Woah. Oooh.

Battlestar Galactica is the show that just won’t stand still. Just when I thought things were settling down into some sort of order, the Hugo award nominated ‘Pegasus’ came along and stirred everything up again.¹ And then, when I thought our new Admiral Adama was reasonably settled… this episode comes along.

Let’s recap, since there’s been a huge gap between episodes, and also because it really takes up space, as I’ve recently discovered. Basically, the rift between President Roslyn and Adama was healed (after Adama got better), Boomer (the Galactica one) got shot, a new Battlestar turned up, the fleet killed the Cylon’s resurrection ship, Lee took command of the new ship, Boomer (the Caprica one) had a baby which got hidden from her, Baltar found himself a solid Number Six, there was an episode from the Cylons’ point of view,² Starbuck went back to Caprica to rescue her boyfriend, and they found a planet that could sustain human life.

Phew. I’ve seen entire TV shows that haven’t managed that much development in five years.

This week, the elections that Lee secured all the way back in season one’s ‘Bastille Day’ are finally held, with Baltar challenging everyone’s favourite adorable Sarah-Jane Smith lookalike³ for the Presidency. Unfortunately for Roslyn, while there are no convenient boat people around,⁴ Baltar has found the perfect divisive issue, with mass appeal. For some reason, most of the people in the fleet aren’t happy following the Battlestars around the place and being occasional collateral damage in an action-adventure show. They want to settle down, walk on solid earth. It’s easy to call them whingers, but it’s important to remember that unlike most of our heroes, none of them have actually visited a planet since they left the twelve colonies.

Speaking of which, Starbuck’s little jaunt to Caprica has not only brought back her spunky sports guy but also a Cylon⁵ who claims that the whole Cylon force has left the colonies. Yay! Everything’s over! No problems! But these suspicious humans just won’t take things at face value. Well, the Galactica crew don’t, anyhow. Everyone else has just voted to take the crappy planet below at face value, so it seems the rulers are out of touch with the masses, as ever.

As the election comes down to the line, Roslyn tries to pull some dirty tricks — but dear old Admiral Adama persuades her not to. Which is sweet. I really like those two, but at the same time, I don’t want it to lead anywhere. At least, not on screen. It’d be like watching your parents. Ew. Unfortunately, by keeping their hands clean, our two fearless leaders allow Baltar to take the election, and settle the fleet on the planet. And then…

… a whole year passes.⁶

This reminds me of ‘banking’ in The Weakest Link. Everyone knows that shows start to get crap after three years. Now Ronald D. Moore and his writerly bunch have separated seasons one and two from the following, inevitably disappointing years. They form the first ‘chapter’ of Battlestar Galactica, and they’re in the bank, forever awesome and unsullied. Future fans will be able to easily say “Oh yeah, I’m a fan of the first bit of Galactica. You know, before they settled on that planet.” It’s very convenient.⁷

The over-arcing elements of any TV show are generally about showing us how we want things to be, and then throwing as much crap as they can find in the way of that situation; be it ex-wives in soapies, regenerations in Doctor Who,⁸ or budget cuts in ER. This one is a doozie. Lee’s getting fat, the Chief’s a union leader, Starbuck’s husband is dying, Adama’s got that godawful moustache again, and Tigh’s left the Galactica. Oh, alright, so in a way, we wanted that last one. But there’s a lot of pieces to pick up next season, a lot of new toys to play with, and a year’s worth of new backstory to explore.

Oh, and did I mention that the frakking Cylons have conquered humanity? Because, hey, they did. Shit. Those are some awesome marching droids, there.⁹¹⁰

1. Which I didn’t review, along with all the other Battlestar Galactica episodes since ‘Fragged’. Just lazy, me. ↩
2. Which was pure genius. Seriously awesome. ↩
3. ↩
4. Plenty of spaceship people though. And ‘Cloud Nine’ is looking a little creaky. ↩
5. So how many is that? Boomer, Number Six, that weedy guy from the Premiere, the beardy psycho from the premiere, the spooky black guy from the hospital, Xena, and now old grumpy man. Seven of Twelve. ↩
6. Alias, anyone? No no no. This is Battlestar Galactica, and it still rocks. For a start, we don’t cut away immediately, but instead, are shown in detail what’s happened since. This gives the impression that the writers actually have ideas about why to do this, and aren’t just picking some random crazy plot development and working out the rest when they come back to work next year. Ahem. ↩
7. I’m not really that cynical. The way things are going, I’m sure the show has another two good seasons in it, at least. But you know that there’s fans out there who’ve already decided to only like the first two seasons. Search your feelings, Luke, you know it to be true. What does your heart tell you? Why do we fall, Master Wayne? Beeee yourself. Ahem. ↩
8. ‘New Earth’ is sitting on my hard drive as we speak and I can’t watch it because Jackson’s not here yet. Curse my twisted TV-watching morality. ↩
9. “They have a plan.” Hmmm. So, Number Six gave Baltar the bomb, to give to her Pegasus-captured self, to detonate when they found a planet, so that the Cylons would find them, so that they’d all get conquered? Is that the plan? Is there still a plan? I suppose we’ll find out within 15 seconds of the first episode of season three. “They had a plan.” ↩
10. Bwa ha! Not only does this review break the site’s footnote record, but it also gets rid of Jackson’s ugly graffiti, finally. ↩

1,010

This entry was posted by the illustrious Tom Charman on Saturday, April 15th, 2006. It concerns such pressing issues as Battlestar Galactica, tv. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.