BSG Watch: Down With the Ship

Sci Fi

Spoilers for Friday's episode of Battlestar Galactica coming up after the jump: 

As Battlestar Galactica was getting ready to return for its last season, I remember wondering whether it would seem as relevant to the times as it did when it debuted—in the middle of the war in Iraq, with the parallels in the story to the still-fresh memories of 9/11. Now, with the Iraq war (so strongly mirrored in the New Caprica storyline) winding down, 9/11 over seven years away and a new administration in Washington, would BSG seem as of-the-moment? 

Maybe that wouldn't matter, because the real greatness of the show had little or nothing to do with its timeliness. But in any event, I had nothing to worry about. The fleet may not be dealing with the aftermath of an economic bubble, and it may never have been attacked by hostile credit-default swaps. But the sense of dread suffusing these last episodes—the crumbling infrastructure, the desperate straits of the civilians, the notion that ways of life are passing without anyone knowing what, if anything, will arise to replace them—let's just say they are not entirely unfamiliar. 

Of course, for all our problems, we're not actually down to our last tube of toothpaste while facing the possibility that the ground beneath our feet could suddenly stress-fracture and shatter, hurling us into the vacuum of space. So: silver linings. 

There was plenty of story advancement in "Islanded in a Stream of Stars," but for my money the strength of the episode was how well it worked tonally, building the end-times mood among the fleet, from the arguments over who gets to strip what spare parts from Galactica, to Adama's white-paint breakdown to that great pull-away tableau of he and Tigh sitting wordlessly on the couch. The Old Man has never looked so old and tired. 

This episode was full of difficult and affecting goodbyes. Let's hope there are a few hellos left in the series yet. 

On to the hail of bullets:

* Are we settled on the conclusion that Galactica herself is the "dying leader" of the prophecy? Could it also be Adama, who could just take himself out in a blaze of glory? (It's hard to imagine him having a life outside the ship, on the basestar or elsewhere.) Hell, the number of potential candidates are endless: somehow I have the feeling BSG is not going to be afraid to kill off characters in its three remaining hours. 

* The rendering of the Cylon Colony was pretty daring, visually impressive and just skirting the edges of ridiculous. What did it remind you of: a beehive, or Castle Greyskull?

* I have a hard time tolerating child-in-peril scenes, but the ones with Boomer and Hera were really effective, chilling without being gratuitous, then surprisingly moving. Grace Park deserves a lot of credit: she has developed Boomer and Athena—not to mention the other Eights, like the one who says goodbye to her "father" Tigh—to the point where I practically forget I'm looking at the same actress in their scenes.

* That said, I can barely stand to think of Hera in the Colony with Cavil as her manny. Any guesses as to the "new playmates" he promises for her?  

* I had hoped Baltar's analysis of Starbuck's dog tags would get us closer to figuring out what actually happened to her—and what she actually is—but for now we can still only speculate. Was his speech about angels his earnest belief, or yet more cultish hoo-ha improvised on the spot? 

* I must admit I've never been a huge Sam Anders fan. But I somehow find Hybrid-Anders much more interesting than walking-and-talking Anders ever was.