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No Exit

2009-02-20T14:27:19Z

Djryan:

<noinclude></noinclude>{{Episode Data
| image= NoExitingCylons.jpg
| title= No Exit
| season= 4
| episode=15
| guests=
| writer= [[Ryan Mottesheard]]
| story=
| director= [[Gwyneth Horder-Payton]]
| production=417
| rating=1,738,000 viewers (Live+SD)<ref>{{cite_web|url=http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/02/18/nba-all-star-festivities-the-closer-wwe-raw-and-monk-lead-week-damages-to-return-despite-ratings/13021|title='Updated: NBA All-Star festivities, The Closer, WWE RAW, and Monk lead week, Damages to return despite ratings'|date=18 February 2009|accessdate=19 February 2009|last=|first=|format=|language=}}</ref>
| US airdate=February 13, 2009
| CAN airdate=February 13, 2009
| UK airdate=February 17, 2009
| dvd=
| population=39556
| oldpopulation=39603
| prev= [[Blood on the Scales]]
| next= [[Deadlock]]
| forumthread= 2634
}}

== Overview ==

:''[[Ellen Tigh]] is resurrected, and she knows all the answers. Anders' condition releases a flood of visions and crucial memories''.

== Summary ==

===Teaser===

* A unique sequence begins this episode, which summarizes in greater detail the origin of the [[Cylons (RDM)|Cylons]]. The episode begins with the phrase "[[Pythia|This has happened before and will happen again]]" as a vista of the decimated [[Earth (RDM)|Earth]] appears, now known not only as the home of the [[Thirteenth Tribe (RDM)|Thirteenth Tribe]] but as an all-Cylon colony.
* The opening sequence shows [[Cylon Centurion Model 0005|original Cylon Centurions]] in a [[First Cylon War|Cylon War-era]] [[Cylon Raider (RDM)|Raider]], and a clip of Centurions firing upon humans during the events of [[Razor]].
* As the Cylon War-era scenes are replaced by present-day scenes of the return of the Cylons, the [[Fall of the Twelve Colonies]] and the struggles of [[The Fleet (RDM)|the Fleet]], the screen text shows: "The Cylons were created by man. They rebelled. Then they vanished. Forty years later, they came back, they evolved. Fifty thousand, two-hundred ninety-eight human survivors, hunted by the Cylons. [[Humanoid Cylons|Eleven models are known]]—one was sacrificed."

* A flashback scene shows [[Ellen Tigh]] taking a tainted cup of alcohol from her husband, [[Saul Tigh]], who was obliged to end her life for her conspiring with the Cylons ([[Exodus, Part II]]).

* As scenes of Ellen flash, an elaborate visualization of a Cylon [[datastream]] (in a rather [[w:The Matrix|''Matrix''-like sequence]]) appears, concluding with Ellen's [[Resurrection (RDM)|resurrection]] in a [[resurrection tank]].
* At first, Ellen screams and is extremely frightened and disoriented, all alone except for one [[Cylon Centurion|Centurion]] on guard, stoic and indifferent to her screams. But soon she takes in her environment, and dramatically calms herself as if realizing or remembering something important. She calls out to the Centurion pleasantly to help her out of the tank, telling it, "It's okay. You can do that much," as if Ellen knew the programming restrictions of the Centurion.

* The scene shifts to present day in [[The Fleet (RDM)|the Fleet]], cleaning up and attending to the wounded from [[Gaeta's Mutiny|the mutiny]].
* In [[sickbay]], Dr. [[Cottle]] tends to [[Samuel Anders]]'s bullet wound to the head inflicted during the mutiny. He prepares to drill holes in Anders's head to relieve pressure from the hematoma caused by the bullet lodged in his skull.
* Anders, his head shaved and in a brace, recalls various scenes of himself in the past, saying outloud, "Among bright stars, I'm lost. There's a new tide. All the forgotten faces, all the forgotten children, we seek the forgotten language..."
* When [[Kara Thrace]] demands Cottle to take out the bullet, Cottle tells her that relieving the pressure is required before he can call up another surgeon from the ship ''[[Inchon Velle]]'', to remove the bullet.
* Anders continues to experience visions and talk of them as he recalls visions of the [[Temple of Five]], the dead shoreline of Earth, and how Ellen Tigh loved the water.

* The scene shifts back to Ellen Tigh after her resurrection as the timeline is given between Ander's surgery and her return: Eighteen months prior.
* A [[Number One]] appears to Ellen, sitting by the tank. "Hello, John," she says.
* When he objects to that name, Ellen recalls that she named the Number Ones after her own father. The One finishes sarcastically that Ellen also designed his model in Ellen's father's likeness.
* They discuss Saul's decision to kill her on [[New Caprica]]. As John argues over Saul's humanity, Ellen questions if John has changed in any significant way in her absence, saying that she had high hopes for him.
* He leaves, promising to send her some clothes.

* [[Galen Tyrol]] shows Admiral [[William Adama]] something very disturbing in the [[FTL]] engine room. "I first noticed it when I pulled the [[sync coil]]," Tyrol answers, pointing to a series of stress cracks along the fuselage of ''[[Galactica]]''.
* Adama asks Tyrol if he would accept reinstatement as Deck Chief of the ship. When Tyrol reminds Adama of Tyrol's [[Final Five|true nature]], Adama says, extending a hand, "Is that right? So's my [[Executive Officer|XO]]." Tyrol accepts. "Fix my ship, chief."

* The corridors of ''Galactica'' are filled with wounded. Back in sickbay, Anders awakens, asking Kara to gather up the others of his kind. He remembers everything about his past as a Cylon and its significance.

===Act 1===

* The scene moves to twelve months prior to the mutiny aftermath, back in the Cylon fleet.
* John discusses how the "mortal experience" that Ellen endured had left her practically unchanged. When she asks if he still has nightmares, John tells Ellen that, contrary to the programming ''she developed'' for the Number One models, John and his kind had removed the sleep subroutine to avoid dreaming altogether some twenty years prior.
* Ellen counters that, if John believes that he and his kind were poisoned by human traits she developed as well as the Centurion's earlier belief in a "[[God (RDM)|living God]]", then why did his kind spend so much time pursuing darker emotions such as vengeance and murder. John answers that, because his Centurion fore-bearers were slaves to humanity, he wants justice for that.
* Ellen tells him that he doesn't have to be that way as [[Sharon Valerii]] enters, carrying a tray of fruits and cheese. Ellen is happy to see someone familiar from her old life, noting to Valerii that John is taking a risk exposing her to Ellen.
* Realizing how John was likely manipulating Valerii through sexual means, Ellen quips if John had discussed [[The Swirl and Twist|the "Swirl"]] with him. A visibly uncomfortable John leaves but not before asking Valerii to talk about the flaws in Ellen's [[humanoid Cylon]] design. Ellen warns Valerii to make up her own mind about John's crusade for vengeance against mankind.

* Present day, back in ''Galactica's'' sickbay, Anders tells Tyrol, [[Tory Foster]] and Saul Tigh of their past lives on Earth, that Foster and Tyrol were lovers. When Saul recalls trying to get Ellen out of debris as the nukes hit Earth, Anders confirms that all five of them were downloaded to a research ship high above the planet, inferring that the Five were warned that an end was coming.
* When Tigh questions if the Five invented resurrection and Foster questions why such technology was needed when the Earth-bound Cylons could have children, Anders corrects, saying that they ''re-invented'' it: organic memory transfer, originally a technology of the Thirteenth Tribe on [[Kobol]].
* Kara Thrace, also at Anders's bedside, strongly asks Anders to rest but he refuses, needing to tell everything he recalls.
* Anders recalls that resurrection fell into disuse when the Cylons of his type learned to reproduce biologically. The Five, in their past lives, worked tirelessly to bring that ability back.
* It was Ellen who made the intuitive leap, Anders recalls, before Cottle arrives and orders everyone out.

* On ''[[Colonial One]]'', [[Laura Roslin]] and [[Lee Adama]] stand in the [[Quorum of Twelve (RDM)|Quorum]] meeting room, recalling past friends.
* Adama indicates that, while the Quorum should be rebuilt, that he believes that the people of the Fleet should have a different representation that foregoes the old Colonial ties.
* Roslin agrees but tells Adama that he will pick the new Quorum while she sits back, still as President, but in title only. Roslin is hand-picking Adama, [[Revelations|no stranger to strong civilian leadership]], as her eventual successor to the presidency. "It's time I let someone else do the heavy lifting."
* Roslin tells him that he is the right one for the job, reminding him that sometimes, in trying to the right thing, he doesn't always do the smartest thing. An ominous cough by Roslin recalls the ultimate reason why she entrusts Adama to the civilian leadership.

===Act 2===

* Tyrol is guiding the admiral through the bowels of the ship again. This time, he shows Admiral Adama more serious structural failure of the battlestar's superstructure and hull.
* When Adama questions how such metal fatigue could have occurred, Tyrol reminds him that, not only was ''Galactica'' a very old ship (over 50 years old), but that the men who constructed the battlestar, perhaps in a rush to get them to service for the Cylon War, cut corners, using inferior metals and workmanship.
* Tyrol notes that some repairs can be made. Adama agrees, but tells him that the repair teams should be all human.

* Anders tells Tigh and the group that the reason the Five left the destroyed Earth and headed back to the Twelve Tribes was to warn all the tribes that they must take good care of the Cylons they built or suffer the same fate as Earth. But it was too late: the First Cylon War between the Colonies had already started on their arrival.
* Tory Foster questions why the Five arrived two thousand years later. Anders notes that [[FTL|jump drives]] weren't invented yet. The Five's ship traveled at near-light speed, experiencing the effects of relativistic space travel where time slowed for them on their journey back, allowing them to stay alive.
* After Anders recovers from a fit of pain, he continues. The Five met with the Centurions, told them that, if they would stop the war against the [[Twelve Colonies of Kobol]], the Five would aid them in further development of organic Cylons. The Centurions were already experimenting with the beings known as the [[Hybrid]]s ([[Razor]]), but nothing that could live on its own.
* Anders tells the group that, in exchange for peace, the Five helped develop the ''eight'' humanoid Cylon models and gave them resurrection as well.
* Thrace stops him. "You said "eight"." They all realize that the "Significant Seven" was originally eight models. One model was missing.
* Before Anders could clarify, he experiences a seizure.

===Act 3===

* Ellen Tigh's return flashes back to twelve months prior, as the star of the [[algae planet]] goes supernova and the Cylon fleet retreats.
* A series of displays show images of the planet. Ellen recalls the original name of the temple: the [[Temple of Five|"Temple of Hopes"]], built 3,000 years ago by the Thirteenth Tribe. From there, the Tribe was shown the way to Earth by God, Ellen recalls.
* John tells Ellen that the Temple of Five's secrets encouraged one of his kind, the [[Number Three]] known as [[D'Anna Biers]], to see the identities of the Five. John tells Ellen that, as a result, he [[boxing|boxed]] all of the Threes.
* Ellen notes that the Threes can be unboxed, unlike the [[Number Seven]]s, which were permanently disposed of.
* John tells Ellen that the Threes will not be unboxed because of the "carnival trick" left in the Temple's mechanism that revealed the faces of the Five and exposed their identities of the Five to the Threes. Ellen counters. She notes that the Thirteenth Tribe merely backtracked the path of their ancestors, finding their temple. She believes that God orchestrated the events.
* John laments, angrily, how he was unable to experience the recent supernova only in human terms and their comparatively limited perceptions, as opposed to what the Centurions could experience.
* When Ellen replies that the eight models were designed to be as human as possible, John counters that he wants to be more like a true machine and not a machine with human limits.
* John leaves and Valerii asks if Ellen regrets what she has done in the humanoid Cylon design. Ellen answers in the negative. In creating the humanoid Cylons as they are, Ellen believes she has given them something important: free will, including the ability to love freely. But Valerii questions who she could possibly love in the universe--other Cylons, even humanity.

* Back on ''Galactica'' in present day, Saul Tigh and Tory await outside sickbay as Galen Tyrol returns. Anders is being prepped for surgery. As Tyrol reminds him that the Five were responsible for stopping the First Cylon War, Tigh talks about how the Five were responsible for creating the humanoid Cylon race, inferring how the Five were, in turn, responsible for the second [[Fall of the Twelve Colonies|war that destroyed the Colonies]].
* Tory Foster reminds both that the humans on Kobol made the Five first. Tigh believes that, while the Cylons must own the responsibility of the humanoid Cylons and their acts, the Five must own up to their actions, just as the humans must own what they did, emphasizing that blame can't be entirely placed on the humans alone.

* As Dr. [[Gerard]] shows the brain scans to Cottle, Thrace and Anders, Gerard indicates that it was lucky that the bullet didn't cause greater injury. Anders's speech is breaking up as he worries that the memories he has recalled might be lost to further surgery. Anders tries to talk more but his speech breaks up more in to strings of unintelligible words--aphasia, affected by the injury.
* Anders tries to object to the surgery, to speak further to the others, but Thrace gives the go-ahead for the surgery. She tells Anders that he has as much time to speak with the others as the surgeons need to prep him.

* The scene backtracks to four months prior, when the [[Resurrection Hub]] is destroyed.
* John arrives at Ellen Tigh's bedside with some liquor in a glass. He tells her of the destruction of the Hub and the imminent extinction of the Cylons. Pleading for her help to rebuild the resurrection process, John tells her that, while the Colonials destroyed the hub, they weren't aware of [[The Colony]] where Ellen's equipment lies in wait.
* But Ellen tells him that she knows only part of the system needed to rebuild resurrection. The others in the Five would be needed for a chance to rebuild the system.
* John does not take Ellen's response well, believing that Ellen is refusing to help out of spite. He threatens Ellen by telling her that he will literally open her skull to tap into what knowledge she has in her head directly from her brain, if he has to.

===Act 4===

* Back in sickbay in present day, Anders tells of the first humanoid created, Cavil, who in turn helped build the remaining humanoid Cylons. He tells them that Ellen believed that the original Centurion's belief in God would stop the cycle of violence between the humans and Cylons.
* But Cavil was spiteful and did not believe in God or mercy. He turned on the Five and killed them by trapping them in a compartment and venting the oxygen. When the Five downloaded, he boxed them (as he did with the Threes, much later). Later, Cavil unboxed the Five but implanted them with new memories, a sleeper-like setup not unlike how Sharon Valerii once was. He unboxed Saul Tigh first, then Ellen and the rest later.
* Anders mentions that they all saw warning signs on Earth that were invisible to other people, but then his aphasia kicks in strongly. [[Layne Ishay]] tells everyone to leave. The surgeons are ready.
* Anders tells of Number Seven, one model they called Daniel. Anders screams to Saul Tigh to stay with the Fleet, that a miracle was about to happen.

* Colonel Tigh returns to his quarters where [[Caprica-Six]] rests. She tells Tigh that the baby in her womb began to move recently. He later feels the baby move as well.

* Back in time on the baseship, Ellen draws a picture of Saul as John returns, commenting on how she should update the picture to include the eye patch.
* John tells her that the [[Simon]]s have readied for Ellen's surgery, but Ellen asks John that, despite the many opportunities he has had to eradicate the Five, he has tortured them in various ways instead. She questions his ultimate reason for keeping the Five alive as Valerii (dressed in a Cylon flight suit) listens in. She concludes that John wanted the Five to witness the evils of Humanity before dying, so that when they were resurrected, they would admit they were wrong to have given John human traits.
* Ellen tells him that, while John claims to be a perfect machine, his petty hatred and jealousy has caused problems not only for the Seven, but ended development of the Daniel models. John retorts that if he is in fact an imperfect creation, then it is because she made him so.
* Ellen tries to reconcile, to apologize and forgive John, but he rejects her and leaves.

===Act 5===

* Tyrol's team continue their work to repair the battlestar as the admiral looks on. Tyrol tells him that he began to think about damage to the battlestar's superstructure that can't be seen.
* Using a device that reveals damage through spectral imaging, he shows Adama that the battlestar's bones are rotten. When he suggests that they use a Cylon technology that would grow into the metal, Adama strongly objects to the idea of Cylon technology being infused so closely into a ship he had prided himself on being resistant to Cylon infiltration.

* Anders is ready for surgery, unconscious, as Kara Thrace speaks some final words of encouragement.

* The admiral returns to his quarters, takes a drink from the bottle, and rinses his face in a sink. When he looks up to the mirror, he discovers cracks in the bathroom wall, shocking him with the extent of ''Galactica'''s damage.

* Back on the baseship, Sharon Valerii comes to take Ellen to surgery. She looks down at the sketch of Saul Tigh and asks Ellen how she can deal with knowing that he may hate her for everything she's done. Ellen responds that, maybe, Saul doesn't, because "love is like that sometimes." Sharon then asks her to put on a surgical gown, which Ellen refuses, believing it to be a useless theatrical prop.

* As they make their way down a corridor, Ellen asks Valerii if she has thought through taking part in John's plans. Valerii responds that she has — and surprises Ellen by bringing her to a waiting [[Raptor]]. Valerii then races the Raptor out of the baseship, which launches pursuing Raiders. Dodging their gunfire, the Raptor jumps away.

* Cottle returns to hand Thrace the bullet. Surprised that Anders hasn't awakened, Gerard and Cottle are setting up an EEG to see how Anders's brain is handling things.
* Later, Thrace speaks to the still-unconscious Anders, but nurse Ishay tells her not to bother: Anders's brain activity is essentially zero.

* Admiral Adama calls Tyrol over the phone after several drinks. "Chief, do whatever you have to do to save our girl."

== Notes ==
[[Image:No Exit Crew Call Sheet.jpg|thumb|right|Crew call sheet for "No Exit"]]

* This episode title (and production information) are derived from a call sheet posted by Wil McQueen.<ref name="flickr">{{cite_web|url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/wilmcqueen/2476722149/sizes/o/|title=Wil McQueen's Flickr photostream|date=8 May 2008|accessdate=30 May 2008|last=McQueen|first=Wil|format=|language=}}</ref>
*As of this episode there were 39,556 survivors. At the start of the Cylon pursuit there were 50,298 survivors, meaning that 10, 742 were killed since the pursuit started.
* ''No Exit'' is the title of a [[w:No Exit|1944 existentialist play]] by [[w:Jean-Paul Sartre|Jean-Paul Sartre]]. The story references three people who are trapped in Hell, shown as a stately room with chairs and sofas. Each character in the play loathes the other two characters. The play contains the notable line, "Hell is other people!"
* When [[Sharon Valerii]] comes to escort Ellen to surgery, Ellen sardonically remarks that that she "should have brought a [[w:tumbrel|tumbrel]]." A tumbrel is a two-wheeled cart used to carry various loads, particularly on a farm.[http://pro.corbis.com/images/HU036695.jpg?size=67&uid=%7BDE6F5EAC-11A0-4608-B615-14298D8BE914%7D] For the viewing audience, this is a cultural reference to the French Revolution in the 1780's, when many condemned prisoners were carried to the guillotine in tumbrels. In the show's universe, she may be referring to a parallel events on Kobol and/or the Thirteen Colonies.
* Inchon is the name of a port city in Korea and it was the location of a major battle during the Korean War. During the battle, UN forces under the command of General Douglas MacArthur turned the tables on their communist adversaries and went on to drive the North Korean Army out of the Korean peninsula entirely.
* Anders' seemingly incoherent ramblings in the beginning of the episode include lines from Milton's Paradise Lost: "he it was, whose guile/Stird up with Envy and Revenge, deceiv'd The Mother of Mankind" (Book I, ln. 34-5); "The mind is its own place, and in it self/Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n." (ibid. ln. 254-55)

== Analysis ==
*When Ellen was resurrected, her reaction to the event was very similar to Boomer's first resurrection in [[Downloaded]]. However, unlike Boomer, it appears that Ellen's original memories were reactivated and immediately her fear disappeared. Ellen however, had a previous life and set of memories to be restored to her, unlike Boomer who was probably designed from the start to be a sleeper agent and knew nothing about life as a Cylon. This seems to indicate that either the memory block that each of the Final Five had imposed on them is limited -i.e 'hardwired' to their particular physical body. Given that Ander's memories ''are'' there and not 'deleted', just surpressed, indicates he would gain his memories back if reborn and the blocking process for the Five is body-specific. If the blocking process is body specific that would suggest all the other 6 models of numbered Cylons have also had their bodies hardwired by Cavil right from the start so they know nothing of the Five, and in such a way that all future copies carry the same block.
*It is unclear to what extent Cylon memory tampering is a physical/biological process carried out on the body as opposed to memories being captured and adjusted/deleted when stored in a Cylon database and then re- introduced into a body -as is what seems to occur during boxing.
*Cavil clearly intends for the Five to rejoin the other Cylons one day-as he has not totally destroyed (if this is at all possible to do to blocked and stored memories) either the original memories of the Final Five or the knowledge the other six Cylons have of the Five , he has simply suppressed it (as indicated by Deanna's flashes of the Five when downloading) with presumably the intention of revealing his plan, and aforementioned knowledge, in due time. Of course Cavil wants the Final Five to return to the fold- but on his terms.
**The resurrected Ellen has a starkly - completely - different personality and attitude compared to her "false memories" counterpart. This Ellen carries many motherly qualities and even has shown love, sadness, and care towards Cavil (John), and is far more intelligent.
**Anders also shows signs of a more intelligent and spiritual personality upon regaining his memories.
*Cavil's attempt to block the memories of the Final Five was not completely successful. Numerous times, especially their time on the post-nuclear Earth, memories from their past would resurface. This explains how:
:#Tyrol was able to sense and find the Temple of Five.
:#The visions that Anders, Tyrol, Tory, and Tigh had on Earth.
*Cavil not only knew about the Final Five, but he purposely kept their identities a secret and erased their identities from any other Cylon that knew. According to Ellen and Anders, Cavil (John) had developed a warped sense of morality. This morality eventually led to his killing of the Final Five and boxing of their personalities. His path eventually devolved to actions motivated by sadism and jealously upon which he would allow each of the Final Five to be resurrected, but with no memories of their past and implanted with false memories. His motivation for this act was to show the Five how unworthy of existence that humans were. Given that he kept at least one body for each of them he ''wanted'' them to someday return but keep them secret unless they agreed with him like he did with Ellen.
*Given Cavil's warped sense of justice, he is likely the Cylon that triggered the second war. He claims to want justice for the Centurions indicating he may have been the one that precipitated what happened.
*Cavil may be lying somewhat about his motives: he claims that he wants justice for the Centurions being enslaved yet he basically did the same thing by putting the inhibitor in that made them non-sentient. If he truly wanted justice, he wouldn't have done that as it makes him just as bad.
**Cavil's reaction to the Rebel Cylons' disabling of the neural inhibitor may be based on his knowledge of what had occurred with the 13th Tribe's Centurions and with the 12 Colonies' Centurions. He may be worried that a third Centurion uprising would occur again.
*In the opening ''Galactica'' based scene it was evident that ''Galactica'' was still suffering from the after-effects of the mutiny as the wounded was in sickbay with an overflow of patients in the outside corridor. The population count during the opening credits was 39,556. That means 47 people had died by the end of "[[Blood on the Scales]]". Two of those deaths are of Gaeta and Zarek so it was 45 deaths during the second half of the mutiny, from 10:30 hours to 15:32 hours, including the Quorum members and their aides. Add this to the 40 deaths that happened in "[[The Oath]]" you have 85 deaths that occurred during the 9 hour mutiny, 06:32 hours when Zarek was sprung to 15:32 hours when Adama and Tigh retook the CIC, beginning with the death of [[Peter Laird]] shortly before 07:00 hours. That is about 9.4 deaths per hour average, but even worse considering the killings didn't really start in earnest until a little after 09:00 hours. a 6.5 hour period making it roughly 13.1 deaths per hour.
* It has been eighteen months since [[Ellen Tigh]] downloaded into a new body.
*During Boomer's first meeting with Ellen, she offers Boomer an apple from a plate of food. In Judeo-Christian mythology apples are commonly believed to be the fruit of the tree of knowledge that gave Adam and Eve knowledge at the price of their innocence (the fruit is not actually named in the text). While Boomer declined the offered apple, she later did begin to think for herself and forgave Ellen for what she did to the Cylon race and helped her escape from Number One.
* The humanoid Cylon civilization known as the Thirteenth Tribe reproduced sexually for generations by the time the members of the Final Five were born. Each of them had a Cylon mother and a Cylon father.
*There are two possible reasons as to why Adama was initially unwilling to use Cylon technology to repair ''Galactica''.
:#It stemmed from Adama's great love and pride in the ''Galactica''. This love was demonstrated several times during the course of the series, such as when he refused to allow a computer network to be installed. It was also seen in his facial and body reactions whenever he was confronted with the degraded condition of his ship. Adama's appalled reaction when he finds out that corners were cut in the original construction of ''Galactica'' in this episode further confirms this.
:#Another possible reason for his insistence that no Cylon technology be installed in Galatica could be a reaction to prevent another mutiny on the ship. He had no qualms of upgrading ''Galactica's'' and the Fleet's FTL drives with Cylon technology initially. He even permitted Cylons to do the installs originally, but post-mutiny, when confronted with needing a crew to repair ''Galactica's'' internal skeleton, Adama insisted on a human crew. His demand that the repairs be done without Cylon interface may have been a result of him trying to not repeat what had sparked the recently ended mutiny in the first place.
*At the same time, Adama's reversal towards the end of the episode further indicates that one of Adama's greatest strengths is the ability to admit when he is wrong and to do whatever it takes to survive.
*Tyrol once more proves that he is a brilliant engineer, something that he clearly retained from before his original memories were blocked, given that Anders identifies him as the genius behind much of Resurrection technology.
*Despite having re-invented Resurrection technology, the Final Five and their civilization had not developed FTL Jump technology, although they did have lightspeed capable drives that allowed subluminal travel but had the side effect of time dilation. By the time the Five reached the Twelve Colonies, the twelve tribes and their own Cylon opponents had the use of FTL which the Twelve Colonies developed independently. Inversely the Twelve Colonies had no access to Resurrection technology. The Final Five presumably integrated FTL into all their future Cylon technology.
* Saul Tigh's military history in the First Cylon War is revealed to be a fabrication. Given how detailed his memories are, they may have been extracted from a captured and experimented-on Colonial Serviceman- such experimentation was seen to have happened during the First Cylon War ([[Razor]]). This was also alluded to near the end of the episode when Cavil explains to Ellen that they had progress significantly in obtaining memories. Cavil's plan to seed the Final Five into humanity on the Colonies would have needed significant infiltration of Colonial databases to create fake identities, service records and family records. Tigh's record was foolproof enough to ensure he was re-activated into Colonial Service between the two Cylon wars. The Cylon superiority in computer infiltration probably made this relatively easy.
* The Final Five were warned of the coming apocalypse on Earth by [[Virtual beings#The Final Five's Virtual Beings|images]] that no one else could see. Sam mentions that the messenger he saw was a woman, whereas Tory saw a man. Galen thought, at least at first, that he had a chip in his head (as with Baltar).
*Cylon infiltration of the Twelve Colonies began much earlier than two or so years before the Cylon attack, as Cavil would have had to work to install Tigh into his assumed role as a demobbed fighter pilot 30 years previously. It is not explained why Cavil waited so long before introducing Anders and Foster and Tyrol. As they do not seem to have as long a 'human' history as Tigh or have aged as much, there must have been a gap of over a decade, possibly two.
*Given Tigh has been seen in flashback as significantly younger than he appears now ([[Scattered]]), it seems that the Final Five age normally or at least age at some rate. Clearly William Adama would have noticed if his XO had not aged in 30 years. Of course this flashback sequence was shot and written before the producers chose Tigh to be one of the Final Five, rendering it potentially tricky in the continuity of the show; that said, the issue ''was'' addressed in dialogue in "[[Revelations]]" when Adama pointed out how Tigh used to have hair when they met and reiterated the length of time he'd known him.
* The Final Five can resurrect or be "reborn" in the same fashion that the Significant Seven can. It is not clear what age each of the Final Five's birthing tank bodies are kept at in stasis however. Given that Tigh was younger when he appeared in flashbacks following his seeding into the Colonies by Cavil, his stasis body (if one is being kept by Cavil as one was kept for Ellen) might be close to that age, and his resurrection (unlikely at this point given the loss of the Hub) might well result in him being reborn 30 years younger. Exploring this aspect of Cylon resurrection is, of course, hampered by the fact that the cast of the show are aging.
* When the Final Five resurrect, their memories are restored, suggesting the mental blocks only exist in their current bodies. However when the Seven Cylons resurrect, they still have no memories of the Final Five. This indicates that Cavil might well have had to kill and box all the active numbered Cylons once he had boxed the Final Five, allowing him to completely wipe the other six model's memories of the Final Five (as opposed to simply 'blocking' them), or hardwiring every one of the six numbered Cylons bodies (and by default the resulting copies) to suppress information of the Final Five. Killing any active Cylon models who had seen the Final Five before this would have been the only way he could have concealed the identities of the Final Five and effectively 'start over'. If this is so Cavil's brutal actions towards his own fellow six models extends well back before the Cylon Civil War.
* The unborn child of Caprica-Six and Saul Tigh is male.
* There have been a number of vague hints thus far that the Number Ones seem to have a deeper knowledge of things, especially their own origin than the other Cylon models, as well as being, by far, the most adamant about not finding out who the Final Five are and insisting that it is part of their programming. This episode finally reveals that the Number Ones do know more than all of the other models, and are in fact responsible for much of the Cylons' programming, especially their knowledge of the Final Five's existence but block on discovering more about them other than the fact that they exist. The other Cylons' willingness and ability to find out more about them clearly indicates that the Ones coding skills were limited in comparison to the Final Five's, and/or they had greatly underestimated (or perhaps undervalued) the free will given them by the Final Five.
* While still giving no hint as to their nature, the fact that the Final Five all saw apparitions, peculiar to each of them, warning them of the coming Apocalypse further reinforces the fact that the visions of Baltar, Caprica Six, and possibly Kara as well are more than mere hallucinations. Added to this the fact that the Final Five did not build the Temple of Five (which they call the Temple of Hopes) nor did they modify it to show their faces, seems to clearly indicate that there is some other power at work in these events, what that power is, and what its goals are remains to be seen.
* It is important to note that, rather than being the enemies of humanity, the Final Five have, quite literally, devoted their entire existence to ending the vicious cycle between human and Cylon that seems to have been played out at least 3 times.
* It makes logical sense that, after a cataclysmic event and exodus the technology of a given people would take a significant step backwards, since the ships would eventually run out of power, and it would be a long time before they would be able to re-create the same technology. And given the challenge of surviving in the early years after such an event, it also makes sense that, after the original travelers died out, much of their knowledge and memory would be lost, save in written texts, which, to their less technologically advanced descendants, would mean little. It also makes sense that, when the technology of that people advanced to the point were they could create artificial intelligence that they would use it to ease their own burdens, thus creating an intelligent slave race that would eventually rebel if treated badly. That would probably happen even if all technology hadn't been lost, as seen from the miniseries, Baltar is questioning why they aren't allowed to make artificial intelligences and the newer battlestars have networked computers. People would always eventually come back to the thought that they could create a race of slave machines.
* Cavil (John) engages in actions that reveals traits of an [[Wikipedia:Oedipus Complex|Oedipus Complex]] In Greek mythology [[Wikipedia:Oedipus|Oedipus]] killed his own father and married his own mother, engaging in sexual relations and having children with her. However, Oedipus did not know at the time they were his parents. The sexual relationship between Cavil and Ellen was Oedipal in three senses: She is his creator and he is made in her father's physical image in addition to being given her father's name. In addition, he tortured and abused Saul Tigh, his father and husband of Ellen who where husband and wife both in the distant past and on New Caprica. The major difference is that they are not biologically related to Cavil (as far as it is known) and Cavil knew that Ellen and Tigh were his "parents" unlike Oedipus.
* In the same vein, Cavil's relationship with Boomer is akin to brother-sister incest.
* The relationships between Tigh and Six and between Tyrol and Boomer are also technically Oedipal, and like Oedipus, they didn't know the relationship to each other as "father" and "daughter" at the time of their first meetings. Currently, Saul and Caprica Six do know of the quasi parent-child relationship, as do Tyrol and Sharon Valerii. Cavil's relationship with Ellen and Tigh is more familial as seen thus far by the actions and words of Ellen including "I love you John, because I made you," and her attempt to hug him implying a mother-son relationship. Since Saul Tigh and Caprica Six have no direct memory of their prior relationship, there are no feelings of pseudo-incestuous implications.
*John Cavil's killing of Daniel, the Number 7 model and the destruction of the Seven's copies mirror the biblical (and Koran) story of [[Wikipedia:Cain and Abel|Cain and Abel]] in which Cain murders Abel to gain God's favor. God, Cain and Abel's creator (through [[Wikipedia:Adam and Eve|Adam and Eve]]) had favored Abel over Cain when he showed preference for an animal sacrifice Abel made over Cain's offering of food stuffs and Cain resented it. Similarly, Cavil felt that Ellen, his and Daniel's creator, favored Daniel over him (Ellen conceded the possibility that she did) and subsequently destroyed him. In a further parallel Cain was Adam and Eve's first born. Cavil was the first creation of the Final Five, hence his Number One designation while like Abel Daniel was a later birth, in Daniel's case, presumably, creation Number 7 making him Cavil's younger "brother" like Abel was to Cain.
*Another interpretation of Daniel's role could be that his character is linked to the Biblical Daniel, considered a prophet by Christianity. The name "Daniel" means "judged by God". He was a cultured member of the Jewish nobility and became famous for the interpretation of dreams. The most well-known incident was when he was called from exile to interpret a mysterious handwriting by an angel on King Belshazzar's wall, following a sacriligious feast. He revealed that the days of his kingdom were numbered; indeed, the King was slain that night and a transfer of power occurred. This story, taking into account the mysterious painting on Kara Thrace's wall and her past experiences, could provide a link between the shifting power patterns in the Human-Cylon long-standing power struggle and her special destiny as the harbinger of death, shaping the new order.
*The relationship between Cavil and Ellen has a mirror in the relationships that the [[Lords of Kobol]] tended to have, specifically Zeus and Hera (who were brother and sister '''and''' married).
**This connection between the atheistic Cavil the monotheistic Ellen and the polytheistic gods that they both reject is a perfect example of multi-layered irony.
* At the core of things, Cavil appears to be driven by a sense of bitterness and self-hatred. He sees his humanoid body as a prison that limits his abilities and the way he perceives things. He believes that he could have been created to be something much more. In short, Cavil hates his own existence and he holds the Five accountable for having created him in the first place. He also fears that he truly is a disappointment to his creators.
* Lee Adama's suggestion that the new Quorum represent the people on the individual ships of the Fleet rather than the Twelve Colonies, indicates that he realizes that the old system is broken and needs to be rebuilt — something which Dualla told him previously during Baltar's trial. The people of the Fleet have aligned themselves according to their "home" ships rather than the now non-existent Colonies. Both Roslin and Lee have come realize this and determine that the people must be represented differently if democracy is to survive.
* When Gerard tells Anders and Starbuck where the bullet is lodged in Anders' brain, Anders instantly supplies the information as to what that area of the brain does, and realizes that is why he is remembering everything. This proves that, while Tyrol may have done most of the work on re-inventing resurrection, and Ellen was the one who made it work, all of them helped, as Anders clearly has detailed knowledge of how the brain works. This would also lend some credence to Ellen's claim that she alone could not rebuild resurrection.
*Right before his seizure, Sam Anders saw the other final four and Kara Thrace glowing. This could be a significant vision or merely the result of something pressing on his visual cortex. [[The Music|The music]] is heard during this scene.
* Although we can now be sure that the Final Five had the same personal names in their old lives as they do now, none of their surnames have yet been used in relation to their original selves.
*This episode further displays the Cavils' unity of thought and personality that none of the other models have displayed. After the destruction of the Hub, the original Cavil who started the Civil War, who called Boomer his 'pet Eight' was killed by D'Anna. However, the Cavil who provides a drink to Ellen carries the same thoughts and conclusions as the recently deceased Cavil. This further propagates the notion that the Cavils desire to be more machine than human as each particular Cavil does not appear to show any divergent or creative thought from each other. They appear to all share the same memories and train of thought while other models like the Sixes and Eights have shown time and time again that each individual in the model line can break from the pack so to speak.
*In a not-so-subtle hint to the audience, when Boomer asks Ellen why would she want to love humans and who would she want to love, immediately the scene shifts to Tyrol walking to the waiting area outside of sickbay.
*Ishay's cold response to Kara after Anders' surgery is a subtle hint of the disdain that Ishay has towards the Cylons. Unlike Doc Cottle (who treats his patients the same, human or Cylon), Ishay's facial responses in the last couple of episodes have shown extreme discomfort of treating the Cylons. She will do her job, but her response to Kara's attempts to speak to Anders post-surgery displayed a cold-heartedness towards her "patient." This flies against what is typically prescribed by doctors of comatose patients who would encourage family members to speak to their loved ones in order to stimulate brain activity and maybe revive their patients.
*When Anders mentioned that the 12 Tribes' Centurions had already begun their attempt to create flesh bodies, this did not seem to surprise Anders. This may hint to the 13th Tribe's origins as they may have begun the same way. They as Cylons developed "flesh" bodies and the organic memory transfer technology on Kobol. However, after they found and settled on Earth, this resurrection technology was lost to time and had to be reinvented. The Final Five's negotiated deal with the 12 Tribes' Centurions seemed to be motivated by their desire to not repeat the cycle by giving the Centurions what the 13th Tribes ancestors had achieved. However, their reasoning for not allowing biological reproduction in the 8 humanoid models seemed to indicate a plan to bring Cylon and Human together.
*It would appear that each humanoid Cylon model was given both a name and a model number by the Final Five. The Number One models prefer not to use names. This logically follows the pattern that the John/Cavil models have shown, that they prefer to be more machine than human, thus lean toward using an impersonal identification system vs. the personal names given to them by the Final Five.
*This episode sheds light on why the D'Anna model were able to "see" the Final Five in their post-death and pre-resurrected states, but were unable to recall the faces definitively once they were resurrected into their physical bodies. The Cavils apparently had hardwired all of the Significant Sevens bodies to purposely block out any type of memory that involved the Final Five. They were programmed to not "think" of the Final Five, but as Ellen explained to Boomer, the Significant Seven were given "free will" and it apparently had overridden John's reprogramming.
*The fact that a team of "Simons" were preparing to perform the neural surgery on Ellen suggests that at one point in time the Cavils had revealed Ellen's existence to at least some of the Number Fours. How much they know about her is not clear.
*The Centurion's response to Ellen after her resurrection seems to indicate that the Centurions also know who the Final Five are. The Centurion's reluctance to help Ellen initially indicated that it was unsure whether it was allowed to help her, upon which she reassured it was allowed to.
*The Centurions on Cavil's baseship appear to have not been tampered with or had their neural inhibitors restored as the Centurions on his baseship do not appear as curious of their surroundings as the Rebel Cylons' baseship centurions.
*Ellen's motherly and kind tone towards the Centurion after her resurrection reinforces Anders' explanation later that the Final Five wanted to tell the 12 tribes to treat their Centurions well.
*As he has been for several episodes, the Admiral is shown taking medicine for apparent pain. The nature of his ailment has not yet been revealed.
*Presumably, the Final Five could have copied themselves many times over as they did with the eight models they created, but chose not to.
*Valerii's lack of surprise when Ellen names Galen, Sam, and Saul as among the Final Five shows that she already possessed that information.
* The journey of the Final Five from Earth to their first contact with the Centurions took approximately 2000 years, which is roughly the time period between the Earth Holocaust and the First Cylon War. Since they were traveling at close to the speed of light, that means their trip took them only 2000 light years from Earth before they made contact. This implies that either Earth is much closer to the Colonies than expected, or that the Cylons had explored much of the distance between the two systems.
* As noted by Moore in the podcast, Saul and Ellen are soulmates who were drawn to each other even after being given false memories by Cavil and inserted into the Twelve Colonies, marrying for what was actually the second time. In contrast, Galen and Tory, described by Sam as "madly in love" in their original lives, have not interacted much at all outside of the secret meetings and their moment together in [[Joe's Bar]]. In fact, when Tory began awakening to her true nature, she was drawn to Sam, not Galen.

== Questions ==
===Characters===
* Will [[Samuel Anders|Anders]] recover following surgery? Will he retain his memories as a Cylon if he does?
* Just what was Saul Tigh's role in the Cylon War? ([[No Exit#Official Statements|Answer]])
* How will [[Ellen Tigh|Ellen]] react when she discovers that [[Saul Tigh|Saul]] is engaged in a relationship with and has impregnated [[Caprica-Six]]?
* Ellen seems very different from the woman we knew. How different were the rest of the Final Five in their past lives?
* Did the Final Five use the same surnames before Cavil altered their memories, as well as the same first names?
* Will Tory and Tyrol rekindle their old relationship, especially if they recover their first hand memories of their old life? Will Tory reveal to Tyrol that she killed Cally?
* Will Boomer and Tyrol to rekindle their old relationship, especially now that both are aware that the two of them are Cylons? Will the example of Saul Tigh and Caprica Six's pregnancy open up to her the possibility of it?
* How will Boomer react to the news that [[Cally]] is dead?
* How will Boomer react to Caprica Six, since she was killed by her at one point? How will Boomer react to Athena? How would Athena react to Boomer?
* How will Adama react to Boomer's return, since she did try to assassinate him at the end of Season One?
* Is Boomer honestly defecting from Cavil's side, or is this part of Cavil's plot?
* Will Cavil ever achieve his goal of evolving beyond his "primitive" humanoid form?
* Will Cavil ever be able to appreciate the gift of free will?
* Do the Simons ([[Number Four]]) and Dorals ([[Number Five]]) know the truth about the Final Five and Cavil's hand in manipulating events and circumstances? If and when they do find out, will they continue to side with him, or will they join the other Rebel Cylons?
* What is the meaning of Anders' ramblings (derived from ''Paradise Lost'') about the mother of mankind being deceived by one whose guile stirred with vengeance? Is there a connection to Ellen and Cavil?
* When did Tyrol acquire all of his knowledge of Cylon technology?

===Number Seven===
* Was [[Number Seven]] named after [[Daniel Graystone]], creator of the Cylons on the [[Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Twelve Colonies]]?
* Did any active copies of Daniel survive One's wrath? If so, what became of them?
* Is the Daniel model somehow connected to [[Kara Thrace]]?
* Is the Daniel model connected to [[Felix Gaeta]]?
* Besides Cavil, were the other Cylons aware of Number Seven's short-lived existence?

===The Cycle===
* What is the exact nature of this Cycle? How long has it been going on for? Can it ever be broken?
* What is the meaning/significance of the name Cylon, since every time humanity creates machines they seem to be given this name?
* Why did the original tribes flee Kobol? Was it another Human/Cylon war?
* What is the significance of the Centurions' form, which is in common between the Thirteenth Tribe and the Twelve Tribes?
* Had the Thirteenth Tribe Cylons already developed their own humanoid forms when they settled on Earth?
* What/who destroyed Earth? ([[No Exit#Official Statements|Answer]])
** What happened to the Centurions that destroyed Earth?
*** Based on the remains they discovered, it appeared that the war was mutually destructive. This isn't surprising as any type of nuclear exchange, i.e. the USA and the USSR, was expected to mutually destroy each nation and for the most part, the rest of the planet.
* What is the nature of the "messengers" that warned the Final Five of the disaster on Earth? In particular, are they related to Baltar's Inner Six and Six's Inner Baltar?
* Sam mentioned that Tory saw a man and Sam himself saw a woman, what forms did the others take?
* Why did these messengers not also appear to the Final Five before the apocalypse on the Twelve Colonies (presumably)?
* Assuming that the visions the Five saw warning of the Apocalypse, the visions given to D'Anna in the Temple of Five, and Baltar, Caprica Six, and Kara's visions are all manifestations, or agents of, an outside power (which seems likely at this point) what exactly is the nature of this outside power? And what is its goal?
* What led the Centurions of the Twelve Colonies to believe in God?
* Would the Centurions eventually have created their own human forms, as the Five's distant ancestors seem to have?
* At which point during the conflict did the Final Five arrive in Colonial space?
* Had the Final Five not stopped it, would the First Cylon War have been mutually destructive, as previous such wars in human history seem to have been?
* If the Final Five had not been ousted by Cavil, would they eventually have established peaceful contact with the Twelve Colonies via [[Armistice Station]]?
* Did the Final Five base any of the Significant Eight models besides John Cavil (made to resemble Ellen's father John) on people they knew?
* Did the Final Five plan on making any more models beyond Number Eight before they were boxed?
* Were the Final Five responsible for the holographic projector in the [[Tomb of Athena]]? If so, how did the references to it in the [[Sacred Scrolls]], which were supposedly written over 2000 years before the [[First Cylon War]], get written?
* Where do the Basestar Hybrids factor into all of this?
* What is [[Hera Agathon]]'s role in all of this?
* Where does [[Kara Thrace]] fit into all of this?
* Why has [[The Music|the song]] written by Anders become a special signal/trigger for the Final Five?

===Resurrection Technology===
* Who originally developed the resurrection technology on Kobol?
* Where is this [[The Colony|other colony]] that Ellen supposedly stored her resurrection equipment on? Does it have a name? Is Anders aware of it?
* What is the status of the research ship the Final Five used to leave Earth 2000 years ago?
* Will resurrection technology ever be salvaged?
* Is Ellen truthful when she says that any attempt to rebuild the [[Resurrection Hub]] would need all five of them?
* How will Anders' condition affect any attempts made to salvage resurrection technology?
* Did anyone else on Earth besides the Five contribute to the re-invention of the resurrection technology?

===What is a Cylon?===
* What exactly is the nature of the humanoid Cylons? Are they cyborgs—a combination of organic and inorganic material—or are they completely organic—like ''[[wikipedia:Blade Runner|Blade Runner's]]'' [[wikipedia:Replicants|Replicants]]. They seem able to pass normal medical examinations, including presumably CAT scans, indicating that they are wholly organic. Yet they call themselves "machines" and exhibit striking differences, such as the ability to interface with fiber optics, indicating that they are cyborgs.
**Chances are overwhelming that they are not Cyborgs. The Colonials had the opportunity to examine dead humanoid Cylon bodies on several occassions including Boomer's, D'anna Bier's, and Natalie's since they were killed on Galactica and at least Boomer's body was sent to the morgue where very likely Dr. Cottle did intensive [[wikipedia:autopsy|autopsies]] at his leisure. The bodies were likely subjected to [[wikipedia:CAT scan|CAT scans]] and [[wikipedia:MRI|MRI scans]] and standard X-Rays as well as traditional [[wikipedia:dissection|dissectional]] autopsy. This is in addition to treating Cylons many times for injuries like on New Caprica, and with Athena's pregnancy and radiation sickness. Gaius Baltar also would had had opportunity to examine Cylon physiology. Any non biological "components" that the Cylons would had had would had been discovered by now. Abilities like Athena's and other Eights (if not other Models) ability to interface with standard computers with cable leads are likely genetic alterations of their nervous systems, which in humans carry electrical impulses to the brain. The Cylons probably genetically modified it for the humanoid Cylons so their nervous system could interface and the nerve ending's electrical impulses could carry idata to and from standard electronic equipment. In anycase the ''Blade Runner'' Replicants are perhaps the proper comparison. Indeed, Ronald D. Moore has borrowed the term "skinjob", a derogatory term for a humanoid Cylon from the same term for a Replicant in ''Blade Runner'', which was also derogatory.
* Is there any difference between birthed humanoid Cylons, such as the original Final Five and the other residents of Earth, and constructed humanoid Cylons, such as Nos. 1-8 and the replacement Final Five bodies?
**Highly unlikely that there are significant differences. Ellen Tigh herself stated that they created the Eight Cylon models to be as close to human as possible. The birth of [[Hera Agathon]] to the Cylon Sharon Agathon ("Athena") and the Human Karl Agathon did not reveal any unusual occurrences while given birth pass the normal complications one expects form human reproduction. Indeed, Dr. Cottle once sardonically complained during Sharon's emergency delivery that the Cylons didn't improve the reproductive organs of the female Cylons: "I find it absolutely amazing. You people went to all the trouble to appear human and didn't upgrade the plumbing!" ([[Downloaded]]) As of "No Exit" Dr. Cottle has not noted any significant differences between human gestation and the Cylon-Cylon Pregnancy of Caprica Six.
* If the humanoid Cylons are cyborgs, how is it possible for their inorganic components to grow and mature?
* If the humanoid Cylons are completely organic, what exactly distinguishes them from Humans? It must be something pretty obvious in the skeletal structure since all of the bodies found on Earth were easily identified as being Cylon.
** Assuming most of the remains uncovered date from 2,000 years prior to the fleet arriving at Earth, it's possible that some sort of genetic markers can still be found in their bone marrow, which allow the Cylons to identify them as their own.
* If humanoid Cylons are in fact different from Humans, how are the two species able to successfully interbreed?
** Since Colonial medicine can't distinguish Humans from humanoid Cylons, it would seem that they are compatible at a genetic level. Maybe the non-Human component is passed through some nano-technology which is passed to offspring at the moment of fertilization (of course this would possibly turn the host into a Cylon also - is this Starbuck's secret? Did she become a Cylon through the experiments on the Farm?).
* Does the fact that they '''can''' interbreed mean that Humans and Cylons really '''are''' the same species, and that the apparent differences are only "skin-deep," such as the superficial differences in appearance between Asians, Africans and Europeans on our Earth?

===Other Questions===
* What became of the lower level mutineers in [[The Oath]] and [[Blood on the Scales]]? Were they prosecuted for their actions, or were they given an amnesty in spite of Adama's earlier threat that there would be "no forgiveness" for any mutineer?
* How do Ellen and Boomer intend to locate the Fleet?
* Is Ellen truthful when she says that D'Anna's vision of the Five was not planted by the Five themselves?
* Will the use of Cylon technology be successful in repairing ''Galactica''?
* Will every ship in the Fleet be allowed to send a representative to the new Quorum? In particular, will there be a representative from the Cylon baseship?
* Are the names given to the other six models by the Final Five the same as those they used to infiltrate the Colonies? If not, what are they?
* Are the [[Number Four]]s and [[Number Five]]s also aware of the identities of the Final Five? When were any of the others, other than Boomer, told?
* How will the [[Cylon Civil War]] be resolved?
* How is it possible that the Thirteenth Tribe's bio-engineering technology was far advanced of the other Twelve Colonies, but they did not have Jump-technology?
**Bio-engineering and jump drives represent different realms of technology and are not directly related. Progress in one is therefore not a prerequisite for progress in the other.
* If the Final Five did not have Jump-technology, and the Colonial Cylons' Jump-technology was on par with that of the humans, how did the Cylons develop Jump-Drives that were far more advanced than the Humans?
** The 12 Tribes' Centurions/Cylons had over 40 years to improve upon Colonial Jump-technology. As it has been shown numerous times during the show, Cylons had developed technologies that are far-more advanced than Colonial technology. As they had 40 years of isolation to test and improve upon designs, it is not inconceivable to see how a race of cybernetic creatures would constantly improve upon technology. For example, the current line of Centurions vs. the original Centurions are far more advance in technology and battle effectiveness.
* Right before going into surgery, Sam maniacally pleaded that Saul "stay with the fleet" and also mentioned that a "miracle from the angels" was coming. What is he referring to? Will Saul and the other Cylons heed his request?
* Where did Boomer's Raptor come from? ([[Torn|Answer]])
* When Ellen said that the Final Five had backtracked the path their ancestors used to find Earth, did they do so only through documented evidence (starcharts, books, etc.), or did they find physical signposts such as the Ionian Nebula, the Lion's Head beacon, and Kobol?

==Character Development==
* ''In the episode we see Sharon Valerii for the first time since "[[The Hub]]". She has been under the tutelage of John Cavil since shortly after the Cylon occupation of Caprica. When she first downloaded, after Cally Henderson (the future Cally Tyrol) shot her on Galactica, she still thought of herself as a human, had a human outlook, and hated her Cylon being. She even kept her old apartment on Caprica. She wanted and desired love and felt bitterly that she had, from her point of view, betrayed her friends as she expressed in [[Downloaded]]:''

:Sharon Valerii: What are you thinking? Do you think I care about your god?

:Caprica Six: Look, God loves you.

:Valerii: This is love. (Re: a picture of the Galactica crew) These people love me. I love them. I didn't pretend to feel something so I could screw people over. I loved them. And then I betrayed them. I shot a man I loved. Frakked over another man, ruined his life. And why? Because I'm a lying machine. I'm a frakking Cylon!

:''Ten months ago as of this episode, and approximately two years after she downloaded back into the Cylon baseship and went under the guidance of John Cavil after the failure of the [[New Caprica]] occupation, this was her attitude to love. It occurred in a discussion with Ellen Tigh after Cavil's passionate speech about how she foisted on him the limiting form of a human body:''

:Valerii: Don't you feel the slightest bit of remorse for what you did to him? What you did to us?

:Ellen: No. [turns her head to look at her] Because he's wrong, Boomer! There is no need for remorse or blame. We didn't limit you. We gave you something wonderful!! Free will! The ability to think creatively. To reach out to others with compassion. To love.

:Valerii: Love? Who? Humans? Why would I want to do that? Who would I want to love?

:''Her attitude toward love seems not only to have been influenced by Cavil, but also is an reaction over her experiences of the failure of the New Caprica experiment and the rejection by [[Hera]], fellow Eight [[Sharon Agathon]]'s child from which she probably felt that being a Cylon she will never know the love of a child of her own. In reaction, she almost killed Hera but was prevented from doing so by Caprica Six. After which she seemed to had made the decision to follow the virulently anti-human Cavil, the very antithesis of what she previous believed. This is possibly a symptom of an emotional compensation coping mechanism due to her traumatic experiences.''

== Official Statements ==
Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune interviews Jane Espenson and Ryan Mottesheard about the episode:<ref>[http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/entertainment_tv/2009/02/battlestar-galactica-no-exit-ellen-cavil-boomer.html "You asked, they answered: 'Battlestar Galactica' writers take on your 'No Exit' questions"], chicagotribune.com.</ref>
* "The Colony" is definitely of significance.
* The Earth was destroyed by an uprising of Centurions that the humanoid Cylons created.
* Cavil kept at least one blank body for each of the Five. The fact that none were killed in the war until Ellen died at her husband's hands is a source of frustration for him.
* Cavil probably wouldn't be happy in a metal body either.
* Like the Ones and Sevens, the Twos, Threes, Fours, Fives, Sixes, and Eights did at one time know and interact with the Final Five, but the Ones corrupted their memories and programmed them not to think of the Final Five.
* The Final Five, and presumably the whole Thirteenth Tribe, were originally polytheists like the other twelve tribes. They became monotheists after encountering the monotheistic Colonial Centurions, who believed in a loving and merciful God, a belief system the Final Five incorporated into the Significant Eight.
* It is re-iterated that Tigh did not actually serve in the first war, but was given fake memories of having done so. His friendship with Adama dates back to their service on a freighter together a few years after the war.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
''John Cavil had just shown a "slide show" - as Ellen Tigh cynically put it - of the destruction of the [[Algae planet]], the home of the [[The Temple of Five|Temple of Hopes]] built by the travelers from Kobol on their way to colonize Earth and the Twelve Colonies, when its own star went nova. Cavil was there to observe it. He relates his experience to Ellen and his disappointment over it, revealing his self-loathing and hatred of his human form and his deep seated resentment to Ellen and the other Finals for foisted on him the limiting form of a human body:''

:John: In all your travels, have you ever seen a star supernova?

:Ellen: No.

:John: No? Well, I have. I saw a star explode and send out the building blocks of the universe. Other stars, other planets and eventually other life. A supernova! Creation itself! I was there, I wanted to see it and be part of the moment. And you know how I perceived one of the most glorious events in the universe? With these ''ridiculous'' gelatinous orbs in my skull! With eyes designed to perceive only a tiny fraction of the EM spectrum. With ears designed only to hear vibrations in the air.

:Ellen: The five of us designed you to be as ''human'' as possible.

:John: I DON'T WANT TO BE HUMAN! I want to see [[w:gamma rays|gamma rays]]! I want to hear [[w:X-rays|X-rays]], and I -- I want to -- I want to smell [[w:dark matter|dark matter]]! Do you see the absurdity of what I am? I can't even express these things properly because I have to -- I have to conceptualize complex ideas in this stupid, limiting spoken language! But I know I want to reach out with something other than these prehensile paws, and feel the [[w:solar wind|solar wind]] of a supernova flowing over me! I'm a machine, and I could know much more, I could experience so much more, BUT I'M TRAPPED IN THIS ABSURD BODY! AND WHY? Because my five creators thought that ''God'' wanted it that way!

== Guest Stars ==

* [[Rekha Sharma]] as [[Tory Foster]]
* [[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
* [[Donnelly Rhodes]] as Dr. [[S. Cottle]]
* [[John Hodgman]] as Dr. [[Gerard]]
* [[Kerry Norton]] as [[Layne Ishay]]
* [[Darcy Laurie]] as [[Dealino]]

== References ==
<div style="font-size:85%"><references/></div>

{{Episode list (RDM season 4)}}

[[Category:Episodes written by Ryan Mottesheard]]

[[ms:No Exit]]

Blood on the Scales

2009-02-11T09:22:15Z

Djryan: /* Analysis */

{{Episode Data
| image=
| title= Blood on the Scales
| season= 4
| episode=14
| guests=
| writer= [[Michael Angeli]] <ref name="battlestarsitrep">{{cite_web|url=http://galacticasitrep.blogspot.com/2008/05/angeli-also-rises.html|title=Angeli Also Rises|}}</ref>
| story=
| director=
| production=416
| rating=
| US airdate=February 6, 2009 <ref>http://tv.ign.com/articles/920/920164p1.html</ref>
| CAN airdate=February 6, 2009
| UK airdate=February 10 2009
| dvd=
| population=39603
| oldpopulation= 39643
| prev=[[The Oath]]
| next=[[No Exit]]
| forumthread= 2552
}}

== Overview ==
:''[[Felix Gaeta]]'s mutiny continues while Roslin finds refuge on the Cylon Basestar.''

== Summary ==

=== Teaser ===
* Rebel marines led by [[Aaron Kelly]] storm the airlock and capture [[Admiral Adama]] and [[Saul Tigh]] both of whom were knocked out by a stun grenade.
* Tigh recognizes Kelly and calls him "the brig rat." Kelly is visibly uneasy about all this.
* Meanwhile, the [[Raptor]] with President [[Roslin]] and [[Gaius Baltar]] on board heads for the [[Basestar]].
* A pair of Vipers, piloted by Narcho and Hotdog, pursue the Raptor. Hotdog, who is unaware of the mutiny on ''Galactica'', gets the Raptor in his sights, but doesn't fire. Instead he orders the Raptor to identify itself.
* Narcho tells Hotdog to destroy the Raptor, but Hotdog continues to ask for the target's identification.
* Roslin transmits a message from the Raptor saying that she is aboard the Raptor. [[Gage]] blocks the transmission, but not before Hotdog receives it.
* [[Gaeta]], now in command of the CIC, contacts Hotdog and orders him to destroy the Raptor. When Hotdog continues to hold his fire, Narcho goes in and launches a pair of missiles at the Raptor.
* The [[Eight]] piloting the Raptor successfully avoids the missiles, which hit the Basestar instead. The Raptor successfully docks at the Basestar.
* Gaeta orders Colonel Tigh to be placed in the brig with the other Cylons, but orders Admiral Adama to be brought to the CIC.
* On board the Basestar, the Cylons demand to know why they're being fired upon. Roslin explains the situation. Fearing that the government has been overthrown, the Cylons want to jump away from the Fleet.
* Roslin insists that they give Adama a chance to retake ''Galactica''. Baltar points out that it's unlikely that Adama will win and that Gaeta and Zarek have the majority of support on ''Galactica''. Roslin counters that they've already seen evidence that not all of ''Galactica'''s crew support the mutiny.
* Roslin tells the Cylons to move their ship into the middle of the Fleet, so that ''Galactica'' won't be able to fire upon them.
* Back on ''Galactica'', Adama is brought to the CIC. Gaeta asks him to call Roslin and convince her to surrender.
* Adama refuses and instead pulls off his admiral pins. He throws them to Gaeta and sarcastically tells Gaeta that he's the admiral now and to make the call himself.
* Gaeta orders gun batteries to target the Basestar, but before they can do so, the Basestar moves into the middle of the Fleet. Gaeta calls off the attack and orders the Basestar to be quarantined. He also gives orders to prepare for [[Tom Zarek]]'s arrival.
* Adama asks Gaeta if he's planning on shooting him. Gaeta gives no response.

=== Act 1 ===

=== Act 2 ===

=== Act 3 ===

=== Act 4 ===

== Notes ==
*The [[Quorum of Twelve (RDM)|Quorum of Twelve]] were murdered on Zarek's order for supporting President Roslin. [[Lee Adama]] survived as he wasn't present during the Quorum session. Two other regular Quorum members (Gemenon Delegate and one other delegate) were replaced by temporary stand-ins (who were killed), and their fate is unknown.
*Romo Lampkin while being forced to serve as Adama's lawyer during his trial he referred to two looming Marine guards as "Wynken and Blynken". This was in reference to the poem of ''[[Wikipedia:Wynken, Blynken, and Nod|Wynken, Blynken, and Nod]]'', a late 19th century Dutch child's lullaby by [[Wikipedia:Eugene Field|Eugene Field]] about three fishermen fishing in the starry night in the sky with the help of the moon and uses a magic wooden shoe as as their boat.<ref>[http://www3.amherst.edu/~rjyanco94/literature/eugenefield/poems/poemsofchildhood/wynkenblynkenandnod.html Wynken, Blynken, and Nod" Lullaby]</ref>
*This episode marks the death of Felix Gaeta and Tom Zarek who are executed by firing squad for their mutiny against Adama and the government.
*The character Captain Kelly was last seen during season 3 when he was arrested for his bombing and assassinations of Baltar's lawyers. His character has appeared intermittently since the show began and it is fitting that he would be a double-turn coat as he was part of the original senior staff and his love for Admiral Adama is proven to be stronger than his hatred for the Cylons.
*The events depicted in "The Oath" and "Blood on the Scales" cover approximately nine hours: Tigh enters Adama's quarters at 0620 at the beginning of "The Oath", culminates with Gaeta seizing the CIC at 0922, and concludes with Adama and his loyalists retaking the CIC at 1532 in "Blood on the Scales". The executions of Gaeta and Zarek, however, take place at an unspecified time later.
*The ship's FTL drive is seen for the first time.

== Analysis ==
*Despite all of the support that Gaeta and Zarek seemed to have at the beginning of the mutiny, Roslin and Adama had more support from people opposed to it and possibly people who rethought it like Kelly. On Roslin and Adama's side were ''Galactica's'' senior staff (the members of CIC were either people on Gaeta's side or forced to work at gunpoint by marines), at least most of the crew given how many people joined Adama's march to CIC, the Quorum of Twelve and the Cylons and Baltar's followers. Gaeta and Zarek had the supporters they'd managed to gather amongst ''Galactica's'' crew and about 25 ships who refused Roslin's order to stand down FTL drives. In the end Adama and Roslin were successful because the people supported them more and Adama had enough respect from his crew that he was able to turn a lot back to his side just by stating his intention to retake the ship and walking by others. Gaeta and Zarek had to use force to get what they wanted. Many people, both in support of Gaeta/Zarek and in opposition, were killed. Given the death count, 40 in the first four hours of the mutiny, from 06:32 hours when Zarek was released from the Brig to sometime after 10:30 hours when Adama and Tigh are captured in the stowage bay (with most of the killing starting shortly after 09:02 hours after Capt. [[Kara Thrace]] rescues Delegate [[Lee Adama]] in the Hanger Deck. [[Peter Laird]] was the very first death, occuring shortly before 07:00 hours.), the attack on those Loyal to Adama was vicious. The break down of mutineer and loyalist deaths hasn't been given yet, but it is most likely that most of these deaths were those loyal to Adama since Gaeta/Zarek forces had the elements of both surprise and preparation in their favor. The 40 figure only represents the deaths by the end of "[[The Oath]]", the approximate halfway point of the mutiny at 10:30 hours. With the retaking of CIC by Adama and Tigh, the mutiny ended at 15:32 hours, approximately 8 hours and 40 minutes elapsed time (they may have been resisters after that time not wishing to be taken into custody). Mutiny death figures since 10:30 hours, including the murder of the Quorum delegates, will be reflected in the survivor population count after the teaser of "[[No Exit]]" unless otherwise indicated.
*Gaeta's sudden lack of pain in his amputated leg signals that his chronic pain (which he tried to numb with painkillers during the webisodes) was partially psychological. Once he was at peace with who he was and what he had done, his mental pain and much of his physical pain and itching disappeared. His last words acknowledged that the irritation had stopped.
*The marines who eventually joined Adama's side near the end of the episode indicates that other mutineers simply were part of the coup out of self-preservation or at least wanting to be on the "winning" side. Once it was clear that Adama and the senior staff were rising up and reclaiming the ship, the marines, and others finally arose as well.
*By sparing Narcho's life, Admiral Adama characteristically shows his love and compassion for those who serve under him. Despite his speech of "no forgiveness" in "The Oath", it is clear that Adama will attempt to give the some of the mutineers a second chance.
*From a pragmatic standpoint, Humanity, such at the verge of extinction anyways, can not afford to lose large numbers of people.
*The mutineers at no point subdued all resistance aboard ''Galactica''. As Adama marched on CIC, many crew members rushed to join him, indicating that they were either still resisting or were waiting for a sign that the tide had turned. CIC also was controlled by Gaeta through the use of marines who held most of the staff at gunpoint.
* Tyrol, while attempting to disable Galactica's jump drive notices odd tears in the hull near the FTL assembly. It is not known whether this was hull stress caused by Tyrol disabling the FTL as the ship was about to jump, or an as-yet unexplained problem that has an impact on Galactica's hull.
**The ''Galactica'' may be suffering from serious long term metal fatigue and/or cumulative battle damage, as evidenced by the bulkhead deformation Tyrol discovers in the FTL drive room. Over the course of the series, Tigh has made a number of comments on ''Galactica's'' worsening structural condition, especially in absence of any possibility for repair at a shipyard. The ship itself is 50+ years old and has seen combat in two wars against the Cylons, and after all the damage its taken - the [[Battle of New Caprica]] being the most obvious example - it is not all that surprising to see the ship's structural integrity begin to fail like this.
** It is extremely unlikely that the damage witnessed by Tyrol was a result of his improper shut-down of the FTL, a tear of that size in metal would likely have been extremely loud and Tyrol does not notice the damage until he just happens to glance up at it. While it is possible that the FTL drive spun up would be louder than the sound of such a crack there is also no strong vibrations shown either in engineering or on the bridge, which would no doubt accompany such a large tear. Given that the area where Tyrol is an auxiliary control center, which is unlikely the be manned unless there is a problem with the FTL drives, it is eminently possible that the tear has been there for some time since it has been quite some time since Galactica has been depicted as having FTL problem. However, as were are dealing with a device that can bend time and space, nothing can be completely discredited at this point.
*Roslin threatens to attack ''Galactica'' if Gaeta and Zarek do not surrender. Numerous missile emplacements are then shown opening along the arms of the rebel basestar. Due to the known incompetence of ''Galactica's'' mutineer crew (Gage being unable to jam Roslin's transmission in [[The Oath]] without Gaeta's help), the chaos aboard ''Galactica'' with a mutiny still ongoing, and ''Galatica's'' status as an undermanned vessel, it is possible that the basestar could have successfully engaged and destroyed ''Galactica'' or at least severely damaged her enough to prevent her escaping.
*Captain Kelly, after having been locked up in the brig for his attempts to assassinate Baltar's lawyers, still holds a deep love for the Galactica and her commander. As he was a part of the original senior leadership (3rd in command as shown after Adama's near-assassination), his nostalgic comments with Tyrol indicated his withering resolve to be part of the coup. In addition, being a witness to the cruelty of Zarek with the Quorum was probably the first catalyst for his repentance.
*Gaeta, prior to his execution, is shown smoking and having drinks with Baltar. This is significant as Gaeta is rarely shown smoking during the show, and when it is shown, it was done when Gaeta finally felt free to be who he wanted to be. The first time was during his taped interview with D'Anna where he "let his hair down" so to speak. Incorporating a final smoke for Gaeta seemed appropriate to allow the audience to see a humanized Gaeta again.
*Gaeta and Baltar have a civil conversation before Gaeta's execution indicating that the two have forgiven each other for thier past transgressions: Gaeta trying to kill Baltar and Baltar's involvement with the Cylons on New Caprica.
*Baltar, despite admitting to not really liking his followers, has developed a sense of responsibility towards them as shown when he's speaking with [[Number Six#Lida|Lida]] about them and deciding to go back. This is the first time that Baltar has been shown to truly care about something besides himself indicating he may have changed somewhat.
*Dialogue in this episode indicates there are 35 civilian ships left in the fleet. This is the first time since abandoning [[New Caprica]] that significant information on the number of ships left in the fleet has emerged. This number doesn't seem to tally with the observed losses in the fleet since the first season, although the number of ships has been portrayed inconsistently throughout the miniseries and the main seasons (a figure in the mid 70s being mentioned in [[Home, Part I]]). The figure of 35 stated here- indicating a loss of half the fleet's ships- seems somewhat inconsistent with a the human population that has only declined by about one fifth since the arrival of Pegasus's crew which bolstered the number of survivors to close to 50,000. Ships being abandoned on New Caprica or afterwards may explain this strikingly low number unless it is a continuity error. If 35 is a correct figure, the other ships in the fleet must have somehow found a way to take a huge number of extra people aboard.
*Ronald D Moore has commented that ''Galactica'' is severely undermanned at this point and therefore large parts of the ship are empty, making it easier for mutineers and counter-mutineers to move around unobserved. This however is contracted by the fact that ''Galactica'' now has the crew of ''Pegasus'' aboard and the ship has in fact been seen to be overcrowded. Even allowing for losses on New Caprica and the fact that ''Pegasus'' was undermanned, the ship should still have a larger crew compliment than when she began her journey. In orbit around New Caprica the two ships still had over 2000 personnel still serving and doubtless most if not all former crew re-enlisted after the evacuation of New Caprica. Galactica's combined crew have not been seen to have taken any substantial losses since leaving New Caprica that would leave much of the ship empty. This may be a retcon or continuity error. It should be noted, however, that a large proportion of the people on the ship following the escape from New Caprica were civilians who may have since been relocated. Furthermore, it may be that only certain areas of the ship - such as the living quarters - are overcrowded. The exact number of personnel that a fully manned ''Galactica'' should have is unknown.
*Despite [[Sharon Agathon]]'s vision-induced paranoia of a Six taking her daughter, [[Hera Agathon|Hera]]<ref>Sharon kills [[Natalie]] in "[[Sine Qua Non]]" when she sees the latter with Hera in a corridor after Sharon, President Roslin, and Caprica-Six all have a vision of a Six absconding with Hera at the opera house.</ref>, she does not protest [[Caprica-Six]] carrying Hera while Sharon supports her injured husband, [[Karl Agathon|Karl]]. It must be remembered that it was Caprica Six who aided in the escape of Athena with Hera from the Baseship after she got Helo to kill her so she would resurrect on the Baseship and recover their daughter. Caprica Six killed [[Sharon Valerii]] ("Boomer") after she tried to kill Hera for rejecting her and then helped get both Athena and Hera off the Baseship. Ironically, Caprica-Six is the only character who has been seen specifically committing infanticide (not counting Baltar's dream about Adama drowning Hera).<ref>Caprica-Six snaps a human infant's neck in her first scene in the [[Miniseries]].</ref>
*Assuming the writers maintained their preference to mirror real-world military traditions, the firing squad assembled to execute Gaeta and Zarek would likely be composed of low-level mutineers who were treated with leniency and then required to seal their loyalty (and feelings of guilt) by executing their former conspirators.
*It isn't clear whether Gaeta and Zarek were given any sort of trial before being executed. Given Adama and Roslin's preference (albeit sometimes waveringly so) for maintaining the rule of law, it would be surprising if the lead mutineers were just shot out of hand.
* During Tyrol and Kelly's discussion in the arms locker, Kelly mentions that he could have told Tyrol that Cally was trouble, Tyrol's response "Thanks, it wouldn't have mattered", indicates that, even if he had known that Cally had been sleeping with Hot Dog, he would still have married her. This clearly indicates that Tyrol loved her, and the way in which he says it clearly indicates that he still does. This means that Tyrol's tirade against the Admiral after his wife's death was an act, possibly out of grief, possibly to get himself dismissed from the Deck Crew so he couldn't sabotage anything should he have any hidden programming.

== Questions ==
* What will become of the other mutineers (Racetrack, Narcho, Seelix, etc)? Will Adama follow through with his promise of "no forgiveness"?
* Will Kelly be allowed to resume his duties on Galactica?
* Who will take over Gaeta's duties?
* What repercussions will the Quorum's assassination have on the Fleet?
* What is the significance of the damage Tyrol discovers in the engine room? Has it been there long, or is it a result of the improper shut down of the FTL drive? Do other areas of the ship show similar signs of damage?
* Is the same structural deficiency present near the other FTL drive?
* In the [[Miniseries]], Colonel Tigh tells Lt. Gaeta to "spin up FTL drives 1 and 2". Why did Tyrol's deactivation of one FTL drive stop Gaeta from ordering the other's use? Is the other FTL drive still functional?
** The ship may need both FTL drives to make a proper jump.
** Only one of the FTL drives damaged during [[Exodus, Part II]] may have been repaired.
* Will Anders survive his injuries? Were Starbuck and Lampkin even successful in getting him to sickbay?
* Will the rebel Cylons become less trusting of the humans as a result of this mutiny? Or will they be more inclined to trust certain humans, such as Roslin, since she managed to convince them to stay and follow her leadership?
* What was that device Roslin and Leoben were using to communicate with the rest of the Fleet?
* Why was Lee Adama - as opposed to Roslin - present at Zarek and Gaeta's execution?
* What will be done to the 25 ships who did not obey Roslin's order to power down their FTL drives?
* Will the FTL upgrades proceed once order has been brought back completely?
* Will there be a faction that will attempt to portray Zarek or Gaeta as martyrs?
* Will Helo survive his injuries?
** There is no reason to suppose that Helo is seriously injured, He was merely hit hard enough in the head to give him a concussion and for him to require medical treatment. Since the entire mutiny takes place in less than 9 hours that injury is more than enough to incapacitate him for the entire duration of the mutiny. Additionally, the wound likely looks worse than it actually is, since all head wounds bleed very badly, but he will likely need stitches.
***Helo was hit in the head with a rifle butt twice in quick succession. From the looks of things he was out for several hours. Head wounds of such force are '''''always''''' serious and not to be taken lightly.
* How will Baltar's new-found sense of responsibility toward his flock change his behavior?
* Will the Cylons' assistance of, and subordination to, President Roslin (and/or Colonial political leaders' fears of being associated with the failed coup d'état) secure them the citizenship and Quorum representation they seek?
* With Zarek dead and Lee Adama being the only surviving member of the Quorum (or one of the few surviving members, considering that two regular delegates were replaced by stand-ins), will he become the new Vice President?
* Are ''Galactica'''s computers now networked?
* With most of the Quorum dead, will Roslin and Adama use the attempted mutiny as a basis to declare martial law?
== The first on screen meeting of Gaeta and Adama ==
*''In the [[Miniseries]] (in the teaser) the first time we see Lt. Felix Gaeta and (back then) Commander Adama Gaeta was handing him routine reports-and also unknown to them the first indications of trouble-while he was practicing his public address on the occasion of ''Galactica'''s-and his-retirement. It is of note considering what we now know of what the unimaginable future had for them:''

:'''Gaeta''': Morning, sir. (hands him messages) Com traffic from the midwatch.

:'''Adama:''' Morning. (re: messages) Anything interesting?

:'''Gaeta:''' Mostly housekeeping. Oh, there is one odd message we were copied on. (shows him the message) The one from Fleet headquarters. Courier officer's overdue coming back from Armistice station.

:'''Adama:''' Hm.

:'''Gaeta:''' They're asking for a status report on all FTL capable ships in case they need someone to Jump out there tomorrow and see if his ship's had a mechanical problem.

:'''Adama:''' I think we're a little busy tomorrow, Mr. Gaeta. What do you think?

:'''Gaeta:''' (grins) Yes, sir. And may I also take this opportunity to say it's been both a pleasure and an honor to serve under you these past three years.

:'''Adama:''' Thank you, Mister Gaeta. The honor's been mine.

== Official Statements ==
*[http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/entertainment_tv/2009/02/battlestar-galactica-gaeta-blood-scales-angeli.html Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune interviews Michael Angeli about the episode:], The Six who sleeps with Baltar on the baseship is named [[Number Six#Lida|Lida]].

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*'''''Tom Zarek''' delivers his ultimatum to '''Laura Roslin''''':
:'''Zarek''': This is Tom Zarek, President of the Twelve Colonies. It's over, Laura. Saul Tigh was killed attempting to escape. Bill Adama was tried and found guilty of his crimes. A firing squad executed him this morning. It's done, Laura. You want to think about the people of this fleet now, and surrender.
:'''Roslin''': No. Not now. Not ever. Do you hear me? I will use every cannon, every bomb, every bullet, every weapon I have down to my own eyeteeth to end you. I swear it!''' ''I'm coming for all of you!'''''
*'''''Felix Gaeta''' is disturbed by the sight of the slaughtered Quorum delegates:
:'''Gaeta''': We--we had the truth on our side. Now . . . now . . .
:'''Zarek''': The truth is told by whoever is left standing.
*'''''Lee Adama''' has just thrown a grenade towards the marines guarding the Cylon Prisoners, allowing him and '''Kara Thrace''' to kill them, after which Kara takes cover and Lee looks at her both amused and pleased with himself:
:'''Lee Adama''': ''walking forward and picking up the Grenade'' I never pulled the pin.
:'''Kara Thrace''': Ok, that is not funny.
:'''Lee Adama''': It would have been if you had thought of it.
:'''Kara Thrace''': No, still not funny.
*'''''Laura Roslin''''' broadcasting to the fleet:
:'''Roslin''': This is President Laura Roslin speaking from the Cylon baseship. Felix Gaeta has seized ''Galactica'' by force. The Cylons were defending themselves. They will not harm you. I repeat, the Cylons will not harm you. I am asking all ships' captains not to jump. Do not jump! Shut down your FTL drives!
*'''''Felix Gaeta''' is about to be executed for his crimes:
:'''Gaeta''': (referring to the pain from his lost leg) It stopped.

== Guest Stars ==
* [[Mark Sheppard]] as [[Romo Lampkin]]
* [[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
* [[Sebastian Spence]] as Lieutenant [[Noel Allison|Noel "Narcho" Allison]]
* [[Bodie Olmos]] as Lieutenant [[Brendan Costanza|Brendan "Hot Dog" Costanza]]
* [[Leah Cairns]] as Lieutenant [[Margaret Edmondson|Margaret "Racetrack" Edmondson]]
* [[Jennifer Halley]] as Ensign [[Diana Seelix|Diana "Hardball" Seelix]]
* [[Ty Olsson]] as Captain [[Aaron Kelly]]
* [[Derek Delost]] as Specialist [[Vireem]]
* [[Mike Dopud]] as Specialist [[Gage]]
* [[Colin Corrigan]] as Sergeant [[Allan Nowart]]
* [[Alexandra Thomas]] as [[Hera Agathon]]
* [[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Number Two]] / [[Leoben Conoy]]
* [[Rekha Sharma]] as [[Tory Foster]]
* [[Andrew McIlroy]] as [[Jacob Cantrell]]
* [[Marilyn Norry]] as [[Reza Chronides]]
* [[Judith Maxie]] as [[Unnamed civilians in the Fleet (RDM)#Picon Delegate|Picon Delegate]]
* [[Iris Paluly]] as Speaking Delegate [[Dahlia]]
* [[Veena Sood]] as [[Unnamed civilians in the Fleet (RDM)#Quorum Delegate|Quorum Delegate]]
* [[Adrian Holmes]] as Marine [[Parr]]

== References ==
<div style="font-size:85%"><references/></div>

{{Episode list (RDM season 4)}}

[[Category:Episodes written by Michael Angeli]]
[[Category:RDM]]

Blood on the Scales

2009-02-09T12:23:00Z

Djryan: Spelling of New Caprica

{{Episode Data
| image=
| title= Blood on the Scales
| season= 4
| episode=14
| guests=
| writer= [[Michael Angeli]] <ref name="battlestarsitrep">{{cite_web|url=http://galacticasitrep.blogspot.com/2008/05/angeli-also-rises.html|title=Angeli Also Rises|}}</ref>
| story=
| director=
| production=416
| rating=
| US airdate=February 6, 2009 <ref>http://tv.ign.com/articles/920/920164p1.html</ref>
| CAN airdate=February 6, 2009
| UK airdate=February 10 2009
| dvd=
| population=39603
| oldpopulation= 39643
| prev=[[The Oath]]
| next=[[No Exit]]
| forumthread= 2552
}}

== Overview ==
:''[[Felix Gaeta]]'s mutiny continues while Roslin finds refuge on the Cylon Basestar.''

== Summary ==

=== Teaser ===
* Rebel marines led by [[Aaron Kelly]] storm the airlock and capture [[Admiral Adama]] and [[Saul Tigh]] both of whom were knocked out by a stun grenade.
* Tigh recognizes Kelly and calls him "the brig rat." Kelly is visibly uneasy about all this.
* Meanwhile, the [[Raptor]] with President [[Roslin]] and [[Gaius Baltar]] on board heads for the [[Basestar]].
* A pair of Vipers, piloted by Narcho and Hotdog, pursue the Raptor. Hotdog, who is unaware of the mutiny on ''Galactica'', gets the Raptor in his sights, but doesn't fire. Instead he orders the Raptor to identify itself.
* Narcho tells Hotdog to destroy the Raptor, but Hotdog continues to ask for the target's identification.
* Roslin transmits a message from the Raptor saying that she is aboard the Raptor. [[Gage]] blocks the transmission, but not before Hotdog receives it.
* [[Gaeta]], now in command of the CIC, contacts Hotdog and orders him to destroy the Raptor. When Hotdog continues to hold his fire, Narcho goes in and launches a pair of missiles at the Raptor.
* The [[Eight]] piloting the Raptor successfully avoids the missiles, which hit the Basestar instead. The Raptor successfully docks at the Basestar.
* Gaeta orders Colonel Tigh to be placed in the brig with the other Cylons, but orders Admiral Adama to be brought to the CIC.
* On board the Basestar, the Cylons demand to know why they're being fired upon. Roslin explains the situation. Fearing that the government has been overthrown, the Cylons want to jump away from the Fleet.
* Roslin insists that they give Adama a chance to retake ''Galactica''. Baltar points out that it's unlikely that Adama will win and that Gaeta and Zarek have the majority of support on ''Galactica''. Roslin counters that they've already seen evidence that not all of ''Galactica'''s crew support the mutiny.
* Roslin tells the Cylons to move their ship into the middle of the Fleet, so that ''Galactica'' won't be able to fire upon them.
* Back on ''Galactica'', Adama is brought to the CIC. Gaeta asks him to call Roslin and convince her to surrender.
* Adama refuses and instead pulls off his admiral pins. He throws them to Gaeta and sarcastically tells Gaeta that he's the admiral now and to make the call himself.
* Gaeta orders gun batteries to target the Basestar, but before they can do so, the Basestar moves into the middle of the Fleet. Gaeta calls off the attack and orders the Basestar to be quarantined. He also gives orders to prepare for [[Tom Zarek]]'s arrival.
* Adama asks Gaeta if he's planning on shooting him. Gaeta gives no response.

=== Act 1 ===

=== Act 2 ===

=== Act 3 ===

=== Act 4 ===

== Notes ==
*The [[Quorum of Twelve (RDM)|Quorum of Twelve]] were murdered on Zarek's order for supporting President Roslin. [[Lee Adama]] survived as he wasn't present during the Quorum session. Two other regular Quorum members (Gemenon Delegate and one other delegate) were replaced by temporary stand-ins (who were killed), and their fate is unknown.
*This episode marks the death of Felix Gaeta and Tom Zarek who are executed by firing squad for their mutiny against Adama and the government.
*The character Captain Kelly was last seen during season 3 when he was arrested for his bombing and assassinations of Baltar's lawyers. His character has appear intermittently since the show began and is fitting that he would be the double-turn coat as he was part of the original senior staff and his love for Admiral Adama is proven to be stronger than his hatred of the Cylons.
*The events depicted in "The Oath" and "Blood on the Scales" cover approximately nine hours: Tigh enters Adama's quarters at 0620 at the beginning of "The Oath", culminates with Gaeta seizing the CIC at 0922, and concludes with Adama and his loyalists retaking the CIC at 1532 in "Blood on the Scales". The execution of Gaeta and Zarek, however, take place an unspecified time later.

== Analysis ==
*Despite all of the support that Gaeta and Zarek seemed to have at the beginning of the mutiny, Roslin and Adama had more support from people opposed to it and possibly people who rethought it like Kelly. On Roslin and Adama's side were ''Galactica's'' senior staff (the members of CIC were either people on Gaeta's side or forced to work at gunpoint by marines), at least most of the crew given how many people joined Adama's march to CIC, the Quorum of Twelve and the Cylons and Baltar's followers. Gaeta and Zarek had the supporters they'd managed to gather amongst ''Galactica's'' crew and about 25 ships who refused Roslin's order to stand down FTL drives. In the end Adama and Roslin were successful because the people supported them more and Adama had enough respect from his crew that he was able to turn a lot back to his side just by stating his intention to retake the ship and walking by others. Gaeta and Zarek had to use force to get what they wanted. Many people, both in support of Gaeta/Zarek and in opposition, were killed. Given the survivor count, 40 in the first four hours of the mutiny, from 06:32 hours when Zarek was released from the Brig to sometime after 10:30 hours when Adama and Tigh are captured in the stowage bay, with most of the killing starting shortly at 09:02 hours after Capt. [[Kara Thrace]] rescues Delegate [[Lee Adama]] in the Hanger Deck. The break down of mutineer and loyalist deaths hasn't been given yet and the 40 figure only represents the deaths at the end of "[[The Oath]]". With the retaking of CIC by Adama and Tigh, the mutiny ended at 15:32 hours, approximately 8 hours and 40 minutes elapsed time (they may have been resisters after that time not wishing to be taken into custody). Mutiny death figures since 10:30 hours, including the murder of the Quorum delegates, will be reflected in the population count after the teaser of "[[No Exit]]" unless otherwise indicated.
*Gaeta's sudden lack of pain in his amputated leg signals that his chronic pain (which he tried to numb with painkillers during the webisodes) was partially psychological. Once he was at peace with who he was and what he had done, his mental pain and much of his physical pain and itching disappeared. His last words acknowledged that the irritation had stopped.
*The marines who eventually joined Adama's side near the end of the episode indicates that other mutineers simply were part of the coup out of self-preservation or at least wanting to be on the "winning" side. Once it was clear that Adama and the senior staff were rising up and reclaiming the ship, the marines, and others finally arose as well.
*By sparing Narcho's life, Admiral Adama characteristically shows his love and compassion for those who serve under him. Despite his speech of "no forgiveness" in "The Oath", it is clear that Adama will attempt to give the mutineers a second chance if it is reasonable.
*The mutineers at no point subdued all resistance aboard ''Galactica''. As Adama marched on CIC, many crew members rushed to join him, indicating that they were either still resisting or were waiting for a sign that the tide had turned. CIC also was controlled by Gaeta through the use of marines who held most of the staff at gunpoint.
* Tyrol, while attempting to disable Galactica's jump drive notices odd tears in the hull near the FTL assembly. It is not known whether this was hull stress caused by Tyrol disabling the FTL as the ship was about to jump, or an as-yet unexplained problem that has an impact on Galactica's hull.
**The ''Galactica'' may be suffering from serious long term metal fatigue and/or cumulative battle damage, as evidenced by the bulkhead deformation Tyrol discovers in the FTL drive room. Over the course of the series, Tigh has made a number of comments on ''Galactica's'' worsening structural condition, especially in absence of any possibility for repair at a shipyard. The ship itself is 50+ years old and has seen combat in two wars against the Cylons, and after all the damage its taken - the [[Battle of New Caprica]] being the most obvious example - it is not all that surprising to see the ship's structural integrity begin to fail like this.
** It is extremely unlikely that the damage witnessed by Tyrol was a result of his improper shut-down of the FTL, a tear of that size in metal would likely have been extremely loud and Tyrol does not notice the damage until he just happens to glance up at it. While it is possible that the FTL drive spun up would be louder than the sound of such a crack there is also no strong vibrations shown either in engineering or on the bridge, which would no doubt accompany such a large tear. Given that the area where Tyrol is an auxiliary control center, which is unlikely the be manned unless there is a problem with the FTL drives, it is eminently possible that the tear has been there for some time since it has been quite some time since Galactica has been depicted as having FTL problem. However, as were are dealing with a device that can bend time and space, nothing can be completely discredited at this point.
*Roslin threatens to attack ''Galactica'' if Gaeta and Zarek do not surrender. Numerous missile emplacements are then shown opening along the arms of the rebel basestar. Due to the known incompetence of ''Galactica's'' mutineer crew (Gage being unable to jam Roslin's transmission in [[The Oath]] without Gaeta's help), the chaos aboard ''Galactica'' with a mutiny still ongoing, and ''Galatica's'' status as an undermanned vessel, it is possible that the basestar could have successfully engaged and destroyed ''Galactica'' or at least severely damaged her enough to prevent her escaping.
*Captain Kelly, after having been locked up in the brig for his attempts to assassinate Baltar's lawyers, still holds a deep love for the Galactica and her commander. As he was a part of the original senior leadership (3rd in command as shown after Adama's near-assassination), his nostalgic comments with Tyrol indicated his withering resolve to be part of the coup. In addition, being a witness to the cruelty of Zarek with the Quorum was probably the first catalyst for his repentance.
*Gaeta, prior to his execution, is shown smoking and having drinks with Baltar. This is significant as Gaeta is rarely shown smoking during the show, and when it is shown, it was done when Gaeta finally felt free to be who he wanted to be. The first time was during his taped interview with D'Anna where he "let his hair down" so to speak. Incorporating a final smoke for Gaeta seemed appropriate to allow the audience to see a humanized Gaeta again.
*Gaeta and Baltar have a civil conversation before Gaeta's execution indicating that the two have forgiven each other for thier past transgressions: Gaeta trying to kill Baltar and Baltar's involvement with the Cylons on New Caprica.
*Baltar, despite admitting to not really liking his followers, has developed a sense of responsibility towards them as shown when he's speaking with [[Number Six#Lida|Lida]] about them and deciding to go back. This is the first time that Baltar has been shown to truly care about something besides himself indicating he may have changed somewhat.
*Dialogue in this episode indicates there are 35 civilian ships left in the fleet. This is the first time since abandoning [[New Caprica]] that significant information on the number of ships left in the fleet has emerged. This number doesn't seem to tally with the observed losses in the fleet since the first season, although the number of ships has been portrayed inconsistently throughout the miniseries and the main seasons (a figure in the mid 70s being mentioned in [[Home, Part I]]). The figure of 35 stated here- indicating a loss of half the fleet's ships- seems somewhat inconsistent with a the human population that has only declined by about one fifth since the arrival of Pegasus's crew which bolstered the number of survivors to close to 50,000. Ships being abandoned on New Caprica or afterwards may explain this strikingly low number unless it is a continuity error. If 35 is a correct figure, the other ships in the fleet must have somehow found a way to take a huge number of extra people aboard.
*Ronald D Moore has commented that ''Galactica'' is severely undermanned at this point and therefore large parts of the ship are empty, making it easier for mutineers and counter-mutineers to move around unobserved. This however is contracted by the fact that ''Galactica'' now has the crew of ''Pegasus'' aboard and the ship has in fact been seen to be overcrowded. Even allowing for losses on New Caprica and the fact that ''Pegasus'' was undermanned, the ship should still have a larger crew compliment than when she began her journey. In orbit around New Caprica the two ships still had over 2000 personnel still serving and doubtless most if not all former crew re-enlisted after the evacuation of New Caprica. Galactica's combined crew have not been seen to have taken any substantial losses since leaving New Caprica that would leave much of the ship empty. This may be a retcon or continuity error. It should be noted, however, that a large proportion of the people on the ship following the escape from New Caprica were civilians who may have since been relocated. Furthermore, it may be that only certain areas of the ship - such as the living quarters - are overcrowded. The exact number of personnel that a fully manned ''Galactica'' should have is unknown.
*Despite [[Sharon Agathon]]'s vision-induced paranoia of a Six taking her daughter, [[Hera Agathon|Hera]]<ref>Sharon kills [[Natalie]] in "[[Sine Qua Non]]" when she sees the latter with Hera in a corridor after Sharon, President Roslin, and Caprica-Six all have a vision of a Six absconding with Hera at the opera house.</ref>, she does not protest [[Caprica-Six]] carrying Hera while Sharon supports her injured husband, [[Karl Agathon|Karl]]. It must be remembered that it was Caprica Six who aided in the escape of Athena with Hera from the Baseship after she got Helo to kill her so she would resurrect on the Baseship and recover their daughter. Caprica Six killed [[Sharon Valerii]] ("Boomer") after she tried to kill Hera for rejecting her and then helped get both Athena and Hera off the Baseship. Ironically, Caprica-Six is the only character who has been seen specifically committing infanticide (not counting Baltar's dream about Adama drowning Hera).<ref>Caprica-Six snaps a human infant's neck in her first scene in the [[Miniseries]].</ref>
*Assuming the writers maintained their preference to mirror real-world military traditions, the firing squad assembled to execute Gaeta and Zarek would likely be composed of low-level mutineers who were treated with leniency and then required to seal their loyalty (and feelings of guilt) by executing their former conspirators.
*It isn't clear whether Gaeta and Zarek were given any sort of trial before being executed. Given Adama and Roslin's preference (albeit sometimes waveringly so) for maintaining the rule of law, it would be surprising if the lead mutineers were just shot out of hand.

== Questions ==
* What will become of the other mutineers (Racetrack, Narcho, Seelix, etc)? Will Adama follow through with his promise of "no forgiveness"?
* Will Kelly be allowed to resume his duties on Galactica?
* Who will take over Gaeta's duties?
* What repercussions will the Quorum's assassination have on the Fleet?
* What is the significance of the damage Tyrol discovers in the engine room? Has it been there long, or is it a result of the improper shut down of the FTL drive? Do other areas of the ship show similar signs of damage?
* Is the same structural deficiency present near the other FTL drive?
* In the [[Miniseries]], Colonel Tigh tells Lt. Gaeta to "spin up FTL drives 1 and 2". Why did Tyrol's deactivation of one FTL drive stop Gaeta from ordering the other's use? Is the other FTL drive still functional?
** The ship may need both FTL drives to make a proper jump.
** Only one of the FTL drives damaged during [[Exodus, Part II]] may have been repaired.
* Will Anders survive his injuries? Were Starbuck and Lampkin even successful in getting him to sickbay?
* Will the rebel Cylons become less trusting of the humans as a result of this mutiny? Or will they be more inclined to trust certain humans, such as Roslin, since she managed to convince them to stay and follow her leadership?
* What was that device Roslin and Leoben were using to communicate with the rest of the Fleet?
* Why was Lee Adama - as opposed to Roslin - present at Zarek and Gaeta's execution?
* What will be done to the 25 ships who did not obey Roslin's order to power down their FTL drives?
* Will the FTL upgrades proceed once order has been brought back completely?
* Will there be a faction that will attempt to portray Zarek or Gaeta as martyrs?
* Will Helo survive his injuries?
* How will Baltar's new-found sense of responsibility toward his flock change his behaviour?
* Will the Cylons' assistance of, and subordination to, President Roslin (and/or Colonial political leaders' fears of being associated with the failed coup d'état) secure them the citizenship and Quorum representation they seek?
* With Zarek dead and Lee Adama being the only surviving member of the Quorum (or one of the few surviving members, considering that two regular delegates were replaced by stand-ins), will he become the new Vice President?
* Are Galactica's computers now networked?

== Official Statements ==
*[http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/entertainment_tv/2009/02/battlestar-galactica-gaeta-blood-scales-angeli.html Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune interviews Michael Angeli about the episode:], The Six who sleeps with Baltar on the baseship is named [[Number Six#Lida|Lida]].

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*'''''Tom Zarek''' delivers his ultimatum to '''Laura Roslin''''':
:'''Zarek''': This is Tom Zarek, President of the Twelve Colonies. It's over, Laura. Saul Tigh was killed attempting to escape. Bill Adama was tried and found guilty of his crimes. A firing squad executed him this morning. It's done, Laura. You want to think about the people of this fleet now, and surrender.
:'''Roslin''': No. Not now. Not ever. Do you hear me? I will use every cannon, every bomb, every bullet, every weapon I have down to my own eyeteeth to end you. I swear it!''' ''I'm coming for all of you!'''''
*'''''Felix Gaeta''' is disturbed by the sight of the slaughtered Quorum delegates:
:'''Gaeta''': We--we had the truth on our side. Now . . . now . . .
:'''Zarek''': The truth is told by whoever is left standing.
*'''''Lee Adama''' has just thrown a grenade towards the marines guarding the Cylon Prisoners, allowing him and '''Kara Thrace''' to kill them, after which Kara takes cover and Lee looks at her both amused and pleased with himself:
:'''Lee Adama''': ''walking forward and picking up the Grenade'' I never pulled the pin.
:'''Kara Thrace''': Ok, that is not funny.
:'''Lee Adama''': It would have been if you had thought of it.
:'''Kara Thrace''': No, still not funny.
*'''''Felix Gaeta''' is about to be executed for his crimes:
:'''Gaeta''': (referring to the pain from his lost leg) It stopped.

== Guest Stars ==
* [[Mark Sheppard]] as [[Romo Lampkin]]
* [[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
* [[Sebastian Spence]] as Lieutenant [[Noel Allison|Noel "Narcho" Allison]]
* [[Bodie Olmos]] as Lieutenant [[Brendan Costanza|Brendan "Hot Dog" Costanza]]
* [[Leah Cairns]] as Lieutenant [[Margaret Edmondson|Margaret "Racetrack" Edmondson]]
* [[Jennifer Halley]] as Ensign [[Diana Seelix|Diana "Hardball" Seelix]]
* [[Ty Olsson]] as Captain [[Aaron Kelly]]
* [[Derek Delost]] as Specialist [[Vireem]]
* [[Mike Dopud]] as Specialist [[Gage]]
* [[Colin Corrigan]] as Sergeant [[Allan Nowart]]
* [[Alexandra Thomas]] as [[Hera Agathon]]
* [[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Number Two]] / [[Leoben Conoy]]
* [[Rekha Sharma]] as [[Tory Foster]]
* [[Andrew McIlroy]] as [[Jacob Cantrell]]
* [[Marilyn Norry]] as [[Reza Chronides]]
* [[Judith Maxie]] as [[Unnamed civilians in the Fleet (RDM)#Picon Delegate|Picon Delegate]]
* [[Iris Paluly]] as Speaking Delegate [[Dahlia]]
* [[Veena Sood]] as [[Unnamed civilians in the Fleet (RDM)#Quorum Delegate|Quorum Delegate]]
* [[Adrian Holmes]] as Marine [[Parr]]

== References ==
<div style="font-size:85%"><references/></div>

{{Episode list (RDM season 4)}}

[[Category:Episodes written by Michael Angeli]]
[[Category:RDM]]

Sometimes a Great Notion

2009-01-20T12:14:40Z

Djryan: Correct spelling of for

{{Episode Data
| image=Sometimes A Great Notion Promo 026.JPG
| title= Sometimes a Great Notion
| season= 4
| episode=11
| forumthread=2307
| extra='''Season 4.5 Premiere'''
| guests=
| writer=[[David Weddle]]<br/>[[Bradley Thompson]] <ref>Mentioned by Ron Moore in the [[Podcast:Revelation|podcast]] for "[[Revelations]]".</ref>
| story=
| director= [[Michael Nankin]] <ref name="brad">{{oldlink|title=Battlestar Wiki:Official Communiques|oldid=149966|text=Confirmed}} by [[Bradley Thompson]]</ref>
| production=413
| rating=
| US airdate=January 16, 2009 <ref>http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=2&id=61270</ref>
| CAN airdate=January 16, 2009 <ref>http://www.spacecast.com/bsg/</ref>
| UK airdate=January 20, 2009 <ref>TV guide in ScifiNow Magazine and Sky Magazine.</ref>
| dvd=
| population=
| prev=[[The Face of the Enemy]]
| next=[[A Disquiet Follows My Soul]]
}}

== Overview ==
[[Kara Thrace]] learns that the dire predictions of the Cylon [[Hybrid]] might be correct, and a devastating discovery plunges the [[The Fleet (RDM)|Fleet]] into chaos and despair.''<ref>Episode description was unintentionally accessible on scifi.com until recently. Descriptions were noted on other websites before being removed, and editor confirmed them several days ago before removal from SciFi.com. </ref>

== Summary ==

===Act 1===
* The episode skips a teaser, beginning with the "Twelve Cylons" opener and the cast credits appearing as scenes of the devastated [[Earth (RDM)|Earth]] appear.
* The leaders and central staff of both [[The Fleet (RDM)|the Fleet]] and the rebel [[Basestar (RDM)|baseship]] wander about aimlessly on the surface of a planet whose surface has been utterly destroyed in a nuclear conflagration for some time. [[Saul Tigh]] stands on a desolate beach, staring out at the ruins of buildings, their mangled shortened skeletons jutting up from the lands ahead in jagged spires. [[Gaius Baltar]] and [[Samuel Anders]] stand about the ruins in confusion, as does [[Anastasia Dualla]], who stoops at the water's edge to mournfully examine it.
* [[Lee Adama]] grimaces as he looks about the dead landscape as [[Laura Roslin]] picks up a short rounded prickly plant, the only visible life found on the world.
* [[Helo]] reports to Admiral [[William Adama|Adama]]: Other scouts report in from around the planet. The destruction is the same all over. No signs of human life and no responses to any hails. [[Number Three (Downloaded copy)|Downloaded Three]] confirms her rebel [[Cylons (RDM)|Cylon]] scouts have had the same findings.
* The Final Four Cylons - including [[Tory Foster]] who had defected to the rebel Cylon baseship - accompany the senior Colonial scouting team. None of the three Final Four soldiers wears rank insignia on his fatigue collars, although Anders does so on his flight suit under his field jacket; conversely, the human soldiers and [[Sharon Agathon]] wear rank on their fatigue collars in this episode.
* [[Kara Thrace]] stands on the surface holding her Viper's Colonial emergency locator beacon, with a [[Leoben]], trying to home in on the signal only it can read, the signal that lead them to this world. The signal of the transmitting beacon is fading from a low battery. Leoben believes it must have been transmitting for a long time.
* Baltar has a team confirming that the radiation from the holocaust has embedded itself in the plant life and water chain. Helo gives a more detailed version of Baltar's findings: the planet was nuked over 2,000 years prior. Adama directs that all be instructed not to ingest the water and plants. Caprica-Six remains on the surface until early in Act 2, and digs in the dirt.
* Roslin quips, "It's perfect. We traded one nuked civilization for another." Adama orders his [[Raptor]] to leave.
* Dualla is near a breakdown as their Raptor returns to ''[[Galactica]]''.
* The [[hangar deck]] is filled with people, anxious for any news on the new world. But Roslin, typically someone who can manage to say anything in the darkest times, can only mutter to Adama, "Get me out of here." Lee Adama tries to placate the crowd's confusion and questions, shouting that the news will be revealed in due time.

===Act 2===

* Kara Thrace and Leoben continue to narrow in on the Colonial signal when she finds the beacon: a standard issue ''Colonial'' device used for all aircraft, part of their [[Avionics|inertial navigation system]].
* Leoben finds some wreckage and reads off the number on its charred skin: "757-NC." Kara immediately becomes agitated. "The number on my [[Viper Mark II|(Viper)]] is 8757-NC," she says--the Viper that she flew back to the Fleet after she was [[Maelstrom|apparently killed]].
* On ''Galactica'', the Agathon family plays together happily as Dualla comes over to babysit little [[Hera Agathon]]. While Dualla says to the Agathons that she "looks forward" to spending time with the child, she later tells young Agathon as her parents leave, " You have no idea what's happened, do you? Today's just another day."
* On the planet, amidst some human skeletons dug up, [[Caprica-Six]] and others find something very unexpected: the remains of a head of what is obviously a type of Cylon Centurion, similar to the old [[Cylon Centurion Model 0005|original model]] from the [[First Cylon War]], but clearly not the same.
* Aboard ''Galactica'' in Baltar's lab, Caprica-Six confirms that other Centurion helmets were found with about 250 skeletons from four sites around the planet as well. A [[Number Eight]] confirms that, while the Centurion design is similar, they have never seen this design before.
* Roslin notes that, apparently, the [[Thirteenth Tribe (RDM)|Thirteenth Tribe]] created their own Cylons (paralleling what occurred in the [[Twelve Colonies of Kobol]]). Lee Adama completes her sentence: Like on the Colonies, these Cylons also rebelled against their masters.
*Baltar notes that they dug deeper to test the skeletons themselves. The astonishing fact, confirmed by his Caprica-Six, is that the every one of the skeletons themselves are also [[Humanoid Cylons|a form of humanoid Cylons]]. ''The Thirteenth Tribe were Cylons''.
* After the meeting, Lee Adama asks Roslin what she will say to the [[Quorum of Twelve (RDM)|Quorum]]. But a visibly disheartened Roslin has nothing to say at all. Admiral Adama tells his son to "carry the ball" for Roslin.
*As the admiral and Roslin leave, Tigh asks to speak to his friend, but the scene is unclear if Adama stops to listen.
*Back on the planet, [[Galen Tyrol]] is attracted to a fragment of wall. As he gets closer, he hears echoes of ghosts saying things like "Fresh fruit, get your fresh fruit!" He sees a human silhouette on the wall, looking as if it were painted there. Surrounding the silhouette is weathered writing, barely readable. Tyrol touches the silhouette--and is thrown into a vision of the world as it once was, and Tyrol as he once was, wearing glasses and a sportcoat as he passes through a bustling marketplace of open carts of fruit and flowers and other goods. He stops to buy an avacado himself then continues walking. A massively bright flash of light appears as Tyrol shields his eyes--
* Tyrol stumbles back, falling to the ground.
* Elsewhere, Kara Thrace questions that, if her Viper is scattered about this planet, then who flew it here, and how did she herself get back to ''Galactica''. Leoben cautions her, telling her, "[[#Noteworthy_Dialogue|You might not like what you find.]]" Thrace is perturbed by his words as Leoben has been, typically, very optimistic in his words to her in the past. She questions if the news would be more disturbing to her, or to Leoben himself.
* In the [[ready room]], Lee Adama stands in thought as Dualla appears, asking him why he hasn't boarded a readied Raptor for his Quorum briefing on ''[[Colonial One]]''. Adama laments the many pilots that had once sat here, many of them lost forever over a dead dream. He doesn't want their sacrifice to be meaningless.
* Dualla tells him that his expression reminds her of what he looked like when his father said that he would [[Exodus, Part I|execute the New Caprica rescue with ''Galactica'' alone.]] When he wonders what to say to the Quorum, Dualla tells him to tell the truth. "If anyone can give them a reason to go on, it's you. Apollo." As he leaves, hesitant, he asks her to meet him for a drink later. She accepts.

* Kara Thrace finds a large piece of wreckage, overturned. She and Leoben turn it over. It's a Viper cockpit, the burnt remains of its pilot still helmeted, still inside. Cautiously, she lifts the head to find it had blonde hair...''her'' hair. Thrace retches.
* As tears well up, she reaches inside the [[flight suit]] of the body to pull out the [[dog tags]]. In clear letters, the tags read "K. THRACE." A ring, her wedding band, is also attached to the chain. Leoben steps back in fear as Thrace asks for an explanation. "I--I don't have one," he says. She recalls what the [[Hybrid]] said, that she would be the "harbinger of death." She yells to the Leoben as he walks away, unable to answer her question, "If that's me sitting there, then what am I?!"

===Act 3===
* [[Samuel Anders]] finds the remains of a stringed instrument, probably a guitar. He holds the neck piece, placing his fingers on it as if to play as he recalls a song: [[The Music|"So let us not talk falsely now, 'cause the hour is getting late."]]. He drops the neck and runs to find Tyrol, sitting placidly by the wall and the vision. They both share their visions, both realizing they lived there, in that area, once. Anders recalls that he played that song for a woman he loved. They are joined by [[Tory Foster]], who also recalls that he played that song for [[Final Five|all of us]].
* "That was me," Tyrol says, pointing to the flash-silhouette on the wall.
* Anders angrily questions the paradox. Why they were all still alive? How did they come to the Colonies, to believe they were human? "Two thousand years is a long time to forget!" he says.

* In Admiral Adama's quarters, Laura Roslin sits on the floor. She has set fire to one of the pages of the [[Sacred Scrolls]], specifically, the Pythian Prophecy, turning successive pages to burn each into ash, one by one.
* Adama arrives to ask Roslin to help figure out a way to shore up the Fleet's quickly sagging morale. She is passive. He tells her that she'd missed her [[doloxan]] treatment. Roslin "didn't feel like it," she says, refusing to reschedule. "You just gonna...lie down and quit?" Adama asks. She laments that he took her advice to leave their Colonial solar system, of all the men and women who had died for what appears to be a fruitless series of visions.

* In the twilight, Kara Thrace creates a funeral pyre, burning the corpse of herself found in the wreckage, sitting alone as the flames consume it.

* Lee Adama and Dualla come back from her date as he humorously (and drunkenly) recalls his report to the Quorum. "We are no longer enslaved to the ramblings of Pythia, no longer pecking at the bread crumbs of the Thirteenth Tribe...We are now free to go where we want to go, be who we want to be." Dualla smiles back warmly as they kiss. They stop kissing mutually both stopping from it getting further. Dualla bids Lee goodbye and enters her quarters. Inside, [[Felix Gaeta]] watches her as she hums. "You're glowing," he says with slight amazement. Then he makes a comment on how Earth is a waste of a planet. Dualla chides him for bringing up the subject. "I want to hold on to this feeling for as long as I can." She looks at a childhood picture of herself in her opened locker, taking off her pendant. "She has no idea what she has ahead of her," she says of her younger self. Gaeta leaves as Dualla stops humming briefly looking at him leave in the mirror, then resumes humming. She looks at a cameo of her parents and then calmly places her wedding ring on the locker hook.
* Without any hesitation at all, Dualla pulls out a sidearm from her locker, places it against her temple, and fires.
* [[Diana Seelix]] arrives inside first, with Gaeta not far behind. Both are aghast at the sight of Dualla's body, blood pooling around her hands. They call for medics repeatedly in fear and distress as the scene ends.

===Act 4===

* Lee Adama stands by the shrouded body of Anastasia Dualla in the ship's morgue as his father enters. "She kissed me goodnight 45 minutes ago, and there was joy in her eyes. So tell me why would she do this?" Lee asks. The admiral's stony face melts into a drunken expression. "I don't frakkin' know," he slurs out, taking out a bottle of alcohol to offer to Lee, who refuses it. Anger rising in his face, Lee leaves, passing by Gaeta outside without a word.
* Inside, Admiral Adama looks under the shroud momentarily, covers Dualla's body, as he cries, holding her head, asking to himself, "What did you do?" He kisses the body, saying, "I let you down. I let everybody down."

* Adama comes out into a corridor, demands a sidearm from one of the [[marines]] standing there. Adama storms down a corridor as other stand or sit expressionless. Two men are fist-fighting, crossing Adama's path. He ignores them as he heads to Saul Tigh's quarters.
* "Sit down, Cylon," Adama says angrily after pulling out Tigh's sidearm, arms it and drops it on a table. Adama pours both of them a drink, but Tigh slowly pushes it away.
* Tigh tries to apologize about his revelation of being a Cylon, but Adama is beyond angry. "Is that how it worked? They program you to be my friend? Emulate all the qualities I respect. Tell me jokes...and I laugh at them."
* Tigh counters that he wanted, chose to be his friend. Adama throws insult after insult about [[Ellen Tigh]], angering Tigh to pick up the sidearm to shoot his friend. "Do it! Or I'll do it myself!" Adama says, pointing his own sidearm to his temple.

===Act 5===

* Tigh's gun is pointed at Adama's forehead, but he hesitates pulling the trigger. Adama goads him, "Go on," but Tigh realizes, returning Adama's insult as he rips out the gun's magazine and safes the weapon. "I'm sorry, Bill, but this is the one time I can't help you." Adama drops his gun and reaches for a bottle, but Tigh tries to stop him.
* Adama drinks from a glass anyway as he speaks of his uncle as a kid in the summers spent there, of foxes that would attack his henhouses, of the dog hunts that chased down the foxes at night, forming into a team, forcing the fox toward the river. Half of the foxes would fight, the others would try to cross the river. But some of them would turn with the current, swimming away into the sea. "Because they wanted to drown," Tigh adds. "Maybe. Or maybe they were just...tired."

* Tigh, uncharacteristically, becomes the sober one giving the other a dressing-down, telling Adama that he can't be like the foxes lost to the sea, reminding him that he is the commander and Tigh is still the XO of the ship, that killing himself would not help himself, or the ship.

* On ''Colonial One'', Lee Adama slowly wipes away a numeral "1" from the [[Survivor count|census]] board as Kara Thrace arrives. Kara had officially reported that she lost the signal, but needs to confide in him about something. Before she does, Lee tells her the news about Dualla. Both can only wonder why Dualla did what she did. Kara presumably decided not to tell Lee about her discovery.

* Adama passes by more passive crewman and some graffiti: "Frak Earth", sprayed on the wall as he heads to [[CIC]], where he meets up with Colonel Tigh wearing his service uniform and rank insignia for the first time since being granted amnesty by then-Acting President Lee Adama. Ordering Lt. [[Hoshi]] to Dualla's old communications station, Adama directs Gaeta to find any nearby stars compatible with habitable planets, and Hoshi to invite the rebel Cylons to their next destination. Adama addresses the Fleet, telling them that, while Earth is no longer a choice, he will find them a new home. "This is a promise I intend to keep."

* Saul Tigh, still in service uniform, organizes the evacuation of the survey crews on Earth in preparation for their search for a new home. On the beach, he greets [[Number Three (Downloaded copy)|Downloaded Three]]. She doesn't want to leave, deciding to stay behind, believing that the cycle of life will keep going on as dreadfully as before. "...and it beats the hell out of being out there with [[Cavil]]. Gonna die in the cold and the dark when Cavil catches up with us." Tigh tries to give encouragement, but Three asks if he ever wanted to just give up, reminding him of Adama's story of the penned-in foxes.

* Tigh thereupon begins to walk into the bay. Chest-deep in water, he continues down. Hearing faint screams, he reaches down and lifts a mangled post box hatch from his apartment building's lobby two millenia ago. Holding it, he has a vision of the end of his former life. He wears a civilian business suit, his face is clean shaven but bloodied, and he has both of his eyes. A voice calls out, "Saul!" from the floor in front of the post boxes. There he finds Ellen, trapped under debris he cannot move. His present-day self thrashes about in the bay while remembering his past self frantically pulling the lighter debris from around Ellen. As more bombs detonate, Ellen delivers a prophesy: "Saul, it's okay. Everything's in place. We'll be reborn...again. Together."

* The vision fades as Tigh realizes the truth. "Ellen...Ellen! You're the [[Final Five|fifth!]]"

== Notes ==

* [[Katee Sackhoff]] noted that this episode could have served as the series finale had the [[WGA strike]] gone longer.<ref name="roadrunner">{{cite_web|url=http://roadrunnerdm.livejournal.com/84288.html|title=Roadrunner - Newsdump from Burbank convention|date=19 November 2007|accessdate=20 November 2007|last=|first=|format=|language=}}</ref> However, the strike ended with sufficient time for production to resume; the previous episode was aired as the mid-season finale, with this episode airing in the first quarter of 2009.
* The scenes were among the last shot and were shot during the crew's shut down party due to the [[WGA strike|2008 Writers Strike]], so Sackhoff was unable to attend.<ref name="roadrunner"/>
*The title of the episode comes from the novel ''[[w:Sometimes a Great Notion (novel)|Sometimes a Great Notion]]'' by [[w:Ken Kesey|Ken Kesey]], which itself quotes the blues song "[[w:Goodnight, Irene|Goodnight, Irene]]". In the song, the singer contemplates suicide: "Sometimes I get a great notion / to jump in the river and drown."<ref name="chicagotribune">{{cite web|url=http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/entertainment_tv/2009/01/final-fifth-cylon-ellen-tigh-battlestar-galactica-dualla-dee-.html|title=Chicago Tribune: 'Battlestar Galactica's' Ron Moore addresses the shocking developments of 'Sometimes a Great Notion'|date=17 January 2009|accessdate=19 January 2009|last=Ryan|first=Maureen|format=|language}}</ref>
*The last Cylon is finally revealed in a vision Colonel Tigh has of the past: it is his dead wife, Ellen Tigh.
*While "[[The Face of the Enemy]]" webisodes were released before "Sometimes a Great Notion", they actually take place several days after it.

== Analysis ==
*The Cylons have testing methods of their own which can distinguish between human and Cylon remains.
*The Thirteenth Tribe Cylons were apparently all unique models and included children, based on the child's playthings found by Dualla.
*Saul Tigh also had the first name "Saul" in his past life.

== Questions ==
*What was the source of the nuclear attacks on Earth?
*What prompted Dualla to commit suicide?
*Was Ellen Tigh able to resurrect after her death in "[[Exodus, Part II]]"? If so, is she with the Cavil faction?
*Did Ellen Tigh resurrect between the events of the [[Miniseries]] and [[Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down]]? If so, how did she get aboard ''[[Rising Star]]''?
*Was Ellen Tigh aware of her Cylon identity?
*Was Ellen Tigh the one who Number Three apologized to in [[Rapture|her vision?]] ([[Sometimes a Great Notion#Official Statements|Answer]])
*What is Kara Thrace?
*Is the corpse found in the field the "real" Kara Thrace? If so, how and when did her Viper get to Earth? And how did so much of her Viper and body remain relatively intact after seemingly being completely disintegrated in the gas giant?
*Why does Thrace keep the dog tags and wedding ring found on the body?
*Will Thrace or Conoy tell anyone about their discovery? How will others respond to this information?
*How will the other Cylons respond to the discovery of the identities of the Final Five?
*How did the Final Five come to be living in the Twelve Colonies 2000 years after their deaths on Earth, without their memories and unaware of being Cylons?
*What similarities and differences exist between the method by which the Final Five were reborn and the Significant Seven's process of [[Resurrection (RDM)|resurrection]]?
*Did Thirteenth Tribe Cylons have any influence on the development of the Significant Seven 2000 years later, or was it mere parallel evolution?
*How did the Significant Seven come to be aware of the existence, though not the identities, of the Final Five?
*Are there other survivors of the Thirteenth Tribe besides the Final Five?
*Does the presence of children among the Thirteenth Tribe indicate that they reproduced among themselves?
*If the Thirteenth Tribe reproduced biologically, did the Final Five have Cylon parents, grandparents or other ancestors on Earth?
*Did Baltar's Cylon detector successfully identify Ellen Tigh in "[[Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down]]"? If so, why did Baltar withhold that information from Number Three during their search for the Final Five?
*With Number Three remaining behind on Earth, who will take over as the leader of the rebel Cylon faction?
*Given the speculation following [[Revelations]] that the survey site at the end of that episode and the start of this, was in Brooklyn, with the remains of the Brooklyn Bridge in the background; and given that the writers paid an homage to ''Planet of the Apes'' with Leoben's Dr. Zaius quote; is the thick, stubby structure in the background toward which Colonel Tigh wades at the episode's end, the pedestal on Liberty Island?
*Will [[Number Three (Downloaded copy)|Downloaded Three]] stay on Earth? ([[Sometimes a Great Notion#Official Statements|Answer]])

== Official Statements ==
*Chicago Tribune interview with Ronald D. Moore: http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/entertainment_tv/2009/01/final-fifth-cylon-ellen-tigh-battlestar-galactica-dualla-dee-.html#more
*Ronald D. Moore has confirmed that Dualla is dead and that Ellen Tigh is in fact the Final Cylon.
*Moore indicates that Ellen Tigh was the Cylon whom D'Anna apologized to in "[[Rapture]]".
*In his podcast commentary to "Sometimes a Great Notion", Ronald D. Moore confirmed that Downloaded Three stays on earth and that her story has ended. Like the three groups of foxes, Adama fought on (after Tigh's encouragement), Three gave up, and Tigh (temporarilly) decided to wander out into the sea.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==

*'''''Leoben Conoy''' echos to Dr. Zaius' final caution to Col. Taylor at the end of ''The Planet of the Apes'':'' "You might not like what you find." Like Taylor, Starbuck is a time-traveling<ref>To her, her disappearance and reappearance were brief; to everyone else's perspective, she was gone weeks.</ref> military astronaut surveying post-apocolyptic Earth (possibly also in the outskirts of New York City), and the "harbinger of death."

*'''''Saul Tigh''' upon seeing Ellen Tigh in a flashback on Earth:''
: "Ellen - You're the Fifth!"

*''After finding her body, '''Kara Thrace''' shouts to Leoben:''
: "What am I?!"

*'''''Laura Roslin's''' assessment of Earth:''
: "It's perfect. We traded one nuked civilization for another."

== Guest Stars ==

* [[Lucy Lawless]] as [[Number Three (Downloaded copy)|D'Anna Biers]]
* [[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Number Two]] / [[Leoben Conoy]]
* [[Rekha Sharma]] as [[Tory Foster]]
* [[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
* [[Brad Dryborough]] as Lieutenant [[Louis Hoshi]]
* [[Alexandra Thomas]] as [[Hera Agathon|Hera]]
* [[Don Thompson]] as Specialist [[Anthony Figurski]]
* [[Sonja Bennett]] as Specialist [[Marcie Brasko]]
* [[Jennifer Halley]] as Ensign [[Diana Seelix]]

== References ==
<div style="font-size:85%"><references/></div>

{{Episode list (RDM season 4)}}

[[Category:Episodes directed by Michael Nankin]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Bradley Thompson]]
[[Category:Episodes written by David Weddle]]

Sacred Scrolls

2006-11-15T18:42:00Z

Djryan: /* The "Three Exodi" Interpretation */ Some cleanup - needs much work

{{cleanup}}

[[Image:Pythia.jpg|right|thumb|A portion of the Sacred Scrolls, specifically, a portion of the Book of [[Pythia]].]]
The '''Sacred Scrolls''' are a set of writings the form the basis of [[Religion in the Twelve Colonies|Colonial religion]], a polytheistic faith resembling the legends of ancient Greece. The scrolls record much of the alleged history of humanity, including life on [[Kobol]] before the great exodus, and the legend of [[Earth]]. Portions of the scrolls are used in religious ceremonies, such as the Service of the Dead ([[Miniseries]], [[Act of Contrition]]).

Most notable among the Sacred Scrolls is the Book of Pythia, also referred to as the Pythian Prophecy. Written 3,600 years ago by the oracle [[Pythia]], they are believed by some to foretell the current exodus from the [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Twelve Colonies]].

==Contents==
The contents of the Sacred Scrolls have only been revealed to us in glimpses, through brief quotes, paraphrases and explanations throughout the series. This section serves to catalog those snippets, and is followed by more detailed analysis.

===The Book of [[Pythia]]===
:'''Roslin:''' Who is Pythia?<br>'''Elosha:''' One of the [[oracle]]s in the Sacred Scrolls. 3,600 years ago. Pythia wrote about the exile and rebirth of the human race. ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

====The Cycle of Time====
:'''Leoben:''' ''"All this has happened before, and all of it will happen again."'' ([[Flesh and Bone]])

:'''Six:''' ''"All this has happened before, and all this will happen again."'' ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

:'''Roslin:''' If you believe in the gods, then you believe in the cycle of time that we are all playing our parts in a story that is told again, and again, and again throughout eternity. ([[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I]])

====The Dying Leader====
:'''Elosha:''' ''"And the lords anointed a leader to guide the Caravan of the Heavens to their new homeland."'' ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

:'''Elosha:''' She also wrote that the new leader suffered a wasting disease and would not live to enter the new land. ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

:'''Roslin:''' The scriptures tell us a dying leader lead humanity to the promised land. ([[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I]])

====A Vision of Serpents====
:'''Elosha:''' ''"And unto the leader they gave a vision of serpents numbering two and ten, as a sign of things to come."'' ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

====The Serpents Lead the People Into Battle?====
:'''Six:''' ''"Led by serpents numbering two and ten..."'' (fragment) ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

====A Confrontation at the Home of the Gods====
:'''Six:''' ''"Though the outcome favored the few, it led to a confrontation at the home of the gods."'' ([[The Hand of God (RDM)|The Hand of God]])

====The Lower Demon====
:'''Elosha:''' The scrolls of Pythia do speak of a [[Sharon Agathon|lower demon]], who helped the people in a time of crisis. ([[Home, Part I]])

====The Blaze and the High Road====
:'''Elosha:''' ''"And the blaze pursued them, and the people of Kobol had a choice. To board the great ship, or take the high road through the rocky ridge."''<br>
:'''Valerii (continuing):''' ''"And the body of each tribe's leader was offered to the gods in the [[tomb of Athena]]."'' And the great ship was the [[galleon]] that departed from here, where we're standing. And it took the founders of the thirteen colonies to their destiny. And those that didn't board the galleon took the high road, a rocky ridge that lead to the tomb. ([[Home, Part I]])

:'''Elosha:''' The path is supposed to be marked by gravestones. ([[Home, Part I]])

====The Gates of Hera====
:'''Valerii:''' That's the spot where your god supposedly stood and watched Athena throw herself down onto the rocks below, out of despair over the Exodus of the thirteen tribes. Athena's tomb, whoever or whatever she really was, is probably up there. ([[Home, Part II]])

====The Arrow of Apollo====
:'''Roslin:''' ''"And the Arrow of Apollo will open the Tomb of Athena."'' ([[Home, Part II]])

:'''Elosha:''' The scriptures tell us that Kobol points the way to Earth. ([[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I]])

:'''Roslin:''' According to the scriptures, if we had the arrow of Apollo we could take it down to Kobol and we could use it to open the tomb of Athena and find our way to Earth. ([[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I]])

====Kobol and the Blood Price====
:'''Adama:''' ''"And [[Zeus, Lord of Kobol|Zeus]] warned the leaders of the twelve tribes that any return to Kobol would exact a price in blood."'' ([[Home, Part II]])

===History===

====Pre-Exodus====
:'''Elosha:''' This place is Kobol... birthplace of mankind, where the gods and men lived in paradise until the exodus of the thirteen tribes. ([[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I]])

====The Exodus====
:'''Elosha:''' How old are the ruins?<br>'''[[Billy Keikeya]]:''' Well, we won't know for sure until we send a ground team, but the initial estimates have it on the order of approximately 2,000 years.<br>'''Elosha:''' That's around the time the thirteen tribes first left Kobol. ([[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I]])

====The Thirteenth Tribe on Earth====
:'''Starbuck:''' The scriptures say that when the thirteenth tribe landed on Earth, they looked up into the heavens and they saw their twelve brothers. ([[Home, Part II]])

===Other books of the Sacred Scrolls===
:'''Adama:''' "Life here began out there." These are the first words of the Sacred Scrolls… ([[Miniseries]])

===Sayings===
:'''Commander Adama:''' ''"The gods shall lift those who lift each other."'' ([[Home, Part II]])
:'''[[Cavil]]:''' ''"The gods lift up those who lift each other."'' ([[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]])
:'''[[Duck]]:''' ''"The gods help those who help themselves."'' ([[Battlestar Galactica: The Resistance|The Resistance]])

These sayings are similar to the [[Wikipedia:Algernon Sydney|Algernon Sydney]] quote "God helps those who help themselves".

==Notes==

The Cycle of Time is apparently a key component of Colonial theology. The notion of a circular progression of time (also known as [[Wikipedia:Eternal return|eternal return]] or eternal recurrence) is foreign to the ancient Greek religion of which Colonial religion are largely based, but it is a common theme in other religions. Some Hindus believe in an endless cycle of ages called [[Wikipedia:Yuga|Yugas]]. The ancient [[Wikipedia:Maya|Maya]] people, as well as the [[Wikipedia:Inca|Incas]] and [[Wikipedia:Aztec|Aztecs]] also believed in the circular nature of time. In philosophy, the [[Wikipedia:Stoics|Stoics]], a movement originating in ancient Greece, held the doctrine. In the nineteenth century, the doctrine appears in the writings of [[Wikipedia:Friedrich Nietzsche|Friedrich Nietzsche]] as a method of life-affirmation.

The book of Pythia, which contains or is identical to the Pythian Prophecy, was written 1,600 years before the exodus of the thirteen tribes from Kobol, and yet it apparently contains a detailed narrative of the events of the Exodus, and continues to be interpreted as a source of prophecy 2,000 years after its prophecies have (apparently) already been fulfilled. We may thus interpret the entire text as a prophecy, since the events it describes can be firmly dated to a point well after its text was written.

==Analysis==

===Correspondences===
Assuming the events following the [[Fall of the Twelve Colonies]] are a repetition of the events predicted by Pythia, and which came to pass centuries later, we can make use of the prophecy by first constructing a coherent historical narrative from them and then looking for correspondences with the events of the series.

*The Lower Demon is [[Sharon Valerii (Caprica copy)|the Caprica copy of Sharon Valerii]]
*The Dying Leader is President [[Laura Roslin]]
*The "serpents numbering two and ten" are the [[Viper (RDM)|Viper]]s of Strike Force Two in the [[Battle for the Tylium Asteroid]].
*The fleet defended by the [[Battlestar (RDM)|Battlestar]] ''[[Galactica (RDM)|Galactica]]'' is the "Caravan of the Heavens".
*The "price in blood" has been paid by various people including [[Crashdown]] and [[Elosha]].

===The "One Exodus" Interpretation===
This interpretation assumes that the timeline is recurring on a scale of 1,600 to 2,000 years, and the exodus from Kobol is directly parellel to the exodus from the Twelve Colonies. It also makes some correspondences in addition to those above:

*The "Blaze" identified by Sharon Valerii is an earlier parallel to the cylon attack. The hostile force is the "jealous God", the Lord of Kobol that tried to elevate himself over the others.
*The Home of the Gods is [[Kobol]], and the people of [[Kobol]] are the [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Twelve Colonies]], in a somewhat metaphorical sense.

The timeline would procede thus:

#The people of Kobol lived in divine utopia with their gods.
#A hostile force - of which "the blaze" and the "lower demon" were parts - moves against the people of Kobol.
#The gods appoint a leader afflicted with a wasting disease to lead a "caravan of the heavens".
#The leader, with the aid of twelve "serpents", wins a perilous battle.
#The people make their way to the "home of the gods".
#Athena despairs and commits suicide.
#The leaders of the people are taken to the Tomb of Athena to be sacrificed to the remaining gods.
#The body of the people depart in a "[[galleon]]" for the colonies.
#Instructions are left to open the Tomb of Athena.
#Zeus warns against a return to Kobol.
#The twelve tribes settle on the [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Twelve Colonies]]. The thirteen tribe settles on [[Earth]].

====Questions and Predictions====
*Can [[Earth]] be at once the "promised land" in this iteration and the last?
*Can we expect the deaths of the leaders of the tribes (the [[Quorum of Twelve]]?) to propitiate the Gods?

This history is admittedly not especially coherent, but suggests the possibility of predicting at least some unfulfilled pieces of scripture. Another interpretation which deals with the repetition of historical events on a larger scale is offered below.

===The "Three Exodi" Interpretation===
This interpretation does not assume that the flight from the [[Twelve Colonies]] mirror the original exodus from [[Kobol]]. Instead, it assumes that these two exodi are part of the same event-continuum and posits a third, implied, exodus. Like the "One Exodus" interpretation, this one assumes that Pythia's prophecies have and will come true. Below is the proposed order of events for Pythia's prophecies:

#The people of Kobol live in divine utopia with their Gods.
#The "blaze" moves against the people of Kobol.
#The body of the people depart in a "[[galleon]]" for the colonies (the four inset items are roughly concurrent).
#*Athena despairs and commits suicide.
#*The leaders of the people are taken to the Tomb of Athena to be sacrificed to the remaining gods.
#*Instructions are left to open the Tomb of Athena.
#*Zeus warns against a return to Kobol.
#The twelve tribes settle on the [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Twelve Colonies]]. The thirteenth tribe settles on [[Earth]].
#The Cylons decimate the Twelve Colonies (Whether this is prophesied is unknown, but this clearly happened).
#The gods appoint a leader afflicted with a wasting disease to lead a "caravan of the heavens".
#The leader, with the aid of twelve "serpents", wins a perilous battle.
#The people make their way to the "home of the gods".
#A "lower demon" helps the people of Kobol find the Tomb of Athena.

Note, too, that this is only a part of the story according to the "Three Exodi" interpretation. It assumes that passages not yet revealed in the series outline (however vaguely) the finding of Earth and some time spent there, and then an event that spurs a migration back to Kobol. In this interpretation, the people of Kobol are actually the remnants of [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|the Twelve Colonies]], both their descendants and their ancestors. From there, the cycle starts again. The cycle is much longer in this interpretation (roughly 4,000 years, as opposed to roughly 1,600-2,000 years)

It is helpful to think of no particular part as the beginning. This is how the pictures of the constellations (only visible from Earth) would be accessible to the people of Kobol "before" any of them had been to Earth. It also explains how the Scrolls can speak about the fate of the Thirteenth Colony and yet be in the possession of people from the Twelve Colonies. In fact, when Pythia was writing about the events in the show, she might have been recording fairly-recent history, rather that far-future prophesy. The vagueness would be mostly due to nearly 4,000 years of linguistic drift, rather than due to the mists of prophecy.

Basically, this interpretation asserts a roughly 3,600-4,000 year cycle which can be illustrated by this crude flow-chart:<br\>
Kobol > Colonies, Colonies > Earth, Earth > Kobol

One description of this theory is as follows:

According to the ancient scriptures of Pythia (which say: “All this has happened before. All this will happen again.”), humanity undergoes a cycle of civilisation, in which humanity advances technologically, but from this seed of advancement and power grows evil and corruption that sows humanities own roots of destruction. Pythia tells how the civilisation of humanity periodically rises and falls, and often has to start over again.

When this need arises, the remnants of the civilisation of the established 12 tribes of humanity might have to return to the last ancestral home of their forefathers, in order to locate the directions to the 13th tribe which left Kobol before the other 12 tribes, which could be seen as a backup pocket of humanity to be located and germinated technologically if the main civilisation should fall.

This 13th pocket of humanity, (Earth), probably develops much slower technologically than the rest of their brother tribes, and so once found by the remnants of the other fallen 12 tribes (the fleet) would probably see these spaceships, technologies and the people aboard them as superhuman, godlike even.

As in history, when civilisations accelerate too fast in technology, they can become unstable, and dangerous, paranoid with conflicting nations or even within themselves, and so the fleet (those from the “caravan of the heavens”), not wanting to cause panic and deterioration of Earth's society, would probably call upon Earth’s religious beliefs system to explain their presence and technology.

Those from the space fleet would declare to the people of Earth that yes, they are indeed the gods the people of Earth have been worshipping, (which would be the same as the fleet's too, since the belief systems stem from the same root), and that they (the fleet), who would probably call themselves Lords not gods, have come to take the people of earth to live in harmony with them, to the land of the gods.

At some point, the fleet would realise how this cyclic order of civilisation occurs, and their part in it, and so the fleet would take the last pocket of humanity with them to start live elsewhere, on a planet somewhere distant from earth, rich in natural resources to be potentially exploited and mined later, which leaders of the fleet’s Quorum of Twelve (having to call themselves “Lords”) would call Kobol. The Lords of Kobol take them there to rekindle the civilisation (in the eyes of the remnants of the previous 12 tribes), and in the eyes of the people of the 13th tribes, to live in the city and land of the gods.

In this new land, a few cities would be first built by the Lords of Kobol for the people of earth to live in, and the advanced technology of the fleet could be kept out of reach from the main population of the new planet of Kobol until a later time. Maybe one ship would be situated at the top of a mountain, possibly called Olympus, (keeping with religious doctrine as the home of the gods) as a link between the primitive civilisation on the planet surface and the ships still in the planets orbit protecting the planet.

No doubt some people higher up in the old Earth’s (new Kobolian’s) society (politicians, possibly believers in faith), would be told the truth, to integrate Earth’s leaders in the affairs of running the planet and developing technology publicly on Kobol. Also, the remnants of at least the civilians from the old fleet would wish to leave the fleets’ ships and live with the new budding civilisation, emerging in the new civilisation as a new set of 12 tribes which people from earth would integrate themselves into, continuing the cycle of the civilisation of the tribes of Kobol.
Eventually, as the civilisations structure, political cohesion and publicly known technology increases on Kobol, more and more power would get relinquished to the new leaders of the 12 tribes on Kobol, and less power is held by the old leaders (Lords of Kobol), seated at Olympus. Technology would increase on Kobol to a point where by it’s possible once again for public space exploration.

In terms of what the Lords of Kobol have now become, at this stage in Kobol’s development, they would have almost died out as a race of humans, having integrated into Kobol’s new civilisation of 12 tribes, and would have dismantled all of the ships and technological facilities they didn’t need any more (like the old fleet) as to hide their true nature from the budding new tribes. They would have withdrawn from society almost, communicating through trusted religious and political tribe leaders, and as a community would hold a skeleton command, guiding the tribes until they are ready once again to leave Kobol and control their own destiny.

The Lords of Kobol, once their new growing civilisation of 12 tribes is ready, would make preparations to carry on the cycle of demographic movement and would secretly (hidden from the public knowledge of Kobol) assemble a 13th tribe, which contained a diverse selection of people from all the 12 tribes in Kobol. The Lords of Kobol would take this small, backup pocket civilisation to another safe, habitable planet, settle them there, plot 12 new constellations from the sky seen from that planet to use as a clue as to how to get to this pocket civilisation from Kobol, should the need ever arise to find them. The Lords of Kobol would leave a recognisable astronomical phenomenon amongst the clues that would be recognised easily by a well travelled space race, to point them in the right direction to Earth.

At the same time, the Lords of Kobol would make some reason for their children civilisation to have to leave from Kobol. This would be either a natural disaster or something else like stressing to the new civilisation of tribes that it is time they found their own place in the galaxy, and this would lead the now established new 12 tribes of Kobol to start making preparations for an exodus to a new land, either found by the Lords of Kobol or themselves. Some of the community of people descended and living still with the Lords of Kobol might not want this cycle to continue, might want the people of Kobol to know the truth, which might instigate conflict amongst the “gods”, and this war might trigger the 12 tribes to leave of their own accord.

The people of Kobol would have been kept naive to the Lords of Kobol’s true identity (as that of a previous race of colonies of Kobol), but would have advanced by this point to an understanding of the technology of space travel. The new tribes are instructed/ would have each incorporated patterns (made from the constellations seen as from Earth) into each of the new 12 tribes’ flags (as a hidden clue unknown to most in the tribes) born from the 12 tribes of Kobol, as they leave Kobol to spread the wings of a new civilisation of humanity in the galaxy.

What remains of the race of the Lords of Kobol? One can only speculate. They would probably have dissolved completely, integrating themselves fully into the Twelve Colonies setting out from Kobol, or followed them, keeping a distance but developing so far ahead technologically as to be able to communicate unconsciously with people in the new colonies, through thought somehow. It would explain how prominent figures in both series were able to know events and insights which are unexplainable otherwise, but the only way of knowing what happened is to wait and see.

===The Form of the Scrolls===

The Sacred Scrolls have been seen as an actual, ornate scroll (similar to a [[Wikipedia:Torah|torah]], as shown in the [[Miniseries]]), as well as a book (Both Adama and Roslin read what appear to be identically-created books in "[[Home, Part II]]").

The total volume of the Scrolls has not been revealed, so it is possible (albeit improbable) that the scroll that [[Elosha]] holds in the [[Miniseries]] as she swears in President Roslin and holds during the Service for the Dead may make up only a portion of the total texts, or key readings from the works. A shortened volume may not be different from the Roman Catholic Church's use of [[Wikipedia:Missal|missals]]: A specialized volume containing prayers and readings specific to a celebrant's use during [[temple]] ceremonies, Services for the Dead, weddings, [[dedication ceremony|dedication ceremonies]] and the like.

Much of the Scrolls appear to be handwritten. While the technology of the Twelve Colonies obviously support electronic printing and reproduction, it may be that the most authentic copies of the sacred texts are either authentic reproductions from a handwritten copy, or genuine handwritten copies. This practice may be for reasons of authenticity, custom, or aesthetics. The practice is similar to the work and purposes of the [[Wikipedia:Scribes|scribes]] before the invention of the printing press in real-Earth history. For comparison, an extreme example of the tradition of handwritten sacred texts in real-Earth history are the [[Wikipedia:Sefer Torah|sefer Torahs]].

===The Service of the Dead===

The final rites to the dead offered by [[Elosha]] at the end of the of Miniseries are Sanskrit verses from the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. Roughly translated, the verse says, "Lead us from the Untruth to the Truth, from Darkness to Light, from Death to Immortality."

===General Questions===

*Are the [[Lords of Kobol]] still an agentive force in this iteration of the cycle?
*Who were the Lords of Kobol? The Caprica Valerii does not deny their existence, and the Tomb of Athena strongly attests to her life and death, but she does not believe they were gods. They were evidently distraught at the calamity which befell their people. Who was responsible for it, and why were the gods powerless to intervene?
*Which god was the "jealous god" that sought to be raised above the others? Is he the same person as the Cylon's one true [[god]]?
*Was Kobol the original home of the [[Lords of Kobol]], or did they originate from some other place?
*Did the people of the Colonies leave Kobol with the assistance of the gods, or under their own power? That is, did the tribes build the [[Galleon]] or other ships, or were they furnished by the gods?
*What was the nature of the "[[Galleon]]?" Was it a large [[Sublight Propulsion|sublight]] colony ship? Did it have an [[FTL]] drive?
*If Roslin is now cured of cancer, can she still be the leader of the Pythian prophecy?
**Official sources suggested that Roslin's cancer cure in "[[Epiphanies]]" may not necessarily be a permanent matter, so the prophecy may still hold true.
*Is it possible that the dying leader may be referring to someone besides Roslin? It could be Admiral Adama as at the beginning of the Miniseries, they displayed a man who was "wasting away" before the Cylons attacked. He could be possibily another route for the writers to go through as having Adama not being able to enter the land that he and Roslin are leading the fleet to.

[[Category:A to Z]]
[[Category:Colonial]]
[[Category:Colonial Religion]]
[[Category:Colonial Religion (RDM)]]
[[Category:RDM]]

{{featured article candidate}}

User:Djryan

2006-11-14T14:14:54Z

Djryan:

Thirty year old Irish bloke living in the UK. Pedant, grump, and fan of BSG.

[http://djryan.tripod.com/blog/blogger.html Damien's Irishperson in Exile Diary]

Soundtrack (Season 2)

2006-11-14T13:53:46Z

Djryan: /* Performance Credits */ - They are Uilleann pipes.

{{Album Data
| image = Bear McCreary Season 2 soundtrack.jpg
| alt= Cover for the United States and UK release of this soundtrack
| title= Soundtrack (Season 2)
| albumno= 3
| composer= [[Bear McCreary]]
| label= La-La Land Records
| tracks= 23
| runtime= 01:18:53
| discs= 1
| released= 2006-06-20
| prev= [[Soundtrack (Season 1)]]
| next= None
}}
: ''For the [[Miniseries]] soundtrack, see [[Soundtrack (Miniseries)]].''
: ''For the soundtrack to Season One, see [[Soundtrack (Season 1)]].''

''Battlestar Galactica'' composer [[Bear McCreary]] gave an interview and previewed six musical cues from Season 2 at [http://www.filmmusicradio.com/index.php?todo=inside&storyid=18 Film Music Radio]. (The Season 2 cues start at 1:06:25.) Note that these cues differ from the actual tracks released in the Season 2 Soundtrack.

==Track Listing==
#'''Colonial Anthem''' (4:02) from "[[Final Cut]]"
#*Contains "Theme from Battlestar Galactica" and "Exploration" by [[Stu Phillips]] and [[Glen A. Larson]]. Adapted and Arranged by Bear McCreary
#'''Baltar's Dream''' (2:45) from "[[Valley of Darkness]]"
#'''Escape''' (3:09) from "[[The Farm]]"
#'''A Promise to Return''' (3:03) from "[[The Farm]]"
#*Dedicated to the Recovery of Ludvig Girdland. Performed by Supernova String Quartet
#'''Allegro''' (4:59) from "[[Home, Part II]]"
#*The initial printing of the Season 2 soundtrack mistakenly attributed this song to "[[Home, Part I]]", but according to composer Bear McCreary's website this is incorrect and all subsequent printings will be corrected.
#'''Martial Law''' (1:51) from "[[Fragged]]"
#'''Standing in the Mud''' (1:45) from "[[Black Market]]"
#'''Pegasus''' (2:46) from "[[Pegasus]]"
#'''Lords of Kobol''' (2:50) from "[[Pegasus]]"
#*Featuring Raya Yarbrough, Vocals.
#'''Something Dark is Coming''' (8:51) from "[[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]"
#'''Scar''' (2:26) from "[[Scar]]"
#'''Epiphanies''' (2:43) from "[[Epiphanies]]"
#'''Roslin and Adama''' (2:49) from "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]" and "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II|Part II]]"
#'''Gina Escapes''' (2:00) from "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II]]"
#'''Dark Unions''' (2:53) from "[[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II]]"
#'''The Cylon Prisoner''' (3:51) from "[[Pegasus]]"
#*Featuring Bt4, Vocals
#'''Prelude to War''' (8:22) from "[[Pegasus]]", "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]", and "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II|Part II]]"
#'''Reuniting the Fleet''' (2:45) from "[[Home, Part I]]" and "[[Home, Part II]]"
#'''Roslin Confesses''' (2:09) from "[[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II]]"
#'''One Year Later''' (1:43) from "[[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II]]"
#'''Worthy of Survival''' (3:35) from "[[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II]]"
#'''Battlestar Galactica''' (0:45) Season 2 Main Title Music
#*Music by [[Richard Gibbs]]. Engineered and Mixed by Gordon Fordyce. Featuring Michael Now and Caitanya Riggan, Vocals
#'''Black Market''' (5:48) from "[[Black Market]]"
#*Featuring Steve Bartek, Guitar

==Lyrics and Translations==

Composer Bear McCreary has [[Sources:Official Communique with Bear McCreary|given his permission]] to ''Battlestar Wiki'' to post the lyrics and translations for the Battlestar Galactica soundtracks. From the booklet accompanying the CD, the lyrics and translations for the musical tracks in the Season 1 CD are:

===Season 2 Main Title Music===

During the first season, the UK airings of Battlestar Galactica used a different title music than the USA airings. [[Ron Moore]] and the production team always favored the UK music, but Scifi Channel executives thought it wouldn't be popular and pressured the BSG production team to use a reworked version of the Season 1 musical track "Two Funerals" as the USA title music in Season 1. However, by Season 2 Moore was able to make his preferred "UK version" of the title music the track that aired in the USA broadcast. Many fans are divided over which they prefer.

According to Bear McCreary's official website, the lyrics to the Season 2 Title Music are actually the [[Wikipedia:Gayatri|Gayatri Mantra]] (the most revered prayer mantra in Hinduism). From McCreary's official website:

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5"
! '''Lyrics ([[Wikipedia:Sanskrit|Sanskrit]]):'''
! '''English translation:'''
|-
| Aum bhoor bhuwah swaha<br />
Tat savitur varenyam<br />
Bhargo devasaya dheemahi<br />
Dhiyo yo naha prachodayat

|Oh God! Thou art the Giver of Life, <br />
Remover of pain and sorrow,<br />
The Bestower of happiness, <br />
Oh! Creator of the Universe,<br />
May we receive thy supreme sin-destroying light,<br />
May Thou guide our intellect in the right direction.
|}

===Lords of Kobol===

Lyrics posted on singer Raya Yarbrough's [http://www.rayayarbrough.com/ official website] by Bear McCreary (the lyrics were not included with the booklet accompanying the CD):

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5"
! '''Lyrics (in [[Wikipedia:Senegal|Sengalese]]):'''
! '''English translation:'''
|-
| Dei Kobol una apita uthoukarana<br />
Ukthea mavatha gaman kerimuta<br />
Obe satharane mua osavathamanabanta<br />
Api obata yagnya karama

|Help us [[Lords of Kobol]] <br />
Let us walk the path of righteousness <br />
And lift our faces unto your goodness<br />
We offer this prayer
|}

===Roslin and Adama===

According to Bear McCreary's website, there is a version of "Roslin and Adama" which is performed with lyrics, which was not included in the series or on the CD, but which was performed live at the Season 2 soundtrack CD premiere party.

==Full credits==
===Performance Credits===
*'''Ethnic Woodwinds''' - Chris Bleth
*'''Uilleann Pipes and Irish Whistles''' - Eric Riger
*'''Acoustic and Electric Violin''' - Paul Cartwright
*'''Acoustic and Electric Guitars''' - Steve Bartek
*'''Electric Bass''' - John Avila
*'''Drum Kit''' - Johnny "Vatos" Hernandez
*'''Percussion''' - M.B. Gordy
*'''Pianos, Percussion and MIDI Programming''' - [[Bear McCreary]]

*'''French Horns''' - Steve Durnan, Daniel Kelly
*'''Trumpets''' - Wayne Bergeron, Larry Hall
*'''Trombones''' - Alex Isles, Steve Holtman
*'''Violin''' - Robert Anderson, Susan Chatman, Charlie Evert, Kirsten Fife, Juliann French, Larry Greenfield, Norm Hughes, Sharon Jackson, Peter Kent, Gina Kronstadt, Songa Lee-Kitto, Cameron Patrick, Vladamir Polimiditi, Kathleen Robertson, Julie Rodgers, Josefina Vergara, Erika Walczak, Francine Walsh, John Wittenberg, Shari Zippert
*'''Viola''' - Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Biana Bandy, Karen Elane Bucanin, Lynn Grants, Scott Holsfield, Marium Mayer, Maria Newman, David Stenske, Maria Todd, Jessica VanVelzen
*'''Violoncello''' - Peggy Baldwin, Giovanna Clayton, Erika Duke-Kirkpatrick, Vanessa Friebarin-Smith, Missy Hasin, Susie Katayama, Rudi Stein, Jacob Szekely
*'''Contrabass''' - Norman Ludwin, Bart Samolis, Dave Stone

===Supernova String Quartet===
*'''Violin''' - Ludvig Girdland
*'''Violin''' - Robert Anderson
*'''Viola''' - Muguel Atwood-Ferguson
*'''Violoncello''' - Jacob Szekely

===Vocals===
*'''Featured Vocalists''' - Raya Yarbrough, Bt4
*'''Additional Vocalists''' - Amy Keys, Doug Lacy, Johnny "Vatos" Hernandez, Bear McCreary

===Production Credits===
*'''Executive Album Producers for La La Land Records''' - MV Gerhard and Matt Verboys
*'''Album Produced by''' - Bear McCreary, Steve Kaplan and Ford A. Thaxton
*'''Score Produced by''' - Bear McCreary and Steve Kaplan
*'''Score Orchestrated and Conducted by''' - Bear McCreary
*'''Score Orchestrated and Mixed by''' - Steve Kaplan
*'''Music Editor''' - Michael Baber
*'''Assistant Music Editor''' - David Bondelvitch
*'''Digitally Edited and Mastered by''' - James Nelson at ''Digital Outland''
*'''Computer Guru''' - Mark Cooper
*'''Contractors''' - M.B. Gordy and Peter Kent
*'''Representation''' - ''Soundtrack Music Associates''
*'''Score Recorded at''' - Stage M at Paramount Studios and Eastwood Scoring Stage at Warner Bros.
*'''CD Art Direction''' - Mark Banning
*'''Sengalese Consultant''' - Nisha Rodrigo

==Press Release==

: ''Reprinted with permission from CineMedia Productions.''

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: SEASON TWO SOUNDTRACK TO BE RELEASED BY LA-LA LAND RECORDS ON JUNE 20

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA TOUTED AS ONE OF THE TOP 10 SHOWS CURRENTLY ON TV BY TIME MAGAZINE AND TV GUIDE

(June 1, 2006- New York, NY) - Considered one of the top 10 shows currently on TV by ''Time Magazine'', ''Entertainment Weekly'', and ''TV Guide'', ''Battlestar Galactica'' is the #1 show on the Sci Fi Channel. On June 20, La-La Land Records will release the ''Battlestar Galactica: Season Two'' soundtrack, featuring more than 78 minutes of the best musical moments from the 2nd season of the Sci-Fi Channel's critically acclaimed, top-rated television series starring [[Edward James Olmos]], [[Mary McDonnell]], [[James Callis]], [[Tricia Helfer]] and [[Katee Sackhoff]].

Composer Bear McCreary builds on his impressive Season One accomplishments and once again delivers a sensational, emotionally rich score that ingeniously melds orchestra, vocals, percussion and synthesizer. The Season Two CD contains few tracks which are longer in length. Says McCreary, "The first one was a soundtrack. The second one is an album."

The Battlestar Galactica: Season Two soundtrack features performances by Supernova String Quartet (on "A Promise to Return" from [[The Farm]]), vocals by Raya Yarbrough (on "[[Lords of Kobol]]" from [[Pegasus (episode)|Pegasus]]), and vocals by Bt4 (on "The [[Gina|Cylon Prisoner]]" from Pegasus). Former Oingo-Boingo members Steve Bartek, John Avila and Johnny "Vatos" Hernandez play on the track from "[[Black Market]]". And the main title theme from ''Battlestar Galactica'', composed by [[Richard Gibbs]], is also on the soundtrack.

Fans of the [[Battlestar Galactica (TOS)|original series]] will be excited to see that the theme from the original ''Battlestar Galactica'' series, composed by [[Stu Phillips]], has been adapted and arranged by McCreary. The homage to the television show that inspired this new incarnation leads off the soundtrack.

Composer Bear McCreary is a classically trained composer with a degree in Composition and Recording Arts from the prestigious USC Thornton School of Music. He has composed score for over thirty independent films, including director Jon Chu's musical short ''When the Kids Are Away'' and the Discovery Channel miniseries ''The 5 Coolest Things''. McCreary was among a handful of select protégés of late film music legend Elmer Bernstein (''THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN'').

The [[Season 3 (2006-07)|third season]] of ''Battlestar Galactica'' will begin airing in October on the Sci Fi Channel. The ''Battlestar Galactica: Season Two'' soundtrack will be available in stores or from [http://www.lalalandrecords.com www.lalalandrecords.com] on June 20, 2006. The soundtrack from the [[Soundtrack (Miniseries)|Battlestar Galactica miniseries]] and the [[Soundtrack (Season 1)|Season One soundtrack]] are both available from La-La Land Records.

==External Links==
*[http://astore.amazon.com/battlestarwik-20/detail/B000FCUYKO/ Amazon.com] page for BSG Season 2 soundtrack.
*[http://www.lalalandrecords.com/Battlestar_Galactica_Season_2.html La-La Land Records] page for BSG Season 2 sountrack, with sample clips.

[[Category: A to Z]] [[Category:Merchandise]]