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Everything louder than everything else! Just because this is the best show on television doesn't mean that it can't occasionally high-jump right the hell over the bar it has set for itself. The editing itself deserves a big sloppy Emmy-flavored kiss, and even that weird "Pegasus" New Age music flips itself inside-out into meaningful. Sorry to be all agog, but damn. I haven't felt this close to a myocardial infarction since I watched "The Resistance" through "Home " all in one sitting. I worried that the last recap, all that "the end of one chapter, the beginning of another" stuff, was being a little glib. It wasn't. Part of the issue is that it all hangs together, but not in a way that makes sense at all. I don't even know if I can encapsulate everything that happened tonight! That's so lame! I'll try. Random Plot Encapsulator Go! The presidential elections finally begin. Bill and Laura walk arm in arm, quietly laughing, hysterical and adorable. The even-more-brilliantly acted Chief (!) attacks Cally (!!) horrifically and somnambulistically, revealing his creepy serial suicide dreams, scared to death he's a Cylon and secretly digging the idea. All of this comes up in an ongoing counseling session with a grumpy/awesome Cottle-as-priest played by Al from Quantum Leap. A habitable planet is discovered. A fully lovable and sexy and nearly-redeemed Roslin tells Gaius to go frack himself (verbatim!) after he changes the abortion platform to a "Forget Earth" platform, in favor of settling the random planet. Zarek reveals his pro-Baltar influence publicly even as Chip Six is demanding a threesome with him, which, when one-third of your threesome is an invisible evil robot, basically amounts to dudes kissin'. Tory reveals a gift for rhetoric, but not yet her gift for being a total Cylon. I love her so much I'd rather be wrong. Noodle-slurping Lee and Kara continue the Longest Mutual Apology in the History of the Colonies, beautifully, and in a way that grants them both real grace for once. Racetrack might have shadowcatted a bunch of people into a mountain and then died. A huge fleet of Raptors and Vipers is dispatched to Caprica in order to fulfill Kara's promise to come back and rescue the Resistance. The very-awesome-throughout Kara is violently protective of Boomer, and later reunites with Anders, who has become cool, and all of them -- Kara, Sharon, Helo, etc. -- get pinned down under fire on Caprica for, like, the fifteenth time. You know I hate to fawn over the awesomeness of this show, but...I'm sure I'll find some problems for the full recap. I'll do my best. It doesn't stand alone as well as "Part I" episodes have done, but I can't really work up a complaint about that, because I am freaking out. And week's ninety minutes. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
This is a funny one, because while everything that happens, each piece of the episode, is awesome, nothing actually happens. It's a great episode; don't get me wrong. Pretty much everything that I've complained about is gone here. But it feels like such a setup that it's funny to take it apart and talk about it. I very much enjoyed every single second of it, for sure, but, like, I don't really remember anything that happens, after the fact, and there's so much momentum toward the finale that it's a strange little thing. Ron Moore -- whose wife, I think, is the best in the world -- said something interesting about that: basically, that endings are less fun to write than beginnings, because with endings, you have to wrap everything up and make it all click, whereas with episodes like this, you take every ball you have, and toss it in the air, and that's more satisfying to write. I get that, because he already knows where it's going. But we don't. So it's like when the window comes down at a peep show, at the end. Or so I would assume.
The following segment includes some violent content. Parental discretion is advised. They are not kidding. The previouslies are introduced by James Callis, and include Kara somehow having a conversation with Laura that takes place simultaneously on Kobol, in a forest, and on Galactica, in the sickbay. Apparently, at some point while Laura was on bedrest, they had this magical conversation and it changed Laura's mind about returning to Kobol -- even though that's the last thing she would have agreed to on her deathbed. I'm surprised Laura didn't airlock Starbuck's ass just for asking. Maybe she was distracted by the fact that she was suddenly in a forest and it was an entire season ago, and still with the cancer. I think it's probably best we haven't seen this conversation before, since clearly it would have been confusing. Or maybe week we'll learn that Laura's back on the chamalla and it all came to her in a dream. The subconscious is a poor editor, but this show is generally brilliant on that front. This episode in particular, I think, is a standout precisely because of the editing. Normally, you don't notice good editing, because that's the point of good editing, but when it hits so many emotional and narrative points, like a thousand home runs in every act, that's a whole other level of good.
Anyhow. Welcome to the longest teaser in the history of television. I love this, because it gives you a whole insight into how this episode is going to go: lots of energy, cutting across fifteen separate lives like a razor. All the loss of faith in the audience suggested by the ham-fisted dialogue in "Downloaded" is repaid in this one, with interest. It's brilliant. This despite nothing really happening; everything that happens has the immediacy and the viscerality of life, and none of the follow-through of fiction. It's awesome.
So Chief Tyrol is rolling about on the hangar deck having a bad nightmare, and it's important to note for both aesthetic and narrative reasons that he looks like one jillion shiny new octagonal cubits on top of a pile of real money. Propriety demands that we stop there, but trust me: it's all happening on the hangar deck. My goodness.
Over in Baltar's lab, a.k.a. the Galactica Morgue, there are octagonal "GAIUS FOR PRESIDENT" flyers all over every surface. The music from "Pegasus" that was so questionable begins at this point, and plays through the whole teaser, and I don't know if there's some subtle point here -- like how Chip Gaius had the same theme in "Downloaded" that Chip Six had, only backwards and sideways and blah blah music theory Crabcanoncakes -- that I'm too thick to notice, or if it's just finally okay in this house, but it's awesome and really contributes to the overall freaked-out awesomeness. Gaius is smoking, totally weirded out and scared, as Six watches from across the lab. "I'm going to lose," he tells her.
Cut to Adama's quarters faster than anything, where Laura's acting weird. She's standing in her stocking feet, reading off little notecards, talking and gesturing to herself, and then tearing them up and tossing them on the floor, doing that subvocalizing and throat-thrumming that makes her so very excellent. Tory knocks on the door and tells her, "One minute." So apparently Gaius and Laura are gearing up for something presidential and important. Laura thanks Tory and goes back to talking to nobody.
Cut like whoa to the Pegasus briefing room, where Starbuck is...different. You don't notice it as much here as later, but it starts here. Did you ever run into a girl you knew in high school, ten years later, and jump back in the James Brownian sense with how she'd turned into a woman? Not necessarily in a romantic sense, but just how your mental image of her as a "girl" is so strained against the reality of her as a woman? Voice deeper, more intense, more sure of itself? And it maybe makes you feel old? That's Starbuck. Katee Sackhoff is a fucking brilliant actor, but I never thought I'd be so impressed with a single choice of hers. Starbuck is a woman. She-- her posture. You know? Her voice. Watch it again with that in mind. It's freaky, and beautiful. She's explaining without any ado at all that they're going to be jumping somewhere two clicks above the surface, and that it's going to be hella dangerous. Helo's there, watching her, and all the pilots in the briefing room are kind of murmuring and wondering about if this is good. Gaeta stands by. Starbuck: "We're also expecting to take heavy fire. Simulations indicate losses of up to 20% can be expected." And who can blame the assembled pilots for going OMG about this, because their lives have been smooth as silk up till now. She admits that the mission -- which seems to be dear to her heart -- is "two-alpha," meaning the pilots can opt out of it; it's voluntary. She watches expectantly as they think really hard and look around at each other.
Back at the lab, Six is "comforting" Gaius, saying that if he just has "faith," everything will turn out "exactly as it should," which isn't really comforting, because in an ideal world, Gaius "should" immolate himself, and little kids should point and laugh. Gaius complains that he doesn't like to lose -- which, we know, little boy -- and then Six grimly and scarily tells him to have some faith, in that way where it's like, "Or I will invisibly kick you in the box." Gaius isn't having it: "I am about to face public humiliation, and you are singing the same old song." She looks off, smiling, because she -- and we -- know she's really, really not. "I'm a little tired of the melody," Gaius adds. Me too, but it's the one you're singing that's so boring. Don't you know by now, Baltar, that Six only shows up to move the plot along? Clearly you're going to win the debate.
Back to Laura, who's apologizing to Adama and being weird and halting and vulnerably out of character: "Sorry about the mess. It's a bit of a ritual -- a superstition, really. I used to do this before testifying at committee hearings." Grateful to have somebody to talk to, even though she initiated this whole crazy conversation in the first place, she gets really into the explanation: "This is what I do. I take one, memorize a talking point, then tear the card." She tears up a card and tosses it into the air: "Let the pieces fall as they may. It helps." Adama watches her noncommittally, but affectionately. Family acting weird and stressing out in weird ways and then giving voice to the stress in weird ways -- it's not exactly new to Adama: "Yeah, my father used to break pencils before he went into court, then borrow one from the clerk. Break preconceptions, work with what you have." I would love to see what Grandpa Adama was like. I imagine Atticus Finch, because Bill himself is very Atticus, only scary and without the dedication to telling the truth at all times. "You know," Laura says, "I like that." She grabs a pencil off Adama's desk, like at the end of the world you can waste shit like this, and tosses the pieces in the air. ["Ha! That's what I said -- that I wanted Adama to go, 'Uh, that was the last pencil in the fleet. Now everyone's going to have to be really sure about their answers in their crosswords.'" -- Wing Chun] "I like it. It's good," Laura smiles, distractedly. She admits that she does feel a little better, but asks what will happen if the moderator doesn't have a pencil. "Then you're pretty screwed," says Adama, very deadpan and offhand.
Mary McDonnell then does one of the neatest things I've ever seen an actor do. She stands there for a second, perfectly still, her hands fly all over in that distracted, useless way she last did with Billy, then she sounds like she might cry or vomit, and then her hands get about halfway to her face before she starts giggling. It's a tiny moment, but one that every single person I've spoken to has mentioned. More people even than didn't notice that Three was also Xena, which I thought would be the all-time record. McDonnell's so good physically at the worst of times, but this was Emmy-worthy, in all seriousness. So Roslin starts laughing, and covers her mouth, and Bill finally smiles at her, and she chokes out that she got the giggles before a debate even in high school. Which is cool in many ways because this is a woman who can rewrite the numbers of humanity with one hand while airlocking a pregnant woman with the other, and barely break a sweat, so of course she deals with stress in weird ways, but more importantly: she can only lose control this time because she's going up against fucking Gaius Baltar. The twitching, wriggling queen of the Squirrel People. Why not laugh? Tory comes to get Laura, and Bill escorts her out. She holds onto his arm, merrily -- and hysterically -- laughing the whole way. It's adorable and just this side of deranged.
Gaeta has taken over for his part in the Pegasus briefing: "What many of you don't know is that the captured Cylon Heavy Raider is capable of technobabble techonobabble we rip the brain out and put it in a Raptor and then they can jump way better and get to Caprica in less than ten jumps." Which gives the Raptors increased jump capabilities through the network, and also wraps up the "bitch forgot about my ride" problem. The pilots all think, "Whoa." Gaeta says that the "limiting factor" -- a phrase I haven't heard since my days in the corporate world, and heard enough times back then for a lifetime -- has been the actual hookup. "That obstacle has now been overcome," he intones dramatically, and nods to some Marines, who bring Boomer into the briefing room. Like you couldn't have downplayed that a little, Gaeta? The pilots all wig as she enters. She's in just a tank top, having lost her baby and most of her will a month ago, and she looks broken and small and it's painful to see. Starbuck jumps on the gasping crowd with a quickness: "She's here to help us. She's gonna lay out our navigational markers and update our jump coordinates." Helo watches this jump to his significant toaster's defense. "Does anyone have a problem with that?" Starbuck demands. One of the several pilots who actually jumped to their feet when Boomer entered sits down. Boomer just stares.
Cut to Six telling Gaius the whole spiel again about how he's been "chosen to lead these people by Almighty God," and plays with his tie. They're so boring with the same conversation all the time. Are they married? Gaius gets hideously below the belt: "Like the baby happened? The one I was 'destined to protect'?" No he didn't! But also, I think I only recently got the hang of how Six is both God and Gaius himself, so that's a pretty terrible dilemma on which he finds himself impaled: "If I'm the hand of God, and was supposed to do this thing, and I didn't fulfill it, then am I, and God, a big jerkoff?" Six gets his meaning immediately and is at once all up in his face, smiling scarily. "Don't let your anger drive you into blasphemy, Gaius." She plays with his hair. "The election's still two weeks away," she adds, and smashes his face down into the desk. He remains there for a sec, and Six's disembodied voice says, "Get your act together," as Zarek enters. Truer words, lady. "You ready?" asks Zarek. Without raising his head, Gaius mumbles, "Yeah, I was just taking a little nap."
In the Galactica hangar, Cally wanders around, looking for Chief. We see him shaking and twitching, just like he was a second ago. I hope he doesn't wig out!
Starbuck finally gets to the briefing going on in the briefing room: "This is our mission. It's our duty to the people we left behind. And if we need to use a Cylon to get them back, then so be it. [And if I got permission for it during a drug-induced hallucination of Kobol, well, threshold of revelation.] This is about trying to get as many survivors off Caprica as we can. Even so, it's still two-alpha. Anyone want to eject?" The pilots fidget. The door at the back of the room opens, and Helo takes his feet: "Commander on deck!" They assemble, and Apollo enters: "Don't worry. I won't be long. I want to hear it too." He's more commanding, too. (I was going to say, "also less of a girl," but that's not it either. Not exactly.)
Bill and the crazed arm candy he's escorting follow Tory down the corridor toward the press room. ["At this moment she was so loopy I wasn't sure Roslin hadn't forgotten to put her shoes back on." -- Wing Chun] "You just have to really try to think about something serious. That always helps," Adama tells the President. He's kind of giggly, too, or whatever passes for "giggly" with him. "Like what?" Laura asks, and he's stymied. They look into each other's eyes, and they both collapse into laughter again. Tory, leading the campaign toward the debate, spares barely a look behind her at the leaders of the entirety of humanity, rolls her eyes, and grumbles, "Great." It's awesome, like, very organic for the scene, to the point where you don't notice it's a classic West Wing cheat: "Aren't they being adorable? I'm so cutely disapproving and sexy. Doesn't that make them even more of a handful? People in power are still people, and they have foibles!" But it's okay, like it usually is on The West Wing, for the following reasons: they are, she is, and it does. And they do. Deliriously, wonderfully, disappointingly, powerfully: they do.
Apollo stands at the front of the brief, Starbuck at the podium with Gaeta and Boomer behind him. "No one has ever attempted a rescue mission from this distance, much less behind enemy lines. You'll be making history just by making the attempt. But bring these people back from Caprica...and you'll be making part of the future." Pause while they, and we, get weird about this. Racetrack -- I always think of Original Boomer with her, because she's so into it, so ready to prove herself, so excited about the mission, about heroism; so beautiful -- asks, by way of telling the COs that nobody's taking the 2A, "If you guys find Earth before we get back, will you save us a few seats?" Apollo smiles, and Racetrack smiles back. Starbuck: "Earth? Hell, if we find any rock with food and water, I'll build you guys a bar." She nods, and Apollo gaetas ("See? I told you I wouldn't be long") for the wireless so that they can listen to the debate, which he characterizes, humorously, as the "fun they'll be missing for the five days." As Jim the Moderator, whom we'll be talking about in a sec, tells us the basics -- that this is the first of two debates and that the election's in a month -- Boomer stands and nearly meets Starbuck's eyes: "Can I go now?" She's so out of it. Just demoralized and taken apart on every level. I'd rather she were bashing her head into something; it's too hard. All she's lost. Starbuck nods and asks the Marines to take Boomer out of there. Helo follows, and the rest of the pilots crowd the radio.
Still in the teaser! I know! The guitar gets suspenseful as Cally gets closer to Chief, just about ready to find him. It's scary.
Now, in the Galactica briefing room, Jim is super-hot. You know how the news anchors on TV shows always have that square blonde Jim Dial hair, and the jaw? They all look like Buddy Baker? And that patrician "most trusted voice in America" thing happening, no matter how young they are? Yeah: Jim is super-hot. Even in a flashy brassy rusty burnt-orange Aaron Doral jacket. "Now here comes Vice-President Gaius Baltar into the room, as we...uh...we await Madam President. Laura Roslin is very much ahead in the polls at this point..." The members of the press or Quorum or whomever look around and get chatty with each other, as Gaius stands at the front of the room, not embarrassing himself for once. I love camera-ready Gaius. "We believe that, uh...She's entering the room shortly, but still...still, of course, waiting for her." Jim does a good debate moderator. Is he in The Colonial Gang? He should be. (The real question is, will I get more "What's with the obsession?" emails about him than I did about Red Devil. That's the question.) The camera finally tracks Roslin's campaign into the briefing room as Jim continues telling us stuff about how Gaius announced his candidacy a month ago, and that he's "one of the most admired and brilliant scientific minds of our generation" and "played a critical role in saving the human race" and whatever. Zarek stands off to the side, hand still all pins-and-needles-y from the art of puppetry, as Gaius and Laura shake hands. "I'm going to wipe the floor with you, Gaius," says Laura, quietly and with a huge smile. "You must be losing your mind again," he laughs dorkishly. Laura: "If that's the best you can come up with, you really are in trouble. Good luck." Her pride and her assuredness. Remember the whole shit-for-hubris issue? Welcome to the scariest chapter.
Helo follows Boomer down the Pegasus corridor, frantically trying to find a way in. "How you doing?" he asks her. "You okay? Sharon, don't shut me out. Not now." He's on all sides of her simultaneously. Without looking anywhere but ahead, she speaks to him: "Something dark is coming, Helo. I can feel it. I can feel it lurking out there, waiting." He asks her to elaborate -- maybe she's talking Caprica -- but she just calls back to a Roslin line: "No. Not on the mission. Not any specific thing. It's more like a dark time."
Quick cut to Cally, still looking around for Chief. She finally finds him, whimpering and rolling around on the floor of the hangar. How the hell did he get there? How far's he gone? She touches him gently, to wake him, and he wakes up. The edits go crazy as he rouses, and beats her terribly. It's just shots of her face, his face, her arms trying to protect herself, his fists dropping again and again. There are two horrible things here. One, the fact that we don't see Chief actually connecting is a blessing and a curse: it's nice not to see him connect, but it's awful to see him and Cally in two different shots. They don't make sense, and the intercutting between them, between wonderful Chief hitting somebody, and then poor little Cally getting hit -- they don't make sense. They don't go together. It's worse. The separate, and vastly more horrible thing, is that even though it goes on forever, you don't want it to end, because when it ends, that's when Chief realizes what he's done. And you don't want that ever. Too hard. He finally snaps back, screams, and jumps away. There are three quick shots: a split-second of Cally's face, bloody; then them Chief looking at his bloody knuckles; and then a full shot of Cally, unconscious or nearly so, covered in blood. Chief rushes to her side and checks her vitals as she groans, out of it. It's monstrous. There's a voice over of Chief screaming for help, and then a silent shot of him carrying her out of the hangar, two different things out of synch, in slow-motion. How many Emmys now? Two or three, this one just for editing, and we're still in the fucking teaser.
Credits. Oh my God! Take a rest if you need it. If you told me Cally got beat up, I'd laugh and buy the person a beer no questions asked, because you know she bothers me. Or so I thought. But it's not just the shocking parental-discretion part at the end of the teaser: Roslin's cuteness as she prepared and promptly lost it, Tory being adorable, the Caprica mission, Boomer's premonitions, the bad-assery at the start of the debates, Starbuck's fulfillment, Chief's dissolution. Is this what it would be like if you did all the drugs at once? My goodness. Battlestar Galactica just called, and it said that it's sorry you can't peel yourself off the screen. 49,579 souls in the Fleet and I don't even care to do the math right now! More show!
Tyrol sits at a table somewhere on Galactica, flashing back to his attack on Cally. Brother Cavill (Al from Quantum Leap! The Boy With Green Hair! That freaky guy from Blue Velvet! Everything you ever saw!) introduces himself, sitting across from Chief: "I understand you've asked for religious counseling." Cylon. Or at least a DEMAND PEACE monkey. ["Well, there is the name: to 'cavil' is 'to raise trivial and frivolous objection.' Is that what he's doing with Tyrol? How, and why, and for whom?" -- Wing Chun] Tyrol says that he's "never really believed" in conventional therapy, because his father was a priest. Whatever happens , I'm glad Tyrol's involved in a religious issue, because the Fleet is 20% Geminese and only accounts for 1/12 of the Fleet's governing body (unless you count Laura's connections), and it's necessary to have a focal character for that with whom we can identify, because it's been verified for me in an informal poll that, yes, I am the only person who actually loves Sarah Porter. Cavill: "I see. You thought you'd have an easier time with a priest than a real doctor. Okay." Shades of Scientology: if I don't call it Psychology, but it works exactly like any decent Psychology, then it's okay. "I pray to the Gods every night," says Tyrol, "but I don't think they listen to me." Cavill pulls a backflip right out the gate: "Do you know how useless prayer is? Chanting and singing and mucking about with old half-remembered lines of bad poetry. And you know what it gets you? Exactly nothing." Tyrol speaks for us all: "...Are you sure you're a priest?" I'll say it right now, every priest I've ever really talked to has basically said that same thing. The Gods are there when you get to the actual end of your rope, not when you're just fucking around and playing therapy case and beating up Cally. That's the point of the Gods. Remember that guy who was in the flood and the boat came by, and the helicopter came by, and the superhero came by, and the whole time the guy's like, "It's cool, God's got this one handled," so of course he dies horribly, and then gets all snotty with God, like, "Why weren't you there for me?" And God's like, "When the fuck was I not?" That's Geminon. It's only a pissing contest when you're lazy; God just wants you to be cool and work hard on being strong.
Cavill explains in no uncertain terms that he's been a priest forever, and that the point of the Gods isn't to answer prayers, because they set it up that way so that we'd have to figure it out for ourselves: "Find our own answers, our own way out of the wilderness, without a nice little sunny path all laid out in front of us in advance." I do have to say that the Cylon God seems a lot nicer when you put it that way, which you can't often say. Cylon God told you the street address and how to get there. "That's what I'm trying to do!" Chief insists. "I'm trying to find my way." Cavill busts another backflip: "Well, it's not going to get better until you see what the problem is. And the problem is, you're screwed up, heart and mind. You. Not the...not the Gods or fate or the universe. You." Tyrol says, "Thanks for the pep talk," kind of mind-blown, but he's in. How could you not be?
In Apollo's quarters on Pegasus, he's totally eating noodles! Nice. The pasta of the fathers will be visited upon their sons, once they get their shit together. Starbuck enters and they act all playground. She's all dressed up and ready to go, she's just so itchy and prepared and gung-ho, it's awesome. This is her last thing. You knew it would be, heading into the fire: take that last hit off the concept of being whole, just in case she dies in a hail of bullets. Apollo: "Um...I just wanted to say, um...uh...good hunting." She thanks him, and there's a wonderfully Apollo moment: "Yeah, it's a good plan. It's a good plan. Sharon should be able to jump you into the atmosphere a couple of clicks above the surface." And Starbuck smiles, because that's just so Apollo. "...Down below the Cylon dradis. I know the plan, Lee. I wrote it." He smiles and looks down. She and Bill should have taught a Commander Orientation seminar to the Pegasus crew: "Yeah, he doesn't actually think you're a subliterate moron, he just thinks in specs." "I gotta go," she says, and Apollo takes a moment: "I hope you find him, Kara. I really do." His smile is heartbreaking: beautiful, loving, resigned, supportive. And since it's them, Starbuck's way too adrenalized to pick up on half of the eighteen things he just said, with his mouth and face. "So do I," she says. And gets it. Apollo watches her go. It's rough. How many times, how many ways, can you say goodbye? Without feeling like a total D.Q.? Starbuck and Apollo will one day figure that out and then we'll all know once and for all. They are nothing if not dedicated researchers of the finer points of that. Like how, one day, the owl won't stop counting and just crunch down, and he'll have done us a great service on that day. And then the metaphor goes to a weird place where the Tootsie-Roll center of their relationship is gooey and gets stuck in your teeth. But you know. That works too, really.
Back on Colonial One -- I miss Billy more, here, than anywhere else -- Tory's reading to Roslin from The Colonial Dispatch, as Roslin waves other nameless aides away: "Last night's debate only solidified the perception that Dr. Baltar, for all his charm, is essentially an empty suit when it comes to matters of substantial policy." Roslin smiles that it's "nice" when the press gets it right. Because Madame Airlock should know from warping the Fourth Estate, considering that she and Tom Zarek were all set to detour the entire process in favor of a religiously-motivated coup against the acting government, using cynical cheap-tricks emotional agitprop no less, a mere few months back. Hubris, girl. "Don't forget, the radical religious charge is dangerous," says Tory. And fucking apt, caver. "It may be a low blow from a desperate man, but it's the only issue he's managed to get any traction on. He will keep exploiting it." Tory manages to keep from adding, "...which is entirely your fault, George W. Koresh." Roslin smiles, resting calmly in the bosom of the truly lost: "He's gotta come up with something much, much bigger than that. If he wants to make it the central issue of his campaign, it's not going to work."
Cut to Zarek saying, "You gotta keep hitting her on the religious thing. Every time we go there, you score points and we move the polls in our direction." And honestly, they should. That is bullshit, and most if not all of what is wrong with America at the moment. We're back in the morgue, by the way, and I'm not exactly on Gaius's side or anything. "Baltar Takes The Heat In The First Debate," blares a newspaper on the desk. Ron Moore loves this Baltar line, for some reason: "Yes. I'm not sure if you're aware, Tom, but the mob isn't usually in the habit of electing ungodly apostates who denigrate people of faith." Which, awesomely, manages to denigrate both candidates and the "mob" itself, all at the same time. Zarek murmurs hopeful nothing and Six appears, perching sexily behind Zarek: "He's right. Listen to him." The intuition-proxy is saying one thing, but the body language is hard to decode. If Six wants to get with Zarek, what's that say about Gaius? Gaius: "Of course. Of course, how blind I'm being. Thank you. Yes. Um, things are going to turn around, you'll see. What is that, advice? Well, thank you. Thank for your keen insight, your astounding political acumen." Somewhere in there, he remembers that Six isn't, you know, real. "You know, I'm so assured right now, Tom, I'm just going to sit right back and wait for the hand of God to reach down and change my political fortunes. How about that?" There's no reaction, beyond "confused much?" from the viewers, because we immediately cut to...
Oh, so many Raptors! Twenty! It's cool! Starbuck, Boomer, Helo, and a couple of Marines are in the lead Raptor, with the Cylon vivisected Heavy Raider brain all nasty and connected to the Raptor computers. Would it have really been more expensive to do this in the Heavy Raider itself? Moore says yes, because they would have had to construct a Heavy Raider. So a few seconds of technobabble in the teaser, and that's fine. This is really where you start to see the Starbuck Is A Woman Now stuff from earlier. Her every word is precise and heavy and commanding. It's awesome. She does all the checks and readiness prep and whatever, and Dualla clears the first of the <10 jumps. Kara rogers that, and then asks for Actual on Galactica. Adama duallas in, and Starbuck, so mature and beautiful, asks, "Did I ever say 'thank you'?" Bill manages not to laugh, and just Adamas right in there: "No. Then again, that would be a first, wouldn't it?" She laughs, like a woman, like a hero. "Thank you," she tells him. He asks her to come back in one piece, so we know this ain't going well, and says that will "be thank-you enough." Again, an Adama tells Starbuck "Good hunting," and he hangs up. Tigh looks at him, and doesn't speak. Nor at any time during this episode does Tigh speak, because right now we're snorting the coke of hope, not popping the barbiturates of nay-saying. It's nice to see him, though -- he's like the stand-in of Adama's completely missing sense of the concept of failure, just looking quietly and daring the universe, Boomer, Starbuck, to fuck this up.
Starbuck is smiling, so much older, as she checks in with the SAR ("Search And Rescue") team. A bunch of pilots check in with the usual awesome names ("Eeyore." "The Secret History." "The Virgin Mary." "My So-Called Life Lunchbox." "My Mom's Old D&D Figurines") and it's the whole mishmash of how exciting this mission actually is, since it's been almost the full season coming. In the back of the Raptor -- where Helo is finally doing actual ECO stuff instead of cuddling manfully with Boomer and/or Chief as his full-time job -- Boomer is like, "I cannot believe you talked me into this," and Helo assures her that it's important and that he'll be with her the whole time: "It's you and me from now on, no matter what. Just like we agreed." He smiles like the dreamiest, most protective, bestest boyfriend in the world, and Boomer's like, "Sorry. Sorry about my issues, I do appreciate that." Close-up on her face: "I just can't get her out of my head." Helo looks away, down. "...Our little girl." You wanna jump through the screen and fucking shake Roslin till her teeth rattle. Boomer notices the Marines watching, and Helo sees Boomer see them, and turns to tell them to fuck off. They look moderately chastened. Fuck them. Don't you know the real pilots got over the toasterfucker thing months ago?
Racetrack checks, and I believe that her co-pilot is named Skull ("The Peacekeeper Wars"), and then Kara tells Sharon, note, that she's on. It's more intimate, but really less, because "Boomer" is a callsign, and that name is gone now. Forever. Ouch. Even Ron Moore doesn't ever say "Boomer" anymore. Sharon flips switches and buttons and shit connected to the huge throbbing nasty brain, and then inserts a cable into her arm. I forget what they call it on medical shows: a "port"? She has a thing already in her arm, like an IV. I'm glad she's getting to help the Fleet again in some kind of capacity, but that's still rough. She's unavoidably a Snow Crash gargoyle, you know? USB ports and crap. It hurts her. Starbuck gives the mark to the twenty Raptors, and they jump away, beautiful to look at.
Racetrack's Raptor appears alone, in some nebula, in the black, alone. The camera moves back once, then again: nobody else. "This doesn't look right," says Racetrack, and Skull ten-fours there are "no other contacts on dradis." Racetrackgets freaked. "Oh, man," says Skull, "we're at the wrong jump coordinates." The Marines get worried. I know that the other thing that happens later, with another Raptor, is just an accident of the shit-happens variety, but this...it's interesting. It changes everything. Boomer needn't know, of course, but it's funny that the planet they're about to discover, which will become so important and will probably be named something ridiculous shortly...that's a coincidence. Maybe the thing that will happen a bit later is just cover for the fact that Boomer sent Racetrack out there for a reason.
The rest of the Raptor fleet jumps in from the first try, even more magnificently, and Starbuck immediately notices that they've lost "someone already." She checks who, and this is awesome and tiny. As she says the name, the focus throbs, for just a beat, past Starbuck to Sharon -- "It's Racetrack" -- and then back again to the foreground. This show is gorgeous! I wasn't even thinking that when I noticed this. I just thought that it was an issue about not trusting Sharon. Sharon immediately gets an "oh, fuck" headache, because she's still a pilot inside, especially now, back on her turf, as Helo asks Starbuck how they get back to grab that Raptor, and Starbuck shakes her head a bit. "Mission rules say we keep going unless we lose three. So we keep going. Racetrack will just have to find her way back to base." Heavy is the head, etc., quietly to herself: "It's a hell of a way to start, though."
Note the tag, the last line, above. Nice.
Back to Fr. Cavill and Tyrol, starting their own mission, back on Galactica. This show, man. "Let's talk about what happened," Cavill suggests. Chief talks about how he can't believe it, can't believe how that could happen with Cally, how it's "like it's a nightmare." Again, we are treated to various flashbacks of the attack. "She said you were asleep when she found you," says Cavill. Good, that means everybody knows what happened, and has judged it a personal freakout issue and not a reason to hand Tyrol to Gaius or Tigh. "Were you having a nightmare when she woke you up?" Cavill asks. There's a flash of Tyrol swan-diving off a bulkhead, and he stutters, "I...don't remember." Cavill's like, "Right. So...been having any recurring dreams lately?" Chief's shoe, walking in the blue light. "No," says Chief. Cavill changes his tone of voice just enough to startle: "Okay. That's what we in the pray trade call a lie. And lies aren't going to get you anywhere, my friend. So skip over the denials and the deceptions and let's get right down to it, shall we? You're having dreams. What are they?" Two things here. First, if you haven't seen the West Wing episode "Noel," go watch it now. This isn't a rip-off or anything like that, but it's an interesting compare-and-contrast. Secondly -- and this one is frankly more important: "Dear Aaron Douglas. Not to get gay on you, but you must never shave again. Let it slide about two days before any time listed on your call sheet. Love, Everybody in the World." Dude's looking hotter than Eick right now. Chief looks down, up, down, chewing his lip, walking that edge of denial he first learned so well with Boomer, way way back, to where he could draw its contours blindfolded. With his toes.
"Tell me about your dream, Chief" is our welcome back from commercial. We flash to Chief walking, slowly, climbing a ladder up the wall, very damn slowly, in an orange safety suit. He finally reaches the top, walks along a catwalk in the hangar, the light blinding, shining up from the floor. He stands against the railing, and then one foot touches the railing wires, and he maneuvers himself very gracefully up over the railing, face set with purpose. Arms outstretched, he drops, down on to the hangar floor below. "Every night -- every night, it's the same," he tells Cavill. It's been happening for a couple of weeks. "And you were having the same dream when Cally woke you up, weren't you?" Cavill asks him. Chief says he doesn't remember -- twice, maybe once -- and gets all the way to "it doesn't really matter" before jumping to the post-trauma: "All I remember is Cally on the ground, and the blood." Cavill offers a somewhat spurious explanation for what happened : "By waking you up, she prevented you from carrying out your secret desire to kill yourself." Tyrol gets all WTF: "I don't have a secret desire to kill myself." And Cavill almost laughs at him: "Well, actually, you're right. It's not a secret....The question is, why?" Tyrol makes a "huh" face, not exactly buying it just yet.
Skull's telling Racetrack that there was "some kind of glitch in the navcon firmware," okay, and that the "bottom line" is that they're "to hell and gone" from where they're supposed to be, "Skipper." That's a lot of different kinds of dialogue for one line, but I like the last parts a lot. Racetrack thinks: "Any chance that we can still catch up with them?" Nope, plus the mission rules say to go home. Racetrack gets kind of pissed, aghast at how, even now, she doesn't get the B-story, while fucking Kat got a whole episode. So unfair. "It was the first jump!" Skull's like, "You're the one that gave me the coordinates," so maybe there's no Sharon fear here, and Racetrack resigns herself to returning to "the barn." Skull suddenly notes a random "large planetary body." Maybe it's Roslin's self-imposed sense of total rightness. They talk about how it's due to dradis interference that it just showed up like that, but meanwhile, Racetrack's checking out the specs on her screen. Nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere. Organic molecular spectra. Fresh water: "Hey, you know what this is? It's habitable." The Marines aren't sure if they believe it, but they're grinning anyway. "We may have just found a world that can support human life," says Racetrack. "Maybe we're not just a bunch of frack-ups after all." Skull looks at her like, "That was the problem?" How funny would it be if, week, there was a whole deal with Racetrack going after Kat, all, "You're just not the pilot you used to be!" and smacking her around, and then all the lesbian fanfic would be about Racetrack stealing Case from Kat, and then season some Nugget could knock Racetrack off her pedestal, and eventually it would loop back around to Tigh.
Roslin, silent Tigh, Racetrack, and Skull watch Gaeta brief Adama on the planet in his quarters: "There's [sic] some extremes at the poles that we couldn't withstand, but that's not unusual." Adama commends Racetrack and Skull, and they are happy. And now officially in possession of shiny new SAG cards!
Over to Pegasus, where Apollo is briefing...whoever's left, I guess on the same stuff again.
In the Petty Quarters, Gaeta is coming out of the shower as Dualla's undressing for her own, and they talk about the same stuff again, and Gaeta notes that the dradis interference might protect the planet from Cylon detection.
In his lab, Baltar's bitching about "this stupid planet" to Zarek and Six, and how the whole Fleet is in an uproar for nothing. Zarek stares at the screen and specs of the planet, and Six lies seductively across a desk behind him, watching Gaius. "You're not seeing the big picture," she says. "This is your new home. The place where you will lead a new life. This is the future, Gaius." Um, last year you said the same thing about Kobol, no? Look, lady. He responds to her dismissively, and Zarek begs his pardon, and then a lot happens at once. "Can you imagine if we actually had to live on that thing?" Baltar asks, wanting Zarek -- sorry, "Tom" -- to side with him against the invisible robot inside his head. But instead, Zarek -- who actually knows a damn thing -- gets confused by the Baltar Mystique, and stares at the map, saying, "You...are a genius." I love how the Mystique makes it all happen. "And?" says Gaius, with a tiny little "what of it, fool?" at the end, even though it's Zarek, as usual, that is the actual genius. "Pay attention," says Six portentously. "You're about to win the election." Chills, people. I love lines like that.
Baltar snaps to, and asks Zarek to elaborate. Zarek explains, "We needed an issue. Something to set us apart from Roslin. Something to put her clearly on the wrong side of a major issue that people care passionately about. This is it: permanent settlement on this planet." Six smiles, peaceful. Of course, Gaius has zero cool: "Permanent settlement here. Have you lost your marbles?" No, I've got them right here to my Pay Attention, Idiot. Six steps up to Zarek, sniffing him with her eyes, completely taken in. "It may look dreary. It may be dreary, but it's solid ground under your feet, and a real sky over your head. You'd be surprised what a powerful idea that is to people cooped up in metal boxes for nine months." Six begs Baltar to listen, still immensely turned on: "He's a smart, sexy man, just like you." But if she's not...then does that mean that Gaius is even more...I've been joking about...wait, what? Gaius comes into sharp-as-hell focus, between Zarek and Six: "Oh, give up." I love it. "I will certainly not be having an invisible threesome with Tom Zarek, regardless of the fact that Maier's dead. Do you know what that could do to my numbers?" Zarek wonders whom Baltar's talking to, and Gaius as usual gets CYA about his ongoing hallucinations: "Give up...on Earth?" He stands up and realizes, finally, what Zarek's saying. "Oh dear Lord," he thinks. Gaius circles around the table, coming closer to Zarek, pointing at the screen, getting it slowly: "So we'd settle...here." Zarek's like, "Dude, yes! Man!" Gaius stares at Tom, who laughs happily. "Yeah, it's starting to look like a lovely little planet after all," says Gaius, and then they shake hands. And possibly make out.
Colonial One. Roslin says forcefully that the planet is "a rest stop," "a place to load up on food and water." She makes it clear that, in her head, there will be no settling. "You've heard the Captain's reports," responds Tory, pushing the idea because she is a Cylon. "Every ship in the Fleet has people begging, pleading, demanding [that] they get time down on the surface." The other aides all nod, and Roslin is cool with "a few hours," but whatever, that's not the issue yet. "Suddenly Baltar's holding out hope for breathing real air, growing real food, sleeping in a bed instead of a bunk," counters Tory. "Living in a house instead of a ship." Roslin scoffs that it's a fantasy: "All the data indicate that life on this planet would be hard. It would be a struggle to even eke a living out for a few years." Tory mentions the whole dradis-interference part, and Roslin's got an answer again: "What, are we now assuming that Cylon technology is not sufficient enough to find this planet? We just found it." Roslin's right, but she's going to lose. I don't believe it. Tory says that people vote their hopes, not their fears, and that's oversimplifying, because it's more of a sine wave than any other graph, and right now she's right, but once they're entrenched, it'll swing the other way. "Baltar is offering them what they want to hear, and you're offering them a bitter reality," Tory adds. Roslin protests that it's the truth, and she's right, but Tory's more right: "They don't want to hear the truth. They're tired, exhausted. The idea of stopping, laying down their burdens, and starting a new life right now is what is resonating with the voters." Also with Tyrol and the majority of the cast that have tried to commit suicide in the last nine episodes. Tory bottom-lines it right between Laura's eyes: "It could turn the entire election around."
Cavill browbeats Tyrol more about his denial -- always a sound therapeutic tactic -- and there is much denial, and then Cavill tells him to go to hell and gets up to leave, engendering a "wait wait don't leave" gambit, and Cavill calls Tyrol an idiot, and Tyrol acts like a puppy some more, and Cavill finally lays it out for him: "Come on! You think you're a Cylon." Tyrol bites back a tear and protests that he isn't, and then Cavill tells him his breakthrough for him: "Well, of course you're not. But that's what you're afraid of, isn't it? That you might be a Cylon and not even know it, just-- just like Boomer, right? Right? That's the thought that's torturing your dreams and crippling your soul. 'I'm a Cylon, just like Sharon, and I deserve to die.'" Tyrol buys it, because of course it's true, and this is lame and dilettante and they could have at least asked a clinician how this would actually go, and Chief asks how Cavill could possibly know for sure that he's human, and Cavill gives yet another callback: "Maybe because I'm a Cylon, and I've never seen you at any of the meetings?" Chief looks at the wall and almost smiles because now it's Good Will Hunting all of a sudden, and Cavill slaps his hands together and says his work is done: "You're going to have to go back to work and try and leave all of this behind you." Chief whines that he can't face the deck or Cally, and Cavill almost slaps him: "Well, you'd better. That's the only family you've got. Just know that that's your family and that they love you. Even Cally. Especially Cally." Why, she'd kill for you! "If you doubt your humanity and your essential nature as a human being, all you need to do is look to them for the salvation you've been seeking from the Gods. The Gods lift up those who lift each other, Chief." And having ended his spree of being a thousand monkeys with a thousand copies of past scripts, shooting out meaningful past dialogue for no reason, all in a cluster, Cavill drums his fingers on the table exactly like the poundy drums of a given act-out, in close-up. If Cavill doesn't show back up this week, I'll be pissed, because that was a lot of setup for an average-at-best "Here is your breakthrough and good luck with that, no need to thank me" kind of crappy ending like that.
The Raptors are getting ready for the last jump (10 - n), and Starbuck warns them that they have no idea of the conditions so they should be ready for anything. She asks if Sharon's ready, and Sharon nods, then looks Starbuck in the eyes: "Ready." They jump, and we actually follow a Raptor through jump, which is basically a jump-cut from space to the golden light of Caprica, but still very pretty. They all zoom down like asteroids and fall into formation. Helo sees no Cylons on dradis, but does note that a Raptor has vanished. He checks up, and 612 is gone, "Tough Guy" and "Carousel" ("Tapestry." "Coffee Mug." "Pride & Prejudice."), and then figures out finally that they've jumped into a mountain. Not upside it, you understand, but actually BAMF-ed right into the center of rock. Gross. Starbuck swallows, no weakness or hesitation. "Damn." Over the comms, she notifies them that 612 is gone, and that they're going ahead. "Scumball" apparently rogers that and they go zooming toward the Resistance area.
"Before Narnia and Middle Earth," there was something that sounded very fucking suspicious until I checked out the SciFi website and figured out it was The Ring Of The Nibelung, soothing the geek inside that just wants to disagree with every fucking thing until it gets proof. The ugliest part of anyone.
Debate Part II. Gaius is just finishing up a nonexistent plank ("I would think that my position and the position of my campaign is abundantly clear," he says, which is hilarious from a script point of view, if you think about it.) and Jim gives Laura thirty seconds. "Well, my initial response," she begins -- and it's important to note that, from what we've seen, she's the first of them to go there like this, with the ad hominemphilosophy swipe -- "is, there he goes again. Once again, ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Baltar is distorting the real issues before us. The issue here -- the real question -- is not allowing the scriptures to dictate the policy of this government." Oh, is it? Because that kind of makes you an asshole, doesn't it? Gaius smirks and crosses his arms, facing Roslin and the crowd equally, brilliantly telegenic and effortless with his semiotics: "We're a bit skeptical of this stance, aren't we?" Laura continues down this stupid-ass path. "The question is, do the scriptures contain real-world relevance? Do they contain the information necessary to guide us to a safer home than some completely unknown planet that we've just now discovered?" Baltar turns another fifteen degrees toward the audience, his face mocking and beautiful: "Oh, come on now." But seriously, what the fuck is Roslin even talking about? "Obviously, my answer to that question is yes. I have always and will continue to feel the scriptures hold real-world relevance." Which is a great way to not say what you mean. What Roslin means is, if the Bible says the Ark is fifteen steps north and six west, you don't have to believe in God to follow the directions. But what she's saying is, "I love transubstantiation so much I pretend it's happening even with my corn flakes." Which nobody would actually think or say.
"Mr. Vice-President, the question is for you...How do you respond to the charges that you seized the idea of permanent settlement on this planet as an opportunistic gamble--" Zarek nods to Gaius "-- Um, some would say as to be construed as a desperate move from a campaign, uh, that was falling behind on every poll?" Gaius stutters a bit, himself, because Jim's got his number: "Excellent question...You see, I have long been a proponent in the search for Earth. The promise of perhaps finding not only a new home, but also the prospect of discovering our long-lost brothers and sisters of the Thirteenth Colony is a powerful one, and one I have believed in heart and soul." Laura smiles, cocks her head, not really playing the game right. "...But the trouble is, the Cylons continue to follow us, as they have done every step of the way since the destruction of the Colonies. And if we have a chance to change this dynamic, to stop this..." He leans into the mic just at this point, wonderfully, "this deadly chase, should we take it? My answer is yes."
Now, optimally, this is where Laura would go, "Oh, I totally fucking forgot! Jim! He's the one that betrayed us! I am such a ditz! I saw him making out with Cylon Enemy Number One for six fucking hours at the Gardens! I don't know how I forgot to mention that!" But of course she hasn't recovered that info yet. If ever there was the right time for spontaneous memory recall, though. Jim gives Roslin thirty more seconds, and she makes some good, useless points that will probably end up being important: "There's no assurance -- none whatsoever -- that the Cylons don't already know about this planet, that they don't make regular stops here looking for us, and that in fact they aren't simply waiting for us to settle on the surface so they can--" Baltar once again stoops to the mic: "I have to respond to that. I simply have to respond to that." Jim, who should know better, gives him fifteen seconds. "What you've seen right now, ladies and gentlemen, is another example of the President using fear to drive her campaign." She shakes her head, but it's her own damn fault. Baltar's not cool enough to come up with that kind of attack on his own. She handed that shit to him. "Fear. Fear of the gods. Fear of the Cylon. Fear of fear itself." No. Just a titch too far. "Is it not time to stop being afraid? I'm asking all of us to stop running from our lives and start living them." The crowd makes thinky faces, and I think that I yelled, "Oh my God, he's Bill Clinton!" the first time I was watching this, only to have Ron Moore say the same thing hereabouts in the podcast. It makes my heart hurt, but it's true. And Jim ends the debate, even though Gaius interrupted Roslin to begin with. The candidates look at each other, and it's very sad, because Gaius Baltar just basically became President. Zarek and Tory whisper to various aides, and Baltar approaches Roslin. "Not your night, I guess," he smarms as they shake. Roslin: "Why don't you go frack yourself." It's a good exit line. Not her best, but it's good, and topical. week: Laura shoots Adama in the face! Roslin walks off and Gaius blinks, not quite as proud as he should be.
Adama and Roslin listen to the wireless in his quarters. It's a cool shot that tracks from the radio up to Tory, who's pacing, so that follows her almost 360 degrees around the room, dipping down to glaring Adama, across the worried aides, and then again to rest on Roslin, broken, all while the radio is talking. It's Jim, interviewing Zarek in Spin Alley. "I thought Dr, Baltar did exceptionally well," Zarek says. "Laid out his vision of the future and offered the people a way to end the suffering and terror that defines so many of their lives. On the other hand, I found myself wondering how Roslin's arguments against settlement could possibly win." Well...yeah. Ouch.
Into a golden Caprica forest, where the pilots and Marines are all wearing full flight gear and helmets and goggles, stalking quietly through the brush, whispering and being super-sneaky. Starbuck and "Karl" talk about getting their bearings for a second before Sharon gives a fist signal to stop and chill. Helo responds to Starbuck, as they stop moving, that the base camp for the Resistance is about a click ahead, and Sharon notes movement at 11 o'clock. Everybody drops, Starbuck between Helo and Sharon, and peers at the bodies in the distance. Boomer peeks out from behind their fallen tree as Starbuck quietly asks, "Friendlies?" This part is cool because there's that mic-on-fabric sound that should be disruptive, but actually adds to the sense of danger and hush. Helo finally yells into the forest, "You got a Samuel T. Anders there?" and Barclay calls back, "Is there a Kara Thrace there?" Anders adds, "If there is, you tell her she took her good, sweet time getting here." Kara smiles, dropping back against the log for a second. Boomer looks bored and tired and in hell, but that's just maybe because they didn't give her toaster ass a helmet. Helo, the only champion in all of humanity, both inside and outside the show, for Kara's relationship with Anders: "Friendlies." Everybody stands up.
The two groups converge in the yellow woods, and Starbuck and Anders hug hard. There are tears. "What took you so long?" he smiles, and she grabs him by the uniform. "We have Marines and Raptors. We're gonna get you and your people out of here, okay?" He smiles. "As good as your word, huh?" And she's adorably Starbuck, all feisty, "Yeah, good as my frackin' word. What, did you think I was going to leave you here? Now you feel like a big frackin' idiot, don't you?" "All right, just shut up and save us already, okay?" So say we all. Buzzkill Barclay interrupts the reunion: "People, this is nice, but we have toasters on our ass." Starbuck asks after the rest of Anders's group, and his face falls. "This is it. Toasters hit our base camp this morning. I lost half my crew." Starbuck's sorry a second before Sharon screams, "Incoming!" and shells start dropping all around them. Bodies flying, people running, Black Hawk Down, the whole bit. Starbuck orders them all back to the Raptors, but Helo and Sharon countermand: "Shell trajectories are coming between us and the Raptors. We're cut off!" I wonder if heavy artillery like that is something that Raptor people like Sharon and Helo would instinctively be able to read better, because of their jobs. Interesting. Anders and Sharon watch the sky, everybody huddles in the clearing together, shells exploding everywhere. Trapped. To Be Continued!
week's an hour and a half! That's tight. Thoughts: I've started calling the Six/Eight movement on Caprica DEMAND LOVE. So I think that DEMAND LOVE is going to save the rescue team within the teaser, and everybody is going to wig out for ninety minutes about how come they're Cylons, but they're being nice. I think that Gaius, who's clearly going to win the election, is going to start the colonization of Planet Natasiland, or Myhugecockia, or whatever stupid thing he calls it, immediately. Probably Roslin, Adama, and Tigh will land themselves in hack. I think Roslin will remember her Caprica memory about Gaius, but it won't matter. I think Gina and that wormy little follower of hers are going to blow a shitload of people up. Is that all the plot threads? That's so awesome. What a great show.