Finally getting this up, I know.
Spoilerifics to follow. Read at your own risk if you haven't made it to Season 4's mid-finale.
I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting from this episode, especially with all the buzz that was surrounding it. This probably wasn't it. Somehow I had assumed that the precipice that the Cylon rebels and the Colonials had created was going to follow with some kind of epic level tragedy. It made me wonder things like, would the creators destroy the show's namesake and that kind of thing.
This is what I love about shows with finite endings. The show can take any angle it needs and it doesn't have to worry about keeping the handsome hero around for ratings.
What we got was much better, I think. My only real complaint is that it feels a little bit like we got shortchanged with the impact of the four being revealed, although seeing Adama go to pieces was a pretty choice scene and Lee's standoff with D'Anna was well worth it as well.
I'm guessing that we'll have more of to follow. Instead, the writers wanted to get us to their end scene of choice - the broken, apocalyptic, devastated remains of Earth.
Not that the sight was a huge shock. Firstly this is a show which has never allowed characters to get off easy. Second, if we follow that the show has more than a little religious undertones, then we won't get grace just by parking ships in orbit.
It does raise some interesting questions though - who exactly did all the bomb dropping and when. If the Cylons were, in general, unaware of Earth, then why exactly were there five hidden models that knew the way? How much of this ties into the "This has all happened before" mantra from a season or so ago.
Especially since, in reality, the four didn't know the way to Earth. They were just there to help open the envelope. Starbuck was the messenger - or rather Starbuck's ship was the messenger.
And to paraphrase Starbuck, it all makes it seem like there's someone pulling the strings. If you look at the whole show as an organized plan to rediscover Earth ... which seems the only explanation since Earth would still be missing without some pretty divine intervention, the real remaining questions would be - who is the puppetmaster?
Or rather, without putting to deep a point on it, the show is asking: Who is God?
And should we read too much into the fact that the final model is as of yet unrevealed. Would they be one and the same? Was D'Anna being specific with the whole "there are four" statement in the sense that the fifth isn't part of the fleet or that the fifth was already on the Baseship?
My money is still on Roslin, Baltar or some yet unseen character. Definitely looking forward to the show's conclusion.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
TV Watch: Battlestar Galactica, Revelations
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
3 comments:
What we do know is that D'anna knows who the 5th is, and it was clear from the scene where she saw the 5th that she recognized who the 5th was and seemed kind of surprised by it. Given her interactions with Baltar, Adama, and Roslin, I don't get the impression any of them are the 5th. So the question in my mind is who D'anna hasn't seen that she'd recognize since she found out about the final 5.
BSG is reminding me a lot of the 4th season of Babylon 5 right now. You get to this point where there's this major climax, the presumed point of the whole series. You get there and realize, wait, they've got a bunch more episodes to do. What now?
A few thoughts on that:
1) Now that earth has been found and it's a total mess, there's going to be a lot of people struggling with a lack of happy ending to the prophecy. Expect this to benefit Baltar's religious cult in a big way.
2) I expect we're going to see a rebellion amongst the Cylons with the 1's and 2's rising against their presumed masters. This all stemming from that conversation about God that Baltar had. I fully expect this to conclude with Baltar being the leader of those cylons. By your command and all that.
Basically in the end I get this sense that Baltar is going to be the big winner in all of this. He'll have all kinds of power, be convinced that he's a messiah, and have absolved himself of his own guilt. How messed up is that?
Oh and has anybody else noticed that the 6 in Baltar's head hasn't shown up in a while? Perhaps he kinda got where he was going and doesn't need her anymore.
Well my runner up faves for Fifth would be D and Gaita, but I would think D'Anna would have wanted them secured as well and can't think of any reason she'd know that only four of them had "activated".
I like them because I think they're both powerful background characters - but I'm still a bit stuck on the idea that she was specific about "being on the Fleet."
But if I really had to give a guess, I'd guess it's a new curveball. Like Starbuck isn't really Starbuck. Or Starbuck's ship is a Cylon.
Or the Fifth model is YOU! All of YOU!
I dunno. I think it's a fun little mystery that thankfully they aren't overplaying in the show.
And yeah, Baltar's 6 has been missing ... and wasn't that after he had some long talk with it about being a Cylon? And since then he hasn't really had any vision type things in general, right?
And yeah, I would certainly think that we'll see a) conflict around the old gods vs new god and b) the rebel Cylons and the Neocons ... er old Cylons....
Post a Comment