4.12 A Disquiet Follows My Soul

This episode had the hallmarks of being a more introspective ‘reset’ episode to counter the barrage of revelations and surprises from the previous season opener. And yet, quietly, this episode delivered its own share of zingers that will surely resonate for the remainder of the entire show.

First up, Tyrol is not the father of his child! Well, I guess some people might have seen that coming. The importance of Tyrol’s child (tellingly I can’t even remember his name!), when compared to the importance of Hera, has never been made a big deal of. That was fine when Tyrol was considered human, but after he was ‘outed’ then his child should have come under a lot more focus.

That spotlight has been switched off, as Hot Dog turns out to have been the father. Presumably this happened on New Caprica, during the time period we didn’t see. It’s hard to know if Callie had been unfaithful, or if she had got pregnant shortly before her and Tyrol got together. It probably doesn’t matter either way, but given Tyrol’s new-found allegiance to his Cylon heritage it might be another shove towards him rejecting humanity.

It did come as a jarring moment, that Tyrol was suddenly speaking on behalf of Cylons to the fleet, and calling them ‘his’ people. It felt like his character had undergone a major transition we had not witnessed and I’m not sure it went over altogether believably. In the same respect, Tigh has also undergone a shift that felt a little jarring. Holding hands with Six whilst they looked at their unborn child on a monitor – given the last time we saw him he was wading out to sea and learning that Ellen was the Final Cylon this was a shift too severe.

It’s obviously the way his character was headed, and Tyrol – I just think perhaps one or two scenes for both of them to be breaking in this change wouldn’t have hurt. Either it was a problem with time available, or the insinuation was that quite some time had passed since the previous episode and we’ve been left to fill in the blanks. In that sense, I suppose, it works.

Laura, meanwhile, has got over her foetal-style surrender and switched it for liberation. Gone is the burden of being the dying leader and now she has turned her attentions to her own mortality and, quite understandably, hoping to find some measure of happiness with the time she has left. Adama, also, by the end of the episode has reached the same realisation about the time he has left with Laura. The closing image of them finally together, happy and content, is tinged with a melancholy regret that it probably should have happened sooner.

It also, I think, shows Adama in a position of weakness that looks set to be exploited by Zarek and Gaeta.

The opinion of not joining up with the Cylons was a fairly-argued point, I thought. Given the Cylons had been mortal enemies of the humans, and practically obliterated their species, for the majority of the human race to want the right to distance themselves and their ships was an understandable one. These people haven’t met the Cylons like we have – they are just a faceless enemy. The right for the captains to decide whether they had their FTL drives upgraded or not was taken away, and it did make Adama appear distinctly dictatorial.

A disquiet looks set to follow, with Gaeta marshalling a faction to potentially turn mutinous and hoist Zarek as their new leader. Given Adama, at this moment, appears to be in a position of weakness then I think Apollo especially, and potentially Starbuck, will need to make themselves available to support him. Quietly, the stage is being set for something seriously dramatic.

4.11 Sometimes A Great Notion

There’s been a big break between episode 4.10 and this one, even for me who had, until this point, watched the entirety of Battlestar Galactica in one mass lump. Whilst waiting for this episode, I have since watched the whole lot – from miniseries to Season 4 – on DVD again so had the chance to reconsider The Final Cylon, and the nature of Cylon-Human mythology, and wonder what the truth about other unsolved mysteries were, such as Starbuck’s scar from whatever was done to her in The Farm in Season 2. Given the inherent mystery surrounding Starbuck, that small detail may be pertinent.

Anyway, basically, I considered myself well-versed for when this last and final block of ten episodes began. And since both human and Cylon landed on a desolate Earth at the end of the previous episode it was never looking to be an easy finish. That proved to be an understatement.

It was quickly established that Earth was dead. The planet had no signs of life. Not only that, it was clearly a charred remain from a mass nuking that had, apparently, taken place 2,000 years previous. As Laura ironically noted, they had left one nuked planet to find another. Gaius established that there was still radiation in the water, and so the planet was not habitable.

Suddenly New Caprica didn’t look so bad!

The episode, then, was ultimately concerned with the ‘fallout’ of this discovery of a dead Earth. This was still a raw learning for humans and Cylon alike. The expectant faces that greeted Laura when she returned to Galactica told as much, and the brawling and drunken disconsolate people that were briefly glimpsed afterwards relayed the effect on the fleet.

Laura instantly curled into a ball, burned up her scriptures, very much defeated. It’ll take a major revelation to get her back on her feet. It took a more personal shock to almost conquer Adama. Namely: Dualla’s suicide. It is here I have to say that I had suspected Dualla as being the prime candidate for the Final Cylon. Her name has ‘dual’ in it, one of the first times we ever saw her she spontaneously kissed Billy (which reminded me of Six and her tactile nature) and, in this episode, her reaction to finding Earth was marked.

I reach two interpretations. One, that Dualla was a symbol of mankind’s broken soul. She found a dead Earth, dug up some burned artefacts, and her spirit was finished. We saw her near cracking up on the journey back to Galactica, but then she composed herself, decided on her course of action, and rekindled happiness through Apollo so she could go out on a joyful note. Then she put a gun to her head. One last taste of happiness before she ducked out of the misery and turmoil she sensed the human race were destined for. It absolutely works on that level, and the handling of her character in this episode was successful – and also triggered Adama’s own flirtation with suicide before Tigh, of all ‘people’, made him pull himself together.

My second interpretation is the part of me that isn’t willing to let go of the idea that Dualla, upon getting to Earth, also ‘triggered’ the Final Cylon inside her – and perhaps realised that she would never be the same again and killed herself as a means of properly awakening her true nature. I hang on to it, but at the same time I feel consigned to the idea that Dualla was both red herring and symbol and has now served her function. But I’m still not counting her out completely.

Fact is, this episode threw some other whoppers at us that I am struggling to discuss here sensibly. Like the fact that the remains on Earth were of Cylon descent – skin-job and centurion alike. The conclusion reached was that the 13th tribe were Cylon all along. Were they all Cylon? It seems like a major conclusion to reach given the small skeletal remains discovered. Were Cylon and human not living on the planet together? This question appears entirely pivotal to the ‘all of this has happened before and will happen again’ mantra that has been stated a few times.

And Starbuck was fulcrum to a knockout surprise that totally put her in the frame as the Final Cylon. Her ship and corpse were apparently discovered on the planet, suggesting that she herself, and her ship, were entirely ‘reborn’. Interesting that Leoben became fearful the moment this truth came to light, especially when Starbuck told him of what the Hybrid had said about her being the harbinger of death. Between Starbuck, and Laura / Gaius / Six / Boomer / Hera in the Opera House, there’s an enormous void-like mystery at the heart of the show yet to be uncovered.

Given all this, we were lead to believe that Ellen Tigh was the Final Cylon by Tigh’s flashback at the end of the episode. Now, again, her being the Final Cylon was another major possibility I had reached. Gaius and his test in Season 1 opened that door of possibility and kept it that way, and her presence in Tigh’s thoughts, mingled with Six, always kept her alive. Add in Deanna’s remark about how the Final Cylon wasn’t in the fleet then it gathered more credence.

And then there she was on Earth, in the past, dying, but telling Tigh it was all right and they would be re-united. Tigh believed she was the Final Cylon, but that doesn’t necessarily make it so. It was his interpretation, and I personally believe that it was a misinterpretation, and we as an audience have been thrown a massive red herring. Perhaps that’s just because of the sense of anti-climax to such a big revelation that is prompting this belief.

So, it was a melancholy and introspective kickstart to the final ten episodes. It’s only afterwards, on reflection, do I realise how substantial and effective it was. Adama’s new quest is to find an alternative to Earth, but I get the feeling we’re not quite done with the planet just yet. . .

4.10 Revelations

Crikey, this episode fairly rattled along and crammed so much, so quickly into its regular running time I couldn’t believe the thing only lasted 40-odd minutes. It was a terrific episode that delivered way more than I expected and took the show smack bang into deeper-in territory than I could have reasonably anticipated.

There wasn’t much pausing for breath. Deanna made her demands that the Final Four should give themselves up to the Cylons and Tori was first to reveal her identity. That made sense. Of all of the Four she has been the one most readily willing to embrace her new-found Cylon side. And she didn’t waste time in revealing herself to Laura, happily swatting her down by stating she was done taking orders from her. In many ways, given Laura’s imperious qualities as President towards Tori and others, she kind of had it coming.

Tigh set things in motion by admitting to Adama that he was a Cylon all along. Since the Cylons were threatening to execute the hostages (they stated they actually had executed one, but we never saw it and it was never mentioned so it was impossible to know if it really happened, though I think we’re supposed to assume it did) Tigh had to take quick action.

Adama had a bit of a nervous breakdown when his friend of 30 years dropped the bombshell on him. That kind of character moment really deserved more time and inspection, but this was an episode that wasn’t hanging around so such introspection would have to wait. I am sure we’ll get to know Adama’s full response in later episodes.

With Adama losing it, and Laura a hostage, it was left to Apollo to step up and take a hold of the situation. Finally, the purpose of his political plot and positioning as president had value! He threatened to flush Tigh out of the airlock (an act, I think, that Tigh was practically welcoming) to prevent Deanna from holding all the cards. Tigh quickly revealed Tyrol and Anders were also like him, and soon they were also in the airlock.

Tyrol didn’t say much during this episode, but he did have a wry smile on his face for most of the episode. I think, after Tori, he is the next in line to have embraced his new nature.

Prior to this moment the Final Cylons had all heard some more music and been drawn to Starbuck’s pristine Viper ship. It was left to Starbuck to check it over and discover that it now highlighted co-ordinates that almost certainly could lead to Earth. (I must admit, for a brief moment, I thought the Viper itself was going to be the Final Cylon! Given the Cylons are machines after all!) It was a terrific sequence when Starbuck made the dash to the airlock, whilst Apollo’s finger hovered over the button to flush Tigh away. The music and the editing really carried the excitement terrifically – I never got a secure sense that all was going to turn out well.

As it happened, Starbuck’s news about the direction to Earth prompted a truce between Cylon and human, as instigated by Apollo. Even the Final Four Cylons were granted a quick amnesty (something that was a little too quick and casually doled out to be realistic, but this episode, as I have said, didn’t have time to hang around). They were to go to Earth together. I honestly thought the show was going to end right there (given I had no sense of time, or how long the episode had left, when I was watching). But oh no. . . the journey was not yet done.

The startling revelation was that the Fleet, and the Cylons, jumped to the route shown and made it to Earth. The image of the planet and the ships approaching it was a marvellous sight to behold. Again, I thought the episode was going to end right there, but it wasn’t done yet. They landed on Earth, and we got to see Adama feel the soil in his hands and then the camera panned past the dulled, almost empty expressions of the other major characters as they looked around this new Earth. It was barren, and the structures of the previous civilisation were now in ruins. And there the episode ended. . .

So what to make of THAT? Is this Earth our Earth? That is, does the Earth we know and live on figure as part of the mythology of Battlestar Galactica? Is the Earth they have found our Earth, only a long time in the past or way, way into the future? (Personally I go with the future idea, given the use of the ‘All Along The Watchtower’ song from the Season 3 finale.) Are we viewers the descendants of the 13th colony that has now, perhaps, ceased to exist? Or at least exists on a more savage level? Or in very few numbers? Is there anyone left on Earth at all?

It was a heck of an ending, and there’s only ten more episodes to go. The bitch of it is I am, for the first time, having to WAIT for the next block of Season 4 to air before I get to see it. I’m not used to having to wait! I want to know NOW!

4.9 The Hub

What a wonderful episode. It was a pleasant turn up from the start when it went back to ‘two days ago’ and did what I had hoped, presenting the ‘other side’ of the base star story jumping away from Galactica. I never imagined it would produce an episode this damn good, though.

With the likes of Laura, Gaius and Helo around the Hybrid, the base star started jumping on the Hybrid’s command. It was doing this a lot, apparently in pursuit of an ever-jumping Resurrection Hub. This set up the main mission with the Cylons and the Viper pilots having to work together when the time was right to spring an assault – get Deanna off the Hub and then blow the thing to pieces. That, in itself, was worthy of a whole episode’s focus. In actuality it was just a piece of the busyness that this episode was packed with.

With each jump Laura was briefly transported to a bizarre fantasy, perhaps her own subconscious, perhaps something more. There she met that religious black woman who guided her around an empty Galactica and showed Laura her death bed. I got the impression this was more symbolic than any genuine future glimpse. And the meaning of it all, that Laura was eventually presented with, was that she had lost the ability to love at all, and thus as a leader of her people it meant her people would ultimately fail in their quest to save humanity.

Or something like that, anyway.

This would prove crucial to the fate of Gaius. Whilst he was busy talking to the Centurion (very interesting, and very Gaius, how he became aware to the awoken consciousness of the Centurions and so quickly sought to win their minds with his words) he was seriously injured. It came to the point where Laura was left alone nursing him, and there he confessed that he had given the passcodes that allowed for the Cylon attack to occur.

It was believable how Gaius had reconciled his guilt with a belief in God. The idea that God made everyone, and made everyone perfect, and thus Gaius absolved himself of the guilt by a belief that he had performed a necessary function of God’s will was convincing stuff. What he didn’t count on was Laura seizing the chance to coldly allow him to bleed to death. It was only for her re-connection with humanity, and love, through Adama in her visions, that made her realise the importance of behaving humanely and prompted her to rectify her actions and save Gaius’ life.

The actual mission to destroy the Hub was a success; a startling changing of the parameters for human and Cylon now that Cylons can be killed, permanently. Where the likes of Cavill and the hostile Cylons will move to next will be an interesting one – their trump card has been taken away from them. Surely they’ll have something up their sleeves. . .?

Deanna was taken into custody of Laura. The act of deceiving the Cylons by breaching the agreement was also a bad move; Laura reneged on the deal and denied the Cylons equal access to what Deanna knew. That moment when Deanna implicated Laura as the Final Cylon was priceless. I guess the creators of the show just could not help themselves kick in that little jaw-dropper as a joke, only to snatch it back. Just when you thought the mystery was revealed. . . Oh no. Not THAT easy. Deanna has self-preservation in mind now that she can die, and knows the only thing she has of value is what she knows – I doubt she’s going to give up that information easily.

Mind, I know that the next episode is the last before the show enters a break before its final run. This will actually bring me up to date with the real air dates of the show. For the first time ever I will experienced the frustration of regular BSG fans by having to WAIT for a new episode rather than having them all ready to watch. . . It would not surprise me if Deanna reveals at least one or two of the known (to us) Final Four right at the last moment of the next episode leaving the massive cliffhanger of what the likes of Adama, for example, will do about the knowledge that Tigh is a Cylon.

In the meantime this episode ended on an almost perfect note with Adama, on his solo mission, meeting the base ship and finding Laura. I was very happy the episode included this reunion. And it was well handled. They hugged and Laura admitted that she loved Adama. His response was priceless. “About time.” Almost a tragedy that time, for these two, is something they don’t appear to have too much of.

4.8 Sine Qua Non

As I learned during the episode the meaning of the title was about what people cannot live without. That is, what could be gone that would render life meaningless. This was a slightly subdued episode, dealing fundamentally in the fact that the base ship with Laura onboard, amongst others, had disappeared. Crucially we never found out here where it had gone to, which put us directly in Adama’s shoes.

There was much passing of roles and power in this episode. By the end of it Apollo had been sworn in as a stand-in President (ever since he became part of the quorum it seemed inevitable that would occur – though I thought it might have come after Laura’s death). Adama had gone solo flying on a hunt for the base ship, and Laura, and thus had left Tigh back in command of the Galactica.

Little did Adama realise he was putting a Cylon in charge! And Tigh is a Cylon with a lot to lose regarding Deanna exposing him for what he is, which may press him to make some hard choices later down the line. Mind you, he’s also been frakking Caprica Six too, with the revelation that she is pregnant coming out of the clear blue sky! Say what you like about the Cylons, they sure are a fertile bunch!

Lamkin once again made an appearance in this episode. Oh joy of joys, he remarked sarcastically. Fundamentally Lamkin was there to point out what was obvious – that Apollo in his quest for new leadership really was the only man for the job. Lamkin even postulated that Apollo had known this all along, in a repressed fashion, and made an interesting case about how Apollo always seemed to ‘fall in’ to roles of importance despite his apparent reluctance to do so.

One thing I totally didn’t get was the business with Lamkin’s cat. Maybe I missed something (I was slightly sleepy when I watched this episode, which evidently didn’t help). But one minute the cat was there, running around, and Lamkin was even talking to the thing. And then the next Apollo was shown the cat’s dead body; apparently it had been dead for weeks! What gives, man!? What was the deal with that frakking cat!? It felt like some kind of significant point was being made out of it but I'll be damned if I picked up on it.

And the Six that Athena shot wasn’t quite dead at the beginning of this episode, but died eventually without serving much purpose. But what she did see was the bright light of the apparent world after this world, so I suspect her role here in demonstrating that she was potentially going on to someplace else was the importance in keeping her around for this episode. Athena didn’t get much in the way of punishment for it though!

In effect this was a transitional, bridge of an episode – but given the importance of some of the changes – like Apollo’s presidency and Tigh’s command – it’s a massively pivotal set of changes. It was also good to see Tigh and Adama have a bit of a scrap, though I did half expect Tigh to flick out some Cylon strength like Tori has shown to possess. . . Adama has always perhaps been a little too tolerant of Tigh’s flaws, but then Adama appeared to be the first to recognise that his tolerance and closeness is his own key flaw, so it was a nice touch all round.

The real hook, of course, is what really happened to the base ship. That Raptor craft managed to jump back, but with a dead pilot and what looked like bullet holes in the hull suggests some form of battle took place. I don’t know if the ‘other side’ of the story is going to come in the next show, though that would definitely be my preferred kind of episode.

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.

4.6 Faith

Now this is more like it. The Season has finally stepped things up a notch and allowed at least some of the more pedantry pieces to click into place. The episode spent most of its focus on Demetrius, and Starbuck, whilst also cutting to Laura spending time in a hospital with a dying woman named Emily – and both of these plot threads led to interesting places.

Laura, first, had the more digestible story. Through hearing Emily explain why it was she found the words of Gaius to hold meaning for her Laura was apparently coming round to believing in Gaius herself. Emily talked of a dream where she had crossed the river and saw her family waiting for her on the other side. Then, towards the end of the episode, Laura experienced the same dream, seeing Emily leave and cross the river whilst she saw her own mother.

It’s the classic life after death scenario, clichéd to the hilt, but here it was handled excellently. Laura moved from someone that had watched her mother die an ungracious death and believed that it held no more than blackness and emptiness to someone that had a new-found sense of hope that there was more to this world than she realised.

She explained as much to Adama at the end of the episode in a neat little coda where, perhaps with a new sense of clarity, she can make good on her pledge to be the one that leads the people to Earth and, in effect, becomes the prophecy of the dying woman. That along the way, as the Hybrid mentioned, she may eventually learn the secret of the opera house is something to look forward to. The opera house business was revealed right at the end of Season 1 and if that gets a decent pay off after all this time then it’s an impressive piece of foreshadowed storytelling.

The more dramatic, traditional story concerned Starbuck. At the hands of her mutinous crew the situation was eventually resolved with Anders stepping up (shooting Gaeta in the leg, something I doubt the increasingly bitter character is not going to take too well). And so Starbuck took a raptor with Athena, Anders, Leoben and a red shirt and Helo stayed behind and started the clock running. We had a good old fashioned race against time.

The raptor finding the broken fragments of the destroyed base star was a good plot turn. (Quite why the other Cylons didn’t annihilate it completely was somewhat fortunate!) There were Sixes and Boomers all over the place, some more willing to get along and join the humans for their own salvation than others.

The business with the Hybrid offered up the most interesting points. I’m sure the fanboys had a field day dissecting the potential meaning behind the hybrid’s cryptic words, but the gist of it seemed clear enough to me without having to pick it all apart. 4 of the final five would point the way to the Final Cylon, and this Final Cylon would go through a desperate time to find Earth where, apparently, everything had originated.

Starbuck was, once again, labelled as being one that would end the human race – but I still think this means only in the sense of a unification between Cylon and human rather than a straightforward massacre. That Starbuck’s function appears to be separate from the Final Cylon probably suggests she’s not it. Gaius seems a too obvious fit, and Laura’s role as “dying leader” surely counts her out. So all the main characters are covered except for the Adamas – unless the Final Cylon turns out to be someone more marginal. Right now, I don’t know if the likes of Anders and Tigh were ever ‘born’ in the natural sense and grew up. If they did, that paves the way for Apollo or Adama to be the Final Cylon. Otherwise, all bets are off. (I guess that would make Helo the only viable main character candidate!)

The idea that Deanna is going to be ‘unboxed’ is also a tantalising one. The moment she claps eyes on Anders (how I wished he had touched the Cylon control panel!!), or Tigh, or Tori, or Tyrol, is going to be a heck of a scene. And surely that moment cannot be too far away, with the Demetrius now linked back with the Cylon base ship and the whole bunch of them set to re-unite with Galactica. That’s a meeting I am looking forward to seeing!

4.5 The Road Less Travelled

If this hadn’t been the first of a ‘to be continued’ two-parter then I would be worried about the pace and momentum of this fourth season. Once again the episode got absorbed in the psychological struggle within Tyrol as one of its key focuses. I appreciate that this is naturally an important aspect to the show, and I expect that it is a slow progression towards a planned resolution – but it does feel like an awful lot of naval gazing and musing about faith.

It’s not like these are dull themes to explore, it’s just that sitting around talking about them introspectively for a show like Battlestar Galactica feels annoying. I know the show can be pulse-pounding and exciting, but the last two episodes have totally slowed the pace down to a drag through the sludge of the soul in this transitional exploration of many main characters. Whilst this may be a means of laying the groundwork for some major revelations I think it’s taking a little too long: I’ve already bought the majority of the transitions in the characters – if anything I am looking for the likes of Tigh and Tyrol to get a move on and embrace their new selves more quickly so the show can progress!

Tyrol had shaved his head by the start of this episode, clearly showing that this was a man going through a new phase of identification. That he seems, by the end, to have linked up and embraced Gaius was something of a weird surprise. It’s not something that I particularly buy into, mainly because I don’t understand it. I don’t understand the grip that Gaius seems to be holding over everyone anyway, all of a sudden.

Fair enough that this cult of followers that indulge him would make him start to believe his own sense of importance, but for the likes of Tyrol? Perhaps the awakening of his Cylon side has cracked open a monotheistic aspect to his psyche? I guess it’s a reasonable interpretation.

Gaius himself is obviously becoming more and more powerful in voice, and his movement is perhaps set to become larger and more potent. Maybe in the grand scheme of things there is to be a union between Cylon and mankind, and those in support of one God will find such a merging easier to handle. Who knows? For the most part I can say that it’s not a plot line that interests me all that much until its intention is made clearer.

What really salvaged this episode, for me, was the business onboard the Demetrius with Starbuck and an increasingly mutinous crew. Picking up Leoben (which had a fair amount of contrivance attached to it – perhaps explained away by fate rather than coincidence?) was always going to be a sticking point. That Starbuck gave him the time of day and listened to him was bound to happen. Quite how much that guy knows is another matter. He speaks of profound understanding of the universe and how things are supposed to be yet, when faced with Anders, there wasn’t a flicker of recognition as to what he really was.

So the episode ending with first Helo and then Gaeta and then eventually everyone admitting that they were no longer willing to carry out Starbuck’s orders, and were going to assume command. It’s hard to imagine how Starbuck is going to get away with her own pursuit of Earth in the face of this state of affairs. Is she willing to gp completely alone? Or with just Leoben? Or is there some way that she can wrangle the situation around to her will and have the crew trust her just a little more to see where it takes them?

4.4 Escape Velocity

It seems to me that Season 4 is spinning its wheels a little, easing itself into a position where it can then launch at its next target. This episode, for instance, focused mainly on Tigh, Tyrol and Gaius and was pretty much concerned with their transitional phase.

Gaius was assuming the role of his cult leader status with the potential for it to develop and turn him into a genuine messianic prophet. Despite Laura wanting to pass laws that blocked the ability for Gaius and his followers to gather in one spot (following the attack at the start of the episode) Gaius eventually came through, after a bit of martyrish beating for his troubles.

Apollo once more served to oppose the strict grip on passing laws Laura was pushing through. Again I can see both sides of the coin. Laura’s actions have something of a tyrannical nature and Apollo is right to bring them to the attention of the quorum and have new motions voted democratically. However, given the state of the fleet and the few numbers left in the entire human race, drastic situations call for desperate measures.

Unfortunately, Laura is perhaps not in the best place to be making decisions, looking down the barrel of her own mortality. It seems that she’s definitely going to die this time. I mean, there’s no sign of Hera’s blood coming to her rescue! (Why is that? Is Hera no longer a viable means of curing her?) Potentially Laura may make moves and strike actions with increasing abandon, which may prove detrimental or helpful in the long run.

Tigh has developed a growing fascination with Caprica Six, wanting to know more about her as a means of knowing more about himself. This shows his growing curiosity and acceptance of what he is. Of the Final Four only Tori has embraced her new self, Tigh and Tyrol are struggling with it.

By the end of the episode Tigh had allowed Caprica to beat him fairly badly, but when he was asking for more she seemed to realise that pain was not what he needed – and instead she kissed him. Quite what that means for the future of their relationship remains to be seen.

Elsewhere Tyrol “frakked up” with his ship repairs and so went into himself, working tirelessly and then drinking. The resulting scene with him and Adama in the bar, with Tyrol letting rip about his disaffected life led to Adama relieving him of his post. If anything is going to ease Tyrol into a new transition as a Cylon it’s no longer having his wife, and his job – the two things that anchored him previously are now gone. And since his child is probably as important to the Final Four (it’s the only one of its kind, right?) then it will have no means of preventing him from embracing Cylonhood!

So that was that, really. Various key players slowly moving across the board to slot into a new place.

4.3 The Ties That Bind

Easily the best episode of this Season so far, focusing in the main on Callie but not in a way that suggested her tragic end was inevitable, or predictable. At the start of the episode she was an exhausted and fraught wreck due to her husband’s pre-occupation with being a Cylon. Given the promises he made last season about how things were going to change in their relationship it was a natural unravelling for Callie since such changes had never occurred.

On some form of drug concoction she accused Tyrol of having an affair with Tori, which in turn meant a public show that the three Final Cylons needed to address, and so they conducted their meeting to discuss the matter. What they didn’t know was that Callie was watching and listening, and the news that her husband was a skin-job wasn’t something she took well.

The final, shocking scene in the airlock was excellently executed (if you’ll pardon the pun). Callie took her child to the airlock and set it to go, apparently ready to blast herself and her abominable half-Cylon child out into space. And then Tori turned up. What wasn’t so surprising was that Tori managed to talk Callie out of it. What was more surprising was the moment Tori had Nicky in her hands, when she belted Callie away with super strength, knocking her flat. By the time Callie came around Tori was in the airlock control room, ready to flick the switch. . .

So that was the end of Callie, blasted out into cold space. Given that Adama was consoling Tyrol at the end of the episode suggests the view must be that Callie killed herself (her attack on Tyrol, and the Doc’s opinion on her condition would corroborate that story). The reveal about Tori is the startling aspect to this. She had said she was enjoying the new lease of life, the change, which explains why she acted so impulsively as a Cylon.

The likes of Tigh, Tyrol and Anders almost certainly have this same potential. Quite how able they will be to keep their Cylon side suppressed remains to be seen; as does how their Cylon side may display itself should it come to the fore. It can only be a matter of time.

There wasn’t much progression with Starbuck, Anders and Gaeta and the rest on the ship searching for Earth (that’ll be a plot point focused on in later episodes, no doubt). But now Apollo is wrangling in politics, with Zarek baiting him to antagonise Laura, the issue about the secrecy of that mission, and the secrecy by which Laura and Adama conduct their decisions is being questioned.

Frankly, at this stage in the show, it’s an issue that doesn’t feel particularly relevant. But maybe it will prove to be so, somehow. So I watch and engage in it, generally wishing the action was elsewhere. Because elsewhere there was Cylon action going on!

I had been premature in my previous assumption from the last episode that the likes of Cavell and the other Cylon moulds had been destroyed. Caprica’s actions had been more of a warning shot – but it was one that backfired. Cavell apparently acceded to Six’s request to reinstate Deanna (how I cannot WAIT to hear what she has to say, if I ever will!) only to turn against her and attack her ship.

With the Resurrection Ship not nearby it seemed that Caprica Six and company, if they were blown apart, would be properly dead. Yet since we never witnessed the absolute destruction I can only hopefully presume total annihilation has not yet occurred. Either Six and co will get out to wage war another day, or she may download after all. Whatever happens, this is a rift between the Cylons that does not appear to be salvageable. It’s a fascinating crossroads they’ve managed to forge here, and quite where the Centurions will fall into this is an extra element of spice thrown into the mix.