4.7 Guess What's Coming To Dinner

Battlestar Galactica has really started to fire on all cylinders, finally, during Season 4. After the more turgid lull of the opening episodes things have got going and seriously upped the ante from all directions. Indeed, what struck me during this episode was that the only character to really be suffering this season is Apollo. Stuck in the role as political do-gooder he’s completely out of the action and involved in banal, boring stuff. Maybe there’s a progression in store for him, but so far his plot is deathly dull.

This episode started with an enthralling moment as the new Cylon base ship jumped to where the fleet was whilst the Demetrius was left behind with a malfunction. Unable to communicate that the base ship was no longer hostile, a full-scale attack was launched upon it. It was only Tigh making a call to hold the attack (showing new-found sympathy for the Cylons, and perhaps a deeper understanding of things than the apparent) averted the disaster.

So now Galactica had a whole bunch of Cylons to contend with, chief amongst them being Six making a plea that they would show the humans where they could find and destroy the Resurrection Ship hub in return for the Final Five and the freedom to leave. There were some interesting discussions regarding mortality, and what that meant in terms of significance to life that the Cylons never had. Potentially, if this hub does get destroyed then the stage is very much set for a complete wiping of the slate of the Cylon race and for the humans to once again be the only dominant race: poising things ready to occur again as they once had, as the prophecy indicates.

Everything certainly suggests that there is going to be some form of truce, and perhaps a merging of Cylon and human, with the main Cylons eventually becoming extinct and the Final Five being the key components in the fate of the humans to start the cycle over again.

Mind you, the end of the episode showed the Hybrid being reconnected and her first command was to jump. Since the humans were planning to go against their word to the Cylons (and the Cylons likewise) whatever truce existed between them is certainly flimsy. How things fare from here depends entirely on where the base ship has jumped to and what level of co-operation on both sides is forthcoming.

All in all, the way is being made clear to make the journey to Earth. What’s more impending is the potential ‘unboxing’ of Deanna which will then allow her to pinpoint the Final Five. Tigh, especially, doesn’t seem particularly keen on that secret being let loose and he may have measures in mind to prevent it from ever happening.

Athena, meanwhile, went and killed Six due to her paranoia about the child going away from her. Given Hera has drawings focused entirely on Six – and thinking of Six and Gaius in the opera house during the second season, discussing how the child was theirs – it seems inevitable that this is going to be the way of it. Is this some kind of metaphorical union between Cylon (Six), human (Gaius) and the child (Hera) that points the way to the fate of everyone? Is Hera the Final Cylon? That seems a great and logical likelihood.

I’ve started getting excited about Season 4, properly, for the first time since the first episode. Now it feels like we’re getting into the thick of it. And where the likes of Starbuck and Gaius and Laura and Hera are all going to play into the grand scheme of things is an intriguing unravelling waiting to happen.