Episode Report Card Jacob: D | 1419 USERS: C+ YOU GRADE IT BattleNoir Redactica
By Jacob | Season 2 | Episode 14 | Aired on 2006.01.27
On Cloud 9, this interesting-looking security guy is questioning Apollo about the mysteriously appearing dead guy with the piano-wire device, with which the security officer is now playing: "Whatever happened, looks like you found your guy." Apollo asks after Siobhan and the kid, and the guy's like, "Cloud 9's an open port. Chances are, they're already off ship. I'll get a team down here." I like this guy.
The security guy leaves as Zarek appears, beginning the one purely noir scene of the entire episode. Completely warm, he's like, "Lee! I just heard, are you all right?" Instead of asking, "Heard from whom?," Apollo just gets bitchy. Zarek explains that he's on Cloud 9 for a "Quorum meeting; nothing as exciting as all this, I assure you." Zarek reiterates that the bordellos of Cloud 9 are legal, "but still...the son of the almighty Adama?" So I guess that's the answer: they're legal but still frowned upon, or something. Maybe the Fleet just finds the pimp-related cognitive dissonance too much to bear. Lee interrupts, hard as stone: "Talk to me about the black market." Zarek explains that it is "widespread, inevitable, and -- according to President Roslin -- illegal." Is the trade policy really so vague that nobody can understand the difference between barter and an artificial decrease in supply? Lee smirks, "So it's no surprise that you and Fisk were in it up to your necks." Zarek begs off and asserts that, given that he represents the Astral Queen, he has to be careful about the friends he keeps. I guess that doesn't hold true for pissing/make-out buddies. Speaking of the Astral Queen, though, Apollo's got Fisk's log, which says that he made three runs to Zarek's ship in the last ten days, proving he's in on it. Apollo demands ship names and contacts and whatnot, and Zarek's eyebrows have gone completely crazy on his face: "I can't help you. Why do you think Fisk approached me?" Lee figures it's about Fisk wanting a piece of the scam, or wanting to squeeze Zarek for protection. Zarek smiles, gets a drink, and has a seat so that he can indulge Lee for as long as it takes. As usual, I want to like him, and then they get you in the fourth act: "You and your father are so blinded by the past. Fisk's black market was up and running when he approached me. He knew Adama would pick up on his unauthorized shuttles, so he tried to force me into taking over the deliveries, creating a firewall between Pegasus and the illegal shipments." So...it was Fisk that created the black market. The "widespread, inevitable" black market. How incredibly stupid. How stupidly "the influence of Cain, it lingers." Whatever. This scene is wonderfully acted and it's fun to watch, even as it's asking you to believe that a universal human quality did not exist in the Fleet until one drunken sailor got his ass organized. Zarek proves that he turned Fisk down by the fact that all supply ships stopped coming to the Astral Queen, period, since the last time he saw Fisk there. Don't those guys usually riot and rape when they don't get supplies on time?