Episode Report Card Jacob Clifton: B- | 2 USERS: D+ YOU GRADE IT Speaking Truth To Power
By Jacob Clifton | Season 3 | Episode 8 | Aired on 11.16.2006
Bulldog, now questionable again, exercises in his cell on the basestar; in his quarters on Galactica. Finally he growls, with purpose, staring out at the camera. A cat's paw. You can count his masters as they multiply. Adama's phone rings, and Bulldog asks to speak to him: "I need to see you right now." He knows Danny knows, Bill knows that, but he also knows he's Bill, so death or high water you know what he's going to say: "I'll be right there."
Kara and Saul in the common room, laying out screen shots from the video: "The Cylons are saddled up on him. They've got a perfect, point-blank, no-deflection shot. They had him dead to rights." Tigh's confused, but sees her destination from here. Starbuck: "Novacek was hit and smoking, flying straight and level. Any nugget could make that kill. The Cylons could've wasted him any number of times, and they didn't. They didn't. They let him escape." Saul takes a big drink and notes that Cylons do nothing by accident. "Yeah, that's what I was thinking too," says Starbuck. "Did Novacek say how he was able to overcome the Cylons that were holding him prisoner? They were sick? Had a virus? I mean, how many viruses do the Cylons have, sir?" Maybe it was the virus from before -- and the fact that Tigh doesn't know the whole story shows how high-level the whole Helo/Roslin issue really was -- "the same virus those Cylons we found were suffering from." Or else, Kara says, they went with a story the Galactica would buy. She keeps talking as Adama comes near to Bulldog's quarters: "Novacek was held on a baseship for three years, escapes, and then conveniently finds our Fleet with no agenda and no reason to be here."
Adama arrives at Bulldog's door, hands open: "Hey, Dan." Bulldog bashes him in the face with a steel pipe, throws him across the room, straddles and hog-ties Adama with his belt: "It's funny how all the training comes back, huh?" He holds the pipe across Adama's throat, bringing him low. Making him small. "Why did you lie to me, Bill?" Adama nears passing out, and Bulldog relents for a moment: "All those years...you know what I kept telling myself? What stupid, fracked-up dream I held onto? I kept thinking, 'Just hang in there, Bulldog. Bill Adama's coming. He won't leave you to rot in here, not him. He won't leave a man behind. Just hold on.'" We build our worlds around things. Rules. Structures. Human psychology is based on projection. You think Bill will come get you, you think there's somebody with answers, you think there's fairness in the universe, and when that goes away and you don't have any easy answers, you feel small. Again with the pipe: "But you weren't coming. You didn't think I was alive. You weren't even hoping I was alive!" Bulldog is the colony of New Caprica, is Geminon and Sagittaron, Scorpion and Caprica, is the Olympic Carrier and Maya, rising to speak. He is Billy Keikeya.