I've been trying to watch the "webisodes" of Battlestar Galactica produced for the winter break. Let me go ahead and say it: watching webisodes sucks. Unless there are some substantial revisions to the format, I'm going to go ahead and declare the idea DOA.
Who ever thought that this was a good idea: you click on an episode, you watch a thirty-second commercial, you sit through a four-minute chunk of story, and then you have to go find the next episode in the list and repeat the process. Except this time, you've already seen the damn ad. And the first twenty seconds or so are the title screen and a recap of the last episode.
Let's go over that again: You spend a minute searching a list, watching the same advertisement and title screen, and then part of an episode you've already watched, all for a little bitty fragment of a story. No possible chance for immersion, only an irrepressibly irritating experience.
Have I mentioned that it's repetitive?
I applaud the networks for trying something new and innovative, and for actually trying to make use of the Internet. In an age where every big media corporation seems terrified of ones and zeroes, this is something laudable. We need more people trying new things.
I just hope they find different people.
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My complaint with Webisodes (the Heroes ones are just as bad) is that they always try to cover a larger story. What could possibly be more insufferable than a thirty-minute story broken into 3 minute chunks? And they try to introduce new characters, but they don't have time to develop them or even really give the audience a backstory. I think the "webisode" could work if it were a stand-alone short using familiar characters. This would be ideal for comedies. Why aren't there Webisodes for "The Office" or "Robot Chicken"?
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