BSG

Much clipping and snipping, followed by four hours of rendering various bits of video, followed by…

“[application] terminated unexpectedly. Reopen?”

NAYYYYAAAAAAAAAAHHHHARRRRRRRGH.

So the vid I was working on will be delayed until next weekend.

I am somewhat proud of myself for clearing out that last pile of old papers and rearranging the office somewhat. Housecleaning can be so cathartic.

I suppose it’s probably the least viewed video on youtube right now. It’s the only one I’ve finished, but not the first one I’ve done, and I’ve no idea how good it is.

Beast in Me

Cue the muppet show announcer: Fiiiiiiiiiire iiiiiiiin Spaaaaaaace!

This episode is about exactly what you think it is.

I remember this episode. The dagget scuffles through miles of air ducts to do something, and things blow up, and things burn. People nearly die.

Whoa! WHOA! I don’t remember the Rejuvenation Center! Which is totally decorated in 70’s colors, and has an air hockey table. We’re treated to Boxey, Muffit and Athena doing Cutesy Dialogue with Boomer for all of a minute before we cut to launch-the-vipers stock footage. Cylons are approaching. A red alert tinges the whole interior of everything red, and more vipers launch. And more. You never knew there were this many. What’s Boomer still in the Rej Room for? Did his viper go without him? The doors shut tight and Athena as-you-know-bobs to let us know that ‘just in case the Galactica gets hit, they shut everyone in whatever room so they all die in flames.’ Well - she actually burbled something about saving oxygen and hull breaches and so forth. But we know the truth.

Vipers are firing and things are a’sploding, and Tigh says something’s wrong — too many fighters coming, and they’re not fighting back. Adama has them close the blast shields that shutter off the bridge. And then we see a fighter turning and approaching, and a centurion intones ‘aim for the bridge’ — BOOM. Fire. Sparks. Space Acting! People fling themselves on the deck plates. Apollo yells over the comm line, but Adama’s face down and out of service. So are about umpty million panels, windows, and other really breakable things.

Another cylon fighter hits a landing bay. The Galactica’s hit bad, and things are aflame, and there’s smoke everywhere. The Rejuvenation Center is surrounded by fire in the corridors. Adama, flat on his face under some rubble, murmurs some advice and goes under, and the doc arrives to tote him away to become an Object of Suspense(tm).

The vipers fly around keeping an eye on things, as the Galactica’s scanners are destroyed. The white male version of Dualla tells Tigh that Boomer, Athena and Boxey are among those in the Rejuvy Center, which has been cut off - how does he know who’s in there? The scanners are down. Is there a sign in sheet somewhere they pulled to check? Did they search the whole ship and guess? Is the Dualla substitute psychic? Sounds like time for a fanfix.

Boomer is taking apart a door. Those viper pilots are multi-talented all right. Smoke is pouring through a vent - won’t someone please save them? Oh my!

Aha! Wounded guy in sickbay says he saw Athena and Boxey go in there before the attack. All is explained. Lorne Greene acts like he’s nearly comatose, but talks like he’s just sleepy. Doc talks to Apollo about heart surgery and why PapaDama needs it, and why he’s not getting it — problems with the energy or something.

Folks in tinfoil suits shoot foam into the flames somewhere… looks like a great big basement full of pipes.

Apollo wants to know how long Athena and Co. realistically have to survive. Tigh, looking like he rolled around in the flour, says ‘not much.’ Well, it was vaguer than that.

Boomer shorts out the door mechanism and gets it open, as what looks like dry ice vapor comes under the other door. Everyone runs through, Boomer leaps dramatically after as the other door dramatically blows up — do they make doors out of explosives? how is that safe? Probably made by the same company that makes all those Hollywood cars you see blowing up in movies when someone shoots a bullet into them.

Apollo and Tigh point at a really lame little schematic of the Galactica, talk randomly about circles and squares they label ‘converter’ this and ‘generator’ that, and Apollo thinks the daggit could make it through the air vents. Then we’re off on another tangent where it’s decided to load up some vipers with bor-ton, so they can shoot it into the landing bay.

Whoa. The Dualla wannabe has some serious rug burns on his face that weren’t there last time I saw him. He announces the launch of the bor-ton flight.

I tell you, someone’s psychic. They’re sending the daggit into the vent with a note. What good will it do? Everyone knows they’re in there. What’s the daggit gonna do, come back with a very very very long hose?

Oh, now, that’s funny. The vipers shooting bor-o-ton are just about the best phallic symbols you can imagine. Guess what the stuff looks like?

The night the lights went out in sickbay…. Doc is listening to Adama’s heart when they do, and he sputters he has to operate now, or he’ll die. Meanwhile, people in foil suits with a coat of cellophane for good measure are spraying bor-o-ton on a door marked “energizer #2″ — yes, save the bunny!

Tigh comes to listen to Adama croak a solution to the fire - smother it with the vacuum of space. You know, it’s something — all these able bodied people wandering around pulling their hair out over a problem they can’t solve, and the near-comatose commander has all the answers. And when did Tigh change his uniform?

Apollo and Starbuck crawl out an airlock to set charges on the hull to bring in that vacuum of space to smother the fire. They’re floating around without tether lines — no magnetic boots either, and no rocket packs. Well, guess they’ll come out of that okay.

Tigh, at Apollo’s behest, puts a tray of mushies in front of the vent. The daggit, mechanical as it’s supposed to be, will sniff them out like Boxey taught it to do. Because robotic dogs can do that, you know, and they would. I’m still wondering about the odd bit of sympatico that led two separate groups to the same conclusion, that a daggit should be sent through the vents.

Adama’s being operated on — from the filmy covering over his head they’re also coloring his hair, or perhaps giving him a perm. The lights flicker ominously.

Down in the hazy room of despair, everyone’s coughing. Tigh ties (hee) a bag of oxygen masks to the daggit and sends him back. When the hull blows, little plastic masks that cover the nose and mouth with no source of oxygen attached to them will save the trapped people.

Predictably, Apollo saves Starbuck from drifting away into space. For want of a tether, the sex symbol was (almost) lost. I can’t really tell what they’re hanging onto out there, but the suits are long johns and the helmets can’t possibly be air tight.

Umpty million shots cut back and forth — it’s Apollo, crawling slowly across the hull — no, it’s a daggit crawling — Apollo — daggit — yay, everyone gets oxygen, and Muffy gets a pat on the head. And Apollo’s still crawling around on the hull. He sets the last charge, leaps through space, and it looks like he’s not going to make it. So Starbuck jumps after him. Well, that makes sense. The charges go off, the fire goes out, and Apollo and Starbuck are doing that thing Crichton and D’Argo did — drift through space, holding hands. Sheba finds them floating there and a shuttle goes out.

Cut to sickbay, where Adama’s recuperating while wrapped in bubble wrap. Well, maybe it’s just sparkly stuff, but it could be bubble wrap. Apollo’s not afraid to cry as he thanks Boomer for saving his family. Muffy is wheeled in on a gurney; he ran back to save a firefighter and got a bit charred. So all’s well that ends well.

Except, why would cylons go to such great lengths to cause all that and never take advantage of it? Makes no tactical sense, does it? Those crazy toasters!

Credits! Trumpets of Pomposity! Flashbacks! Last night, I had a sour apple margarita, and now we’re ready for part two of the original Pegasus episodes.

“You’re finished, Adama!” Baltar has yellow teeth. He cackles maniacally, and rather convincingly. The cylons retreat! Adama asks Cain to land the fighters on the Pegasus, since the landing bays on Galactica are in flames.

At the meeting, on Galactica (sure fixed the landing bays fast, didn’t we?) Cain insists on his original plan - attack the base on Gamoray. Everyone argues fine points of strategy - Apollo, Tigh, Adama. Back in his office, with just the two commanders, Adama worries that the tanker incident will happen again - he doesn’t want any more surprises from Cain. His wooly eyebrows jut out in a particularly concerned way. But, there’s no other choice but to go with Cain’s plan.

Cassie finds Cain in the corridor and she emotes at him, wants to go with him, but he won’t let her. I guess that’s the last of the relationship conflict. We won’t see Cain again, from the way this is headed.

Sheba and one other Pegasus pilot are assigned by Cain to the ground crew. Apparently I’m the only one who can see what Cain is doing? Starbuck makes a pass at Sheba that goes nowhere - one of his better attempts, actually. They’re packing up to go. Why a ground crew? I have no idea. Apparently it takes a ground crew to do whatever it is they’re doing.

Cassie finds them and proves that I’m not the only one who sees what Cain is doing - she insists he doesn’t intend to come back from this. She also decides she’s going to go with the ground crew as their med tech. Sheba insists she’s right and Cain isn’t coming back, but Apollo overrides her and insists we’re going to follow orders.

A shuttle takes the group down, and they parachute into the capital city of Gamoray, firing as they come down. They run around in the dark firing at centurions. Starbuck says they’re taking out anti-assault batteries - oh, that’s why they did this! Guess I missed that.

A cylon is giving a speech about furthering the perfection of the cylon race. The bombs our team set are going off, and the cylons start scrambling. Starbuck in his black leather/pleather/vinyl stealth suit climbs up into the control room with Boomer and shoots a bunch and pitches a bomb, and they bug out.

Apollo and Sheba, delayed by a dramatic moment with a wounded Bojay, arrive just as the control room blows up. Oh.

Cylons are lurching out into the street just in time to be blown up by vipers. Civilian cylons apparently wear face masks like kabuki performers and satin robes with hoods. They appear to wear uncomfortable shoes, judging from the way they walk before being shot.

Baltar and his Rubber Jowls want to attack the fleet. Lucifer informs him that Imperious Leader is on Gamoray, and that IL no doubt will think ill of him for letting the fleet Baltar was sent to destroy have their way with Gamoray.

The fuel depot is secured and the tankers are sent in. The ground force takes off in the shuttle - who’s going to protect the tankers? They land on Pegasus because Cassie insists Bojay is hurt badly and needs attention asap. Starbuck and Cassie exchange words - she still can’t make up her mind.

Apollo argues with Cain - again, Cain’s changed up and is going after the four - three? - base stars and Baltar. He reminds Cain that Sheba will be going into battle too. So he goes looking for her, and Sheba is in sickbay where apparently Cassie is the only person there other than Bojay, and where is the Pegasus doctor? Sheba walks away from Cain, and he looks at Cassie and goes after Sheba. Sobby scene, goodbye dear dada, yadda yadda.

Everyone takes off in their vipers. They clear a corridor through the fighters and go right through, with Pegasus right behind. Baltar misinterprets and decides on a strategy based on what he thinks they’re doing, not what they’re actually doing. He thinks Pegasus is a decoy.

Pegasus is on fire, under attack, and darn if it doesn’t look like exactly the same footage as when the Galactica was on fire. Baltar orders the cylons away to Gamoray to protect the Imperious Leader, unintentionally giving the Pegasus a break to recover.

Sheba comes back wounded. At this point, it’s hard to keep track of who’s where, and why, but it’s looking like Apollo is taking the wounded back to the fleet because he knows what Cain is planning.

Adama contacts Cain, as all men in his family are apparently mindreaders, and orders Cain to come back — Cain tells him the wounded and nonessential personnel are on the way and he’s gonna do what he’ll do and you can’t stop me Adama, neener neener.

Baltar’s fuming over ‘what is he doing WHAT WHAT’ and Lucifer is miles ahead of him — it’s Cain. And Baltar realizes it’s not gonna be fun, and demands all fighters come back. So much for protecting Imperious Leader.

Cain is psychic and knows the cylon fighters are on the way back, and so tells Starbuck he’s not sticking around - he’s going back and Cain’s going forward, and that’s that.

Sheba, going by on a gurney on the way to a shuttle, begs her daddy to let her stay in a manner more like a four year old than a twentysomething fighter pilot.

With the shuttles and extraneous personnel gone, Cain waves around his pokey stick and struts around his bridge, and orders the ‘electronic defense shields’ to maximum power. Plug in fresh D cells, guys, we’ve got to deflect lasers!

Oh look, there goes Apollo and Starbuck disobeying orders. Surprise, Surprise. Let’s watch them each take on a base star. And win. What good fortune, to be cast regulars and therefore invulnerable.

Pegasus launches missles, which look like nukes rising from silos until you see the base stars, when the missles seem to morph into huge orange energy beams. Am very confused now. Guess I know how the special effects folks must have felt.

Adama, Apollo and Starbuck visit Sheba in sickbay and welcome her to the family, since Cain’s vanished into the depths of space. Or something. Did Cain survive to chew more scenery and whack people with his silver-tipped pokey stick? Guess we’ll never know.

I’ve recovered enough from the last round to pick up where I left off with… BSG Old Skool Reviews! Good grief. You’d think I would learn.

We have Lloyd Bridges starring as Commander Cain in this round. John Colicos and his rubbery Phlox-like jowls are of course starring as Baltar.

Go, vipers! Go Apollo! Go Starbuck! uh oh. Someone’s snuck up behind our friends and started shooting. You know, it looks like another viper. Two. Confusion all the way around. Finally someone recognizes someone else and they fly off to land on the Pegasus. Apollo won’t shut up as ordered. He’s busy exclaiming over the wow-ness of it all.

Back at the fleet, they’re out of gas. Okay, Tylium, but yeah. And they’re picking up… civilian cylon transmissions? What’s the difference between a cylon civilian and a cylon centurion? Maybe civilian cylons have interchangable face plates? LED jackets? Bluetooth connectivity and optional MP3 player features?

Starbuck and Apollo walk into a dramatically dark room and meet Cain, who’s about as arrogant as any narcissistic CEO you’ll find. He tells them they’re going on the offensive against the cylons. Apollo’s a little agog. So am I.

Galactica picks up Pegasus and can’t figure it out. Until the signal comes in and Cain is calling Adama an old war daggit. ???? He’s not quite furry enough, but all righty then. A shuttle brings him right on over and much swaggering and hugging and cheering ensue. Adama’s having a bit of shock and awe. After the cheering dies down and Adama and Cain talk privately we find that Cain wants to take on a cylon base called Gamoray (an evil part of my brain is now singing, “when a guy hits Colonel Tigh with a big pizza pie that’s Gamor-aaaayyy”).

Scene change - Cain asks Starbuck and Apollo to help him locate the love of his life. He plays a 3D image of Cassie saying, “help me obi-w — ” No, bad fan! She’s saying “come back real soon, you old war daggit.” And then he asks if they’ve met his daughter Sheba, and plays a bit of Sheba wishing her dad a happy birthday. WHYYYYY? There is no point, other than Cain forcing family vids on them. They’ve met her. She nearly shot them down.

Starbuck goes to talk to Cassie, and thinks she’s going to have to let the old guy down easy, but when he finally spits out the message, she whirls and races out. How she finds Cain I’m not sure - maybe there’s a neon sign outside his door? They snuggle and huggle and cuddle and confess great angst and missing you and she’s all glowy. And she tells him Starbuck is in love with her, and she needs time to think. She didn’t say ‘I’m in love with Starbuck.’ Hmmmmmm. So, Starbuck’s the substitute, perhaps not as dear to her as the Big Man Cain?

Starbuck, meanwhile, is talking to Apollo about it. He’s all nervous about the situation, but denies any intent to marry or whatever, and also says she wouldn’t marry Cain, and who cares? Not Starbuck. Uh huh.

Boxey perks up when Starbuck leaves - “poor starbuck, well, at least he’s still got Athena. And Miriam, and — ” Apollo’s a bit aghast that a kid who’s all of eight could possibly have noticed all the chicks Starbuck hangs out with. Like, you couldn’t miss it - even a blind man walking around without a guide daggit would bump into one or three of them wimmen. Srsly.

Sheba’s bragging about all the bases they’ve knocked out. Apollo’s all insistent that their upfront tactics won’t work for the fleet cause they have lots of civilians to protect. Sheba’s as argumentative and arrogant as her daddy. Who arrives just a few minutes later with Cassie, and Sheba gets upset and runs out. Aw, grown daughter doesn’t like dad hanging out with a hooker. Okay, former hooker. But given the timeline it’s pretty sure she was one when they first hooked up, unless the canon’s been rearranged and she was supposedly a nurse back then instead.

The commanders try to agree on a plan of action - Cain wants to do it with just his warriors, Adama wants to merge squadrons. Tigh and Adama are all gaga about this guy. Apollo tries to console his Pa by saying everyone admires him and respects him just the same and Adama sort of does the accept-it-and-brush-off thing before seeing him off.

Sheba argues with her daddy as he’s sitting in a viper - don’t go, too risky, no, it won’t be — geeze, this sounds a little like Star Trek where the first officer and the captain argue over the mission and whether it’s safe for the captain. Cain wins. Apollo and Boomer are among the vipers flying toward the base, and suddenly Cain is changing plans right and left, claiming he can ‘feel’ the enemy and knows what’s really happening, and Apollo’s not happy - but what can you do? They fly into some sort of cloud. Apollo finds the tanker they’re after, then another, then cylons come in fighting.

Cain’s all swooping around shooting cylons. He sends blue squadron (the Galactica contingent) after some fighters veering away, and Cain destroys the tankers while they’re gone. Sheba helps him. He denies knowledge of where the tankers went. Back with Adama, he blames the situation on mixing the two squadrons together. Now he’s saying they need to go after the base, since the tanker thing didn’t work out. Adama orders him off - he wants to work on a battle plan right away, but Adama holds firm, and won’t let Apollo complain after the meeting either. Adama just stands there and stares him down until he leaves.

He finds Sheba and she says the tankers were caught in crossfire and it was accidental. He doesn’t believe it. Sometimes, Apollo can be smart!

Cain insists his plan will work. Adama wants to split the Pegasus’ fuel among the fleet and make it somewhere they can get more fuel without tangling with the enemy. Argue, bitch, moan - but in this version Adama is also the President. Cain then insists upon carrying out the mission anyway. Adama confronts him on the tankers. He doesn’t deny it but froths that they must take Gamoray! (evil brain! stop singing!) Adama repeats orders and furthermore puts Tigh in command of the Pegasus. Oooooo. Lookit them balls! That’ll teach Cain to tap Adama on the chest with his silver-tipped pokey stick.

Cain goes drinking. Sheba arrives and tells him she and the men will follow him wherever he goes. He says he knows what they mean, but no mutiny - he won’t pull out and leave civilians defenseless. Hmm, changing your tune much?

Baltar and his Rubber Cheeks strut and brag about how complete their victory will be to Lucifer the Christmas Tree Light Cylon in Red Lame. He says ‘Gamoray’ about fifty times, and my brain won’t quit singing…. Ugh. Oh, saved by the centurion who interrupts them. Baltar decides in a moment of supreme hubris that he will lead the strike force to destroy the fleet. He grins, turns around, and takes out a wall with his cheeks. Well, not really - but it could happen.

A shuttle docks on the Pegasus and Tigh is in charge. Lt. WoodenMan informs him of bad feelings against him aboard ‘this ship’ = Tigh informs him that Adama’s will be done, forget feelings.

The Pegasus fighter pilots are blocking the way, however, and for some reason it’s Apollo’s trying to reason with them, tell them Adama’s the fleet leader, and threatens to pull… a tape recorder? but when he yanks it out, it’s a ray gun. Huh. And the red alert sounds, and everyone runs off.

Adama announces the presence of the largest task force he’s seen since the destruction of Caprica - he gets a ‘you were right’ from Cain and he tells Cain he needs his ‘tactical wizardry.’ Cain exits to head for his battlestar, saucy and willing.

Baltar’s cheeks hardly fit in his helmet, as he grins and flies a cylon ship toward the fleet. And then vipers launch, and Cain heads for home, and all his people cheer madly when they hear him inform Tigh he needs to leave now, don’t let the door hit him on the way out.

Galactica fires at the cylon raiders and the vipers come in to show off the same stock footage we’ve seen in every episode so far. Guns shoot, explosions happen, and once more the landing bay’s on fire. Baltar’s plan seems to consist of burning out the landing bay so the vipers can’t refuel, then flying the vipers around until they’re dead in space. Which the cylons could probably have done before now, but it’s more dramatic at this point, when Cain can sweep in and save the day.

Baltar is all ‘wooo! we’re winning! we’re about to destroy the last battlestar!’ and the centurion deadpans that maybe he should look over here at the other battlestar. Baltar’s slow on the uptake - he thinks the centurion means Galactica. Then he looks, and says ‘that’s impossible’ and the centurion says ‘no, that is a battlestar.’ That’s a great line- for once, I believe the cylon is actually a machine/android. Baltar pulls a great ‘oh shit’ face, and ‘to be continued’ flashes across the screen.

Please insert margarita to continue.

Rocky, for some reason your comment showed up on a post I don’t think you intended to comment on - don’t understand why. Must be some sort of MySQL glitch. So I’m acknowledging it here. Thank you for your compliment on the essay, and for the LJ rec. I’ll check that community out.

As for the next episode…. Looks daft. The clips before the credits, that is. Daft. Someone’s capturing people with nets. Hmmm. I almost remember this one.

We open with a fight. More stock footage, more explosions that should only happen within atmosphere. In the cut scenes showing pilots in cockpits, the stars are dense; in scenes showing Galactica they’re normal looking scattered stars. They even throw in footage of the fleet I haven’t seen before. Cylons get to the fleet, and the vipers mop up. The agriculture ship, the one with all the domes, takes a beating.

Tigh says two agro ships were destroyed - ships? OH, they mean the bubbles on that big ship with the terrariums. Yeah, that I saw. Flash to Tigh talking to a jowly guy about needing seed and crops being destroyed because the airlock was damaged and air was — wait a minute, how is it they’re walking around among the damaged crops? a) no air b) there wouldn’t be any crops, dirt, or anything else if the damage I saw being done actually happened.

Ah, it’s only tv. Right?

Adama knows where to get seed - an agricultural colony. But he wants to trade with something that won’t link them with the colonial fleet, lest the cylons get wind that they were there. There’s a generator without military markings. It belongs to Siress Bellaby, who will only deal with Adama.

Cue a shuttle ride to the Gemini freighter, which is none other than the ship used in new BSG to sneak in a viper squadron to destroy the base on the asteriod. It looks like a conglomeration of railroad freight cars. Now we’re inside walking down a corridor, Tigh and Apollo and Adama. Adama has a big bunch of flowers and looks like he’s going to his own funeral. There’s an awkward dithering scene where he tries to leave and Apollo pushes him into where Bellaby is calling out to him, sounding just like any maneating tv lady looking for a good time.

Okay. Here she is, the budget Lwaxana Troi. Although she precedes TNG by lots of years…. She’s Lwaxana all over. “What do you want in return for the energizer?” “Oh, Adaaaaama, after all these years, you should know - I want … you.”

This hurts to watch, I’m telling you. Adama just ordered Apollo to prepare the shuttle with provisions for five - they’re taking the old bat along. She refused to cooperate otherwise. Adama is whoring himself out for seeds to grow food for the fleet. And he’s not happy about it. I liked Picard’s methods of dealing with this sort of thing better; Adama’s totally losing his cool on Apollo, and it’s not Apollo’s fault. They could do something else — like laser off/paint over the fleet markings on one of the other generators? This would only be necessary if this were the only spare whatsit in the whole fleet. Come on, guys, at least make a bit of sense.

Boxey wants to go. Apollo decides if Bellaby’s going, the kid’s going. Pigtail girl is on vacation - nondescript short-haired dude is flipping the usual switches on the bridge and telling them to take off. On the shuttle, Budget Troi is cuddling up to Adama.

???????? a brief narration and caption fest as Adama explains in voiceover where they’re going and why it exists. Way to disrupt the show. Whatever. It’s one of the many planets with humans on it. They run across planets just like it all the time. The villagers are running and hiding at the sight of the moon, because when the moon is full, the pig people ride! I’m not kidding - and these are the ugliest pig masks ever. They have nothing to protect themselves (the villagers, that is) except an old musket… rifle… long old-looking gun. Constable goes outside with the gun. The pigs are riding camels in costume and we’re expected to believe there are so many of them that the buildings are shaking up and down and around. Right.

I think it’s always night on whatever planet because it’s easier to disguise really bad props and riding animals. You never get a clear look at anything, between that and the quick cuts from one thing to the next.

GAH-inducing scene in which Adama manipulates himself a chaperone. Mini-Lwaxana wants to get him alone, and that’s the last thing Adama wants. Starbuck and Boomer ride off on a tank-thingie with the energizer whatsis, and Adama is fending off Mini-Lwaxana with “please, not in front of the children.” Apollo gives him a classic “I hate you Father” look when he says that. I laughed.

Bonus: here’s a picture of Adama and his eager lady friend, seeing off Boomer and Starbuck. Coincidentally, it’s also a perfect example of why this show has no credibility at all.

My planit iz pastede on yay.

Of course, I could grab any still from just about anywhere and show you something unconvincing. This is pretty obviously bad, though.

And I guess the title is meant to be funny. Starbuck and Boomer go to town, talk to the folk (who scheme to turn Starbuck into the new constable), and are driving off in their little humvee thingie when nets fall on them. Bandits make off with everything and leave them in the road, on foot, swearing in fake curse words. “Why buy the energizer if you can steal it?” Boomer sez, in disgruntled brilliance. Magnificent!

Or, the title is homage to the Magnificent Seven. By which we (those of us who saw that movie, anyway) know that Our Heroes will help the poor pig-ridden village. Which we already knew they would.

There’s a dude with a sparkly jacket and poofy shirt in charge in the village - we’ll call him Liberace - and when Starbuck goes back and confronts him about the theft, Lib sez there’s no theft in Serenity and there must be some other explanation. He wants Starbuck to stick around and work for a while … as constable. Starbuck lays out the cash, and Liberace gives him a hard time, chatting about conversion from quantums to quatloos to Australian dollars. The next thing you know Starbuck’s gambling and winning. Gambling for seeds, prostituting for seeds… between Adama and Starbuck we’ve got a whole lot of sinnin’ going on.

Flash to the pig people. Sharpen weapons. Point at moon. RRRRR, OOOO.

Liberace gives Starbuck the badge of the constable as if it’s some sort of money. As-You-know-Bob talking to a chum in the background informs us it doesn’t matter how you get it, you’re still responsible once you have it to protect and so forth. Like Starbuck’s going to buy into their rules - well, what am I saying. He will. The Plot Fairy said so.

Boomer walks back to camp and tells everyone else the bad news - they repeat everything he’s saying, I guess because someone thought it was funny. Adama makes an odd series of assignments somehow managing to keep himself adequately chaperoned. No one is fooled. Everyone looks at each other like “the old man’s lost it.”

Budget Troi is sniping about sending boys to do men’s work, and Adama tries to get her to shut up. She says she’ll tell him where the energizer is for a kiss - wait, how does she know? She lays one on him and says it’s worth it. I guess she likes being kissed insincerely? She shows him the tracks of the transport leading up to a shed - he kisses her briefly out of gratitude and races off to re-appropriate his goods. Maybe I’m cynical that way, but if an old lady in a foofy purple bathrobe can spot something that warriors/soldiers can’t, maybe we should fire Greenbean and Apollo and have her doing the real work?

“Squire” Adama comes to the saloon looking for the local law enforcement, apparently thinking it will be simple to report his stolen goods, show them to the constable, and get them back. He doesn’t figure on the village folk introducing him to Constable Starbuck. In a more private setting, he reams Starbuck a new one for always getting himself into situations like this, giving me flashbacks to every time Little Joe did something boneheaded and got Pa to help him get out of trouble, only Starbuck doesn’t have Hoss standing around looking sheepish for helping him. “My main suspect was playing cards,” Starbuck excuses. (I’m using a said-bookism for Seema, of course.) Liberace comes in, Adama tries to wiggle his officer out of the constable gig. Liberace ain’t having it. He’s actually fessing up now to the existance of the pig-dog camel riders and listing out the damages, and Starbuck wibbles ineffectually - oh, yeah, he’s such a man. “I don’t feel so well.” Bleah. Apollo comes in and wants them to come along - pig-dogs are raiding the food. Adama wants Budget Troi to go hide in the jail. He takes charge, takes the men to the edge of town, and it’s a showdown! “Holy frak, feels like they could shake us to death!” Yeah, Starbuck, I think it’s funny too.

Budget Troi arms herself and stomps back out there to help. And gets kidnapped. Great. Hopefully Adama knows poetry? (yes, bad TNG fan, no biscuit for obscure references. This is re: a bad ep in which Picard fakes undying devotion to Lwaxana to convince a Ferengi… oh, never mind.)

Liberace and Co. plus Adama and Co. decide to go after her in the regained vehicle along with the daggit, who has tracking ability. Heck, a blind deaf-mute has better tracking ability than these people. Muffy leads them … somewhere. It’s dark. I’d like to see you do better. He goes in a cave, the guys get torches and go in after, and are busily as-you-know-bobbing as they wander through toward a fire. The budget Tellarites surround them. The head pig boy beckons, Adama goes over to … grunt with him, and he’s led in a smaller cave where Bellaby is being held. She burbles something about how much he must love her and he just does this great eye roll.

Back at the fire, things are tense. Adama comes back and froths about how stubborn lazy and self centered the leader is, and he can’t be reasoned with. How’d he figure out the lazy part? Starbuck develops a light bulb and whispers with Adama then goes in — it’s a long shot, Adama says, but worth a try. A few tense minutes later Starbuck comes back with Budget Troi. So, what did he do? Hmmm.

Back at the village, transactions are finally finished and seed is acquired. Starbuck announces that he’s solved everyone’s problem. Guess what? he gave the job of constable, and the badge, to the leader of the pig dogs. The villagers have to accept it after all. No more raids, no more problem. Bellaby kisses Starbuck in joy and informs Adama she needs a different sort of man, that he’s just too dignified and serious - she wants a “real animal.” And goes to buy the house a drink.

blink blink

Apollo thanks the lords, cause he justs didn’t see calling her mother. Adama gives him a long slow incredulous look. Freeze Frame. Cut to Trumpets of Pomposity and Adama’s ragtag fleet voiceover.

The next episode: The Young Lords. Starbuck crashes. Things happen. It looks like night again. Whee.

Lost in Castration

You may have seen this article a long time ago. I didn’t even know it existed, nor did I know Dirk Benedict had a website.

Here’s the thing: I’ve been watching both series. The lovable rogue of old came off to me as flirtatious all right, but you know, a cage match between him and the new Starbuck? He’d probably lose. He’d try to flirt with her, or totally misjudge her cause she’s a girl. In an actual military setting, Starbuck the lovable rogue would have washed out before the cylons ever arrived thanks to his habit of manipulating situations so he could break the rules. So would Apollo, who, in the 1978 series, rushed off willy-nilly and disobeyed orders on a weekly basis, getting himself and others into dangerous situations and out of contact with Galactica.

The women 1978-Starbuck flirted with were petty and one-sided, responding to their emotional urges in pretty much the same way a toddler would. In other scenes they are presented as being level-headed and professional. The characters had multiple personalities, depending on how the show’s writers and/or production crew wanted the plot to unfold, and the characters were sacrificed to their whimsy. It happened all the time in television and it still does. But, I have a lot of problems with that sort of writing. The main difference between the two series is that one is not character-centered, and the other follows a logical progression of incident-reaction-character growth/change, in which the writers have an idea of the main events and how characters will behave, and write the characters consistently. I’ll let you guess which is which.

Example: My initial reaction to a female Starbuck was disbelief. Then I watched, and saw that by comparison, female-Starbuck is actually more macho than male-Starbuck. She out-plays, out-bullies, and out-flies most of the guys. Which is not to say the guys are pansies - Helo, Apollo, Racetrack and others are fit, toned, athletic soldiers with attitudes, and certainly approach problems with the respect for discipline and chain of command that one would expect — except when Apollo goes against his father because Adama is moving against the president. Starbuck the girl is believable because her history, revealed to us not as her explaining it to someone but in bits and pieces, usually through others forcing her to reveal it - also consistent with her character. She is a tough, determined, and also somewhat broken person who is doing the best she can. We can hurt for her because we, or most of us, have known someone who was abused, know people who are compensating for deep personal hurts, know people who are their own worst enemy with flawed personalities. She’s the same character over and over, but she grows slowly, learns from mistakes, and we feel as though we know her because we see this happening. Whereas the old Starbuck was the same from episode one til episode last. You don’t need more than one episode to know he’s a lovable rogue with a charming smile and a hedonistic bent. He’s loyal to his friends, not afraid to leap into a fight, loves to fly. To an extent this is also true of new Starbuck - but she is not a lovable rogue. She’s a stubborn woman who’s gone into the military and loves to fly, but her willingness to leap into a fight may very well be tied to a deeper, unexpressed death wish. She’s complicated. She’s human, not a paper doll hero.

And then there’s Apollo, who firmly believes that the colonies’ best interests are served by preserving the government, which supercedes the need for him to follow orders. In other words, he disobeys orders because he believes he has a moral imperative to do so. Not because he wants to spare his fellow soldiers, out-macho anyone, or any of the other reasons old-Apollo had whenever he turbo’d off alone into space on some wild ride into danger. This is a character-driven plot choice. Apollo believes in a democratic government and will even buck the military to preserve it when the military shows signs of moving against it.

This isn’t to say that I don’t care for the older version; I loved the 1978 series, and I loved the characters. But I was also a kid then. I watch the episodes today and wince, and wish that the writers had done better. I don’t care about the special effects so much as I do about the characters. When Athena throws a hissy about Starbuck seeing Cassiopia, I wince. When Cassie shrugs off Starbuck’s wanton ways, I wince. These aren’t the adults I’m hoping to see now, years later, looking back at shows I watched in my formative years. These are high school kids playacting relationship dynamics. And while it’s certainly common for adults to act like kids - check out any divorce in progress for an example of regression - I’d hope that even if they were inept with relationships, even if they had emotional problems, they would behave differently. Part of maturity is learning to react with a balanced perspective - not ignoring emotional reactions but treating emotions as one of several factors that should influence decision making. Most of the characters in the old series are working out of the id, except for Adama, who is a fine example of the ego at work.

Mr. Benedict says that the newer version is female-driven. In a cast with equal numbers of females and males? The original had two regular female members, a revolving door of short-timers, and Serena gets killed in the first couple of episodes for the sin of marrying Apollo. (This is often called the Bonanza effect, wherein love interests of the main characters die because the guys need to be free to receive the adoration of the hoards of female fans.) Athena and Cassiopia (and later Sheba) have supporting roles. Athena sits on the bridge and announces things, even though we’re told she’s a pilot and a warrior. Cassie is a nurse, though originally a hooker. Sheba is one of the pilots - and why are all the new recruits female when they get around to recruiting? Just because there are females on the show does not make it female-centric; giving females names and speaking roles only evens out the playing field. Having a lot of women on the screen but having only two or three with speaking parts, then showing them being over-emotional and wishy-washy, does nothing for me. I am not a badge-carrying, all-caps FEMINIST who sees injustice in every instance of a female character in a supporting role; I merely appreciate well-rounded, realistic characters of all genders. So I’d have to say the newer BSG wins on that front, in that whether dealing with male or female, I can believe that the characters are people, rather than trying to ignore irritating bits while enjoying the good. The show is human-centric.

And ‘enjoy’ isn’t necessarily right. ‘Appreciate’ is more like it. New BSG is rather more like the HBO series, in that it doesn’t idealize. But I never really believed, in the old series, that the characters were really suffering so much - Apollo mentioned his dead wife a number of times but only when the plot demanded, and while he and Starbuck were always racing off to spare each other whatever consequences going on the long patrol would cause them (”you just got married, I’ll go”). There were no real consequences for them. Starbuck took the patrol, crashed, went through a lot of whatever, but always came back in the end with no real price paid for taking the mission instead of Apollo. Heroes in 70s tv were predictable that way: 1) no consequences for breaking rules or disobeying orders (unless it was a cop show, then the chief would chew them out and then do nothing) 2) no marriage/long-term romance 3) no permanent disability or injury with consequences that last longer than one episode. New BSG chops those rules up and spits them out. Heroes are injured and on crutches, and struggle with recovery. They die. They stay on Caprica to send a scientist back to the fleet, because they believe said scientist is more useful to the common good, then suffer through hunger, radiation poisoning, and long runs through wilderness to escape the enemy. No, it’s not very enjoyable to watch. But life is like that. You struggle. Maybe not with cylons, but with work schedules and sick kids and idiot bosses who make you stay long hours. And if there’s one thing that keeps a human being sane, it’s knowing that we’re not alone in struggling, and spacemen fighting robots is only given effective emotional connection for us when the struggle is in terms we understand. There’s a lot riding on every shot of a viper’s laser, but the more visceral, less CGI shots of Starbuck in a hospital bed hating life, of Helo in the rain panting and limping - they connect us so when the viper does fire it has more impact. The viper fights are more visceral in the new series because we aren’t shown stock footage of the same four maneuvers over and over again; we see the pilots in the cockpits, sweating and swearing, collisions and palpable fear, and interspersed shots of how vast space is and how distant the Galactica, how nukes strike panic into them. I never get that space is vast in the old series. I don’t buy into the idea that the cylons are that much of a threat - we only see three of them at a time. No wonder the fleet can hold the cylons at bay with one squadron - yeah, there was red and blue squadron, but why do we never see them all? We see two or three vipers. The limits of budget, yes. But.

It’s not the special effects that do it. Are we more interested in the Matrix or in BSG 2003? Which one connects us with the characters more? Matrix is pretty and neat and waaaaay cool special effects - and one-dimensional, when held up to a show that allows us to feel with the characters. One of the things that jars me (today) out of old BSG is that the props/special effects department tries too hard. Women in spandex, plastic props, irritating and difficult names for everything (resorting to scientific names for some animals and fake time unit names based on metrics really throws me for a loop), and all that reconstituted myth couched in Lorne Green’s lugubrious delivery — too much. New BSG shows a civilization not much different than our own. Alien, but familiar. It works very well. Adama wears glasses, as do several others. The clothes aren’t wild polyester and foil attempts at futuristic. Not having CGI doesn’t have to be a drawback.

I suppose the upshot of what I’m trying to say is that re-imagined isn’t un-imagined, as Mr. Benedict insists. Different isn’t worse, or better, it’s simply different. I can suppose there might be others who believe the first version was superior — in presenting idealistic and one-sided characters, yes. In character development and presentation, no. The original Star Trek had more primitive special effects and some pretty hammy acting, and yet I can watch the most wince-worthy of Trek episodes and be less annoyed than I was by The Gun on Ice Planet Zero or The Lost Patrol because the plot had some sense to it. Sure, someone stealing Spock’s brain to run their air conditioning was a hare-brained excuse for sticking a widget on Nimoy’s head, dressing a few women up in fur bikinis, and letting McCoy and Spock crack wise, but at least they made a passing attempt at science, and the characters were consistent. At least we weren’t expected to believe a single star system had 12 life-sustaining planets, that every asteriod and moon has a breathable atmosphere despite total absence of plants or some artificial means of creating one, or that a random prisoner on a forgotten planet will draw maps to Earth on his cell wall to be discovered by a pilot who just happens to be thrown in the same cell and remember the pictographs accurately enough to correct a drawing of the Earth system rendered by a small child.

There’s a thing called ’suspension of disbelief.’ Mine was a lot more durable when I was a kid, apparently. It certainly withstood crap like that much better before I had a clearer understanding of science and statistical probability.

Okay, at some point, you’ll hate me. I know it. Then you’ll comment and tell me to STOP with the old BSG eps, and I probably will, just because I’m hating it… except this one. The title’s wacky, but you know, there’s something familiar about it. The fleet sends the folks from the prison ship to do some hard labor.

I’m always amused by the little crew mover things - they cram the pilots on them and then roll the guys through the halls to the landing bays. I have this urge to throw a bowling ball.

Pigtail girl is on the job again. The latest scout mission finds a hostil ice planet - as in hostile atmosphere. She shows their scan on the screen. Boomer and Starbuck go for a closer look. Now we’re getting something we haven’t had before — cylons in their base are preparing to fire, and get the attention of the patrol. They hit the first viper in range with their super gun. I can see where this is going. They’re gonna send prisoners to take it out. I think I like the search for water idea better.

Two cadets go into the atmosphere - against orders, but hey, no one gets disciplinary action for that anyway. Of course, one gets shot. The other is forced down by cylon raiders. All he needs now is a tauntaun. Starbuck and a reluctant Boomer go in next, but Boomer convinces him to go home to report — finally, someone takes a suggestion! The stock footage keeps showing three vipers instead of two. Whatever.

The Conversation on the bridge. What can we do against a big gun like that? A small ground force. Cue the computer search and the selection of prisoners. Cue the cute goodbye scene with Boxey. Apollo’s going? So are Boomer and Starbuck. So are six prisoners with arctic experience. I wonder if you searched every prison in the US, how many prisoners would have arctic exploration experience?

More footage of cylons reacting to the appearance of vipers and a shuttle. Wow, this is the most I’ve seen of actual centurions, like ever. And they’re boring and monotone. I don’t think the centurions in BSG 03 ever speak, come to think of it. The shuttle gets shot, crashes into snow, and we’re off to adventure! Galactica can’t read them anymore. The cylons in slow monotone talk to the patrol, letting them know to search for wreckage and leave no survivors — everyone repeats everything everyone else says! ack! Quit talking!

The shuttle’s in bad shape; Starbuck smacked his head on the console and everyone got thrown around. They drive a landram off the shuttle - wow, so that’s how they get them down there. Apollo finds Boxey in the vehicle - “Muffit wanted to see snow.” Good grief! Starbuck uses the gun on the vehicle to shoot down the cylons.

Oh, goody, cylons are torturing the captured pilot with acrylic rods connected to his cortex. Which they aren’t, they’re sort of hanging down around him, and he looks not so worried yet. The cylon claims the machine will read his mind. “You have a nervous system that carries impulses. Impulses that contain information.” For a bunch of… things that have access to a mindreading machine, these centurions are amazingly untechnical.

The storm hits, so the transport stops and they wait it out. Muffit hops out of the transport and runs off. We get scenes of cylons wandering in the snow, and the daggit running around, and it looks like the daggit will confront them - except it doesn’t. People walk out of the snow, and then we go to a big room where all the folks are unmasked and waking up. A hunting party found Muffit who led it back to the transport. Huh? Not only that, they look the same - clones. Lots of the same women, lots of the same men. Now, of all the things you would expect to find on a planet where the air actually turns liquid, would you say ‘clones?’ As it turns out, the cylons have a human scientist who built the laser and is allowed to stay there experimenting as he wants to so long as he helps them. Shades of scientist Baltar of next gen BSG.

So then there’s this long trek through the snow, where they all stumble along, and the cylons are out wandering around too, and there’s hiding and slogging and more snow.

Back on the base star, which we haven’t seen in a while, Lucifer and Baltar duke it out verbally before a ‘to be continued’ flashes on the screen. Baltar’s face is weird - like rubber, like Phlox’s in that scene in the Enterprise pilot (which is about all I saw of that show). Only it’s not special effects. It’s just John Colicos’ enormous chipmunk cheeks.

I guess I need to watch part two. Someday.

At least it wasn’t the LOST patrol. I was a little burned out on the lost theme.

At some point, I’m going to write an essay comparing the two BSG’s. Not original, perhaps, but what about me really is? Nothing new under the sun, y’know. Heck, even that’s a cliche.

As I type this, the Trumpets of Pomposity are working on the credits, as the same four ships sail past three or four times…. And the credits roll, and roll, and here we are at last, with the fleet moving out of a cloud of asteriod dust. Everyone’s on the bridge — well, Adama, and Adama Jr., and Adopted Adama the III i.e. Boxey. They’re leaving their star system. What the frell kind of star system has 12 habitable planets in it? I guess it depends on your definition of star system; maybe they mean a system of 12 stars and associated planets?

Apollo sez Starbuck volunteered for a long patrol so he can get on the short list for a visit to the Rising Star, which just opened for business. Athena angsts that she’s unable to make it for dinner with Starbuck cause she has to work; Pa’dama cuts her a break and says he’ll fill in for her. Gee, thanks, Dad! Cut to the luxury liner, where Starbuck’s bribing someone to get a private room so he can make out with Cassiopia. Something tells me Starbuck will have a few difficulties in a short while. Vague memories are coming back to me of juggling two women in two rooms…. Yes, it’s Battlesitcom Galactica: The Teen Years.

All the ladies are dressed so seventies! Ah, the pastels, the off-the-shoulder flowing gowns…. Oh, gah. They’re faux-kissing. Neither actor is really into this. The private room looks like it’s decorated in early 80’s Holiday Inn. Cassie excuses herself, Starbuck lights up a cigar, and oops, here comes Athena! And then Tall Butler Guy brings in the drinks, and Starbuck lays down the square gold-painted chips for another room, hustling Athena on out of there before Cassie returns.

Quick cut to the bridge and back, for a single line about “hope Starbuck is enjoying himsef” - we’re meant to laugh, I guess. Starbuck is feeding square chunks of styrofoam to Athena, who mumbles something about how wonderful they are. He jumps up to run to his other room, claiming he’ll get more, and stops in to smooch on Cassiopia. Then a page over the loudspeaker yells for him to report to Galactica. He dashes in to say goodbye to Athena as well. On his way down the hall he loads up the butler with cubits aka money, and rushes off. They look more like gold-painted triscuits than cubits. Athena and Cassie are wandering down from two directions, each with their souvenir clusters from Starbuck’s jacket, and bump into each other — guess how long it takes Athena to exclaim in fake dismay? Cassie just smiles. Ain’t that just like Starbuck?

He changes into something dark brown and velour, jumps in his viper, and is informed that they lightened the ship by removing the laser generators. So, he’s going on a long patrol without weapons. Whee. He’s also wearing a different helmet. Hmm. He tests the maneuverability of the lighter ship and finds out that a new computer has been installed. Gee, must’ve missed that briefing. You’d think he would get a “getting started” pamphlet (or maybe - gasp - actual training) but, no. Surprise! Her name’s C.O.R.A. I’m having flashbacks to Voyager’s ‘Drive.’ Which was executed with more logic and better writing. CORA’s speaking in slang and sighing in frustration - geeze, the computers in this are so not computer-like.

Hey, there’s two ships - they look vaguely colonial. They’re shooting at each other, too. One goes down on a moon. Starbuck argues with CORA over who gets to land the viper. He just can’t cut a break with women, can he? Convenient that every moon and asteriod has an atmosphere, eh?

He lands, he comes over to the crashed ship, he nearly gets beaned by a faux-Irishman who’s claiming he’s shipping parts to farmers. The dude offers him ambrosia that’s very old and very good to buy his silence. Dude’s afraid of pirates. He thinks Starbuck is a pirate. He manages to distract him and knock him out, and tries to take his viper. Come on, CORA, where are you? Dude turns her on, and tells her where to go - she wants to find Starbuck.

Irishman is sending a code to someone and the Cylons picked it up. Athena’s all worried and confuzzled by this code, and now they have to send a couple more vipers after the long patrol, who has no weapons, blah blah he-might-be-captured. Geeze louise, guys, you could have sent two vipers out the first time and let them keep the weapons! You’d think they would figure out that if Apollo or Starbuck gets two miles from Galactica, they’ll fall out of the sky and end up riding growling horses or being clobbered by space-Irishmen.

Boomer and Apollo take off. Pigtail girl - have I mentioned her? She’s apparently the Dualla-analog in this series, gives permission to launch and so forth - transfers control to the pilots and they fly. Meanwhile Starbuck wakes up, takes off in the Dude’s ship, and gets chased down by another faux-Irish in a uniform. He doesn’t introduce himself as a warrior or anything, tries to reason with them, then tries to tell the truth, then tries to bribe them. Too bad you’re not in uniform, huh?

Quick shot of vipers flying - yeah, okay, they’re still looking for him. Starbuck wakes up in jail. There’s a lot of other people here, all with bottles of something, and they toast to him. They’re in Proteus prison, whatever that means. There’s an adultress here too, with her spawn. They’re talking in terms of ’sin’ and have names that correspond with the sins of their forefathers, which is why they’re here - they’re being punished for stuff their great grandads committed. Huh. They’ve been living here for generations making ambrosia for the colonies. Starbuck thinks this is wonderful since there’s hardly any of it in the fleet.

Cassie comes to the bridge, taps Athena for an explanation of where Starbuck is, and she explains. Cassie lingers as another transmission comes in — she recognizes the code as a merchant code, because her pappa used to have her transmit his merchant… messages. I guess. Good thing Athena was so nice and not at all vindictive toward the woman who was smoochin’ her so-called boyfriend. Or whatever she thinks he is.

Apollo and Boomer follow the signal of the lost viper and find it parked in a back lot in Hollywood that looks like it was last used for a spaghetti western. I expect a cast of gringos and cowpokes to appear, but instead, someone’s shooting lasers at them. They return fire. Faux Irish limps away in a hurry, they give chase. They run, dodge laser fire, run, separate, crouch, creep, kick in doors…. Come on, guys, just follow the smell of whisky. Boomer’s about to shoot when a woman runs out and scream and bumps into him. They call off the fun then - a woman and child are present! no fighting!

The explanation comes in the morning - did I mention it was night? - and we discover they were in prison, and escaped, and Irish was doing his best to provide.

The fleet changes course. There are cylons on the way. Sadly, this means the three vipers won’t know where they are. Boxey shows up on the bridge so we the audience can see the daggit again, and he delivers a heartfelt “i miss my daddy” monologue, and Pa’dama tells him stories about earth, cuddling him on his knee. I don’t remember liking that cuddling thing when I was eight.

Starbuck is informed his new name is Bootlegger 147. He charges at the guard, finds out all the cell doors are open, and boggles that all the folks are staying there. He delivers his dramatic revelation that the colonies had no idea these people were still here, that he’s a colonial warrior, blah blah, and everyone buys into his story immediately and overtakes the guards. Everyone runs outside - wow, the prisoners are so fit for living in tiny cells - and just then Apollo and Boomer arrive to exchange banter and deliver the bullet - Galactica’s out of range and cylons are coming!

The three vipers launch and Starbuck has CORA do the driving. Hmm, there are only three cylons? They were acting like it was a huge fleet. CORA flirts with him. They execute a maneuver that results in Starbuck losing consciousness due to the excessive g’s they pull - CORA coos until he wakes up again. The cylon following them crashed into the prison. Boom goes the ambrosia. Starbuck’s disappointed.

Flip to the Rising Star, where everyone including the faux Irish and his family are dining around a table set with plates of food cubes in pastel colors. Boxey gives his father a drawing he did of a solar system and Starbuck sez it’s wrong, that this blue planet goes over here, and this launches questions of how he knew that. He remembers it from drawings in the cell he was in back on Proteus. Irish sez that was the cell inhabited by some old prisoner who did nothing but draw pictures all the time, who was some sort of wise dude. Isn’t that convenient how he knew this, seeing as how he didn’t know what cell Starbuck was in? Pa’dama pontificates that this is the solar system where earth is.

Trumpets of Grandiosity! End credits!

I’m doubting at this point that the writers of this show really meant to be so pedantic and stilted. But. Forcing the characters to do and say odd and illogical things to accomplish contorted plot turns will inevitably end up with this sort of acting. It’s as though, once the plot was in place, they were trying to shoehorn in all kinds of after-the-fact rationalizations to make it all hang together, rather than rewriting.

Onward.

They certainly lose a lot in this series.

Lance LeGault is in this one. Wooo. Apollo is running from Cylons in his viper - what’s he doing out there alone? Oh - Adama tells the eager pilots who want to help him that it’s a plot to surprise the Cylons who are pursuing him. Sure enough, the minute the Cylons transmit something about him, he brakes and shoots but doesn’t get all of them. Then he’s out of fuel and has to - yes, indeed - he has to crash. Which he does. On a handy planet where people are living in the old West, if the West were able to use tinfoil as clothing.

Shot of a kid grooming a palomino pony, scolding it for growling and alerting a thieving something or other that was after their flock — I remember this now, it’s the planet of growling horses. The viper flies in low and the kid hopes on another pony and heads out, even though his mom shouts for him to stop.

Kid introduces Apollo to the way of his world, where his dad’s dead, his uncle comes around to help out on the place, and he’s never seen a ship before. Mom appears and insists they hide the viper.

Boxey races up on the bridge looking for someone to talk to. The folks tell him lies about Apollo and Starbuck and Boomer take the kid to the “bachelor officer’s quarters” - I’d figure Grandpa Adama would be a better choice, but that’s me.

Back at the homestead, Ma is rustling some grub. Meager rations. She’s got a half linen, half leather outfit on, including a leather skirt over white pants. She’s also really uptight. Evidently, her husband was killed and Apollo dampens her ire by telling her his wife was killed. They’re interrupted by a rider approaching - it’s a cylon on horseback. His chest plate is dented as if he’s been shot by bullets. He wants to know if anyone heard anything. Uncle shows up in a tinfoil cowboy hat. Kid says it’s Uncle Booties. giggle Cylon goes away, reminding them they’re behind on tribute. Somehow, I don’t think the Cylons in these parts are quite what anyone expected.

Ma explains to Apollo, after some really iffy acting/expositioning on the part of kid and uncle, that kid’s dad was a warrior dueling with Red-Eye aka Cylon Mounted Police, and she doesn’t want kid to become a warrior. So she hasn’t told him about it. “Red-Eye only kills those who try to kill him.” Uncle wants Apollo to kill the Cylon - Apollo doesn’t want to because where there’s one, there’s more, and he doesn’t want to incite the Cylons to kill everyone.

Back in the barracks, Boxey is playing pyramid with the guys - for jelly beans. Good grief. Kid wins. Wooo. Cassiopia rushes in and scolds ‘em one and all for teaching him to play cards, smoke, and drink. Aw, Boxey has to go now.

The next scene switch takes us to what we are apparently supposed to believe is a honky-tonk bar, complete with a piano and player, sci fi version, which is a funky board with lights on it and noises like someone’s whacking on an electronic harpsichord. It’s the same tune you’ll hear in every spaghetti western ever. The only one here not wearing a tinfoil cowboy hat is a boss hogg wannabe in a white suit and matching ten gallon. When Apollo saunters in and orders… didn’t catch that, Boss snaps his fingers and a guy comes over and knocks his drink out of his hand. Apollo’s in borrowed clothes so he doesn’t stand out. The guy crowds him repeatedly, so he goes over and sits with the Cylon, in the corner. And starts a conversation. The Cylon “senses” he wants to destroy him — did they assimilate a few telepaths or something? The Cylon stands and gets mouthy at Apollo; Boss tells Red Eye to SIT and he does. A chick in frilly hookerwear tells Apollo “Lacerda wants to see you.” Boss is all of five feet away - why doesn’t he just say so? Oh yeah, he’s the Boss.

“You have courage, a foolish trait.” Yeah, Boss. That’s our Apollo. Apollo says he wants to work for him. Uh huh. He leaves, rides back to the homestead on a horse painted with pseudo zebra stripes. Ma Kettle tells him the kid is out chasing lupus, which so far I’d heard as loopas until I saw them — they mean wolves. Kid’s trying to shoot a wolf and misses. He reloads and hits it just in time. Apollo shows up for a chat about being a man even when Ma thinks you’re still a kid… hmm, the boy appears to be all of ten.

Galactica, commander’s office. The Cylons aren’t pursuing. Apollo’s tactic worked, Tigh says, and everyone wants to go looking for him. Adama pontificates and froths at the mouth about not wanting to risk the fleet. Tigh flails his hands and froths back at him until he allows a patrol to launch.

Apollo talks the kid to sleep, then talks to Ma Kettle about finding the Cylon outpost to get fuel. Her cousin Jason rides up and lets them know Red Eye took half Uncle Booties’ herd of ovines. Back at the bar the Bootster rages and rants and chews scenery in the Boss’ general direction. Boss gives the signal to Red Eye, who rises from the chair and hovers his big metal hand over his gun. Draws and shoots Booty just as Apollo and friends arrive. The kid shoots at the Cylon but Apollo yanks the gun away and breaks it. Kid shrieks at Apollo and runs out. Apollo knows the Cylon won’t shoot an unarmed someone. How? I don’t know. It’s not your typical Cylon. Maybe Apollo’s telepathic too? Plus, it threatened him when he just talked to it, so I’m thinking there’s a flaw in his reasoning somewhere. Not that the writers care. The Cylon sits down.

Starbuck and Boomer are flying long and hard, seeking their lost friend, brainstorming ways to stay out longer and still have fuel to get home.

Apollo apologizes to Ma, standing outside the bar. She says he did the right thing even if no one else understands and kisses him on the cheek. He stalks off, and a bar girl calls him over to a corner. She warns him Lacerda and Marcos are plotting against him. She tells him how Red Eye came to be there; there was a crashed ship and they found one centurion still working. She knows a lot of details, handily. Enough that Apollo knows he can now shoot with impunity so he goes to his horse and straps on his laser pistol. Marcos calls him out while he’s doing so. What timing.

Boss Lacerda calls out Red Eye, and there’s a shootout! Everyone hides behind stuff. Apollo is faster than the Cylon, surprise surprise, and it falls flat then dies in a fountain of sparks. Everyone gathers round, except the bad guys, who escape out the back alley.

Back at the homestead, cute little blond kid is all ‘zap, zap, pow!’ and crowing about how he’s gonna be a hero just like Apollo. Apollo gives him a stern talking down and accidentally calls kid ‘Boxey’ which is enough to remind Ma he needs to go home and not stick around being her new baby daddy. She tells him she knows where her husband’s ship crashed and maybe there’s fuel….

The patrol finds him. Boomer lets out one of the fake yee-hah yells they do from time to time when things are going swell. Apollo is on his way home, leaving babe o’ the week to comfort her kid that he’d be back someday…. Obvious she doesn’t know about the Bonanza effect. (cf: old western tv show “Bonanza,” featuring a man and his three adult sons, who often had a lady love last an entire hour-long show then kick off in the last five minutes, usually shot, leaving her Cartwright boy free for some romance later in the series.) Otherwise she wouldn’t want him to come back.

You know, I think I’ll go clean my palate with some BSG 2003 now.

Note the new addition above, “Dolor.” My first BSG - comments/concrit welcome.

I just recognized the voice that does the monologue in the opening credits. It’s the guy who played John Steed on the Avengers. Hm.

Adama climbs the lazy susan as Tigh informs us all the “fleet is panicking.” Meanwhile, Boomer’s waking up and thanking Apollo and Starbuck from inside his tube. Meanwhile, Adama is in his office telling Tigh the void is a “black sea” mentioned in the Word of the Lords of Kobol. Tigh doesn’t believe it. Adama shows him his medallion o’ shiny diamond as if that proves anything.

In another room, possibly a pilot’s lounge or something, all the women/cadets are babbling about Cylons and fighting, while Apollo tells a big-eyed enthusiastic Starbuck about a little place on a freighter he found for after the wedding, that with “a few curtains and maybe some paint” it would be “wonderful.” There’s “convincing portrayal of strong independent women,” and then there’s “trying too hard.” And then there’s “hammering the point into the audience’s brains with a sledgehammer.” Richard Hatch and Dirk Benedict look like they’re really having to work at playing this scene seriously and doing their best not to cry, laugh, or possibly both. Oh, wait - Serena just asked if they felt left out and Apollo sarcastically replies, “oh, of course not.” Am I to be faulted for thinking this was bad acting, instead of sarcasm? My bad.

Adama is shown the blip in sector whatever, somewhere behind them. It shows then it vanishes - tease! Out goes the patrol. Apollo and Starbuck are being followed by Serena, who insists she’s Apollo’s wingman and blah blah pushy pushy. Starbuck sez, okaaaay, have a nice patrol, then says he’s going to the officer’s club. Then he runs and gets in Apollo’s viper. You can almost hear the nyah nyah as he turbos out the tube into space. Apollo hustles after him, Serena goes after him, and Apollo shouts at her to go back - she threatens to bring him up on charges, nevermind how many times she’s disobeyed orders in the last ten .. centons?

Argue, argue, let’s do this, no you go home, and Starbuck takes off on his own. And promptly he’s surrounded and swearing to himself. Lucifer brings him into the Big Chamber o’ Baltar. Starbuck lights a match on a centurion’s chest. Hee. He looks up at Baltar and announces he’d trade his life for one shot at him. There’s banter, Baltar offers peace, has him taken away. His idea, as he monologues to Lucifer, is to trick them into thinking the Cylons want peace.

Apollo mourns over the radar screen. Serena wants to get married right away, doesn’t want to wait, because they’re in danger and she’s anxious and afraid. Segue to the Chamber of a Thousand Candles, and Adama droning on and handing out jewelry. Long pans across smiling faces and glistening eyes, and Adama “binds” them - just their hands - and declares them sealed. A star glimmers overhead - oh, it was so dark I didn’t notice there’s a window there. Adama’s all excited because a star in the void means Kobol, “where life began” - and then we’re there.

Wow, they went to Egypt for a shoot? Cool. Adama, Apollo and … I think that’s Serena, hike up and climb around in some rubble near the pyramids. Pa wanders off so Apollo starts necking. I swear, those crazy kids need a chaperone all the time or they just wander off task. Adama notes the arrival of the Landram, which unloads all the female pilots, and he tells them to make camp and post a guard.

Baltar is standing at the base of his high chair, wearing … tights and boots? Auditioning for Robin Hood, hmmm? Lucifer tells him a star appeared “out of nowhere” in the void and led the humans to a “dead planet”. Baltar’s confused, then remembers the old story and gives out a ‘mwahahaha.’ Well, a chuckle. It’s in the tone.

Adama is strolling through ancient columns covered with heiroglyphs and talking about Eden, the largest city. He just happens to have brought the funky amulet with him and wanders into an anteroom, reads a line of heiroglyphics, and socks the medallion into the appropriate shaped hole. The door opens! Serena gasps! Adama takes a “torch” - a stick with a glowing jello mold on it - and they nearly fall into some skeletons Adama thinks are tomb robbers. He puts the medallion in another likely looking hole and opens some bars, and they walk on into the chamber he claims is the tomb of the ninth lord of Kobol. Awestruck, he kneels at the sarcophagus, and Baltar strolls in from another direction.

Adama jumps up and starts to strangle Balt — cut to sunset over pyramids! — to strangle Baltar. Apollo stops him, only to have Baltar make a long speech about all his sufferings and claim to be there to tell them he was supposed to lead them into a trap, but he’s not going to do that - he’s there to tell them the Cylon empire is in chaos and a single battlestar could end them forever. Adama says “the tongue of an angel and the soul of a snake.” That about sums it up.

Baltar wants them to pretend to be his prisoners and dangles Starbuck as bait. Everyone’s suspicious, but Apollo’s ears perk up at the news of Starbuck. Adama blabs out that he thinks Earth exists and he’s gonna look for it. Great.

Lucifer is in the Big Chair. Centurion in a kilt comes in. They talk. Lucifer doesn’t trust Baltar and suspects a double cross; he wants Powah! and Glorah! Halle-lu-ya! Though he doesn’t sing gospel, the sentiment is there behind his flashing red eyes.

Serena and Apollo are pitchin’ woo in their typical stilted fashion when Starbuck shows up and tells him about the base star. Why are there so many people on the ground? How many people does it take to look around in a tomb? Apollo darts off to find Pa with Baltar in tow. Adama, who’s wandering about the tomb for no apparent reason, snaps at him for not following orders and taking Baltar to the Galactica; Apollo says he decided not to, cause he wants to protect the council etc. What a good officer he is, ignoring the president and his military superior officer.

Star shine through a high window lights up the chamber suddenly, and Adama hurries around to look up - the light hits his shiny medallion and bounces around a few times until there’s a shining blue triangle of light. Then the sarcophagus opens. Baltar scurries, Adama shouts at him, and everyone hustles down some steps into the actual tomb, where the actual sarcophagus is. Baltar immediately tries to open it. Apollo unconvincingly tries to struggle with him and the thing falls open to reveal an unbandaged mummy holding a gaudy gold spraypainted scepter with two huge gems of red and blue. Baltar snatches it up as Adama burbles “you dare touch the sacred crypt” — Baltar doesn’t believe in that claptrap until the place shakes and rocks fall, at which point he hollers an apology. Yeah, too late for that. They’re trapped.

New word - meggon. Apollo says they’re using 50 meggon loads - meaning the Cylons are attacking, which they are. The camp is going up in flames and people are running to vipers.

Adama, do something! Baltar shouts. Whatever happened to hyper-competent Baltar, commander of the base star?

Tigh is fussing about on the bridge and wishing there were warriors aboard. You know, that’s pretty doggone dumb, leaving the fleet unprotected that way. Sounds like all of them went down to the planet and set up tents - though what they were doing all that time Adama was just pacing around inside the tomb, gods only know. Did they really need fifteen or so people on the ground to watch the commander pace? Also, are there only twenty viper pilots in the whole fleet? Good grief. The formerly sick pilots arrive from sickbay, weak as kittens, but Boomer reminds Tigh that vipers are flown from a seated position, so it’s not like being able to stand is a prerequisite. Uh huh. We want dizzy, lightheaded, weak pilots at the controls of sophisticated machinery we can’t easily replace. Yeah.

Vipers are coming! The vipers are coming! so are the cylons! Lots of stock footage of flying ships firing and exploding. Starbuck’s having to nanny the girls through their maneuvers. Meanwhile the sleepytime gang, fresh from sickbay, are taking off.

Back in the tomb, everyone’s dusty and Adama’s ecstatic. He’s found instructions. Another volley hits the pyramid overhead, sending clouds of dust and chunks of rock flying - the door’s open, but the heiroglyphics Adama was reading are in pieces. What a tradeoff, eh?

More vipers shooting cylons. More cylons flying around. And Baltar’s trapped under a rock. Run, Adama! Run Apollo! “You have not heard the last of Baltar!”

Adama and Apollo and Serena head for the surface, where they’re met by Starbuck and some chick whose face I can’t make out. “We’ve got to get off the surface as soon as possible.” No sooner does Adama utter the magic words than centurions appear and shoot Serena before being shot. Cue dramatic dying scene, complete with stricken looks all around.

She makes it back to the ship, long enough to be tucked neatly under a sheet before making her farewell speech to her son. This scene isn’t half bad, actually. No anvils, no hammy acting. Pa takes Boxey from the room and Apollo cries with her to the bitter end. Which we don’t see, because we cut to the hall outside where everyone else is gathered, hugging each other. Apollo takes Boxey by the hand, leads him down the hall, and has the talk of ‘everything will be okay.’ Credits.

Why are the female cadets “girl warrior #x” in the credits?

It’s memorial day weekend here in the states. Have a good holiday!

“Your sister’s a pilot!” Serena yelps at Apollo in the teaser. Wow, could’ve fooled me. I thought she was a button-pushing bridge decoration.

After the credits (accompanied by the Trumpets of Pomposity and Grandiosity that is the theme song) we are treated to a long painful dinner party wherein Apollo announces his engagement to Serena, Athena smiles at Starbuck, and Starbuck panics, goes hubba-wubba-huh and scrambles from the room. More or less. Aaaand, patrol launched. Our Guys are in vipers and flying, seven minutes into the episode.

Cut to three base stars floating in space. Replay of the Baltar meets Lucifer scene, plus some oozing from Lucifer about having the most capable centurions in the universe. Aren’t they all sort of the same?

Our viper guys run across a dead patch of space, that’s… blacker and emptier than usual. Starbuck wants to go in, Apollo jets off himself - there’s that headstrong reckless thing again. They lose contact. “Oh, frak.” Starbuck is left wondering what to do now that Apollo’s lost… in space.

Guards? Security? break up an apparent bachelor party for Apollo before it starts. “where are you getting your victuals?” Who the heck says ‘victuals’ when they mean ‘beer’? Tigh shows up to shoo the security officers away and scold the ‘kids’ for stealing from the officer’s rations, then enables them in their debauchery by encouraging them to continue.

‘millicenton’? geeze.

Starbuck is flying into the void, outlining his plan as he goes, and hears nothing from Apollo so keeps flying. He finds Apollo, does a 180 and leads them home. “Let’s go home, buddy.” Elsewhere, Jolly and Boomer “pick up some crazy readings off that asteriod” and go on down there to investigate. Now, that is one habitable asteroid - no suits or breathers, and they’re stalking up to the cylon base just fine.

Baltar is sitting in a Big Tall Chair. Lucifer arrives bowing and scraping, and Baltar thinks he’s in charge. Good thing for the cylons these folks are so dumb. They saw the scouts near the ‘listening post’ and let them go, per Baltar’s orders. Looks like a plan is in the works.

Jolly and Boomer are nearly back to Galactica and Jolly’s driving drunk or something - he’s sweating and having trouble keeping his nose up. On the bridge, Pa Adama points at the wall o’ planets and orbits drawn all in red and points at the same sector we were in last episode - come on, Pa, show some progress.

Apollo’s party is in progress already and Jolly falls down. Boomer isn’t having fun, either. Turns out they forgot to go through decontamination and now people are getting sick. Great, now we can get lots of medical technobabble. People are feverish and doc tucks them into hermetically sealed tubes for safekeeping.

On the bridge, Pa is sitting in his easy chair, which is mounted on his lazy susan. The news arrives that people are falling over feverish - my, what a short incubation period this virus has. Plus, you know, it was an asteroid, all dust and rock, so I’m a little confused at this point. Also about the ‘walking around without a space suit’ thing. Still. Anyway, Pa’s all upset about it and immediately rushes all the way down to where the party’s happened - yes, the president of the quorum and military leader and father figure to all rushes in where the contamination broke out first, and exposes himself. Then announces a quarantine and proceeds to walk back to the bridge. What?

Apollo, who happened to be on the way himself, was there too - so what does he do? He goes and argues with his bride to be about her being a cadet pilot in training because he wants her to be safe. DUDE. And he picks up the kid and kisses on him. And makes up with fiancee and necks for a bit. DUUUUUUDE. Way to pay attention. Have fun sweating in a tube in sickbay with the whole family.

Pa’dama arrives in sickbay to announce that half the bridge crew are down — OF COURSE they are, Typhoid Adama! And now you’re breathing on the doctor! And I think he knows about the sick people. You know? Go be useless somewhere else.

Which he does. He reads a few things on a screen featuring pictographs/stick people and big all-caps lettering. Apollo comes in and he informs #1 Son that the cadets need to be in the cockpit pronto because the illness is sweeping the squadrons. Guess Adama and his son are immune or something? Apollo hands Pa the roster on his way out and Pa looks properly chagrined at seeing Serena on the list.

Off to the briefing room, where it becomes clear to me that the straps and shiny body suit I saw Athena wearing are really a pressure suit worn by pilots. Wow, guess she really is a pilot, even though she doesn’t fly anything. Unless she flies the Galactica itself, which is like, whoa. What isn’t clear is why she practically climbed in a locker when Starbuck came in, and now she’s lounging around in public in one - cause there she is with the other cadets, who are shuttle pilots. And all of those cadets Apollo is facing now are women, and all of them are wearing those pressure suits. Serena gets Captain Apollo’s attention to whisper ‘I love you’ and embarrass him in front of the other kids. Someone giggles. I swear, we are stuck in Sweet Valley Galactica. I’m just waiting for Tigh to show up and start handing out detention.

Back in sickbay, Cassiopia is helping doc tend the pilots he’s put in suspended animation. There’s been no transitional scene or explanation for her sudden shift from prostitute to nurse. Did she have a crash course between episodes? Doc goes up to the bridge and climbs the lazy susan to announce that the only hope “those boys have” is going back to the strange asteroid with an atmosphere.

Athena is in the simulator targeting a cylon. She shoots, she scores, she also hits Starbuck in a simulated way. Apollo’s supervising but gets called to the bridge. Pa and Ap argue about whether they’re ready to fly for real. I guess Pa wins, as we swiftly move to shots of pilots getting into vipers and taking off. There’s tension on the bridge until all are launched, then cheering breaks out.

The door on the base star sounds like sabers being drawn. Probably is. Lucifer informs Baltar that the fleet is heading for the “magnetic abyss, possibly endless, etc.” in other words, the colonials are doing something illogical. Baltar thinks things are going well, that Adama will just hand over Galactica without firing a shot — geeze. Keep your fantasy life to yourself. He wants to capture a colonial pilot. “By your command.”

The warriors argue, Apollo issues a verbal slapdown to the mouthy woman who dares assert that he not go it alone to get the sample from the dead asteriod to figure out the mysterious disease/virus/whatever. Apollo takes off, and soon after (like, seconds) a cylon shows up. Starbuck sends the wimminfolk off so he can shoot it, Athena won’t go. “I’m your wingman.” He tells her to hang back and not shoot him. He shoots, he scores, they peel off and go after Apollo.

The other wimminfolk are disobeying orders and following Apollo in, but I’m sure that will turn out okay since there are no consequences for disobeying orders. Much flying about and shooting as the women shoot cylons and the base itself, until everything’s destroyed and they can get the medical shuttle, which we never actually see, in to collect whatever they need.

And Baltar is surprised that the colonials are heading into the abyss, and can’t understand why they destroyed the listening post/base. He insists the cylons capture a patrol. Credits.

Wow. No one crashed. Maybe that’s in part 2.

Written as the eps play in front of me. The first three seem to be collected into a single three hour lump - hmm.

“Saga of a Star World?” Isn’t that, like, any planet you could name? What worlds don’t have stars?

It’s 1978. The premise… not half bad. The actors… not so bad either. The special effects… plastic. The execution… well. Sometimes okay, sometimes wince-inducing.

We are introduced by scenes full of “as you know, bob”-isms to the scenario - the cylons want peace. We are clubbed with it numerous times, as well as with Adama’s disbelief/reticence/misgivings. I must say Lorne looks much better in the dark blue/silver trim uniform with cape, than in the jumpsuit version. John Colicos is a butter-won’t-melt-in-my-mouth Baltar, and we can tell right away that he’s The Bad Guy(tm). The president is ineffectual and appears to have a bad case of the dumb.

A small contingent of Cylon raiders shoots Zak out of the void. Dang. He was way cuter than his older brother. Gun turrets fire! Lasers zwhing through space! Jolly and Boomer take turns shooting at the enemy. The explosions sound like good ol’ fashioned terrestrial explosions - in fact, they all sound like the same explosion, as it was no doubt taken off the tape labeled “stock sound effects.” The base ships are missing! Where are they? Adama realizes with dismay what it means, and climbs up on the lazy susan command deck to call the president and rub it in that he was right, the prez was wrong. (The little round platform spins slowly for no reason, seriously. Unless it’s generating its own gravitational field?)

A battlestar is destroyed! And another! Colonel Tigh, using a laser pointer on the gigantic colony map grid, shows what long range scan hath found — base stars heading for Caprica! Oh nos!!

The bug-headed Cylon orders the attack. Cylons aren’t human-looking, nor are they all human-created robots, and I’m missing Six in her scant red halter/dress. Base stars spit out ships, which do barrel rolls and plunge into atmosphere. Flash to Galactica - light speed for home! Adama calls to his faithful crew. Leaving the vipers behind? “There’s gotta be a good reason” Starbuck sez. Flash to Caprica - look, it’s Jane Seymour! A very young, pretty Jane reporting on peace, just as raiders begin to fire on the city behind her. She’s standing on a chess board in front of some buildings. Now she’s looking for Boxey, who actually has a real dog - excuse me, daggit - at the moment. And the flag burns. And people run. A big concrete wall falls on the daggit! Things blow up just as they do on back lots at MGM and Paramount. Strangely, the cameras keep rolling and transmitting into space so we get shots of Adama, imitating Lorne Green woodenly comforting Athena, who weeps unconvincingly for her little brother. And now the base ships are heading for the outer planets, having wrecked the inner planets.

Adama does something we know Olmos-Adama probably wouldn’t — he demands a shuttle to go looking for someone on Caprica. Apollo wants to take him in his viper. Of course, we have to make the disaster personal by having Adama prowl through the wreckage of his house looking for his wife. We’ve had the dead pet shot to establish sympathy for animals and kids, let’s get the mourning husband angle. Woe! Woe!

Miles of shots of vipers flying. Starbuck’s cockpit is sparking and smoking. He taps the gauge (that used to work on my friend’s Pinto, too) and flips lots of little switches around. He’s coming in hot! Random people look like they might be crying, and Athena nearly breaks her neck rushing to the landing bay to ask “are you alright?” And now we have time for an argument. I suppose this is to set up the ongoing tension of “will Starbuck and Athena get together?”

The burnt out Casa Adama. He doesn’t find what’s left of his wife, just a box full of pictures that managed to not burn, so Adama can talk to the static image of his wife. And here come the hordes of survivors who now want to cram themselves into Apollo’s viper and escape! But Father Adama has shifted into Super!Grieving mode, and must monologue. The necessity of leaving and getting back to the only surviving battlestar be damned. The mob is about to tear Apollo apart, but Jane Seymour stops them, and now… stilted dialogue to inform the masses what’s happened. “Let the word go forth to every man woman and child…” And the little ships fly out into the air in front of the painted representation of a solar system and dangle on wires in front of black velvet sprinkled with white paint, thus becoming the ragtag fleet we saw in front of the same sparkled canvas every week.

Baltar on a carefully arranged set complete with barren trees and a confused sky that can’t decide whether the sun is setting or it’s just cloudy - robot Cylon #2,345 informs him that the fleet escaped. “What? They must all be destroyed!” I know you didn’t like your mother in law, Baltar, but this is going too far! For someone who wants to dominate the human race he’s sure bent on killing them all. Maybe he has a realistic idea of how many are manageable for him - say, 10.

Oh, here’s a scene I remember - Athena undressing in a locker room to reveal random straps on her legs and arms that I suppose must be futuristic underwear, though the bunk is inconveniently placed between her and the camera to conceal the really revealing bits. And the nekkid parts I see are shiny, like a flesh toned spandex suit perhaps? And Starbuck bursts in and can’t look at her, and she hides in a locker, and there’s a long bad exchange about how long term relationships aren’t Athena’s cup of tea, and it’s sort of maybe not going to work between them and if you think my summary’s bad? you should hear the actual dialogue. It’s more vague.

Everyone’s working on the fleet trying to keep it going. Everyone’s arguing. People are living in horrible crowded conditions… and while it’s unconvincing that these folks are still neatly dressed in colorful pantsuits and skirts, with combed hair, it’s still something we didn’t see much of on BSG 2003, at least not so early. We’re still in the first (second?) episode here. Starbuck takes Cassiopia back with them, as well as lots of wounded, and finds out she’s a prostitute. She was getting flack from a woman that we find out is a member of a sect that doesn’t believe in physical contact between genders, except when blessed by some high priest at some ceremony that happens every seven years. Hmmm, they didn’t look Vulcan.

The insect Cylon issues orders to a centurion to get Baltar into action.

Serena, aka Jane Seymour, meets up with Apollo and wants help with her son Boxey. They wander through a crowded section of a transport between hanging sheets of jaggedly-torn bubble wrap. Props department must have used the packing material from the last shipment of Cylon armor. We have a scene with a kid that should have been cute and touching but ends up being treacly and accompanied by a soundtrack straight out of a Care Bears cartoon. Awww, Serena likes him.

A rich dude is hording food. Boomer and Apollo motivate him to share. “Sire” Uri is a member of the new Quorum of 12.

We get a long, boring look at a long tube the doc is using on Cassiopia’s broken arm - a regenerator, aka a flashlight with a red bulb in it, brought to you by the same props people who gave us bubble wrap curtains. She comes out and Starbuck trots off with her arm in arm after he says he’ll find her a place to stay.

A council meeting. “Sire” Uri wants to go to Boralis for food. Apollo wants to go to Carillon instead, by a short route rather than the long way that apparently is traditional, sending a team of fighters out to clear an inconvenient mine field. He expects, and gets, Boomer and Starbuck to volunteer. And now Apollo and Pa Adama are fighting about it, spewing cliches at each other, dramatically pitching metaphors and stalking around the room.

Back in Chez Bubble Wrap, Apollo gets Boxey and takes him to the lab of … some scientist dude. SD talks about having to make a fake daggit for a lot of trumped-up reasons that wouldn’t convince a four year old. Out comes the chimp in the daggit suit, complete with spinning ears. It earns Apollo a bump of the forehead with Serena. No kissing in front of the sprog!

Athena goes looking for Pa and finds him drinking and angsting about the horrors of confronting terrified colonists on what was left of Caprica. “I don’t want to do this anymore, wa wa wa.”

Starbuck shows Cassie his phallic symbol viper and then follows her into a launch tube so Athena can just happen to walk through looking for him, see him necking on a monitor, fly into a jealous rage, and vent steam into the tube. “That little snake.” Yes, let’s boil him alive! How dare he take her request for no relationship seriously and kiss someone else!

Fortunately, he survives to “volunteer” to go shoot mines. By now you’re thinking I’m just shifting abruptly for the sake of brevity, but the cuts are quite abrupt with no sense of passage of time; for all I know, Starbuck is still blistered and scalded and riding around in a viper slathered in Noxema. The toxic cloud they’re flying in is doing inexplicable things to the hulls of the ships, and they’re firing blindly at mines and blowing them up. Athena, whose function I still don’t quite understand, sits on the bridge intently punching buttons. It’s what she appears to be there for. Maybe it’s like the computer on Lost and if she doesn’t press the buttons something dire will happen? Just a few minutes of shooting mines and we’re there!

Baltar arrives to talk to Insect!Cylon, who informs him that the deal’s off, and Baltar says his understanding was that the human race be subjugated under him; Bughead says he’s going to be executed.

Starbuck and Apollo are roaming around on Carillon in armored tank-like vehicles, which I don’t see how they got it down on the planet — did they dangle it under the vipers? Boomer’s along, too, riding with Starbuck, and Serena and Boxey and the daggit are with Apollo and (I think) Jolly. WTF? You thought having Wesley on the bridge was annoying! They stop and walk up to a cave, and a chick wearing feathers (Vegas showgirl from another planet!) runs out. Starbuck guesses she’s Tauran from her accent, which I suppose means everybody’s Tauran, since it’s the same accent everyone has had so far. They walk into the gambling den of women in draped skimpy things and men in confining long sleeved robes over long sleeved shirts.

Cut to tank #2. Boxey asks why the Cylons are trying to hurt them, and why we can’t just turn them off if they’re machines. Evidently the Cylons were reptiles who made the machines which were then called Cylons, and Apollo doesn’t think there are any living reptile Cylons left, except I just saw the Bughead so that’s not very good intelligence.

Back in the casino Starbuck and Boomer watch three women, who have four eyes and two mouths apiece and sing in harmony, shattering glasses. Starbuck wants to be their agent. Man, he’s a crappy warrior. No attention to the mission. Then again, I’m not sure what that is yet, either.

In Tank #2, they find a tylium deposit. Oh, so that’s what they’re doing. Muffy the daggit jumps out and runs off, prompting a long long long sequence where the kid is running and running between yards of fake rocks screaming “Muffy!” and I sat here screaming “shut up, learn to act!” Aliens with green glowing eyes pop over a ridge and capture the adults. The bugs take them to their leader, and Apollo uses the Languatron (seriously, it’s got a big label on the front — LANGUATRON) which looks like a ginormous tv remote. Bug squeaks, languatron translates. The bugs reunite them with the kid and all is well.

Cut to scenes of shuttles going down from the fleet. Voiceover about ‘much needed rest.’ Hey, let’s give people leave and not investigate the curious coexistence of a mine and a casino. The casino is luring people into complacency as it’s designed to do.

We get a scene where Starbuck, Athena, and Cassiopia have a conversation - Starbuck is gambling and the next thing he knows, the women are sniping at each other and trying to claim a key to a suite to which they want to drag Starbuck and ravish him. Athena wins, and Starbuck’s confused, and I’m thinking he’s acting too much like a battered wife here. I wonder if they made him a woman in the new version so he’d be tougher. Apparently, it’s the females of the colonial subspecies of the human race who are typically demanding and aggressive.

A short scene with an elevator delivering people to the basement, gaping frightened expressions, and a scream - one of the Vegas transplants slaps her hands to her cheeks and does a full throated glass-breaker, and the camera blurs her face to fadeout. How 70’s.

Useless scene of bickering quorum members telling us nothing new, other than they never learn to listen to Adama. This, as I recall, was a constant theme in this series.

Cassie’s in the elevator with Anonymous Obnoxious Pilot/Redshirt, it goes to the basement, she screams - and we see people struggling unconvincingly to escape being strapped down in vaguely bee-like cells by the bugs. O_O Okay, these bugs, the Ovions, are living on a planet that appears to be a barren rock with no ecosystem. They must have come here from somewhere else. They didn’t bring groceries and now they have to kidnap stray humans who wander past? And how did this ‘resort’ escape attention prior to this when they’re obviously making people disappear?

Now it’s gone to this contrived scene where Adama meets Tigh in the hanger bay, gives him a headset, and they talk to each other across a whole twenty feet from within the cockpits of vipers. I can think of a number of problems with this if the goal is to not have eavesdroppers. Wouldn’t it be easier to scan for life signs and/or listening devices, deal with them, and have a nice quiet conversation face to face? Instead of transmitting on a frequency someone could conceivably pick up with a radio? Maybe I’m just not an expert in these matters. Pa Adama (Padama?) is worried that Sire Uri’s men will overhear. Hey, you voted the guy into the Quorum. Adama wants to “do something” and Tigh is all “whatever you say big guy - what are we doing?” Sounds like he thinks Uri is a Cylon conspirator. But Uri didn’t want to come here - he wanted to go to that other place? I’m confused. And why is there steam hissing out from under that viper? Why does Adama look so tanned? Why do I even bother wondering?

Adama wants to send bunches of people who aren’t pilots to the Big Party so Uri doesn’t know the pilots are elsewhere protecting the fleet from the impending doom. Tigh agrees and goes nancing through the bunkhouse/dorm swiping uniforms from people’s lockers. Eh? Why not just ask? Or better yet, order them to give up the goods? Or go down to storage where there are probably spares in different sizes? “Inspection”? Oh brother. I guess it’s one uniform per warrior or something.

Oh wow - Starbuck’s taking off his uniform. I had no idea there was velcro along the neckline and shoulder. It’s a stripper’s uniform!

Pa ‘dama is on the bridge giving Apollo excuses for not going to the ceremony honoring him. Apollo sez Pa’s been more of a father to him, he’s been someone he could trust and look up to — wow, I thought you could do that to a father too. Adama gets up on the bridge lazy susan and looks thoughtful and grim.

Apollo comments on strange men in uniform. Serena rationalizes seeing the strange men in uniform away by saying they’re probably retired pilots and kisses Apollo on the nose. If she keeps missing that way, we’ll never believe they’re in love! Starbuck and Boomer have the same misgivings about some guys wearing uniforms belonging to their squadron. Serena tells them not to miss their own coronation - Apollo’s gonna be king? Wha?

The Ovions report to the Cylons, receive orders from a centurion to keep the humans occupied. Starbuck and Apollo decide to go to investigate and rather than ask the folks with the uniforms who they are, head for the basement, where they see centurions marching. I still don’t understand why Pa didn’t tell them what’s going on.

Oh, Starbuck wants to ignite the tylium with his handgun after Apollo gets everyone to safety. He so SMRT! Boxey, who wandered into an elevator after the daggit, runs out and foils the plan by nearly getting bonked on the head by a centurion - why didn’t the machine shoot him? Are bonking subroutines higher on the priority list than shooting? They then rescue Cassiopia, who was captured forever ago, from being crammed into a cell in the hive - the same one I saw the bug people putting someone else into earlier. I guess they wanted her to ripen a little first?

Running, fighting, running. Frak! shouts Starbuck. There have also been mentions of yaron, centon, and other faked up time measurements. Uri is making a speech and when Apollo runs in and shouts for evacuation, Uri shouts he’s in charge - until the centurions appear and shoot, at which point he’s suddenly obedient and running. People run from the cave and get to the vehicles, which have turret guns. Muffit runs around biting centurions on the calf, which appears to disable them for some reason. The centurion falls face down on the ground, sparking. How dumb. “Shoot for the calves!” should become a colonial battle cry.

“25 microts” is the ETA of the attack fleet. Starbuck gets to hug Cassie and Boxey wants Apollo to be his daddy. Say it like you mean it, kid. They take off. Still no clue how the wheeled vehicles got to the planet, cause all I see are shuttles and vipers, none big enough to put a hummer in.

Stock footage of Cylons firing on Galactica, crashing one in the landing bay. Stock footage of vipers in formation. When the vipers show up, the Cylons turn their heads and look out the window of their ship - wow, amazing technology for detection of the enemy!

Felgercarb! I’d forgotten that one. Lots of shots of ships in action — no real indication of how many there are or how many are left. Athena is on the bridge pretending she can act. Ouch, that was a bad line. Adama doesn’t want them to pursue the base star; predictably Apollo and Starbuck go anyway and pretend they are a huge fleet of ships by chatting it up. Hey, if Cylons have to look out the window to see the enemy, it might work.

A centurion tells Imperious Leader all their ships are destroyed. Imperious orders the ship closer to the planet. When they find out there are just two vipers, they fire on the vipers, which bug out because they know laser fire will ignite tylium - predictably this happens and blows up the entire planet. Wow. Hate when that happens.

“Fleeing from Cylon tyranny, the last battlestar, Galactica, leads a ragtag fugitive fleet on a lonely quest - a shining planet known as Earth.” Uh huh.

And the epilogue. Baltar, having a bad hair day, faces another Imperious Leader, who informs him that ‘his people’ destroyed the other base star. Oh, look, the traitor’s being sent to find the fleet. To be spared from death - I figured they would have killed him already, oh well. New Imperious Leader wants a truce - again. Right. Lucifer, the pointy headed two eyed Cylon, enters the room. Ominous music. Credits!

Ensign Greenbean? eh? Oh, it’s Ed Begley.

According to the credits it was a Landram vehicle they were driving.

And that’s it for the first three episodes, all in a row. We’ve seen most of the standard BSG elements introduced - the new terms that actors can’t make sound natural, the daggit who runs off and gets the kid in trouble, the women fighting over Starbuck, No One Listens to Adama Even if He’s Always Right(tm), the viper pilots who do what they please and don’t get in any real trouble, bad science, and uneven performance from some of the less experienced actors. And now the ragtag fleet is sailing off with the Cylons coming after, to pursue other stock BSG traditions such as crashing on planets and finding other humans thither and yon.

Tune in tomorrow when I start the two parter “Lost Planet of the Gods.” Apollo will get married, and horribly written relationship discussions ensue.