Pegasus (episode)

For information related the battlestar Pegasus itself, see Pegasus.

Overview

Tensions run high when the Pegasus, a battlestar more advanced than the Galactica, is found -- only to have Admiral Nelena Cain usurp command of the fleet and foist her demands on those under her new command.

Summary

• The Pegasus, a Mercury-class battlestar, has joined the fleet. She survived the attack by blind-jumping as the Cylons attacked the Scorpion Ship Yards.
• A Cylon fleet, comprised of two basestars, about a dozen support ships and a large mothership of unknown purpose have been trailing the fleet -- and detected by Cain and the Pegasus.
  • Pegasus discovered this Cylon Fleet and have been carrying out hit-and-run attacks against the Cylons. At first the Cylon Fleet's course seemed to be random, until Cain realized they were going to systems with natural resources. Cain then tried to predict which system the Cylons were going to Jump to, and stumbled upon Galactica; after looking over Galactica's logs, Cain surmizes that the Cylon fleet was following Galactica (which itself was Jumping to systems with natural resources for the civillian fleet, ("Water", ("The Hand of God"), etc).
• Upon assuming command of the fleet, Cain begins moving crew members around, transferring Lee Adama and Kara Thrace to the Pegasus.
• Tyrol welcomes his civilian counterpart on Pegasus. Laird is an aeronautical engineer-turned Deck Chief that designed the old engines in the Blackbird, and who's both appalled and impressed by Tyrol's new stealth fighter.
• Lee is essentially busted down to Raptor pilot in a recon mission to the Cylon fleet. But he shows his defiant side by asking Kara to commandeer the Blackbird to take some better recon photos of the fleet without being noticed by Colonial or Cylon forces.
• Helo and Galen Tyrol discover that Gina, the Cylon prisoner aboard the Pegasus, was raped by the crew as a form of torture. They rush to Galactica's brig, where a Pegasus lieutenant, Thorne, is about to rape Sharon. Tyrol throws Thorne against a bulkhead, unintentionally killing him. The pair are arrested for courts-martial.
• Commander Adama is angered to hear that Admiral Cain is going to hold the court-martial on Pegasus, not Galactica where the offense occurred. Cain assures Adama that they will be given a fair trial.
• Admiral Cain, however, does not give the pair a court martial hearing or trial by jury, instead rapidly deciding the verdict by herself and ordering Helo and Tyrol to be executed.
• Upon discovering what Admiral Cain has done, Commander Adama orders a Raptor to fly out with an armed Marine boarding party and launches Galactica's Vipers against Pegasus, demanding that Admiral Cain release Helo and Galen Tyrol.
• Admiral Cain refuses, and balks at the thought of an "independent tribunal" to settle the dispute because the last time Galactica held one Commander Adama dissolved the tribunal when he "didn't like the verdict". Adama refuses to back down and insists that he will get his men back.
• Admiral Cain launches Pegasus' Vipers against the incoming Vipers from Galactica. They close in on each other as the episode ends.

Questions

• Will Starbuck and her Blackbird stealth fighter play a role in the armed standoff between Pegasus and Galactica?
  • Although we won't know until next episode, that seems initially unlikely, as the Blackbird is being used for the Recon mission against the Cylon "Unknown". The episode seemed to suggest that both were occurring at the same time.
• Where did the Pegasus crew get fresh fruit?
  • Dualla explains in "Final Cut" that their ships have very effective refrigeration units to keep food fresh for long duration duty tours, etc.
• In the absence of Apollo and Starbuck, who is leading Galactica's fighters against Pegasus? George Birch? Symes?
• As for the unknown ship in the Cylon fleet, what is its function? Is it, as Adama speculates, a Raider factory? Or a Command-and-Control vessel? Could it be a HumanoCylon creation facility? The next episodes' title "Resurrection Ship" could foreshadow that possibility, as when HumanoCylons "die" they're downloaded into new bodies, and these new bodies are stockpiled where?
  • Could the title "Resurrection Ship" refer to Pegasus, as it was presumed to be dead but "came back"?
• Could the new "Cylon mothership" be a command ship that contains the Re-Imagined Series' equivalent of the Imperious Leader?

Analysis

• Cally's charged reaction to the drunken Pegasus crewmen bragging about raping Number Six/Gina repeatedly is probably due to herself being the survivor of an attempted rape, in "Bastille Day".
• Talking amongst themselves on Cylon-occupied Caprica, the Cylons mentioned in passing that there was a main Cylon fleet in "Final Cut".
• In the miniseries, Adama first proposes that the Galactica will go about independent of the rest of the fleet and fight the Cylons. Roslin persuades him to instead protect and lead the fleet on their escape from the colonies. The Pegasus, in contrast, did travel about independently attacking the Cylons. The condition of the Pegasus's crew may be an indication of what would have happened to the Galactica if she stood and fought.
• Aside from Cain herself, the crew of the Pegasus seems exclusively male. Female crew members are conspicuously absent from the CIC and ready room of the Pegasus, and the dialogue of the drunken Pegasus crewmen suggests they've perhaps forgotten how to act around women. This may be a contributing factor to the behavior of the Pegasus' crew—if they travelled through space as long as they did, believing they were the remainder of humanity, Cain's power over the crew would have been more than merely military in nature—as the only surviving human woman, Cain would hold absolute sexual power over her crew as well. In addition, the lack of women aboard the Pegasus and the resulting sexual frustration could have led to the overly regimented, authoritarian, and brutal culture the crew developed, culminating in the senseless, repeated gang rape of the Cylon prisoner Gina.
  • It seems likely, however, that if the show's creators had the 'sexual power' angle in mind they would have represented it in some way in the actual show--there is no real evidence of any of this in the episode aside from the apparent lack of female cast members, and the jump to these conclusions seems a large one. Additionally, some viewers recall seeing female extras walking the corridors of the Pegasus. Even if female crew members are seemingly underrepresented in the few characters we've had a chance to become aquainted with thus far, it seems likely that it is a coincidence (that the roles were chosen because of the suitability of the actors for the roles, not because of their gender). Ron Moore has expressed in his podcasts that his vision of the Battlestar Galactica universe is being more or less completely egalitarian with regard to gender.
  • This contention further seems unlikely as about one-third of the way through the episode, a female Viper pilot from the Pegasus is prominently portrayed (the scene on the hanger deck before the argument between Apollo and Pegasus' CAG)
    • While this is true, the absence of female extras in the ready room or the background of CIC (where any actual acting talent would likely be unnecessary) suggests an intentional decision made during production.
      • Female extras can be seen at least once. There are two female pilots in the Pegasus pilot ready room during the briefing, then at least two more can be seen as the pilots leave the ready room. Later, female crew are visible again during Adama and Cain's phone conversation at the end. No less than two, possibly three female Pegasus crew are standing around talking outside that wall of windows behind Cain, and they then split up and wander off in various directions.
• Cally's disgust with the Pegasus crew's gang-rape of Gina is interesting in light of the fact that she had no compunctions about killing the Galactica copy of Boomer herself. Evidently she now acknowledges the Cylons' humanity in at least some measure. Perhaps she's felt a connection between this and her own assault on board Astral Queen by Mason in "Bastille Day".
  • It's also possible that, since her fellow female deck crew also look disgusted and follow her out, women just don't appreciate talk about rape in general. RDM says something to this effect in the podcast.

Notes

• Population count is 49,605, a dramatic increase of 1,752 since the 47,853 count in Flight of the Phoenix, undoubtedly to account for the addition of Battlestar Pegasus and her crew to the Colonial fleet.
  • Cain notes that Pegasus lost 700 crew in the openning attack, thus we may speculate that at the time of the attack her crew totalled to about 2,450.
  • During the episode, Admiral Cain mentioned that due to Gina's actions, 800 of her crew were lost. One possibility is that part of the 800 included the 700 lost during the initial attack. That being the case, the revised total number is 2,550. If the 800 crew lost was due to a separate incident, then the starting Pegasus numbers maybe around 3,250.
  • This is substantially smaller than Galactica's crew, possibly explained by many of Cain's crew being on leave at the time of the attack. Galactica, although soon to be decomissioned, was still fully operational. Also, Pegasus's systems are newer, and may be more automated.
• As the episode ends, it's interesting to see that the bulk of Galactica's Viper fleet consist of the Mark II's, while Pegasus had the Mark VII's. A classic picture of "old vs. new".
  • While Pegasus seems to have entirely Viper Mk. VII's, they would presumably have had to removed most of the automated systems from them (to prevent Cylon virus infiltration). Doing this makes them more difficult to fly (Galactica's few Mk. VII's are only used by the most capable pilots now). Pegasus' pilots might have more advanced fighers but they aren't as reliable now as the tried-and-true Mk. II's.
• Nelena Cain is the female version of Cain, who was portrayed by the late Lloyd Bridges in the original Battlestar Galactica.
• This episode is inspired by the two part episode, "The Living Legend".
• "Pegasus" apparently starts a multi-episode arc. The cliffhanger ending marks the mid-season finale. Season 2 will continue in January 2006 with Resurrection Ship.
• Ronald D. Moore also wrote another episode called The Pegasus, in the seventh season of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Official Statements

• Ron D. Moore stated in his podcast that there were a number of scenes filmed for this episode that had to be deleted for time, but that he expects to be edited back into the episode for the DVD release. According to Moore, although most episode rough cuts run a little overtime and one or two scenes have to be edited out, "Pegasus" had more than a full extra Act worth of material left over. The full episode would have been an hour and 15 minutes long. Moore tried to put in more scened to push it to 90 minutes, in which case Scifi Channel would aire it as a 90 minutes special (as they had done in the past for "Stargate Sg-1" on occasion), but ultimately not enough material could be included in "Pegasus" to make it 90 minutes long without detracting from story quality; they were left with an episode that was too short to be a 90 minute special, but also too long to include all filmed scenes in a one hour episode. Deleted scenes, which Moore says will be resorted in the DVD release, include:
  • A scene when Adama, Tigh, and Roslin are heading to the flight deck to meet Admiral Cain when she first arrives on the ship, and while they're walking Adama and Tigh give Roslin a brief biography of Cain; who she is, that she was an up and coming officer promoted to Admiral over several other possible choices, etc.
  • An extension to Admiral Cain's meeting with Adama and Roslin in Adama's quarters, in which she explains that Pegasus survived Cylon computer virus infiltration through the Command Navigation Program because Pegasus was being overhauled at the shipyards, and most of her computers were disconnected.
  • A scene where Admiral Cain asks about Galactica's Cylon-prisoner, Caprica-Sharon, and goes to the brig to observe her.
  • An entire subplot alluded to in the episode when Roslin complains to Adama that Pegasus is focusing on re-supplying the Fleet's military assets (re-arming Galactica and re-supplying Pegasus from stores in the civillilan fleet) while ignoring the needs of the civillian fleet. The subplot show how Roslin wanted Pegasus to provide machine parts for repairs to the civillian Fleet, and that after these are repeatedly ignored the civillian fleet ultimately goees "on strike" by refusing to give Pegasus more tylium fuel. It would also expand on Cain's refusal to acknowledge Roslin as the President (and therefore her superior as Commander-in-Chief).
• Moore also stated in the podcast that the rape scene with Boomer was also filmed so that the rape was actually underway when Tyrol and Helo intervened. Ultimately, the decision was made to use the version seen where Thorne is stopped just in time, before he is able to rape Boomer.

Statistics

Guest Stars

• Michelle Forbes as Admiral Nelena Cain
• Graham Beckel as Colonel Jack Fisk
• John Pyper-Ferguson as Captain Cole "Stinger" Taylor
• Sebastian Spence as Pegasus pilot
• Unknown as Lieutenant Thorne
• Unknown as Chief Petty Officer Laird
• Leah Cairns as Racetrack

Writing & Direction

• Written by Anne Cofell Saunders
• Directed by Michael Rymer

Production Notes

• Series 2 (2005/2006)
• Production Number: 2.10
• Airdate Order: 10 (of 20)

First Run Air Dates & Releases

• UK Airdate:
• US Airdate: September 23rd, 2005
• DVD Release:

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