Some fascinating Starbuck theories here.

I'll admit that when I first saw her disappearance act in the finale I was thinking to myself "say what? that can't be it!!" but later on I realized that sometimes it's best to leave some things unexplained and open to interpretation.

To me it was very obvious what Starbuck was -- a poorly executed plot device by befuddled writers.

I hate when things are over-explained. It rarely (if ever) pays off enough to warrant it. Starbuck died, we know that much. She then reappeared as a version of the original, with her memories, feelings, and passion. But this time around she was driven, or perhaps it is better to say she was being pulled toward an ultimate purpose.

Once she achieved that purpose, she was rewarded with the ability to say goodbye... and then she was gone, like a thought or a muse. I think that people call her an angel because it is easy to define her that way.

RDM was smart to not define it.

Organic writing during a long production run can work, or it can result in Lost.

BSG seemed to tread the tightrope pretty well but some threads either meandered and petered out or, like the Starbuck thing, ended up backed into a corner from which there was no elegant escape.

I can't say I was particularly fond of the disappearing angel but there were more offensive things to worry about (Times Square, gack!). Besides, Starbuck really had to be there until the end, and we were treated to the wonderful Someone To Watch Over Me en route.

That's part of the problem I had with the Starbuck thing, it was bad but it was only one of many poorly done aspects of the finale.

As far as over-explaining something goes, there's a lot of room between over-explaining and not explaining at all. The way it was handled, it was like Dr. Kimble finally catching up to the one-armed man, and the the one-armed man just disappears. Looking at the way The Fugitive really ended, I don't thing too many people felt things were over-explained, and appreciated finding out the background information and seeing Richard Kimble finally proven innocent.

The funny thing is the Times Square ending was planned from the beginning, one of the few things that were! Likewise the very end of Lost was planned from the beginning, but by very end I mean the last 60 seconds. It was the season leading up to that last 60 seconds that saw them really lose their way by dwelling on irrelevancies, trivializing that which seemed quite important before, and just ignoring other stuff.



The Jedi Master