculous Break A Leg universe it didn't always yield desirable results on BSG. Let's look at the finale for illustration.

Starting with what I liked, I'm actually a bit surprised myself. Considering my prior poor opinions of Baltar as a character and a storytelling device (which really only got worse as the show progressed), his development in the finale, though obvious, redeemed him entirely in my eyes. His speech to Cavil on the bridge of Galactica was a masterful culmination of his seemingly bizarre and random foray into becoming a religious prophet, and I felt one of the only moments in the finale that successfully managed to wrap up loose ends and answer questions in a satisfying way. I had chills.

Another moment in the finale that I loved also involved Baltar, but it was far more basic and emotional. He tells Six about his plans to farm some land that he spotted on the way down to the planet, then cracks as he is reminded of his father, who taught him to farm while growing up. It's one of the most touching moments in the entire run of the show and could only have been possible knowing Baltar's entire history and character throughout the show.

Chief Tyrol snapping that bitch Tory's neck after he finds out the she killed Callie is the moment I was waiting for all season. It would have been even more satisfying had the writers not forgotten about her entirely up until then; since blasting Callie out of a launch tube we've basically neither seen nor heard from her annoying ass at all. Oh well, missed opportunity.

Now for the things I hated, and they are pretty much what everyone on the internet has not liked.

When I first finished watching the finale I was... pissed. Everybody's an angel or whatever? Fuck you! I felt cheated and that Moore just didn't know how to wrap everything up, so he yanked the ultimate deus ex machina (in fact, a literal deus ex machina) out of his ass to wrap up two of the most mysterious and pervasive questions on the show: what is the nature of the Six in Baltar's head, and what is Kara Thrace?

I'm pretending that the Baltar in Six's head doesn't exist, because I had entirely forgotten about him before the finale and kind of wish Moore had as well. 

Now don't get me wrong, I still think he spent the entire season writing himself into a corner (or rather failing to write "hooks" or lay breadcrumbs in prior episodes that he could reference in the finale). I still think he copped out, or ran out of time, or just plain didn't realize how large a problem he had set for himself as he deepened (or neglected to address) the two main questions on the show. When you build up a question as large as (Baltar's) Six's nature over four seasons without a single scrap or clue as to what the answer may be (or even whether there is really an answer), then you really are left with little else than "She's an angel".

However, if you set aside the bullshit copout of answering two large questions as "angel" and examine them in the broader perspective, it starts to make sense. Moore didn't properly set the stage for those answers to work within the context of the show, or for their being angels to feel at all satisfying as resolutions to plot questions. But if you kind of squint your mind's eye and pretend he did his job as a storyteller and prepare the audience properly, you may realize (like I have) that it works. He fucked up the reveal, but it works.

There are of course numerous plot holes. Let's list a few:

Kara's an angel, fine. That explains how she got back to Galactica after she died... on Earth! How did her ship manage to crash-land on Earth with her inside? It blew up in the nebula.

How did her father teach her a song, also written in musical notation by Hera, that wound up being the way to punch in the coordinates to jump to our Earth? Before you say her father is the boxed Cylon Daniel, he's not. Moore has already directly refuted that hypothesis.

I also liked how Adama told his gunnery captain to start firing away as soon as they jump in to the Colony... but then they just don't. At all. It's like they all sit there getting pummeled by the guns, Adama screaming that they can't much more of this (or was that Tigh?), and nobody on Galactica is firing back. Not a plot whole per se, just an annoying lack of attention to detail.

Here's a good one to wrap it up: how in the world, on a ship as utterly massive as the Colony, did they manage to crash the ship (and land the Raptors) within what must have been less than 500 yards of Hera's position? And why didn't Cavil have any Cylon resistance inside the colony? Had there been any Centurions inside at all, the human boarding party would have had no hope of reaching Hera before Galactica was destroyed.

In any event, it's all over now except for the splitting of hairs and counting the money. I'll probably watch The Plan, since the other TV movies were pretty damn good, and I'll give Caprica a shot despite the fact that it looks like all the soap opera of BSG with none of the Star Wars.

I guess I'll miss you, BSG, you were certainly unique and creative, in a medium filled with same and conventional.

Anyone else have any dissenting opinions?

Oh and by the way, spoilers above.

A couple weeks ago I got an IM from my friend Nate asking me if I wanted to go to a mutual friend's annual St. Patrick's Day blow-out in San Diego.  Now, I rarely go on weekend getaways.  My weekends are usually spent gaming, sleeping, drinking, rehearsing for shows, or -heaven forbid- shooting Break A Leg awesomeness.  Taking a trip somewhere requires time and money and more effort than it takes to, for example, walk the block to the liquor store for a 6-er and a bag of chips. But, I won't be taking one of my annual vacations this year because I will be in a show during the time that would usually happen.  And I had nothing to that weekend.  So, after a moment's reflection I figured: why the hell not?

Now, if you haven't flown on Virgin Air, I highly recommend it.  They have the tv's in the back of every seat from which you can watch shows, talk with other passengers, and order food and drink.  Their service is pretty good as well.  Additionally, if their are First Class seats available when you check in, you can upgrade your regular ticket for $50.  The day we were to leave, I got a text from Nate saying he had gone ahead and done this.  Happy Birthday to me.

Now, our buddy gives us a ride to the airport, which was cool, and since we had preboarded we got in line for security checks.  We go through all the stuff: take shoes off, take off anything with even trace amounts of metal in, put everything in those bins that are never big enough for all your stuff, go through the scanner thing, and then wait for your stuff to come out the other side.  The scanner things at the San Francisco Airport are neat: you stand in this plastic cylinder and the scanny bits revolve around you.  I wanted them to beam me somewhere, but apparently they haven't got that far with the technology yet.  Slackers.

Anyway, we go through the scanny thing and we're waiting there and there's a problem with some unidentified item in my bag.  So they call the security chief lady over and she starts prodding my bag and asking my if there's something with batteries in there.  Now, I always carry a flashlight in my bag, because, hey, they're useful.  So, she pulls out my flashlight...and keeps digging.  Eventually, she finds my drinking horn.  This is a long cow horn with a metal bell on the wide end and a drinking cap that unscrews on the tiny end.  She asked me what it was.  I said it was a drinking horn.  She asked me what it was for.  I said it was for drinking out of and then sounding.  "Sounding?" she asks.  "Yes, like a trumpet," I reply.  "I can demonstrate, if you like."  "By all means," says she.  So, in a crowded airport in front of the security chief, I sounded my horn like I was storming Isengard.  We wee quickly sent on our way.

FLY FIRST CLASS! Oh man, if you have never flown First Class, try it at least once.  As soon as you get on the plane they offer you drinks.  Any service that you would normally have to pay for - you don't.  That means free movies, free drinks...well, ok, not quite free because you did pay the extra cash, and on a 1 hour flight it is nearly impossible to go through their entire stock of whiskey (yes, I tried).  But the seats are all comfy and there's tons of leg room, which is important to a tall guy like me, and I was just nice.

We got picked up at the airport in San Diego by three of our So-Cal friends and immediately headed to a bar.  While we're sitting there at the booth we had confiscated, a somewhat cute girl sits down beside me and starts chatting me up.  Shortly thereafter her gigantic female friend joins her (and therefore us) and starts handing out business cards for hosting BDSM parties.  We left rather quickly.

The next day we spent helping clean up the house for the party that night, which were rumored to be legendary.  Eventually, people started showing up, many of whom had no idea that Nate and I were going to be there.  I always like surprising people like that.  Suprise!  I'm here!  Yeah, great, but do you mind if I finish my shower? Go ahead!  Ok, but can I do it without you watching me?

Just kidding!

Anyway, the party was pretty fun, but I didn't really consider it to be epic.  Dunno, maybe I missed something.  But I DID have the best corned beef I've ever had in my life.  My friend makes it with Guiness and Tapatio.  It was tender and juicy and ridiculous.  I still dream about it.  I don't think I went to bed before 4am for 3 days.  And on Sunday I spent 4 hours playing lazertag with a 9 year old and a 2 year old.  Our flight home was delayed an hour a half, which would put us in San Francisco at about 12:30am with a 1 hour ride home and I had to be up for work the next morning.  And on the ride back we DID drink all the whiskey.

I was a wreck for 3 days after we got back, but MAN, did I earn it.

Wish us luck at the Streamy Awards!

Happy Jenday!

There are days, and then there are days. There are days full of wonder, whimsy, and excitement; followed by days with a 2 A.M. vomiting wake-up followed by an episode of Word World, then back to bed.

The company that I work for has instituted a "Day for Pay" program for salaried people employed at my level. The term they've chosen sounds nonsensical at best ("Don't I already work a day for pay?"). What it really means is that you take a day off for no pay. Kind of like a reverse vacation day, that you pay for out of your own pocket. Or something like that.

So I chose to take mine today, being at the time of this writing Thursday March 19 2009. We had purchased some passes to the California Academy of Sciences at our preschool's annual fundraiser. 

Let me take a side-road here and talk about this fundraiser. Here's how it breaks down: we pay a small monthly fortune to allow our child to attend for three half-days per week. Then there's this fundraiser, where all of the parents acquire things to be auctioned off. Guess who attends the auction fundraiser? Right, the parents, but you of course need to buy admission tickets. It's a fairly elaborate Ponzi Scheme that we all willingly take part in.

So we have these passes for the Academy of Sciences, but Ronin wakes up around 2 Thursday morning vomiting. It's a fairly sublime form of terror to be awakened by the sound of wretching coming from less than 6 inches from your face. 

So we didn't make it out there today, since we didn't know how well he would be feeling. We spent the day in the backyard repotting plants and taking care of random projects that had piled up around the house. It actually ended up being probably a more enjoyable day than what we originally had planned, which led me to the intentionally lame pronouncement that my company's bullshit Day for Pay was actually a Day for Play! What now, bitches?

Don't forget, Friday night at 9 is the two-hour series finale of Battlestar Galactica. Lost is already kicking its ass, so it's throwing in the towel now while it's still so far behind that it thinks it's in first place. Maybe I'll break down how bad it is in retrospect next week once I have 20/20 hindsight. In fact, let's put my ass on the line now and just say it: next week's post will be a blow-by-blow of how badly Lost has thoroughly trounced BSG throughout their entirely made-up-by-me TV rivalry.

Then I'll explain why Lost sucks.

So, a year ago, Mr. Drew Lanning posted a rant about his anger over Battlestar Galactica.

The show is, as you fans know, ending very, very soon. Also, Drew's blog has gotten a very loud, very angry discussion going.

So, I figured I'd resurrect it from the bottom of the blog pile and put it back here because -- hey, it's awesome.

Enjoy!

Editor's Note: If any of you watch Battlestar Galactica, haven't reached the ending, and don't want any plot points ruined, you probably want to avoid Drew's hilarious and very angry blog. Oh, also, there's some swearing, but you probably expect that from him by now.

---

For the past several weeks I've been writing weekly installments for this website's blog, and it's been quite the eye-opener, let me tell you. I can barely scrape up the will, desire, and talent to drop one of these logs into the internet's stream once a week. I sometimes ask myself, "How did I get into this mess?"

Well I've learned a few things about writing for the internet crowd in the past few weeks, and I thought I'd throw all of that together into this post. If Yuri fires me I could go out in a blaze of glory, so to speak. What I've learned about drawing an audience can be summed up as such:

• Sex - this needs no explanation
• Battlestar Galactica - the internet is dork central, and BG is like their theme song, if it were a song, but it's not, it's a TV show.
• Flame wars - not a slap fight between Danny Noriega and Andy Dick, a flame war is started when one internet douche intentionally tries to pick a fight with other internet douches. Hilarity ensues. Works best when the first douche doesn't really believe his own vitriol.
• Being wrong - see this xkcd comic for more about why this is important.

So these are the elements. Let's put them all together, shall we?

Battlestar Galactica sucks.

Someone told me a while ago that the network didn't have a budget for effects so they had to work with crafting a good story with memorable characters. Seems to me like they forgot the "crafting a good story with memorable characters" part.

Now I'm not talking out of my ass here, I've also spent the last several weeks getting completely caught up to the show in preparation for its season four premiere this April. I've watched every single episode except seasons 2 episode 15, which I heard sucked anyway. Well they all sucked, but that one was apparently a real stinker.

Where do I begin? Let's go ahead and start with the Cylons. What fucking morons! They apparently have the resources to annihilate the human race in twelve different systems at the same time, we're talking billions upon billions of people here, yet are "stretched thin" while trying to occupy a settlement of only tens of thousands? What kind of incompetent robots are we dealing with here? If SkyNet had the Cylons' resources Sara Connor would have been paste on the wall of a night club bathroom.

Oh, and how about the one where we're asked to believe that the Cylons had a changed of heart and abandoned their occupation of every single human planet they had conquered, only to turn around and occupy New Caprica? The writers must have thought they were clever with their bullshit current-event tie-in justification for that "whoops, we painted wrote ourselves into a corner" moment.

That's the overall problem with the show: too much symbolism with current politics and foreign affairs. It's one thing if Israel occupies Palestine or the US occupies Iraq. We're on Earth, and it's gotten pretty damn small. Some of us want the land you're squatting on, or hate your boss, or want your oil. But the Cylons and Humans have the entire galaxy to putz around in, can't someone just go to the other side of the universe and cool their jets for awhile? If they want to leave us alone, why don't they just leave us alone?

With dumbshits like Xena Warrior Princess and Al from Quantum Leap in charge, it's no wonder they can't muster the nuts to wipe out humanity. Dean Stockwell couldn't even get Scott Bakula home in 96 episodes. Useless.

Let's toss a few names around too, shall we? Kara Thrace: terrible actress. Who the fuck hired her? She's the second most annoying character on the show. Who's the first? Gaius Baltar. That dumb shit should have been killed during the second season, from a storytelling standpoint. I'm so sick of this universe's stupidest genius pulling the wool over everyone's eyes week after week after week. The writers haven't even given us one logical rationale for why he's chosen to make several of his selfish decisions, like choosing to not reveal Boomer's true identity as a Cylon. That made no sense whatsoever.

One last thing: it apparently only takes 16 months for a war-veteran in charge of a Battlestar to become a fat-ass pussy. That was the one moment of clarity the writers ever had, when Admiral Adama tossed his son out on his "fat ass". Priceless.

Now let's get the flame war going in the comments.

Oh, and sex. Just think about sex or something, that should cover it.