Photo courtesy Sci Fi
As a serious remake of a campy seventies sci-fi show, Battlestar has defied expectations from the start. So it’s fitting that as we move closer to the big finale, this season is becoming something we never expected: a love story between two of its oldest characters.
Love Boat Galactica
In a continuation of last week’s episode, where Adama finally acknowledged how much he cares about Laura Roslin, we see what happened to the Cylon Basestar once the reconnected Hybrid jumped away with Roslin and Baltar and the other soldiers.
We’re still sick of dream sequences and visions (not to mention parallel realities), but the imaginary scenes of Roslin’s death were an acceptable way to show her realizing that she hearts Adama — and that protecting the fleet needn’t stifle her basic humanity. When she reunites with Adama, it's a four-hankie moment — the sort of emotional scene the show handles so well by underplaying it.
They Have a Plan
Now that D’Anna/Xena has been reactivated, the question on everyone’s mind is “Who colors her hair? It’s fabulous!” That and who the last of the Final Five is. A hat tip goes to the writers for the exchange where D’Anna responded to Roslin’s inquiry by acting as if she herself were one of the Five — and then mocking Roslin’s worry. It was a nice acknowledgment of the show's having become dominated by coy mysteries and big revelations. Or maybe when the producers were shooting they didn’t realize how the moment would at this point seem self-parodying.
D’Anna’s information makes a good bargaining chip, so we’re probably not going to find out who the last Cylon is for while. (We’re still going with Lee, by the way. But our favorite left-field prediction? Zak, Adama’s son, who died long before the show’s beginning.)
Roslin did, however, get a great morsel: Baltar’s admission that the destruction of the colonies owed to his sleeping with the enemy. Roslin considered just letting Baltar die from his stomach wound, and although the narrative played out a little too neatly — she figured her kindness would get her closer to learning the Final Five — it’s a plot point that’s clearly going to matter later. We’re an episode away from the mid-season hiatus, and things are really starting to get interesting. At last. —Tim Grierson
