Battlestar Galactica returns to Sky next week, and the Radio Times quite properly marks the occasion with a writeup on Tuesday's daily choices page. "The best thing on the box ... unsurpassable TV drama", reviewer Mark Braxton says. "Long may it continue." Couldn't agree more.
But he does rather spoil his glowing review because he feels the need to add a little caveat: "BG's great strength has always been not alienating non-sci-fiers with dominions of Tharg or federations of Sisk." In other words, it's alright to like this show because it's proper drama, not like those other sci-fi programs that are full of all that geeky sci-fi paraphernalia. I mean, it's not like the central premise of Battlestar Galactica involves a bunch of people from planets called silly things like Caprica, who live on a spaceship and are being hunted by killer robots.
Oh, hang on...
Let's get this straight. If you like Battlestar Galactica, I don't think you can call yourself a 'non-sci-fier'. You have excellent taste in science fiction, certainly, but you're absolutely not a non-sci-fier.
This little dance as TV pundits try to talk up Battlestar without appearing to actually like a science fiction program can be watched whenever anybody talks about Battlestar Galactica. The general reaction seems to be to try to say that it's not really sci-fi at all. Trailers quote critics who compare it to The West Wing and Deadwood, emphasising that this is a proper show, even though it has got spaceships in it. Mark Braxton is rather going one stage further by actively denying that the program even has any of that sort of stuff in it at all, in blatant contradiction to the reality of the program's content. In fact, with the exception of Stargate, I can't think of another show currently in production which comes closer to having anything even resembling a 'dominion of Tharg' in it.
It's amusing to watch critics try to justify the fact that they like Battlestar Galactica when all their instincts tell them they should dismiss it as niche audience geekery. But it's sad they weren't there for Firefly with the same plaudits...