Scattered

"Scattered" An episode of the Re-imagined Series
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Overview

Chaos is rampant as paramedics try to save Commander Adama's life after he is shot, and Galactica is accidentally separated from the Fleet.

Note: This is part one of a two-part episode. See the episode, "Valley of Darkness," for the conclusion.

Summary

On Galactica

• Moments after the shooting of Adama, a basestar ambushes the Fleet, prompting XO Colonel Tigh to execute an emergency jump procedure for the Fleet to rendezvous at another point. After Galactica jumps, it finds itself stranded from the rest of the Fleet, in the middle of nowhere.
• After being shot by Sharon Valerii, Commander Adama is rushed to the ship's infirmary. As Dr. Cottle is not onboard, a team of medics work to stabilize Adama's condition.
• Lieutenant Felix Gaeta devises a plan to find the co-ordinates of the Fleet: he networks the FTL computer to the Navigation, Damage Control, and Fire Control computers aboard Galactica, so it will only take 10 minutes (instead of 12 hours) to compute the Fleet's location. However, not only will this involve jumping back to their last position, where they were ambushed by the Cylons, but networking the computers will make Galactica susceptable to Cylon computer infiltration.

Tigh brutalizes Valerii during her interrogation.

• Colonel Tigh visits the incarcerated Valerii, who insists she knows nothing about what's going on. She asks about Adama's condition.
• Lee Adama agrees to a parole with Colonel Tigh, the conditions of which mean that Adama is allowed to perform his duties as Viper pilot and CAG but must report to the brig after duty shift is complete. The parole begins immediately, as Captain Adama is required to lead Galactica's Viper and hold off the Cylons.
• Once Galactica jumps back to its last position, the Vipers manage to hold off the oncoming waves of Raiders. A Heavy Raider makes it way towards Galactica. Apollo shoots it down but the Heavy Raider crashes into the starboard flight pod, depressuring it and the contents of the stillborn museum.
• The Cylons attempt to crack Galactica's computers as Gaeta manages to calculate the Fleet's location. While the Cylons fail to gain control over Galactica's systems, they manage to infect them moments before Gaeta breaks the network. Galactica jumps to return to the Fleet.
• The medics successfully stabilize Adama's condition, but he remains in serious condition.
• The crashed Heavy Raider seems completely destroyed as it lay on Galactica's starboard flight deck, but multiple sets of red sensors soon light up from inside, and a group of Cylon Centurions make their way out of the craft.

On Caprica

• In the Delphi Museum, Helo and Kara Thrace meet after she recovers the Arrow of Apollo. Thrace attempts to shoot the Caprica copy of Sharon Valerii.

• Helo stops Thrace and tells her that Valerii is pregnant. Thrace refuses to accept it.
• After Thrace's attempt to shoot Valerii, she escapes from the Delphi Museum's grounds in Thrace's captured Cylon Raider. (Exclaims Starbuck: "Bitch took my ride.")

On Kobol

• On Kobol, the survivors of the Raptor crash escape into the forest to avoid the Cylons.
• With Socinus dying, Chief Tyrol, Cally, and a crewmember named Tarn return to the crash site to retrieve a medkit. On their way back, the trio are ambushed by Cylons, and only Tyrol and Cally manage to escape.

Questions

• Does Tigh recall that Gaius Baltar first tested his Cylon detector on Valerii? Or did he know in the first place? (Answer)
• Regarding the firewall status display: What is not to say that the Cylons programmed the display, or more accurately the GUI interface for it, to show a false reading on their intrusion progress? (see Analysis for related topic)
• Just how many aboard Galactica agree with Adama's decision to jail Roslin? (Answer)
• What is the significance of the number "3"? It is prominently shown on a door that a younger William Adama enters (in Colonel Tigh's flashbacks); when Lieutenant Gaeta arranges 3 bars of soap beside each other after washing his hands in the bathroom, and is also shown during the sequence with the firewall (that Lieutenant Gaeta devises to slow down the infiltration of the Galactica's network by Cylon forces), that has 4 levels of encryption, with 3 sub-encryption codes for each barrier.
• Is LSO Captain Kelly normally third in the chain of command on Galactica, or would a CAG outrank him if on board the ship?
  • As Captain Kelly is the highest-ranking Captain that is not assigned pilot duty, the chain of command would point to Kelly as next in line, but Captain Adama, as CAG, would likely follow Kelly next in the chain of command were not for his arrest.

Analysis

Gaeta's firewall under attack, but not (yet) breached.

• Visual evidence of the data security breach: As Gaeta leans away from the status display to the floor to yank out the cable networking the computers (while he's not looking), the display does show that the last firewall is breached (probably why the Cylons were able to infiltrate a few but not all of Galactica's computers).

The virus breaches Gaeta's last firewall on the display in the upper-left corner.

• Kelly as third-in-command: In this episode, we discover that Captain Aaron Kelly is third-in-command, but we haven't really seen that much of him since the Miniseries (although we see him doing his job as Landing Signal Officer in "Final Cut"), which makes this seem contrived. However, in the Miniseries, Kelly gives Tyrol an order to aid the stricken port flight pod rescue after Tigh hesitates to give an order (himself following Adama's command to tend to the matter). Giving such an order with the second-in-command standing there is something only a third-in-command would have the guts or authorization to do. Tigh did countermand him moments later to order the venting of the pod, but did not suggest he was out-of-line for stepping in. This strongly suggests that Kelly already was third-in-command, either at the time of decommissioning or as a direct result of casualties taken in the attack. Additionally, "Final Cut" seemed to establish that as LSO, he just spends most or all of his duty time in the flight pod, and thus wouldn't normally be seen in CIC. Given that a battlestar's initial defense involves the reliability of Viper launches, Kelly's rank and duties could be considered just as important as the command staff needed to initiate the launch orders.

• Time placement relative to "Valley of Darkness": Considering that Colonel Tigh is still sitting at Commander Adama's bedside as Valley of Darkness opens, and that the Vipers deployed in this episode have just arrived in the flight deck, and the pilots are getting out of their aircraft, it is plausible to assume that Valley of Darkness takes place either directly after the events of this episode, or at the most, a couple of hours.

• Starboard flight pod: The starboard flight pod is significantly damaged in this episode. However, as RDM reminded us in audio commentary (podcast) for this episode, this landing pod - originally set up as a museum - is not in active use.

• The networked-computer vunerability: Computers simply being networked is not a sufficient condition to allow foreign interference - why would any of the systems Gaeta linked be connected to wireless channels? Was the infiltration that he detected most likely originating from within Galactica?

As with any other Colonial ship, Galactica receives data all the time from exterior sources. In addition to its mainframe computer, Galactica primary computers include the FTL, Navigation, Damage Control, and Fire Control systems. The mainframe ostensibly handles wireless communications (Note Caprica-Valerii's request for access to the mainframe with its communications channels in "Flight of the Phoenix"). The mainframe probably did come under attack by the Cylon virus but was able to avoid infection because a Colonial mainframe may have been what the Colonials believed would be the central lynchpin in stopping any Cylon computer cracking.

While the Colonial Fleet became lax in their computer defenses years after the Cylon War, they probably believed that a networked computer system would be acceptable provided that their battlestar's mainframe computer or a robust avionics package and programming would be able to block or stop any electronic incursion. That fact might have been true--where it not for the Command Navigation Program, which gave the Cylons a backdoor to any Colonial flight computer system. Instead of ramming the main door (mainframe) down, the Cylons used the "window", entering through a lesser computer (or opening a hole in their network) to achieve the same effect. The CNP helped to bypass the defenses of the mainframe, where normal communications were probably screened and electronic attacks thwarted, to enter through another system.

Galactica's computers may have never been networked in her history before this episode. Her computers may also not be as robust as her sister battlestars. But her computers were designed to be networked or run separately since Gaeta was able to set up a network at all. It was very likely that the mainframe was part of Gaeta's ad hoc network since the other computers would not be able to gather any data from the mainframe's wireless communications. Once the connections were made, the other computers (all of which probably had less resistance or defenses to Cylon viruses) were likely more susceptible to infection than the mainframe as these computers could now "hear" the same things that the mainframe heard normally in its business (such as Cylon electronic attack sequences), but was far more able to thwart. The lesser computers became infected quickly. After a time, even the mainframe in whole or in part would be infected since the Cylon virus is remarkably adaptable and polymorphic, even turning later into a Logic bomb after learning and probing Galactica's hardware (in "Flight of the Phoenix").

Notes

• The second season introduced the practice of showing the current fleet population in the opening credits. Throughout this episode, that population is 47,875. That represents 12 total casualties since "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part II".
• Socinus's lungs are filling with fluid.
• Captain Kelly is third in the chain of command, after Tigh. This was demonstrated in the Miniseries, as Kelly attempted to give orders on trying to stop the fires after the nuclear strike on the battlestar, while Tigh hesitated in giving the order to vent the affected compartments.
  • Note: It is possible that Kelly is only third in command because of the malefactions of Apollo, and that, typically as fourth it is not a surprise that we have not seen him before. The sudden incapacity of two superiors has bumped him up the ladder. It is also worth noting that Doc Cottle holds the rank of Major, as stated in "Bastille Day", which would make him third in command, were it not for his absence from Galactica when Adama was shot.
  • Note: Another possibility is that Dr. (Major) Cottle might not even be in Galactica's chain of command at all (he is a medical officer, not a combat officer); in the United States military there are times when a lower ranking person will be in "Operational Command" of people who are technically higher in rank. For example, the United States Navy makes a distinction between Line Officers and Staff Officers. Line officers are those officers in general military specialties, and are eligible to command ships and other units. Staff Officers, however, are only permitted to command units within their specialty. Aboard ships, the senior Line Officer is in command, no matter the rank of any embarked Staff Officer.
• Adama and Tigh served on a merchant freighter together after leaving the military; Adama was responsible for bringing Tigh back into the military when he reentered.
• According to Ron Moore's podcast, the flashback scene at the end of the episode in which Tigh is a drunken wreck in a run-down hotel room about to kill himself, but at the last minute Military Police knock on the door and reinstate him into the military, is an homage to a similar scene involving Martin Sheen's character at the beginning of the film "Apocalypse Now".
• This episode marks the first (known) attempt at networking Galactica's computer systems, at least under William Adama's command.
• Tigh's distrust of Baltar seems evident in this episode, particularly in the reply he made to Gaeta regarding the trust he had in the Lieutenant's programming abilities over Baltar's.
• Tigh's wife has taken residence in Tigh's quarters.
• Starbuck seems to incorrectly assume that there is a "real" Sharon Valerii and that the Valerii on Caprica is just a copy of her.
• This episode introduces the first combat depiction of the Cylon Heavy Raider, previously seen during Colonial Day.
• This episode showed the first change in the intro sequence, including subtitles, a lack of the "episode clip" sequence, and the use of the theme music previously used only in the UK showings of the first season.
• Kerry Norton (Paramedic Layne Ishay) is the wife of Jamie Bamber (Lee "Apollo" Adama)

Goofs

• During the scene on Caprica, Helo exclaims "for God Sakes" instead of the more Colonial "for Gods' Sakes" or Cylon "for God's Sake".

Noteworthy Dialogue

• In Galactica's sickbay:

  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.

• During a flashback sequence:

  Saul Tigh: So, how'd you do it? How'd you get off this frakking freighter?

  William Adama: Connections. Anne's father has a friend in the Defense Committee.

  Saul Tigh: So the new wife comes through. I wish I had in-laws with pull.

  William Adama: Give me a couple years. I'll have some pull. You watch me. I'll have my own battlestar someday.

• In Galactica's brig:

  President Laura Roslin: (to Tigh) Colonel, once we find the fleet, I'd like to have a word with you.

  Colonel Tigh: There's nothing to talk about. You went up against the old man and you lost.

• Tigh's pep talk to the CIC crew:

  Tigh: This is his command. His orders are still the word of the Gods on board this ship. Just so we're clear. This will be Adama's command until the day he dies. And we are not going to let him die. So say we all.

• On Caprica Valerii being "right":

  Starbuck: She's right, huh? Sharon the Cylon is right. Let's all just listen to Sharon the Cylon. Do whatever she says. Because that's a good idea.

  Helo: Hey, Kara, she helped me get this far.

  Starbuck: OK. I get it. I get it, Helo. You and I go way back, so I get it. All right? I remember how you felt about her, but she is not the real Sharon. That is some cheap, knock-off copy.

• After Starbuck shoots at Caprica Valerii:

  Helo: I'm not going to let you kill her. She's carrying my child.

  Starbuck: My Gods, men are so painfully stupid sometimes! How do you know that?

  Helo: I know, all right? She's not lying.

  Starbuck: They lie about everything, Helo. Their entire existence is a lie. They're not human, Helo, they're machines. You can't have a baby with a machine.

  Helo: I don't know what to tell you, OK? But I believe her. It's hard to describe, we've been together for a long time. I mean, I know what she is, but she's not like the others! Look at me, she is not.

• Lee Adama gives his word to Tigh regarding his parole:

  Adama: All right, you have my parole. When I'm on duty, I will make no attempt to free her or sow insurrection among the crew. When I'm not on duty, I'll report back to this cell.

  Tigh: (matter-of-factly) Pre-flight brief is underway in the ready room.

  Adama: Right.

• Starbuck, upon the realization that Caprica Valerii has just stolen her Cylon Raider:

  Starbuck: Bitch took my ride...

Official Statements

• "We shot a scene where I’m in the brig, and Tigh is trying to get in my face, and I’m all, 'Just shoot me now, you pussy.' It was great." -- Grace Park,

• We've almost completed shooting the opening of Season Two, with Michael Rymer back at the helm filming a two-parter written by David Weddle & Bradley Thompson called 'Scattered' and 'Valley of Darkness.' Things have been going well so far, with a good mood on the set and a feeling of satisfaction and pride running through the whole team at their accomplishments in year one and anticipation for year two." --

From RDM's Sci-Fi Channel Blog

From Podcast

• Regarding the bar room scenes (i.e. how Saul Tigh and William Adama met) that were filmed, but weren't fully utilized:

  "We were going to open this show, with just that scene, to show how the two men met. And then come into this scene we're watching now, where Tigh takes command of Galactica, and Adama's been shot, and there's all this chaos. And the episode was going to continue to sort of flashback onto their relationship. On the early days of Tigh and Adama. [...] And we shot those sequences. And edited it together, and we looked at them, but ultimately we didn't like them. We just didn't feel -- they weren't quite the show. [...] You can't really put your finger on any particular person, except maybe me, because it is my concept. [...] I don't know if I created, or had the writers of this episode, Bradley Thompson and David Weddle, I don't know if I really gave them a rich enough environment to tell that backstory. "

• On splitting the original "Scattered" into "Scattered" and "Valley of Darkness".

  "We've always struggled with the length of our scripts, the length of our episodes. If you look at it, there's only 40 minutes in change of actual program content. And our scripts tend to run, in the early drafts, in the 50s or low 50s. [...] 60 page scripts are not unheard of. An ideal page script for us, going into shooting, is usually around 46-47 pages. Sometimes we make that, sometimes we don't. [...] And I think we did on 'Scattered', I think in the final draft it was around 47-48 pages. The shows are still too huge. They're still too long. The style of storytelling -- I might have talked about this before -- just requires spending more time on character, creating moments, really, sort of, taking your time as you go through the show. [...] So we essentially divided it into two and created another action storyline for part two."

Interviews

• Jamie Bamber talks about the challenge of filming the episode's opening act:

So far this season I've been given great stuff to do, and as my character I've been very careful not to apologize for the decision he made in Kobol's Last Gleaming. It's the one thing that Lee can claim as his own act and he's not about to second guess himself. Michael Rymer [who directed Kobol's Last Gleaming and Scattered] and I got together early on and decided that would be the case. We could have taken Lee down either path. He could have felt massive guilt in the way in which his father is gunned down seconds after betraying him, and then not having the chance to put that right. It would have been easy to go back and question what he did, but I think the character is far more interesting and stronger for not doing that. Lee is standing on his own two feet and moving forward, which he has to do.

Guest stars

• Aaron Douglas as Chief Petty Officer Galen Tyrol
• Nicki Clyne as Specialist Cally
• Leah Cairns as Lt. Margaret "Racetrack" Edmondson
• Luciana Carro as Lt. Louanne "Kat" Katraine
• Warren Christie as Tarn
• Bodie Olmos as Lt. Brendan "Hot Dog" Constanza
• Ty Olsson as Captain Aaron Kelly
• Alonso Oyarzun as Socinus
• Michael Tayles as Flyboy
• Kate Vernon as Ellen Tigh
• Chris Shields as Corporal Venner
• Jennifer Halley as "Seelix"
• Kerry Norton as Paramedic Layne Ishay
• Kurt Evans as Paramedic Howard Kim
• Nicholas Treeshin as Sergeant Watkins
• Aleks Paunovic as Sergeant Fischer

External Links

"Scattered" at scifi.com