Battlestar Galactica (9): What If It Had Been Zack?

I did little fist pumps in the air when Lee said that because I had been tossing around ideas with some friends that it would be an amazing twist if Zack turned out to be the last Cylon. So, as my sister asks: is the door now open to bring the other Adama son back to life?

But let us have a Quick Recap: After some bewilderment, Kara and Lee join the battle. Tigh has a vision of shooting Adama, but then follows orders and commands anyone who can fly to suit up. Anders is unable to fire his weapon, and a Raider scans him. His eye turns red, the Raider turns away, and the entire Cylon offensive jumps away. Kara is brought onto Galactica, says she was only away for six hours, and that she has pictures of Earth. Despite passing Doc Cottle’s test, Roslin does not believe she really is Kara, the ship Kara returned on is in mint condition, and Kara cannot give any definite information on the location of Earth beyond her feeling, so the fleet continues to jump based on the path of the nebula. Baltar is being protected by a cult living in a storage container on Galactica. While he is willing to get it on with one of his “followers,” he tries to leave, but stays to pray over a sick boy to the one true god. While shaving away his icky faux-Jesus look, he and one of his followers are attacked by Joe, whose son Kevin was killed on New Caprica. Baltar begs Joe to kill him, proving to Unseen Six (this is how I am going to refer to the Six only Baltar can see) that he would be willing to give up his life for the sick boy. When he escapes Joe, he finds that the young boy is miraculously healed. Adama offers Lee his wings back, but Lee tells him that even though he took them off for the wrong reasons, he is going to accept a position in the civilian government. Kara confronts Anders in front of her picture on the Remembrance Wall, and she starts to doubt what she is. He tells her that even if she is a Cylon he still loves her, but she does not reciprocate the sentiment. While they talk, the fleet jumps again, and Kara decides she has to convince Roslin to listen to her. She attacks he guards and Anders, makes he way to Adama’s quarters where Roslin is sleeping, and the episode ends with Kara raising a gun to the President. Got all that?

This could have been the crappiest episode in the history of Battlestar Galactica, and I still would be over the moon about its very existence. In fact, I had to rewatch the episode, because when I tried to think about what had happened, I realized that in my euphoria nothing had really stuck in my mind. Luckily for all of us, I realized on the second time around that “He That Believeth in Me” is a quality episode.

And one of the most quality moments: could Lee and Kara’s hug have been any more wonderful? She pulled away/pushed away from Anders, but she held onto to Lee, and boy did he hold onto her. I know that I am repeating myself and I do not need to point our every single time they show affection for each other, but Lee and Kara are a very important issue to me, and I just cannot help myself.

It has been too many episodes since we have had such a good battle scene. And it has been a long long time since a Fleet ship full of people was destroyed. For a while the Cylon/Galactica interchanges were skirmishes at most, stand-offs often, so I kind of forgot what an adrenaline rush it is when all the Vipers and Raiders are zooming around and shooting at each other. For the Cylons to launch such a large offensive I would think they were planning on destroying the Humans once and for all. But they turn back after scanning Anders, so were they looking for the Final Five? The Known Seven are not supposed to think about the Final Five, but the Threes did, and now the Sixes are, so it is possible they were fishing. There is something afoot on the Cylon side. Last season when the show starting taking place so often on the Cylon Baseships I was less than compelled, but now I want to know why they attacked and why they turned back, which only the Cylons can tell me.

I am not the only one wondering, but unlike the Galactica Cylons, I am not coming up with solutions. I have to question Tigh’s plan. I understand the principle behind it; he believes that his choices make him who he is, not whatever his DNA happens to be, so he will choose to end his life and/or their lives if it seems some sort of programming is taking over. His determination is a wonderful contrast to Anders’ crippling confusion. It would be unrealistic for all of them to simply “accept” that they are Cylons, and it is in keeping with Tigh’s character that he refuses to give up on the life he has lived. But even if they shoot themselves to prevent any damage they would do, aren’t there just other copies of their models? This leads me to another question: where are the other copies? This question can be absorbed into another question I have been pondering for a long time: is there a Cylon home world? There may be no answers to my questions, or they may be unimportant in the grand scheme of things, just something I have been tossing around in my head, re-prompted by this episode.

Tigh was not the only one resorting to gun-waving. Kara, whatever/whoever she is now, is not messing around. I do not disagree with Roslin’s wary attitude towards Kara reborn, but maybe she is a bit too presumptuous in thinking that Kara would just be ignored without fighting back. Normal Starbuck wouldn’t do that, so why would she return any less insistent or emphatic about something in which she believes? But Roslin is being rather persumptous in a related area as well. If I were sharing dreams with two Cylons and a Humalon baby, I would start to wonder if I were a Cylon. So concerned with what Kara might be, Roslin so far is not entertaining this (obvious) possibility. But maybe that is part of human frailty; it is always someone else, never me.

It is when you can no longer deny that it is someone else that things get complicated, and interesting. Lee couldn’t seem to care less what Kara came back as, and he asks his father if they could have Zack back would it matter that he was a Cylon. Lee is now facing a potential reality that the woman he loves is not human. He could be in the same situation Helo was two years ago, a situation to which Lee has been less than sympathetic. Now that it might be him, will he be more respectful of Helo and Sharon’s family? With Kara’s return Lee is in a position not just to change, but to grow.

Finally, and this may be highly trivial, but I love the new opening. I am usually hesitant when shows change their credits or intros, but I am a big fan. By concentrating on the issues of the Know Cylons, the Battlestar Cylons, and the Final Cylon, the intro focuses the viewers’ attention to be congruent with that of the characters. The general threat of the Cylons has been particularized over the years; it is not so important anymore what they are, so much as who they are.

The TV Girl