‘The Way That People Are Watching’ …Caprica (Part 1)

This post includes some very general spoilers for Battlestar Galactica and the first two episodes of Caprica.

“I knew that wasn’t real. Nothing in here is real. It was the way that people were watching.” — It’s not the reality of the observed but the manner of observation that counts: That’s one of several pertinent points of view towards virtual reality. In Ronald D. Moore’s new TV series Caprica, prequel to his amazingly thought-provoking reimagining of Battlestar Galactica, a virtual avatar driven by an artificial intelligence pinpoints this problem by uttering the somewhat heavy-handed line above. But there is more to the scene than that, and it is this surplus that makes the scene work and could, for this one viewer, make the series work.

Typing out that line of dialogue made it seem clunky and pretentious to me. It is the kind of line you’d expect to be quoted in a schoolbook chapter titled, “Science Fiction Actually Discusses Some Stuff Important Enough For The Classroom”, followed by an activity that encourages pupils to “Discuss What This Line Might Mean. Could It Mean That People Watch Things Even If They Aren’t Real? Yes? Amazing! Also, Note That This Character Is Frightened By Fictional Popular Media, And So Should You.”

And indeed, the line could be read as an abstract of what Eco labelled apocalyptic thinking in his essays on Apocalittici e integrati: What people were watching, in the case of this scene, was a collage of depravity, a deviantly sexual, murderously violent and confusingly blasphemous orgy in a virtual environment. No matter that it wasn’t real: The new media experience packages the descent of civilisation in the guise of its unreality, and this will be the end of us all, right? That apocalyptic interpretation is certainly supported by the fact that the whole series is set “58 Years Before the Fall”, the destruction of human society in a nuclear holocaust depicted in Battlestar. By such moral pessimism, uncontrolled sexuality equals a propensity towards murder, watching either of those things for entertainment equals succumbing to a base craving to repeat them, and it’s all new media’s fault for being so unacceptably good at producing the kinds of things we secretly want to see but shouldn’t.

Caprica takes these concerns very seriously. But in terms of dramatic attraction, it would be excessively boring to simply demonstrate that theory, and then have characters describe it. Yet the scene in question is never in danger of boring viewers, because that line of self-conscious meta-commentary is integrated in several layers of situational context, all of which is relevant to the point. This balances apocalyptic fears against Eco’s integrated media competence that is necessary to cope with the manner of storytelling, as well as demonstrated by other characters in the story. And the complexity in question does not revolve around such simple meta-jokes as the fact that the character shocked by the brutal virtual reality is itself a virtual being, or the idea that the whole fictitious reality of the planet Caprica is less than real and we are the ones watching it, one way or another. Instead, the complexity comes first and foremost because there is so much going on at the same time.

Virtual Zoe says that line to a virtual avatar of real schoolgirl-turned-hobby-programmer Zoe, giving us a doppelganger scene, which the episode correctly expects us to cope with immediately, because it is now a standard device of fantastic cinema and TV. And cope we do, without taking time for wonder or disorientation, especially since we’re already busy figuring out which character is which. That’s not the question which character is the real Zoe and which is her digital copy: We know that. But like Battlestar did with the robotic Cylons, the series treats the artificial character as another full person, so digital Zoe has different values, perceptions and a different agenda than real Zoe, and we’re left figuring out who these two people are — rather than which one is real. This transcends a purely pessimistic interpretation while driving home the general point: Virtuality doesn’t preclude your relationship with a character, it’s the way you watch them act and speak and think and feel that matters.

Here, it is real Zoe that has some experience with facing a media doppelganger, and generally more experience than virtual Zoe with their shared virtual world. So it is she who soothes virtual Zoe and explains to her how this world works. But immediately, the dialogue goes to other places, because there is still more going on, as real Zoe is going to use that virtual world and her virtual copy for a real world plot, thus not just demonstrating routine media use but putting it in its typical place as a means to an end. Neither view outweighs the other: There is reason to worry about the casual brutality along with virtual Zoe, but there is just as much reason to follow the unfolding intrigue for which the virtual escapism is just a vehicle of communication.

That complexity, I think, makes a better point about virtuality than a direct interpretation of virtual Zoe’s fears ever could, continuing a parallel virtue from Battlestar. Technology has all the dimensions of current media debates in these series, prominently including apocalyptic concerns. But we are never allowed to forget how the media we discuss are integrated into all the real things we do. The revolution is not incorporated in the sole robot developed by a mad genius off in his secret lab, for the sake of creating a robot and of being mad and a genius and all secret-y about it. The revolution takes place in a new format for schoolkids’ afternoon chat rooms, where they go for the sake of talking about all the other stuff going on in their lives. And we have no hero climbing the steps to that secret lab and confronting the possibilities and dangers of cybernetic innovation, but a user competently manipulating the media they take for granted: That’s the way that people are watching.

The first two episodes have been a bumpy ride for me, with some scenes I adore endlessly, and many others that literally put me to sleep. I feel that the distinction between situational complexity and technological wonder defines one of the qualities that set apart the two types of Caprica moments, and I’ll be discussing some of those moments in greater detail next.