Stop watching now.
The ending is execrable.
I tossed and the DVDs I made from 10’ C Band satellite. I’ve been meaning to put the store bought pilot DVD on Ebay.
It was great until the last season. 
I wish I could but I find it irritating, especially when (a) it could be fixed by just rewriting a couple of lines of dialog and an additional shot or two and (b) the mistake detracts from the art. It would add to the level of awesomeness of the BG and its size and scope and power if they just chucked in a line about them needing to be at the ammo dump for a week, and showed a couple of seconds of shot of gigantic relays of trolleys shuttling in and out loaded to the max with ammo.
And it’s not really a case of “stop doing the math”. When you have this massive behemoth of a ship, and then shots of a couple guys hand carrying some little crates of shells, you don’t need to do math. You just need to have a tiny sense of proportion. And when that kicks in I get taken out of the story.
There is nothing at all in any line of dialogue about the vessel being below complement. Again, OK if that’s the story then that’s the story but there is nada, nothing, zip about the ship being below complement at the start of the story.
Sure there was. Watch the mini-series that started it all and is the real pilot. The whole deal is explained there.
I don’t know what you’re talking about. I just brought the scene where they go to the ammo supply up on Netflix. Most of it we don’t see because it’s focusing on Adama and the Cylon. But we do see a couple guys moving a very large container (as in, taller than the workers) of warheads with a pallet jack. That’s when the unloading is just getting started. And we know they had carts and forklifts.
It is a TV series, you understand, and “33” isn’t the beginning of it. This is somewhat akin to complaining through this week’s episode of “House” that nobody ever mentioned he’s a doctor.
Princhester, I highly, highly, highly recommend going back and watching the initial miniseries. When I first started watching BSG (I’m still only halfway through season 2) I started with “33” and it didn’t make any sense to me. Well, it made some sense, but there were a lot of plot flaws and confusing stuff.
The miniseries is the true start to the series, and when “33” starts, the show creators have clearly assumed that you have seen the miniseries. There’s a lot of backstory that they don’t bother to reiterate. I think you will enjoy season 1 a lot more if you watch the miniseries first.
If you must watch the series, I agree. 
But the ending sucks like a Thai Ladyboy.
IIRC, the whole business of “33” was that it basically required the whole fleet to “sound general quarters”, “man battle stations”, “red alert”, “set condition 1SQ” or whatever the correct term for putting a spaceship on maximum readiness every 33 minutes. And because the Galactica and most of the ships are presumably either operating at a reduced complement or simply not crewed for operations of that tempo, it’s pretty hard on them. The reason they don’t jump at 31 minutes is because they are hoping that with each jump they lost the Cylons and can finally stand down and get some rest.
One thing about the series is that the Cylons seemed a lot more alien and “robotic” in earlier seasons IMHO. Why exactly every 33 minutes? Not 36 or 28 minutes. Always 33. It implies a sort mechanical precision one would expect from machines. Cylons don’t get tired or bored or sloppy. For whatever reason it takes exactly 33 minutes for the Cylons to acquire the fleet, spin up their FTL drives and jump after them.
As the series went on, the Cylons become a lot more “human”. Really almost to the point that they were less humanoid “machines” and more like identical clones of the same people. Even becoming individualized within their particular “model”. I don’t want to say to much because it does become sort of a main theme of the show.
Although they never really explain why a society of robots would develop humanoid biological robots that appear as either the hottest women you would ever see anywhere or nondescript balding middle-aged men.
Just did. It wasn’t.
~2,000 according to the mini-series ( Adama mentions “almost 2,000” ) and by inference a much reduced air wing. The internets seem fixated on the figure of 5,000 for a fully staffed ship, but that could well be from external canon or not canon at all - I haven’t seen a clear reference yet.
Also not in-show and just for amusement value the model designer indicated that the Galactica is 4,740 ft. long. That’s more than 4x the length of a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, which sports a crew of 3,200 + another 2,480 in the air wing.
When I saw a new thread with BSG in the title I thought for a second there was some kind of new series out (you know, besides the garbage heap that is Caprica) and almost got excited.
I thought the Crew Chief guy (sorry, haven’t got all the names down yet) said 5000 when he was yelling at the (supposed) arms trader at the ammo dump. Maybe misremember
I guess you should just stop watching NOW. When you watch these kinds of sf shows there’s always things here and there that can gnaw at you if you pick into every little detail. But overall BSG was a great series from beginning to end. Sure there were some episodes that felt like fillers, but they served their purposes too in nudging the story arc along. I’m in the camp of those who really liked the series ending. The way all the loose threads were tied together at the end was brilliant and satisfying. I have a suspicion that you’ll hate it though.
Well, Blood and Chrome, about Adama in the First Cylon war has started production.
No, I’ll keep going with it. I’m not writing it off, I did basically enjoy both the mini-series and “33” but I just dislike these sorts of niggles. I grudgingly accept that the standard battle tropes (endless survival of overwhelming odds, magical replenishing ammo) are unavoidable if irritating features of TV and movies. However, it just annoyed me that “100+ hrs without sleep” was a cornerstone of the ep and seems unrealistic.
That does make some sense. On the other hand, I think it would be worth a try to say “Maybe one time, if we’re NOT here in 32 minutes, they won’t be able to track us in 33 minutes the next time, because whatever they’re doing depends on them being in visual range each time we jump.”
If you’re referring to the thing about the ship being understaffed, I thought (it’s been several months since I saw it, granted) the miniseries made it it clear that Galactica was basically a museum piece being put into drydock for the last time. Weren’t they converting one of the decks into a gift shop? You don’t really need a full battle complement for a museum with gift shop.
I thought 33 minutes was the quickest they could prepare to jump, whether calculations or charging the flux capacitor. 
Yes, one entire outrigger had already been converted to a museum, including glassing over the 2 ports. Plus the entire modern air wing, pilots & Mark 7 Vipers, were wiped out when they tried to attack the Cylons only to find their entire software suite was compromised. That’s when they had to move the old Vipers (one of which was Bill Adama’s IIRC) from the museum to the active flight deck.
You’re probably right Princhester, that they never flat out stated “We’re only at 2/3 complement” during the miniseries. It’s pretty easy to infer it though. Add that to the horrendous casualties (100+ lost when Tigh depressurized a deck to put out the fire, entire flight wing wiped out), and its clear why they’re so short handed.
If you think about it, each jump probably takes them 368.8 million miles from the last jump - about the distance it takes light to travel 33 minutes or the distance from the Sun to Jupiter. The fleet appears. A signal traveling at light speed reaches the Cylon fleet indicating the new position. They jump to intercept.
Of course, with more time and preparation, the fleet can probably jump much further. Flying faster than light aint like dustin crops.