Earth (RDM)

Earth seen from space in "Crossroads, Part II".

In the Re-imagined Series Earth is the believed destination of the Thirteenth Tribe of Kobol, as attested in the Sacred Scrolls. The Thirteenth Tribe left for Earth nearly 4,000 years prior to the Fall of the Twelve Colonies. The remaining Twelve Tribes leave Kobol to form the Colonies approximately 2,000 years after the Thirteenth Tribe's departure.

A Cause for Hope

Earth is first mentioned by Commander Adama during a speech after the battlestar's funeral services after escaping from Ragnar Anchorage. Adama claims that Earth was a top military secret that can now be revealed (see Miniseries).

In a private conversation with new President Laura Roslin immediately afterward, Adama admits that he has not the slightest idea where Earth may be, if it exists. His true motivation was inspirational; he intended to bolster the morale of the population (especially his beleaguered crew) in the aftermath of the near-annihilation of humanity.

Tangible Faith

While she is initially skeptical, rebuking Adama for his dishonesty, Laura Roslin's faith grows perceptibly throughout the first season. Her use of chamalla to treat her cancer causes vivid dreams and hallucinations. Roslin increasingly interprets these as prophetic visions, especially after the Fleet accidentally discovers the legendary homeworld Kobol (Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I).

Eventually, a religious artifact is recovered which later aids in revealing the general location of Earth (Home, Part II).

In the activated Tomb of Athena, the stars of the Twelve Colonies are represented in the twelve Zodiacal constellations, as viewed from Earth, recognized by Roslin as the shapes of the original flags of the Twelve Colonies. The chamber itself was intended by its builders to be a stylized replica of the night sky of the Earth, from which all twelve constellations could be seen. This is corroborated by Kara Thrace, who quotes scripture, saying that Earth was the place where the people of the Thirteenth Tribe could look up into the sky and see their twelve brothers.

Morerover, Lee Adama recognizes the Lagoon Nebula, also represented in the night sky of the mystery chamber. This astronomical object is known to Fleet personnel, since Commander Adama remarks that this celestial body would take some time to reach.

More Clues to Earth

Over a year later, the Fleet discovers a derelict Cylon baseship near the Lion's Head Nebula, a celestial marker revealed by Felix Gaeta to Admiral Adama and President Roslin (Torn). The information is derived from Gaius Baltar's research on the path to Earth. The derelict basestar finds an ancient beacon left by the Thirteenth Tribe. While a Colonial boarding party finds the probe, it also learns that the Humanoid Cylons aboard the basestar are dead or dying, suggesting a deadly pathogen was released by the beacon. In their haste to leave and for the safety of the Fleet, the beacon is abandoned on the basestar, where it is destroyed when the basestar self-destructs (A Measure of Salvation).

After the Fleet must gather needed foodstuffs from the algae planet, believed previously uninhabited by humans, Galen Tyrol senses and finds the Temple of Five, an ancient temple built by the Thirteenth Tribe, as told in the Sacred Scrolls, apparently built during a stopover on this world. Believed to be hidden inside the Temple of Five is the Eye of Jupiter, an artifact that may provide more clues to the location of Earth. However, a Cylon force arrives with the same intentions on the Eye, leading to a standoff between Adama and the basestar command (The Eye of Jupiter). The Eye is later revealed to be the algae planet's own star as it began to nova, taking the form of the circular starburst patterns throughout the Temple of Five. While the Colonials are not privy to the special holograph feature of the Temple that the Cylons witness in the early moments of the nova, the Colonials are later are able to discern the information of the new nova as a waypoint to the next marker, a nebula in the Ionian system (Rapture).

When the Fleet arrives at the nebula, it is intercepted by four basestars. Unable to escape due to a mysterious, crippling Fleet-wide power outage, Galactica is forced to prepare for attack and launches Vipers and Raptors. Apollo breaks off from the attack to track an "Unknown" contact on DRADIS. The contact is Captain Kara "Starbuck" Thrace, miraculously returned from the dead with news that she has been to Earth, knows its location and how to take the Fleet there.

The episode "Crossroads, Part II" concludes with a sweeping zoom from the Fleet, the Cylons, the Ionian nebula and to an arm of the Milky Way and to a zoom in to Earth itself, confirming that Earth is an actual location (from the perspective of the viewers), showing Earth's North American continent.

According to the Hybrid, the Final Five are from the "home of the 13th," generally interpreted as Earth (Faith). This matches statements made in the "The Eye of Jupiter" claiming that the Temple of Five was built by people from the thirteenth tribe.

Starbuck's Visit

Starbuck's guncam photo of Earth.

Starbuck claims she visited Earth in her Viper, a trip lasting 6 hours according to her Viper's clock but months having passed in the Fleet. She is unaware of how she got to and from Earth in a Viper with no FTL capability. She describes Earth as having blue seas and white clouds, and took a variety of photos from her Viper. She also describes a "yellow moon and star" matching the descriptions by Pythia. Her photos have star patterns matching the zodiacs seen in the Tomb of Athena. On the return trip, she describes seeing a ringed gas giant planet, a "flashing triple star" and a comet. This turns out to be a vision of a burning basestar (the comet) around a gas giant at the site of a Cylon Civil War battle (Faith).

After the Fleet leaves the Ionian Nebula, Thrace feels pain with each jump and is overcome by a strong sense that the Fleet is going the wrong way (He That Believeth In Me). She confronts President Roslin, the only person she reckons can persuade the Admiral to change course, with a pistol in his quarters, which gets her thrown in the brig. She is later released to take command of the Demetrius on a mission to find Earth (Six of One).

Arrival and Ruins

The ruined city found by the landing party.

After being informed by Anders and Tyrol that something about her Viper is different, Starbuck climbs in the cockpit and powers up the electronics, detecting what appears to be a Colonial emergency locator signal, which only the Viper can receive. After determining that it is likely a bearing to Earth, the Fleet plots a jump and arrives in the planet's orbit, leading to ecstatic jubilation throughout the Fleet.

However, the happiness is short-lived when a combined human-Cylon team lands on the planet and arrives at a shore, overlooking a destroyed city. Moreover, Geiger counters detect radioactivity, indicating the city — and possibly the whole planet — suffered a nuclear catastrophe (Revelations).

The ruins are "thousands of years old." (Battlestar Galactica: The Top 10 Things You Need to Know).

Further scans on the planet reveal that the planet suffered a nuclear holocaust of some kind about 2,000 years before. There was still low-level radiation in the ground and water from the disaster and it is unsafe for living on even after so long. Further investigation reveals the truth about the inhabitants of the planet: they weren't human, they were Cylon, all of them. Among them lived the Final Five who have no memory of this and only realized this as they got small flashes (mostly of their deaths) while among the ruins. Ultimately the decision is made to abandon Earth as it is apparently uninhabitable and look for a new planet that supports life. Also on the surface is found the remains of a crashed Viper and apparently the dead body of Kara Thrace which is as of yet unexplained. (Sometimes a Great Notion) It is implied by Anders in (No Exit) that the Centurions on Earth did kill their masters. When he describes when the Final Five finally reached the colonies, Anders says, "It happened again!"

Notes

• Several clues point to Earth as the true homeworld of humanity. As the Fleet approaches Earth, the artifacts they encounter become more ancient. The ruins on Kobol are 2,000 years old, the Lion's Head nebula beacon is 3,000 years old, and the Temple of Five is dated to 4,000 years. However, that last piece of data has been contradicted by Ellen Tigh when she said that The Temple of Hopes, as it is known and called by the Thirteenth Tribe, was built 3,000 years before the Fall of the 12 Colonies in No Exit.

Official Statements

• Edward James Olmos jokingly describes how he thinks the Fleet could find Earth:

I personally — this is not [from] any of the writers, but my thing — I wanted to come into [the present day], find Earth, cruise on top of it, see it for what it is, and as we're coming down to it, we're blown up, we're nuked. And then [someone says to] the President of the United States, which is [George W.] Bush, "They've been taken care of. Thank God you saved the world again." And you turn, and you see who told him that, and it's one of the Cylons. [Laughs]

References

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• See Also
  • Sacred Scrolls#The Origin of Mankind|Origin of Mankind theories
• Other Series
  • Earth (TOS)|Earth from TOS
  • Earth (1980)|Earth from "Galactica 1980"

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