Pioneer on the Internet – Sean Gursky

For the last few weeks I have working on various stages of this post. Some versions had the beginnings of what made this show appealing to me. Other revisions had a simple graphic and a thank you. Each time I wrote something I felt that it wasn’t doing proper justice to the show or what I was thinking and for a show like this I think it would be difficult to properly convey everything you feel about it.

With that said, tonight is the series finale of Battlestar Galactica. Since the air dates of this season were announced over six months ago I have had March 20th noted on the calendar. It seemed like such a long time to wait, I felt that I could prepare myself for its end, but once 2009 began and the final episodes of the season started to air it flew by.

For the last sixteen months I have devoted a lot of my time and energy into this show, probably more than I have with any other show in that time. It is a bittersweet thing to see a show you love go off the air, one that I haven’t felt before. How did fans of Six Feet Under, The Sopranos or The Wire react when their show drew to a close? What will it be like watching the final minutes of the show air before wrapping up the television season for good?

I haven’t thought about what life after Battlestar Galactica would be like, it’s a topic I don’t want to dwell on. Instead I will focus on the now and realize that in five hours it will all be over.

To Galactica, the best ship in the fleet. You will be missed but never forgotten.

So say we all.

On Monday evening there was a surprise in store for me. The week before How I Met Your Mother was a repeat and I assumed there would be no new episodes until the WGA strike was resolved.

How wrong I was. Not only was there a new episode, it was hilarious and I learned something about the Canucks.

Canadian born, cigar smoking, Tom boy Robin Scherbatsky recalled a perk of dating the sports reporter at her network with:

Robin: I even got into the changerooms and met Mayson Raymond.
Barney: Who?
Robin: He plays left wing for the Vancouver Canucks.

I looked over to Jenna and shook my head. I was not familiar with a Mason Raymond and we carried on with the episode.

The next morning I read an article titled Canucks recall three from Hamilton from Yahoo Sports. The first paragraph went like this:

The Vancouver Canucks on Tuesday recalled left wings Mason Raymond and Jason Jaffray and goaltender Drew MacIntyre from Manitoba of the American Hockey League.

I guess he really is a player, and the Canucks called him up in lieu of their recent injury streak.

While the Vancouver head office would never admit to Hollywood influencing their player call ups but there was a lot of talk about it following the episode on Monday.

The following night Vancouver played Anaheim, perhaps some of the writers for the show would take a time out from the picket line and see the game, because Raymond did not disappoint!

The two fresh faces in the Vancouver Canucks dressing room were easy to spot. Lockers displaying pucks with a piece of tape that said: “1st NHL goal” gave Mason Raymond and Jason Jaffray away. link

There you go, you can learn new things from TV shows and seeing as this episode was written months ago it is pretty remarkable that he would score his very first NHL goal after being name dropped on TV.

I think there is a pretty evident parallel here. When I worked nights I was getting less sleep and more active on seagurs. I am now back on a regular sleep schedule and my posting frequency drops!

A team of parka clad researchers are heading to the North Pole to investigate this relation further.

I have not been up to much in the last week. The long weekend saw a staff party, some long sleeps and I caught up on a few movies.

The first movie was Redacted, and it caught my attention by seeing a trailer a few weeks back. The movie showed great promise and looked like it would be right up my ally. Unfortunately I found it slow, focused on an event in the oversea war I had not heard of and failed to deliver an story pacing.

I tried to redeem my lackluster movie weekend with a movie Dad lent me called Rescue Dawn. Because this movie was from Dad’s personal collection I expected it to not be an intelligent movie with an intricate plot but be simple and have a few explosions.

Unfortunately there were no explosions and the movie was dull. Because it starred Christian Bale my expectations were set higher but was sorely disappointed. The story could have been good but it failed to maintain the tension and urgency of escaping from the Vietnamese POW camp.

I have to make up for these two shows with Lions for Lambs or perhaps go for a reliable choice that will not let me down.

Season three of Lost was released on DVD this week and there has been a little bit of promotional items released online. The biggest is a new orientation film. Some wild things happen and the DHARMA rabbit hole goes a little deeper.

The season four trailer is also edited in a fast and exciting style that we have all come to know, love and hate from ABC. Fifty-five days until the season starts and this is fueling my excitement.

YouTube IconSeason 4 Trailer (0:35) | The Orchid Orientation Preview (2:02)

Unfortunately we may not receive the eight episodes we expected, but two less. DarkUFO had an update on this situation, read below:

There is a natural break in the story at the end of episode 6. But there are 8 episodes in the can, and those last two start a new arc and don’t really stand alone. So…….some PTB at ABC don’t want to show those last two. At all — until fall or NEXT Feb. when/if there are more episodes to go with them. But other powers in the Disney pack are strongly pushing for all 8 episodes this Feb, because they are so desperate for original content to be aired. But right now, there is nothing to follow # 8, not planned, not written, nuttin’. link

Everything you know is wrong!

When it happened, the news spread fast and hard. Season six of 24 is starting January 14 with a two hour premiere followed by another two hours the next night, but for those who are resourceful the premiere started this weekend.

Fox announced that the first four episodes were to be released on DVD the day after the second two hour premiere ended.

Some who received the DVD set early did the honorable thing and started sharing it out over the Internet.

Not one to wait another week I jumped on the torrent for the first four episodes and was able to enjoy the first two episodes a week early. It has been a long time since I watched 24 and it feels great to have Jack and the gang at CTU back.

The first two episodes were fantastic and I have read the next two do not disappoint either.

We’re running out of time!

Lost was pretty good last night. Wait, that is a huge understatement. Last night was one of the best episodes of the season.

The ending came completely out of left field. It was one of the few times that I have yelled at the TV out of shock. This episode was worth waiting for, and now we are in the final stretch. Three weeks from now it will all be over until September.

What a ride!

Edit: It seems that there are some issues with my host as I have had problems editing this post. Your results may vary.

Wednesday is a new day in my TV schedule. I looked at it as Hump-Day but I have joined the masses and see Wednesday’s as another chapter in the book of Lost. It has been a long time since the last new episode but I welcomed tonight with open arms and was not disappointed. Since Toys ‘R Us and Zellers did not have the Nerf Maverick, my mid-week-weekend needed a boost and here it was.

Avatars created by the forum members at SomethingAwful.com.

There really isn’t much else to write except that Scrubs and Lost have kicked my face inside out this week, and I love it.

Not a whole lot to report. I’ve been working and am almost heading home. Friday at 9PM by West Edmonton Mall is scary, there’s a lot of traffic. It’s almost like my mini-rush hour. The weather has created a few accidents but fortunately the mighty Jetta and I are always going in the opposite direction.

Did you know that in MySQL a TINYINT has a size limit of 127? Yeah, it certainly is a tiny integer compared to its integer brother which has a limit of’well, I’m not sure, it’s large. Anyhoo that created some headaches about twenty minutes ago but we’re all good.

My craving for more Lost has come to its climax as I was going to stop off at Future Shop tomorrow and pick up season one so I could resume watching it where I left off. But, Gord has come through and will supply me my fix as we were able to get our schedules in line. On my way home to Millet this evening I’m stopping by his place to get all remaining episodes, including what has been aired of season two. I won’t have another marathon on my days off, but I plan on going through six or so on Tuesday, and maybe more Wednesday evening. By the sounds of it I think I’m gearing up for another marathon.