Sat, 05 Apr 2008 15:33:00
Battlestar galactica - He Who Believeth In Me
SPOILER ALERT BELOW THE FOLD. You’ve been warned.
Vipers in the launch tube in 3, 2, 1…
When we last left the crew, Tigh, Tory Foster, Anders and Chief Tyrol were listening to some Dylan and finding out they was toaster-riffic. See also Starbuck risin from the dead and Jesus Baltar scurrying away.
The episode/season picked up precisely there, right in the middle of everything. Random thoughts, the day after we watched:
- Starbuck in a brand-spanking new beautiful Viper claiming she woke up orbiting earth. What the frack? My only guess is wormhole physics. Hence the reason that “Watchtower” was able to get through, otherwise time becomes too much of an issue. She found a wormhole/thin spot in the fabric of space/time, and who the hell knows which version of her - or her ship - is actually back. I do not think Starbuck is a Cylon. I think they are making it way, way to easy to think she’s the last one. Could be a double bluff, but I just think it’s lazy. kara already hates herself, how would this be any different? Now, destroying her further by making Zack a Cylon and she has to kill him...or try to...now that’s some shit for Thrace’s ass.
- Massive dogfight sequence, which was really awesome to see again. I *love* these ships, Colonial and Cylon alike.
- Jesus Baltar. Need I say more? This fucking guy has the worst best luck ever. I mean, sure he’s hated by 99.97623% of all remaining humans and a large portion of the Cylons as well, but could he come up smelling like roses more frigging often? Get jumped in the toilet by murderous parent intent on revenge? No worries, mate, Hottie Cultist #351 will beat your assailants to death with a pipe. Cult member’s kid dying of viral encephalitis? No worries. You just say a prayer and he’ll be fine, dude, then they will all believe you are Jesus. More pussy for you, my friend.
- Anyone else catch that Laura is staying in Bill’s quarters? I smell old people sex. Well, not literally smell it. Ben Gay and KY. Eww. No, I mean look for a whole future episode based around the very non-Ozzy and Harriet scenarios that living situation will conjure up.
- I like where Tigh’s defiance about his nature is going. He’s been fighting demons his whole life, and when push comes to shove, he always makes the right decision...eventually. The scene in CiC where he shot Bill in the face was great, as was his absolute defiance about who and what he is. He’d rather die than help the Cylons even if he is one. It raises all these nature/nurture, will versus instinct type questions. Can you choose to be human? Is there something special about the Final Five that allows them to make decisions rather than follow programming?
- Fucking Starbuck. She can’t just knock on Roslin’s door and say ‘Ma’am I really really need to speak with you about these jumps.” and based on their shared experiences with the arrow and religion and the tomb and map and shit, convince Laura to listen to her. No, not Starbuck. She has to throat-chop two Marines, knock her husband out with a pistol whipping and then go threaten Laura at gunpoint. That’s Starbuck for you.
Problem here is, I’m not sure what I want to see. I want them to get to earth so I can see what happens, but if I’m thinking about them as people I care about, Laura’s caution is warranted and she;s probably making the right decision.
- One minor writing complaint. When they are standing by the memorial wall, Kara says to Anders that she worries she was grown in a Petri dish. I realize that I’m probably the only person watching who thought of this as a flaw, but Petri dishes were named after a specific person. Richard Petri invented them in 1887. It’s kind of stupid to think that they also had a guy named Petri who happened to invent a little dish for growing shit in a lab. A better line would have been “Is it possible that they grew me, another me, in a test tube” or “in a lab somewhere.” Saying “Petri dish” is too Earthy. It shook me out of the moment. Not for long, though.
- The position Lee is talking about in the government. Vice President?
- It seems like most of the major players are coming around to the idea of accepting Cylons as “one of us.” Save for Starbuck of course, who told AndersCylon that if she ever found out he was, well, what he is, she would put a bullet in his fracking head. See? This Zack idea I keep kicking around would be AWESOME. And note that Lee and Bill were specifically discussing what would happen if Zack came back and was a Cylon. And the guy that played Zack in the flashback way back when? His agent refuses to comment on whether or not his client is working on the show.
I’m just saying.
All in all I REALLY enjoyed this episode. Tons of shit happened, loads of forward progress. LOVE love love the space battle and the fight in the bathroom. One weird thing I’ve noticed is that the vast majority of great BSG episodes feature the bathroom. Weird.
Looking forward to more. If they can maintain half of this episode’s forward momentum, excitement and intrigue, I will be fracking thrilled. BSG feel like it’s back.
So say we all. (?)
Posted by JimK at 03:33 PM on April 05, 2008
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Comments:
#2 Posted by miguelito 
on 04/05 at 07:37 PM -
Oh, and Athena walking up to Tyrol and Anders when he was saying “you’re Samuel T. Anders,” where she just says “Who else would he be?” with a just barely puzzled look… yet another interesting thread they could go down. Do they confide in her and ask for help, or no? Or will she figure it out on her own?
#3 Posted by Buzzion on 04/05 at 08:16 PM -
I like where Tigh’s defiance about his nature is going. He’s been fighting demons his whole life, and when push comes to shove, he always makes the right decision...eventually. The scene in CiC where he shot Bill in the face was great, as was his absolute defiance about who and what he is. He’d rather die than help the Cylons even if he is one. It raises all these nature/nurture, will versus instinct type questions. Can you choose to be human? Is there something special about the Final Five that allows them to make decisions rather than follow programming?
I don’t think its special for them. Look at Six. She defied the other Cylons by bringing Hera back to Galactica. And no other great example is Sharon. She lives with the humans. Is on their ship, has fought the cylons and is a member of the military. She is a full individual as far as I can tell. Don’t you think that if there was some way for the cylons to use her programming to cause major damage to Galactica they wouldn’t?
In fact I was kind of disappointed that none of the Four pointed to her as the proof that they are not programmed robots but individuals.
#4 Posted by ErikTheRed on 04/06 at 04:12 PM -
I have mixed feelings about the space battle scenes. They’re wonderfully done, but after you’ve seen them on DVD they look weak in Crap-tastic Standard Definition television. After seeing them rebroadcast in 1080i HD on the Universal HD channel, the SciFi channel version looks like complete shit. There’s something horribly ironic about how we have to experience the best sci-fi show out right now in the lowest-tech presentation the first time around. I’m certainly not buying any more discs until they’re out in BluRay.
#5 Posted by ErikTheRed on 04/06 at 04:18 PM -
In fact I was kind of disappointed that none of the Four pointed to her as the proof that they are not programmed robots but individuals.
Buzzuon, you nailed it. The show has great premise and some good story arcs (aside from the obvious stretching done in season 3 to add an extra season into the mix), but really terribly scene development and editing. JimK had an excellent nit to pick on the Petri dish thing, and even on Earth test tube babies aren’t grown in Petri dishes. It’s just sloppy all the way around. It would be an absolute joy to watch a show of any sort where some actual proof-reading for internal story consistency and fact-checking is done.
#6 Posted by miguelito on 04/06 at 06:33 PM -
Erik.. Yeah, I’ve been begging for Sci-Fi HD from Time Warner for ages, and we’ve yet to get it. Hell we don’t even have History HD yet. Oddly History HD showed up on the Tivo line up months ago, then was finally removed the other day, squashing hopes that they were at least planning to add it shortly.
#7 Posted by benweger on 04/06 at 10:23 PM -
When I saw Baltar in his “shrine room” all I could think was… CASTLE ANTHRAX!
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Opening 10min… just kicked ass. Great effects (of course).. McCreary’s music was top notch again (man can he help keep the tension level up with the music) and the whole Cylon IFF with Anders opens up a whole new line of possibilities. For the last bit and the scenes of upcoming stuff, it looks like there’s going to be a power split in the cylons with some not wanting to give up the power they feel they’ll lose if the final 5 are found, and are working to avoid it. At least that’s what I gathered from the Dean Stockwell model supposedly lobotomizing raiders from that quick clip… I assume that means overriding whatever hidden programming made them abort the attack upon getting the signal from Anders.
Adama and Roslyn.. yeah, I was 1/2 expecting some semi-joke of Apollo kind of asking where ol’ dad was sleeping in the meantime, like kind of probing to see if they were together or he was really just letting her stay there because it was the best room on the ship and she was there for medical treatments.
I was a little surprised that Apollo completely accepts her, almost no questions asked. I guess it shows that he really does completely love her and just doesn’t care even if she is a cylon. And that she told Anders straight out that she’d shoot him if he was a cylon… ouch for him.
Nice to see minor characters like Seelix still around and being used. After Dity Hands, we finally see her flying.. though a little prematurely due to the situation.
Oh and the bit with Tigh in the start. Knew it was fake of course… but watching again, notice it looks like a single shot without cuts, which makes it look smooth and a little cooler. Olmos likely went down (the wound looked like cgi) got back up and the action was filmed with the camera swinging back and Tigh dropping the prop gun just before it panned back and showed him grab the mic to send the order.