The Big Reveal

[lydamorehouse]

The Big Reveal of the final episodes of BSG still has me puzzling. Despite the fact that  naomi kritzer and I just spent an hour or so discussing BSG over lunch, I still am not sure how I feel about the ending.  I will say above-the-cut that I'm not mad, just puzzled.  I'm only a little concerned about shark jumping, and in this case much more than with the Iraq-war-in-disguise jump of the last season.  The last season cliffhanger made me mad because I felt that they missed opportunities to develop character and story arc, in this one I'm afraid they might be headed in a too-cheesy-for-me-to-stomach direction.

Okay, so I can buy 

 

...that Chief Tyrol is a cylon (if, in fact, that's why the four were all drawn to that hanger bay,) if only because he's had doubts about his humanity in the past.  It bothers me, if only because one of the things I like about him is his biases and fears about cylons.  Making Chief Tyrol a cylon almost single-handedly reduces the number of humans willing to refer to cylons by a pronoun other than "it" by half.  Now, the cylons only have Helo (Agathon) as a sympathetic human.  Also, making Chief Tyrol a cylon casts a shadow over his vow to "fight for humanity" with President Roslin.  Although this explains why he survived so much better being spaced than Cally did.  (BTW, shouldn't their eyeballs have exploded?)

Starbuck... well, I had no doubts of her cylonness, since she went to the seer who said that the cylon torturer dude knew her "better than she knows herself."  Naomi introduced me to the idea that Starbuck could be a pop-tart (half-human half-cylon) which I like a lot as a theory, although they'd have to do a lot of hand waving to make me buy that given how much importance Six and the other cylons have placed on Sharon/Athena and Agathon/Helo's child.  Of course, if Tyrol is also a cylon they have an heir AND a spare, given that he has a son with Cally.  Oh, but if Starbuck is NOT a cylon, I'm going to need more than a cryptic  -- "I've been to Earth" to explain why she showed up with the cylon troops.  Frankly, I've been expecting her return as a cylon the moment they had her die on the show.  Given how much cylon dreaming she did in that episode, they basically telegraphed that she was a cylon to me.

Saul Tigh?  Hmmm, well, cylons must be experimenting with flaws.  

Sam (Anders?) ?  Well, okay... if only because I have no attachment to him.  I have ended up liking him, but does he need to be human?  Nah.  Although combining Anders and Starbuck seems like a dumb move for the cylons.  And frankly, not letting him know he's a cylon has cost the cylons a lot of "lives" in the resistance.  Although doesn't Three let him live in the "Arrow of Apollo" arc?

The President’s assistant?  Again, no matter to me.  She's a fine villain/not villain if that's the direction they want to take her.  She's always seemed a little off to me, anyway. 

The thing that bothers me the most is Starbuck's return with "I've been to Earth, Lee."  Yeah, in the resurrection chamber.  And what about that?  If the above are cylons, have they never been resurrected before?  Can they be?  I'd think the cylons would know if they had five bodies lying around in the resurrection ship that looked just like these people.  If they don't know, then I don't understand how resurrection works, exactly, and they they have all those bodies lying around on the ship.

Earth?

 

...Really?  Did they learn nothing from the original series?

Comments

[fireriven.livejournal.com]

Starbuck showed up with the Third Race, not the Cylon fleet. Have you watched the original series? I can go more in depth if you'd like more of an explanation. (Her dreamings in her seeming-death-episode were a product of the Third Race as well, just as the Six-in-Baltar's-Head and the Baltar-in-Six's-Head are.)

[lydamorehouse]

If it has to be explained to me when I've been watching the series since the beginning, that's just plain bad story telling.

I watched the original back when it first aired. I don't remember anything about it except that Rick Springfield played Zack in the pilot episode and there was an annoying robot dog in it.

[fireriven.livejournal.com]

Well, I don't think they necessarily meant anyone to understand that there was a Third Race coming in. It's just that my boyfriend and I have been comparing this show back to the original, seeing how many storylines Moore has incorporated. Pretty much the only one he hasn't used yet is that of the Third Race, and the neither-Cylon-nor-Humanness of the figments of Baltar and Caprica Six's imaginations, as well as the Starbuck disappearing storyline lead us to believe he's finally bringing in that Third element.

Also, in the finale, I perceived that Apollo was actually flying away from the direction of the incoming Cylon fleet, because he'd picked something up on radar. It seemed to me that he was flying towards a much larger ship, swathed in a gas cloud: a ship that shone (the ship of the Third Race was a ship of lights). Starbuck was playing hide and seek with him in that gas cloud, accompanying the hidden ship.

That's what I got out of it, anyway.

[lydamorehouse]

Okay, so you're saying that the writers of the new BSG are actually following a lot of the plot points of the original series? Hmmmmm. I'm not entirely sure that's such a good idea. Even as a tween I found the last season of the original Battlestar kind of cheesy (and I tolerated a lot as a kid that I wouldn't now.)

Well, I guess I'll reserve judgement... but a third race?

[zippyfish.livejournal.com]

I hadn't been paying that much attention to the last season... did catch the finale, though. I don't think they're really Cylons; I think Tyrol's kid is a big clue that they're not.

Though apparently Bob Dylan might be.

[lydamorehouse]

Well, the cylons and the humans have reproduced once already, why not twice?

[zippyfish.livejournal.com]

Wasn't there a red glow when Boomer had sex with Helo? Wouldn't Callie have noticed if the Chief were a Cylon? I don't know... it seems silly to me if they're going to build up Boomer's kid as the Cylon messiah and then, as you said, have a spare. It's just a thought, though.

[lydamorehouse]

Oh, that's right the spin-glow! Yeah, you'd think that would be an easy detection option.

And, I also remember that Giaus invented the cylon detector... which despite his lies, worked, didn't it? You'd think they'd be a bit worried if the X/O turned out to be a cylon... and it's not like Giaus particularly likes Tigh and I could see him throwing him to the wolves just because.

Plus, someone else pointed out that Tigh's years of service would mean that the cylons had planned this since... before they had human-looking counterparts????

[rambleman.livejournal.com]

hi! our BSG panel was awesome, and i ended up finding you on LJ semi-randomly after tracking down some Think GalactiCon hits post-Wiscon.

anyway, i completely forgot to mention the Cylon detector at the panel! it's a huge plot point, then suddenly, it disappears. if Baltar ditched it as problematic, they should have commented on it. i figure the writers dumped it as being too easy to clarify things, backing them into a corner on any character they've tested. which means it existed only to help the Boomer reveal and little else. sloppy, sloppy, sloppy.

oh, and the BSG community i mentioned is what_the_frak...

jef

[lydamorehouse]

Thanks! I spent a good portion of last night trying to find what-the-frak and discovered that I am, in fact, a techno-idiot. *sigh*

[jenwrites.livejournal.com]

Next season is the last, so I'm hopeful they're going to do the Earth thing right since they won't have a lot of time to fuck things up.

[lydamorehouse]

Oooh, but it seems they can frak things up pretty quickly. Witness the whole transition between this season and the last.

[swords-and-pens.livejournal.com]

I've always been a bit suspicious of the assumption that Starbuck is a cylon. My first reactions was, "No, too obvious, and besides, this means the gods pitch to the cylons, since she's the one who did the whole Arrow gig." And it doesn't explain her ship surviving, even if she dies and is reborn. Nor do I see any point in the cylons making her a duplicate ship "just because."

I could almost have an easier time believing that "the gods" somehow saved/altered her and gave her a vision of earth. Hence the cryptic "I've been to Earth" line. Certainly, I'd like to see something like this, instead of "Wow, the cylons have the drop on us yet again. Bob. Sure sucks to be human." It might also ties in with the whole Third Race thing (which, I have to admit, would piss me off like Lyda, since it's such a awkward bump in in the story line).

Of course, that leaves the identity fourth cylon up in the air, which is it's own bit of annoyance.

The thing I found most interesting in the new cylons is that all of them are in support roles in terms of the command/action structure. No one is directly in charge of anything - they just help get things done. Every one of them is clearly out-ranks. Very clever, but possibly too clever in that it may come back to bite they cylons in the ass.

[lydamorehouse]

Yeah, plus most of them fought in the resistance. (And you mean fifth... since four potentials were revealed: Tigh, Anders (the Pyramid player husband of Starbuck), Chief Petty Officer Tyol, and the President's Assistant (whose name I should know, but don't.)

Honestly, it's their number that made me suspicious. Four. When we know that there are five cylons we don't know. Then, with the appearance of Starbuck, I thought, "Okay, well, there's five."

I agree, however, that Starbuck is an obvious choice. Hopefully, that means they'll do something with her (this third race option?) to surprise me.

[swords-and-pens.livejournal.com]

Yeah, fifth. Five. Seven of Nine. Whatever. :)

And aren't there supposed to be six? Or am I forgetting/misremembering due to lack of coffee this morning?