Geeking out on Battlestar Galactica

Sorry I’ve slowed down on my posts a bit, but I really haven’t been feeling like writing when it’s triple-digit degree weather. So what I’ve been mostly doing when I haven’t been desperately seeking anywhere air conditioned (definitely not my house) is watching Battlestar Galactica.

I know I’m a bit late in the game — I’m halfway into season 2 — but now that I’m finally watching this show after years of everyone telling me to, I find that it’s just as compelling as people have been saying it is. Now the cool thing about having your own loosely-themed blog is you can basically write about anything and make it relate, so here I can talk about one of the stars of Battlestar Galactica…the Korean-Canadian Grace Park, who plays several versions of a Cylon often known as Sharon Valerii.

It’s really refreshing to see an Asian actress in a mainstream American(/Canadian) TV show where she doesn’t even play a character that is specifically supposed to be Asian. Not that I’m totally adverse to “Asian-specific” roles, but it’s nice to see an Asian woman playing a character that could just as well be a white character. Of course, this shouldn’t even be a big deal — especially for a show filmed in Vancouver, BC — and maybe the fact that I do think it’s worth pointing out says something about the industry.

Apparently it took some effort on Grace Park’s part to not get cast in stereotypical roles, too. She said at last year’s Asia Pacific Actor’s Network conference that she “had to really hold out.”

I hope she continues to pick good roles and showcase her considerable beauty and talent.