Why isn't Ron Moore the show runner? I sure hope syfy is not trying bate and switch us. While I can appreciate Jane, Ron is by far a more visionary writer and the Battlestar that has benefited scifi/syfy so much was his rendering not hers. Just saying. And I was pleasantly surprised at the pilot for Caprica it was far more interesting and invloved than I thought it was going to be.

I know your pain, Rapter Wrangler Delta, I'm afraid it seems to have fully been Ron Moore's decision. Syfy gave him this gift and he decided to bail out after the first 10 eps. I think this was a huge mistake, unless he's willing to go back to his first love -- writing. His lack of writing is what really hurt most of Season 3 and Season 4.

While I loved half of Ms. Espenson's eps (Dirty Hands, Escape Velocity), I hated the other half (The Passage, the worst BSG ep of all time, and The Hub and Deadlock). The humor just didn't fit much of the time (although watching Baltar feel flatered at the kid named "Gaius" was pretty good.)

My biggest concern is that the show continue to explore the issue of terrorism in a complex way that points to the hypocrisy of how state actors portray the subject. The show has to be more than just about a hamhanded discussion of overt racism. I was actually disappointed that racism wasn't made more subtle in the pilot.

I just read, via Airlock Alpha, that Olmos will direct an episode and David Eick (who's not a bad writer) will write one, too. Very exciting. I hope Eick remains strongly involved in the editing process, since he fought for one of the Adama family scenes in the pilot.

Most of the time we don't really know about the genesis of an episode in the writers room. It might have a particular writers name attached to it but many people could have had input in it,so good/bad parts might actually have originated with someone other than the named writer.
Similarly we don't know how how much Ron Moore will be contributing to Caprica. all we can really do is wait to see how good it is!

Are you people kidding? I was not interested in Caprica if Ron Moore was running it, but now that Jane is the show-runner, I'm on board for the duration! She's terrific.

Actually, Grraargh, there's a pretty strong positive corelation between the quality of BSG and Ron Moore's involvement in the episodes. Moore has admitted he was heavily involved in the rewriting process in Season 1. So, you can still see variation in quality, but it's not as great. To me, the Weddle and Thompson episodes are obviously of lesser quality in being overly action-oriented and in being more melodramatic and less inventive in terms of story, and especially dialogue; they also avoid political themes. Carla Robinson's work is good, but not great, and Toni Graphia and Michael Angeli hit the ball out of the park; amazing work!

Also, officially Ron Moore-penned episodes are nearly uniformly great -- with the exception of "Home", which was just okay. He also refers to specific moments that he helped write, such as having the Chief nearly kill Helo in "Flight of the Phoenix", which I thought felt very real. Upon rewriting the 3rd season finale, he decided that the Sagitaron plot didn't work. He also heavily rewrote "Downloaded", which was why it was so good for a Weddle and Thompson episode.

As he became less involved in rewriting the show, the quality dropped; he became more focussed on editing.

Season 4 was the worst by far and varied a lot by official writers: Weddle and Thompson's season opener was dull and predictable; they did a fine job, though, in their last episode "Someone to Watch Over Me." The only writers to consistently shine were Mark Verheiden, Michael Angeli, and Ron Moore. The rest's work varied a lot in quality.

The only hope I have is that Ron Moore keeps writing, and I'm happy that Michael Taylor is still there. I'm very dubious about the work from the rest, including another Buffy alum's inclusion; Buffy and Angel were enjoyable, but they were pretty childish in comparison with their convenient plot twists, over-reliance on archetypes, and serious lack of dramatic and psychological realism.

I'm not saying Ms. Espenson shouldn't be given a chance (especially after her amazing work on "Dirty Hands" and "Escape Velocity"), but it just seems kind of sudden to give her that much control, and her work hasn't proven itself in terms of themes and drama the way that of Mark Verheiden or Michael Angeli or Toni Graphia or even Jeff Vlaming and Anne Coffell Saunders has.

A show is only as good as its head writer, and I hope for the best, but I do worry.

Personally, I think everyone's doing a bit too much assigning of blame or success to Ron Moore on this one. Early Battlestar had the advantage of being fresh with a new concept and lots of unexplored ground to cover. Ron should get all the credit in the world for creating that.

But then a few years in, the number of new story-lines fell off the face of the Earth. I don't think that's Ron Moore or Jane Espensen's fault or credit. We were learning less about the characters and watching approximations of the characters' reactions from different writers in a sort of serial form.

My complaints with season 3 and 4 were that The Cylons stopped being the primary antagonists. It lead to a more nuanced but less gripping enemy. Drama had to become more manufactured because there wasn't the threat of imminent death every other episode.

And honestly, I would disagree that everything Moore touched was gold. I actually thought many of his episodes were dramatically heavy handed. There was often very little range of emotion outside of fear and anger. The attempts at humor when it was there was sterile and unconvincing. Honestly, I've never thought that non-stop lack of control was a very gripping or psychologically realistic It felt like a stage play for emo-kids with no self control. And I like Ron Moore.

All that said, it would be nice if Moore was show-running Caprica only because BSG is his baby. But at the same time, if he doesn't want to do it... far better to give it to someone who is excited to be doing it then keeping it and doing a half-hearted job.

I just have to say, WOW, Muldfeld and Test Monkey. That was the most intelligent, interesting exchange I think I've read in Sci Fi Wire's comments. And you two really know your BSG.

I also agree with Muldfeld's take on Buffy alums. I enjoy Espenson's work, so I'm more than willing to see how Caprica turns out.

I think everyone should wait and give Jane a chance. Not every episode written by every other writer on BSG was top notch either. Give her the first ten episodes as show runner before you give up.