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"Revelations"

The mid-season finale of BSG has come and gone, and we wait in the shadows for Sci-Fi to give us the dates for the final chunk of BSG episodes -- ever -- to air (in 2009). This leaves us plenty of time to ponder what we saw, the revelations received, in this, the end of the story arc that has driven the show since the mini-series.

Because, of course, they find Earth.

And, of course, it totally sucks the big one.

But let's start at the beginning. A much more thorough recap can be found here; I'm going to go through and discuss my likes/dislikes, and what we may have left.

Tory is a little bitch. That's right, I came out and said it. The first of the Final Cylons to jump-ship, she has had a hankering for some Cylon love for a while. I really, really hope that Tory gets a good pay-off, because they've played so much with her character this season, I'd be disappointed if it was merely to show the contrast between the Final bunch. She is, however, a tool. She doesn't have the cajones to live up to what she is, but she so desperately wants to. She has to have a cover to get off the ship, ostensibly to give Roslin her meds and, you know "be her assistant" and such, but as soon as she arrives, all she does is act petulant. I would have preferred it if instead of telling Roslin she no longer takes orders from her she would have gestured to her crotch and said, "Suck it." 

I like Chief, Anders, and Tigh getting together around the Viper and quickly becoming frustrated. I especially liked Tigh finally getting his act together, and the moment where he realizes what he needs to do is one of the best moments in the episode. Marches down the hall, to Adama, and let's him know that, shit, man, I should've told you a while ago, but hey, I'm a Cylon... 

And Adama kept waiting for him to go "PYSCH!" but it never happened. Instead we get a nice little-bit of Adama realizing that things are too frakked up to keep going on, and he drools all over his son. Tigh gets brought to the airlock, understands what might need to be done to stop D'Anna from airlocking more pilots on the base-star, and then gives up Anders and Chief much more quickly than I would have guessed.

The look on Chief's face when the Marines come in to interrupt the little Starbuck-Anders-Chief Viper love-fest is priceless. And when Starbuck turns to Anders, the classic Starbuck WTF face plastered all over her, I kept thinking of the line earlier in the season, where she tells him that if he was a cylon, she'd blow his brains out. Ahhhh, sweet love. But things are more complicated than that now, and hey, at least Tigh, Chief and Anders aren't all whiney like Tory is. Also, not evil like Tory is. But I suppose the difference is they don't want to be Cylons, and Tory does. 

Back to the Airlock for a moment -- why is it that the favorite means of execution is airlock? It was badass early on in the show's run, when it was a nice creative way to off someone without a big mess, but at this point it's kind of played out. I mean, seeing someone shoot out into the icy vacuum doesn't have the same weight it once did. Especially not after Cally's frozen-drifting-through-space mugshot a handful of episodes ago. Isn't it just easier at this point to put a bullet in someone's head?

I both like and hate how the writers got themselves out of a pickle. The idea that the Final Five will show everyone the way to Earth was always a problem I was particularly fond of -- because the Final Four that we know had no idea how to get there. They were just some dudes who suddenly realized they're a little different than everyone else. Like back when Anders is on the basestar and the hybrid mentions that the Five will lead everyone to Earth and he has that shifty-eyed "oh shit" look on his face. But in this ep it's resolved in a way that is believable, but kind of a cheat. OK, so the ship Starbuck came back on suddenly is getting a beacon from Earth, and they wouldn't have known without the Final Four getting all head-trippy. I buy it, it's a way out, but it's kind of a cheat. 

Emphatic "meh."

I also don't know how much I buy the humans making another deal with the cylons, especially now that their leader is totally-batshit-crazy D'Anna. Especially after something she says in this very episode, about how can you try to live with the humans after they failed so miserably on New Caprica? But whatever, you know, we all want Earth, blah blah blah. I don't know if the people of the fleet -- the people who suffered on New Caprica, who worked so hard to shake off the yoke of occupation -- would be so happy to know they're gonna settle down on this Thirteenth Colony together. But this show could give a rat's ass about the regular folk in the fleet, so it's a moot point*.

Then they jump into Earth orbit and everyone flips their shit. What was with Lee jumping up and down and stripping? It was like suddenly Galactica is an intergalactic Chippendales. But they're all totally stoked, and Earth is all pretty, so of course, they take down some ships filled with only the characters who are the focus of the show (fuck scientists, other quorum members, and so on!), and come to some pretty nasty conclusions.

Now, here we are at the ending, and I'm sure this is one of those things people will mostly love, but I'm pretty unexcited about. They're on Earth, and Adama gets a handful of soil (like he was destined to get), and it's radioactive, and there are ruins everywhere, and the weather's shitty, and man, everyone's moping because there are no nice planets in the galaxy.

I was waiting the whole time for the Statue of Liberty to be buried half in the sand and for Adama to scream "YOU BASTARDS!" at it as the Ape-Cylons came riding in on horses. I suppose on one hand, it's a good resolution to the whole Let's-find-Earth plot that's been driving the show since the mini-series, but on the other hand, it's a bummer, and, it seems to be, a vague rehash of the whole New Caprica crap. Fleet finds planet. Everyone happy. They settle down. Planet shitty. Cylon crap. blah blah blah. Except now they're on the Thirteenth Colony and it's shitty and there's going to be Cylon crap blah blah blah. 

So I don't know. I think the show has lost so much of my goodwill this season I don't know if I trust Ron Moore y Co. to not ruin the last half of the last season for me. The possible conflicts we have moving forward are the Other-Cylons, perhaps some survivors on Earf? And, of course, the idea that this has all happened before, and will happen again.

Though, for the record, if the remains of the Thirteenth Colony are from when the initial exodus, that lead to the founding of the other Twelve Colonies, occurred, then there really wouldn't be any ruins. Didn't any one watch that Discovery Channel special about Earth After People? A couple hundred years and ain't nothin' existin'. 

Also, where are the forests 'n shit? On Caprica there were forests, even after all the cities had the shit bombed out of them. That's how Helo got his boogie on with Athena/Boomer/Cylon. 

The big reveal we're all waiting for is who the Final Fifth cylon is. We've had some conflicting information about their location, with D'Anna telling us they're not in the fleet (abwah?), but Number Six (who shall now be referred to as Pregnant Six, you sly dog you) mentioned that she could "feel" the Five nearby. So... who do we trust? I think there are some lame possibilities. 

Obviously, D'Anna could be lying. Which is a much more "LOST" way of dealing with things than BSG typically resorts to. In this way, I think Gaeta might be a good choice, because why did we spend time with him this episode, fumbling and bumbling his way around the console in CIC, if not to set something up? Dualla has also been brought back from episodic limbo, which is great, because in the episodes she has been in she's been totally wasted. Good job, team.

Alternately, the final fifth cylon could be on Earth. Or could be dead. Considering how many characters have eaten the Big Mac over four seasons, that gives us fairly limitless possibilities. D'Anna doesn't mention that one of them is dead, though, and no one presses the issue on the fifth, which is annoying and not dealt with, but whatever. Thoughts? Ideas? Perhaps D'Anna is the fifth cylon... perhaps...

So, I guess it was a pretty good episode... that leaves me fairly worried about the remainder of the season. We're going to see a lot of regulars eat it. I just hope that Moore gets his shit together, and blows my friggin' mind.

Word.

-RoboNixon

*Which isn't to say they always hated the regular people. In season 2, especially, we get a much grander sense of the world, with a lot of press, a sense that there were really other people in the fleet, beyond the characters we followed. There were the Roslin-haters, there were the press people, there were the prisoners on the ship in Season 1, there were the black-market dealers in Season 2, and so on. Even in Season 3 we get Chief aboard the Tylium processing ship with the coal-miner-like workers. This season we get... Uhhh... Err.... Um.... 

Exactly.