Battlestar Galactica: Final Season (SPOILERS)

Small question: Aren't there other planets/colonies besides Caprica? You mention it like it was the only planet humans went to, but aren't there 12 planets, all with names that sound like the signs of the Zodiac? (It's not a point that affects anything, except that Caprica's always been the "main" one, and obviously Cavil goes with this because this is where he put the Five.)

I like that list, Yoda. I find the histories confusing, but mostly because they're always being talked about but we've never seen the backstory acted out. And sometimes these people just don't get their facts straight because they are talking about legends and prophecies at that point and things get jumbled a little too easily, thereby confounding my attempts to keep it all straight.

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Seds, that computer is hilarious!

Yeah, I said that on page 4. I think she's Daniel's daughter.

I think she was resurrected/cloned/some-other-reproduction-technology by someone we haven't seen yet (I suspect a Lords of Kobol or Ship of Lights intervention on her part). What if the Lords of Kobol were survivors from an interspecies war that happened before our timeline begins?

I think Kara has memories of Earth from over 2000 years ago, but I don't think she was along (at least in this present form) with the Final Five cylons while they were sub-limming it to the 12 Colonies and re-inventing resurrection. After all the Final Five chatter, it would seem pretty messy to me to toss in a sixth.

I think it's pretty smooth that there was another cylon model in the lineup, especially since it accounts for the mystery of why the Sharons are #8 but we had only seven "significant" constructed models. One of the things they are positively stellar at with this show is ret-conning (retroactive continuity) and that was a stroke of brilliance.

Yoda, I notice you don't mention Kara among those with head-characters and I wonder what's your take on Leoben in the viper when Kara crashed.

Nice observation about Ellen picking up the traits of whoever is around. I was seeing it as she's calm, wise, benevolent until she's around Saul, but your explanation works too.

Fine work on the timeline (you know I love timelines!) and if you want more clarity you might check out the one on Battlestar Wiki, and the character history of Ellen Tigh there (or probably any of the FF). It gives times and references eps where the times were given, and pulls together all available info.

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The Saul thing makes a lot of sense; it might just be him. There's no time she'll be away from the Cylon baseship but not near him, so I guess there's no way to test either theory.

Yeah, I saw the Battlestar Wiki timeline, though I wanted something that touched on the major events, without anything extraneous. It is helpful, though, but I think some of it might be fairly speculative. Which is cool, but I wish they'd group or label that sort of thing. But in those instances in which they source, I've found it invaluable for the last few years.

As for Kara; the Leoben in the head thing has just completely slipped my mind. I forget: was it explicit, the way it usually is with Head Six and Baltar and all that, or more like a memory? It's goofy that I even have to ask, but I temporarily forget entire plotlines in this show, because so much is going on. I remember realizing in the first half of this season that Tyrol had hit Callie at one point. I'd completely forgotten until something came up that reminded me of it.

Anyway, if we count Kara as one of the people with people in their heads, it still kinda leaves Baltar as the odd man out, so I have to think he's got a revelation in store. Or at least, I hope so. I will say that, very early on, I was worried these sorts of things would just be brushed aside as purely imagination, but the fact that The Final Five had them, and were warned by them, means they must have come up with an explanation for them, which I find both exciting and relieving.

Here is something else to add to the "Is Kara the 7th Cylon" mix. She makes a comment about Tigh and Ellen after they attack each other on the Raptor, saying "..it was like watching my mother and father making-out..". It could be a way for the writers to give us a hint maybe at whats to come or me just grasping at straws, but it looks to me as thou she is either Daniels offspring or the mutated/corrupted bio-bot Daniel/Kara, a.k.a. Cylon #7.
Heck, for all this speculating, the 7th Cylon will probably end up being Adama's dead son Zack.

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Oh, good show, Pete! Brilliant observation, for sure.

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Indeed! Nice catch on that one! Very intriguing...

I'd say it's clear that he's not really there, because he's not there in ashen form when she finds her body on Earth. So he might be a memory or a head character.

I watched some of the original series on hulu tonight (god bless those hulu people!!) and Apollo and Starbuck both are abducted and sent on a mission by the Beings of Light, namely John, who can be seen only by them. John is pure "reflection of intelligence" or a soul with no body. I suspect the head characters are a similar manifestation. I think they're going to turn out to be other entities, who have taken on the form of characters familiar to the people in whose heads they live, because that's the shape given to them by the person they are there to communicate with.

I'm going to speculate myself half out of my mind by three weeks from now.

I find so much of this speculation fascinating, but I also know that, with only four episodes left, they are just going to have to start leaving some of this stuff hanging.

It never really occurred to me that they might have to explain the "head" characters. I don't see that as a huge plotline priority for them, so it wouldn't surprise me if we get absolutely no explanation of that whole phenomenon.

SD, are you saying that the Leoben that walked around Earth with Kara (when she found her body) wasn't real? Because I didn't get that feeling at all. I assumed he was as real as anyone else. Usually the head characters dress oddly (out of place), in some way that is meaningful to the person. (Head Six is always dressed sexy, for instance, which makes sense for Baltar.)

But Leoben on Earth had, I believe, a coat on like everyone else. And usually we get some indication that it is a head-only manifestation, such as other characters not being able to see or hear the person.

Or am I misreading what you meant?

Before Starbuck crashed, when she was telling Lee to let her go, that "they" were waiting for her, Leoben was sitting behind her in her viper. Then, on Earth, when she and Leoben (who may have been there or may not have... it's crossed my mind recently that he might not have been there then either) find her viper, there's no dead Leoben in the back seat.

...heh. My answering your post was interrupted by a phone call from my friend who wanted to talk about BSG and who made the Temple of Athena and why it incorporates (significantly) the Earth's night sky. Geeks unite!

Ok, I am hoping that they spend a little time explaining the head characters, because the hc's have influenced human characters rather a lot. I want to know what they are, and even more, I want to know if they're good or evil and whose side they're on. I can deal with not getting what I want at this point in my life, but I'm really hoping.

My other big hope is that the Ship of Lights folds into this mix, because I think it'll be really pretty.

Wow, see, I don't remember seeing Leoben in the back seat at ALL in her Viper. Really?? How did I even miss that?

Yeah, I forgot it, too, for some reason! Maybe it's just because it came at the beginning of a rush of revelations/events.

Anyway, regarding the head characters: I didn't think Baltar's required much of an explanation...he's kind of a screwed up guy who's been through some crazy stuff, so I had no problem with him having little hallucinations, even if they were the kind that almost seemed to tell him things he didn't know. I can chalk that up to his subconscious.

BUT, now that The Final Five apparently had something similar, and it specifically warned them of an impending nuclear attack, they can't just write it off as some sort of neurotic tick. That's a very important event that can't/won't be ascribed to their subconscious somehow determining that there will be an attack, and warning them. Why wouldn't anyone else have it? None of them talked about it as if it had happened before, either.

The "head" characters are definitely something more. I'm happy that something like this now figures to get a full explanation, but I am a bit worried that it'll be something spiritual and nebulous. Not that I disagree with a show having a spiritual plotline, but up to this point everything has had an empirical explanation that could have been conceivably guessed, and was mostly "fair" within the show's established rules.

Anyway, we'll see soon enough.

Which episode was the Kara-Viper-Leoben thing in? I have the DVDs for those seasons here and can rewatch. This is just killing me that we didn't notice him earlier. It would tell us a LOT if she's having the same type of experience as the Five...

... although I still say the Leoben on Earth with her searching for her crashed Viper was real.

I believe it was Maelstrom. Scratch that. I just rewatched that ep and he is NOT there. Holy crap. I was sure he was there!! He flies with her at some point, and I guess I transposed the image of him behind her in the viper into that scene. Crazy.

She has a dream or vision or something in that ep and someone who looks like Leoben but isn't guides her through the experience of revisiting her mother's death. I was thinking he was also with her when the viper went kerpow, but it was just her in the cockpit.

While looking up the ep, I found something else (distraction or redeeming myself, you decide) on a site about the science in the show.

The baby in the ultrasound appears older than the four months that Cottle gives as the fetus' age. (my question: How long ago did Caprica start sleeping with Tigh... and stop sleeping with Baltar?)

The ultrasound image freezes, but that wouldn't happen if the baby really died: we'd see continued movement from the mother and the ultrasound wand would keep moving.

The above notes, plus Roslyn taking a sudden interest in the baby, plus Cottle's previous lie to Athena and Helo... it starts looking a little funny.

Hmmm.... what are you implying then? That either the baby isn't dead (which Caprica would well know herself)? Or that they delivered the baby and then Cottle whisked it away, a la Hera?

I keep coming back to the fact that we have only four episodes left. I don't see it as all that easy for them to start adding on subplots at this point, unless they tie in directly to things they still have to wrap up for us.

My brain hurts.

The viper only seats one. Leoben has never been in a viper, as far as I remember.

I'm not implying much. I have no idea on this one. I think it's possible that the baby might not be dead but as to why Cottle would make that move or if that's what we're supposed to get, I have no idea. I found it an interesting little cluster of facts. I don't think it would be all that difficult to have gotten an ultrasound of a fetus of the given age, is the only thing that nags at me about all that. So if they chose to show us an older fetus, and chose to show a freeze-frame, was it just because it looked better that way? I have no idea.


Sedai - what's odd is I'm not the only person who remembers that scene with Leoben sort of over Kara's shoulder in the viper. I'm not arguing with you, just saying that at least two people "remember" something that is not in the ep. I watched the ep start to finish and then called my friend I discuss this show with and it took me ten minutes of insisting that it isn't there before he could consider believing me. He actually described the scene to me, exactly as I remember it, and I said, "yeah, that's just what I remember. It's not on the disc." lol So as far as there being no Leoben body on Earth, it's a moot point because I am an insane person.

Thematically though, it's a head Leoben who guides Kara through facing her mother's death and his influence is what makes her let her viper drop. IMmediately after her mother breathes her last, Leoben is in the room with Kara and says, "now was that so bad? Now you're free..." (paraphrased a bit there) and she says, "You're not Leoben" and he says, "I never said I was" (not paraphrased). But whether he is a head character or just an entity in her dream is up for interpretation.

So... holy frakking herk!

There was clear confirmation that 6's baby is really dead. I like that they settled that decisively and quickly.

Starbuck and the piano player. Did anyone else start to suspect he wasn't really there before the reveal? Is she losing her mind, or was that another guide? I'm leaning toward "both", actually. When that song turned into the prelude to All Along the Watchtower, every hair on my head stood on end, even though I was already sure she'll turn out to be at least half cylon.

Chief and Boomer totally had me in tears and "awww"s and then Boomer turns out to be a very bad little cylon. Do you think she was working for Cavil the whole time, or that she realised while in the brig that she had to go back to him and taking Hera would be a good way to win his favor back? Either way, my heart broke for Galen. Ouch.

From the time they started retracting the launch bay til the end of the show, I was barely breathing. The Galactica is just starting to crumble around them. Obliteration seems to actually be a possible conclusion, at this point. I don't think that's where they're going, but it's out there, starting to loom.

Awesome ep. I stayed up til 2am watching the re-run on Sci Fi, since last week's episode never got posted online. I hope that's not a trend for the rest of the run, because I already want to see some of these episodes again.

Thoughts?

ACK! I have to avoid this thread for a while. I'm posting this without reading ANYTHING just above this post! (So, please, no spoilers in any responses, thanks!)

Does anyone know a place where I can watch this past Friday's BSG episode online? I do have it on DVR, but can't use it till tomorrow because hubby is studying downstairs (where the DVR is) and kinda needs tons of quiet.

So I'd like to watch it (episode 419, titled "Someone to Watch Over Me," I think) on my computer. I tried hulu and Fancast and even Scifi.com -- none have that episode up (despite Scifi talking about watching "the latest" episodes online)....

Well, PW came to the rescue and I just watched the episode. (Thanks, PW!)

I obviously picked the WRONG episode to miss. It was amazing and has totally restored my faith in this show.

SD, I immediately assumed the piano player wasn't there, actually. I'm not usually that astute, but this time it seemed perfectly obvious. He wasn't talking to anyone else, and no one else seemed to be talking to him or hearing the music or responding to it. Plus, music is a creative endeavor, and I've been looking for more signs that Kara is creative.

Frankly, I assumed the piano player was Daniel in some form -- and that also Daniel is her father. I noticed we didn't get to see any memory shots of her father's face in her memories. I'm positive we would have seen Daniel/piano player. And that he is, indeed, her father.

I was actually CRYING when Galen went through the projected/head house: holding the bottle of wine, seeing trees and grass outside, the whole house looking so airy and bright and sunny (things we NEVER see on this show, whch is always metallic and dark and sad) ... and then their daughter's room, with stuffed animals and light-colored wood. I literally started crying, it was such a happy release and I realized how much we/viewers needed that little ray of hope. That is precisely the sort of image I want to see at the tail end of the series three episodes from now, when they do find a habitable planet. I want to see a few happy glimpses of some happy futures. Visually. I want it. I need it. So there.

But then to have Galen's happy images taken away from us. How ugly.

I kinda assume what Ellen said at the end with Tigh in the day care center was true: that Boomer was in with Cavil to get Hera, and that Roslin was right all along, that Boomer plays head games with everyone.

What a great episode. I just hope the Galactica makes it to an inhabitable planet. BTW, I do like that we saw Kara telling the pilots in the beginning to keep looking for a planet, etc. A nice nod to those of us wondering if that's still foremost in their minds. Obviously yes.