Pop Vultures

Each week, when I watch Battlestar Galactica, I feel a wee bit nervous. Will this be the week the show suddenly stops being fabulous? Will it somehow take a wrong turn, make Baltar humble, or the president infallible, or force Starbuck to deal with her issues in therapy? And, each week, I can only lean back after the episode and say, “Frak, that was good.” Because, yes, I do say frak. You got a problem with that?

It’s not that the show hasn’t had its missteps — some fans are still bitter about the black market episode — but overall it has been terribly consistent, not just in quality but in characterization and themes, and this fourth (and final) season has been remarkable in the way it has woven together elements from previous seasons. Much like Lost, having a fixed end point has only benefited the show, as suddenly there is no treading water: each episode, each scene matters - and are they ever making the most of it.

After the jump, thoughts and spoilers on the season so far.

A while back, I asked that my television shows hurt me, and it looks like Ronald D. Moore was listening. By turning three popular characters — and Tori — into Cylons at the end of season 3, he’d already thoroughly shocked his audience. Most people would have bought Baltar as a Cylon, or even Helo or Dualla, two of the lesser characters. But bad-ass, Cylon-hating, wife-killing, eye-losing Tigh? Say it ain’t so! To then follow this up with the unexpected and seemingly pointless death of Callie let the viewers know that anything could happen, at any time. These days, people are wagering that the fifth Cylon is likely Starbuck or Adama, but that seems to be more of a guess based on the fact that we know the fifth one is gonna shock us. Which means, of course, that it’s going to be someone else.

The show has also continued to explore and expand upon the theme it introduced in the first hour of the pilot, when Adama delivered his speech aboard the Galactica: what makes us human? Somehow, the show has managed to address this concept throughout its four seasons and hasn’t repeated itself yet. Granted, people have been debating nature vs nurture for hundreds of years (a number I just made up, so you science historians out there can feel free to correct me), so it is perhaps unsurprising that the show has not managed to answer it over the course of four season. Still, the evident angst displayed by the new Cylons as they came to grips with how what they are might define who they are felt fresh — and freshly heartbreaking. Tigh’s insistence that he will continue to be exactly the man he was before the discovery, that “whatever else I am, whatever else it means, that’s the man I want to be,” reaffirmed the show’s assertion that it is our actions that grant us humanity, not our makeup.

Of course, insisting that people that act like humans must therefore be humans would be far too simple for this show. They also have to bring in that bane of every Philosophy 101 student, the free will vs. fate debate — and the bastards refuse to even take a stand on that. We’ve seen both sides of the argument, through Athena’s seeming loyalty to the Galactica and its crew and Boomer’s apparent lack of control when she blew up the water tanks or shot Adama. For good measure, those are the actions of the same Cylon model, too, so we can’t even make any sweeping statements about some models being programmed to behave in certain ways. Instead, we get to watch the new Cylons struggle to remain the people they want to be or, in the case of Tori, begin to embrace her Cylon traits, with no real idea as to how much control they truly have.

And THEN, if that’s not enough, they layer religion on top of the whole free will vs. fate issue by bringing in the (new to them) idea of the one God, suggesting that God made them all perfect, and if God has a plan for them (fate), that whole free will thing might be overrated. At the very least, that’s how Tori seems to be taking it. I knew I didn’t like her.

Just before the viewers start to feel like they’re back in their college dorm rooms, discussing religion and philosophy till the wee hours and feeling mighty profound (or perhaps just mighty stoned), the show grounds itself again in contemporary politics, this time through the worryingly Bush-like antics of President Roslin, who is suddenly embracing confidential policies and questionable legislation in order to “protect the people.” It’s a brave choice, to give the popular fictional president similar traits to the unpopular real president, but it’s the best way to present the issue with all those shades of gray the viewers have come to expect. Instead of a mustache-twirling villain, she’s a sympathetic character, making her choices both more understandable and more devastating.

You know, I actually meant to discuss the episode when I started this entry, and it rather got away from me. I suppose you can’t put this many themes in front of a recovering English major and not expect some gleeful analysis. Sorry about that.

How about next week I discuss the characters and the plots? After all, I still have free will. I think.

Your turn. What do you think about the season so far?