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| Thursday, June 19, 2008 11:08 PM |
| On the Viewer - Battlestar Galactica ("Revelations") |
 by Fëanor |
With this episode, I finally caught up with Battlestar Galactica - only to realize that it was the mid-season finale and there wouldn't be any more episodes until next year. Ah, well. It is a great episode, and could almost serve as an ending to the series as a whole - although it would be a depressing ending.
Big spoilers ahead!
The episode opens with an odd little conversation between Apollo and Starbuck that ends with Starbuck passing on a rather dark and not at all reassuring thought from Leoben: for children to reach their full potential, their parents have to die. Is this a foreshadowing of the series ending? For Cylons to reach their potential must their parents, humanity, die?
Speaking of the Cylons, the Three is pretty much taking charge over on the rebel basestar, and she reveals that in fact only four of the Final Five are in the fleet. Which means the fifth is either someone we haven't met yet - or is someone already on the basestar. Hmmm... Anyway, the Three makes the rather savvy move of taking as hostages all the humans on the basestar, to be held until the Final Four are safely on board. Three asks Adama to come with her back to Galactica when they arrive at the fleet. As Roslin is saying goodbye, she whispers to him that if it all goes to hell and the Cylons get the Four, he will have to destroy the basestar with all the humans on board, rather than let the Cylons have Earth.
The basestar finally gets back to the fleet and the Raptor arrives with Adama and the Three aboard. There's an interesting moment as the Final Four stand at various spots around the Raptor, wondering whether Three really can, or really will, identify them. But Three takes an interesting tack and says she'll go back to the basestar and wait for the Four to come to her. She asks that the humans simply not interfere with shuttle traffic. Her plan seems to be working almost immediately, as before she even gets back on the Raptor, Tory asks to come with her, with the excuse that she wants to give Roslin her medication and be by her side. Tigh tries to stop her, but he has no real good argument against it and must demur.
Time to come up with a plan for rescuing the hostages! Unfortunately, they don't have a very good one, and all agree that if it comes down to it, they really will have to blow up the basestar.
At this point I was starting to wonder, what if somehow this is all a mistake and these people really aren't the Final Four? What if Three says Tory is totally wrong? But instead she confirms Tory's identity. Tory reveals the truth to Roslin and Baltar (Gaius predictably tries to make like he knew all along somehow, unconsciously), and rejects Roslin's suggestion that she try to sway the Three to back down. "I'm done taking orders from you." Clearly Tory has found a place where she can have power and she's not planning to give that up.
Then all the sudden Three tosses a human out of an airlock and tells Galactica she'll keep doing that every quarter hour until they get the Four. Well, that ups the ante a bit! Adama says to initiate the crazy rescue plan, but all of the sudden the Final Four start getting this weird staticy transmission that leads the three of them still on Galactica to the hangar deck and the mysterious Viper in which Starbuck returned from Earth. They think something has changed about the ship, but don't know what, and decide maybe Starbuck can help them. Tigh agrees, but he's also come to another decision. He knows that unless he gives himself up, many people will lose their lives in the rescue mission. So he goes to Adama's quarters and tells him to scrub the mission, and finally slowly reveals his terrible secret: he himself is a Cylon. Adama fights him on it, offers arguments why it couldn't be so, and alternate explanations for Tigh's experiences - he almost convinced me, and had me once again thinking that maybe somehow Tigh, at least, wasn't a Cylon - but Tigh will not be deterred, and tells Adama he must use him as a hostage. Adama does order him to be taken to an airlock and used as a hostage, but then breaks down. This revelation hits him even harder than I had expected it would. He busts up his office and drinks himself into a stupor. When Apollo comes in to help him, he whimpers, "I can't kill the bastard." The whole sequence is really powerful.
Apollo takes over, tells the Three they will kill Tigh if she harms the hostages, and demands that Tigh reveal the identities of the other Cylons in the fleet, to save everyone.
Meanwhile, Anders and the Chief are trying to convince Starbuck that something's changed about the Viper, but she's skeptical. Then soldiers come in to arrest Anders and the Chief; Tigh has given them up. Anders admits it's true to a shocked Starbuck, but still maintains that she has to check out the Viper.
Anders and the Chief join Tigh in the airlock and Apollo tells Three he'll space them all if she doesn't back down. Tory tells the Three Apollo will back down if pressured, but Baltar says pressure won't work on Apollo because he's too much like his father. Three orders the nukes targeted on the fleet. The humans realize that with hot nukes already pointing right at them, the ships in the fleet won't be able to spool up their FTL drives in time to escape. Apollo orders everyone out of the airlock but Tigh and prepares to space him. Three, convinced that humans will never forgive Cylons for what happened on the 12 Colonies and that no peaceful solution is possible, gets ready to fire on the fleet.
But as all this is happening, Starbuck has indeed discovered that something is different about the Viper - it's picking up a distant signal that she deduces must be from Earth. She rushes into the airlock control room just in time to stop Apollo, telling him the Cylons have given them Earth.
Next thing we see, all the important humans and Cylons are in the hangar bay with the Viper discussing the signal. Apollo has shared the information about the signal with the Cylons, and granted the Four amnesty. He knew if they just ran away again now, another confrontation in the future would be inevitable. But now peace is possible. They will all go to Earth together. A handshake with Three seals the deal, and the hostages are released.
Apollo and Roslin together talk Adama out of his stupor and get him to put his uniform back on to lead them to Earth. Roslin says, "I want to see you pick up that first fistful of earth."
But at this point it's not at all clear that the signal is really from Earth, so I was a little uncomfortable with everybody taking it for granted that it was, and making speeches and getting all choked up. They get even more ahead of themselves when they arrive and a check against the constellations reveals it definitely is Earth. Adama makes a big (and actually rather moving) speech to the whole fleet, and everybody gets happy and excited and dances and cries and laughs and there's a big celebration - all before they've even seen the planet! I'm thinking at this point, hey, don't you guys remember how everything always goes horribly wrong for you? You don't even know yet if there are people on the planet, whether they want you around, whether there's room for you, or what's waiting for you down there at all!
And indeed my fears were justified. A group of ships land and Adama does pick up that first fistful of Earth - only to discover it's irradiated. All around them is a barren, gray wasteland full of the ruins of destroyed cities. They've made it to Earth, but it's a post-apocalypse Earth.
Woah. That's some ending. I don't know how you follow that up with ten more episodes. Then again, I had no idea how they were going to follow-up the end of Season 2, either. Hopefully it's safe to once again trust that they know what they're doing and will take things in an interesting direction.
I have often wondered as the series has gone on whether we would ever see Earth (maybe the series would end with them approaching the planet?), and if we did, what Earth it would be. Would it be the Earth of our distant past? Of our future? Or would it be our very own Earth - the Earth of today? I thought the latter the most likely, but clearly I was off on that.
Anyway, this episode had a couple of slightly corny spots, but overall it was just extremely intense and effective, with lots of great ideas, a great story, great acting, and plenty of tension and thrills. The series' themes of love and violence, of hatred and forgiveness, of trust and betrayal, of parents and children, are all coming together in a moving and powerful fashion. I'm really looking forward to seeing how they wrap this all up in the second half of the season. |
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