Islanded in a Stream of Stars

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Islanded In a Stream of Stars
"Islanded In a Stream of Stars"
An episode of the Re-imagined Series
Episode No. Season 4, Episode 18
Writer(s) Michael Taylor
Story by
Director Edward James Olmos
Assistant Director
Special guest(s)
Production No. 420
Nielsen Rating
US airdate USA March 6, 2009 [1]
CAN airdate CAN March 6, 2009
UK airdate UK March 10, 2009
DVD release
Population 39,521 survivors (Population decline. 35)
Additional Info
Episode Chronology
Previous Next
Someone to Watch Over Me Islanded In a Stream of Stars Daybreak, Part I
Related Information
Official Summary
R&D Skit – View
[[IMDB:tt{{{imdb}}}|IMDb entry]]
Listing of props for this episode
Related Media
@ BW Media
Promotional Materials
Online Purchasing
Amazon: Standard Definition | High Definition
iTunes: [{{{itunes}}} USA]


Overview[edit]

As Galactica's condition continues to get worse, Adama is faced with the possibility of abandoning ship. In the meantime, Boomer winds up forming an unexpected bond with Hera and Gaius Baltar learns a surprising truth about Kara Thrace

Summary[edit]

Teaser[edit]

  • With Sharon Valerii's kidnapping of Hera Agathon and her escape, the spatial disruption caused by the close-proximity jump of her Raptor causes an immense breech in the port side of the alligator's head of Galactica
  • A projection of little Hera in CIC. She sits atop the command and control console with models of Galactica, three Cylon Raiders and a baseship. She moves the Galactica model in to collide with the baseship as the projection transitions to show the actual Galactica and her Fleet.
  • Inside, crew of all kinds, both from the allied Cylons and Colonials, are trying to seal the breech. Tempers are high: a Number Six and another human crew member argue. Eventually a Number Eight comes to break the two up.
  • In Admiral Adama's quarters, Ellen Tigh speaks about Hera's abduction as Lee Adama, Kara Thrace and Saul Tigh listen. Ellen believes that Cavil will take Hera to the Cylon homeworld for study, to determine how Cylon procreation is possible. Saul completes Ellen's thought by saying that she knows the Cylon colony's location.
  • While Lee Adama objects to the disproportionate risk in retrieving Hera, not only does Ellen indicate that the child is important for the survival of all the Cylons, but Thrace tells Lee that Hera is vital to the human's survival as well.
  • She explains how Hera wrote some music--notes that Thrace's father wrote--the same song that switched on the Final Five and led them all to Earth.
  • But the admiral is "had it up to here" with prophesies and destinies. He doesn't want to endanger what's left of his people.
  • When Saul convinces Adama to at least check out the colony, Adama permits a Heavy Raider to go, preferring that the Agathon's not know.
  • In the Agathon's quarters, Sharon is breaking down, as her husband tries to get her to talk and vent her feelings.
  • Laura Roslin, now in sickbay and noticeably weakened, experiences the Opera House dream of Hera running through it, eventually being picked up by a Number Six and Gaius Baltar. She wakes to find the admiral at her side, and tells him of the dream.
  • A seam on the battlestar's hull fractures with cataclysmic results. Dozens of people, both Cylon and human, are trapped inside, the rushing air and falling pressure sealing their fate.
  • The Six and human male that argued earlier are closest to a bulkhead door. With all her strength, she pushes the Colonial in front and to the door's edge as two other Colonials pull him in. She screams to close the door behind her and lock it.
  • As the door is sealed, the Six loses her grip and is blown out into space.

Episode summary[edit]

Lee "Apollo" Adama struggles to convince the newly-elected Fleet Quorum that Galactica can be saved, but many councilors are worried about becoming dependent on the Cylons for military protection. Once the Galactica meets its inevitable demise, the Basestar will be the logical choice for the new flagship. Sonja assures them that the Cylons will continue to respect William Adama's military authority when he transfers to the Basestar, along with the rest of Galactica's crew and their planes and munitions. Other representatives begin calling first dibs on certain parts of Galactica, which will of course be stripped once its time is up. Laura Roslin's cancer is killing her, and she is now confined to bed in the ship's hospital. She gradually convinces Admiral William Adama that he has to abandon Galactica and move everyone over to the Cylon Basestar. Ellen Tigh tries to convince Colonel Saul Tigh that Roslin is right, but he refuses: The decision is Adm. Adama's alone.

Karl "Helo" Agathon's marriage to Sharon "Athena" Valerii is falling apart, as she cannot overcome the loss of her child, Hera, or the knowledge that her husband had sexual intercourse with the Number Eight known as "Boomer". Trying to save his marriage, Helo tries to get Adm. Adama to approve the launching of a Raptor to find Hera. Adama has already permitted Sonja, the Cylon representative on the new Quorum, to secretly take a Heavy Raider to the Cylon home world, known as "the Colony". The Colony though has already been moved to a new location by Cavil prior to the Cylon Civil War; sending Helo out in a Raptor to look for it would be a suicide mission. Adama finally refuses to give permission, to which Helo appears devastated.

Gaius Baltar continues his religious broadcasts to the Fleet, and his latest message focuses on angels walking among humanity. Baltar encounters Caprica Six, who rejects his romantic overtures. She tells him she's changed and that he has not. Baltar breaks down over the loss of his former lover. Later, Kara "Starbuck" Thrace meets Baltar while they are both in the ship's head. Kara tells him that she died on Earth, and discovered her own body there. She gives him her dog tag to analyze. He scrapes blood from the dog tag, and finds it came from a body which was already dead. When the Galactica crew, Cylons, and Baltar's believers meet on Galactica's flight deck to bury those who died in the hull breach, Baltar reveals what he discovered about Starbuck and calls her an angel. He preaches about eternal life, but Starbuck slaps him and the service breaks up. Later, Apollo meets with Starbuck and offers her his unconditional love and support. They part as friends. Starbuck puts a photo of herself on the memorial wall of the dead.

Aboard the stolen Raptor, Hera keeps crying for her mother, infuriating Boomer. Boomer almost sedates the child, but cannot bring herself to do so; they keep jumping toward their destination. In an attempt to calm Hera, Boomer reveals her "Cylon projection" dreamworld to Hera. Hera can see the world, too, and bonds with Boomer. Boomer begins to develop strong emotional ties to the child. When the two arrive at the "colony", a Cylon base on top of a small, rocky planetoid, Cavil takes Hera from Boomer and declares that soon she will have many playmates. The child weeps and calls out for Boomer, and Boomer also sheds copious tears unwilling to part from Hera.

After an emotional breakdown, Adm. Adama realizes the ship must be abandoned. He meets with Col. Tigh, who initially resists the evacuation order but gives in after a brief discussion. All civilians are to be removed over the next few days, arrangements are to be made to put the military personnel aboard the Basestar, and Galactica is to be stripped for parts. Rather than let the ship break down, Adama intends to "send her off in style."

A Number Eight and Number Six have hooked Samuel Anders up to a Hybrid tank in a an attempt to help his brain reboot, but there is no apparent change. Starbuck (Cpt. Kara Thrace), Anders's wife, goes to Anders' bedside alone, and decides to kill him rather than let him live in a vegetative state. But as she aims a gun at his head, Anders comes awake. He babbles like a Hybrid, but his ravings also indicate that he's aware of the threat to his life. With one hand, he subdues Starbuck and she drops the pistol. Anders continues to babble, but some of his rants indicate that he is reintegrating, perhaps even repairing, his mind. Galactica's power and temperature fluctuations were because Anders was connecting to the ship, as the Hybrid tank and the Cylon polymer used to repair the battlestar are giving him the power to interact with the ship's computers. Tigh deems this too dangerous to continue, as Anders might jump the ship. Anders is disconnected from the Hybrid tank, and he falls into a coma again.

A few days later, Starbuck meets with the comatose Anders. She brings Hera's drawing of the song (the song which helped awaken the Final Five in the episode "Crossroads", and about which further complications were revealed in the episode prior to this one, "Someone to Watch Over Me"), and states assertively, that together, they will discover what is going on. She reconnects him to the ship's power systems. He awakens again, and begins speaking in the kind of a hybrid.

Notes[edit]

  • The title comes from the book The Outermost House, by Henry Beston, where he chronicles his time spent living on an isolated beach in Cape Cod. In the chapter "Night on the Great Beach" he wrote, "For a moment of night we have a glimpse of ourselves and of our world islanded in its stream of stars— pilgrims of mortality, voyaging between horizons across eternal seas of space and time."
  • Two original Cylon Raiders can be seen inside the Colony.

Analysis[edit]

  • When Caprica-Six was at Baltar's congregation and he spoke to her about hearing about her living arrangement and offered a place to stay. From this it seems after the in utero death of Liam Tigh, Saul Tigh and Caprica Six have broken up as a couple. As a side effect, Col. Tigh has reverted to his "us" and them" attitude toward Cylons as a whole despite himself and his wife being Cylons.
  • Hera has the power of projection, which she demonstrated at the beginning of the episode playing in a projection of CIC on top of the tactical light table with the ship miniatures including a model of Galactica which she pushed, a Cylon baseship and three Cylon Raiders. It is not known if Hera was ever in CIC but her mother has been. This indicates strongly that Hera and Athena have been sharing projections for months probably years, conceivably since birth. Also included in the projection was the embers of welding torches, structural repairs are also going on in Galactica's corridors and Hera almost certainly saw them. She very likely thought they were pretty and incorporated it into her projection.
    • Hera's projection may be prophetic in nature. She pushes the model of Galactica into a model of a basestar, which could hint at an eventual confrontation between Galactica and the Cylons, and quite possibly the destruction of Galactica. The battlestar Pegasus was destroyed in a similar fashion by ramming a basestar.
  • In sickbay, Adama and Roslin reminces about New Caprica and about the cabin they wanted to build but can't. This scene is in its own way similar to the scene in which Boomer and Tyrol shared a projection of the house they had intended to build on Picon. As humans, Adama and Roslin can only conjure up fond memories or regrets both couples knowing that it was never to be, building their dream houses.

Questions[edit]

  • What does Cavil mean when he tells Hera that she'll be having playmates?
  • Will Galactica be stripped after all?
  • How conscious is Anders?
  • Can the Colony be found by Galactica's planes?
  • How can Baltar tell that Starbuck's blood came from a dead body?
  • Is the planet that Boomer jumps in front of Jupiter? The color patterns are similar, the rocky moon could be Ganymede or Callisto, and there is a hint of the Great Red Spot at the lower left.
  • Will Boomer honestly defect from Cavil given her emotional attachment to Hera?
  • Given the presence of 1st War Era Cylon Raiders at The Colony, does it also contain functional 1st War Era Cylon Centurions?
  • Is Cavil really interested in pursuing biological reproduction as a means of continuing the Cylon race?
  • Are all of the Final Five considered mothers and fathers of the other models, or just the Tighs?

Official Statements[edit]

Noteworthy Dialogue[edit]

Number Eight: Thank you.
Tigh: Thank me? For what?
Number Eight: For the privilege of finally being able to meet my father before I die.
Tigh: You shouldn't be thanking me. I spent most of my life trying to kill your kind.
Number Eight: There's too much confusion.
(The Eight flatlines)
  • Bill Adama is talking with Kara Thrace about looking for Hera:
Adama: In other words, it's our destiny to go after her, right?
Thrace: Right.
Adama: Wrong. I've had it up to here with destiny, prophecy, with God or the Gods. Look where it's left us. The ass end of nowhere; nearly half of our people are gone; Earth, a worthless cinder; and I can't even walk down the halls of my ship without wondering if I'm gonna catch a bullet for getting us into this mess.

Guest Stars[edit]

References[edit]

Battlestar Galactica (Re-imagined) Season 4 (2008-09) Episode List


DVD Movies and Features: Razor | The Plan

Webisodes: Razor Flashbacks | The Face of the Enemy

< Previous Season Episode | He That Believeth In Me | Six of One | The Ties That Bind | Escape Velocity | The Road Less Traveled | Faith | Guess What's Coming to Dinner? | Sine Qua Non | The Hub | Revelations | Sometimes a Great Notion | A Disquiet Follows My Soul | The Oath | Blood on the Scales | No Exit | Deadlock | Someone to Watch Over Me | Islanded in a Stream of Stars | Daybreak, Part I | Daybreak, Part II

Original Series definition: marriage

Re-imagined Series definition: used to signify a civilian transport vessel over a certain gross weight/mass, i.e. Colonial Heavy 798

Re-imagined Series definition: the process of using the FTL engines to make an near-instantaneous apparent faster-than-light transport of a ship from one point in space to another

Re-imagined Series definition: nerve center or "bridge" of a battlestar, see: Combat Information Center

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