I can’t comment on For All Mankind, I haven’t watched it yet, so I will take your word for it. I can only speak about what’s in my sphere of awareness, but it sounds like you’ve not had a good time with it.
I have to ask, did you not mean to level your criticism of BSG post season three, rather than post season two?
Three is arguably the best season of the series. It had so many highlights, from the devastation of New Caprica, to the climax at the end of the season that the series spent three seasons building towards. There’s so much to point towards in that season that was truly excellent sci-fi.
If you made a typo/mistake, and you actually meant post season three, I can understand your view point and completely agree that from then onwards it wasn’t quite the same. But where we differ is in regards to blame. I think you’re missing important context.
There was a writers guild strike at the end of season three, and it completely derailed the series from then onwards. In fact, it wasn’t the only series that suffered in such a fashion at that time. It’s worth having s read about it if you have the time:
I don’t think it’s just to lay this particular criticism at Ronald D. Moore’s feet.
I am also struggling to reconcile what you’ve said about his weak portrayal of women in For All Mankind when he did such an incredible job on BSG. If that’s the case I’m heartbroken.
The reason why I am so enamoured with the idea of an RDM helmed Trek is because Trek has shown consistently that it thrives when it leans more into standalone series over serialisation.
Its current hybrid approach is a strength that SNW and SFA has shown works. This is something I feel RDM has shown he can do excellently in the past. BSG was an excellent example of hybrid serialisation until the strike. And for his series work, his writing credits in TNG alone are exemplary:
“Yesterdays Enterprise”
“Data’s Day”
“Ethics”
“Disaster”
“Tapestry”
“Sins of the Father”
“The Pegasus”
etc…
I’m going to say that I saw some of the problems to come in BSG season three, but I still bought the physical media up to that point.
I don’t think you can blame it all on the writers strike, any more than you can blame Picard season two or Discovery season four’s weaknesses on the pandemic.
Other shows managed better. It’s the test of a good senior production executive to manage through those situations.
I was deeply disappointed in where For All Mankind took its women characters. I was hoping that having Naren Shankar join after he finished with The Expanse would redeem it, but it just kept getting worse in its treatment of women.
!a driven engineer who becomes the head in Houston only to fall into a honey-trap and feed the Soviets information!<
!an astronaut who played up her physical beauty and whose top-gun husband became a despondent alcoholic when she leaves him responsible for the kids!<
!an astronaut who hides her sexual preference through a fake marriage!<
!the neglected wife of an astronaut who is stalked and manipulated into a one time sexual encounter with a young man she once looked after as a child, then carries the burden of responsibility for the impact of his obsession.!<
I can’t comment on For All Mankind, I haven’t watched it yet, so I will take your word for it. I can only speak about what’s in my sphere of awareness, but it sounds like you’ve not had a good time with it.
I have to ask, did you not mean to level your criticism of BSG post season three, rather than post season two?
Three is arguably the best season of the series. It had so many highlights, from the devastation of New Caprica, to the climax at the end of the season that the series spent three seasons building towards. There’s so much to point towards in that season that was truly excellent sci-fi.
If you made a typo/mistake, and you actually meant post season three, I can understand your view point and completely agree that from then onwards it wasn’t quite the same. But where we differ is in regards to blame. I think you’re missing important context.
There was a writers guild strike at the end of season three, and it completely derailed the series from then onwards. In fact, it wasn’t the only series that suffered in such a fashion at that time. It’s worth having s read about it if you have the time:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effect_of_the_2007–08_Writers_Guild_of_America_strike_on_television
I don’t think it’s just to lay this particular criticism at Ronald D. Moore’s feet.
I am also struggling to reconcile what you’ve said about his weak portrayal of women in For All Mankind when he did such an incredible job on BSG. If that’s the case I’m heartbroken.
The reason why I am so enamoured with the idea of an RDM helmed Trek is because Trek has shown consistently that it thrives when it leans more into standalone series over serialisation.
Its current hybrid approach is a strength that SNW and SFA has shown works. This is something I feel RDM has shown he can do excellently in the past. BSG was an excellent example of hybrid serialisation until the strike. And for his series work, his writing credits in TNG alone are exemplary:
“Yesterdays Enterprise” “Data’s Day” “Ethics” “Disaster” “Tapestry” “Sins of the Father” “The Pegasus” etc…
I’m going to say that I saw some of the problems to come in BSG season three, but I still bought the physical media up to that point.
I don’t think you can blame it all on the writers strike, any more than you can blame Picard season two or Discovery season four’s weaknesses on the pandemic.
Other shows managed better. It’s the test of a good senior production executive to manage through those situations.
I was deeply disappointed in where For All Mankind took its women characters. I was hoping that having Naren Shankar join after he finished with The Expanse would redeem it, but it just kept getting worse in its treatment of women.