Caprica pilot

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"Caprica pilot" An episode of the Caprica Series
Episode No.	Season 1, Episode 1
Writer(s)	Remi Aubuchon Ronald D. Moore
Story by
Director	Jeffrey Reiner
Assistant Director
Special guest(s)
Production No.	101
Nielsen Rating
US airdate	January 22, 2010
CAN airdate	January 22, 2010
UK airdate	February 2, 2010
DVD release	21 April 2009
Population	{{{population}}} survivors
Additional Info	Series pilot
Full Credits
Episode Chronology
		Next
	Caprica pilot	Rebirth
Related Information
Official Summary
R&D Skit – View
[[IMDB:tt{{{imdb}}}|IMDb entry]]
Listing of props for this episode
Related Media
			@ BW Media
Promotional Materials
Online Purchasing
Amazon: Standard Definition | High Definition
iTunes: USA

Overview

In the wake of the tragedy experienced by the Adama and Graystone families, a scientific breakthrough is about to occur—the invention of the Cylons.

Note: This episode is the two-hour pilot for the Caprica TV series, the spin-off of the Re-imagined Series produced by Remi Aubuchon, Ronald D. Moore, David Eick for the Syfy Channel. It was released on DVD prior to being aired on television.

Plot summary

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Caprica, 58 Years Before the Fall

• Young people are engaged in group sex, fist fights, shootings, wild dancing, all to the beat of loud party music--this is the V-Club. From a balcony, Zoe Graystone watches a girl below, next to the stage. The girl appears to be a perfect copy of Zoe. Ben Stark and Lacy Rand join Zoe on the balcony and deplore the hedonism and depravity happening around them, but promise that she, the girl below, will change it all.
• On the dance floor, the music grows subdued. A muscled man displays a knife to the audience, and a dancer emerges on stage, her face shifting from human to monster and back in the strobe lights. While this is happening, another girl is dragged to the stage, to the sound of the audience chanting "Kill, kill, kill!" The muscled man brings the knife down and kills the girl, all to cheering from the audience. At that moment, the copy of Zoe looks and terrified and suddenly vanishes.
• On the balcony, Ben promises Zoe that eventually the copy will be perfect, because Zoe is perfect. They kiss while Lacy stares.
• In the real world, Zoe continues to immerse herself in the V-Club experience via a Holoband, until another girl opens the bathroom stall and discovers her.
• Outside the Athena Academy, Zoe, Ben, and Lacy meet again and talk about running away to Gemenon. They finish by pledging themselves to the "one true god."

Two Families Ripped Apart

• On the grounds of their waterfront home, Daniel and Amanda Graystone play tennis until they are interrupted by a call from the Academy about Zoe.
• In the kitchen, the three Graystones fight about Zoe's behavior, Daniel's "dirty science," and life in the Graystone family. Tensions escalate until a comment about marrying into money pushes Amanda over the edge, and she slaps Zoe.
• Zoe retreats to her room and the privacy of the Holoband. She hurries to a secret room in the V-Club and meets her copy. The two sit and talk about the horror of the human sacrifice, and how the audience knew what they were doing and drew strength from the experience. Zoe promises that her copy will help to change these attitudes among people, both here and on the outside.
• Amanda wordlessly drops Zoe off in front of the Academy. The instant Amanda drives away, Zoe and her two friends leave, heading for a maglev subway station.
• In front of the three of them on an escalator, Shannon Adama and her daughter Tamara talk with Joseph Adama (who is walking through another part of Caprica City), demanding that he come home in time to be at Willie's birthday party. Depsite a court appointment, Joseph promises to be there.
• At the last moment, Lacy backs out, despite promises of a new family and a new life on Gemenon. She watches the Lev leave the station.
• On the train, Tamara tells her mother about someone she was forced to deal with for insulting her Tauron heritage. While this is happening, Zoe types out a message on a computer sheet forgiving her mother, then sends it.
• She looks at Ben, who seems very nervous and distracted. He apologizes, stands up, and opens his jacket to reveal a bomb strapped to his torso. He announces, "The one true god shall drive out the many," and detonates the bomb. The train is consumed in the fireball. The sound of the explosion is heard by Joseph. He and the pedestrians around him are frozen by the sight of smoke rising into the street.

Daniel Graystone manages to resurrect Zoe- after a fashion. Daniel and Joseph Adama meet under conditions of mutual grief. Graystone, already having Zoe-A, a digital clone of her memories and personality which was created by his brilliant daughter Zoe in life, plans to steal a break through CPU chip from one of his business competitors. To obtain it he convinces Joseph Adams to use his organized crime contacts, which is done, possibly with Adams's acquiescence to murder to acquire it. Graystone, with the chip and a pre existing military robot prototype, intends to create a robotic version of his daughter, known as Zoe-R, which, unknown to him, is the first step toward creating the Cylon race. Adams, despite lingering reservations works with Graystone to see his own dead daughter again and "Tamara" is recreated in Virtual Reality, much like Zoe-A. Adams meets her in virtual reality but unlike Zoe-A she is terrified and confused. Tamara then realizes she cannot feel her heart beat, to their mutual horror. As his "daughter" goes into hysterics, Adams breaks the connection and is appalled at his partner's methods and ethics and, as he views, the immorality of the creation and renounces it.

However, as a result the tragedy of losing his daughter, he grows closer to his 11-year old son, William Adams. He also has a new found pride in his actual Tauron family name and reclaims the name of "Adama" for him and his son.

Afterward not heeding Adama's fears, Graystone attempts to download Zoe-A into one of his prototype U-87 Cyber Combat Units robotic Cylon forms. It seems to be a failure with the download data becoming corrupted and lost forever. Graystone goes into Virtual reality to find Zoe-A but to his renewed grief, she is gone. Later however Zoe-R awakens in her mechanical body and calmly calls her best friend Lacy Rand for help.

Notes

• In the script, Joseph Adama insists that Daniel Graystone delete the Tamara avatar. This does not happen in the aired pilot.
• In the stadium scene, the shot where fans are throwing food and drinks at the Caprica Buccaneers contains a small goof. If you look at the stadium rafters, a Canadian and an American flag can be seen. The stadium scenes were shot at General Motors Place in downtown Vancouver, home rink of the Vancouver Canucks. Also of note, the Pre-Cylon War Buccaneers team colors of blue, green, and white are the colors of the current Canucks uniforms.
• For whatever reason, Sina Najafi isn't wearing blue contact lenses in at least the pilot, thus meaning that William Adama now has dark brown eyes instead of the blue eyes Olmos' character has.
• It is worth noting that Joseph Adama doesn't use his lucky cigarette lighter at any point during the pilot.

Differences between the DVD and TV Cut

• Several establishing shots of Caprica were redone or added for the TV version of the pilot, giving the planet a more exotic and futuristic look. In addition, the backgrounds of some exterior scenes were digitally altered with CG imagery. Specific CGI changes include:
  • At the beginning a neighboring world of Caprica is shown. The planet is not mentioned in dialog and therefore it is not known whether it is actually one of the other Colonies. Given that it seems to be an arid, red and desert-like world it might be Gemenon or Tauron.
  • The background of the Caprica City street in which Joseph Adama loses his cell phone connection in his last conversation with his wife, and subsequently sees the smoke from the maglev train bombing, is altered to include colorful banners and advertising displays.
  • There is an establishing shot of a municipal building prior to the scene in which the Mayor and Jordan Duram discuss the official response to the bombing.
  • The Graystone Industries building was heavily redesigned.
• In the V-Club scenes, several shots of people having sex, as well as shots of naked and topless women, were removed for the TV version.
• Some scene transitions are slightly different in the TV version due to the insertion of commercial breaks. For example, on the DVD, after the explosion, the scene cross-fades to a shot of Daniel Graystone mourning in his house. In the TV version, there is a cut to black after the explosion, which leads to a commercial break; after the break, there is an establishing shot of the Graystone mansion, and then a slightly different shot of Graystone inside.
• When Daniel Graystone confronts Zoe's avatar, she states that the human brain consists of about 100 terabytes of information, instead of the 300 megabytes that were mentioned in the DVD version.
• The scene at the Pyramid game was completely reshot with the characters watching from box seats high above the field. This also offers the very first glimpse of a professional Pyramid match.

Questions

• Will Zoe's consciousness in the U-87 emerge more frequently or less frequently as time goes on? (Answer)
• How long will it take for the U-87 to go into mass production and enter military service as the Cylon Centurion Model 0005?
  • Also, why is the production model designated the 0005, instead of remaining the U-87?
  • On a related note, why do all of the 0005s have masculine voices instead of keeping the distinctly feminine voice of the U-87 (which sounds suspiciously like Zoe's)?
• Will the murder of Defense Minister Val Chambers lead to greater discrimination and reprisals against Taurons?
• Will Tamara Adama's avatar be downloaded into a Cylon brain, or will Graystone actually comply with Joseph Adama's wishes and delete it, considering that Adama knows the Guatrau personally and socially to the point of being on first name terms with him? (Partial Answer)
  • On that note, did Graystone create an avatar for Shannon Adama as well? If so, how will Joseph, Sam, and William react? (Answer)
• Why did Joseph and Sam Adama go to such great lengths to keep their family's past a secret from William and Tamara? Could it have something to do with how their father, William the First, died?
• Where and how did Ben Stark obtain the G-4? Was his suicide bombing authorized?
• Will Joseph Adama invest in a holoband for himself and William, or does he consider the entire network, and possibly networks in general, to be abominations? Is this the origin of William's phobia about integrated computer networks as depicted on Battlestar Galactica?
• If there isn't a single flower on the entire surface of Tauron, what kind of crops do they grow?
• Why did Zoe and Ben decide to go to Gemenon to escape religious persecution? Is there an enclave of the Soldiers of the One on Gemenon? (Partial Answer)
• Will holoband technology be banned along with artificial intelligence due to the Cylon War, or will it still exist at the time of the Fall?
• In what way was Zoe's avatar supposed to bring about change and how exactly was it to do this?
• Is there any significance to the fact that Caprica's twin world was never previously seen? Is this planet Tauron or any of the other Colonies?

Noteworthy Dialogue

• Joseph discussing his family past with Willie:

Joseph Adama: I want you to know who you are. We come from a long, proud line of Tauron peasants who knew how to work the land and still stand proud. You're named after your grandfather. Did I ever tell you that?

Willie Adama: Nope.

Joseph Adama: William. He was killed during the Tauron uprising. Our last name isn't Adams. I changed it after I arrived here on Caprica. Our family name is Adama. Adama. And it's a good, honorable Tauron name.

• The Cylon prototype after having destroyed all targets during an exercise:

Cylon prototype: All targets neutralized. Program completed by your command.

• After having watched the live-fire demonstration of Graystone Enterprise's military robot:

Joan Leyte: What'd you call it?

Daniel Graystone: A cybernetic life-form node. A Cylon, Minister.

Joan Leyte : Hmm. Cylon. Interesting.

Starring

• Eric Stoltz as Daniel Graystone
• Esai Morales as Joseph Adama
• Paula Malcomson as Amanda Graystone
• Alessandra Torresani as Zoe Graystone
• Magda Apanowicz as Lacy Rand
• Avan Jogia as Ben Stark
• Polly Walker as Sister Clarice Willow

In the pilot, Avan Jogia is credited as part of the principal cast. He becomes a guest star in his future appearances. On the other hand, Sasha Roiz and Brian Markinson, who are both credited as guest stars in the pilot, join the principal cast in the first regular episode of the series.

Guest cast

• Sasha Roiz as Sam Adama
• Brian Markinson as Jordan Durham
• William B. Davis as Minister of Defense Val Chambers
• Sina Najafi as William Adams
• Jorge Montesi as The Guatrau
• Hiro Kanagawa as Cyrus Xander
• Genevieve Buechner as Tamara Adams
• Anna Galvin as Shannon Adams
• Katie Keating as Prefect Caston
• Veena Sood as Minister of Defense Joan Leyte
• Karen Austin as Ruth
• Nancy Kerr as Prosecutor
• Terence Kelly as Mayor
• Angela Moore as Judge
• Josh Byer as Defendant
• Vicky Lambert as Hecate
• Jim Thomson as Voice of Serge
• Jared Keeso as Rod Jenkins
• Kathryn Schellenberg as Dancer
• Maiko Miyauchi as Dancer
• Daina Ashbee as Dancer
• Adrienne Chan as Dancer
• Salma Allam as Dancer
• Kirsten Wicklund as Dancer
• Shawn Stewart as Dancer
• Donald Sales as Dancer
• Paul Becker as Dancer
• Cara Long as V-Club Patron
• Jay Devery as V-Club Patron
• Keita Parker as V-Club Patron
• Chelsea Darden as V-Club Patron
• Megan Sehn as V-Club Patron
• Chantal Ayre as V-Club Patron
• Michelle Andrew as V-Club Patron
• Eva Hartkopf as V-Club Patron
• Feguins Toussaint as Sean (uncredited)

Prior to the release of the pilot, many names were given in the cast. Of those not confirmed in the credits are the following and if they do appear, would be categorized uncredited:

• Edwina Cheer as Bikini Girl
• Ildiko Ferenczi as Bikini Girl
• Marci T. House as Woman
• Nathalie Marrable as Burlesque Dancer
• Charlie Robson as Avatar

Michelle Andrew is credited in the pilot, but as "V-Club Patron" and not as "Lap Dancer". Roger R. Cross portrayed Tomas Vergis, but his scenes were all cut and the part has been recast for future appearances.