BSG vs. Firefly/Serenity

Yesterday, the Syfy channel was showing Serenity, which I own and I have kind of started rewatching Firefly.

I also have been Netflixing Battlestar Galactica. Yesterday I had an interesting moment of:
"Do I watch Serenity because it's on but I've seen it before many times. Or should I put in the BSG DVD that I just got and which I have not yet seen?"

I ended up watching BSG.

There are some parallels, such as both shows are about a rag-tag crew (one much, much bigger than the other) living on the edge, both running from something.

Where Firefly/Serenity wins is the humor. BSG is just grim and grey, always inside the ships, only sunlight is flashes where Gaius and Number Six are talking back at his house on the lake pre-apocalypse. F/S at least visits planets and gets to go out into the sun.

Plus F/S has Wash for levity. When I first watched Firefly, I marathoned it and then again for the commentary. I loved Wash and Zoe right away. And as I rewatch Firefly, my affection for Jayne has increased. Adam Baldwin does a great job as Jayne, being sly, blunt, crass, but with hidden depths. And funny too.

Where BSG wins is with the plot. What's going to happen? Will they find Earth? Who are the Cylons? When and how will we find out? What in the world is up with Number Six in Gaius's head? What does Six see in Gaius? It does ask much bigger questions than Firefly.

Plus there's just more of BSG with several seasons, movies like Razor and the Plan, and now the prequel Caprica. I'm sure in an alternate world, there are multiple seasons of Firefly, but alas in the one I'm in, there's only the one season.

I am looking forward in BSG to seeing how women are portrayed. Sure the President is a woman and the military is mixed gender. But the continuation of the human race does depend on baby-making and in BSG, it's still women who do that. Plus in the episode I just watched about the prison ship, Cally, who was part of the delegation to recruit prisoners for a work detail, was taken by a prisoner and it's implied that he was going to rape her. That's still a danger that women face that men do not.