Previously on Battlestar Galactica: Brother Cavil had special plans for Hera at the Cylon Colony while Admiral Adama finally decided that he has to abandon the Galactica.
Here we are, part one of the two-part series finale. Hold on to your frakking hats. Things get off to an amazingly confusing start as we see an affluent city with the subtitle “Caprica City, Before the Fall.” Is your mind blown yet? Adama (Edward James Olmos) sits in a meeting where a man is trying to convince him to do something he doesn’t want to do.
We also get to see Gaius Baltar’s first date with Caprica Six (Tricia Helfer), where she slowly rubs the inside of his thigh while getting drunk in his limo. Baltar (James Callis) gets a disturbing call and is forced to go see his aging, senile father, who stabbed his nurse.
Baltar’s dad is pretty darn funny, making a bunch of jokes about Caprica Six being a whore. He thinks Gaius has betrayed his family’s history, even changing his accent so he sounds more educated.
In another first meeting, we get to see Lee (Jamie Bamber) stop by Kara Thrace’s apartment for dinner. Why is he there? To have dinner with his brother and his girlfriend, of course, and none other than Zak Adama shows up, warning his big brother against stealing his girlfriend. I think we all know how that will turn out.
Finally back on Caprica City, Laura Roslin (Mary McDonnell) gets drunk with her two sisters at a baby shower for one of them. Everything is great and it’s nice to see Laura having a good time. That ends quickly the next day when the Caprica City Police stop by to tell Laura that her dad and two sisters were killed by a drunk driver. My heart breaks because apparently Laura Roslin’s life has always sucked.
She heads outside and walks over to a fountain. She wades in and lets the sprays of water coast over her face. This motif segues beautifully into Laura Roslin’s morphine drip in the present. She’s not feeling well, and neither is Lee, who’s dealing with tearing the Galactica apart and redistributing the pieces to the fleet.
Baltar is doing considerably better, as he and his female freedom fighters are growing in numbers. Head Six concurs, telling Gaius that he will be the author of humanity’s final chapter. This takes him back to Caprica City, where Caprica Six magically helped Baltar by getting his dad into a nice retirement home. Gaius’ dad is Julius, which is very ancient Roman.
Tyrol is in the brig for his role in assisting Boomer to kidnap Hera, and Helo is upset that Tyrol doesn’t seem to realize that all the Cylon models are different. Starbuck is still busy working with Hybrid Anders to figure out the secret to the genius of “All Along the Watchtower,” even turning the musical notes into mathematical formulas.
How awesome would it be if Bob Dylan’s song actually contained some secret equation that correctly predicts major world events? It would be like National Treasure, only with rock music instead of boring history.
Another person obsessed with those musical notes is Hera, who is doing nothing but drawing them over and over again at the Cylon Colony. Brother Cavil wants to treat her like a pin cushion, but Simon is worried about her health.
Laura Roslin is still getting cancer treatment and she goes back to three months after her family died, fielding a phone call with a friend who asks if she’ll be joining President Adar’s campaign. She says no, then accepts a blind date with a man named Shawn Ellison.
Admiral Adama spends his day roaming the halls of the Galactica, preparing for his ceremonial final Viper flight off the ship. He bumps into Hot Dog (played by Edward James Olmos’ real-life son Bodie), who is still carrying around Nicholas. Hot Dog took the photos of the dead Viper pilots off the memorial wall to take with him. Adama checks out the wall and the many photos left up. He sees a picture of Hera and gets mad.
He then checks on Starbuck and asks if Baltar’s outing was the truth. She tells him about burning her own dead body, and while she doesn’t know what she is, Adama knows that she’s his daughter. He’s really there to ask Hybrid Anders a question. She plugs him in, which takes us back to Samuel Anders being interviewed in a locker room hot tub back on Caprica. He talks about how all he cares about while playing Pyramid is the mathematical and physical joy of the perfect throw. How did no one realize he was a Cylon until the season 3 finale?
Baltar interrupts Lee’s traffic directing to talk about the potential rebirth of the fleet after the Galactica is gone. His only goal is to get a seat on the government. If memory serves, things didn’t end so well the last time Gaius Baltar was involved with politics. Lee is smart enough not to trust anything Baltar ever does, so he refuses to acknowledge Baltar’s followers in the Quorum. Baltar is also a fairly smart guy, so he acknowledges that “I wouldn’t trust me either.”
On the hangar deck, Adama and Starbuck show up and put a giant piece of red tape on the floor. Adama has had a change of heart and he’s ordering a mission to find Hera because they found out the location of the Cylon Colony from Anders.. The entire ship is talking about this daredevil mission which is a volunteer assignment and anyone is welcome to join, even former military officers jailed due to their part in the mutiny. Ellen Tigh informs Tory that the Final Five will be going.
Adama shouts out to everyone that he and whoever will join him will take the Galactica to find the Cylon Colony, and if there aren’t enough people to staff the ship, he will lead a Raptor assault. He warns any takers that this is almost certainly a one-way mission. He demands everyone stand on one side of the red tape
People make their choices, with Lee and the Final Five Cylons all going. Doc Cottle tries to sign up, but Adama insists that the fleet can’t afford to lose a doctor. Aww, poor Doc. A weary Laura Roslin walks in and joins Adama’s mission. A Number Six also joins, which gives Baltar a lot of food for thought.
The episode then jumps to this final mission where Starbuck is on a Raptor recon mission. She finds the Cylon Colony, but unfortunately it’s in the middle of an asteroid belt right on top of a black hole. I’m no astronomer, but that sounds dangerous and/or physically impossible.
However, Starbuck finds that there is a single place just above the Colony where the basestars can jump to. The bad news is that the Cylons will almost certainly attack as soon as they jump in. Admiral Adama orders them to prepare to go anyway.
Next week on Battlestar Galactica: It’s the two-hour series finale starting at 9pm and you can not afford to miss it. My prediction is that some amazing stuff will be revealed, major characters will die, and, hopefully, I won’t be super pissed like when The Sopranos ended.
(Image courtesy of the Sci Fi Channel)
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
John watches nearly every show on TV, but he specializes in sci-fi/fantasy like The Vampire Diaries, Supernatural and True Blood. However, he can also be found writing about everything from Survivor and Glee to One Tree Hill and Smallville.
