'Battlestar Galactica': Hera, Boomer and the sounds of a Cylon

Like a good basketball player, "Battlestar Galactica" lulled everyone to sleep, slowly dribbling the ball as we all tried to steal it. Suddenly, with the shot clock down to 5, it darted past us for a slam dunk. Two points, and even though many knew (or thought they knew) it was coming, there wasn't anything you could do to stop it.

Did we ever really trust Boomer? A little. Athena worked hard and gained our trust, and it's difficult not to trust someone who has the same face of someone you trust. Got that? The stupid Cylon projection trick, seeing Galen smile ... Boomer not only made him believe, but many of us may have thought, "Oh, maybe she's reformed and they'll still kill her because of her crimes" 'cause that's how the gritty "Galactica" seems to work.

That was reaching for the ball, and by the time we tried to recover and play defense, Boomer had given Athena a bathroom beatdown, frakked her husband Helo right in front of her, stolen Hera and escaped back to Cavil, leaving a big hole in the hull of a crumbling battlestar. Two points.

Before the episode scored, there was little physical movement. Kara "Starbuck" Thrace (and there is an excellent interview of Katee Sackhoff here) epitomized the malaise with her monotonous beginning. And then she meets the mysterious piano player who reminds her so much of her dad. They have some nice moments throughout, all the way up until Starbuck begins to play a tune that makes the final five Cylons' ears perk up. It was the music that drew them all together in the first place, and it was music that Starbuck had learned from her father as a little girl -- and that had been written on a sheet of paper by Helo and Athena's daughter Hera. Curiouser and curiouser.

Come to find out that this piano player that we had all interacted with so well was a figment of Starbuck's imagination, much like Gaius Baltar's Six.  But at least Gaius knows when he's being played (by now), whereas Starbuck was most likely sitting drunk in the bar talking to herself while others watched. Very cool twist in the end with him not being there. It seemed to make it pretty clear that this piano guy was either the father of or a descendant from Daniel, the Cylon destroyed by Cavil, and who just happened to be Starbuck's daddy.

That would make Starbuck part Cylon, like Hera. Possibly the two most important beings on the show.

One of them will now be in the clutches of Cavil. Boomer's betrayal was well-orchestrated, though even my boss had questioned why and how Ellen Tigh managed to escape the base star so easily. It made no sense, and now it makes perfect sense.

Pity poor Galen, too. Chief Tyrol hadn't genuinely been happy in a long while.  Girlfriend's a Cylon, girlfriend's killed, wife is killed, he's a Cylon and his kid's not his.  But we got to see him at peace with Boomer for a while. Then she not only rips away Hera with his unknowing help, but also ransacks Galen's mental picture of their dream life together.

This whole episode was a great, very slow reveal, but because of it, just makes me more anxious for the building action to come. Will they mount a rescue attempt for Hera? That'd be interesting and could be the catalyst for the big confrontation everyone's waiting for. There are only a few more episodes left to lay out the mythology, and it seemed like not much of that was accomplished in this flashback-heavy episode. It still feels like there's a long way to go in the storytelling, but the end is, at least, in sight.

Related

-- Starbuck speaks! Katee Sackhoff on the final days of 'Battlestar Galactica'
-- 'Battlestar Galactica' strikes up a tune
-- Five reasons not to be scared of 'Battlestar Galactica'
-- Is 'Battlestar Galactica' a retelling of The Aeneid?

-- Jevon Phillips

Photos: SciFi.com

Comments

[Maya]

Great recap, but you forgot one thing -- it looks like Roslin may have literally dropped dead when Hera's raptor smashed into the Galactica. She knew Hera was in trouble even before Helo. Something tells me, even if she's "dead," that's not the last of Roslin. As you said, curious.

[Nasim]

I think Sam is going to be the hybrid of Galactica fulfilling the role of the dying leader. ( I actually think I saw Starbuck by the tank of a hybrid Sam in the promo next week...)

[MKD]

Just a few thoughts:

1. Not sure how Starbuck being a mix explains her possible resurrection, can non-full blooded cylons do that?

2. If human/cylon mixes are the future, how will Hera and Starbuck populate that new species?
I take it a few humans and cylons will survive but no oure cylon or pure cylon children will be born-just hybrids.

3. If humans and cylons will face extinction, is this the prophecy that Kara Thrace will lead the human race to destruction? End of humans start of mix? Explains the opera house.

4. Are these cylon/human mixes going to populate Earth and are therefore our ancestors?

5. Why am I spending so much time on this?

Overall, this episode was slow and for me, disappointing. The Chief has the worst taste in women and is pathetic. What happened to Baltar's power to the people armed movement? Why do characters make uncharacteristic decisions?

This needs to pick up in a big way. If all of this is about the two hour finale, we should just skip to that. If I have to watch Galen be intimate with anyone again, it might trigger a three state killing spree...

[Ben Sona]

I beleive that Hera is the next Starbuck or the next harbinger of death. So far the hybrid's vision has come true. Starbuck is "leading them all to their end"

By them I mean the 7 models created by the final five. It must be the cycle the shows creator keeps talking about in his podcasts and interviews.

Cavil knows the fate of his race and wants to stop the next go around by taking out Hera.

One more thing, Hera was apparently in the crate when Boomer boarded the raptor. It was this time that Roslin felt Hera's pain and passed out.

[Kevin]

I thought this summary was right on the money!

In fact, this is kind of awesome: " by the time we tried to recover and play defense, Boomer had given Athena a bathroom beatdown, frakked her husband Helo right in front of her, stolen Hera and escaped back to Cavil, leaving a big hole in the hull of a crumbling battlestar."

It hit all of my thoughts, not including that I thought that perhaps Daniel might be Baltar, and Thrace might be the first Cylon/Cylon offspring, but maybe her father had been the CO (who's baby just died in the Six). It's clear that Thrace's resurrection is tied to her Cylon bloodline, and now we have some confirmation that she has it, and that her mom's crazy talk about her being "special" and Kara's childhold drawing of pictures of the way to Earth weren't just skewed plotlines.

I'm not sure if we have a full betrayal by Boomer, but it sure looks that way. But Adama and the Roslin were pretty obstinate about her to the Chief, which was kind of interesting, because I really didn't like them for a few minutes during that episode. I guess they were just acting like tired old, old people after a long, long trip.

Now if we could only buy that Cylon song on iTunes.

PS - I do have a life, but Friday nights are going to become very boring in a few weeks when this series ends.

[Bryan]

Do we know Starbuck's Dad's name? Could he be the "Daniel" that was boxed?

[drx1]

And Brother Cavil has been orchestrating this since before Saul joined the Colonial fleet....

[Tacroy80]

I seem to be the only person out there with any sympathy for Boomer. I actually have a great deal of affection for the character. She's somebody who not only had everything taken away from her, she had her very identity, and her *entire* understanding of the world, cruelly yanked out from under her. It makes sense that she would regress to such a childlike state - she's unsure of anything, she has no ground whatsoever on which to stand. Having had all previous ideas and beliefs systems destroyed, she was a complete blank slate. However, she was, as is natural for many people who have their lives destroyed, desperately searching for something, and someone to believe in - someone to take all the questions away, and provide a complete, ready-made system of thought, belief, and behavior. In other words, she was a sitting duck for a dominating, controlling, manipulative person like Cavil. In some sense, I bet she's *terrified* to think for herself, because every instance in which she has, or thought she has, has either ended in disaster or crumbled to ashes. No wonder she clings to him! And at the same time, I thoroughly believed that her interactions with the chief represented her true feelings. For one thing, as I said earlier, she's currently very childlike - she doesn't have enough confidence for the sort of independent thought that such sophisticated manipulation would require. And I was *incredibly* moved by the idea that she was able to retain some shred of her own personal identity, some awareness of her own ideas and desires, that has survived even through Cavil's brainwashing.

I also can't blame her *too* much for what she did to Athena. Keeping in mind that she's essentially a child, easily overwhelmed by primitive emotions, it makes sense that she would be overwhelmed with rage at Athena. After all, Boomer was yanked out of her own life, complete with a job she loved and excelled at, friends who loved and respected her, a sense of place in the world - and a man she adored, who adored her back, and with whom she planned to have a child one day. Boomer got yanked out ... and Athena got plopped right into HER place and got everything that had once been Boomer's, or that she had ever dreamed about, right down to the adoring husband and child. I actually feel much more sympathetic towards Athena than you do; I think she's done the best she could with her circumstances. I also admire the way she's been able to establish such a strong sense of her own identity, place in the world, and ethical system. And Boomer's response was, admittedly, childishly primitive and cruel: "you took away the man I loved and my child, so I'm going to do it right back!" But at the same, there's a significant part of me that feels glad that Boomer got to vent at least SOME of her thoroughly justifiable rage and anguish at the person who had stolen her life.

Another aspect of the Eights that fascinates me is the way that the writers have explored how the same base "material" of a personality can be shaped so differently based simply upon how much choice, agency, agency a person feels they have. Athena's circumstances forced her into making the difficult decisions that led to establishing the core structures of her life. Boomer, on the other hand, was violated - yes, violated - in the most fundamental way imaginable - in a way that made it clear to her that she was utterly powerless, and was made to feel like she knew nothing and didn't have the capacity to make her own decisions or shape her world - a sense of helplessness that Cavil opportunistically seized upon, and has greatly exacerbated.

To put it mildly, I suspect a lot of abuse survivors out there can relate.

Same basic people, and yet so different - all because one had the gift of choice ... and the other was suddenly, horrifically stripped of it.

[Vertigo]

The cylon song in their heads is this song...

Bear McCreary - All Along The Watchtower

This is the one with the "indian" feel to it, weird instruments which is the one in BSG

The one played on the piano by starbuck can be found. It is just a short ditty.. very good for cellphone ringtone. :)

http://skydexter.free.fr/cylon.mp3

is where i found the piano one, which fades into the full one... love it!

Philip Glass - Metamorphosis Five is another famous BSG song.. it is also great for relaxing.