James Tauber's Blog 2009/03
The Long Pay Off: Battlestar Galactica and Lost
NOTE: This may contain SPOILERS for Babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica and Lost.
I'm a big fan of episodic television with long arcs. I love pay-offs that are separated by months or even years from their initial set up, where you can go back and watch earlier episodes and see things you never noticed before.
Back when I was watching the X Files, it was always the so-called "myth arc" episodes I liked and never the "monster of the week". But it eventually became clear that even the myth arc episodes in the X Files were being made up as they went along. I felt duped.
So it was with great anticipation in 2000 that I started watching reruns of Babylon 5, a show famous for having been planned out in advance. Despite numerous flaws, this planning paid off multiple times. There were multiple OMFG moments where you realize how pieces of the puzzle from previous seasons fit perfectly together. In one classic multi-season arc there is a mysterious episode in season 1 involved time travel two years in the future. In season 3 you see the other half. Amazing stuff that would be very hard to pull off without the show being planned in advance.
Of course there are dangers with planning in advance. B5 suffered from story changes due to actors leaving.
This brings me to two of my favourite shows on TV at the moment: Battlestar Galactica and Lost.
Lost has supposedly been planned in advance and BSG largely made up as they went along.
If you'd asked me at the end of last year, I would have said the two shows were counter examples to the need for planning in advance. I didn't feel like Lost was giving me the payoffs and I felt like BSG was doing a great job without the long arcs. This year I've changed my mind. Lost is starting to get some pretty cool payoffs (although it could still screw things up) and BSG is breaking up under the stress of not being worked out in advance (although perhaps the finale will redeem it).
At least BSG had a definite end point planned for a while. There's nothing worse than a show that pretends to be teleological but is being written ad hoc with no real end in sight.
There are also opportunities available to the story teller when things aren't planned too much in advance. With BSG I didn't feel there were any truly amazing payoffs (again, the finale could prove me wrong) but there were certainly moments that were so out of left field and unpredictable it made for awesome story telling. It leads to a completely different kind of OMFG moment. Had BSG been planned in advance, those events might have been easier to see coming.
I guess that's the trade off. Plan in advance and you can get amazing payoffs but you run the risk of leaving too many clues so there are no real surprises. Write ad hoc and you can totally surprise the audience but also expose yourself to too many plot holes. BSG has one more shot to see if it can successfully close some of those holes.
Despite their flaws, I think Battlestar Galactica and Lost are both excellent examples of what works about each approach.
UPDATE: Here's a (spoiler filled) post on 12 Plotholes That Must Be Filled in the Battlestar Finale
by James Tauber : Created on March 20, 2009 : Last modified March 20, 2009 : 2 comments (permalink)
Eldarion Logo
For years, I've had "Eldarion" in the back of my mind as a name I'd like to use for some creative endeavour. It is a reference to Tolkien: Eldarion was the son of Aragorn and Arwen and the Second High King of the Reunited Kingdom.
Much to my surprise, the domain was available when I checked back in 2002, so I registered it immediately.
At first I thought I'd use the name for my film and music endeavours. When I attended SXSW Film and Music in 2005, I actually had business cards printed that said "Eldarion". They were black cards with white writing, a reference to the Gondorian flag.
I planned a logo that would feature the White Tree of Gondor and the seven stars of the House of Elendil but never had the skill to pull it off.
With a need for a logo coming up again recently, I approached my friend Greg Newman. My brief to him was pretty much as follows:
- use the text "eldarion" in Anivers (the font family I'd chosen a couple of months earlier)
- feature some reference to the White Tree and/or the Seven Stars
- make it silver on dark grey rather than white on black to give it more life
He blew me away with the result and the response has been phenomenal.
It may strike some as unusual to choose a fantasy reference for a high-tech startup. But I'm reminded of a wonderful scene in the British comedy Yes Prime Minister where the PM is advised that if his first television broadcast is to say nothing new and exciting then he should wear a modern suit, the background should feature abstract paintings and the opening music should be Stravinsky. On the other hand, if the broadcast is to contain radical new announcements, then he should wear a dark suit, the background should feature oak paneling, leather volumes and 18th century portraits and the opening music should be Bach.
The same idea applies, I think, to choosing ancient symbols from the legendarium of Tolkien for what is intended to be a very modern and forward thinking new company.
Stay tuned for lots more about Eldarion.
by James Tauber : Created on March 2, 2009 : Last modified March 2, 2009 : 6 comments (permalink)