![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Capricopera
Welcome to the operahouse on Caprica. In a previous post I drew connections between Wagner's Ring and the show but I didn't expect "End of Line" to turn into an opera!
So yes I did enjoy the mid-season finale even though it wasn't perfect (yes I'm hard to please and I will quibble a little bit).
First the flaws, then we'll talk about the good meat:
- I don't think the special effects were very convincing during the truck chase or when featuring Daniel in the arena. The whole thing looks kinda fake. I think they sadly chose action-packed storytelling over quality.
- the" previously on" part included a deleted scene showing a conversation between Clarice and Olaf about a stolen bike that was actually a code for a meeting call by Barnabus. I saw the bonus scene online but most viewers did not. If they were to mention it why did they delete it in the first place?
-There were predictable things like Tamara shooting Joseph so he wouldn't be able to return to New Cap City; Emmanuelle being revealed as Evelyn; Clarice not being in the car but outside because she spotted Amanda on the bridge when Lacy pushed the button. No surprise in there at all.
- Above all some stuff looked botched-up, rushed, as if they were in a hurry and just getting rid of certain things (Joseph's quest in New Cap City) or fast-forwarding towards cliffhangers (Barnabus' attempting to kill Clarice happened too quickly after their meeting IMO).
Despite the flaws, Caprica provided again a lot of stuff to ponder and enjoy.
On the pilot , Joseph told a devasted Daniel that he understood him and that in about five seconds he would be jumping off a bridge himself....It took 8 episodes to take us to the bridge in question, and it's Amanda who jumped off Pantheon Bridge. Was it a metaphor foreshadowing conversions to monotheism? At least, if we listen to the opera song that goes along, the unfair gods are rejected, denigrated:
The gods cannot a heart betray
They know not night
They know not death’s long day
They sport in splendor with our fears
And look as dewdrops on our tears
Also Zoe burned a metaphorical bridge after killing Philomon. There was no way back for her then. I always knew it would end badly for Philomon, and I expected him to behave the way he did when Cylon!Zoe came out, but I didn't mind the fact that it was predictable because it suited the opera tragic theme. Fates have decided, insignificant humans would be crushed. This is the essence of tragedy. "Poor kid" indeed. The scene was well done. I loved the Zoe/Cylon editing, how Zoe's point of view differed from Philo's, how he couldn't not freak out in front of the giant killer robot. It echoed what Daniel said when scolding him "This is a robot, doctor!". BTW I smiled at Daniel's line about fancy cellphones! Suddenly Philomon, who had been living a fantasy, was facing reality and it killed him. I liked the fact that the other Lab Tech got a cameo showing his wounded finger to remind us what the U-87 was capable of doing to human beings...Cellphones that work can harm people, Barnabus taught Lacy that lesson!
Joseph, on the other hand, was sent back to reality through a virtual kill, and it saved him. I didn't expect Tamara to shoot herself first but it makes sense. Joseph had to see it otherwise he could never move on.
Both our grieving fathers must let their dead daughters go now; both daughters have cut the bonds. Not sure that Daniel has quite given up on Zoe's ghost though hence his telling Cyrus that what the U-87 did was sentience but "didn't mean it was anything else", something that Cyrus noticed of course!
The above shot of Joseph waking up on his sofa and weeping was beautiful and poignant (and weirdly his position sort of echoed Zoe/Philomon date). There was a poetic side to his tears for, in the pilot, he told Daniel that he had only wept once when seeing Caprican flowers for the first time. Tamara's signature was a flower, something the episode reminded us again through Emmanuelle's trick to get in touch with her. Real flowers on the side of the road made young Joseph cry once and he cried again because of a virtual one that he would never see again. Very moving.
I wonder if it's pure coincidence but Barnabus called Clarice "Flower" during their meeting, before she got the upper hand. I heard it well, didn't I? Firstly, of course, he greeted her with a "Hello Willow!" that must have made smiled the Buffy fans around. They couldn't help making James Marsters said that!
I really liked the Barnabus scenes. James Marsters played them very well. And I liked his hair! Clarice emerging from the mist was pretty cool, and the confrontation worked. I also liked how Barnabus played with Lacy––still a "little girl" with her white socks and therefore more a flower than Clarice––he sort of deflowered her when he made her blow up Clarice's car, killing Nestor who once tried to charm Lacy in the Willow house!
Interesting parallel between Cylon!Zoe and Clarice, they both took a male life in "End of Line". But why Keon couldn't have been killed off as well? He almost ruined the scenes!
The blonde/brunette game goes on. The virtual brunette named Emmanuelle was a mask for the blonde Evelyn, and in the V-world Zoe asked blonde Lacy to take her place and tell Philomon that was what she really looked like. Also, speaking of connections, Zoe kept pressuring Lacy, playing the guilt card which isn't unlike the way Barnabus uses people around him.
I don't think that we have seen the last of Zoe and Amanda despite their concomitant suicide ( a jump up the air for the U-87, a fall for Amanda). I wouldn't be surprised if Amanda were somehow "saved" and rescued by Clarice. I haven't seen previews for the rest of the season though.
The title was once again very well chosen. It fit in Zoe's choice but we know that this is not the end of line concerning the Cylon production. The colonial officer who met up with Daniel before going out with Tomas Vergis (and who reminded me of Admiral Cain) gave Daniel an impossible deadline concerning the delivery of working robots, leaving him only one week to fill his contractual obligations. This episode was the end of a certain storyline, the one that was about mourning the loss of two daughters. "End of line" also called to the mind of BSG's fan what the Hybrids always said when talking crazy like The Pythia.
Poor Daniel. I fell for Joseph but at least he has Sam and Evelyn (who turned out to be a Tauron, something I did not expect!) to watch over him; he has his son to care about. Daniel is more alone than ever. Of course there's Cyrus but it isn't the same. I love the Daniel/Cyrus scenes though, the two actors have chemistry (but again Eric has chemistry with everyone and everything). Amanda jumped off the bridge (or rather walked into thin air, a leap to death not a leap of faith)but this is really Daniel's fall. He is realising that his hubris has a cost, and he is losing everything that matters most.
Will he lose his mind too?
I loved the scene in which Amanda got dressed (her underwear was very film noir) and the Amanda/Daniel scene in the kitchen. They are both aesthetes, smelling the wine before drinking it. It's often little details that I enjoyed the most on the show, like what Amanda said about the couple dynamics, that she couldn't be crazy around him because he was always so sane, always himself. In a way Daniel has been an anchor for her fragile mind, he "somehow repelled" the madness. She could count on him to be him, so now finding out that he may have done something crazy is the last blow for Amanda. As Daniel didn't deny the Vergis theft...Amanda left. I loved the way she got up and walked away...she was like a drifting ship.
Eric Stoltz was perfect in the episode. I think I'm becoming a true believer in Stoltzism! His acting is subtle and so real, the way he delivers every line is spot-on, I'd love to have him chop vegetables in my kitchen and I may have a crush on his skilful freckled hands! The last scene was simple but powerful "this is Graystone". I read once that the greastest actors can act wonderfully from behind. Eric's back did that. That man is ridiculously talented. End of line.
And the scene of Daniel playing his own theme on the piano was enough to make me love the episode! Such a wonderful detail and a relevant musical point about Daniel's self-sufficient being.
I've just read Bear McCreary' s blog and he tells that it was Eric's idea to play the Graystone theme and that he was inspired by the blog. That blog is a must read. Looks like Bear had been waiting this episode to reveal that Stoltz requested the piano in Daniel's lab for music and science have always been connected and that it would show another private facet of Daniel. I couldn't agree more with him. Now I wonder if Eric Stoltz ever read Richard Powers' The Time Of Our Singing !
I also wonder who came up with the idea of Daniel's culinary skills and his use of kitchen knives...
Bear also explains how he composed the final opera (with the help of his mom for the libretto)that he called Capricoperatica and confirmed that Alessandro Juliani who played Felix Gaeta on BSG sang the male part. Another little detail that would make any BSG fan happy. I think it's great to have a character play operatic music first supposedly from a stereo in a scene and then the music being slowly repeated, spreading out in the episode until it becomes the score. It's the opposite process of having a character theme on the score being suddenly played on screen by a character (like the Final Five theme played by Kara and the pianist on "Someone to Watch Over Me" in the final season of BSG, or like Daniel playing his own theme in this episode ! Don't tell me that the two characters aren't connected! ).
Eventually soprano and barytone sing together:
Soprano:
The gods forswear, all mercies past,
Each mortal heart will beat its last
Together:
Each mortal hand in stillness lie
All mortal love, condemned to die
The gods have wings, and bright ascend
To leave us weeping in the end
We don't see Daniel weep, but as his mortal love is gone we know he will.
How could I not love this show? And now I've got to wait until October? It is cruel. The Caprica gods indeed left us weeping in the end.
no subject
Not really surprised that Evelyn was Tauron. I love Teryl Rothery and I hope this continues for her.
no subject
When Joseph showed his tattoe, Evelyn seemed curious like a Caprican would be so that's why I was surprised.
no subject
I've been convinced since I first heard his name that Daniel Graystone will be one of the human cylon models; the "Daniel" model Ellen says was contaminated and destroyed. Plus I think Daniel is Kara's human piano-playing father.
OCTOBER?! That's a long wait.
no subject