BSG: Blood on the Scales

[beccatoria]

Well, that was okay. Not as good as last week, with some stellar moments and some parts that I think my reading of the show prevents me from fully appreciating.

In some ways, this episode was painful for me to watch because I love Laura more than pretty much any other fictional character and I just... Yes. Her yelling was awesome. Yes. Her teaming up with the Cylon to rain down terror and devastation upon Tom Zarek and Felix Gaeta was awesome.

I did not appreciate the undercurrent of romance that permeated the entire thing.

I feel ungrateful because, let's just say that this episode played out in an AU where Laura was not, in fact, sleeping with Adama and we know for a fact there's nothing romancey going on. And this episode happens. I honestly don't think she would have done much, if anything, different.

She still would have expressed her belief that Adama would regain control of the Galactica. Adama's "death" would still have been a moment that impressed even further, even in this insanely frakked up situation, how much more awful things could get/had gotten. It would still have represented the death of any chance to end this quasi-peacefully; she still would have made her I WILL RAIN DOWN DEVASTATION ON YOU! speech (though wouldn't it have been awesome if that was precipitated by the Quorum massacre instead?) At the end, she still would have collapsed a little, into the arms of whoever was there, because something I love about Laura is how she still feels this crap. She is more hardcore than Kara Thrace, but when she's finished hardcoring, the weight of what she's done is never lost on her and she never tries to lie to herself about how much it hurt.

Maybe I unerestimated how much canon A/R would skew my reading of her motivations just through my own defensiveness. A lot of me felt like I was 'supposed' to read a lot of romantic motivation in her choices. I resented the beats that were clearly about her fearing for Adama's life rather than putting that aside and fearing for the entirety of her species' future survival. Like I was going to somehow forget that she's with Adama if for like, thirty seconds we don't see teary-eyed close-ups.

But then again, how much of this is my defensiveness? And also, even if this is what the show is doing, if it's succumbing to those sexist romantic cliches that now that she has a MAN all her decisions are secretly about her MAN, and that while she threatens to nuke her own Fleet into oblivion, it's still her MAN that saves things in the nick of time so she doesn't have to - even if this is a true reading, there's also me and my choice to see it that way (even if I hate it). These cliches will never stop being true until we stop giving them credence and choose to read other things into those situations.

Not that I'm trying to absolve the media of good representation by claiming it has no responsibility other than pandering to the lowest common denominator, I just...

I don't know.

I think I'm hurt because dude, Laura Frakking Roslin was wielding a basestar of nuclear woah and actually using her own civilian fleet for cover, and screaming vengeance and murderous awesome, and I kind of didn't love it as much as I would have otherwise because I spent half of it worried that maybe the reason she was doing all of it was the crap reason instead of the good reason?

And this isn't the person I want to be. I don't want to be the person whose ship or anti-ship trashes their enjoyment of the show. I want to be more comfortable reading against the text when I need to, but also, I find reading against the text about certain things really exhausting. So, I don't know.

To continue my very embarassing 'shipper craziness (really, I remember when these were NOT the first thoughts I had about an episode!) OMG TIGH AND CAPRICA you are hilarious and adorkable.

"I CAN TAKE CARE OF MYSELF," (EVEN THOUGH I'M ONLY IN THIS EPISODE FOR ABOUT TWELVE SECONDS).

Yes, Caprica, yes you can. But I haven't quite forgiven you for not killing anyone with your stiletto heels. We had an agreement, woman. Let's just say, I'm assuming your journey to Baltar's Harem of Religious Crazy was punctuated by many mutinous extras who needed a stiletto to the temple.

I wonder if we'll see Helo and Hera and Caprica hanging out with Baltar's crazyfolks next episode or if we'll just skip forward an unspecified amount of time. I kind of hope we do, because that could be a WORLD of hilarious. And also, Baltar and Caprica have not actually seen each other or spoken since he and D'anna dumped her and that would be interesting and awkward.

But on the other hand, if they did that scene (and here comes the insane shipperness, really, I recognise my nutsness) it would FILL ME WITH FEAR that they were trying to get Baltar and Caprica back together again. Especially with his recent revelation to Gorgeous Six (for real, I hope she sticks around, her hair is PRETTY) that his faith really is hollow. I loved that he admitted that, and honestly, am not against Baltar making some changes and becoming a better person, as long as he does it in ways that seem genuinely perspecacious and about understanding his own flaws and addressing them (unlike, say, The Hub).

Once upon a time (i.e. at the start of season three), I would have loved seeing Caprica and Baltar get back together. At that point in the story, that relationship had a lot of what I now love about Caprica and Tigh. This sense of two deeply damaged people fumbling to put some kind of life back together, and with this sense that whatever life they could put together would always be haunted by what came before, that there was no clean slate, no getting rid of baggage. Just this messy, quiet desperation and chance that they could save each other.

But in season three Baltar and Caprica didn't save each other. They didn't save each other spectacularly.

And now it's Caprica and Tigh who give me that sense of unbelievable baggage and damage and yet, oddly, hope that I used to get from Caprica and Baltar. And from this perspective, having Caprica get back together with Baltar, or, indeed, having Tigh get back together with Ellen, feels very false. Like going back to "the good old days," when that shouldn't ever be possible. Like a fake second chance.

And I guess that also, being involved with the Caprica/Baltar relationship far more from her POV than his, if they got back together, no matter how much he'd repented and become a better person, I'd always feel that he didn't deserve it and that it somehow meant that it was okay to treat someone that badly repeatedly because there's always time to be sorry later. I actually want to see Baltar become a better, more whole person and less of a godawful excuse for a human being. I also honestly believe he's always loved Caprica in this difficult, confused, selfish way. And I think that he missed his chance with her, and that if he realises that, the poignancy could be heartbreaking. For both of them. Because they still love each other, but it's...too late.

And then he can get together with someone else. A fill-in for a lost love who he can maybe learn to actually love if he learns about compromise and reality. The same way that Tigh was Caprica's "I'll love anyone I can save," and Caprica was Tigh's "Not-Quite Ellen," and Baltar and Caprica were each other's pale immitations of respective Head!Characters. Together all three (four, really, with Ellen) of them form a beautiful, lost, broken dance, but I want them to keep moving forward, in new steps, rather than backward repeating old ones.

AHAHAAHA, that could lead to Gaius/Ellen. Actually... No, please someone stop me before accidentally I hurt myself.

Lastly, politics.

I feel bad - I've always enjoyed Gaeta but I've never loved him. I think that his deicisions here were understandable given the story and that it was effective to make Gaeta the character they used for this.

Probably the most affecting moment for me was when he found out Zarek had murdered the Quorum. Everything about why he did it was there - including his anger. They had the truth on their side, and now, they have massacres to cover up that make them as bad as the people he wants to fight against. And Zarek, claiming that the truth is whatever the winners claim, just broke Gaeta's heart because the truth, the objective truth as he could understand it, was the only reason he did any of this.

In many ways I'm still completely confused by Zarek's attitudes. I find myself minding less about my inability to really understand him as I consider his tenure across the show. I thought when he was introduced, he was just there to simplistically reverse the stereotype of terrorist freedom fighters. Well, not simplistically because to be fair to the show (and to the most excellent episode Bastille Day), they never ever uncomplicated the reasons for his imprisonment or his attitudes. But I did think that they were trying to show complexity in his actions and the politics surrounding them while making the man himself very idealistic, in a "not all terrorists are evil, m'kay?" kind of way. At that point, if they'd suddenly revealed that Zarek was, in fact, just another powerhungry piece of dirt who had big words for murdering the government, it would have been dumb, and suddenly turned the whole thing into, "oh oops, terrorists ARE evil, m'kay?" But I think four years later, maybe that's enough time passed that it's just interesting. Enough time that the "noble terrorist," is in itself a cliche reversal of a cliche.

BSG is always better when confusing boundaries than when simplistically reversing them. It's always better when the gender-swap, the religion-swap, the racial-swap, the political-swap that puts you on the "other" side to the one you're usually one, is a messy and very imperfect fit.

My bloodthirst from last week isn't totally quenched.

I'm really glad that Gaeta and Zarek got executed.

Not glad in the sense that I, as a viewer, enjoyed watching him get his comeuppance, but just...satisified. It was the right ending. It was pointless and hollow and the only way it could possibly end. And no, I'm not blind to the irony that the response to a coup whose defining attribute was execution without trial, is...execution probably without trial. It doesn't make things equal because circumstances are different, but I'm not blind to it either, and it certainly adds to my feeling that this didn't resolve or fix anything. Compare this to Adama, Roslin, Lee, Starbuck and Billy having a picnic in a tent on Kobol.

What I don't know is what the hell's going to happen to everyone else. Knowing Adama and his unsurprising attitude to the marines who were about to kill him, in just assuming that now they'll follow him to CIC (which like, of COURSE they will because they don't want to die in a firing squad and because they've been captured and because a lot of people are basically sheep) is to just assume that now that the leaders have been killed, they can all go back to serving under him, and we'll see some bitching in the rec room as Starbuck punches Racetrack a few times and that'll serve for continuity regarding that HILARIOUS TIME she helped murder people.

(Note: I have chosen, for the sake of my sanity, to view Racetrack laughing at Zarek's jokes as a canny bit of self-preservation on her part. Because really, if Zarek had told me a joke at that point, I would have laughed too. If only from nervous adrenaline.)

But yeah, that scenario is what I don't want. I no longer know if I want these people put up against a wall and shot for similar reasons to Gaeta (because, you know, I never wanted that for any of them, I just think/thought the story demanded it). Maybe not. Maybe my bloodlust is cooling a little. But...I want something.

Because I disagree with everything Narcho did and think he's kind of a jerk, but he said it very succinctly when he said, "I've always respected you, but I hate the Cylons. And I can't take orders from a leader who won't fight them."

Now, I also think this is a ridiculously short-sighted view of the fact that Adama is still fighting, or at least actively defending the fleet from, the Cylon, just...you know, the ENTIRE REST OF THE SPECIES rather than this one rag-tag half-destroyed basestar that committed next-generation genocide on their own species as an indication that maybe, just maybe, they are a tiny bit trustworthy in terms of a mutual defense treaty.

So maybe the government needs better frakking PR or something because I know it's a weird concept, but it's also a pretty simple one. When the enemy defects, you use that resource.

But still. People think like Narcho. This will not change. It needs to be addressed.

As, to be honest, does the fact that the heads of the civilian government and the military are literally in bed with each other. I don't necessarily think this is illegal, or whatever, and given the circumstances, even if it were, well, I'm also aware how loose the frat regs are in the military these days. But I can see why it worries people. To be honest, it kind of worries me, though I'm obviously not unbiased.

I don't mind hardline Roslin and her somewhat sketchy political ethics. But I will mind if they don't rebuild the Quorum.

Random Other Things:

- Not a single Agathon got to kill Gage or Vireem. I find this disappointing.

- Hera? Still creepy. "Ouch." Where, "Ouch," comes with an expression that looks a little like, "You know what? Human flesh looks TASTY." Subsequently, I continue to adore her.

- NO! NOT SAM! I DEMAND THAT YOU SURVIVE!

- I'm not entirely sure why I'm not getting horrific flashbacks to the quadrangle of doom, but I think it's the lack of melodrama or attempt to say, use a horrifically brutal mutiny as background to some relationship angst, and instead there's just...this complicated situation where no one's really the bad guy and no one's getting drunk and losing wedding rings. Probably the fact I like the quasi-platonic not-quite-sibling vibe that Starbuck and Apollo have reclaimed since Maelstrom also helps.

- They give Roslin the big, emotional romantic moment of "OMG HE'S DEAD," about Adama. But for Adama? Yeah. Tigh. IJS.

- I think Chief's "It wouldn't have mattered," was in response to Kelly's hypothetical warning that Cally was trouble. But...I kind of like it more expansively, also in response to his kid not being a Cylon. That ultimately, he would have been okay with that because he loved Cally and loves Nicky. I'm not wild that this yet again underlines this show's somewhat weird obsession with filandering women and the stoic men who love them anyway, but it's better than just pissing all over her again. I still think it's the stupidest retcon ever, but I'm a tiny bit mollified that RDM apparently said in an interview his intention wasn't to make Cally seem like a cheater but more like Cally and Chief didn't get together straight after the jaw incident and that was a lot later, and she'd been seeing Hot Dog but then Chief suddenly proposed out of the blue or something. Which, really, HOW would we have assumed that? But also, better than nothing. Also I really like "your kid's not a cylon," because it doesn't assume that Nicky is no longer his kid. Because THEY ARE ADORABLE.

- NO! GALACTICA! DON'T FALL APART NOW! WE HAVE SIX EPISODES TO GO!

- I am a bad, bad, feelingless human being. I found Gaeta's "It stopped," about his leg right before they got shot to be a) cheesy and b) something that really pulled me out of the moment.

- SHOW. IT IS VERY CRUEL TO TEASE ME WITH SCENES OF WILLIAM ADAMA GETTING SHOT TO DEATH BEFORE REVEALING IT WAS ALL A BIG DREAM.

So, there's that. I liked it. Not as much as last week's and I'm still - and this is painful to admit - getting to grips with Laura Roslin again.

Comments

[whatever-lj.livejournal.com]

I looked forward to seeing your analysis, and as usual, you don't disappoint.

Roslin -- Yeah! Why, oh why, did they need to keep swooping in for big close-ups of her teary-eyed face? I guess I am an AR shipper, but I still found it insulting -- does the show not think that I will remember that she likes Adama? And I thought I'd throw up when she murmers "Bill!" when she thinks he's dead. Yucky.

The whole QUORUM was exectuted! When she come down the ladder of love and collapses at the site of Adama, I like to think that she has been briefed on the massacre, and when she falls apart it is not just because she sees Adama alive and well -- I like to think she falls apart because she is truly OBE (over- come by events) -- the events: being shot at in a raptor, the frustration with the radio, the struggles on the cylon baseship, the search for the proper words to convince the fleet, that this may be the end of the human race, finding out that the WHOLE QUORUM has been MASSACRED -- oh, and it's good that Bill is alive, too.

I do think you're wrong though, about Adama not being given a reaction to the news that Tigh has been executed. I thought it was perfect and moving -- no screaming and crying, just the quiet beat of devestation. This time I thought the show was trusting me to know that Bill had just taken one in the chest (and he didn't have to whisper "Saul" with teary eyes).

[sache8.livejournal.com]

Heya. I followed you here from grav_ity's incessant chatter about how you guys lived and breathed BSG together. Your episode recaps are really enjoyable to read. Entertaining, even-- the stiletto line had me in stitches. ;-)

I just wanted to say that while I'm not a live and breath die-hard Roslin/Adama shipper, neither does the ship really bother me. I honestly feel I can say with a fair amount of credibility that my perspective of the ship is pretty objective, and while I definitely recognized the beats of "Oh my love!Angst" with Roslin's part of this ep, I didn't get the feeling that they were affecting her in such a way that she would have done anything she wouldn't have done without the romance element. I think that Roslin was just plain furious. After all, the relationship between her and Zarek has its own history. My perception of her actions was just Roslin doing her Roslin thing. I don't know if that makes you feel better, but I thought I'd put it out there. ;-)

My particularly rabid fangirl tendencies in this fandom tend almost exclusively toward Anders, the Agathons, and Bear McCreary, with honorable secondary but-not-quite-as intense love for Chief and Tigh, so I suppose in some way that accounts for my 'detachment.'

That being said:

- NO! NOT SAM! I DEMAND THAT YOU SURVIVE!

*wimpers* I'm over here hyperventilating with concern, myself. I can't believe we have to wait a week. Although, the fact that is still open-ended suggests that, even if they do off him, he'll at least get a good dose of focus.

[emmiere.livejournal.com]

Together all three (four, really, with Ellen) of them form a beautiful, lost, broken dance, but I want them to keep moving forward, in new steps, rather than backward repeating old ones.

No, no. Don't stop. ;) This is a quad o' doom I can get behind, basically because the doom will be that of others if they are unleashed on the universe in tandem. But, I am against the retreading of old ground in general, it's why I can't ever get behind the idea Chief and Boomer getting back together, even though they are basically the same person now. So, IDK, all I really want is for Caprica to not get dumped again and everything can fall into place from there.

I really enjoy your analysis/squee this week, especially on Laura, but this was oddly the part that caught my attention. :)

[cyborganize.livejournal.com]

I resented the beats that were clearly about her fearing for Adama's life rather than putting that aside and fearing for the entirety of her species' future survival.

YES THAT YES. dude, it is BREAKING MY HEART that you are blaming yourself for the disappointment rather than THE MAN. cliches are cliches because there is a whole naturalized architecture of domination behind them, NOT because we angry feminists can't make them go away with the power of our minds! SHOW, THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE. what a waste.

I haven't watched it yet, btw, but poor Melissa gave me the blow-by-blow. My episode synopsis after having it described to me on IM: "My cock." "MY cock." "No, MY cock." "Bill's cock!" *dueling cocks* "MAGIC COCK."

OK, going to read the rest of the post now. I just had to get that out...

(sadly, I have banned myself from IM this morning so that I can actually leave the house *pout*)

[nightxade.livejournal.com]

- SHOW. IT IS VERY CRUEL TO TEASE ME WITH SCENES OF WILLIAM ADAMA GETTING SHOT TO DEATH BEFORE REVEALING IT WAS ALL A BIG DREAM.

*comfort* Oh my darling, the scene had dreamy lighting all over it. Plus Adama is badass enough not to require no damn blindfold. And I should hope the marines are badass enough not to require a damn target.

Gaeta: Itchy stump = conscious? I really wanted him to start singing at the end. Not out of defiance. Just out of.. Gaeta. I'm glad he got a sort of humanizing at the end with Baltar, but glad they didn't cheapen his entire efforts. His insistence on a trial proved that that's what he really wanted. He wanted get in Daddy's face and let him know just how much he failed his children.

Was he counting on there being a reckoning? Was that his out? "I want them to remember who I am." Not what he did. Who he was. All interesting thought-provoking thoughtiness there.

But ultimately, I can't forgive him because as right as he was in many places, he ordered the president's transport to be shot down. I don't see that as much different from Zarek killing the Quorum. ("Ding Dong The Quorum's Dead!" *grin*)

Laura: I don't think your anger over R/A here is unjustified. You know I ship them, but not romantically. This was "I'm reigning hell because you killed my honey!" That's not the Laura Roslin I want.

Zarek: There was no indication that he wanted anything other than power in this coup, nor in anything he's ever done prior. He knows the right words to play on people's rage, fear and hatred, but he's never ever given them any alternatives to what the opposition offers. In that, he has remained consistent.

Kelly: Thank you for him and his issues with the whole thing. Wonderful.

Narcho: Thank you for his honesty. I don't think though that Adama has done as you said regarding the marines etc. There will be a reckoning for those who actively took part in the coup. He gave Narcho a chance. Narcho responded honestly. Adama locked him up. But now's not the time and place for a major justice seeking. There's going to have to be a lot of allowance for repentence.

Narcho's view: Yes, people like him can't (easily) be changed. Hate gets into the blood. It can't get out with kind words. 25/35 ships were with Gaeta and Zarek. That's a lot of PR that A/R are going to need to work on. VP Lee has a lot of work ahead of him. But yes, as you said, no one has merely been cuddling with the enemy. People have to look at the bigger picture.

We had a similar RL situation when the Gulf War II started, with Americans (and even some Canadians) believing Canada refused to help. THe poorly conveyed truth is that we disagreed with the war on Iraq, but promised to help the fight on terrorism. Consequently, we've had supply ships in the Gulf, have taken the front in Afghanistan to free up US troops to go to Iraq, and it was later revealed that specific Canadians were actually in Iraq doing highly specialized work.

And finally: My previews are more awesome than your previews. I can offer you Sam comfortiness. "All will be revealed!"

[daybreak777.livejournal.com]

I spent half of it worried that maybe the reason she was doing all of it was the crap reason instead of the good reason?
Ah, interesting. It doesn't bother me that she may have done it all for love. And I don't even ship them. Love for Adama, love for the fleet. It's all wrapped up for me. She is like wife and mother. Yes, I know she hasn't been that for so long. But you made me see it. Her kids died in the hospital while she was away. (She didn't know yet, but still.) They told her her man was dead. I'm okay with her rage about that. It would have been cool without the romance too, though. I guess I could go either way with it.

I haven't quite forgiven you for not killing anyone with your stiletto heels.
Hee! This made me giggle. I love how you want every woman on this show kicking ass and taking names just because they can. That would be awesome.

Tigh get back together with Ellen, feels very false. Like going back to "the good old days,"
Yes, there should be no good old days. Will Baltar get Head!Six and the lab back? We can't go back. Though Tigh and Ellen seem rather epic so I don't know.

Maybe my bloodlust is cooling a little. But...I want something.
I want something too. I WANT ALL MUTINEERS DEAD. I'm probably not going to get that. But I think that makes me more ragey. Because Narcho and Gage and Connor are still out there. This totally needs to be addressed. I don't even care how they die. Accidentally, one an episode, is fine by me. But Connor's going to turn up on the bad side of any future conflict. Seelix too. Gage is still a rapist. No way these people should be running loose.

But I can see why it worries people. To be honest, it kind of worries me, though I'm obviously not unbiased.
I am deeply, deeply worried. The people are just sheep and will follow Mom and Dad. But it's wrong. And it worries me very much. And if left unaddressed, like the tear in Galactica, it can all come apart even more spectacularly. Though with six eps to go I can't imagine things getting worse.

But then again, this is BSG.

[indigo419.livejournal.com]

And also, even if this is what the show is doing, if it's succumbing to those sexist romantic cliches that now that she has a MAN all her decisions are secretly about her MAN, and that while she threatens to nuke her own Fleet into oblivion, it's still her MAN that saves things in the nick of time so she doesn't have to - even if this is a true reading, there's also me and my choice to see it that way (even if I hate it).

Hmmm, interesting. I do see that the cliche is there to be read if one wants to stop there. But I have also been enjoying what I see as the mirroring between the K/L and A/R relationships. I don't think of K/L as being traditional - or maybe it is, except in reverse - but one thing I like about it is that Lee and Kara rely upon each other, know each other's responses in a crisis situation even without conferring with each other or even being able to see each other. And I thought that that was the same with Bill and Laura here. Laura doesn't know that Bill's still alive, but she acts on the assumption that he is, and is moving her pawns to be where she anticipates him to be in three or four moves. Bill doesn't know what Laura's doing, but he counts on her to come through, and indeed she does, sending him a shot of courage just when he thinks he's lost it all/Saul.

I felt we were shown a Laura who might break, who was teary when she thought that Adama might be dead or dying, but she never lost sight of her job: to keep the fragile alliance together one more day. Fight 'em until we can't. She's realized once again that the task is not so much to make it to the goal, to Earth, but to just keep moving, one day at a time. That's what Lee is doing, what all of Team Adama is doing. Not giving in to despair. So maybe in that sense the whole thing is a big paean to love, or at least to the daily interactions that anchor one to life: Kara/Lee or Kara+/Sam, Athena/Helo, Galen+Nicky, even Galen+Kelly.

[kiki-miserychic.livejournal.com]

Laura does not do it all for the nookie.

I laughed at Caprica's quick "I have Hera" when they were leaving. All the operahouse dreams and Athena's chill with Caprica taking Hera protective mommy-style. Tigh and Caprica were good for the LOLZ, while being adorable.

Gorgeous Sixes hair is made of magic.

Gaeta is an idealist, which is the best and worst character trait of BSG characters. It either makes them a hero or dead or evil.

Zarek was a poor choice as a partner. He was in it for his own reasons that didn't sync up with Gaeta. Gaeta wanted to make things better and Zarek seemed like the best blunt instrument to use. This has been what Zarek wanted from the beginning of the series and he got. At a high price to himself and the ones around him.

I don't like that Gaeta was executed simply because it's what he wanted to do to Adama, except idealism kept Gaeta from gunning him down. Gaeta put on the farce of a trial because he wanted something to justify what he was doing beyond his own principles and the good of the Fleet. There was not much else besides execution that could have happened to Gaeta. I did expect Gaeta to shoot Zarek in the head and then off himself in the CIC.

I think Gaeta was right. His methods weren't, but his reasons were. I don't know how much motivations count when the reality of his actions led to death.

The main reasons I don't like A/R is that they bring out the worst in each other and it's like creating a freaking dynasty/dictatorship/royal family.

Tyrol was a BAMF this episode.

[asta77.livejournal.com]

she still would have made her I WILL RAIN DOWN DEVASTATION ON YOU! speech (though wouldn't it have been awesome if that was precipitated by the Quorum massacre instead?)

I would have loved to have seen a reaction to that, but I doubt very much she (nor any of them) had knowledge of the slaughter of the Quorum until after she returned to Galactica. Still, it would have been awesome if we had even a brief shot of her returning to Colonial One and just seeing blood everywhere. And will we get to see Laura deal with the fact that had she not turned her back on her job and created some domestic fantasy with Adama this all might have been avoided?

A lot of me felt like I was 'supposed' to read a lot of romantic motivation in her choices. I resented the beats that were clearly about her fearing for Adama's life rather than putting that aside and fearing for the entirety of her species' future survival. Like I was going to somehow forget that she's with Adama if for like, thirty seconds we don't see teary-eyed close-ups.

Maybe it’s denial on my part. Maybe it’s just easier for me to enjoy this show and love this character if I ignore the A/R. While I certainly agree with you that there were too many unnecessary reminders of their relationship and love for each other (blech), it never felt like it was the big motivating factor for her actions, to me. She’s sacrificed so much of herself for the protection of the fleet and survival of humanity, there was no way she was going to allow Gaeta and Zarek to destroy all that. Angeli doesn’t have the light touch some of the other writers have and I think it’s a case of not trusting the audience to make the right connections and using the relationship with Adama as some sort of shorthand.

I’m still not entirely clear of Zarek’s motivations. I have to ask myself now if he ever was an idealist. Ultimately, he didn’t end up being all that different from Phelan.

I was also left to wonder if Zarek and Gaeta received the same trial that Adama was afforded. And was Romo asked to defend them? ;) Unless they both plead guilty. Gaeta might have been able to cobble together some sort of defense, but Zarek ordered the murder of eleven people.

And we'll see some bitching in the rec room as Starbuck punches Racetrack a few times and that'll serve for continuity regarding that HILARIOUS TIME she helped murder people.

Hee!

People think like Narcho. This will not change. It needs to be addressed.

It really has to be. At the very least I would expect to see more violence between the military personal as people want payback for fallen comrades, if not for the mutiny itself.

They give Roslin the big, emotional romantic moment of "OMG HE'S DEAD," about Adama. But for Adama? Yeah. Tigh. IJS.

HA! Glad you picked up on that too.

[rose-griffes.livejournal.com]

I freaked out a bit when Baltar said that line about cutting his legs off (because he had run away again). I totally blame 'The Body Is a Myth.' ;0)

[nightxade.livejournal.com]

You know what makes me saddest about Gaeta. It's not merely that he likely won't be remembered as he wishes, but that Adama will always hate him. All of Adama's children who have betrayed him have had the opportunity for redemption, but Gaeta's dead. Gone.

Not that I'm saying everyone needs redemption from Daddy. Or rather, they have the opportunity to reunite with him because he is forced to see their reasoning for what they did. If he could forgive the Sharons, he could have forgiven Gaeta in time.

[nightxade.livejournal.com]

And also also! Nothing about Hoshi! I am a bit annoyed about that. The guy hunted for his love all that time and got nothing but a passing camera angle throughout this whole thing. I don't expect him to have made a heartfelt plea to Gaeta to stop or something, but.. at the very least, it would have been nice to see them in the brig at the end too.

[grav-ity.livejournal.com]

(Note: I have chosen, for the sake of my sanity, to view Racetrack laughing at Zarek's jokes as a canny bit of self-preservation on her part. Because really, if Zarek had told me a joke at that point, I would have laughed too. If only from nervous adrenaline.)

THAT KILLED ME. Seriously, it's like my shining memory from the whole damn ep. Which I adored, obviously, because I love the Old Man.

Philandering is spelt ph. :)

LOVE CALLY!!! Loved that whole scene. Love the ambiguity of the "wouldn't have mattered" (which, for the record, I think was about Cally because why would a Cylon care about having a half Cylon kid?)

My big problem with...oh, just go read my post. I am not retyping it here.

[obsessive-a101.livejournal.com]

Hi! I hope I'm not intruding, but I've always enjoyed reading other people's thoughts/reviews of episodes, because, heck, they are usually a lot more organized than my thoughts. I love the points you raise up here.

As for Bill and Laura... I'm a shipper, yes I am (though I'm pretty much a rabid Laura Roslin fangirl LOL). And it's funny, because though MM tore my heart apart with her acting in those scenes and the facial expression, I'm being very optimistic in my reading here, I think it's interesting to note that the devastation she clearly felt at the announcement of the Admiral's execution was overshadowed in the next moment. I actually love how they show her pulling together and unleashing herself after Zarek's line about how she should surrender because it would be the best thing for the "people." The rage on her face in that moment I thought really was the entryway in everything that happens afterwards I thought, so Bill actually didn't color that scene as much as I might have thought of as a shipper. The timing of his words and her shift in expressions and body language seemed to indicate that she was angry that Zarek would even dare say that to her. That he even had the right to say that to her.

(^_^)" I don't know. Hence, my rambly, ill-written thoughts. *sighs*