Battlestar Galactica: Season 4 - Page 6

Yes, the circumstances behind Starbuck's return are strange. Monumentally strange. When someone thought to be dead for two months comes back thinking only a few hours have passed, you know what you do? You investigate. You don't go "Let's throw her in the brig and ignore the whole situation."

Actually, the hybrid said she would bring about the apocalypse, not that she wouldn't lead them to Earth.

He does apparently:

* Shaw and the first Hybrid:

Hybrid: Come in, Major. I've been waiting for you for a long time.
Shaw: You're what all this is about, aren't you? What are you?
Hybrid: What am I? A man? Or am I a machine? My children believe I am a god.
Shaw: Are you ... a god?
Hybrid: I have seen things. Your life, Kendra Shaw. The things you have done. Things you felt you had to do. All leading to this moment. You wish to be forgiven, my child. ... Do you wish to be forgiven?
Shaw: Yes.
Hybrid: Then come up closer. There's something I have to tell you. Come. (Grabs her arm.) Kara Thrace will lead the human race to its end.
Shaw: What?
Hybrid: She is the herald of the apocalypse. The harbinger of death. They must not follow her.

Quoted from here.

I thought Kara was supposed to bring balance to the Force, not leave it in darkness!

It occurs to me that the words can be taken different ways. He's a Cylon of sorts. Kara will lead the human race to its end (Earth? In a good way?). She is the herald of the (Cylon) Apocalypse. The harbinger of (their) death. They shouldn't follow her because it means the end of the Cylons.

Hell, it could mean everything or nothing at all. It could be a lie. Or the truth, from a certain point of view. Fuck it all, just wait till we see the rest of S4.

I finished the Season 3 DVDs yesterday and I just now finished the Season 4 opener a few minutes ago. And all I've gotta say is this: wow. I don't mean "Wow, those special effects were great" or "Wow, what a twist". No, I mean "Wow, I can't believe the difference in quality between BSG on DVD and watching stuff in standard definition on SciFi." I get Dish and they don't offer SciFi in HD so I planned on holding out for the Season 4 DVDs but I knew I wouldn't make it. Everytime I clicked NEW POSTS on these boards, I would see this in bold lettering glaring at me as the only unread thread. The temptation was just too much.

I'm still sifting through all the discussion on the last 6 pages and there's some really great dialog going on between you guys with the theories and all. It's refreshing to finally talk to people about this show without that awkward "You watch a show called Battlestar Galactica? On SciFi?" stare from my friends. You really have no idea.

Since there's really nothing I can say that hasn't already been said or theorized already (you guys even had the Gods listed out - you people really are amazing), I only have one question. Forgive me if I sound like those people on IMDB who ask shit like "When is this coming to my area???? HeLpZ!" but it's really killing me:

Is SciFi gonna go HD for satellite providers? I know they reran the first two seasons on UniversalHD last month, but goddammit I really don't wanna miss another badass firefight like that one in HD again.

I think Dish Network was supposed to launch a sattelite that was going to have Sci-Fi in HD, but something got fucked up and it was either postponed or scrapped completely. Not sure on the details.

You people are spoiled. I watch BSG on a 20" SDTV off regular cable. And the Scifi feed is much worse than any of the other channels I watch.

Thats the way I was looking at it. A Cylon saying that Kara was the harbinger of doom, I would take that as her being the harbinger of THEIR doom, not mankind's.

I could live with a final revelation being that "Cylons" created Man. It would be a great twist for this show and turn everything upside down again.
Maybe Earth in BSG is a highly evolved "Cylon" culture (the rumored supernatural third power).
So Cylon Earth creates man, sends Colonists into space. Colonists evolve, create their own Cylons, get beaten, flee back to mother Earth only to discover that their destination was their beginning. It's all backwards.

I just hope for a good "Lord Voldemort explains his plan"-moment/montage in the last episode where the 13th Cylon or God will explain to us every shit that went down and why and how.

Or, by having the Cylons follow them to Earth, she's bringing doom for the humans.

Everyone's reaction seemed to be more in the line of "That kooky Starbuck is at it again!". Couldn't they spare a couple of Raptors to check out if what she's saying may be true? It's not like the stakes aren't high.

That's the problem, though. The Cigarette Smoking Man was more interesting when he was mysterious. Or in the world of Firefly, who cares where the Reavers came from? If the show ends with a big explanation, that explanation couldn't possibly be as interesting as all the possibilities being dreamed up here. The smarter ending would be a wtf moment, something that'd give us something to talk about for years to come.

Yeah, but some of us hate it when shows end with a question mark. I'm still pissed that we never found out if Benson beat Governor Gatling in that election.

I'm not saying they need to spell everything out; but at least point us strongly in the right direction. They will reveal the 12th Cylon and they will find Earth. That may be enough to satisfy me. I don't mind if they raise new questions at the end to keep us thinking. I would expect no less from a show of this quality. It would also give them somewhere else to go if they wanted to continue the story in some form down the road. But there are definitely some "why" questions I would prefer to see answered when they wrap up this season.

It's probably going to be revealed that the entire series took place in the imagination of Tommy Westphall as he watched an episode of the original Battlestar Galactica.

Ok, probably not. But you never know.

I'd prefer it if the last scene in the series has Adm Adama covering his face with both hands as the camera zooms in....and Lt. Martin Castillo is shaken awake and sees Crockett (Katie Sackoff) and Tubbs (Jamie Bamber) looking at him , and holding Capt Real Estate (James Callis) in cuffs, in the new, reimagined Miami Vice!

I'd watch that show!

So is SciFi really posting the new episodes at noon on the day they air them?

Yes, but it's a live stream, so it's only available from 12-1.

Ah okay. Seemed like a bonehead move to have your most popular show available online all day before it airs.

My bone-headed theory of the week: the two half-breed babies are Adam and Eve.

That just blew my mind.

Shit. I was out mowing the lawn at noon. I would have watched it for sure. Hell, it would probably look better on my pc than it does on the shitty Sci-Fi feed I get from Charter Cable.

The episode streams on the site until the following week, actually. A friend just streamed He that Believeth In Me last night so you guys should be fine. If not, its possible that the episode is available again for streaming after it airs.

Well, Hera is supposed to be the start of a new generation of "god's children" so that makes sense.

And Frank's right. The search for the answer is always going to be more interesting than the answer itself. So I officially put my vote in for more ambiguity.

That is precisely what I'm afraid of. Either that, or Helo and Sharon are Adam and Eve.

On second thought, nah. How about the 40,000 other people?

Apollo's grand exit is one of my favorite moments in all of BSG. I nearly cried.

What? Nobody talks during the episode?

What an emotionally charged pre-credit sequence.

I wonder why Boomer didn't vote along with the rest of her model line? And what did One do/say to convince her to do so?

I'm starting to not like the way they are handling Helo. Either he's the Final Cylon and they are telegraphing that fact way too early, or he isn't and they are going to great pains to lead us down a false path. Helo is going with Kara to look for Earth? And has anyone noticed that Helo hasn't had a single line not relating to his post? No interaction with Athena or his daughter, no scenes showing him as a human really.

Oh, and I love how James Callis uses a slightly deeper voice when talking as the "Spirit Gaius". Twas a nice touch.

I have to say I love Baltar talking to Baltar. I also appreciate how much time they spent on Apollo's departure. It makes it much more final that he's no longer a Viper pilot.

Based on the end of episode promo, I'm looking forward to the centurion models turning on the humanoid cylons. And if Tory puts Callie out the airlock I think everyone will be happy.

Yeah but what about All Along the Watchtower? To me that says the Earth in this show is at least in the 20st century or (most likely) in the future.

Oh, and folks, did you know that Doctor Who is next Friday at 8:30? Geeeeez.

According to one of the shows podcasts done by the creators, All Along The Watchtower as heard in the show was done by a colonial musician. In terms of continuity, it has nothing to do with Earth at all.

Not this again. It's been explained before that it's not our reality's All Along the Watchtower. They just liked the song and said you should consider it having been created by some parallel artist in the Galactica universe.

Edit: I see Y3K beat me to it.

Sorry, like 90% of the fans I just watch the show and don't listen to the podcasts. This is one of my favorite shows on TV and that explanation from the creators is just weak. I can't wait for the Colonial version of Ice Ice Baby. Come on.

This latest ep contains further proof why Cairns and Park are in the show.

I'm having to watch the second showing.

All of this Lee stuff is making me worried, they're playing it like he's leaving the show! (I know he's not leaving, but still!) The scene with Kara is what really started me going - it was like they were never going to see each other again... and of course I was totally sunk when they played the Adama theme.

I can't wait until Sunday to see this again.

Not this again. It's been explained before that it's not our reality's All Along the Watchtower. They just liked the song and said you should consider it having been created by some parallel artist in the Galactica universe.

there's also this interview, though:

http://209.85.207.104/search?q=cache...ient=firefox-a

The A.V. Club: How did you choose "All Along the Watchtower" as the song that triggered the new Cylons?

Ronald D. Moore: That's actually a song I've been interested in doing something about for a long time. It's one of Bob Dylan's really interesting pieces, and I've always been fascinated by the lyric and the imagery. When I was working at Roswell, there was a point where I was going to do an entire episode about it. And then as we got into Galactica in the first year, I was starting to think ahead about ways of saying that, you know, things that happened on Galactica were tied into our reality here on Earth in some way, in the past or the future, or some other connection. And one of the ways that I thought of making that connection explicit was at some point, to have a song we recognize playing in the background on one of their jukeboxes. It's another way of saying, "Well, why do they wear suits and ties? Why do they use many of the expressions we use in contemporary culture?"

OK. Starbuck is officially irritating the crap outta me.

Aww, why'd my favorite woman on the show have to go and get fucked by Baltar? Tory, you don't know where his skanky ass has been!

Cylons are Jehovah's Witnesses.

All of this has happened before and will happen again.

The Centurions achieve sentience and rebel against their makers. I like that.

Moore's answer on "All Along the Watchtower" suggests that there's a very strong link between our world and Galactica's. In the past, I've jokingly suggested they are inside a computer simulation. I highly doubt Moore would so openly tell his audience to go screw themselves, so I'm voting that they are heading towards Earth in the far future.

Nice episode. Roslyn is really losing it. And The Cylon rebellion is very interesting. That Robocop style meeting was great.

'Be on your guard. This very moment Gaius Baltar may be having sex with you. If that should happen please report it immediately to the authorities.'

Colonial Health Ministry.

Great episode. Suck on that Cavil, you prick! And I started to get the feeling that Lee will be the dying leader in the end.

I swear, he'll be sworn in as the next President. I guessed this from the promos ("Legend...or Leader?").

Swear!


And James Callis is a frickin' revelation. The scene between Gaius and Head Gaius was genius. Both in acting and writing. Wow.

I teared up at the end when Adama and Kara hugged. Oh man, I was so happy to see that.

As for next week, so who puts who out of the airlock? Callie or Tory?

It just keeps getting better!

I especially loved how Cylon #1 used a democratic procedure to bascially enforce his will, while the 6's subverted the democtratic process in the name of a larger concept of freedom and "cylon rights"

Also liked Roslin and Starbuck's interaction. Starbuck is right: Roslin should give her some benefit of the doubt after having had visions of her own. And Roslin is clearly as afraid of being upstaged by another religious figure (which is what Starbuck seems to be becoming) as she is that Starbuck is a Cylon.

Also liked the Lee Adam asend off, but....

Some pet peeves: how will Starbuck and Helo find Galactica again, assuming they do find Earth? And with the Cylons liable to attack at any time, would Lee really have the choice to not be a Viper pilot? With Starbuck out of it he is the ranking officer and the best pilot they have.

Callie most likely. It was hinted she figures out her husband is a Cylon and goes ape shit.

I think they'll find Earth and it'll be decimated, looking completely war torn. Maybe long ago there was some war and the survivors left Earth and started the colonies.

About Kara's prophecy, maybe the hybrid was talking about the Cylons following her.

And when it talked about "This has all happened before, and it will happen again" or whatever, maybe it was talking about the Centurions and Raiders rebelling against the human Cylon models who were using them as slaves and dumbing them down.

I still think it would be great if they got to Earth only to have a human fleet launch and attack both Galactica and the Cylons. With the end of the show being the Cylons and Colonials working together to keep the pesky Earthlings at bay.

I read an interesting post on a LJ community stating that in the new Cylon rebellion, the lines were drawn pretty much down gender lines. Sixes and Eights were reacting to the lobotomizing of the Raiders more emotionally (and Leoben, but he's more of a mystical type, seems like he's more in touch with his emotions) and the Cavills, Simons and Dorals were all reacting with colder logic, just as men are sterotyped as logical and women as emotional.

I'm wondering if this is intentional, as in the Cylons programmed the "sterotypical" traits of human genders into the models, or if the "emotions" grew out of of the roles they were programmed to play (mother/seductress).

I'm leaning toward the latter, simply because of how Boomer cast her lot with the colder male models - if we assume that she was created to be a mother-type, when Hera rejected her, that nullified her cause for being and may have caused her to eschew everything that went with said programming. I think if the emotionality were inherently programmed in, she would have stayed her course and voted with the rest of the Eights.

The unbalance of the gender ratio seemed highly apparent last night, and I'm really, really believing that the last Cylon HAS to be female.

Also, I'm not quite clear and I won't be able to rewatch until the showing on Sunday night, but is Helo going with Kara - leaving Athena and Hera behind on the Galactica - or did he just set up the team that will be travelling with her?

P.S. To the comments about Helo seeming robotic/wooden - Michael Angeli wrote this episode, and he always seems kind of sketchy when writing Helo stuff (A Measure of Salvation, The Woman King). That's just my impression...