Battlestar Wiki - User contributions [en]

Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II

2006-03-12T16:11:52Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Burdens2.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 20
| Guests= [[Richard Hatch]] ([[Tom Zarek]]) [[Kate Vernon]] ([[Ellen Tigh]]) [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] ([[Cavil|Brother Cavil]])
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm1093194|Anne Cofell Saunders]], [[IMDB:nm0894156|Mark Verheiden]]
| Story=
| Director=[[Michael Rymer]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= March 10, 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,550
| Prev= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
| Next= TBA
}}

== Overview ==

: ''Everything turns on its head as the survivors vote for a new president -- and vote for their fate.''

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]], the marines, and the [[resistance (movement)|resistance]] continue to take fire from Cylon centurions and artillery. They make their way up a hill, and hold their position.
*The Cylons hold fire, and Sharon remarks that the Cylons will attempt to capture them with non-lethal weapons, such as gas.
*Eighteen hours later, they emerge to find that the Cylons have disappeared. [[Cavil]] -- who suddenly appears behind them -- announces that the Cylons have left the Twelve Colonies and that humanity was spared.

===In the Fleet===

*[[Cally]] is cleared back to work by [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]], despite having her jaw wired shut (which elicits a sexist observation from the doctor). [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] visits her, apologizing for the attack. Cally forgives him, saying that she's always cared for him.

*[[Gaius Baltar|Dr. Baltar]] continues to gain in the polls. On ''[[Colonial One]]'', Tory mentions there's always a victory plan. [[Laura Roslin|Roslin]] later calls a private meeting with Dr. Baltar, asking to deliver a joint statement of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_%28verb%29 tabling] the issue of colonization until after the election, which Baltar rejects.

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] returns to ''[[Galactica (RDM)|Galactica]]'', with the resistance fighters, much to the delight of Admiral Adama. She mentions the fact that the Cylons have left Caprica, and a man appearing to be Brother Cavill confirms it. He also says he has a message, but is attacked by Chief Tyrol, claiming he's a Cylon. Both Cavill and Caprica-Sharon are escorted to the brig under marine guard.

*The other Cavill (from last episode) is also taken to the brig, claiming he's not a Cylon, but changes his tune upon seeing his "brother", as he calls him. Both Cavills then talk about the fact that the “war heroes” (Caprica Six & ''Galactica''-Sharon) have talked about how the attack of the colonies and the pursuit of the fleet were mistakes. They were told to relay the message that man and Cylon will go their separate ways. Both Roslin and Admiral Adama are less than trusting regarding the message.

*Election Day has arrived and Baltar has an apparent five thousand-vote lead over Roslin with only a few ships left. On ''Colonial One'', Tory makes a call to ''Galactica'', putting a plan into action.

*Amazingly, Roslin initially appears to have retained the presidency. While most are celebrating, Lt. Gaeta makes a startling discovery regarding the votes, and informs the Admiral that Col. Tigh may be involved in a conspiracy to throw the election.

*Admiral Adama confronts Roslin regarding the conspiracy, saying he has a confession to rig the vote. Roslin admits her involvement and Adama is disappointed.

*Baltar is informed of his election as President. He's less than pleased, vowing to have full investigation in time. President-elect Baltar then orders a course for “New Caprica”.

*[[Gaius Baltar]] is sworn in as the new President of the Twelve Colonies, and orders the immediate colonization of New Caprica.

*''[[Cloud 9]]'' is destroyed by a nuclear blast, Gina being present before the explosion; in addition to the ''Cloud 9'', at least two other ships are destroyed in the blast. Admiral Adama reports to the president that this may be a Cylon attack, but Baltar ignores him and presses forward with colonization.

===One Year Later===

*[[Felix Gaeta|Mr. Gaeta]] is reporting to the President regarding a Union issue aboard Colonial One, now down on the planet. Baltar is upset, saying there have been no Cylon attacks but the people still complain. He has regressed, turning to alcohol, medication, and womanizing.

*Admiral Adama, now donning a mustache, is walking around a near-empty Galactica, the ship falling into disarray. Over half of the crew has moved down to the planet, and they are running on such a skeleton crew that they barely have enough pilots to fly training missions, much less a good CAP. Adama has a discussion with Tigh about going down to the planet, which Tigh reluctantly agrees to.

*[[Samuel Anders|Anders]], now Kara’s husband, is sick with pneumonia. Dr. Cottle is saying he can’t do much for him, saying there are no antibiotics available, but he is young and healthy, and with a little luck he "should" pull through.

*Kara runs into the Tighs as [[Tyrol]], now a union boss, is making a speech to begin a strike, a pregnant Cally by his side. Saul mentions that ''Pegasus'' keeps the backup medical supplies and that Apollo would spring some for Starbuck. Starbuck disagrees, which prompts Tigh to state that Apollo would be "over that by now".

*Roslin is doing what she does best, teaching the settlement's school, and manages to find enjoyment in her old position. [[Maya]] is with her, as is the now one year old [[Hera]], whom Maya has named "Isis".

*Kara calls Lee aboard ''Pegasus'', requesting the antibiotics. Lee's gained a lot of weight in the past year. Dualla is now an officer, serving by Lee Adama's side in ''Pegasus''' CIC. Before Lee can reply, Dualla catches something on [[DRADIS]].

*A fleet of [[Cylon]] [[Basestar (RDM)|basestar]]s arrive in orbit around New Caprica. The Adamas are having a discussion about what to do, when [[Helo]] asks if alert fighters should be launched. Admiral Adama keeps them in as the defense fleet jumps away.

*Mr. Gaeta informs the President of the Cylon approach. Later, before his assembled staff, copies of Number [[Number Five|5]], [[Number Eight|8]], and [[Number Six|6]] approach the President. The Cylons declare that as long as there’s no resistance, no harm will come. President Baltar declares surrender on behalf of the colonists, and as Cylon armies occupy the planet, Kara vows to resist.

== Questions ==

*What "number" is Cavil?
*Was Roslin's threat to put the two Cavils into space actually carried out?
**Most likely not, she had the election on her mind, much to do, and didn't actually make it an order. Baltar would have been unlikely to vent them into space.
*Where did the defense fleet jump to?
**Likely a prearranged rendezvous point, similar to that of the miniseries.
*Where is Caprica-Sharon?
**Most likely, still in ''Galactica'''s brig. This is probably why Helo is still aboard ship, having taken a CIC officer's position.
***This seems to be confirmed by his ready acceptance of Adama's order to jump away from New Caprica; if Sharon was not still aboard he would have protested.
**In the podcast, Ron Moore vaguely hinted that they hadn't forgotten about Sharon, but that we'd have to "wait and see". Apparently, several of the early season 3 episodes will have flashbacks dealing with events that took place in the year that passed.
*What happened to Zarek?
*Why is Leoben looking for Starbuck, specifically?
** Could it be the same [[Leoben Conoy]] that Starbuck interrogated in "[[Flesh and Bone]]"?
*** As seen with ''Galactica''-Sharon, it is distinctly possible that that particular Leoben was lying when he said he'd actually die and not download.
** It is likely that, as the only escapee from [[The Farm]], they are interested in continuing with her. After all, there was an incision, and something had changed with her.
*Why has the population (until Tyrol's recent union speech) accepted Baltar's imperious rule? People were hardly so passive under Roslin. Indeed, Adama executed a military coup over a rather less important issue than giving a nuclear weapon to a Cylon agent.
**Admiral Adama wasn't conclusive as to how the weapon got on board Cloud Nine.
**Baltar pointed out there have been no attacks since he took office. Under Roslin the attacks were common. Perhaps for a year the people decided they preferred the safety Baltar gave them to their liberties.
**They did vote them in, and perhaps the struggle of trying to survive on this planet is distracting their attention, i.e. at first they weren't sure how much to blame on Baltar, or on the simple struggle of trying to rebuild. Howevever, it hasn't been a particularly smooth or easy presidency, as shown by the recent Union strike.
*Are the Six and Eight that Baltar surrendered to [[Caprica-Six]] and [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|''Galactica''-Sharon]]?
**Judging from Six's reaction to Baltar, almost definitely.
*Where did the Cylon fleets go, after they left the Twelve Colonies? Cavil was deliberately vague when asked if they simply returned to the [[Cylon homeworld]].
*Did the nuclear bomb ever get picked up by the fleet's radiological alarms?
*How many people died in the Cloud Nine explosion?
**The Cloud Nine explosion also destroyed ships near it. Given the stated size of the New Caprica population along with subtracting the minimal crew sizes needed to maintain the ships in orbit, you can estimate that approximately 3000 to 5000 people died.
*When Gina-Six was instantly vaporized due to being only two feet from a nuclear detonation, did she still transmit her consciousness? Was she even capable of transmitting considering that any internal hardware responsible for this task would have been instantly destroyed?
**They have already established that with the [[Resurrection Ship]] destroyed, Cylons in the fleet that are killed will ''actually'' die. Gina expressed suicidal impulses as early as "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]".
**Additionally, since the Cylons found the planet due to the radiation, it is unlikely that Gina was resurrected, as she then would have told the Cylons the location of the planet.
*Given Roslin's memories of Baltar with Six, why didn't Admiral Adama suspect Baltar of handing over the nuke to the cylons? If he did suspect him, why not act on it?
**He had no real proof.
*Did the events of "One Year Later" actually happen, or were they a dream or vision sequence given to Baltar?
**Although Baltar has had elaborate visions in the past, this vision left Baltar's point of view several times, addressing issues such as the marriage of Kara to Sam Anders and Adama's friendship with Tigh that are of little knowledge or importance to Baltar.
***Ron D. Moore has stated in interviews that the first 4-5 episodes of season 3 will deal with the Cylon occupation of New Caprica, and unless a vast swath of episodes is going to be a dream sequence, all of these "one year later" events ''really'' happen.
***Moore actually discusses this in the podcast, saying that many people might just assume this is a dream, or a ''Dallas''-like season-erasing shower-dream episode, but he thought it was a bold decision to jump ahead a full year, and have all of it be definitely real.
*Why was it so easy for Adama to hide the collusion of the rigged election from the press, and why were there no consequences?
**So far as we know, Adama, Tigh, Gaeta, Dualla, Dualla's two associates, Tory, and Roslin are the only people that knew; 6 are military personnel, 4 of whom would be implicated, and the other 2 were directly involved civilians. All are strongly motivated to conceal the information.
* Why would it take the Cylons over one year to find New Caprica, alerted by the nuclear detonation prior to the inhabitation of the planet?
**It was stated in the previous episode that the interference from the gas cloud surrounding it would hide the planet fairly well. The Cylons were slightly over a light year away, according to the Number Five. Searching something as large as the gas cloud likely is for a planet or fleet is, given the sensor range limitations, quite impressive to accomplish in months, even with general directional information from a light-year out.
***Actually with the Cylon base 1 light year away, it would take 1 year for the nuke to show up on the Cylon sensors. Short of some FTL communication system, that's the only way the Cylons would have been able to detect the planet. Since the fleet is all in within non-FTL distances, all the FTL devices, if any exist would likely have been destroyed or disabled.
*If the Cylons really left the Twelve Colonies, leaving behind a nuked-out wasteland, what happened to all of the human captives in the [[Farms]]?
**Has it really been established that all that remains of the colonies are nuked-out wastelands? Yes, it's clear that they were nuked from the mini-series, yet in more recent episodes, it's also clear that the Cylons have been rebuilding them, in particular Caprica. The comment is bizarre in that Admiral Adama would know this as well, given the return of Anders who no doubt gave a full account of his experiences.
***Adama and Roslin appeared to be questioning the Cavils immediately after the Caprica copy was detained, leaving no time for Anders' debriefing.
*Why have the Cylons returned? According to [[Cavil]], the two races were to go their "separate ways". The Cylons may have been worried about the humans retaliating at some point in the future, but the location of the Cylon world(s) is still unknown to the humans, so ensuring the safety of their society presumably isn't the motive behind the occupation of [[New Caprica]].
**This assumes that the Cylons were being honest in their announcement of withdrawl from all Human contact and association. It is possible that this was a tactical feint and the Cylons went looking for possible alternate locations where the Humans could have resettled.
*Did the Cavils lie about the pursuit of humanity being a mistake? Or were they telling the truth?
** If they were telling the truth, perhaps not all Cylons are readily able to admit and rectify their mistakes as the Cavils believed.
** It seems that the intent was truthful, given that Caprica-Six and Sharon are taking an active leadership role in this new occupation. What seems unclear is how their positions has changed from Downloaded, where they clearly felt that the Cylon destruction of humanity was wrong. This is especially so for Sharon, who still considered herself human. Why would she go along willingly with this new course of action of occupation and presumably other forms of experimentation.
*Will the Cylons resume their pursuit of the Fleet?
*How many people are left in the Fleet?
**The population of New Caprica City is given as 39,192. There were just under 50,000 people in the Fleet before establishing the settlement, so that gives a figure of roughly 10,000 missing. It is uncertain how many were killed in the destruction of Cloud 9 and surrounding Fleet ships but this loss along with any births and deaths that have taken place during the year since the election, leaves very few military personnel in the Orbital Defense. This almost certainly means that both ''Galactica'' and ''Pegasus'' will be extremely short on crew, as many military personnel will have been left on the planet. There was clearly no time to retrieve even selected members of the crews before the Fleet jumped.
***Will the Adamas resort to Cain's tactic of conscripting civilians to fill the gaps?
*What happened between Apollo and Starbuck?
**Colonel Tigh mentioned an incident that happened "a long time ago" that would prevent Apollo from giving antibiotics to Starbuck. When she contacted him aboard ''Pegasus'', he seemed very much not to want to talk to her.
***Problems may have arisen due to possible jealousy of Anders.
***What about all the mean stuff she said to Apollo when she was drunk, about him and Dee?

== Analysis ==
*Baltar's arrogance seems to have led to corrupt rule during his year on New Caprica—he replaces Roslin's modest desk with a larger, elaborate one, replaces the population count whiteboard with a portrait of himself, and keeps a harem aboard the landed Colonial One.
*After a whole year, everyone is still living in tents. There is a vital shortage of medicine, the military is of no use, and labor conditions are apparently intolerable. Baltar's administration is apparently as incompetent as Roslin feared.
**It is not clear whether these conditions are the result of admimistrative incompetence or the inherent difficulties of colonizing a marginally habitable planet.
***Of course, it was Baltar's idea to settle on a marginally habitable planet in the first place.
*It's ironic that the obligations of duty keep Lee Adama aboard Pegasus while everyone else goes planetside—he is a reserve officer, and promised to build his pilots a bar as soon as they found a habitable planet.
*Ron Moore has once again decided to play with viewer's expectations; in the podcast for "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II]]" Moore commented on how everyone assumed that ''Pegasus'' would be destroyed by the end of the episode, and thus he thought it would be a good twist to keep ''Pegasus'' alive as another ship in the Fleet. Here, many viewers assumed that the nuke that Baltar gave to Gina in "[[Epiphanies]]" would be used to destroy ''Pegasus'' this time, but it wasn't.
*29 people died between this episode and the preceding one? One or two Raptors were lost, and some Marines died on Caprica, but that doesn't seem high enough.
**Is it possible they took out all of the people who left in the raptors because they were not apart of the fleet at the end of the previous episode?
***They didn't remove Starbuck from the count when she left for Caprica at the beginning of Season 2.
****She left at the end of season one, before they started the count. But, they did not add her to the count when she returned with Helo, because the count rose by one.
**Maybe more people died during the attack on Caprica than was shown.
***Yet another possibility is the inclusion of the Caprica survivors in the count to offset many of the losses that had incurred in the rescue mission.
***Although they didn't actually talk about the losses, there was a shot of a wounded person being taken away on a stretcher after the Raptors returned from the [[Caprica]] [[SAR]] mission.
**There may have been a series of election-related riots or murders.

== Notes ==
* '''According to Ron Moore's podcast, although Scifi Channel was willing to air this episode as a 90-minute special, it had to be heavily edited down for international distribution; outside of the United States, viewers will only see a 1 hour version of the episode, which Moore regards as "almost incomprehensible".''' Many plot threads, such as the entire Cally/Tyrol subplot, were completely removed from the one hour version.
* Ron Moore's podcast for episode 13, [[Epiphanies]], states that the Nuke given to Gina will come back in this episode, to the benefit of the Cylons.
*In RDM's podcast for the previous episode, he said that in early drafts of this special 90 minute long episode, the writers actually tried to make it a 2 hour special, but this was soon dropped (these times are including commercials).
*The election board appears to have a definitive list of the names of all of the ships in [[The Fleet (RDM)]]. Not all of them are clearly visible, but this would seem to indicate that the writers do have an actual list that they get new ship names from. Ship names visible on the chart are: Demetrius, Diomedes, Embla Brokk, Enkidu, Epheme, Galactica, Gideon, Gemenon Traveller, Greenleaf, Monarch, Odysseus, Pegasus, Persephone, Prometheus, Swordfish
*The framed photo of President Roslin and [[Billy Keikeya]] was still on her desk during the election.
*When Roslin "won" the rigged election results, Roslin received 24,265 votes, while Baltar recieved 22,266. This means that the elligible voters in the Fleet number 46,531. In the podcast, RDM explains that he quickly came up with these numbers, to try to reflect roughly how many survivors are below the voting age.
*Toward the end of the episode, President Baltar refers to a government body called the "People's Council". This may be the proportionally elected lower house mentioned in by RDM in his [http://blog.scifi.com/battlestar/archives/2005/01/index.html#a000016 blog post] on January 30, 2005.
*[[Hera]] is seen on New Caprica in the same white cradle that Baltar had a vision of her being in in "[[Scattered]]", etc. According to RDM's podcast it's actually the exact same cradle.
*Tyrol's union speech is an almost word for word quote of Mario Savio's address during the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley in 1964. According to Ron Moore and David Eick in the podcast, they even got permission from Savio's widow to use it (even though, due to the way copyright laws work from back then, they could have just used it without permission, they felt they should get it). As a result, it's even listed in the credits: "Mario Savio speech excerpted courtesy of: Lynne Hollander Savio". Actor Aaron Douglas (Chief [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]]) actually studied film of Savio, so all of the hand gestures Tyrol makes when he gives the speech are gestures that Savio actually used.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*''Dr. Cottle decides Cally is ready to return to duty:''
:'''Cottle:''' You're done here. I'm kickin' you out of here and sending you back to work.
:'''Cally:''' (muffled, because her jaw is immobilized) Work??? Like this?
:'''Cottle:''' You gotta love a woman who can complain even with her jaw wired shut.

"Would you mind telling me what's going on? I'm not a frakking Cylon, I'm not…(''sees the other Cavil in the cell'')…oh. Well, okay then."
:—''Brother [[Cavil]]''

*''Trying to bring order to a Union meeting:''
:'''Tyrol:''' Everyone, please be quiet. (''crowd ignores him'')
:'''Cally:''' Hey! Shut the frak up! (''crowd quiets down'')

*'''Admiral Adama:''' We're leaving. But we'll be back.

*''The Cylons occupy New Caprica:''
:'''Tyrol:''' "What do you want to do now, Captain?"
:'''Starbuck:''' "The same thing we always do. Fight them until we can't."

== Official Statements ==

From the official site (http://www.scifi.com/battlestar/):
When Baltar wins the vote, Roslin considers stealing the election because she believes he is a Cylon collaborator.

== Guest Stars ==
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] as [[Cavil|Brother Cavil]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*[[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*[[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Leoben Conoy]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0443286/ David Kaye] as [[James McManus]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Winston Rekert as Priest

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Anne Cofell Saunders]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Mark Verheiden]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Michael Rymer]]

Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II

2006-03-11T16:58:06Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Burdens2.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 20
| Guests= [[Richard Hatch]] ([[Tom Zarek]]) [[Kate Vernon]] ([[Ellen Tigh]]) [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] ([[Cavil|Brother Cavil]])
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm1093194|Anne Cofell Saunders]], [[IMDB:nm0894156|Mark Verheiden]]
| Story=
| Director=[[Michael Rymer]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= March 10, 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,550
| Prev= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
| Next= TBA
}}

== Overview ==

: ''Everything turns on its head as the survivors vote for a new president -- and vote for their fate.''

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]], the marines, and the [[resistance (movement)|resistance]] continue to take fire from Cylon centurions and artillery. They make their way up a hill, and hold their position.
*The Cylons hold fire, and Sharon remarks that the Cylons will attempt to capture them with non-lethal weapons, such as gas.
*Eighteen hours later, they emerge to find that the Cylons have disappeared. [[Cavil]] -- who suddenly appears behind them -- announces that the Cylons have left the Twelve Colonies and that humanity was spared.

===In the Fleet===

*[[Cally]] is cleared back to work by [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]], despite having her jaw wired shut (which elicits a sexist observation from the doctor). [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] visits her, apologizing for the attack. Cally forgives him, saying that she's always cared for him.

*[[Gaius Baltar|Dr. Baltar]] continues to gain in the polls. On ''[[Colonial One]]'', Tory mentions there's always a victory plan. [[Laura Roslin|Roslin]] later calls a private meeting with Dr. Baltar, asking to deliver a joint statement of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_%28verb%29 tabling] the issue of colonization until after the election, which Baltar rejects.

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] returns to ''[[Galactica (RDM)|Galactica]]'', with the resistance fighters, much to the delight of Admiral Adama. She mentions the fact that the Cylons have left Caprica, and a man appearing to be Brother Cavill confirms it. He also says he has a message, but is attacked by Chief Tyrol, claiming he's a Cylon. Both Cavill and Caprica-Sharon are escorted to the brig under marine guard.

*The other Cavill (from last episode) is also taken to the brig, claiming he's not a Cylon, but changes his tune upon seeing his "brother", as he calls him. Both Cavills then talk about the fact that the “war heroes” (Caprica Six & ''Galactica''-Sharon) have talked about how the attack of the colonies and the pursuit of the fleet were mistakes. They were told to relay the message that man and Cylon will go their separate ways. Both Roslin and Admiral Adama are less than trusting regarding the message.

*Election Day has arrived and Baltar has an apparent five thousand-vote lead over Roslin with only a few ships left. On ''Colonial One'', Tory makes a call to ''Galactica'', putting a plan into action.

*Amazingly, Roslin initially appears to have retained the presidency. While most are celebrating, Lt. Gaeta makes a starting discovery regarding the votes, and informs the Admiral that Col. Tigh may be involved in a conspiracy to throw the election.

*Admiral Adama confronts Roslin regarding the conspiracy, saying he has a confession to rig the vote. Roslin admits her involvement and Adama is disappointed.

*Baltar is informed of his nomination as President. He's less than pleased, vowing to have full investigation in time. President-elect Baltar then orders a course for “New Caprica”.

*[[Gaius Baltar]] is sworn in as the new President of the Twelve Colonies, and orders the immediate colonization of New Caprica.

*''[[Cloud 9]]'' is destroyed by a nuclear blast, Gina being present before the explosion; in addition to the ''Cloud 9'', at least two other ships are destroyed in the blast. Admiral Adama reports to the president that this may be a Cylon attack, but Baltar ignores him and presses forward with colonization.

===One Year Later===

*[[Felix Gaeta|Mr. Gaeta]] is reporting to the President regarding a Union issue aboard Colonial One, now down on the planet. Baltar is upset, saying there have been no Cylon attacks but the people still complain. He has regressed, turning to alcohol, medication, and womanizing.

*Admiral Adama, now donning a mustache, is walking around a near-empty Galactica, the ship falling into disarray. Over half of the crew has moved down to the planet, and they are running on such a skeleton crew that they barely have enough pilots to fly training missions, much less a good CAP. Adama has a discussion with Tigh about going down to the planet, which Tigh reluctantly agrees to.

*[[Samuel Anders|Anders]], now Kara’s husband, is sick with pneumonia. Dr. Cottle is saying he can’t do much for him, saying there are no antibiotics available, but he is young and healthy, and with a little luck he "should" pull through.

*Kara runs into the Tighs as [[Tyrol]], now a union boss, is making a speech to begin a strike, a pregnant Cally by his side. Saul mentions that Pegasus keeps the backup medical supplies and that Apollo would spring some for Starbuck. Starbuck disagrees, which prompts Tigh to state that Apollo would be "over that by now".

*Kara calls Lee aboard Pegasus to requesting medication. Lee's gained a lot of weight in the past year. Dualla is now an officer, serving by Lee Adama's side in Pegasus' CIC. Before Lee can reply, Dualla catches something on [[DRADIS]].

*A fleet of [[Cylon]] [[Basestar (RDM)|basestar]]s arrive in orbit around New Caprica. The Adamas are having a discussion about what to do, when [[Helo]] asks if alert fighters should be launched. Admiral Adama keeps them in as the defense fleet jumps away.

*Mr. Gaeta informs the President of the Cylon approach. Later, before his assembled staff, copies of Number 5, 8, and 6 approach the President. The Cylons declare that as long as there’s no resistance, no harm will come. President Baltar declares surrender on behalf of the colonists, and as Cylon armies occupy the planet, Kara vows to resist.

== Questions ==

*What "number" is Cavil?
*Was Roslin's threat to put the two Cavils into space actually carried out?
**Most likely not, she had the election on her mind, much to do, and didn't actually make it an order. Baltar would have been unlikely to vent them into space.
*Where did the defense fleet jump to?
**Likely a prearranged rendezvous point, similar to that of the miniseries.
*Where is Caprica-Sharon?
**Most likely, still in ''Galactica'''s brig. This is probably why Helo is still aboard ship, having taken a CIC officer's position.
**In the podcast, Ron Moore vaguely hinted that they hadn't forgotten about Sharon, but that we'd have to "wait and see". Apparently, several of the early season 3 episodes will have flashbacks dealing with events that took place in the year that passed.
*What happened to Zarek?
*Why is Leoben looking for Starbuck, specifically?
** Could it be the same [[Leoben Conoy]] that Starbuck interrogated in "[[Flesh and Bone]]"?
*** As seen with ''Galactica''-Sharon, it is distinctly possible that that particular Leoben was lying when he said he'd actually die and not download.
*Did the Cavils lie about the pursuit of humanity being a mistake? Or were they telling the truth?
** If they were telling the truth, perhaps not all Cylons are readily able to admit and rectify their mistakes as the Cavils believed.
*Why has the population (until Tyrol's recent union speech) accepted Baltar's imperious rule? People were hardly so passive under Roslin. Indeed, Adama executed a military coup over a rather less important issue than giving a nuclear weapon to a Cylon agent.
**Admiral Adama wasn't conclusive as to how the weapon got on board Cloud Nine.
***Baltar pointed out there have been no attacks since he took office. Under Roslin the attacks were common. Perhaps for a year the people decided they preferred the safety Baltar gave them to their liberties.
*Are the Six and Eight that Baltar surrendered to [[Caprica-Six]] and [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|''Galactica''-Sharon]]?
**Judging from Six's reaction to Baltar, almost definitely.
*Where did the Cylon fleets go, after they left the Twelve Colonies? Cavil was deliberately vague when asked if they simply returned to the [[Cylon homeworld]].
*How many people died in the Cloud Nine explosion?
**The Cloud Nine explosion also destroyed ships near it. Given the stated size of the New Caprica population along with subtracting the minimal crew sizes needed to maintain the ships in orbit, you can estimate that approximately 3000 to 5000 people died.
*When Gina-Six was instantly vaporized due to being only two feet from a nuclear detonation, did she still transmit her consciousness? Was she even capable of transmitting considering that any internal hardware responsible for this task would have been instantly destroyed?
**They have already established that with the [[Resurrection Ship]] destroyed, Cylons in the fleet that are killed will ''actually'' die. Gina expressed suicidal impulses as early as "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]".
*Given Roslin's memories of Baltar with Six, why didn't Admiral Adama suspect Baltar of handing over the nuke to the cylons? If he did suspect him, why not act on it?
**He had no real proof.
*Did the events of "One Year Later" actually happen, or were they a dream or vision sequence given to Baltar?
**Although Baltar has had elaborate visions in the past, this vision left Baltar's point of view several times, addressing issues such as the marriage of Kara to Sam Anders and Adama's friendship with Tigh that are of little knowledge or importance to Baltar.
***Ron D. Moore has stated in interviews that the first 4-5 episodes of season 3 will deal with the Cylon occupation of New Caprica, and unless a vast swath of episodes is going to be a dream sequence, all of these "one year later" events ''really'' happen.
*Why was it so easy for Adama to hide the collusion of the rigged election from the press, and why were there no consequences?
**So far as we know, Adama, Tigh, Gaeta, Dualla, Dualla's two associates, Tory, and Roslin are the only people that knew; 6 are military personnel, 4 of whom would be implicated, and the other 2 were directly involved civilians. All are strongly motivated to conceal the information.
* Why would it take the Cylons over one year to find New Caprica, alerted by the nuclear detonation prior to the inhabitation of the planet?
**It was stated in the previous episode that the interference from the gas cloud surrounding it would hide the planet fairly well. The Cylons were slightly over a light year away, according to the Number Five. Searching something as large as the gas cloud likely is for a planet or fleet is, given the sensor range limitations, quite impressive to accomplish in months, even with general directional information from a light-year out.
***Actually with the Cylon base 1 light year away, it would take 1 year for the nuke to show up on the Cylon sensors. Short of some FTL communication system, that's the only way the Cylons would have been able to detect the planet. Since the fleet is all in within non-FTL distances, all the FTL devices, if any exist would likely have been destroyed or disabled.
*If the Cylons really left the Twelve Colonies, leaving behind a nuked-out wasteland, what happened to all of the human captives in the [[Farms]]?
*Why have the Cylons returned? According to [[Cavil]], the two races were to go their "separate ways". The Cylons may have been worried about the humans retaliating at some point in the future, but the location of the Cylon world(s) is still unknown to the humans, so ensuring the safety of their society presumably isn't the motive behind the occupation of [[New Caprica]].
*Will the Cylons resume their pursuit of the Fleet?
*How many people are left in the Fleet?
**The population of New Caprica City is given as 39,192. There were just under 50,000 people in the Fleet before establishing the settlement, so that gives a figure of roughly 10,000, ignoring any births and deaths that have taken place during the year since the election. This almost certainly means that both ''Galactica'' and ''Pegasus'' will be extremely short on crew, as many military personnel will have been left on the planet. There was clearly no time to retrieve even selected members of the crews before the Fleet jumped.

== Analysis ==
*Baltar's arrogance seems to have led to corrupt rule during his year on New Caprica—he replaces Roslin's modest desk with a larger, elaborate one, replaces the population count whiteboard with a portrait of himself, and keeps a harem aboard the landed Colonial One.
*After a whole year, everyone is still living in tents. There is a vital shortage of medicine, the military is of no use, and labor conditions are apparently intolerable. Baltar's administration is apparently as incompetent as Roslin feared.
**It is not clear whether these conditions are the result of admimistrative incompetence or the inherent difficulties of colonizing a marginally habitable planet.
*It's ironic that the obligations of duty keep Lee Adama aboard Pegasus while everyone else goes planetside—he is a reserve officer, and promised to build his pilots a bar as soon as they found a habitable planet.
*Ron Moore has once again decided to play with viewer's expectations; in the podcast for "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II]]" Moore commented on how everyone assumed that ''Pegasus'' would be destroyed by the end of the episode, and thus he thought it would be a good twist to keep ''Pegasus'' alive as another ship in the Fleet. Here, many viewers assumed that the nuke that Baltar gave to Gina in "[[Epiphanies]]" would be used to destroy ''Pegasus'' this time, but it wasn't.
*29 people died between this episode and the preceding one? One or two Raptors were lost, and some Marines died on Caprica, but that doesn't seem high enough.
**Is it possible they took out all of the people who left in the raptors because they were not apart of the fleet at the end of the previous episode?
***They didn't remove Starbuck from the count when she left for Caprica at the beginning of Season 2.
*It seems odd that no mention was made of the casualties on the return from Caprica, just jubilant celebration?
**Although they didn't actually talk about the losses, there was a shot of a wounded person being taken away on a stretcher.

== Notes ==
* '''According to Ron Moore's podcast, although Scifi Channel was willing to air this episode as a 90-minute special, it had to be heavily edited down for international distribution; outside of the United States, viewers will only see a 1 hour version of the episode, which Moore regards as "almost incomprehensible".''' Many plot threads, such as the entire Cally/Tyrol subplot, were completely removed from the one hour version.
* Ron Moore's podcast for episode 13, [[Epiphanies]], states that the Nuke given to Gina will come back in this episode, to the benefit of the Cylons.
*In RDM's podcast for the previous episode, he said that in early drafts of this special 90 minute long episode, the writers actually tried to make it a 2 hour special, but this was soon dropped (these times are including commercials).
*The election board appears to have a definitive list of the names of all of the ships in [[The Fleet (RDM)]]. Not all of them are clearly visible, but this would seem to indicate that the writers do have an actual list that they get new ship names from. Ship names visible on the chart are: Demetrius, Diomedes, Embla Brokk, Enkidu, Epheme, Galactica, Gideon, Gemenon Traveller, Greenleaf, Monarch, Odysseus, Pegasus, Persephone, Prometheus, Swordfish
*The framed photo of President Roslin and [[Billy Keikeya]] was still on her desk during the election.
*When Roslin "won" the rigged election results, Roslin received 24,265 votes, while Baltar recieved 22,266. This means that the elligible voters in the Fleet number 46,531. In the podcast, RDM explains that he quickly came up with these numbers, to try to reflect roughly how many survivors are below the voting age.
*Toward the end of the episode, President Baltar refers to a government body called the "People's Council". This may be the proportionally elected lower house mentioned in by RDM in his [http://blog.scifi.com/battlestar/archives/2005/01/index.html#a000016 blog post] on January 30, 2005.
*[[Hera]] is seen on New Caprica in the same white cradle that Baltar had a vision of her being in in "[[Scattered]]", etc. According to RDM's podcast it's actually the exact same cradle.
*Tyrol's union speech is an almost word for word quote of Mario Savio's address during the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley in 1964. According to Ron Moore and David Eick in the podcast, they even got permission from Savio's widow to use it (even though, due to the way copyright laws work from back then, they could have just used it without permission, they felt they should get it). As a result, it's even listed in the credits: "Mario Savio speech excerpted couresy of: Lynne Hollander Savio". Actor Aaron Douglas (Chief [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]]) actually studied film of Savio, so all of the hand gestures Tyrol makes when he gives the speech are gestures that Savio actually used.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*''Dr. Cottle decides Cally is ready to return to duty:''
:'''Cottle:''' You're done here. I'm kickin' you out of here and sending you back to work.
:'''Cally:''' (muffled, because her jaw is immobilized) Work??? Like this?
:'''Cottle:''' You gotta love a woman who can complain even with her jaw wired shut.

*''The Cylons occupy New Caprica:''
:'''Tyrol:''' "What do we do now, Captain?"
:'''Starbuck:''' "Same thing we always do. Fight them until we can't."

*''Trying to bring order to a Union meeting:''
:'''Tyrol:''' Everyone, please be quiet.
:'''Cally:''' Hey! Shut the frak up! (''crowd quiets down'')

*'''Admiral Adama:''' We're leaving. But we'll be back.

== Official Statements ==

From the official site (http://www.scifi.com/battlestar/):
When Baltar wins the vote, Roslin considers stealing the election because she believes he is a Cylon collaborator.

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] as [[Cavil|Brother Cavil]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*[[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*[[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Leoben Conoy]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0443286/ David Kaye] as [[James McManus]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Winston Rekert as Priest

=== Writing & Direction ===


=== Production Notes ===

*Series 2 (2005 / 2006)
*Production Number: 2.20
*Airdate Order: 20 (of 20)

=== First Run Air Dates & Releases ===

*UK Airdate: Date
*US Airdate: Date
*DVD Release (UK): Date
*DVD Release (US): Date
*[[Wikipedia:Nielsen Rating|Nielsen Rating]]: X.X million households, XXX share

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Anne Cofell Saunders]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Mark Verheiden]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Michael Rymer]]

Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II

2006-03-11T16:56:20Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Burdens2.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 20
| Guests= [[Richard Hatch]] ([[Tom Zarek]]) [[Kate Vernon]] ([[Ellen Tigh]]) [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] ([[Cavil|Brother Cavil]])
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm1093194|Anne Cofell Saunders]], [[IMDB:nm0894156|Mark Verheiden]]
| Story=
| Director=[[Michael Rymer]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= March 10, 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,550
| Prev= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
| Next= TBA
}}

== Overview ==

: ''Everything turns on its head as the survivors vote for a new president -- and vote for their fate.''

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]], the marines, and the [[resistance (movement)|resistance]] continue to take fire from Cylon centurions and artillery. They make their way up a hill, and hold their position.
*The Cylons hold fire, and Sharon remarks that the Cylons will attempt to capture them with non-lethal weapons, such as gas.
*Eighteen hours later, they emerge to find that the Cylons have disappeared. [[Cavil]] -- who suddenly appears behind them -- announces that the Cylons have left the Twelve Colonies and that humanity was spared.

===In the Fleet===

*[[Cally]] is cleared back to work by [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]], despite having her jaw wired shut (which elicits a sexist observation from the doctor). [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] visits her, apologizing for the attack. Cally forgives him, saying that she's always cared for him.

*[[Gaius Baltar|Dr. Baltar]] continues to gain in the polls. On ''[[Colonial One]]'', Tory mentions there's always a victory plan. [[Laura Roslin|Roslin]] later calls a private meeting with Dr. Baltar, asking to deliver a joint statement of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_%28verb%29 tabling] the issue of colonization until after the election, which Baltar rejects.

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] returns to ''[[Galactica (RDM)|Galactica]]'', with the resistance fighters, much to the delight of Admiral Adama. She mentions the fact that the Cylons have left Caprica, and a man appearing to be Brother Cavill confirms it. He also says he has a message, but is attacked by Chief Tyrol, claiming he's a Cylon. Both Cavill and Caprica-Sharon are escorted to the brig under marine guard.

*The other Cavill (from last episode) is also taken to the brig, claiming he's not a Cylon, but changes his tune upon seeing his "brother", as he calls him. Both Cavills then talk about the fact that the “war heroes” (Caprica Six & ''Galactica''-Sharon) have talked about how the attack of the colonies and the pursuit of the fleet were mistakes. They were told to relay the message that man and Cylon will go their separate ways. Both Roslin and Admiral Adama are less than trusting regarding the message.

*Election Day has arrived and Baltar has an apparent five thousand-vote lead over Roslin with only a few ships left. On ''Colonial One'', Tory makes a call to ''Galactica'', putting a plan into action.

*Amazingly, Roslin initially appears to have retained the presidency. While most are celebrating, Lt. Gaeta makes a starting discovery regarding the votes, and informs the Admiral that Col. Tigh may be involved in a conspiracy to throw the election.

*Admiral Adama confronts Roslin regarding the conspiracy, saying he has a confession to rig the vote. Roslin admits her involvement and Adama is disappointed.

*Baltar is informed of his nomination as President. He's less than pleased, vowing to have full investigation in time. President-elect Baltar then orders a course for “New Caprica”.

*[[Gaius Baltar]] is sworn in as the new President of the Twelve Colonies, and orders the immediate colonization of New Caprica.

*''[[Cloud 9]]'' is destroyed by a nuclear blast, Gina being present before the explosion; in addition to the ''Cloud 9'', at least two other ships are destroyed in the blast. Admiral Adama reports to the president that this may be a Cylon attack, but Baltar ignores him and presses forward with colonization.

===One Year Later===

*[[Felix Gaeta|Mr. Gaeta]] is reporting to the President regarding a Union issue aboard Colonial One, now down on the planet. Baltar is upset, saying there have been no Cylon attacks but the people still complain. He has regressed, turning to alcohol, medication, and womanizing.

*Admiral Adama, now donning a mustache, is walking around a near-empty Galactica, the ship falling into disarray. Over half of the crew has moved down to the planet, and they are running on such a skeleton crew that they barely have enough pilots to fly training missions, much less a good CAP. Adama has a discussion with Tigh about going down to the planet, which Tigh reluctantly agrees to.

*[[Samuel Anders|Anders]], now Kara’s husband, is sick with pneumonia. Dr. Cottle is saying he can’t do much for him, saying there are no antibiotics available, but he is young and healthy, and with a little luck he "should" pull through.

*Kara runs into the Tighs as [[Tyrol]], now a union boss, is making a speech to begin a strike, a pregnant Cally by his side. Saul mentions that Pegasus keeps the backup medical supplies and that Apollo would spring some for Starbuck. Starbuck disagrees, which prompts Tigh to state that Apollo would be "over that by now".

*Kara calls Lee aboard Pegasus to requesting medication. Lee's gained a lot of weight in the past year. Dualla is now an officer, serving by Lee Adama's side in Pegasus' CIC. Before Lee can reply, Dualla catches something on [[DRADIS]].

*A fleet of [[Cylon]] [[Basestar (RDM)|basestar]]s arrive in orbit around New Caprica. The Adamas are having a discussion about what to do, when [[Helo]] asks if alert fighters should be launched. Admiral Adama keeps them in as the defense fleet jumps away.

*Mr. Gaeta informs the President of the Cylon approach. Later, before his assembled staff, copies of Number 5, 8, and 6 approach the President. The Cylons declare that as long as there’s no resistance, no harm will come. President Baltar declares surrender on behalf of the colonists, and as Cylon armies occupy the planet, Kara vows to resist.

== Questions ==

*What "number" is Cavil?
*Was Roslin's threat to put the two Cavils into space actually carried out?
**Most likely not, she had the election on her mind, much to do, and didn't actually make it an order. Baltar would have been unlikely to vent them into space.
*Where did the defense fleet jump to?
**Likely a prearranged rendezvous point, similar to that of the miniseries.
*Where is Caprica-Sharon?
**Most likely, still in ''Galactica'''s brig. This is probably why Helo is still aboard ship, having taken a CIC officer's position.
**In the podcast, Ron Moore vaguely hinted that they hadn't forgotten about Sharon, but that we'd have to "wait and see". Apparently, several of the early season 3 episodes will have flashbacks dealing with events that took place in the year that passed.
*What happened to Zarek?
*Why is Leoben looking for Starbuck, specifically?
** Could it be the same [[Leoben Conoy]] that Starbuck interrogated in "[[Flesh and Bone]]"?
*** As seen with ''Galactica''-Sharon, it is distinctly possible that that particular Leoben was lying when he said he'd actually die and not download.
*Did the Cavils lie about the pursuit of humanity being a mistake? Or were they telling the truth?
** If they were telling the truth, perhaps not all Cylons are readily able to admit and rectify their mistakes as the Cavils believed.
*Why has the population (until Tyrol's recent union speech) accepted Baltar's imperious rule? People were hardly so passive under Roslin. Indeed, Adama executed a military coup over a rather less important issue than giving a nuclear weapon to a Cylon agent.
**Admiral Adama wasn't conclusive as to how the weapon got on board Cloud Nine.
***Baltar pointed out there have been no attacks since he took office. Under Roslin the attacks were common. Perhaps for a year the people decided they preferred the safety Baltar gave them to their liberties.
*Are the Six and Eight that Baltar surrendered to [[Caprica-Six]] and [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|''Galactica''-Sharon]]?
**Judging from Six's reaction to Baltar, almost definitely.
*Where did the Cylon fleets go, after they left the Twelve Colonies? Cavil was deliberately vague when asked if they simply returned to the [[Cylon homeworld]].
*How many people died in the Cloud Nine explosion?
**The Cloud Nine explosion also destroyed ships near it. Given the stated size of the New Caprica population along with subtracting the minimal crew sizes needed to maintain the ships in orbit, you can estimate that approximately 3000 to 5000 people died.
*When Gina-Six was instantly vaporized due to being only two feet from a nuclear detonation, did she still transmit her consciousness? Was she even capable of transmitting considering that any internal hardware responsible for this task would have been instantly destroyed?
**They have already established that with the [[Resurrection Ship]] destroyed, Cylons in the fleet that are killed will ''actually'' die. Gina expressed suicidal impulses as early as "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]".
*Given Roslin's memories of Baltar with Six, why didn't Admiral Adama suspect Baltar of handing over the nuke to the cylons? If he did suspect him, why not act on it?
**He had no real proof.
*Did the events of "One Year Later" actually happen, or were they a dream or vision sequence given to Baltar?
**Although Baltar has had elaborate visions in the past, this vision left Baltar's point of view several times, addressing issues such as the marriage of Kara to Sam Anders and Adama's friendship with Tigh that are of little knowledge or importance to Baltar.
***Ron D. Moore has stated in interviews that the first 4-5 episodes of season 3 will deal with the Cylon occupation of New Caprica, and unless a vast swath of episodes is going to be a dream sequence, all of these "one year later" events ''really'' happen.
*Why was it so easy for Adama to hide the collusion of the rigged election from the press, and why were there no consequences?
**So far as we know, Adama, Tigh, Gaeta, Dualla, Dualla's two associates, Tory, and Roslin are the only people that knew; 6 are military personnel, 4 of whom would be implicated, and the other 2 were directly involved civilians. All are strongly motivated to conceal the information.
* Why would it take the Cylons over one year to find New Caprica, alerted by the nuclear detonation prior to the inhabitation of the planet?
**It was stated in the previous episode that the interference from the gas cloud surrounding it would hide the planet fairly well. The Cylons were slightly over a light year away, according to the Number Five. Searching something as large as the gas cloud likely is for a planet or fleet is, given the sensor range limitations, quite impressive to accomplish in months, even with general directional information from a light-year out.
***Actually with the Cylon base 1 light year away, it would take 1 year for the nuke to show up on the Cylon sensors. Short of some FTL communication system, that's the only way the Cylons would have been able to detect the planet. Since the fleet is all in within non-FTL distances, all the FTL devices, if any exist would likely have been destroyed or disabled.
*If the Cylons really left the Twelve Colonies, leaving behind a nuked-out wasteland, what happened to all of the human captives in the [[Farms]]?
*Why have the Cylons returned? According to [[Cavil]], the two races were to go their "separate ways". The Cylons may have been worried about the humans retaliating at some point in the future, but the location of the Cylon world(s) is still unknown to the humans, so ensuring the safety of their society presumably isn't the motive behind the occupation of [[New Caprica]].
*Will the Cylons resume their pursuit of the Fleet?
*How many people are left in the Fleet?
**The population of New Caprica City is given as 39,192. There were just under 50,000 people in the Fleet before establishing the settlement, so that gives a figure of roughly 10,000, ignoring any births and deaths that have taken place during the year since the election. This almost certainly means that both ''Galactica'' and ''Pegasus'' will be extremely short on crew, as many military personnel will have been left on the planet.

== Analysis ==
*Baltar's arrogance seems to have led to corrupt rule during his year on New Caprica—he replaces Roslin's modest desk with a larger, elaborate one, replaces the population count whiteboard with a portrait of himself, and keeps a harem aboard the landed Colonial One.
*After a whole year, everyone is still living in tents. There is a vital shortage of medicine, the military is of no use, and labor conditions are apparently intolerable. Baltar's administration is apparently as incompetent as Roslin feared.
**It is not clear whether these conditions are the result of admimistrative incompetence or the inherent difficulties of colonizing a marginally habitable planet.
*It's ironic that the obligations of duty keep Lee Adama aboard Pegasus while everyone else goes planetside—he is a reserve officer, and promised to build his pilots a bar as soon as they found a habitable planet.
*Ron Moore has once again decided to play with viewer's expectations; in the podcast for "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II]]" Moore commented on how everyone assumed that ''Pegasus'' would be destroyed by the end of the episode, and thus he thought it would be a good twist to keep ''Pegasus'' alive as another ship in the Fleet. Here, many viewers assumed that the nuke that Baltar gave to Gina in "[[Epiphanies]]" would be used to destroy ''Pegasus'' this time, but it wasn't.
*29 people died between this episode and the preceding one? One or two Raptors were lost, and some Marines died on Caprica, but that doesn't seem high enough.
**Is it possible they took out all of the people who left in the raptors because they were not apart of the fleet at the end of the previous episode?
***They didn't remove Starbuck from the count when she left for Caprica at the beginning of Season 2.
*It seems odd that no mention was made of the casualties on the return from Caprica, just jubilant celebration?
**Although they didn't actually talk about the losses, there was a shot of a wounded person being taken away on a stretcher.

== Notes ==
* '''According to Ron Moore's podcast, although Scifi Channel was willing to air this episode as a 90-minute special, it had to be heavily edited down for international distribution; outside of the United States, viewers will only see a 1 hour version of the episode, which Moore regards as "almost incomprehensible".''' Many plot threads, such as the entire Cally/Tyrol subplot, were completely removed from the one hour version.
* Ron Moore's podcast for episode 13, [[Epiphanies]], states that the Nuke given to Gina will come back in this episode, to the benefit of the Cylons.
*In RDM's podcast for the previous episode, he said that in early drafts of this special 90 minute long episode, the writers actually tried to make it a 2 hour special, but this was soon dropped (these times are including commercials).
*The election board appears to have a definitive list of the names of all of the ships in [[The Fleet (RDM)]]. Not all of them are clearly visible, but this would seem to indicate that the writers do have an actual list that they get new ship names from. Ship names visible on the chart are: Demetrius, Diomedes, Embla Brokk, Enkidu, Epheme, Galactica, Gideon, Gemenon Traveller, Greenleaf, Monarch, Odysseus, Pegasus, Persephone, Prometheus, Swordfish
*The framed photo of President Roslin and [[Billy Keikeya]] was still on her desk during the election.
*When Roslin "won" the rigged election results, Roslin received 24,265 votes, while Baltar recieved 22,266. This means that the elligible voters in the Fleet number 46,531. In the podcast, RDM explains that he quickly came up with these numbers, to try to reflect roughly how many survivors are below the voting age.
*Toward the end of the episode, President Baltar refers to a government body called the "People's Council". This may be the proportionally elected lower house mentioned in by RDM in his [http://blog.scifi.com/battlestar/archives/2005/01/index.html#a000016 blog post] on January 30, 2005.
*[[Hera]] is seen on New Caprica in the same white cradle that Baltar had a vision of her being in in "[[Scattered]]", etc. According to RDM's podcast it's actually the exact same cradle.
*Tyrol's union speech is an almost word for word quote of Mario Savio's address during the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley in 1964. According to Ron Moore and David Eick in the podcast, they even got permission from Savio's widow to use it (even though, due to the way copyright laws work from back then, they could have just used it without permission, they felt they should get it). As a result, it's even listed in the credits: "Mario Savio speech excerpted couresy of: Lynne Hollander Savio". Actor Aaron Douglas (Chief [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]]) actually studied film of Savio, so all of the hand gestures Tyrol makes when he gives the speech are gestures that Savio actually used.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*''Dr. Cottle decides Cally is ready to return to duty:''
:'''Cottle:''' You're done here. I'm kickin' you out of here and sending you back to work.
:'''Cally:''' (muffled, because her jaw is immobilized) Work??? Like this?
:'''Cottle:''' You gotta love a woman who can complain even with her jaw wired shut.

*''The Cylons occupy New Caprica:''
:'''Tyrol:''' "What do we do now, Captain?"
:'''Starbuck:''' "Same thing we always do. Fight them until we can't."

*''Trying to bring order to a Union meeting:''
:'''Tyrol:''' Everyone, please be quiet.
:'''Cally:''' Hey! Shut the frak up! (''crowd quiets down'')

*'''Admiral Adama:''' We're leaving. But we'll be back.

== Official Statements ==

From the official site (http://www.scifi.com/battlestar/):
When Baltar wins the vote, Roslin considers stealing the election because she believes he is a Cylon collaborator.

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] as [[Cavil|Brother Cavil]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*[[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*[[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Leoben Conoy]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0443286/ David Kaye] as [[James McManus]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Winston Rekert as Priest

=== Writing & Direction ===


=== Production Notes ===

*Series 2 (2005 / 2006)
*Production Number: 2.20
*Airdate Order: 20 (of 20)

=== First Run Air Dates & Releases ===

*UK Airdate: Date
*US Airdate: Date
*DVD Release (UK): Date
*DVD Release (US): Date
*[[Wikipedia:Nielsen Rating|Nielsen Rating]]: X.X million households, XXX share

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Anne Cofell Saunders]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Mark Verheiden]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Michael Rymer]]

Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II

2006-03-11T16:06:50Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Burdens2.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 20
| Guests= [[Richard Hatch]] ([[Tom Zarek]]) [[Kate Vernon]] ([[Ellen Tigh]]) [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] ([[Cavil|Brother Cavil]])
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm1093194|Anne Cofell Saunders]], [[IMDB:nm0894156|Mark Verheiden]]
| Story=
| Director=[[Michael Rymer]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= March 10, 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,550
| Prev= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
| Next= TBA
}}

== Overview ==

: ''Everything turns on its head as the survivors vote for a new president -- and vote for their fate.''

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]], the marines, and the [[resistance (movement)|resistance]] continue to take fire from Cylon centurions and artillery. They make their way up a hill, and hold their position.
*The Cylons hold fire, and Sharon remarks that the Cylons will attempt to capture them with non-lethal weapons, such as gas.
*Eighteen hours later, they emerge to find that the Cylons have disappeared. [[Cavil]] -- who suddenly appears behind them -- announces that the Cylons have left the Twelve Colonies and that humanity was spared.

===In the Fleet===

*[[Cally]] is cleared back to work by [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]], despite having her jaw wired shut (which elicits a sexist observation from the doctor). [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] visits her, apologizing for the attack. Cally forgives him, saying that she's always cared for him.

*[[Gaius Baltar|Dr. Baltar]] continues to gain in the polls. On ''[[Colonial One]]'', Tory mentions there's always a victory plan. [[Laura Roslin|Roslin]] later calls a private meeting with Dr. Baltar, asking to deliver a joint statement of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_%28verb%29 tabling] the issue of colonization until after the election, which Baltar rejects.

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] returns to ''[[Galactica (RDM)|Galactica]]'', with the resistance fighters, much to the delight of Admiral Adama. She mentions the fact that the Cylons have left Caprica, and a man appearing to be Brother Cavill confirms it. He also says he has a message, but is attacked by Chief Tyrol, claiming he's a Cylon. Both Cavill and Caprica-Sharon are escorted to the brig under marine guard.

*The other Cavill (from last episode) is also taken to the brig, claiming he's not a Cylon, but changes his tune upon seeing his "brother", as he calls him. Both Cavills then talk about the fact that the “war heroes” (Caprica Six & ''Galactica''-Sharon) have talked about how the attack of the colonies and the pursuit of the fleet were mistakes. They were told to relay the message that man and Cylon will go their separate ways. Both Roslin and Admiral Adama are less than trusting regarding the message.

*Election Day has arrived and Baltar has an apparent five thousand-vote lead over Roslin with only a few ships left. On ''Colonial One'', Tory makes a call to ''Galactica'', putting a plan into action.

*Amazingly, Roslin initially appears to have retained the presidency. While most are celebrating, Lt. Gaeta makes a starting discovery regarding the votes, and informs the Admiral that Col. Tigh may be involved in a conspiracy to throw the election.

*Admiral Adama confronts Roslin regarding the conspiracy, saying he has a confession to rig the vote. Roslin admits her involvement and Adama is disappointed.

*Baltar is informed of his nomination as President. He's less than pleased, vowing to have full investigation in time. President-elect Baltar then orders a course for “New Caprica”.

*[[Gaius Baltar]] is sworn in as the new President of the Twelve Colonies, and orders the immediate colonization of New Caprica.

*''[[Cloud 9]]'' is destroyed by a nuclear blast, Gina being present before the explosion; in addition to the ''Cloud 9'', at least two other ships are destroyed in the blast. Admiral Adama reports to the president that this may be a Cylon attack, but Baltar ignores him and presses forward with colonization.

===One Year Later===

*[[Felix Gaeta|Mr. Gaeta]] is reporting to the President regarding a Union issue aboard Colonial One, now down on the planet. Baltar is upset, saying there have been no Cylon attacks but the people still complain. He has regressed, turning to alcohol, medication, and womanizing.

*Admiral Adama, now donning a mustache, is walking around a near-empty Galactica, the ship falling into disarray. Over half of the crew has moved down to the planet, and they are running on such a skeleton crew that they barely have enough pilots to fly training missions, much less a good CAP. Adama has a discussion with Tigh about going down to the planet, which Tigh reluctantly agrees to.

*[[Samuel Anders|Anders]], now Kara’s husband, is sick with pneumonia. Dr. Cottle is saying he can’t do much for him, saying there are no antibiotics available, but he is young and healthy, and with a little luck he "should" pull through.

*Kara runs into the Tighs as [[Tyrol]], now a union boss, is making a speech to begin a strike, a pregnant Cally by his side. Saul mentions that Pegasus keeps the backup medical supplies and that Apollo would spring some for Starbuck. Starbuck disagrees, which prompts Tigh to state that Apollo would be "over that by now".

*Kara calls Lee aboard Pegasus to requesting medication. Lee's gained a lot of weight in the past year. Dualla is now an officer, serving by Lee Adama's side in Pegasus' CIC. Before Lee can reply, Dualla catches something on [[DRADIS]].

*A fleet of [[Cylon]] [[Basestar (RDM)|basestar]]s arrive in orbit around New Caprica. The Adamas are having a discussion about what to do, when [[Helo]] asks if alert fighters should be launched. Admiral Adama keeps them in as the defense fleet jumps away.

*Mr. Gaeta informs the President of the Cylon approach. Later, before his assembled staff, copies of Number 5, 8, and 6 approach the President. The Cylons declare that as long as there’s no resistance, no harm will come. President Baltar declares surrender on behalf of the colonists, and as Cylon armies occupy the planet, Kara vows to resist.

== Questions ==

*What "number" is Cavil?
*Was Roslin's threat to put the two Cavils into space actually carried out?
*Where did the defense fleet jump to?
**Likely a prearranged rendezvous point, similar to that of the miniseries.
*Where is Caprica-Sharon?
**Most likely, still in ''Galactica'''s brig. This is probably why Helo is still aboard ship, having taken a CIC officer's position.
**In the podcast, Ron Moore vaguely hinted that they hadn't forgotten about Sharon, but that we'd have to "wait and see". Apparently, several of the early season 3 episodes will have flashbacks dealing with events that took place in the year that passed.
*What happened to Zarek?
*Why is Leoben looking for Starbuck, specifically?
** Could it be the same [[Leoben Conoy]] that Starbuck interrogated in "[[Flesh and Bone]]"?
*** As seen with ''Galactica''-Sharon, it is distinctly possible that that particular Leoben was lying when he said he'd actually die and not download.
*Did the Cavils lie about the pursuit of humanity being a mistake? Or were they telling the truth?
** If they were telling the truth, perhaps not all Cylons are readily able to admit and rectify their mistakes as the Cavils believed.
*Why has the population (until Tyrol's recent union speech) accepted Baltar's imperious rule? People were hardly so passive under Roslin. Indeed, Adama executed a military coup over a rather less important issue than giving a nuclear weapon to a Cylon agent.
**Admiral Adama wasn't conclusive as to how the weapon got on board Cloud Nine.
***Baltar pointed out there have been no attacks since he took office. Under Roslin the attacks were common. Perhaps for a year the people decided they preferred the safety Baltar gave them to their liberties.
*Are the Six and Eight that Baltar surrendered to [[Caprica-Six]] and [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|''Galactica''-Sharon]]?
**Judging from Six's reaction to Baltar, almost definitely.
*Where did the Cylon fleets go, after they left the Twelve Colonies? Cavil was deliberately vague when asked if they simply returned to the [[Cylon homeworld]].
*How many people died in the Cloud Nine explosion?
*When Gina-Six was instantly vaporized due to being only two feet from a nuclear detonation, did she still transmit her consciousness? Was she even capable of transmitting considering that any internal hardware responsible for this task would have been instantly destroyed?
**They have already established that with the [[Resurrection Ship]] destroyed, Cylons in the fleet that are killed will ''actually'' die. Gina expressed suicidal impulses as early as "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]".
*Given Roslin's memories of Baltar with Six, why didn't Admiral Adama suspect Baltar of handing over the nuke to the cylons? If he did suspect him, why not act on it?
**He had no real proof.
*Did the events of "One Year Later" actually happen, or were they a dream or vision sequence given to Baltar?
**Although Baltar has had elaborate visions in the past, this vision left Baltar's point of view several times, addressing issues such as the marriage of Kara to Sam Anders and Adama's friendship with Tigh that are of little knowledge or importance to Baltar.
***Ron D. Moore has stated in interviews that the first 4-5 episodes of season 3 will deal with the Cylon occupation of New Caprica, and unless a vast swath of episodes is going to be a dream sequence, all of these "one year later" events ''really'' happen.
*Why was it so easy for Adama to hide the collusion of the rigged election from the press, and why were there no consequences?
**So far as we know, Adama, Tigh, Gaeta, Dualla, Dualla's two associates, Tory, and Roslin are the only people that knew; 6 are military personnel, 4 of whom would be implicated, and the other 2 were directly involved civilians. All are strongly motivated to conceal the information.
* Why would it take the Cylons over one year to find New Caprica, alerted by the nuclear detonation prior to the inhabitation of the planet?
**It was stated in the previous episode that the interference from the gas cloud surrounding it would hide the planet fairly well. The Cylons were slightly over a light year away, according to the Number Five. Searching something as large as the gas cloud likely is for a planet or fleet is, given the sensor range limitations, quite impressive to accomplish in months, even with general directional information from a light-year out.
***Actually with the Cylon base 1 light year away, it would take 1 year for the nuke to show up on the Cylon sensors. Short of some FTL communication system, that's the only way the Cylons would have been able to detect the planet. Since the fleet is all in within non-FTL distances, all the FTL devices, if any exist would likely have been destroyed or disabled.
*If the Cylons really left the Twelve Colonies, leaving behind a nuked-out wasteland, what happened to all of the human captives in the [[Farms]]?
*Why have the Cylons returned? According to [[Cavil]], the two races were to go their "separate ways". The Cylons may have been worried about the humans retaliating at some point in the future, but the location of the Cylon world(s) is still unknown to the humans, so ensuring the safety of their society presumably isn't the motive behind the occupation of [[New Caprica]].
*Will the Cylons resume their pursuit of the Fleet?

== Analysis ==
*Baltar's arrogance seems to have led to corrupt rule during his year on New Caprica—he replaces Roslin's modest desk with a larger, elaborate one, replaces the population count whiteboard with a portrait of himself, and keeps a harem aboard the landed Colonial One.
*After a whole year, everyone is still living in tents. There is a vital shortage of medicine, the military is of no use, and labor conditions are apparently intolerable. Baltar's administration is apparently as incompetent as Roslin feared.
**It is not clear whether these conditions are the result of admimistrative incompetence or the inherent difficulties of colonizing a marginally habitable planet.
*It's ironic that the obligations of duty keep Lee Adama aboard Pegasus while everyone else goes planetside—he is a reserve officer, and promised to build his pilots a bar as soon as they found a habitable planet.
*Ron Moore has once again decided to play with viewer's expectations; in the podcast for "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II]]" Moore commented on how everyone assumed that ''Pegasus'' would be destroyed by the end of the episode, and thus he thought it would be a good twist to keep ''Pegasus'' alive as another ship in the Fleet. Here, many viewers assumed that the nuke that Baltar gave to Gina in "[[Epiphanies]]" would be used to destroy ''Pegasus'' this time, but it wasn't.
*29 people died between this episode and the preceding one? One or two Raptors were lost, and some Marines died on Caprica, but that doesn't seem high enough.
**Is it possible they took out all of the people who left in the raptors because they were not apart of the fleet at the end of the previous episode?
***They didn't remove Starbuck from the count when she left for Caprica at the beginning of Season 2.
*It seems odd that no mention was made of the casualties on the return from Caprica, just jubilant celebration?
**Although they didn't actually talk about the losses, there was a shot of a wounded person being taken away on a stretcher.

== Notes ==
* '''According to Ron Moore's podcast, although Scifi Channel was willing to air this episode as a 90-minute special, it had to be heavily edited down for international distribution; outside of the United States, viewers will only see a 1 hour version of the episode, which Moore regards as "almost incomprehensible".''' Many plot threads, such as the entire Cally/Tyrol subplot, were completely removed from the one hour version.
* Ron Moore's podcast for episode 13, [[Epiphanies]], states that the Nuke given to Gina will come back in this episode, to the benefit of the Cylons.
*In RDM's podcast for the previous episode, he said that in early drafts of this special 90 minute long episode, the writers actually tried to make it a 2 hour special, but this was soon dropped (these times are including commercials).
*The election board appears to have a definitive list of the names of all of the ships in [[The Fleet (RDM)]]. Not all of them are clearly visible, but this would seem to indicate that the writers do have an actual list that they get new ship names from. Ship names visible on the chart are: Demetrius, Diomedes, Embla Brokk, Enkidu, Epheme, Galactica, Gideon, Gemenon Traveller, Greenleaf, Monarch, Odysseus, Pegasus, Persephone, Prometheus, Swordfish
*The framed photo of President Roslin and [[Billy Keikeya]] was still on her desk during the election.
*When Roslin "won" the rigged election results, Roslin received 24,265 votes, while Baltar recieved 22,266. This means that the elligible voters in the Fleet number 46,531. In the podcast, RDM explains that he quickly came up with these numbers, to try to reflect roughly how many survivors are below the voting age.
*Toward the end of the episode, President Baltar refers to a government body called the "People's Council". This may be the proportionally elected lower house mentioned in by RDM in his [http://blog.scifi.com/battlestar/archives/2005/01/index.html#a000016 blog post] on January 30, 2005.
*[[Hera]] is seen on New Caprica in the same white cradle that Baltar had a vision of her being in in "[[Scattered]]", etc. According to RDM's podcast it's actually the exact same cradle.
*Tyrol's union speech is an almost word for word quote of Mario Savio's address during the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley in 1964. According to Ron Moore and David Eick in the podcast, they even got permission from Savio's widow to use it (even though, due to the way copyright laws work from back then, they could have just used it without permission, they felt they should get it). As a result, it's even listed in the credits: "Mario Savio speech excerpted couresy of: Lynne Hollander Savio". Actor Aaron Douglas (Chief [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]]) actually studied film of Savio, so all of the hand gestures Tyrol makes when he gives the speech are gestures that Savio actually used.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*''The Cylons occupy New Caprica:''
:'''Tyrol:''' "What do we do now, Captain?"
:'''Starbuck:''' "Same thing we always do. Fight them until we can't."

*''Trying to bring order to a Union meeting:''
:'''Tyrol:''' Everyone, please be quiet.
:'''Cally:''' Hey! Shut the frak up! (''crowd quiets down'')

*'''Admiral Adama:''' We're leaving. But we'll be back.

== Official Statements ==

From the official site (http://www.scifi.com/battlestar/):
When Baltar wins the vote, Roslin considers stealing the election because she believes he is a Cylon collaborator.

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] as [[Cavil|Brother Cavil]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*[[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*[[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Leoben Conoy]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0443286/ David Kaye] as [[James McManus]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Winston Rekert as Priest

=== Writing & Direction ===


=== Production Notes ===

*Series 2 (2005 / 2006)
*Production Number: 2.20
*Airdate Order: 20 (of 20)

=== First Run Air Dates & Releases ===

*UK Airdate: Date
*US Airdate: Date
*DVD Release (UK): Date
*DVD Release (US): Date
*[[Wikipedia:Nielsen Rating|Nielsen Rating]]: X.X million households, XXX share

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Anne Cofell Saunders]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Mark Verheiden]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Michael Rymer]]

Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II

2006-03-11T15:13:14Z

Wedge: /* Analysis */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Burdens2.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 20
| Guests= [[Richard Hatch]] ([[Tom Zarek]]) [[Kate Vernon]] ([[Ellen Tigh]]) [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] ([[Cavil|Brother Cavil]])
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm1093194|Anne Cofell Saunders]], [[IMDB:nm0894156|Mark Verheiden]]
| Story=
| Director=[[Michael Rymer]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= March 10, 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,550
| Prev= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
| Next= TBA
}}

== Overview ==

: ''Everything turns on its head as the survivors vote for a new president -- and vote for their fate.''

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]], the marines, and the [[resistance (movement)|resistance]] continue to take fire from Cylon centurions and artillery. They make their way up a hill, and hold their position.
*The Cylons hold fire, and Sharon remarks that the Cylons will attempt to capture them with non-lethal weapons, such as gas.
*Eighteen hours later, they emerge to find that the Cylons have disappeared. [[Cavil]] -- who suddenly appears behind them -- announces that the Cylons have left the Twelve Colonies and that humanity was spared.

===In the Fleet===

*[[Cally]] is cleared back to work by [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]], despite having her jaw wired shut (which elicits a sexist observation from the doctor). [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] visits her, apologizing for the attack. Cally forgives him, saying that she's always cared for him.

*[[Gaius Baltar|Dr. Baltar]] continues to gain in the polls. On ''[[Colonial One]]'', Tory mentions there's always a victory plan. [[Laura Roslin|Roslin]] later calls a private meeting with Dr. Baltar, asking to deliver a joint statement of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_%28verb%29 tabling] the issue of colonization until after the election, which Baltar rejects.

*[[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] returns to ''[[Galactica (RDM)|Galactica]]'', with the resistance fighters, much to the delight of Admiral Adama. She mentions the fact that the Cylons have left Caprica, and a man appearing to be Brother Cavill confirms it. He also says he has a message, but is attacked by Chief Tyrol, claiming he's a Cylon. Both Cavill and Caprica-Sharon are escorted to the brig under marine guard.

*The other Cavill (from last episode) is also taken to the brig, claiming he's not a Cylon, but changes his tune upon seeing his "brother", as he calls him. Both Cavills then talk about the fact that the “war heroes” (Caprica Six & ''Galactica''-Sharon) have talked about how the attack of the colonies and the pursuit of the fleet were mistakes. They were told to relay the message that man and Cylon will go their separate ways. Both Roslin and Admiral Adama are less than trusting regarding the message.

*Election Day has arrived and Baltar has an apparent five thousand-vote lead over Roslin with only a few ships left. On ''Colonial One'', Tory makes a call to ''Galactica'', putting a plan into action.

*Amazingly, Roslin initially appears to have retained the presidency. While most are celebrating, Lt. Gaeta makes a starting discovery regarding the votes, and informs the Admiral that Col. Tigh may be involved in a conspiracy to throw the election.

*Admiral Adama confronts Roslin regarding the conspiracy, saying he has a confession to rig the vote. Roslin admits her involvement and Adama is disappointed.

*Baltar is informed of his nomination as President. He's less than pleased, vowing to have full investigation in time. President-elect Baltar then orders a course for “New Caprica”.

*[[Gaius Baltar]] is sworn in as the new President of the Twelve Colonies, and orders the immediate colonization of New Caprica.

*''[[Cloud 9]]'' is destroyed by a nuclear blast, Gina being present before the explosion; in addition to the ''Cloud 9'', at least two other ships are destroyed in the blast. Admiral Adama reports to the president that this may be a Cylon attack, but Baltar ignores him and presses forward with colonization.

===One Year Later===

*[[Felix Gaeta|Mr. Gaeta]] is reporting to the President regarding a Union issue aboard Colonial One, now down on the planet. Baltar is upset, saying there have been no Cylon attacks but the people still complain. He has regressed, turning to alcohol, medication, and womanizing.

*Admiral Adama, now donning a mustache, is walking around a near-empty Galactica, the ship falling into disarray. Over half of the crew has moved down to the planet, and they are running on such a skeleton crew that they barely have enough pilots to fly training missions, much less a good CAP. Adama has a discussion with Tigh about going down to the planet, which Tigh reluctantly agrees to.

*[[Samuel Anders|Anders]], now Kara’s husband, is sick. Dr. Cottle is saying he can’t do much for him, saying there’s no medication available.

*Kara runs into the Tighs as [[Tyrol]], now a union boss, is making a speech to begin a strike, a pregnant Cally by his side. Saul mentions that there should be some medicine aboard Pegasus.

*Kara calls Lee aboard Pegasus to requesting medication. Lee's gained a lot of weight in the past year. Dualla is now an officer, serving by Lee Adama's side in Pegasus' CIC. Before Lee can reply, Dualla catches something on [[DRADIS]].

*A fleet of [[Cylon]] [[Basestar (RDM)|basestar]]s arrive in orbit around New Caprica. The Adamas are having a discussion about what to do, when [[Helo]] asks if alert fighters should be launched. Admiral Adama keeps them in as the defense fleet jumps away.

*Mr. Gaeta informs the President of the Cylon approach. Later, before his assembled staff, copies of Number 5, 8, and 6 approach the President. The Cylons declare that as long as there’s no resistance, no harm will come. President Baltar declares surrender on behalf of the colonists, and as Cylon armies occupy the planet, Kara vows to resist.

== Questions ==

*What "number" is Cavill?
*Was Roslin's threat to put the two Cavills into space actually carried out?
*Where did the defense fleet jump to?
**Likely a prearranged rendezvous point, similar to that of the miniseries.
*Where is Caprica-Sharon?
**Most likely, still in ''Galactica'''s brig. This is probably why Helo is still aboard ship, having taken a CIC officer's position.
**In the podcast, Ron Moore vaguely hinted that they hadn't forgotten about Sharon, but that we'd have to "wait and see". Apparently, several of the early season 3 episodes will have flashbacks dealing with events that took place in the year that passed.
*What happened to Zarek?
*Why is Leoben looking for Starbuck, specifically?
** Could it be the same [[Leoben Conoy]] that Starbuck interrogated in "[[Flesh and Bone]]"?
*** As seen with ''Galactica''-Sharon, it is distinctly possible that that particular Leoben was lying when he said he'd actually die and not download.
*Did the Cavils lie about the pursuit of humanity being a mistake? Or were they telling the truth?
** If they were telling the truth, perhaps not all Cylons are readily able to admit and rectify their mistakes as the Cavils believed.
*Why has the population (until Tyrol's recent union speech) accepted Baltar's imperious rule? People were hardly so passive under Roslin. Indeed, Adama executed a military coup over a rather less important issue than giving a nuclear weapon to a Cylon agent.
**Admiral Adama wasn't conclusive as to how the weapon got on board Cloud Nine.
***Baltar pointed out there have been no attacks since he took office. Under Roslin the attacks were common. Perhaps for a year the people decided they preferred the safety Baltar gave them to their liberties.
*Are the Six and Eight that Baltar surrendered to [[Caprica-Six]] and [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|''Galactica''-Sharon]]?
**Judging from Six's reaction to Baltar, almost definitely.
*Where did the Cylon fleets go, after they left the Twelve Colonies? Cavil was deliberately vague when asked if they simply returned to the [[Cylon homeworld]].
*How many people died in the Cloud Nine explosion?
*When Gina-Six was instantly vaporized due to being only two feet from a nuclear detonation, did she still transmit her consciousness? Was she even capable of transmitting considering that any internal hardware responsible for this task would have been instantly destroyed?
**They have already established that with the [[Resurrection Ship]] destroyed, Cylons in the fleet that are killed will ''actually'' die. Gina expressed suicidal impulses as early as "[[Resurrection Ship, Part I]]".
*Given Roslin's memories of Baltar with Six, why didn't Admiral Adama suspect Baltar of handing over the nuke to the cylons? If he did suspect him, why not act on it?
**He had no real proof.
*Did the events of "One Year Later" actually happen, or were they a dream or vision sequence given to Baltar?
**Although Baltar has had elaborate visions in the past, this vision left Baltar's point of view several times, addressing issues such as the marriage of Kara to Sam Anders and Adama's friendship with Tigh that are of little knowledge or importance to Baltar.
***Ron D. Moore has stated in interviews that the first 4-5 episodes of season 3 will deal with the Cylon occupation of New Caprica, and unless a vast swath of episodes is going to be a dream sequence, all of these "one year later" events ''really'' happen.
*Why was it so easy for Adama to hide the collusion of the rigged election from the press, and why were there no consequences?
**So far as we know, Adama, Tigh, Gaeta, Dualla, Dualla's two associates, Tory, and Roslin are the only people that knew; 6 are military personnel, 4 of whom would be implicated, and the other 2 were directly involved civilians. All are strongly motivated to conceal the information.
* Why would it take the Cylons over one year to find New Caprica, alerted by the nuclear detonation prior to the inhabitation of the planet?
**It was stated in the previous episode that the interference from the gas cloud surrounding it would hide the planet fairly well. The Cylons were slightly over a light year away, according to the Number Five. Searching something as large as the gas cloud likely is for a planet or fleet is, given the sensor range limitations, quite impressive to accomplish in months, even with general directional information from a light-year out.
***Actually with the Cylon base 1 light year away, it would take 1 year for the nuke to show up on the Cylon sensors. Short of some FTL communication system, that's the only way the Cylons would have been able to detect the planet. Since the fleet is all in within non-FTL distances, all the FTL devices, if any exist would likely have been destroyed or disabled.
*If the Cylons really left the Twelve Colonies, leaving behind a nuked-out wasteland, what happened to all of the human captives in the [[Farms]]?

== Analysis ==
*Baltar's arrogance seems to have led to corrupt rule during his year on New Caprica—he replaces Roslin's modest desk with a larger, elaborate one, replaces the population count whiteboard with a portrait of himself, and keeps a harem aboard the landed Colonial One.
*After a whole year, everyone is still living in tents. There is a vital shortage of medicine, the military is of no use, and labor conditions are apparently intolerable. Baltar's administration is apparently as incompetent as Roslin feared.
**It is not clear whether these conditions are the result of admimistrative incompetence or the inherent difficulties of colonizing a marginally habitable planet.
*It's ironic that the obligations of duty keep Lee Adama aboard Pegasus while everyone else goes planetside—he is a reserve officer, and promised to build his pilots a bar as soon as they found a habitable planet.
*Ron Moore has once again decided to play with viewer's expectations; in the podcast for "[[Resurrection Ship, Part II]]" Moore commented on how everyone assumed that ''Pegasus'' would be destroyed by the end of the episode, and thus he thought it would be a good twist to keep ''Pegasus'' alive as another ship in the Fleet. Here, many viewers assumed that the nuke that Baltar gave to Gina in "[[Epiphanies]]" would be used to destroy ''Pegasus'' this time, but it wasn't.
*29 people died between this episode and the preceding one? One or two Raptors were lost, and some Marines died on Caprica, but that doesn't seem high enough.
**Is it possible they took out all of the people who left in the raptors because they were not apart of the fleet at the end of the previous episode?
***They didn't remove Starbuck from the count when she left for Caprica at the beginning of Season 2.
*It seems odd that no mention was made of the casualties on the return from Caprica, just jubilant celebration?
**Although they didn't actually talk about the losses, there was a shot of a wounded person being taken away on a stretcher.

== Notes ==
* '''According to Ron Moore's podcast, although Scifi Channel was willing to air this episode as a 90-minute special, it had to be heavily edited down for international distribution; outside of the United States, viewers will only see a 1 hour version of the episode, which Moore regards as "almost incomprehensible".''' Many plot threads, such as the entire Cally/Tyrol subplot, were completely removed from the one hour version.
* Ron Moore's podcast for episode 13, [[Epiphanies]], states that the Nuke given to Gina will come back in this episode, to the benefit of the Cylons.
*In RDM's podcast for the previous episode, he said that in early drafts of this special 90 minute long episode, the writers actually tried to make it a 2 hour special, but this was soon dropped (these times are including commercials).
*The election board appears to have a definitive list of the names of all of the ships in [[The Fleet (RDM)]]. Not all of them are clearly visible, but this would seem to indicate that the writers do have an actual list that they get new ship names from. Ship names visible on the chart are: Demetrius, Diomedes, Embla Brokk, Enkidu, Epheme, Galactica, Gideon, Gemenon Traveller, Greenleaf, Monarch, Odysseus, Pegasus, Persephone, Prometheus, Swordfish
*The framed photo of President Roslin and [[Billy Keikeya]] was still on her desk during the election.
*When Roslin "won" the rigged election results, Roslin received 24,265 votes, while Baltar recieved 22,266. This means that the elligible voters in the Fleet number 46,531. In the podcast, RDM explains that he quickly came up with these numbers, to try to reflect roughly how many survivors are below the voting age.
*Toward the end of the episode, President Baltar refers to a government body called the "People's Council". This may be the proportionally elected lower house mentioned in by RDM in his [http://blog.scifi.com/battlestar/archives/2005/01/index.html#a000016 blog post] on January 30, 2005.
*[[Hera]] is seen on New Caprica in the same white cradle that Baltar had a vision of her being in in "[[Scattered]]", etc. According to RDM's podcast it's actually the exact same cradle.
*Tyrol's union speech is an almost word for word quote of Mario Savio's address during the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley in 1964. According to Ron Moore and David Eick in the podcast, they even got permission from Savio's widow to use it (even though, due to the way copyright laws work from back then, they could have just used it without permission, they felt they should get it). As a result, it's even listed in the credits: "Mario Savio speech excerpted couresy of: Lynne Hollander Savio". Actor Aaron Douglas (Chief [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]]) actually studied film of Savio, so all of the hand gestures Tyrol makes when he gives the speech are gestures that Savio actually used.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==
*''The Cylons occupy New Caprica:''
:'''Tyrol:''' "What do we do now, Captain?"
:'''Starbuck:''' "Same thing we always do. Fight them until we can't."

*''Trying to bring order to a Union meeting:''
:'''Tyrol:''' Everyone, please be quiet.
:'''Cally:''' Hey! Shut the frak up! (''crowd quiets down'')

*'''Admiral Adama:''' We're leaving. But we'll be back.

== Official Statements ==

From the official site (http://www.scifi.com/battlestar/):
When Baltar wins the vote, Roslin considers stealing the election because she believes he is a Cylon collaborator.

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell] as [[Cavil|Brother Cavil]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*[[Kate Vernon]] as [[Ellen Tigh]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*[[Callum Keith Rennie]] as [[Leoben Conoy]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0443286/ David Kaye] as [[James McManus]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Winston Rekert as Priest

=== Writing & Direction ===


=== Production Notes ===

*Series 2 (2005 / 2006)
*Production Number: 2.20
*Airdate Order: 20 (of 20)

=== First Run Air Dates & Releases ===

*UK Airdate: Date
*US Airdate: Date
*DVD Release (UK): Date
*DVD Release (US): Date
*[[Wikipedia:Nielsen Rating|Nielsen Rating]]: X.X million households, XXX share

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Anne Cofell Saunders]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Mark Verheiden]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Michael Rymer]]

Downloaded

2006-02-25T21:08:51Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Cylon_resurrection.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Downloaded
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 18
| Guests= [[Lucy Lawless]] ([[D'anna Biers]])
| Writer= [[Bradley Thompson]] and [[David Weddle]]
| Story=
| Director=[[IMDB:nm0941276|Jeff Woolnough]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= 24 February 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population=
| Prev= [[The Captain's Hand]]
| Next= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
}}

== Overview ==
Cylon society is revealed when a Cylon's consciousness is downloaded into a new body following her death. The conquerors of occupied Caprica hail two "heroes of the Cylon," who both resist their new celebrity.

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===
*Episode begins with a flashback to "Nine months ago - Caprica" showing Baltar's house being destroyed in the [[Miniseries]]. The copy of Number Six who had a relationship dies...and then we follow from her point of view as her consciousness is downloaded and reborn into another body in a Cylon rebirthing vat. She fell so deeply in love with Gaius Baltar that ''she'' starts having hallucinations of ''Baltar'', because the emotional impact of falling in love affected her so much. We then cut to "Ten weeks ago" on ''Galactica'' when [[Cally]] shoots [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|Galactica-Sharon]]...and follow from her point of view as she is downloaded (no doubt aided by the [[Resurrection Ship]] at the time) and wakes up totally disoriented in a new body in another rebirthing vat. A copy of the same model of Cylon known to humans as [[D'anna Biers]] tells her she'll be fine, but upon seeing another Sharon-model, Galactica-Sharon starts screaming uncontrollably.
*On Caprica in the present day, the Cylons are rebuilding [[Delphi]] for their own use, even making gardens. A D'anna-copy sits down to talk with the Number Six copy that seduced Baltar. She has never told anyone that she fell truly in love with Baltar, and to this day hallucinates him as a result, because she thinks the others would destroy her for being defective. The D'anna-copy asks if she will go and see another Cylon who was recently downloaded into a new body, and is still having trouble adapting: ''Galactica''-Sharon, who is also something of a celebrity and war hero for her acts of sabotage and attempted assasintation on Adama. She points out that she even still calls herself "Sharon". She warns that if she cannot be fixed, there is talk of "[[boxing]]" her: putting her consciousness in cold storage and never loading it into a new body again.
*This copy of Number Six is considered a war-hero; she was personally responsible for gaining the information that allowed the near-total sabotage of the Colonial Fleet, and has actually become something of a celebrity to the Cylons. They even refer to her specifically as "'''Caprica-Six'''".
*In a short conversation while walking to ''Galactica''-Sharon's old appartment (which she moved back into), the D'anna-copy quickly lists off the Numbers of several Cylon models: "D'anna Biers" is '''Number Three''', "Aaron Doral" is '''Number Five''', and "Sharon Valerii" is '''Number Eight'''.
*Caprica-Six goes to ''Galactica''-Sharon's appartment, where she proclaims that she doesn't believe in the Cylon God or his "love" and that the only real love she had was with the ''Galactica'' crew. She expresses intense guilt at betraying them. Caprica-Six starts to manipulate her by trying to empathize with her, saying that she loved a man too: Gaius Baltar. Startled, ''Galactica''-Sharon says that Baltar is not dead, but is the new Vice President of the Colonies, on board ''Galactica''.
*Moving their conversation to a cafe on the ground floor of Sharon's appartment, Caprica-Six and Sharon wonder why Number Three never told Caprica-Six that Baltar was alive. Caprica-Six (through conversation with her hallucinated Baltar) realizes that Number Three manipulated her. Sending her to Sharon, and letting her find out that the man she loved was alive, might make her go crazy. Number Three could then use this as an excuse to have them ''both'' boxed.
*Meanwhile, [[Samuel Anders]] and two other members of the human [[Resistance (movement)|resistance]] are planning to plant a bomb in the garage underneath the cafe, and blow it up. They know the Cylons will all just download into other bodies, but Anders points out that from Caprica-Sharon, they know that Cylons remember dying, and it must be horrifically painful: they're going to show them that nowhere is safe, and they should leave Caprica if they want to stop painfully dying and being reborn over and over again.
*Number Three shows up at the cafe, and asks how things are doing. Having realized her plan, Caprica-Six lies and says emphatically that Galactica-Sharon will move out of her appartment and start adapting back to Cylon life. Galactica-Sharon takes the hint and goes along with the lie. Disappointed, Number Three offers to help her move out right now, and they leave the cafe and start going up the stairs to Sharon's appartment.
*The resistance members set up the bomb and all but Anders leave, but just before he can get out a Cylon Centurion starts snooping around, and he can't get back to the exit. It sees the bomb and Anders shoots it then ducks behind a car as the bomb goes off.
*All three Cylons survived the blast, because the stairwell protected them on the higher floor. Caprica-Six is buried under some rubble, and Number Three insists that she is dead and they should leave her (subtly trying to kill her so Three can have her boxed). However, Caprica-Six then moves and asks for help and they uncover her. Her knee is dislocated, and Three again suggests that it would be easier, if Six wants, to just kill her so she'll be reborn. Realizing Three is trying to have her boxed, she insists on not doing that.
*They see someone else moving around under some rubble, and Number Three clears it off only to find that it is Anders. She takes his gun away and prepares to kill him, but Galactica-Sharon protests. Caprica-Six agrees, but to avoid suspicion from Number Three, claims pragmatically that they shouldn't kill him to he can be interrogated. Sharon sees that he has Starbuck's dogtags, and Number Three explains that she was on the planet a few weeks ago. Sharon realizes he's someone important to her.
*Number Three cruelly toys with Anders, putting his gun on the ground and daring him to take it. Sharon tells her to stop, and Number Three retorts that Sharon is a broken machine that thinks she's human, but she's not. Sharon says that at least she has a conscience, and Number Three says she's a murderer. Caprica-Six realizes that's exactly what the Cylons have been doing: murder and the [[Fall of the Twelve Colonies|genocide of the human race]] cannot be the [[Cylon Religion|path of their loving God]].
*Caprica-Six realizes why Number Three wanted her and ''Galactica''-Sharon boxed: they are celebrities in a culture based on unity. Three realized that based on their love of two human beings, they have different perspective on the War, and due to their celebrity status as Cylon heros they could actually cause a change in the way many other Cylons think about their conflict with the humans, upsetting the ''status quo'' which Number Three upholds.
*Number Three says they've been corrupted by their experiences, and are a waste. Caprica-Six explains to Sharon that that is why Three wanted to get rid of them: because both of them now know the murder, vengeance, and genocide are sins in the eyes of God, and Sharon realizes that letting them tell the other Cylons this would make them all consider that the slaughter of mankind was a mistake.
*The rubble of the building shifts as Cylons outside are trying to clear their way to the survivors inside, and Anders makes a run for it and grabs his gun, shooting at Number Three before Galactica-Sharon knocks the gun out of his hands...which then lands near Number Three, who takes the gun. She stands up and just as Number Three is about to execute Anders, Caprica-Six hits her over the head with a large rock of stone from the rubble, then bashes it into her head again, killing her.
*Caprica-Six tells Anders to leave, and gives him back Starbuck's dogtags. Galactica-Sharon gives him back his gun as he leaves. Six realizes that with all of the Cylons dead in the cafe, it should be at least 36 hours before Number Three gets resurrected and tells the others what happened.
*Caprica-Six tells Galactica-Sharon that this is enough time to start changing things, start a new beginning for the Cylons: A way to live in God's love, without hate or lies. Together, these two Heroes of the Cylons can show them the way. Sharon says that she is with her, and they are dug out of the ruins of the building.

===On ''Galactica''===
*[[Sharon Valerii (Caprica copy)|Caprica-Sharon]] has gone into labor; she passed out and her placenta detatched, and Dr. [[Cottle]] delivers the baby by C-section. It is premature and its lungs aren't fully developed as a result, so it has to be put in an oxygen-incubator. As Caprica-Sharon predicted, it is a girl. Helo and Caprica-Sharon adore it together, and name her "[[Hera]]".
*Meanwhile, President [[Roslin]], [[Baltar]], [[William Adama|Admiral Adama]], and Col. [[Saul Tigh|Tigh]] debate what to do with it. Baltar points out that it is half-human. Adama realizes the Cylons want it, and that the Cylons still hiding in the Fleet will try to make a move for it if they know about it.
*President Roslin has decided to hide Hera to protect her, so she has Cottle convice Helo and Caprica-Sharon that their baby has died (using a fake). Caprica-Sharon goes into hysterics and nearly chokes Cottle before breaking down, sobbing.
*In fact, Roslin has given her to a woman named [[Maya]], who lost her baby in the Cylon attack. Maya adopts Hera, thinking she is a normal human child from a Pegasus officer.
*Helo, helped by Chief Tyrol, spreads the "ashes" of Hera (actually faked) out the back of a Raptor into open space.
*Number Six is devastated that Baltar "let" this happen and could not protect "their baby", though he says he did all he could. Number Six says that God's will was that Hera survive, that God's will was that "she would lead the next generation of God's children". In a rage, she says that Gaius has commited a sin, and his entire race will suffer God's vengeance.

== Questions ==
*What will D'anna do when she is re-embodied?
*Who is Number One?
*Based on reports of Lucy Lawless being asked if she wanted to "be God" and her current command behavior, could Number Three be based on a Count Iblis type character?
**No. Number Three is a just a physical Cylon which will ''claim'' to be a God, Count Iblis was actually a God (God-like being).
**Ron D. Moore has also stated in [[Iblis#In the Re-Imagined Series|interviews]] that he does not intend to bring a Count Iblis character onto the Re-Imagined Series.
* What model numbers are "[[Simon]]" and "[[Leoben Conoy]]" ?
* Based on information mentioned in the Analysis, could the Cylons be patterning a [[Wikipedia: gerontocracy|gerontocratic]] form of leadship structure?
*Given that Baltar's home was destroyed and Caprica-Six "died" in a nuclear explosion, how did Baltar survive?
**In the [[Miniseries]] novelization, this is expanded upon; his house wasn't entirely destroyed (that is, not reduced to pebbles) and when Caprica-Six blocked the blast with her body it shielded him enough; he was thrown through the house against a wall and slightly hurt but did not die.
* This episode raises new questions about the nature of Baltar-Six. Is she (merely) a projection from Baltar's subconscious mind or has she somehow been implanted into his psyche by the Cylons? It has already been established by the brainscan performed by Dr. Cottle that there is no cybernetic implant in Baltar's brain, at least none that is detectable by human technology. Also, in Ron Moore's podcast he seems to indicate that she is no more than a hallucination, produced by Baltar's subconsciousness. Her actions, however, do seem to be aimed at advancing a Cylon agenda.

== Analysis ==
*Apparently the documentary broadcast from [[the Fleet]] in "[[Final Cut]]" was not made widely available, since if Caprica-Six had seen it, she would have already known about Baltar's survival.
*In the scene where ''Galactica''-Sharon is downloaded into her new body, when another Sharon smiles and says "we love you Sharon", this mirrors how another Sharon said the same thing to her on the basestar in "[[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part II]]", at which point she also freaked out.
*There does not appear to be any pattern to the numbering scheme of the 12 Cylon models: Three (D'anna), Five (Doral), Six (Shelley Godfrey/Gina), Eight (Sharon), i.e. not all females are an even number, males an odd number.
**However, these models do seem to get progressively younger the higher (perhaps, "most recent") their Number is: Three is eldest and has the number closest to one, while Eight is youngest and has the highest number out of these four.
*Cylon society on Caprica appears to consist of mostly mimicking human behavior - clothing, apartments, cafe's, parks for relaxation, etc. In essence, the Cylons are merely trying to be what they have just exterminated - humans.
**They have established previously that they consider humans to be more "real" and closer to God than they are ("this form brings us closer to God..."); they think that humans are more "real" and that if they wish to be real, they should adopt ''some'' aspects of what humanity is, but this doesn't necessarily stop them from being quite different from humanity.
*As Caprica-Six and ''Galactica''-Sharon pointed out, the Cylons' claim that they are superior to humans because humans still kill because of greed and jealousy, etc. is hypocritical. They point out the logical disconect of conducting genocide and murder in the name of an all-loving God. Further, Number Three's plan to "box" Caprica-Six and ''Galactica''-Sharon, which would ''in effect'' be murdering them, also makes her a murderer like the humans she claims to be better than.
*At various points in the series, Baltar's internal Number Six has been seen manipulating physical objects: a test-tube in "[[Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down]]", a chair in "[[Home, Part II]]", etc., which has led to the question of whether this is a continuity error, or if she is more real than she claims to be. In this episode, we seem to get an answer to this: Caprica-Six's hallucinatory Baltar makes a drink while in ''Galactica''-Boomer's appartment and hands it to her...only for the camera to shift angles, the hallucination-Baltar to be gone, and to show that Caprica-Six is actually grasping at air. Thus it can be inferred that this is just a stylistic choice by the production team: whenever Number Six ''appears'' to be manipulating a physical object on ''Galactica'', Baltar is hallucinating that she is doing this, and the camera is showing things that aren't "really" happening, from Baltar's perspective.
*The Cylons did not expect their initial attack to be anywhere near as successful as it was. This would explain the apparently large number of Cylon military vessels showing up everywhere as the Cylons expected to fight a more protracted war against a larger surviving human military force.
**That the Cylons felt it so necessary to sabotage the Colonial Fleet through Caprica-Six implies that they felt attacking without that advantage would have at best cost them many ships, and at worst resulted in defeat. The placing of the backdoor in the [[CNP]] was high risk; if the Colonials had discovered it before the Cylons attacked, they would have been forewarned of the coming assault, and could even have surprised the Cylons by acting as if they were unaware of the problem while secretly disabling the backdoor on all military spacecraft.
*Hera's being hidden away soon after her birth in order to protect her fits her messiah-status, as other messiah figures have often also been hidden after their birth in similar fashion, such as [[Wikipedia:Jesus|Jesus]], [[Wikipedia:Moses|Moses]], [[Wikipedia:Harry Potter|Harry Potter]], [[Wikipedia:Superman|Superman]], [[Wikipedia:Aragorn|Aragorn]], [[Wikipedia:Luke Skywalker|Luke Skywalker]], etc.
**This is also a common theme with tragic characters such as [[Wikipedia:Oedipus|Oedipus Rex]].

== Notes ==
*Anders refers to humanoid Cylons as "Skin Jobs" in this episode, another referrence to [[Wikipedia:Blade_Runner|Blade Runner]] by the Re-Imagined Series. The Cylon Centurions are being referred to as "Bullet Heads".
*The vision of [[Number Six]] that Baltar sees all the time is ''not'' the same person as the woman he was sleeping with on Caprica who used him to lower Colonial defenses: [[Caprica-Six]]'s consciousness was downloaded into a new body. Chip-Six might be a duplicate, or something else.
*[[Lee Adama]] is visible in a photograph in [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)]]'s apartment in [[Delphi]]. However, Adama and Valerii had never served together prior to the events of the [[miniseries]]. This is probably a continuity error.
*Apollo and Starbuck do not appear in this episode. This is the first episode that Apollo has never appeared in, and the third episode of the season in which Starbuck has not appeared (after "[[Fragged]]" and "[[Black Market]]").
**As of this episode, the only characters that have appeared in every episode of the Re-Imagined Series are President [[Laura Roslin]], Admiral [[William Adama]], and Colonel [[Saul Tigh]]. Michael Hogan (Col. Tigh) is actually not one of the seven "regular" cast members, but he has still been in every episode to date.
*Ricky Worthy (Cylon "[[Simon]]") and Callum Keith Rennie (Cylon "[[Leoben Conoy]]") do not actually appear in this episode. In several brief shots, body doubles dressed as their characters are seen from behind or in the distance, but these actors did not return for the episode.
*We learn a lot of Cylon names in this episode: out of the 12 [[Cylon agent|humanoid models]] of Cylon, besides the already-known "[[Number Six]]", the one who posed as human reporter "[[D'anna Biers]]" is model '''Number Three''', the one who posed as PR representative "[[Aaron Doral]]" is model '''Number Five''', and the one who infiltrated ''Galactica'' posing as the pilot "Sharon 'Boomer' Valerii" is model '''Number Eight'''.
*A longstanding question has been answered: What do the Cylons call each other amongst themselves? They actually don't use the names of any human personas they might have infiltrated the Colonies with. "Number Six" is actually called "Number Six" in dialog for the first time in this episode (in the [[Miniseries]], we were left with the cryptic "There are twelve models, I am number six"). It is revealed that Cylons just call and think of themselves as "Number Three" or "Three", etc. It was speculated that individual copies might be destinguished by using a serial number or other ID, but apparently Cylon society is based so much on the idea of unity and lack of individuality that they simply ''do not have'' designations for individual units. When Number Three refers to ''Galactica''-Sharon, she just refers to her as "an Eight", etc. "Caprica-Six" is a makeshift nickname that was made up for the individual "celebrity" Number Six (probably because the Cylons had never developed a formal convention for naming individual units). Caprica-Six is sometimes called "Caprica" for short.
*This gets a little confusing, because even though all of the Number Six copies on Caprica look and dress identically, copies that Caprica-Six walks by still recognize who she is.
*"Caprica-Six" appears to be a take on the ''ad hoc'' naming convention developed by fans for telling the different Cylon copies appart: review sites and messageboards over time started destinguishing the copy of Boomer on ''Galactica'' and the copy of Boomer on Caprica as "''Galactica''-Sharon" and "Caprica-Sharon" for convenience. This loosley developed system then spread to other Cylons as they appeared ("[[Gina|''Pegasus''-Six]]", "Caprica-Doral", "Caprica-D'anna", etc.), though it isn't based on any official material (''BattlestarWiki'' eventually adopted these terms of convenience as well). When Number Three remarks to "Caprica-Six" that her nickname is a little funny, because she's only one of hundreds of copies of "Number Six" on Caprica, this might be a small joke by the writers at the expense of fans.
*Sharon showed difficulty in performing chin ups, but later showed no problem in moving pieces of concrete weighing at least 100 pounds.
**She could have just been angry, and not actually appearing strained because it was physically hard.
**One of the consistent features of both ''Galactica''-Sharon and Caprica-Sharon has been the conflict between her "natural" Cylon Number Eight personality and her human Sharon personality. While probably intended that the two personalities should remain separate, with the Number Eight personality primary, it never worked out that way. In "[[Water]]", for example, Sharon reasserts herself before Number Eight can finish planting the charges. At this point, both ''Galactica''-Sharon/Eight and Caprica-Sharon/Eight have their personalities all jumbled up, with the Sharon personality exerting the stronger influence but retaining knowledge of being a Cylon and being Number Eight. Anyway: the Sharon "code" would have to include imposed limitations on what she believes her own strength and physical abilities to be, or she'd be found out much, much more easily. Inconsistencies in her apparent physical abilities can therefore be explained along with inconsistencies of her mixed but not really integrated personalities.
*Number Three appears to have some command functions based on her actions and behavior. These apparently include determining final disposition of other Cylon personalities.
*Lucy Lawless once again uses her native New Zealand accent for [[D'anna Biers]], even though at the end of "[[Final Cut#notes|Final Cut]]" it was implied that her character normally doesn't.
*Galactica-Sharon's old appartment number on Caprica was "502"
*Much of the dialog in the episode recap is entirely new, and dubbed in to better summarize the segment.
*According to RDM's podcast, there was an entire subplot in this episode in which Lucy Lawless's character "D'anna Biers" would interview President Roslin about rumors that the pregnant Cylon prisoner's baby had been born. Then "''Galactica''-Three" would try to kidnap the baby off of ''Galactica'' in collusion with [[Gina]] (''Pegasus''-Six). The subplot was cut for time (they wanted to spend more time focusing on events on Caprica), and also because they felt it made the episode very confusing; cutting between many different Cylon copies both on Caprica and ''Galactica''. These scenes apparently ''were'' filmed, then cut, because promotional photos for this episode show pictures of D'anna Biers on Galactica (with her new hairstyle), so it will probably appear in deleted scenes released in the next DVD set.
*Sharon has a pair of hand carved, wood or stone, decorative elephants in her apartment. Caprica-Six asks her if they are from "[[Ithaca]]", which on Earth is an island off the coast of Greece and is the home of Odysseus in Homer's [[Wikipedia:Odyssey|Odyssey]]. She states that they were a gift from her mother for her graduation.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==

*''Caprica-Sharon has gone into premature labor with her Hybrid baby:''
:'''Cottle''': I find it absolutely amazing you people went to all the trouble to appear human, and didn't upgrade the plumbing.

*''"Caprica-Six" and a D'anna-copy walk past a crowd of other Cylons of various models, and they all keep turning their heads to look at Caprica-Six:''
:'''Caprica-Six''': I still can't get used to this.
:'''D'anna-copy''': Well youre a Hero of the Cylon now. You're our first celebrity!
:'''Caprica-Six''': Oh, I'm just another Six
:'''D'anna-copy''': You're too modest. I'm just another Three...and they're Fives (''motions at a Doral-model'')..and Eights (''motions at a Sharon-model''). But you, everyone calls you "Caprica-Six"...like you're the only Six on the planet!

*''Anders and some resistance members are planning to bomb a cafe filled with humanoid Cylons:''
:'''Jean''': Security is minimal: two Centurions patrol out front, third bullet-head walks the perimeter. Bullet-head walking perimeter makes random changes to his patrol, be tough to get past him.
:'''Anders''': All right, so we go under him. The storm drain leads directly to the garage underneath the cafe. There'll be dozens of Skin Jobs inside.

*''President Roslin, Baltar, Admiral Adama and Col. Tigh discuss what to do with the Hybrid baby:''
:'''Roslin''': If [[Hera|the baby]] does survive, the question is: what do we do with it?
:'''Baltar:''': Do? What are you suggesting? That we throw it out of an airlock?
:'''Roslin''': I don't make suggestions Mr. Baltar, if I want to toss a baby out of an airlock I'd say so.

== Official Statements ==
*David Eick's video blog shows the crew preparation for filming a Cylon rebirthing scene, most likely for this episode.

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===
*[[Lucy Lawless]] as [[D'anna Biers]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*Kerry Norton as Paramedic [[Layne Ishay]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Erica Cerra as [[Maya]]
*Diego Diablo Del Mar as Hillard

=== Writing & Direction ===


=== Production Notes ===

*Series 2 (2005 / 2006)
*Production Number: 2.18
*Airdate Order: 18 (of 20)

=== First Run Air Dates & Releases ===

*UK Airdate: Date
*US Airdate: 24 February 2006
*DVD Release (UK): Date
*DVD Release (US): Date
*[[Wikipedia:Nielsen Rating|Nielsen Rating]]: X.X million households, XXX share

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Bradley Thompson]]
[[Category:Episodes written by David Weddle]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Jeff Woolnough]]

Downloaded

2006-02-25T21:08:05Z

Wedge: /* Analysis */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Cylon_resurrection.jpg|300px]]
| Title= Downloaded
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 18
| Guests= [[Lucy Lawless]] ([[D'anna Biers]])
| Writer= [[Bradley Thompson]] and [[David Weddle]]
| Story=
| Director=[[IMDB:nm0941276|Jeff Woolnough]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= 24 February 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population=
| Prev= [[The Captain's Hand]]
| Next= [[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I]]
}}

== Overview ==
Cylon society is revealed when a Cylon's consciousness is downloaded into a new body following her death. The conquerors of occupied Caprica hail two "heroes of the Cylon," who both resist their new celebrity.

== Summary ==

===On Caprica===
*Episode begins with a flashback to "Nine months ago - Caprica" showing Baltar's house being destroyed in the [[Miniseries]]. The copy of Number Six who had a relationship dies...and then we follow from her point of view as her consciousness is downloaded and reborn into another body in a Cylon rebirthing vat. She fell so deeply in love with Gaius Baltar that ''she'' starts having hallucinations of ''Baltar'', because the emotional impact of falling in love affected her so much. We then cut to "Ten weeks ago" on ''Galactica'' when [[Cally]] shoots [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)|Galactica-Sharon]]...and follow from her point of view as she is downloaded (no doubt aided by the [[Resurrection Ship]] at the time) and wakes up totally disoriented in a new body in another rebirthing vat. A copy of the same model of Cylon known to humans as [[D'anna Biers]] tells her she'll be fine, but upon seeing another Sharon-model, Galactica-Sharon starts screaming uncontrollably.
*On Caprica in the present day, the Cylons are rebuilding [[Delphi]] for their own use, even making gardens. A D'anna-copy sits down to talk with the Number Six copy that seduced Baltar. She has never told anyone that she fell truly in love with Baltar, and to this day hallucinates him as a result, because she thinks the others would destroy her for being defective. The D'anna-copy asks if she will go and see another Cylon who was recently downloaded into a new body, and is still having trouble adapting: ''Galactica''-Sharon, who is also something of a celebrity and war hero for her acts of sabotage and attempted assasintation on Adama. She points out that she even still calls herself "Sharon". She warns that if she cannot be fixed, there is talk of "[[boxing]]" her: putting her consciousness in cold storage and never loading it into a new body again.
*This copy of Number Six is considered a war-hero; she was personally responsible for gaining the information that allowed the near-total sabotage of the Colonial Fleet, and has actually become something of a celebrity to the Cylons. They even refer to her specifically as "'''Caprica-Six'''".
*In a short conversation while walking to ''Galactica''-Sharon's old appartment (which she moved back into), the D'anna-copy quickly lists off the Numbers of several Cylon models: "D'anna Biers" is '''Number Three''', "Aaron Doral" is '''Number Five''', and "Sharon Valerii" is '''Number Eight'''.
*Caprica-Six goes to ''Galactica''-Sharon's appartment, where she proclaims that she doesn't believe in the Cylon God or his "love" and that the only real love she had was with the ''Galactica'' crew. She expresses intense guilt at betraying them. Caprica-Six starts to manipulate her by trying to empathize with her, saying that she loved a man too: Gaius Baltar. Startled, ''Galactica''-Sharon says that Baltar is not dead, but is the new Vice President of the Colonies, on board ''Galactica''.
*Moving their conversation to a cafe on the ground floor of Sharon's appartment, Caprica-Six and Sharon wonder why Number Three never told Caprica-Six that Baltar was alive. Caprica-Six (through conversation with her hallucinated Baltar) realizes that Number Three manipulated her. Sending her to Sharon, and letting her find out that the man she loved was alive, might make her go crazy. Number Three could then use this as an excuse to have them ''both'' boxed.
*Meanwhile, [[Samuel Anders]] and two other members of the human [[Resistance (movement)|resistance]] are planning to plant a bomb in the garage underneath the cafe, and blow it up. They know the Cylons will all just download into other bodies, but Anders points out that from Caprica-Sharon, they know that Cylons remember dying, and it must be horrifically painful: they're going to show them that nowhere is safe, and they should leave Caprica if they want to stop painfully dying and being reborn over and over again.
*Number Three shows up at the cafe, and asks how things are doing. Having realized her plan, Caprica-Six lies and says emphatically that Galactica-Sharon will move out of her appartment and start adapting back to Cylon life. Galactica-Sharon takes the hint and goes along with the lie. Disappointed, Number Three offers to help her move out right now, and they leave the cafe and start going up the stairs to Sharon's appartment.
*The resistance members set up the bomb and all but Anders leave, but just before he can get out a Cylon Centurion starts snooping around, and he can't get back to the exit. It sees the bomb and Anders shoots it then ducks behind a car as the bomb goes off.
*All three Cylons survived the blast, because the stairwell protected them on the higher floor. Caprica-Six is buried under some rubble, and Number Three insists that she is dead and they should leave her (subtly trying to kill her so Three can have her boxed). However, Caprica-Six then moves and asks for help and they uncover her. Her knee is dislocated, and Three again suggests that it would be easier, if Six wants, to just kill her so she'll be reborn. Realizing Three is trying to have her boxed, she insists on not doing that.
*They see someone else moving around under some rubble, and Number Three clears it off only to find that it is Anders. She takes his gun away and prepares to kill him, but Galactica-Sharon protests. Caprica-Six agrees, but to avoid suspicion from Number Three, claims pragmatically that they shouldn't kill him to he can be interrogated. Sharon sees that he has Starbuck's dogtags, and Number Three explains that she was on the planet a few weeks ago. Sharon realizes he's someone important to her.
*Number Three cruelly toys with Anders, putting his gun on the ground and daring him to take it. Sharon tells her to stop, and Number Three retorts that Sharon is a broken machine that thinks she's human, but she's not. Sharon says that at least she has a conscience, and Number Three says she's a murderer. Caprica-Six realizes that's exactly what the Cylons have been doing: murder and the [[Fall of the Twelve Colonies|genocide of the human race]] cannot be the [[Cylon Religion|path of their loving God]].
*Caprica-Six realizes why Number Three wanted her and ''Galactica''-Sharon boxed: they are celebrities in a culture based on unity. Three realized that based on their love of two human beings, they have different perspective on the War, and due to their celebrity status as Cylon heros they could actually cause a change in the way many other Cylons think about their conflict with the humans, upsetting the ''status quo'' which Number Three upholds.
*Number Three says they've been corrupted by their experiences, and are a waste. Caprica-Six explains to Sharon that that is why Three wanted to get rid of them: because both of them now know the murder, vengeance, and genocide are sins in the eyes of God, and Sharon realizes that letting them tell the other Cylons this would make them all consider that the slaughter of mankind was a mistake.
*The rubble of the building shifts as Cylons outside are trying to clear their way to the survivors inside, and Anders makes a run for it and grabs his gun, shooting at Number Three before Galactica-Sharon knocks the gun out of his hands...which then lands near Number Three, who takes the gun. She stands up and just as Number Three is about to execute Anders, Caprica-Six hits her over the head with a large rock of stone from the rubble, then bashes it into her head again, killing her.
*Caprica-Six tells Anders to leave, and gives him back Starbuck's dogtags. Galactica-Sharon gives him back his gun as he leaves. Six realizes that with all of the Cylons dead in the cafe, it should be at least 36 hours before Number Three gets resurrected and tells the others what happened.
*Caprica-Six tells Galactica-Sharon that this is enough time to start changing things, start a new beginning for the Cylons: A way to live in God's love, without hate or lies. Together, these two Heroes of the Cylons can show them the way. Sharon says that she is with her, and they are dug out of the ruins of the building.

===On ''Galactica''===
*[[Sharon Valerii (Caprica copy)|Caprica-Sharon]] has gone into labor; she passed out and her placenta detatched, and Dr. [[Cottle]] delivers the baby by C-section. It is premature and its lungs aren't fully developed as a result, so it has to be put in an oxygen-incubator. As Caprica-Sharon predicted, it is a girl. Helo and Caprica-Sharon adore it together, and name her "[[Hera]]".
*Meanwhile, President [[Roslin]], [[Baltar]], [[William Adama|Admiral Adama]], and Col. [[Saul Tigh|Tigh]] debate what to do with it. Baltar points out that it is half-human. Adama realizes the Cylons want it, and that the Cylons still hiding in the Fleet will try to make a move for it if they know about it.
*President Roslin has decided to hide Hera to protect her, so she has Cottle convice Helo and Caprica-Sharon that their baby has died (using a fake). Caprica-Sharon goes into hysterics and nearly chokes Cottle before breaking down, sobbing.
*In fact, Roslin has given her to a woman named [[Maya]], who lost her baby in the Cylon attack. Maya adopts Hera, thinking she is a normal human child from a Pegasus officer.
*Helo, helped by Chief Tyrol, spreads the "ashes" of Hera (actually faked) out the back of a Raptor into open space.
*Number Six is devastated that Baltar "let" this happen and could not protect "their baby", though he says he did all he could. Number Six says that God's will was that Hera survive, that God's will was that "she would lead the next generation of God's children". In a rage, she says that Gaius has commited a sin, and his entire race will suffer God's vengeance.

== Questions ==
*What will D'anna do when she is re-embodied?
*Who is Number One?
*Based on reports of Lucy Lawless being asked if she wanted to "be God" and her current command behavior, could Number Three be based on a Count Iblis type character?
**No. Number Three is a just a physical Cylon which will ''claim'' to be a God, Count Iblis was actually a God (God-like being).
**Ron D. Moore has also stated in [[Iblis#In the Re-Imagined Series|interviews]] that he does not intend to bring a Count Iblis character onto the Re-Imagined Series.
* What model numbers are "[[Simon]]" and "[[Leoben Conoy]]" ?
* Based on information mentioned in the Analysis, could the Cylons be patterning a [[Wikipedia: gerontocracy|gerontocratic]] form of leadship structure?
*Given that Baltar's home was destroyed and Caprica-Six "died" in a nuclear explosion, how did Baltar survive?
**In the [[Miniseries]] novelization, this is expanded upon; his house wasn't entirely destroyed (that is, not reduced to pebbles) and when Caprica-Six blocked the blast with her body it sheilded him enough; he was thrown through the house against a wall and a little hurt but did not die.
* This episode raises new questions about the nature of Baltar-Six. Is she (merely) a projection from Baltar's subconscious mind or has she somehow been implanted into his psyche by the Cylons? It has already been established by the brainscan performed by Dr. Cottle that there is no cybernetic implant in Baltar's brain, at least none that is detectable by human technology. Also, in Ron Moore's podcast he seems to indicate that she is no more than a hallucination, produced by Baltar's subconsciousness. Her actions, however, do seem to be aimed at advancing a Cylon agenda.

== Analysis ==
*Apparently the documentary broadcast from [[the Fleet]] in "[[Final Cut]]" was not made widely available, since if Caprica-Six had seen it, she would have already known about Baltar's survival.
*In the scene where ''Galactica''-Sharon is downloaded into her new body, when another Sharon smiles and says "we love you Sharon", this mirrors how another Sharon said the same thing to her on the basestar in "[[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part II]]", at which point she also freaked out.
*There does not appear to be any pattern to the numbering scheme of the 12 Cylon models: Three (D'anna), Five (Doral), Six (Shelley Godfrey/Gina), Eight (Sharon), i.e. not all females are an even number, males an odd number.
**However, these models do seem to get progressively younger the higher (perhaps, "most recent") their Number is: Three is eldest and has the number closest to one, while Eight is youngest and has the highest number out of these four.
*Cylon society on Caprica appears to consist of mostly mimicking human behavior - clothing, apartments, cafe's, parks for relaxation, etc. In essence, the Cylons are merely trying to be what they have just exterminated - humans.
**They have established previously that they consider humans to be more "real" and closer to God than they are ("this form brings us closer to God..."); they think that humans are more "real" and that if they wish to be real, they should adopt ''some'' aspects of what humanity is, but this doesn't necessarily stop them from being quite different from humanity.
*As Caprica-Six and ''Galactica''-Sharon pointed out, the Cylons' claim that they are superior to humans because humans still kill because of greed and jealousy, etc. is hypocritical. They point out the logical disconect of conducting genocide and murder in the name of an all-loving God. Further, Number Three's plan to "box" Caprica-Six and ''Galactica''-Sharon, which would ''in effect'' be murdering them, also makes her a murderer like the humans she claims to be better than.
*At various points in the series, Baltar's internal Number Six has been seen manipulating physical objects: a test-tube in "[[Tigh Me Up, Tigh Me Down]]", a chair in "[[Home, Part II]]", etc., which has led to the question of whether this is a continuity error, or if she is more real than she claims to be. In this episode, we seem to get an answer to this: Caprica-Six's hallucinatory Baltar makes a drink while in ''Galactica''-Boomer's appartment and hands it to her...only for the camera to shift angles, the hallucination-Baltar to be gone, and to show that Caprica-Six is actually grasping at air. Thus it can be inferred that this is just a stylistic choice by the production team: whenever Number Six ''appears'' to be manipulating a physical object on ''Galactica'', Baltar is hallucinating that she is doing this, and the camera is showing things that aren't "really" happening, from Baltar's perspective.
*The Cylons did not expect their initial attack to be anywhere near as successful as it was. This would explain the apparently large number of Cylon military vessels showing up everywhere as the Cylons expected to fight a more protracted war against a larger surviving human military force.
**That the Cylons felt it so necessary to sabotage the Colonial Fleet through Caprica-Six implies that they felt attacking without that advantage would have at best cost them many ships, and at worst resulted in defeat. The placing of the backdoor in the [[CNP]] was high risk; if the Colonials had discovered it before the Cylons attacked, they would have been forewarned of the coming assault, and could even have surprised the Cylons by acting as if they were unaware of the problem while secretly disabling the backdoor on all military spacecraft.
*Hera's being hidden away soon after her birth in order to protect her fits her messiah-status, as other messiah figures have often also been hidden after their birth in similar fashion, such as [[Wikipedia:Jesus|Jesus]], [[Wikipedia:Moses|Moses]], [[Wikipedia:Harry Potter|Harry Potter]], [[Wikipedia:Superman|Superman]], [[Wikipedia:Aragorn|Aragorn]], [[Wikipedia:Luke Skywalker|Luke Skywalker]], etc.
**This is also a common theme with tragic characters such as [[Wikipedia:Oedipus|Oedipus Rex]].

== Notes ==
*Anders refers to humanoid Cylons as "Skin Jobs" in this episode, another referrence to [[Wikipedia:Blade_Runner|Blade Runner]] by the Re-Imagined Series. The Cylon Centurions are being referred to as "Bullet Heads".
*The vision of [[Number Six]] that Baltar sees all the time is ''not'' the same person as the woman he was sleeping with on Caprica who used him to lower Colonial defenses: [[Caprica-Six]]'s consciousness was downloaded into a new body. Chip-Six might be a duplicate, or something else.
*[[Lee Adama]] is visible in a photograph in [[Sharon Valerii (Galactica copy)]]'s apartment in [[Delphi]]. However, Adama and Valerii had never served together prior to the events of the [[miniseries]]. This is probably a continuity error.
*Apollo and Starbuck do not appear in this episode. This is the first episode that Apollo has never appeared in, and the third episode of the season in which Starbuck has not appeared (after "[[Fragged]]" and "[[Black Market]]").
**As of this episode, the only characters that have appeared in every episode of the Re-Imagined Series are President [[Laura Roslin]], Admiral [[William Adama]], and Colonel [[Saul Tigh]]. Michael Hogan (Col. Tigh) is actually not one of the seven "regular" cast members, but he has still been in every episode to date.
*Ricky Worthy (Cylon "[[Simon]]") and Callum Keith Rennie (Cylon "[[Leoben Conoy]]") do not actually appear in this episode. In several brief shots, body doubles dressed as their characters are seen from behind or in the distance, but these actors did not return for the episode.
*We learn a lot of Cylon names in this episode: out of the 12 [[Cylon agent|humanoid models]] of Cylon, besides the already-known "[[Number Six]]", the one who posed as human reporter "[[D'anna Biers]]" is model '''Number Three''', the one who posed as PR representative "[[Aaron Doral]]" is model '''Number Five''', and the one who infiltrated ''Galactica'' posing as the pilot "Sharon 'Boomer' Valerii" is model '''Number Eight'''.
*A longstanding question has been answered: What do the Cylons call each other amongst themselves? They actually don't use the names of any human personas they might have infiltrated the Colonies with. "Number Six" is actually called "Number Six" in dialog for the first time in this episode (in the [[Miniseries]], we were left with the cryptic "There are twelve models, I am number six"). It is revealed that Cylons just call and think of themselves as "Number Three" or "Three", etc. It was speculated that individual copies might be destinguished by using a serial number or other ID, but apparently Cylon society is based so much on the idea of unity and lack of individuality that they simply ''do not have'' designations for individual units. When Number Three refers to ''Galactica''-Sharon, she just refers to her as "an Eight", etc. "Caprica-Six" is a makeshift nickname that was made up for the individual "celebrity" Number Six (probably because the Cylons had never developed a formal convention for naming individual units). Caprica-Six is sometimes called "Caprica" for short.
*This gets a little confusing, because even though all of the Number Six copies on Caprica look and dress identically, copies that Caprica-Six walks by still recognize who she is.
*"Caprica-Six" appears to be a take on the ''ad hoc'' naming convention developed by fans for telling the different Cylon copies appart: review sites and messageboards over time started destinguishing the copy of Boomer on ''Galactica'' and the copy of Boomer on Caprica as "''Galactica''-Sharon" and "Caprica-Sharon" for convenience. This loosley developed system then spread to other Cylons as they appeared ("[[Gina|''Pegasus''-Six]]", "Caprica-Doral", "Caprica-D'anna", etc.), though it isn't based on any official material (''BattlestarWiki'' eventually adopted these terms of convenience as well). When Number Three remarks to "Caprica-Six" that her nickname is a little funny, because she's only one of hundreds of copies of "Number Six" on Caprica, this might be a small joke by the writers at the expense of fans.
*Sharon showed difficulty in performing chin ups, but later showed no problem in moving pieces of concrete weighing at least 100 pounds.
**She could have just been angry, and not actually appearing strained because it was physically hard.
**One of the consistent features of both ''Galactica''-Sharon and Caprica-Sharon has been the conflict between her "natural" Cylon Number Eight personality and her human Sharon personality. While probably intended that the two personalities should remain separate, with the Number Eight personality primary, it never worked out that way. In "[[Water]]", for example, Sharon reasserts herself before Number Eight can finish planting the charges. At this point, both ''Galactica''-Sharon/Eight and Caprica-Sharon/Eight have their personalities all jumbled up, with the Sharon personality exerting the stronger influence but retaining knowledge of being a Cylon and being Number Eight. Anyway: the Sharon "code" would have to include imposed limitations on what she believes her own strength and physical abilities to be, or she'd be found out much, much more easily. Inconsistencies in her apparent physical abilities can therefore be explained along with inconsistencies of her mixed but not really integrated personalities.
*Number Three appears to have some command functions based on her actions and behavior. These apparently include determining final disposition of other Cylon personalities.
*Lucy Lawless once again uses her native New Zealand accent for [[D'anna Biers]], even though at the end of "[[Final Cut#notes|Final Cut]]" it was implied that her character normally doesn't.
*Galactica-Sharon's old appartment number on Caprica was "502"
*Much of the dialog in the episode recap is entirely new, and dubbed in to better summarize the segment.
*According to RDM's podcast, there was an entire subplot in this episode in which Lucy Lawless's character "D'anna Biers" would interview President Roslin about rumors that the pregnant Cylon prisoner's baby had been born. Then "''Galactica''-Three" would try to kidnap the baby off of ''Galactica'' in collusion with [[Gina]] (''Pegasus''-Six). The subplot was cut for time (they wanted to spend more time focusing on events on Caprica), and also because they felt it made the episode very confusing; cutting between many different Cylon copies both on Caprica and ''Galactica''. These scenes apparently ''were'' filmed, then cut, because promotional photos for this episode show pictures of D'anna Biers on Galactica (with her new hairstyle), so it will probably appear in deleted scenes released in the next DVD set.
*Sharon has a pair of hand carved, wood or stone, decorative elephants in her apartment. Caprica-Six asks her if they are from "[[Ithaca]]", which on Earth is an island off the coast of Greece and is the home of Odysseus in Homer's [[Wikipedia:Odyssey|Odyssey]]. She states that they were a gift from her mother for her graduation.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==

*''Caprica-Sharon has gone into premature labor with her Hybrid baby:''
:'''Cottle''': I find it absolutely amazing you people went to all the trouble to appear human, and didn't upgrade the plumbing.

*''"Caprica-Six" and a D'anna-copy walk past a crowd of other Cylons of various models, and they all keep turning their heads to look at Caprica-Six:''
:'''Caprica-Six''': I still can't get used to this.
:'''D'anna-copy''': Well youre a Hero of the Cylon now. You're our first celebrity!
:'''Caprica-Six''': Oh, I'm just another Six
:'''D'anna-copy''': You're too modest. I'm just another Three...and they're Fives (''motions at a Doral-model'')..and Eights (''motions at a Sharon-model''). But you, everyone calls you "Caprica-Six"...like you're the only Six on the planet!

*''Anders and some resistance members are planning to bomb a cafe filled with humanoid Cylons:''
:'''Jean''': Security is minimal: two Centurions patrol out front, third bullet-head walks the perimeter. Bullet-head walking perimeter makes random changes to his patrol, be tough to get past him.
:'''Anders''': All right, so we go under him. The storm drain leads directly to the garage underneath the cafe. There'll be dozens of Skin Jobs inside.

*''President Roslin, Baltar, Admiral Adama and Col. Tigh discuss what to do with the Hybrid baby:''
:'''Roslin''': If [[Hera|the baby]] does survive, the question is: what do we do with it?
:'''Baltar:''': Do? What are you suggesting? That we throw it out of an airlock?
:'''Roslin''': I don't make suggestions Mr. Baltar, if I want to toss a baby out of an airlock I'd say so.

== Official Statements ==
*David Eick's video blog shows the crew preparation for filming a Cylon rebirthing scene, most likely for this episode.

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===
*[[Lucy Lawless]] as [[D'anna Biers]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*Kerry Norton as Paramedic [[Layne Ishay]]
*[[Matthew Bennett]] as [[Aaron Doral]]
*[[Michael Trucco]] as [[Samuel Anders]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*Alisen Down as Jean Barclay
*Erica Cerra as [[Maya]]
*Diego Diablo Del Mar as Hillard

=== Writing & Direction ===


=== Production Notes ===

*Series 2 (2005 / 2006)
*Production Number: 2.18
*Airdate Order: 18 (of 20)

=== First Run Air Dates & Releases ===

*UK Airdate: Date
*US Airdate: 24 February 2006
*DVD Release (UK): Date
*DVD Release (US): Date
*[[Wikipedia:Nielsen Rating|Nielsen Rating]]: X.X million households, XXX share

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Bradley Thompson]]
[[Category:Episodes written by David Weddle]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Jeff Woolnough]]

The Captain's Hand

2006-02-19T11:58:12Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Adamas.jpg|300px]]
| Title= The Captain's Hand
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 17
| Guests=[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm0900599|Jeff Vlaming]]
| Story=
| Director=[[IMDB:nm0590790|Sergio Mimica-Gezzan]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= February 17 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,584
| Prev= [[Sacrifice]]
| Next= [[Downloaded]]
}}

== Overview ==

== Summary ==
*The episode begins as two [[Raptor|Raptors]] begin a training mission outside [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']], which is near a [[Wikipedia:Binary star system|binary star]], causing [[Dradis|DRADIS]] and communications interference. The Raptors pass through a nebulus cloud, upon which they pick up a transmission. In the ''Pegasus'' C.I.C., the Raptors disappear from DRADIS, the Comm officer believing that they may be in distress.

*On ''[[Galactica]]'', [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] and the deck crew are in the process of unloading containers, when [[Cally]] mentions she heard movement from inside a fallen container. Against waiting for the [[Colonial Marine Corps|Marines]], Tyrol decides to investigate by entering the container. Inside, Tyrol finds a pregnant teenager who asks for [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]].

*[[Lee Adama]] travels to the [[Mercury class battlestar|battlestar]] ''[[Pegasus (RDM)|Pegasus]]'', where he meets up with [[Kara Thrace]]. Lee has been promoted to '''Major'''. The two encounter Commander [[Barry Garner]], now in command of ''Pegasus'', who orders Kara to the flight deck while he and Lee proceed to [[CIC|C.I.C.]]

*[[Barry Garner|Commander Garner]] and [[Lee Adama|Major Adama]] talk in private about the discipline on [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']]. Garner thinks that [[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] is a huge part of the problem, but Adama defends her, citing her excellent piloting skills. Garner thinks that the virtues learned in his experience as an engineer would do the ship some good.

*Back on ''Galactica'', Dr. Cottle & Admiral Adama discuss the fate of the young woman found in the container. Admiral Adama speaks to the young girl, [[Rya Kibby]], as to why she is a stowaway. Rya mentions the fact that she doesn't want to keep the baby, but Admiral Adama (upon Rya's parents request) is intent on sending her back to her family. Dr. Cottle suggests that she request asylum aboard ''Galactica'', getting a hard stare from the Admiral. Rya affirms that's what she wants.

*While reviewing the last transmissions from the Raptors, [[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] makes a startling discovery, in that the reason for the disappearance may be the result of answering a supposed distress call. She attempts to bring this up with Commander Garner, who flatly rejects the theory.

*News of [[Rya Kibby|Rya's]] asylum request has raised a stir amongst the Fleet. On ''Colonial One'', [[Laura Roslin|President Roslin]] discusses the issue with Admiral Adama, [[Tory Foster]] (her new aide following [[Billy_Keikeya|Billy]]'s death), and Delegate [[Sarah_Porter|Sarah Porter]] from Gemenon. Delegate Porter mentions that the abortion is a travesty & demanded the girl be returned to her parents. President Roslin responded by saying the asylum request is under review.

*Over wireless, [[Barry Garner|Commander Garner]], [[Lee Adama|Major Adama]], and [[William Adama|Admiral Adama]] discuss the situation. Commander Garner feels they should jump to the missing location of the Raptors to bring them home. The Admiral asks Lee if he concurrs, in which Lee discusses Starbuck's theory that they were drawn to a Cylon trap. Admiral Adama is inclined to agree with the Major and Starbuck, and orders a recon mission to ascertain the fate of the two raptors. Garner is furious over the decision, and orders Major Adama off the C.I.C.

*Garner decides to make the jump regardless, causing a heated discussion in C.I.C. between him and Lee. By the end of the discussion, Garner asks the Sergant-at-arms to have Major Adama removed from the C.I.C., while the Major asks the same for Garner, relieving him of command. Drawing his weapon, the Sergeant asks for the '''Major''' to leave.

*Raptors are launched from ''Pegasus'' towards the now located raptors. One of the pilots is able to look inside their cockpits, only to find both Raptor crews dead. At that moment, a [[Basestar (RDM)|Basestar]] jumps into view of the pilots. ''Pegasus's'' own DRADIS indicates the arrival of two additional Basestars, which begin attacking ''Pegasus'' with conventional and nuclear missile barrages.

*During the course of the assault, [[Pegasus|''Pegasus's'']] [[FTL]] drive is disabled. Garner attempts to determine the cause from C.I.C., but is confused. Major Adama, still being held by the Sergeant-at-arms, attends to other duties, and confronts Commander Garner. Commander Garner decides to head down to the engine room, and abdicates command to Major Adama.

*''Pegasus'' manages to jump away, with [[Barry Garner|Garner]] sacrificing himself in the process.

*In [[William Adama|Admiral Adama's]] quarters, he and [[Lee Adama|Major Adama]] review the reports from the incident on ''Pegasus'', pointing out that Lee was more forgiving of the late Commander than Starbuck was. Admiral Adama then asks what Garner's fatal flaw was, and Lee responds by mentioning that Garner was good with machines, but that command is about people. The Admiral asks Lee to keep that in mind, as he offers Lee the job of commanding ''Pegasus'', along with a promotion to Commander. Lee takes a moment, then shakes his father's hand, accepting the promotion.

== Questions ==
*Would Adama allow Dr. Cottle to be arrested? From the episode, he is of the opinion that he would do what is necessary.
*Was Baltar's report real, or was it just invented to produce the opportunity to drive his wedge?
**Possibly, but either way, it is fairly obvious that with the constant Cylon attacks the Fleet's population (barring the unexpected return of ''Pegasus'') is almost always declining, as noted by Admiral Adama.
*Who will replace Baltar as Roslin's Vice President?
**Can Roslin actually pick another Vice President, under Colonial law, if Baltar refuses to resign? One of the reporters at the end actually directly asked if Baltar would remain as Vice President. Perhaps Roslin cannot forcibly remove Baltar from his office just because he's running aginst her.
***Baltar, if they are following American political protocol as they seem to be doing, was elected in his own right. For example, George Bush cannot force Dick Cheney to resign, only Mr. Cheney himself can elect to resign. Interestingly, 204 years ago US President John Adams faced a similar situation: His own Vice-President, Thomas Jefferson, plotting his political downfall.
*How will Zarek position himself in the Baltar campaign?
**It is likely that Zarek hopes to become Vice President himself.
***Follow-up question: does Zarek plan to have Baltar killed, as per his plan in "[[Colonial Day]]"?
****A possibility, but Zarek actually seems willing to make a beneficial alliance with Baltar, which Roslin would never have agreed to.
*Will Tigh accept the fact that Lee Adama now outranks him and has command of a ship? Or does Saul have no interest in command and already told Admiral Adama that before the posting was offered to Lee?
**As mentioned in [[Scattered]], Col. Tigh was never really interested in commanding a [[Battlestar|battlestar]].
***Fleet protocols, as in the real-world US Navy and other naval services around the globe, would require Tigh, as the senior officer to take command, as he did when Adama was incapacitated.
****This is true for an intra-ship command structure, but if other qualified officers were available, Col. Tigh probably had the privilege to pass up the command of Pegasus, citing XO's prerogative (or something similar).
*What will happen to Rya, now that she had been granted asylum on ''Galactica''?
*Why was Lee promoted straight from Major to Commander? Can a Colonel not be placed in command of a battlestar for long-term purposes?
**No. Colonel [[Jack Fisk]] was promoted to Commander of ''Pegasus'' before his death. It appears to be something of a rank nomenclature formality, as Garner was promoted up from being head of engineering. Compare to the [http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Captain established terminology convention] on ''Star Trek'' for always referring to the commanding officer of a ship as "Captain", even if that officer does not hold that specific rank.
***This is done in real life as well. In the US Navy, a person in the command of a vessel is referred to as "Captain" even if his actual rank is Lieutenant Commander, Ensign or even if he/she is a Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO).
*Had Garner been serving as XO to ''Pegasus's''' previous commander, the late [[Jack Fisk]]?
*Does the fact that the Cylons had such a large force waiting to ambush ''Pegasus'' indicate that they have a new [[Resurrection Ship]] in place?
*How does the double layer flight pod system on ''Pegasus'' operate? Just before the battlestar jumps away from the ambush, there is a short sequence of Vipers returning to the ship that shows them landing on two distinct levels of the flight pod, with Vipers landing on the lower level being upside down with respect to ''Pegasus''. Both the Colonials and Cylons obviously have some form of artifical gravity on their spacecraft, so this explains why such an arrangement is possible. However, it would appear to be less convenient to have the Vipers landing on either side of the "divider" running through the flight pod, unless all the hangar and launch facilities are actually located there (which may well be possible, but would still seem to require Vipers to be reoriented at some point, as they always seem to be launched "the right way up"). In contrast, ''Galactica'' operates similarly to modern aircraft carriers - all Vipers land on a single deck and are moved down to a hangar deck below using large elevators.

== Analysis ==
*When Baltar announces his candidacy for the Presidency, Number Six applauds with a slow clap. This reflects how then-Commander William Adama led the entire crew in a long, drawn-out slow clap in respect of President Roslin when she was re-instated to her office in "[[Home, Part II]]".
*Survivor count is decremented by six from "[[Sacrifice]]", but seven people died in that episode - terrorists [[Sesha Abinell]], [[Vinson]], [[Page]] and [[Chu]], two unnamed marines, and civilian [[Billy Keikeya]]. At least one birth must have taken place to offset the population count between the two episodes.
*Based on the ''[[Colonial One]]'' whiteboard seen toward the end of the episode, only five people died as a result of the ambush on ''Pegasus'': [[Richard Bayer|Richard "Buster" Bayer]], [[Lyla Ellway|Lyla "Shark" Ellway]], the unnamed crew of [[Raptor 314]], and Commander [[Barry Garner]].
**This casualty figure is conspicuously low, considering that ''Galactica'' lost 85 crewmen as the result of a hit by a single nuclear missile in the [[miniseries]], while ''Pegasus'' is hit with no less than three in this episode.
**On the other hand, it is at least consistent with the surprisingly low number of casualties incurred in the [[Battle of the Resurrection Ship]], and may indicate that the hull armor on ''Pegasus'' is significantly stronger than on ''Galactica'', which has many conspicuously bare structural ribs.
*In the course of this episode's timeline, [[Lee Adama]] rises from the rank of Captain (CAG of ''[[Galactica]]'') to Major (No details are given on that posting except Adama was assigned to [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']]), to Commander and CO of [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']] in the wake of Commander [[Barry Garner|Barry Garner's]] death saving his ship.
**Major Adama's duty was intended as a temporary stint as ''Pegasus'' acting XO, to familiarize himself with the duties of a senior officer. In the opening scene, he tells [[Anastasia Dualla]] that he expects to return to ''Galactica'' "in a couple of weeks".
*Garner's decision to mount a rescue operation in contravention of his commanding officer's orders is an explicit parallel to "[[Pegasus (episode)|Pegasus]]", down to the choice of words:
:'''Adama:''' "I'm getting my men."
:'''Garner:''' "I'm going to get our men."
*Two Raptors are lost in the beginning of the episode, but the officers refer to ''four'' missing pilots. This indicates that the ECOs aboard the Raptors are also qualified pilots—although, given that this is a training mission, they may in fact be instructors assigned to coach the pilots in training.

== Notes ==
*Timeline-wise, Baltar says that he made an initial projection of the fleet's population "over seven months ago". This would have been before the arrival of ''Pegasus'', since he said he factored in the arrival of her crew subsequently.
*It has been "almost a month" since Apollo was shot in "[[Sacrifice]]".
*The recap at the beginning of this episode shows a scene we have not yet seen in the series. It is the scene where Admiral Adama says that he is choosing Garner as the new Pegasus Commander, possibly a scene that was cut from "Black Market" and will most likely appear on the next DVD set.
**Actually, this scene is really use of existing footage from "Black Market" when Adama and Tigh are telling Apollo to go to ''Pegasus'' on the hangar deck: the scene has been cleverly redubbed, so that Adama is saying entirely new lines when the camera is pointed at ''Tigh'' (not at Adama's face), and then Tigh says new lines when the camera is pointed at ''Adama'' etc. The following exchange never happened in that episode:
::Adama: "I'm putting Garner in command"
::Tigh: "He's an engineer, not a command officer"
::Adama: "He's the best they've got"
*There is also another case of this redubbing when Baltar is talking to Gina during the "previously" montage: when the camera is pointed at Baltar, we hear [[Gina]] saying "You must betray Roslin and run for President in the upcoming election", but this was never heard in the aired version of "[[Epiphanies]]".
*Col. Tigh does actually appear in this episode, seen very briefly in the ''Galactica'' CIC with no dialog. He also contributes the "Previously on ''Battlestar Galactica''" voiceover, and a few lines of dialogue in the above-mentioned redubbed scene from the recap.
*[[Roslin]] references Shakespeare's ''Merchant of Venice'' when she asks [[Quorum of Twelve|Councillor]] [[Sarah Porter]] if she wants her "pound of flesh". It's unclear if analogues of his work exist in the [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Colonies]].
*[[Mercury class battlestar]]s do not need to retract their flight pods prior to a jump, unlike the [[Galactica type battlestar|Galactica type]].
*The adjectival form of "Gemenon" is "Gemenese".
*Under Gemenese law, minors are the "property" of their parents.
*Capt. [[Cole Taylor|Cole "Stinger" Taylor]] is still onboard ''Pegasus'', mentioned by Capt. Thrace as being in the brig for insubordination.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==

== Official Statements ==

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===

*[[IMDB:nm0001334|John Heard]] as Commander [[Barry Garner]]
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Aaron+Douglas Aaron Douglas] as Chief [[Galen Tyrol]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Nicki+Clyne Nicki Clyne] as Specialist [[Cally]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*Brad Dryborough as Lieutenant [[Hoshi]]
*Christian Tessier as [[Tucker Clellan|Tucker "Duck" Clellan]]
*Amber Rothwell as [[Rya Kibby]]
*Kavan Smith as Lt. [[Richard Bayer|Richard "Buster" Bayer]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2015903/ Stephanie von Pfetten] as Cpt. [[Marcia Case|Marcia "Showboat" Case]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Patricia+Idlette Particia Idlette] as [[Sarah Porter]]
*Aaron Pearl as Ensign [[Abel Thornton]]
*Christina Schild as [[Playa Palacios]]
*Tammy Hui as ECO [[Lyla Ellway|Lyla "Shark" Ellway]]
*James Bell as Lt. [[Steve Fleer|Steve "Red Devil" Fleer]]
*Kurt Max Runte as Ensign Charles Bellamy
*Kimani Ray Smith as Pegasus Sergeant

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Jeff Vlaming]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Sergio Mimica-Gezzan]]

The Captain's Hand

2006-02-19T10:56:53Z

Wedge: /* Questions */

{{Episode Data|
Image = [[Image:Adamas.jpg|300px]]
| Title= The Captain's Hand
| Series= [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|The Re-imagined Series]]
| Season= [[Season 2 (2005-06)|2]]
| Episode= 17
| Guests=[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
| Writer=[[IMDB:nm0900599|Jeff Vlaming]]
| Story=
| Director=[[IMDB:nm0590790|Sergio Mimica-Gezzan]]
| Production=
| Rating=
| US Airdate= February 17 2006
| UK Airdate=
| DVD=
| Population= 49,584
| Prev= [[Sacrifice]]
| Next= [[Downloaded]]
}}

== Overview ==

== Summary ==
*The episode begins as two [[Raptor|Raptors]] begin a training mission outside [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']], which is near a [[Wikipedia:Binary star system|binary star]], causing [[Dradis|DRADIS]] and communications interference. The Raptors pass through a nebulus cloud, upon which they pick up a transmission. In the ''Pegasus'' C.I.C., the Raptors disappear from DRADIS, the Comm officer believing that they may be in distress.

*On ''[[Galactica]]'', [[Tyrol|Chief Tyrol]] and the deck crew are in the process of unloading containers, when [[Cally]] mentions she heard movement from inside a fallen container. Against waiting for the [[Colonial Marine Corps|Marines]], Tyrol decides to investigate by entering the container. Inside, Tyrol finds a pregnant teenager who asks for [[Cottle|Dr. Cottle]].

*[[Lee Adama]] travels to the [[Mercury class battlestar|battlestar]] ''[[Pegasus (RDM)|Pegasus]]'', where he meets up with [[Kara Thrace]]. Lee has been promoted to '''Major'''. The two encounter Commander [[Barry Garner]], now in command of ''Pegasus'', who orders Kara to the flight deck while he and Lee proceed to [[CIC|C.I.C.]]

*[[Barry Garner|Commander Garner]] and [[Lee Adama|Major Adama]] talk in private about the discipline on [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']]. Garner thinks that [[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] is a huge part of the problem, but Adama defends her, citing her excellent piloting skills. Garner thinks that the virtues learned in his experience as an engineer would do the ship some good.

*Back on ''Galactica'', Dr. Cottle & Admiral Adama discuss the fate of the young woman found in the container. Admiral Adama speaks to the young girl, [[Rya Kibby]], as to why she is a stowaway. Rya mentions the fact that she doesn't want to keep the baby, but Admiral Adama (upon Rya's parents request) is intent on sending her back to her family. Dr. Cottle suggests that she request asylum aboard ''Galactica'', getting a hard stare from the Admiral. Rya affirms that's what she wants.

*While reviewing the last transmissions from the Raptors, [[Kara Thrace|Starbuck]] makes a startling discovery, in that the reason for the disappearance may be the result of answering a supposed distress call. She attempts to bring this up with Commander Garner, who flatly rejects the theory.

*News of [[Rya Kibby|Rya's]] asylum request has raised a stir amongst the Fleet. On ''Colonial One'', [[Laura Roslin|President Roslin]] discusses the issue with Admiral Adama, [[Tory Foster]] (her new aide following [[Billy_Keikeya|Billy]]'s death), and Delegate [[Sarah_Porter|Sarah Porter]] from Gemenon. Delegate Porter mentions that the abortion is a travesty & demanded the girl be returned to her parents. President Roslin responded by saying the asylum request is under review.

*Over wireless, [[Barry Garner|Commander Garner]], [[Lee Adama|Major Adama]], and [[William Adama|Admiral Adama]] discuss the situation. Commander Garner feels they should jump to the missing location of the Raptors to bring them home. The Admiral asks Lee if he concurrs, in which Lee discusses Starbuck's theory that they were drawn to a Cylon trap. Admiral Adama is inclined to agree with the Major and Starbuck, and orders a recon mission to ascertain the fate of the two raptors. Garner is furious over the decision, and orders Major Adama off the C.I.C.

*Garner decides to make the jump regardless, causing a heated discussion in C.I.C. between him and Lee. By the end of the discussion, Garner asks the Sergant-at-arms to have Major Adama removed from the C.I.C., while the Major asks the same for Garner, relieving him of command. Drawing his weapon, the Sergeant asks for the '''Major''' to leave.

*Raptors are launched from ''Pegasus'' towards the now located raptors. One of the pilots is able to look inside their cockpits, only to find both Raptor crews dead. At that moment, a [[Basestar (RDM)|Basestar]] jumps into view of the pilots. ''Pegasus's'' own DRADIS indicates the arrival of two additional Basestars, which begin attacking ''Pegasus'' with conventional and nuclear missile barrages.

*During the course of the assault, [[Pegasus|''Pegasus's'']] [[FTL]] drive is disabled. Garner attempts to determine the cause from C.I.C., but is confused. Major Adama, still being held by the Sergeant-at-arms, attends to other duties, and confronts Commander Garner. Commander Garner decides to head down to the engine room, and abdicates command to Major Adama.

*''Pegasus'' manages to jump away, with [[Barry Garner|Garner]] sacrificing himself in the process.

*In [[William Adama|Admiral Adama's]] quarters, he and [[Lee Adama|Major Adama]] review the reports from the incident on ''Pegasus'', pointing out that Lee was more forgiving of the late Commander than Starbuck was. Admiral Adama then asks what Garner's fatal flaw was, and Lee responds by mentioning that Garner was good with machines, but that command is about people. The Admiral asks Lee to keep that in mind, as he offers Lee the job of commanding ''Pegasus'', along with a promotion to Commander. Lee takes a moment, then shakes his father's hand, accepting the promotion.

== Questions ==
*Would Adama allow Dr. Cottle to be arrested? From the episode, he is of the opinion that he would do what is necessary.
*Was Baltar's report real, or was it just invented to produce the opportunity to drive his wedge?
**Possibly, but either way, it is fairly obvious that with the constant Cylon attacks the Fleet's population (barring the unexpected return of ''Pegasus'') is almost always declining, as noted by Admiral Adama.
*Who will replace Baltar as Roslin's Vice President?
**Can Roslin actually pick another Vice President, under Colonial law, if Baltar refuses to resign? One of the reporters at the end actually directly asked if Baltar would remain as Vice President. Perhaps Roslin cannot forcibly remove Baltar from his office just because he's running aginst her.
***Baltar, if they are following American political protocol as they seem to be doing, was elected in his own right. For example, George Bush cannot force Dick Cheney to resign, only Mr. Cheney himself can elect to resign. Interestingly, 204 years ago US President John Adams faced a similar situation: His own Vice-President, Thomas Jefferson, plotting his political downfall.
*How will Zarek position himself in the Baltar campaign?
**It is likely that Zarek hopes to become Vice President himself.
***Follow-up question: does Zarek plan to have Baltar killed, as per his plan in "[[Colonial Day]]"?
****A possibility, but Zarek actually seems willing to make a beneficial alliance with Baltar, which Roslin would never have agreed to.
*Will Tigh accept the fact that Lee Adama now outranks him and has command of a ship? Or does Saul have no interest in command and already told Admiral Adama that before the posting was offered to Lee?
**As mentioned in [[Scattered]], Col. Tigh was never really interested in commanding a [[Battlestar|battlestar]].
***Fleet protocols, as in the real-world US Navy and other naval services around the globe, would require Tigh, as the senior officer to take command, as he did when Adama was incapacitated.
****This is true for an intra-ship command structure, but if other qualified officers were available, Col. Tigh probably had the privilege to pass up the command of Pegasus, citing XO's prerogative (or something similar).
*****I had a problem with this as well..I can only assume that (offscreen) Col Tigh was either a)Offered the position and declined b) Had a previous discussion with Adm Adama stating he never wanted his own command c) Adm Adama didnt think Col Tigh capable of the position..which would require a deep convo with his XO or d) Adm Adama needs him personally as his XO (which is the "nice" answer. This was POSSIBLY covered in a Tigh comment in "Scattered" ''Colonel Tigh: (to Commander Adama) You never should have brought me back into the service. If you had just let me be, I'd have died back there on Caprica along with everyone else, and been happier for it. I don't want a command. I never did. Don't you dare die on me now.'' Address please Mr Writers! :) --[[User:Simmons|Simmons]] 03:49, 19 February 2006 (EST)
*What will happen to Rya, now that she had been granted asylum on ''Galactica''?
*Why was Lee promoted straight from Major to Commander? Can a Colonel not be placed in command of a battlestar for long-term purposes?
**No. Colonel [[Jack Fisk]] was promoted to Commander of ''Pegasus'' before his death. It appears to be something of a rank nomenclature formality, as Garner was promoted up from being head of engineering. Compare to the [http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Captain established terminology convention] on ''Star Trek'' for always referring to the commanding officer of a ship as "Captain", even if that officer does not hold that specific rank.
***This is done in real life as well. In the US Navy, a person in the command of a vessel is referred to as "Captain" even if his actual rank is Lieutenant Commander, Ensign or even if he/she is a Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO).
*Had Garner been serving as XO to ''Pegasus's''' previous commander, the late [[Jack Fisk]]?
*Does the fact that the Cylons had such a large force waiting to ambush ''Pegasus'' indicate that they have a new [[Resurrection Ship]] in place?

== Analysis ==
*When Baltar announces his candidacy for the Presidency, Number Six applauds with a slow clap. This reflects how then-Commander William Adama led the entire crew in a long, drawn-out slow clap in respect of President Roslin when she was re-instated to her office in "[[Home, Part II]]".
*Survivor count is decremented by six from "[[Sacrifice]]", but seven people died in that episode - terrorists [[Sesha Abinell]], [[Vinson]], [[Page]] and [[Chu]], two unnamed marines, and civilian [[Billy Keikeya]]. At least one birth must have taken place to offset the population count between the two episodes.
*Based on the ''[[Colonial One]]'' whiteboard seen toward the end of the episode, only five people died as a result of the ambush on ''Pegasus'': [[Richard Bayer|Richard "Buster" Bayer]], [[Lyla Ellway|Lyla "Shark" Ellway]], the unnamed crew of [[Raptor 314]], and Commander [[Barry Garner]].
**This casualty figure is conspicuously low, considering that ''Galactica'' lost 85 crewmen as the result of a hit by a single nuclear missile in the [[miniseries]], while ''Pegasus'' is hit with no less than three in this episode.
**On the other hand, it is at least consistent with the surprisingly low number of casualties incurred in the [[Battle of the Resurrection Ship]], and may indicate that the hull armor on ''Pegasus'' is significantly stronger than on ''Galactica'', which has many conspicuously bare structural ribs.
*In the course of this episode's timeline, [[Lee Adama]] rises from the rank of Captain (CAG of ''[[Galactica]]'') to Major (No details are given on that posting except Adama was assigned to [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']]), to Commander and CO of [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']] in the wake of Commander [[Barry Garner|Barry Garner's]] death saving his ship.
**Major Adama's duty was intended as a temporary stint as ''Pegasus'' acting XO, to familiarize himself with the duties of a senior officer. In the opening scene, he tells [[Anastasia Dualla]] that he expects to return to ''Galactica'' "in a couple of weeks".
*Garner's decision to mount a rescue operation in contravention of his commanding officer's orders is an explicit parallel to "[[Pegasus (episode)|Pegasus]]", down to the choice of words:
:'''Adama:''' "I'm getting my men."
:'''Garner:''' "I'm going to get our men."
*Two Raptors are lost in the beginning of the episode, but the officers refer to ''four'' missing pilots. This indicates that the ECOs aboard the Raptors are also qualified pilots—although, given that this is a training mission, they may in fact be instructors assigned to coach the pilots in training.

== Notes ==
*Timeline-wise, Baltar says that he made an initial projection of the fleet's population "over seven months ago". This would have been before the arrival of ''Pegasus'', since he said he factored in the arrival of her crew subsequently.
*It has been "almost a month" since Apollo was shot in "[[Sacrifice]]".
*The recap at the beginning of this episode shows a scene we have not yet seen in the series. It is the scene where Admiral Adama says that he is choosing Garner as the new Pegasus Commander, possibly a scene that was cut from "Black Market" and will most likely appear on the next DVD set.
**Actually, this scene is really use of existing footage from "Black Market" when Adama and Tigh are telling Apollo to go to ''Pegasus'' on the hangar deck: the scene has been cleverly redubbed, so that Adama is saying entirely new lines when the camera is pointed at ''Tigh'' (not at Adama's face), and then Tigh says new lines when the camera is pointed at ''Adama'' etc. The following exchange never happened in that episode:
::Adama: "I'm putting Garner in command"
::Tigh: "He's an engineer, not a command officer"
::Adama: "He's the best they've got"
*There is also another case of this redubbing when Baltar is talking to Gina during the "previously" montage: when the camera is pointed at Baltar, we hear [[Gina]] saying "You must betray Roslin and run for President in the upcoming election", but this was never heard in the aired version of "[[Epiphanies]]".
*Col. Tigh does actually appear in this episode, seen very briefly in the ''Galactica'' CIC with no dialog. He also contributes the "Previously on ''Battlestar Galactica''" voiceover, and a few lines of dialogue in the above-mentioned redubbed scene from the recap.
*[[Roslin]] references Shakespeare's ''Merchant of Venice'' when she asks [[Quorum of Twelve|Councillor]] [[Sarah Porter]] if she wants her "pound of flesh". It's unclear if analogues of his work exist in the [[The Twelve Colonies (RDM)|Colonies]].
*[[Mercury class battlestar]]s do not need to retract their flight pods prior to a jump, unlike the [[Galactica type battlestar|Galactica type]].
*The adjectival form of "Gemenon" is "Gemenese".
*Under Gemenese law, minors are the "property" of their parents.
*Capt. [[Cole Taylor|Cole "Stinger" Taylor]] is still onboard ''Pegasus'', mentioned by Capt. Thrace as being in the brig for insubordination.

== Noteworthy Dialogue ==

== Official Statements ==

== Statistics ==

=== Guest Stars ===

*[[IMDB:nm0001334|John Heard]] as Commander [[Barry Garner]]
*[[Richard Hatch]] as [[Tom Zarek]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Aaron+Douglas Aaron Douglas] as Chief [[Galen Tyrol]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Nicki+Clyne Nicki Clyne] as Specialist [[Cally]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0722413/ Donnelly Rhodes] as Dr. [[Cottle]]
*Rekha Sharma as [[Tory Foster]]
*Brad Dryborough as Lieutenant [[Hoshi]]
*Christian Tessier as [[Tucker Clellan|Tucker "Duck" Clellan]]
*Amber Rothwell as [[Rya Kibby]]
*Kavan Smith as Lt. [[Richard Bayer|Richard "Buster" Bayer]]
*[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2015903/ Stephanie von Pfetten] as Cpt. [[Marcia Case|Marcia "Showboat" Case]]
*[http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?+Patricia+Idlette Particia Idlette] as [[Sarah Porter]]
*Aaron Pearl as Ensign [[Abel Thornton]]
*Christina Schild as [[Playa Palacios]]
*Tammy Hui as ECO [[Lyla Ellway|Lyla "Shark" Ellway]]
*James Bell as Lt. [[Steve Fleer|Steve "Red Devil" Fleer]]
*Kurt Max Runte as Ensign Charles Bellamy
*Kimani Ray Smith as Pegasus Sergeant

{{Episode List}}

[[Category: A to Z]]
[[Category: RDM]]
[[Category:Episodes written by Jeff Vlaming]]
[[Category:Episodes directed by Sergio Mimica-Gezzan]]