Mark Watches ‘Battlestar Galactica’: Daybreak, Part III

In the third and final part of “Daybreak,” the future of the human and Cylon populations is put to the test, and the destiny of nearly every character is finally revealed. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to finish Battlestar Galactica.

Oh, hope. You’re a funny thing to have. I think the final message of the show is one of hope, but even then, the beginning of the third part of “Daybreak” is like the writers wanted to give us one of the last reminders that they sure love making us feel miserable. Want to feel good things about the characters on Battlestar Galactica? LOL NICE TRY. There’s so much excitement here in those first couple minutes as the Final Five plan to use their knowledge of resurrection to send it to Cavil’s ship; even Adama has time to make a joke about how little he understands the entire process. Good ol’ Adama; I love that after all of this, he refuses to engage the complicated and weighty ideas of science and faith. He’ll still be a pragmatist and an atheist, and I honestly love that the show never takes his beliefs or experiences and changes them to fit the story, nor do they insult or belittle him for them. Until the very end, Adama just wants to enjoy his life, and destinies and prophecies be damned.

What’s fascinating to me is how all of this falls apart. I’d long put the events that set this up in the back of my mind, and I think the writers knew we wouldn’t expect any of these details to come back to be important now. But they did come rushing back as soon as Ellen Tigh stated that the Final Five Cylons had to share their memories with one another; Tory Foster panics, and then I panic. Cally’s death at the hands of Tory would come to light in the worst situation imaginable. Oh god, when she starts telling the others to keep in mind that they’re all fallible, I squirmed. And Cavil’s joke about two civilizations waiting on the Final Five is SO POORLY TIMED AND HE HAS NO FUCKING IDEA.

It really was an inevitable ending for Tory, wasn’t it? I mean, I hate it and I wish she didn’t have to die, but Tyrol had been set up for the whole season to react this way. He’d lost everything that ever meant everything to him, and upon learning that Cally died so Tory could protect her identity, he gave in to the nihilistic, endless rage that he’d been harboring for months. He grabs Tory by the neck, choking her so hard that it snaps. And in the ensuing chaos, all that hope is lost in a matter of sixty seconds. I don’t think I’ve ever reacted so ridiculously to a plot twist in my whole life. I couldn’t stop shrieking at the screen, at one point choking on my spit as I watched the Cylons in the CIC who were part of Cavil’s force open fire on everyone, believing we’d see even more people die. And we did, but I did not expect Cavil to use his pistol to shoot himself, mirroring the horrifying suicide of Budd Dwyer. (I was a kid when it happened, so I only knew vague things about it, but I later saw it in a media class in high school and it’s one of those things that you never forget. I did look this up, and it turns out I’m not the only one who immediately thought of this during this scene. As a heads up/trigger warning, I highly advise against watching this video, as I’m sure some of you will now Google it since you may not be familiar with it. To say that it’s disturbing is an understatement; I still can’t forget it and I haven’t seen it in over ten years.)

The situation continues to escalate at an alarming, terrifying rate when a rock hits Racetrack’s Raptor and her dead hand just happens to hit the button that sends off nuclear missiles, and I just lost it as the Colony is destroyed and sent spinning off towards the black hole. Would this be how they all die? The Galactica is essentially attached to the Colony, and the two are being sucked into the singularity.

And then Adama orders Starbuck to make a blind jump, and then my entire brain collapses from what transpires from this order. Those notes that made no sense to her or to Cavil turn out to work perfectly as FTL coordinates. (No, seriously, this blog entry has made me love Bear McCreary from now until the universe ceases to be.) I honestly adore how this jump comes with sets of flashbacks: we see her find her body on Earth. We see Leoben call her an angel. We see her tell Lee Adama that she thinks about death every time she gets into the cockpit. We see her claim that her biggest fear is being forgotten. So I started to wonder if any of this were true, or if Kara Thrace had found a way to be remembered.

But before we can deal with this, the effects of the jump are catastrophic for the Galactica. Tigh describes it as if the ship broke her back, her spine snapping. The Galactica will never jump again. They are essentially stuck wherever they are. The crew are littered about the CIC, some dead, some alive, and some in a distant place of shock and grief. One of those people is Galen Tyrol, who has no expression on his face.  His flashback is of Cally, long before the two of them were together, and she catches him with Boomer. Her warning that he needs to determine who he can trust is never more haunting or prescient. Who can Tyrol trust? At this point, the man has never been more alone, more disgusted with himself, and more upset at what his life has become. His actions upset the last chance at a peace between the Cylons and the humans, and I don’t think he ever figures out just what a huge effect he had on the future of humanity.

We do learn that effect, though, as Roslin, clearly shook up from the jump, turns to Starbuck and asks her where she’s taken the Galactica for the last time. When the camera cuts to a view showing us an exterior shot of the Galactica, I gasped when I recognized the craters of our moon below the ship. As the camera pans to reveal Earth in the background, I shouted, “YOU HAVE TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME.” In the seconds that followed, I realized that I’d been tricked, that I’d been led to believe that the “Earth” I saw in “Revelations” was our world. But I’d never seen our moon. The show purposely never showed us a recognizable continent, and I fell for it completely.

It was clear to me that this was the case when we Earth up close and it’s not the irradiated wasteland it should have been. The idea of the fleet somehow traveling through time to a future (or past) version of Earth where an early tribe of humans existed was just a bit too much for me to accept, so it seemed obvious to me this was another Earth, our Earth. Kara Thrace led the fleet to Earth. The dying leader took her people to Earth. THEY FOUND THE FIRST FUCKING GROUP OF HUMANS jesus goddamn christ what is this show doing to me

I was simply in shock and I still sort of am. My entire view of this show, the context I’d put it in, was completely wrong. As Lee starts detailing his plan for the fleet, to get them to sacrifice their technology to break the cycle, I started to come to the realization that this show was now actively (and quite ambitiously) trying to give our existence a new mythology. Like the myths of the Greeks or the Romans, or the tenets of Buddhism, or the beliefs of Christianity, I understood that this was a way to understand our world and how it came to be. By spreading the fleet’s population over the globe, they would influence humanity to come, Cylons and humans mixed in with everyone. The Centurions, now possessing free will, are given the basestar to pursue their own freedom. I like that Ellen Tigh rationalizes the risk involved in such an idea because it seems that they’ve found a way to end the cycle that has repeated before and will repeat again.

What blows me away about this is that the show has created an entire mythology about the origin of humans, one that stretches hundreds of thousands of years before we ever showed up on this Earth, and that this mythology has its own prophecies, it’s own visions, it’s own ridiculous and exaggerated events that might make no sense to us or require immense leaps of faith in order to believe in. As someone who is fascinated by religion, I found myself falling more and more in love with this idea that the show’s point was to craft its “religion” over the course of four years, that all we were watching was a complex, hyper-realistic retelling of an amalgamation of origin stories.

But before I’d get the last bit of “answers” that the show was prepared to give me, I found myself more concerned where these characters would end up. It’s an interesting parallel to “Revelations.” I found myself asking, once again, where things could go from here. Earth was found then, and the dream of a static life was over; now, finding another Earth brings about a new set of possibilities, though they’re the first positive ones the survivors have had in a long, long time. So what are these people going to do now? This is their new home, and they don’t have much choice about it. It’s from here until the final moments of the show that I also believed I stopped commenting on the liveblog. I think I went almost fifteen minutes without saying a word, just after the set of flashbacks to give our characters their final bits of relevance. Watching Adama give Galactica a final glimpse before he’s the last person to leave (and in the Mark II that Tyrol’s team helped build him) was depressing, and I knew that this was the tip of the iceberg. It was time to start saying goodbye to these characters, and Adama starts it off by bidding goodbye to the one constant over every single episode of this show: the Galactica herself. “I’d rather spend the rest of my career,” he tells his interviewer in a flashback, “what’s left of it–on a broken down old ship, than to have someone sit here and question my word.” The man gave up retirement and got to see his ship through right to the very end.

Samuel Anders’s words are next, and we’re reminded of his goal to be linked to perfection and creation that he told those reporters so many years ago; now, a hybrid aboard Galactica, I can’t imagine a more perfect end for him. Linked eternally to the mathematics and physics of that ship, he guides the entirety of the fleet away from Earth, and they gently fly towards the sun, obliterating any chance for the humans and Cylons on Earth to use their technology.

Tyrol says goodbye to the Tighs, saying that he’s just tired of people–Cylon or human. But at the same time, his mistakes and choices are his, and even if he is exhausted by what people have done to him, he still has to live with what he’s done, and that includes killing Tory Foster. Going off to the “northern highlands of Earth” by himself is probably the best idea, because his character has lost so much since the opening of this season. Of all the open ends left hanging by this series finale, I might like Tyrol’s the most; I don’t want to know what he did or where he went, because his journey is so deeply personal. He still needs to figure out who and what he is, and I don’t necessarily need to know what that is.

Our last glimpse of the Tighs cues my thoughts of when it was revealed that Ellen was the Final Cylon. I was excited by the reveal because it meant that Saul Tigh might not end up alone. Of course, I’d forgotten about Tigh/Caprica Six, so there was that awkwardness to deal with. But the final flashback these two get is a powerful message about their relationship. All Ellen wanted back then was to be with her husband full-time, not just when he had time off, or when he could escape the rigors of his job as XO. Now, many years later, and the revelation that they’re actually Cylons, the two mortal beings have all the time in the world on this new planet, and her wish has been granted. It’s one of the only purely joyous moments in “Daybreak,” and I am so satisfied that not everything here is bittersweet and depressing.

Which means that it’s time for me to talk about, arguably, the two biggest emotional moments in this finale, and quite possibly the entirety of the series. When the camera cuts to Adama and Roslin sitting in the lush plains of this new Earth, I knew the inevitable had come, and I began to dread the moment when it would arrive. When Doc Cottle said that Roslin had 48 hours before the Battle of the Colony, I just sort of hoped that he meant that’s how long she could last before he’d need to find her. Even if he did mean that, it took on a new meaning as her vision faltered while she watched the herd of gazelle leap about on the African plain.

I didn’t understand what it was that Adama was going to do to give Roslin a better view, but I was already frightened by where this was heading. Roslin was clearly dying, and as much as I didn’t want to deal with it, the show wasn’t letting me get around it. Lee and Kara follow Adama as he carries Roslin to his Mark II, and three of them exchange bizarrely-coded goodbyes. Adama knows what takes Lee a few moments to admit: This is the last time they’ll see him. And so his greeting to Starbuck is a reference to something they’ve said all along, and she knows it’s goodbye. As they wave goodbye to Roslin, the scene focuses on Lee and Starbuck, and it’s here that the one major question left for season four is addressed: Starbuck’s identity.

When she tells Lee she’s not coming back, that she feels satisfied that she’s completed something that needs to be done, she questions Lee: What is he going to do with the rest of his life? I was touched that he decided that he didn’t want to just exist and rest and relax; he was on a new world, and that new world inspired a sense of discovery and desire in him, something he’d not experienced in a while. And then he turns to find that Starbuck has simply ceased to exist. I gasped, and then immediately felt so goddamn satisfied by that image of Lee standing amongst the green, waving grass blades in the field. In that one moment, “Maelstrom” was given the weight and emotional force it had when I first watched it. Kara “Starbuck” Thrace’s actions had a consequence, and her death was real and had meaning. There was no shitty retconning of that plot, there was no attempt to deny her agency or free will, and there was no denial of her experiences in season four. They were still real, she still affected people and the fleet, and whatever “power” sent her back to direct those people to Earth never bothered to intervene and control her. She did what she was “destined” to do, and after saying goodbye in her own way to Lee Adama, she was gone.

The truth is that I don’t want to know the details of who she was. I know others do, and I accept that. We want different things from the show. I hate comparing this show to LOST (though the similarities in their series finales are eerily obvious to me), but mythology only matters so much. I want closure on the characters, and Starbuck’s disappearance gives me that. If she was really an angel, spelling that out would have made me feel disappointed. It would have felt cheap and easy.

And as much as it pains me to admit it, if Laura Roslin had not died on screen, the end of “Daybreak” would have also felt cheap and easy. Her flashback with Sean Allison ends on a fantastic note: she commits to being on Mayor Adar’s campaign for president “all the way to the end,” and we see her commitment to William Adama. She stays all the way to end, as long as she can. The Mark II flies over a pack of flamingoes and her final words are a sentiment that represents her love and appreciation for the world around her: “So much…life.”

When her hand dropped (and even now, as I’m typing this), tears burst into my eyes rapidly. Here were the two characters I loved the most, the first real relationship I shipped on a television show, and before Adama could ever build that cabin they spoke of on New Caprica, Roslin passes away quietly at Adama’s side. But when he took of his wedding ring and put it on Roslin’s finger, I lost it. As I’m losing it now. I said in the comments that I did not just weep or cry. I sobbed in such an ugly, noisy way that I almost stopped “Daybreak” because it was distracting me. I remember trying to speak to my friend who I watched this with, because I was clearly making a goddamn scene in his apartment, and all I was able to get out was a choked, “SHE WAS MY FAVORITE CHARACTER,” before I just gave in and start bawling. Even typing these sentences now, I am so unbearably heartbroken that Laura Roslin died, even though the show couldn’t avoid it and the writers showed tact, love, and respect for it. It hurts, and it hurts so bad to even think about it. I just wanted them to be together, to live until old age in that cabin, and to enjoy the fruits of what they’d led their people to. Instead, Adama, overwrought with grief, points out the hills where he’s going to build the cabin he promised her.

And he’ll do it without her.

It was nice to see smiles on the faces of people I’d come to respect and adore on this show, and that these smiles were never robbed of the hope they had. I was ecstatic to see that Helo had survived, that he and Athena were off to enjoy their new world with Hera as a complete family. It was nice to see Romo in charge without it being ironic or cynical. Maybe in another life, this is something he’d be especially good at. Maybe this is that life.

As I regained myself, I wanted to feel good about this ending and not let Roslin’ death distract me; there was still a lot more character development and storytelling in these last few minutes, and even though I knew I’d watch this again, I wanted to take it all in this very first time. It seems that Gaius and Caprica get a happy ending as well after a particularly difficult journey for the two of them. Without giving away too much, the writers use the appearance of both their Head characters to help “answer” a few last lingering questions that Baltar and Caprica have. Again, it’s not a complete, thoroughly-defined answer. All we learn is that saving Hera is part of some greater plan, and that, for what it’s worth, their lives “will be less…eventful.” Even if it’s not the Great Big Answer some might want, I was, again, rather satisfied with the ambiguous nature of this all, especially since we get the full context of it all just minutes later.

But before we do, in just a single sentence, Gaius Baltar brings me right back to that delicate and vulnerable state of endless sobbing with just a single sentence:

“You know, I know about farming.”

Lost it. Completely fucking lost it, and I WILL NEVER GET IT BACK. The enormity of that statement, the emotional weight it carries for the character arc of Gaius Baltar…gods, it is just too much. IT IS TOO MUCH FOR ME TO HANDLE.

And then “Daybreak” dares show me an image of Bill sitting on the very hill he’ll build the cabin, next to a makeshift grave for her body, saying the must gut-wrenching statement of love that I have ever heard:

“I laid out the cabin today. It’s gonna have an easterly view. You should see the light that we get here. When the sun comes from behind the mountains, it’s almost heavenly. It reminds me of you.”

I’ve already seen quite a few comments from people around the web that they wish this was the final scene of “Daybreak.” I agree that it would be an utterly heartbreaking and beautiful end to Battlestar Galactica, and I would have been happy with that. BUT–and you knew that was coming–I think the final “epilogue” of sorts is necessary on some level to establish the “mythology” of this show as its woven into the fabric of our very existence. There’s a part of me that just simply loves when fiction attempts to give us an alternate timeline or history to explain events that are unexplained, and I’ve mentioned that before while watching Doctor Who and Fringe. While I must admit there are a few heavy-handed images–such as the use of archival footage of robots–I don’t feel dissatisfied with their existence. For me, it’s an ambitious attempt to create that mythology I spoke of earlier, of crafting a complex body of work that attempts to explain the human condition. If this had just ended at Adama, I don’t think it would have been at all obvious that this show was trying to say that we are all descendants from mitochondrial Eve–in this case, that would be Hera Agathon. It shows us that she was important to the survival of humanity, that there was a reason for Athena and Roslin to follow the guides of the Opera House dream, that everything that happened in the Battle of the Colony was not without meaning.

I can see how people would hate this, and I’m not here to really change anyone’s mind. I know people who despise the end to LOST and The Wire, and both those series finales I loved a great deal. I know it might be weird that an atheist would find solace and entertainment in a show that posits in-universe that some sort of being/force/God/gods exist and has been trying to guide humanity away from their repeated cycle of violence for hundreds of thousands of years across the galaxy. But I don’t view this aspect of Battlestar Galactica in real-world terms. It may sound redundant to state this, but the show isn’t real, and the final moments in New York City with Head Baltar and Head Caprica cement this for me. It’s not a real thing, but it’s an attempt to do what so many millions of billions of people have tried to do with humanity: explain how we got here. Explain why we are the way we are. Explain why things happen that can’t really be explained. Is the science bad? Oh, it’s ridiculously terrible, and I know that. It may very well be a cop-out to just state that a lot of mythologies have bad science, but to me, it works. It works because the science is bad, because it’s a flawed but powerful way to explain the origin of humanity and the origin of our cyclical behavior.

I don’t know that we have escaped any circle of violence, irrespective of the Cylons or not. The ending to this show, to me, doesn’t invalidate any of the themes, issues, or character arcs that I witnessed and experienced. It’s still a power reflection on the best and worst aspects of human nature. And aren’t our national and personal myths simply the same thing, whatever we seem to believe?

All of this has happened before, and it can happen again. Battlestar Galactica simply puts forth the idea that we can choose it one way or another.

The liveblog for The Plan will be at 10am PST on Saturday, December 3rd. I’ll probably have a bit more to say about this show on Monday, the 5th, when my review for the last bit of BSG material is over, but I do want to state what should be obvious at this point: This is one of the most touching and satisfying television experiences that I have ever had. I am in love with this show, and it’s something I’ll keep with me for many, many years to come. Thank you to all of you who bugged me to watch this. You’re all wonderful.

Tomorrow, we start a surprise! It will finish on Friday, December 9th, and then I start Mark Watches Buffy The Vampire Slayer on Monday, December 12th. ABOUT TIME.

About Mark Oshiro

Perpetually unprepared since '09.
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251 Responses to Mark Watches ‘Battlestar Galactica’: Daybreak, Part III

  1. Noybusiness says:

    Did my reply get through to you on the Part II thread? 'Cause there were questions in it (about extended Daybreak, Babylon 5).

  2. Noybusiness says:

    [youtube 8Yj0Iwa8_gk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Yj0Iwa8_gk youtube]

  3. Ryan Lohner says:

    Remember how Racetrack said in Final Cut that she wanted to die taking as many Cylons as possible with her? I'd say she got her wish.

    Also pretty neat is that the "promised land" that the dying leader dies before reaching is the cabin.

  4. Noybusiness says:

    [youtube YWhnu6pEpog http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWhnu6pEpog youtube]

  5. Noybusiness says:

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  6. Noybusiness says:

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  7. Noybusiness says:

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  8. Noybusiness says:

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  9. Noybusiness says:

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  10. Noybusiness says:

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  11. BklynBruzer says:

    MASSIVE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS FROM PART 3 INCOMING:
    (I can't help it, this show makes me have so many feelings!)

    "I don't mean to rush you, but you are KEEPING TWO CIVILIZATIONS WAITING!" Cavil, never change.

    I'm sorry, but Chief's twitching as he finds out about Tory killing Cally is just silly.

    "FRAK!" Can't help but laugh at that, sorry Cavil! Though… I didn't make the Budd Dwyer connection before… Yeah, not gonna laugh at that again…

    It's amazing how tiny Galactica is compared to the Colony.

    You go, Kara! "There must be some kinda way outta here…"

    I love All Along the Watchtower. So much.

    Bear McCreary, you are amazing.

    Lee, Kara… I love you two but this is just a goddamned stupid idea for both of ya.

    This is one of the saddest scenes in all of the finale for me, seeing Galactica tear herself apart like that… Best frakking ship in the fleet.

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    That reveal still gets to me. Frak. And props to the VFX peeps for having it be Africa that shows us it's Earth, rather than North America.

    "Lieutenant Hoshi suits me just fine, sir!"

    "You got a one-track mind, Doc…" I love this frakking show.

    Okay yeah I don't like the ID/Creationist/divine angle. But, it fits with the show. I can live with it.

    I like the acknowledgement they fucked up, and the abandonment of technology.

    They deserve a second chance, and even though New Caprica was fucked up, this third chance should work out.

    More Mark Sheppard. MORE. Actually, MORE OF EVERYONE WHY DID THIS SHOW HAVE TO END I LOVE IT SO MUCH AUGH

    That is definitely a risk worth taking.

    Sam 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Sam & Kara 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    "See you on the other side…"

    Galactica 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Adama in a flight suit again, flying a Viper. This is great.

    Last man off the ship, perfect.

    Bill, you're the best.

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    I like that the light shining on us partially comes from the Galactica. That's awesome.

    LAURA 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    BILL & LAURA 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Oh gods, now I'm crying at him carrying her.

    THIS FRAKKING SHOW

    THIS FRAKKING SHOW

    THE WAVING. THIS FRAKKING SHOW.

    Oh god Lee and Kara why are you two so adorable?

    …such a bad idea, you two. BUT YOU ARE SO CUTE TOGETHER I DON'T CARE.

    Aw, Zak 🙁

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    I love Starbuck with longer hair

    First time I've heard "Today is the first day of the rest of your life" without wanting to punch the person who said it.

    "I wanna explore, I wanna climb the mountains, I wanna cross the oceans!"

    Goodbye, Kara 🙁

    "You won't be forgotten."

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Okay the pigeon's a bit silly. I'll admit that.

    "So much… Life…"

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    God these two are amazing together.

    LAURA 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Tears. So, so many tears. SO MANY TEARS.

    Bill's ring 🙁

    Oh god this is so beautiful and so sad and goddammit BSG how do you do this to me?

    Aw, Saul & Ellen 🙂

    Helo, Athena, and Hera: THE BEST FAMILY. THE BEST. FIGHTING AGATHONS FOREVER.

    "I'm doing it for you." Aw, Gaius 🙂

    "You know, I know about farming." Aw, Gaius 🙁

    "I laid out the cabin today…" Aww, Bill 🙁

    HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Okay, totally biased here, love that they went with NYC for this last scene.

    I know the science is bad, I don't care. I enjoyed myself.

    Hey, it's Ronald D. Moore!

    Gods, I love this version of All Along The Watchtower. Best song ever y/y

    Gods, I miss this show 🙁

    • chikzdigmohawkz says:

      And props to the VFX peeps for having it be Africa that shows us it's Earth, rather than North America.

      It was RDM's idea for it to be Africa, and he had to fight the network on it because they wanted it to be North America. So he finally pulled out the MTE idea and said something along the lines of 'look, this is what we're doing and she's from Africa, so deal with it.' And they finally agreed that it made sense. (So I can't hate the concept too much, even though it's bad science.)

      • BklynBruzer says:

        Oh really? I didn't know that. I just liked that for once it wasn't North America.

      • tanbarkie says:

        It's bad science, but speaking as a biologist, it's far LESS bad than the vast majority of TV/movie science (by comparison, see Hera's magic cancer-curing blood). Mitochondrial Eve is one of those very rare scientific ideas that has a great deal of emotional power, but for which the actual details require a fair amount of knowledge in the field to "get." So it's relatively easy for me to temporarily hang up my scientist hat, suspend my disbelief, and just enjoy the THEMATIC perfection that is Hera being Mitochondrial Eve.

    • ChronicReader91 says:

      HOW DOES THIS SHOW DO THIS TO ME?! 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁

      CAN'T BE REPEATED ENOUGH TIMES.

  12. Jenny_M says:

    Mark, I think you have summed up exactly how I feel about the finale and was never able to put into words. So thank you.

    (I really wish I could have watched the LOST finale with you…somehow…because…omg. All the tears.)

    Also: BUFFY, HOORAY!

  13. Wookie_Monster says:

    So many people hate on the coda, but thinking about it, I realized it's the only logical continuation of the "embrace the stone age" stuff, as if the writers wanted to acknowledge how monumentally stupid that idea was. "Let's ditch all technology! Sure, our children might die pointlessly of exposure, infected teeth an in childbirth, but at least there won't be a robot war in the near future!"

    …except you have made all but sure there will be one in the distant future, because your ancestors will have forgotten the Cautionary Tale Of The Cylons by the time it starts mattering to them. Great job, Lee.

    I was actually fine with the finale, until I started thinking about it. What a shame for such a usually intelligent show.

  14. Maya says:

    You know, I used to really hate the finale, but I think in going through the series on here, I've come to appreciate it a lot more. But yeah, people really, really hate this finale. I was at the Battlestar panel this year at Comic-Con and the first question was still "So what was up with that finale?"

    I actually like the coda, mostly because all things involving Head!Baltar are wonderful to me.

    PLAY US OUT BEAR!

    [youtube lEhlAA85_tY&feature=channel_video_title http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEhlAA85_tY&feature=channel_video_title youtube]

    Because this video will never be not awesome.

  15. Hey, guys, remember that time the Galactica got repossessed?

    [youtube HFakMBHzZHg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFakMBHzZHg youtube]

    • tanbarkie says:

      Bahahahaha! I lost it when the repo man announced the location of his office.

    • Noybusiness says:

      That reminded me of a gag from "Daffy Duck's Quackbusters".

      "Did you hear the one about the girl who didn't pay her excorcist's bill? Her soul was repossessed!"
      Always cracks me up.

  16. terracotta says:

    I just started crying just reading your words about Laura's death. I've never loved a character like I love her.

    We were talking about Daybreak over on the Remember Laura livejournal community today, and I said that Laura's death was exactly what it should have been. I would have felt cheated if her story had ended any other way. Not because I wanted her to die (because my GOD, I wish she hadn't), but because her whole story had been about mortality, and death, and learning to live for the moment, and if she'd just sailed off happily into the sunset, it would have made all of that somehow … lesser? I don't know. I'm glad it happened the way it did, even though it breaks my heart. Which it does.

    I have some issues with Daybreak (I'm not at all keen on the way the Opera House scenario turned out, for one thing), but emotionally, it hit the spot. I can't remember which reviewer it was, now, but there was a review of this that I read at one point, and they said that they felt 'The Wire' and BSG were the two best shows out there. And while 'The Wire' was more technically perfect, they'd always choose BSG over it because BSG pretty much attaches itself to your soul, flaws and all.

  17. BklynBruzer says:

    Once again, Mark, you say everything I was thinking. And you say it so much better than I could ever say it.

  18. psycicflower says:

    Mark said he wanted 40,000 Roslin/Adama gifs … okay I don’t have that many gifs full stop but I can do a Roslin/Adama gifspam with a ridiculous amount of gifs in celebration of Mark’s first proper ships! (more gifs, lots and lots of gifs, in replies because I don’t want to cause a never ending scroll or freeze anyone’s page)

    Series 1 – I think they might like each other. I think I ship it.
    ’Madam President, if I may? I think you should know that my father… well, this entire ceremony was his idea.’
    ‘I know. I think he's enjoying it.’
    ‘Well, actually, he hates protocol pomp and all that.’
    ‘Really?’
    ‘He's making a gesture, trying to make you feel like the president.’

    <img src="http://i39.tinypic.com/rh69w2.gif&quot; border="0" alt="Image and video hosting by TinyPic">
    <img src="http://i40.tinypic.com/96ykpl.gif&quot; border="0" alt="Image and video hosting by TinyPic">
    <img src="http://i41.tinypic.com/34qvf37.gif&quot; border="0" alt="Image and video hosting by TinyPic">
    <img src="http://i41.tinypic.com/2rxa7io.gif&quot; border="0" alt="Image and video hosting by TinyPic">

  19. Karen says:

    I haven't commented on the previous Daybreak posts because I haven't rewatched it recently, so I couldn't remember what happened in which part. Long story short: I'm not a fan of this finale. So here are all my various thoughts.

    1. Kara died when she flew into that storm in season 3 and she was sent back by a higher power to help the colonists find Earth. D'Anna said earlier that hybrids can see things that other people can't. When Sam said he'd see her on the other side it was because he knew that he was going to die and that Kara had already died and her mission was over so they'd be together in the afterlife.

    2. These last episodes have made it incredibly obvious that the creators were telling the truth when they said they only planned around a season in advance because wtf? The planet that they discovered earlier in the season was supposed to be identified by the constellations that WE recognize, thus implying that that planet was Earth, OUR Earth. Except now this episode is telling us that JK THIS IS REALLY OUR EARTH. So there are two Earth-like planets in the galaxy with the same star patterns in the sky… mmm hm…

    3. So the people who were willing to mutiny after a Cylon alliance are just willing to give up all their technology and fend for themselves in the wilderness like no big deal? Are we really supposed to believe that?

    4. And I hope that all the colonists have fun in their new lives. ENJOY DEATH FROM EXPOSURE THE ELEMENTS, LACK OF MEDICINE FOR EASILY TREATABLE ILLNESSES LIKE INFECTIONS, STRUGGLING TO FARM AND HUNT WHEN NO ONE HAS ANY EXPERIENCE DOING SO, AND POSSIBLY ATTACK FROM WILD ANIMALS!

    5. So the whole point of the opera house dream/vision was that Baltar was going to pick up Hera and carry her like five feet? OK THEN.

    6. While I do appreciate that Adama wanted to be with Roslin in her last hours, I would have liked it better if after Roslin died, we saw him meet up with Lee because I think that father-son relationship has been at the heart of the show.

    • monkeybutter says:

      What, you mean you can't just wake up in the morning and say "let's agriculture!"?

      Yeah, I was disturbed by their absurdly sunny outlook on giving up all technology, especially since it's not like they have access to the seeds or plants that modern people consume, because, you know, people had to develop those over long periods of time. I expect there were a lot of unfortunate incidents with berries, the weather, and non-compliant animals.

      • BSGfan1 says:

        I balked at abandoning technology at first, but when you think about all the horrible shit they saw over the years, I think it was not a bad idea. Eventually the technology will find it's way back but in a different way.

        • monkeybutter says:

          Yeah, I understand their motivation for doing it, I just think they're being unreasonably optimistic about their lives without technology. Lee stands out as particularly impractical with his plan to climb every mountain, and ford every stream, and generally being all

          <img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lv57o4ur341qc76u6.gif"&gt;

          It's a sweet sentiment, but you need food and clothes, man. They should at least retain some of what they have until they can make new weapons, containers, and other tools. I find it really hard to believe that everyone refrained from grabbing a little bit of metal to help themselves along at first.

          • BSGfan1 says:

            I guess after seeing their creativity and indomitable spirit I believe they will succeed:)

          • rabbitape says:

            I wish they could have finessed the point a bit more, because the idea that they would want to temper their use of technology after all they'd been through and having it turn against them isn't a bad idea. Like if Romo had said "And then we'll put the space port here," and Lee had been all "Ooh, too much," that would have been a little better. They'd still have medicine, tools, etc.

            What kills me worse, though, is the image of people walking leisurely away with just what they can carry on their backs (or that one guy who has, like, a briefcase). What is that? How is that even remotely reasonable? How the hell are you going to survive with just a duffel bag? And if that's your plan, why aren't you scrambling to build or find shelter right this minute and with a quickness?

            To me, that's even worse than the "no technology" bit. That's "no technology and no preparedness."

            • monkeybutter says:

              I know, right? They look like they're going on a day hike, not restarting civilization. Couldn't they have used what raptors they have left to scout out a good place (or places) to settle at first, and maybe send out teams of hunters to kill animals so that they would have skins for shelter and bedding? There's no reason to waste energy wandering around with no supplies!

              • BSGfan1 says:

                Wouldn't using the Raptors (aside from Adama flying Roslin around), have been in direct conflict with their new ideology to not use the current technology they have?

                My Head!canon is that 150,000 years later reflects every attempt to course correct (sorry for the LOST reference) but since it all happened before, it WILL happen again, just differently each time. 🙂 The technology will rise again…and again…etc

                • monkeybutter says:

                  Yes, it would, since I think their quit-technology-cold-turkey ideology is silly.

                  It's not that I'm aghast that they would give up modernity (or disbelieve that humans will ever recreate a comparable civilization), I just think it's impractical and blithely optimistic that they would immediately give up EVERYTHING, go wandering around a strange world armed only with a light jacket and a walking stick, and expect to survive. They are not frakkin' prepared.

                  • BSGfan1 says:

                    They aren't trying to be practical.I think they are so disgusted by and sick of everything that happened. Sick of the human on human violence; sick of the Cylon vs human violence; sick of the Cylon on Cylon violence; sick of being in space; SO sick of EVERYTHING they experienced that they would rather chuck it all. They are calling a Mulligan. I really have no problem with the decision. They'll adapt or die.

    • Sean C. says:

      Y'know, regarding "4. And I hope that all the colonists have fun in their new lives. ENJOY DEATH FROM EXPOSURE THE ELEMENTS, LACK OF MEDICINE FOR EASILY TREATABLE ILLNESSES LIKE INFECTIONS, STRUGGLING TO FARM AND HUNT WHEN NO ONE HAS ANY EXPERIENCE DOING SO, AND POSSIBLY ATTACK FROM WILD ANIMALS!" and all similar reactions people have had to the abandonment of technology and medicine and etc. …

      Everything was falling apart and in short supply by this point anyway. The medicine wasn't going to last forever, and supplies of everything were being exhausted. Remember "this is the last tube of Tauron toothpaste in the Universe"? The ships and raptors will run out of tylium, because there's no tylium on Earth, 'cause if there was we'd have found it by now. 🙂

      As was mentioned, provisions were divided and remember we saw people walking away with bags of stuff with them. They didn't walk away with just the clothes on their backs. And the tech wasn't going to last forever either. It breaks down, batteries run out, and they didn't really have a way to generate much power. When you think about it, it makes sense (at least to me).

      • I'm sure after thinking about it that the civilian fleet was fragmenting and running out of resources (and probably algae too!) enough to make a complete fresh start make sense, but i shouldn't have to ponder that out. It doesn't take much to show or even MENTION how unsustainable all of their ships had become. I wish they had, I guess.

    • Joshua says:

      As Shaun C kinda said, for 3 and 4, what technology did they have left?

      The food had run out long ago, leaving them with only algae. The paper had run out because people ate it all about a season ago, as Adama and Tigh joked about at the time. The antibiotics were restricted to pilots only on New Caprica, so they must have run out totally now, or at least very soon. Their ships only barely go, apart from Galactica, which doesn't go at all but is required for protection if they do try to fly somewhere.

      Given that, there isn't really a choice to abandon their technology – they don't really have any left. I also think that Lee's statement fails to properly express RDM's intention here, according to an interview I saw. They're not choosing a Luddite path, but rather just completely sick of living on ships, and sick of each other.

      If so, then all the usable technology they have left may fit into the packs they're all carrying.

      Your point 2 really bugs me though. Yeah, it does make that obvious.

      As for 5, I have nothing to back this up with, but I personally feel that the writers were setting this up for Karl and Athena to be killed and for Baltar and Caprica Six to raise Hera themselves. I think at this late hour some dim spark of humanity blew in their souls and they couldn't do it, and wrote a happy ending instead.

      • Meenalives says:

        Yes, they were running out of supplies, but that was because they were in an enclosed space with no outside resources. If they had organized themselves and started to use the natural resources around them, as they did on New Caprica before the Cylons showed up, they could have rebuilt their technology, not to their previous level, but at least enough to have penicillin and steel, and maybe electricity. They have the knowledge necessary to do that, while very few of them have the skills to hunt or farm without the use of technology (where would Helo or Athena have learned to hunt without guns?). As I said in my comment, it sure beats dying in childbirth.

    • Latlansky says:

      Gah! I totally agree about Lee and his dad. That made me angry.

    • evocativecomma says:

      Yes yes yes yes yes yes a million times yes. So. Much. Yes.

      Here's the only thing I'd read that makes me feel a little bit better: Why The Battlestar Galactica Finale Is A Huge Cop Out And It Doesn’t Matter.

      Some cogent quotes:

      "Why the frak does Baltar have an imaginary friend? Answer: It’s God! Why isn’t Starbuck dead and what the frak is she? Answer: Oh it’s God! Why did the Cylons destroy the colonies? Oh it’s God! How are the humans going to find a home? Oh it’s God! Every remaining question was answered tonight and the answer to every question was: Oh it’s God."

      "We’ve hung around all this time, don’t we deserve better answers than that?"

      "Tonight’s Battlestar Galactica finale was a cop out, but it was also the perfect goodbye. Ron Moore dropped the ball on plot but as always, the show delivered where it really mattered: Characters."

      One of my personal beefs with the finale, though, that this article does not address, is that we are shown that the planet they settle on is our Earth–everything in the final scene confirms it.

      But how can it be, when the first Earth they found had our constellations?

      This new planet cannot be our Earth. It's logistically impossible. I hate that with every fiber of my being.

      But I love that, after all of this, it is Galactica itself that is the dying leader. The prophecy said that the dying leader would never reach Earth. Roslin did. The Galactica did not.

      To me, it does matter a little more than it does to this columnist, but much of what is said rings true for me.

      • Al says:

        There's actually an answer to your problem with the constellations, but RDM has admitted that it wasn't intended by the writers.

        The constellations as we saw them in the Tomb of Athena match those in our present-day sky. However, the sky we see today is *not* the same sky we would have seen 150,000 years ago. Stars move over time, and during the events of Battlestar Galactica, none of our present-day constellations would have existed. So, it is possible–however unlikely–that Nuked Earth had a set of constellations that match the Zodiac signs on Our Earth. It would be a hell of a coincidence, but maybe it'll help you sleep easier tonight.

  20. Noybusiness says:

    Sorry for there being so many music videos above. I blame Bear McCreary. 😉

  21. Suzannezibar says:

    "I was able to get out was a choked, “SHE WAS MY FAVORITE CHARACTER,” before I just gave in and start bawling. "

    I have never loved or admired a character so much as I have Laura Roslin. Never. There was so much ugly crying going on during my first watch of the finale and during the liveblog on Saturday. Even now, as I am sitting in a university library in public , tears are rolling down my face as I'm reading all of this.

    It meant so much to me that Helo, Athena, and Hera got a happy ending. Gods bless them all.

    I said it at the end of "Islanded in a Stream of Stars," and I will say it here again–thank you, Mark, for sharing your journey through this show with us. It has been an absolute privilege and a wonderful experience reading your reviews. I've stood by my opinion for two years now that Battlestar Galactica is the best damn television show I've ever seen, and your thoughts have given me so many new insights and appreciation of the show (and I appreciated it pretty damn much to begin with). And I CANNOT EVEN BEGIN TO DESCRIBE HOW HAPPY YOUR ROSLIN/ADAMA SHIPPING MADE ME. Their relationship was, quite simply, one of the purest expressions of love I have ever seen, on television or otherwise.

    And finally, my favorite tribute to the series as a whole–the music and way the video are put together is perfect:
    [youtube Uk7wooBRuY4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uk7wooBRuY4 youtube]

  22. knut_knut says:

    Even though we didn’t get answers to all our questions (or I guess we did…), I don’t really mind. Maybe the next time I watch BSG it’ll bother me, and the next time it’ll bother me even more until I fall into a BSG Finale Spiral of Hate, but for now the fact that there’s closure for the characters is enough for me.

    I love how Lee originally wanted to spend his life basically as Fat Lee, the ultimate couch potato.

  23. slybrarian says:

    Oh, god, but the ending makes me so angry. The combination of creationist BS and mind-bogglingly stupid luddism is just nuts. I just wanted to grab Lee by the throat and start shouting about how he's condemned everyone to a slow death by starvation, disease, and carnivorous megafauna. No more medicine. No more metal tools. No more algae tanks for food – hell, no food period except some berries that may or may not be edible and some animals that are going to be hard to hunt once you run out of bullets. Which, by the way, you get no more of, so have fun with the sabre-tooth cats. Integrating it with human history just makes it worse, because we know they fail so horribly to teach their children that even basic tool use barely gets passed on, to the point that LANGUAGE ITSELF may die out. No one lives on to say, "Maybe we shouldn't enslave sapient machines next time around." Even Hera dies a relatively early death, assuming she's really MTE. It is, in short, a complete and utter clusterfuck that shows everyone exactly how NOT to settle a wilderness planet.

    TL, DR: GAIUS. You know nothing about farming! You know how to run a combine across fields filled with specially-bred plants and covered with fertilizer! None of which exist now!

    • xpanasonicyouthx says:

      but

      but how boring would human history be

      if all our problems were solved long ago

      (i am grasping at the flimsiest of straws here, I realize that. I just have no answers for the horrific science/history ideas and instead will shout IT'S A MYTH and OMG LAURA ROSLIN over and over again.)

  24. guest_age says:

    I remember when this originally aired, and my best friend IMed me full of rage over the finale. Not having watched it, I couldn't do much but say, "Uh…there, there?" Now having seen it myself, I told her flat-out on Saturday after the liveblog, "That was nearly perfect and I don't understand why you didn't like it because everything is both 'nothing hurts' while simultaneously being 'everything hurts.'"

    There were so many perfect character moments and there's something so powerful to me about Tyrol basically changing the future of two species because of his feelings for his wife. Especially in the context of what he said earlier this season about settling and having never really gotten over Boomer.

    But the most powerful moment of the entire series is when Adama puts his wedding ring on Roslin's finger. I tend not to cry over sad things in my media–I'm not sure why, but I don't. I do, however, tend to cry at happy things. I've cried over friendships and weddings and that moment when your OTP finally gets together, but never over a character dying.

    And it's like my brain got confused because on the one hand, the love Adama was showing in that moment was beautiful and wonderful and happy and on the other it was the most heartbreaking thing I've ever seen, so I sort of started to half-cry and it was SUPER UGLY TEARS and then I just started choking. Oh, God, so ugly were my tears and choking.

    I have my own headcanon as to what Starbuck, head!Six, and head!Baltar were, but I'll keep them to myself. I think that's what I like about this finale–I can have my headcanon and someone else can have theirs, and it doesn't matter if mine matches with theirs. It just matters that it makes sense to each of us and means something to us.

    I'm glad that I watched this series along with you, Mark. I can't wait for your surprise but even more so, I can't wait for you to start Buffy!

  25. stellaaaaakris says:

    My first thoughts when finishing Part 3 were *endless tears forever* (redundant? deal with it) and "Damn, Helo's old." But don't worry, Helo, I will always love you!

    The end of BSG deserves lists, right? Right.

    What I liked about Daybreak as a whole:
    -The Fighting Agathons all live! I was very worried when I didn't see Helo in the CIC with Athena and Hera, especially when Athena had a very troubled face.
    -They find Earth.
    -Nekkid Sam in flashbacks.
    -Baltar and Caprica!
    -Cottle wanting to support Adama and his goodbye to Roslin.
    -Boomer returning Hera.
    -All the warm fuzzies and all the sad tears it made me feel.
    -GAIUS FRAKKIN' BALTAR and he knows about farming
    -Head Six and Head Baltar may be my favorite characters after Helo and Athena. I imagine they are walking around me when I go to work, being fabulous, and making snarky comments about people.
    -Hot Dog taking the pictures of the pilots. You know that those left on the board were probably put up by people who've since died so nobody remembers the original ones anymore.

    What I disliked about Daybreak or wish had been included (though some may have been in the extended versions or I might have missed it while sobbing):
    -Lee's imperialist manifest destiny speech, but knut_knut explained the other day that Lee's hair was an alien that feasted on his brain, so I shall deal.
    -Where everybody was going (I might have missed it, but the last time I remember seeing Chief was when he killed Tory)
    -Adama going poof! just like Kara if she and Lee hadn't spotted him. I would have been so pissed if there was no goodbye scene.
    -Roslin dying. I cried.
    -Sam flying into the sun with the fleet (I didn't actually dislike this but it broke my heart so I can't put in the happy section above).
    -No goodbye between Tigh and Adama.
    -MOAR Leoben.
    -I didn't have a bunch of the funny scenes you were describing so when they were all in the CIC making deals, I expected somebody to knock out Cavil from behind when he was distracted – it would've made me laugh. This was all before he shot himself.
    -Cavil, just Cavil.
    -Really wish I got an answer on why the Sixes can have different hair lengths, colors, and styles.
    -Not enough sexy arms these past 2 seasons.
    -And I'm assuming I can strike all memory of "Black Market" from my mind, yes? I half kept waiting for random blond girl of Lee's past to be mentioned again.

    This was an amazing show but I don't think I'll be able to watch it again for another year or so. It's on BBC America all the time and I always flip to it, but I can't watch because my soul hasn't recovered. I even thought about borrowing Season 4 from the Library so I could watch the extended scenes, but I can't make myself watch this all over again. I sobbed wayyyyy too much the first time around and now I know what'll be coming, so I'll start crying in anticipation.

    • xpanasonicyouthx says:

      ALIEN HAIR

      :: DEAD ::

      • knut_knut says:

        It’s the only explanation

        • psycicflower says:

          It's definitely the explanation I'm clinging to.

        • threerings13 says:

          So I was listening to the commentary for the extended Daybreak, and apparently, in some of his action scenes, Lee was wearing a wig because they cut his hair for the flashbacks. But only in some very brief scenes. I was hoping when they first said that that it explained his HORRIBLE hair, but apparently not. They just had to reproduce the horrible hair in wig form.

    • knut_knut says:

      AHH!! I DIDN’T EVEN REALIZE ADAMA AND TIGH NEVER SAID GOODBYE! I suppose they could still stumble upon each other…and it probably was a good thing because I’d cry even more, if that’s at all possible, BUT STILL! THEY’RE BEST FRIENDS!

      • BSGfan1 says:

        I think because they are best friends they don't have to have a good bye. I actually thought it was a perfect ending for them.

    • Karen says:

      knut_knut explained the other day that Lee's hair was an alien that feasted on his brain, so I shall deal.

      I choose to believe this is true.

  26. Ryan Lohner says:

    Sorry, this ending is still complete bullshit to me. Because Romo Lampkin is absolutely right: this would NEVER, EVER HAPPEN. Thousands of people would not agree as one to give up all their technology and become cavemen.

    And if they did, they wouldn't survive. These people have been drinking purified water all their life, so Earth's water alone would wipe them all out. And even ignoring the whole disease thing, are you telling me enough of these people would know about farming and/or hunting to sustain them all? The most likely outcome of the ending is that all the Colonials died out before they could breed with the Cro-Magnons, and we're not related to them at all. The show itself even seems to acknowledge this by the article saying that Mitochondrial Eve was "a young woman." Hera died young, along with everyone else.

    Ron Moore has actually admitted that it was all a desperate attempt to explain why none of their technology has been discovered, which he came up with at the last minute. And to that I can only say, if your idea forces you to create such huge holes in basic logic to make it work, you need a new idea.

    And finally, the whole concept also comes with a healthy dose of feeling like we're being lectured about how all technology is evil, especially when you get to that ridiculous final montage implying that all the robots we're building are going to kill us some day. And this comes with the delicious irony that the show is saying we were wrong to watch it, since it involved using a television or a computer. And the people who made the show, with all its fantastic special effects, were wrong to do so. I've said it before and I'll say it again: this is what comes of not planning ahead.

    • Karen says:

      I agree 100%. I still enjoyed the show as a whole, but I think that when you take a step back you can see the pitfalls of what happens when you have a mythology ladden show, but don't have a predetermined end game story.

    • rabbitape says:

      I personally would rather have the question of "well then why haven't we found any of their technology?" over having them swear off tech altogether. A little more finesse around this problem and a more palatable solution that still leaves the former question out there would have been much more satisfying, in my opinion.

      For me, though, that's still not an insurmountable problem — I still got what I wanted out of the finale, and I still love watching it. It INFURIATED me when it first aired, but over time those frustrations fell away, and I'm left with just the overwhelming emotional response to watching these characters. YMMV. 🙂

  27. littletonosense says:

    “You know, I know about farming.”

    Yep. This is when I lost my shit. I can't think of any character's last words that are more perfect. This sentence alone completely retconned the character of Baltar for me. I tolerated him through all four seasons, until this final line. It really just clarified his character for me, because I don't think I was really understanding him before.

  28. psycicflower says:

    THIS so much to point 4. I hope Helo doesn't have any problems with his recently shot leg wound. Or Nicky doesn't have more problems with his kidneys. Or that the climate in the areas they've settled don't change too much from season to season. Or that there aren't any diseases that their immune system isn't used to around. Or that the natives aren't hostile. So on and so forth.

  29. BSGfan1 says:

    Oh My Gods Mark. Your review made me cry all over again. Especially with the Baltar line. I'm broken. I don't want this show to be over now or ever.

    Thank you for allowing me to join your beautifu Battlestar Galactica journey.

  30. stellaaaaakris says:

    Time to go over my predictions!

    -I will be unprepared. You are all laughing at how unprepared I am. Totes, totes mcgoats. All the rot13'd replies and comments were quite upsetting and made me very anxious.
    -We will find out that Lee actually hallucinated Starbuck's ship crashing and she just found a window made by Will Parry's subtle knife and found a way to Earth. OOOoooo, the Eye of Jupiter is actually one of those natural windows the angel was talking about in The Amber Spyglass! Ummm, no, but I think that last bit still happened. Yup.
    -We'll find out what Starbuck's destiny is. To lead the people to Earth with the Power of Rock and then to go poof! And to be pigeon for Lee.
    -They will find Earth and it will be AWESOME. They certainly found Earth – two times. The first time, severely lacking in awesome. The second time, it was very pretty but not totally awesome either. But definitely an improvement!
    -Dee will get back with Lee. I'm going to say no and now I'm going to go sob in a corner.
    -Lee will be a pilot again. For about half a day, but that counts.
    -Roslin will make me jealous with her hair. How was I supposed to know she was going to lose her hair this time? I was 100% jealous of it in the Daybreak flashbacks and, honestly, her wig looked pretty good too.
    -Roslin will die before they reach Earth, BUT she's the final Cylon and will download into another body. (I know, she didn't hear the music but I don't care. This is my ridiculous prediction and I don't want her to die for reals.) Em, no, but I love the way they handled her death.
    -Caprica Six will leave Baltar and raise Hera with Athena and Helo. I don't know. Nope, but I'm glad. I realized in Daybreak that I seriously ship the two of them. And, more importantly, Helo and Athena both survived to raise Hera and to teach her to hunt!
    -Baltar will shave his beard. Hell yeah! And he cut his Jesus hair, which I hadn't even thought to hope for. If only Lee could have followed his example, although the explanations provided in replies to me in Part I were interesting (especially the alien explanation) – but, still, I don't have to like it.
    -Tory will have screen time and lines. Yup, but I still don't like her and I have no feelings about her individually being a Cylon.
    -Chief, Anders, and Tigh will all confess to somebody and will try to fight with the humans but their programming will get in the way and something bad will happen. Well, Tigh confessed to Adama but nothing bad really happened except Adama got drunk and broke a mirror. But that mental image or whatever it was that Tigh had right at the beginning of the season when he shot Bill had me worried for a moment. The others were all outed without confessing.
    -Baltar, Lee, Chief, Roslin, and…Doc Cottle will be seriously injured, maybe die. With the exception of Roslin, none of them were even injured.
    -I won't see Billy again :'( Unfortunately, completely correct.
    -I will sob tears of endless sadness. Dear God, did I ever. From the moment Kara said goodbye to Sam until the very last second, I was sobbing, ugly sobbing.
    -AND WORLD PEACE. I'll settle for a somewhat happy ending. Or at least the hope for one at some point in the future.I'm going to go ahead and give myself this because, for a show that tried to destroy my soul, that was a pretty uplifting, happy ending.

    All in all, I'm not going to be a Seer anytime soon.

  31. enigmaticagentscully says:

    That's it, I'm gone. I'm sitting here with tears streaming down my face.
    Only one TV show has EVER made me cry as much as the BSG finale. I do hope one day Mark gets around to it, but that's a discussion for another time. But Jesus fuck this finale broke my heart six ways from Sunday.

    My Laura. My beautiful, smart, strong, brave, independent Laura, who has been my favourite character from the very first episode, just slips away in the most tragic way possible. She worked so hard for so long and never gets to enjoy the peace that her part in this story brings. It's not fair. It's NOT FUCKING FAIR. And yet…it's so perfect.

    • BSGfan1 says:

      Seriously. I really can't remember a show that has affected me more than BSG. And while I LOVED LOST, BSG strikes me in a totally different way. I cannot explain it. It hits me in all the right places.

    • Suzannezibar says:

      SO. SAY. WE. ALL.

      I would not change a bit of what happened with Laura, but oh…I just can't stand it. SHE IS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL AND BRAVE AND DETERMINED WOMAN, and I just want her to be happy forever.

  32. echinodermata says:

    The finale bugs me. I talked about it in the previous review. I talked about it on the spoiler blog days and weeks before.

    So what I'll leave with is something that was sparked in my mind by something in this review of Mark's. That thing is The Last Question by Isaac Asimov. It's a short story, and it's beautiful, and I would recommend it wholly, and without being spoilery, thinking about BSG's finale, which pisses me of a lot, and thinking about The Last Question, damn did Asimov get it right.

  33. monkeybutter says:

    Ahh, Agathons frolicking. I got my wish. <3

    Just about every other character broke me, especially Roslin and Adama. Their final moments together are beautiful, and I'm relieved that she got to see Earth. No matter who the dying leader was intended to be, Roslin believed it to be herself, and I'm glad she could at least feel secure in humanity's survival. And then the ring. Tears forever. I honestly wouldn't have minded if the episode ended on Adama and his cabin, not because the epilogue isn't important in terms of the show's mythology, but because I thought it was a more powerful scene.

    Baltar and Caprica killed me, too. James Callis is a phenomenal actor, and even though I barely ever liked what Baltar was doing, I was always fascinated by him, and enjoyed his scenes the best. I'd like to think that he and Caprica get to know and love each other now.

    Going off to the “northern highlands of Earth” by himself

    I'm torn between singing "Princes of the Universe" or "North to Alaska" in Tyrol's honor.

  34. Jae says:

    Bill and Laura doing Out of Africa (….come on, tell me that isn't what that scene was) made me bawl like a baby, not gonna lie. Same thing with "I know about farming." Oh dear. (And I want to give poor Tyrol a hug.)

    Emotionally, I left this one satisfied, and it's enough. I really didn't even WANT to pick at plot logic. For those two moments alone, the whole thing was worth it.

  35. dasmondschaf says:

    I dislike the coda, only because I found much of the mythological aspects of the fourth season to be ridiculous. I kept watching mostly to find out how a few character arcs concluded, and I have to say I will NEVER be disappointed with the amazing, varied, and realistic cast of characters BSG has given us! I felt like I was going to CRY FOREVER at the conclusion of Adama & Roslin's arcs, and I felt a stirring in my heart I did not think possible when Baltar said "I know about farming." AGH THIS SHOW.

    I was also always bothered by the idea that a bunch of aliens land on earth, abandon all their technology, and… start to interbreed with the earliest humans? 150,000 years ago, yes, we had anatomically modern humans, but we certainly hadn't reached behavioral modernity, and I just find it… kind of disgusting… that these sky-people come down and basically have their way with a bunch of earthlings. Oh, and also, we all have culture because it was taught to us by aliens! I guess it just leaves kind of a weird taste in my mouth.

    But series mythology aside, I still really enjoyed rewatching this show! It reminded me of my love for these characters, even when (possibly ESPECIALLY when) they are at their worst and most flawed.

    • chikzdigmohawkz says:

      150,000 years ago, yes, we had anatomically modern humans, but we certainly hadn't reached behavioral modernity, and I just find it… kind of disgusting… that these sky-people come down and basically have their way with a bunch of earthlings.

      Yes. It may make me kind of a bigot, but sometimes I even have trouble relating to people who are not in love with books (I mean, they're books, and you read them, and sometimes you drink tea whilst reading them, and WHAT MORE COULD YOU POSSIBLY WANT FROM LIFE????). So the idea of…let's use the word 'mating'…the idea of mating with peoples from 150 000 years ago – not a particularly attractive thought.

  36. NB2000 says:

    It actually happened during the previous part but the sentiment really belongs here: when Helo got shot and the episode moved past him I started screaming at my monitor, begging RDM not to kill him, if he just let Helo and Athena and Hera live (which became "Agathons AND Gaius/Caprica Six a few minutes later) then I wouldn't care what else happened. I would live with whatever resolution they gave for the plot and mytholog, just as long as the characters that I've loved the most were able to survive. So seeing the three of them walking along as a family was a massive relief.

    I don't think I've mentioned it on the blog proper before but Gaius and Caprica Six were the characters that made me want to check out the series. I'd heard about the show when it first started but it wasn't until I read about their storyline somewhere around the end of series 2 that I decided to go ahead and watch it. Throughout seasons 3 and 4 I'd always had at least a faint hope that they'd be reunited (which explains my negative reaction to the Tigh/Caprica Six plotline), them heading off to start a new life together was everything I could have hoped for.

    And as much as it pains me to admit it, if Laura Roslin had not died on screen, the end of “Daybreak” would have also felt cheap and easy.

    ITA about this. I think this might be why, as upsetting as it is, I don't get as upset at Laura's death as I have for other characters that I've loved. After four seasons of being told that the "dying leader" would not survive long after the discovery of Earth I'd have almost been disappointed if they'd turned around and let her live at the last minute. It certainly helps that the sequence itself is so beautifully done, and that her death is completely peaceful.

    Hopefully someone will have posted the video but the music that plays over Kara jumping the ship is one of my all time favourite pieces of music from this show. I love the way Watchtower is woven into it and the way it builds up to the reveal of Earth.

    Kara/Pigeon is ridiculous, and way too much. The almost kiss on the dinner table interrupted by Zak should have been where it left off.

    and then I start Mark Watches Buffy The Vampire Slayer on Monday, December 12th. ABOUT TIME.

    As sad as it is to end one project YAY BUFFY AT LAST OMG!

    • psycicflower says:

      [youtube 8Yj0Iwa8_gk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Yj0Iwa8_gk youtube]

      So sad we have no more Bear McCreary music to gush over 🙁

    • Karen says:

      SO EXCITED FOR MARK TO START BUFFY. sdlkfjds;ljfsd

      That show is like a dear friend to me and Mark is about to meet her and I'm all nervous because WHAT IF HE DOESN'T LIKE HER?

      • psycicflower says:

        DON'T TALK LIKE THAT! WHY WOULD YOU EVEN THINK THAT!

      • thisyearsgirl says:

        Haha, those are my feelings exactly! I'm ridiculously excited.

      • NB2000 says:

        …*flails*OH GOD WHAT IF HE DOESN'T?! No, no he will, it'll be fine. *quietly worries anyway*

      • Katie says:

        Omg, what if Buffy is not as great as I remember it to be? What if it feels dated? Now that there's a gazillion vampire shows around? WHAT IF MARK DOESN'T LIKE HER?

        • Dru says:

          What if it doesn't stand up to being watched one episode a day, instead of one a week? What if Mark laughs at her clothes? What if he laughs at the cheesy budget special effects, and compares anything at all to Twilight? (this despite the fact that the show ended over TWO YEARS before the first Twishite was even published)

          WHAT IF HE DOESN'T LIKE HER? **joins in the worrying**

  37. Katie says:

    Beautiful review Mark. And I find it absolutely fascinating how it’s Baltar’s sentence about farming that gets to everyone every time. He’s evil! He’s selfish! He’s petty. You’re not supposed to care about him! And yet you do. I think it illustrates how much the writers trust the viewers. To have mercy and see the gray between black and white.

    My official prediction for mystery series: Angels in America.

  38. Gillweed says:

    I watched all of BSG in about a week (thanks to my wonderful boyfriend who wouldn't stop nagging me until I saw it) and maybe that's why this ending was perfect for me. I didn't really realised why I liked it so much until I read this review. It's a myth, one version about how we got here, through hell, nuclear war, many hardships of amazing people being led by some kind of really messed higher power that's never defined but has really hot messengers. I am Biology student, but I didn't mind bad science here. Hera being Mitochondrial Eve just represented that we all have bit of human and Cylon in us, and it's our potential to be as awesome as Athena and Helo. I understand why everybody in the fleet was ready to give up on technology. These people were trough so much, Colonies destroyed, New Caprica taken from them, they simply needed new beginning. Maybe I like cheesy, but the ending totally worked on me. I even didn't mind the robot montage, it was just there, reminded me of the Blink ending with all the statues to be honest.
    I rarely cry when watching tv (still nothing for Doctor Who), but god, this episode. Anders being sent to his death with "See you on the other side" to Starbuck, and that beautiful scene with the entire fleet for one last time killed me. Even the scene with Centurions being left on their own made me tear-eyed, they were adorable. There HAS to be a gif of them poking that gooish stuff with their long fingers please! I love that scene.
    But what really broke me was Adama and Roslin. Her dying in such a beautiful and sad way, after seeing such amazing scenes and her dream fulfilled, her people finally free and in a good place. By the time they reached flamingos, I was sobbing.
    Not to say there weren't some parts that I didn't like. Implying that Hera died young made me so sad after everything they went through to save her. Also, one of my favourite parts of the story was the father/son relationship between Adamas, and in the end, that's it, Lee's all on his own?! I was so upset with that. I understand Bill's grief, but Lee is his son for crying out loud.
    All in all, it was a beautiful ending for amazing series, and all the bad parts don't ruin the good ones.

  39. Gillweed says:

    Just one more thing, I hit post too soon.
    I know some people hated the ending really bad so I have to ask. Did it effect your enjoyment of the entire series? I am so sad that I can't even rewatch the good bits of Lost anymore because the final season left such a bad taste in my mouth. It is ridiculous but every time I try to watch episode I like all I can think of is: That's going to end so bad, and I can't continue at all.

    • psycicflower says:

      No it hasn't. Granted this is the first time I've rewatched the show and it's always great watching a show along with Mark and the rest of the community. I may have moments of well that doesn't end well but I think I enjoy enough of the rest of the show that disliking the finale doesn't really overwhelm the positive feelings I have about the show as a whole.

    • BSGfan1 says:

      Nope. I love the show and always will. I don't base my view of the series based on the ending. Sometimes a you don't stick the landing but that doesn't mean you ignore all the rest of the good in the performance.

    • xpanasonicyouthx says:

      You know, I'm like you: This all took so little time that I didn't have time to build up hopes and dreams and expectations to be crushed, so it doesn't feel as jarring as it does to other people.

    • dasmondschaf says:

      I disliked the entire fourth season, and I still enjoyed the rewatch! If nothing else, it allowed me to focus on what the series did WELL, since I knew precisely what was going to end in "really? REALLY?". In my head, I'd basically classified BSG as a trainwreck; the rewatch reminded me why I loved it enough to watch the series in real time in the first place.

    • rabbitape says:

      I thought I would feel that way on rewatching, especially since I was so turned off by the finale and the seeming haphazard scrambling of season 4 at the time. But I was pleasantly surprised to see that this time around, I loved it all. This may be one of those cases where knowing what's coming — i.e. being spoiled — actually let me enjoy the work so much more.

    • Dru says:

      Did it affect your enjoyment of the entire series?

      A big, resounding NO to that. That is, if you mean "did it ruin the series for you?", because I still love BSG and always will – it's my one true fandom love, and despite all my RAGE and "huh?" and let-down feelings over some aspects of the finale, I can't quit it.

      It is strange to go back to the miniseries and watch everyone all young (or young-er, in Adama and Tigh's cases) and not yet traumatised and completely broken. The finale definitely does affect how I saw them on the rewatch, because I just felt SO SAD, but it didn't lessen my love for them one jot.

  40. enigmaticagentscully says:

    Completely off topic, my Buffy DVDs came in the post today! :D:D:D
    I needed something to cheer me up after all this utter tragedy.

    Promise not to watch them before we all start together though! Much though I LOVE Battlestar Galactica, I'm psyched to watch a show for the first time along with mark again. Especially Buffy, which I've been meaning to see for ages…

    • Karen says:

      I GOT ALL SEVEN SEASON OF BUFFY FOR CHRISTMAS LAST YEAR. Best Christmas gift ever!

    • dasmondschaf says:

      I got all seven seasons as a present a few years back. ISN'T THE BOX SET PRETTY?????

      • enigmaticagentscully says:

        It's…OK looking? Oh wait, bearing in mind that I have the British version box set (Region 2? I think?) so it probably looks different. 😛

        Still can't wait to watch though! I was gonna get it for Christmas but then I'd be behind on Mark's reviews so…I just said fuck it and bought it myself!

  41. BSGfan1 says:

    I just have to add that in a lesser actor's hands Baltar's "You know, I know about farming", could have been a disaster. My God I adore James Callis. He is forever my favorite on BSG.

    • xpanasonicyouthx says:

      THIS.

      • BSGfan1 says:

        He just nailed the right amount of insecurity, sadness, regret and hope with one line followed by what I thought was a legitimate quick cry.

        /bursts into tears

    • tanbarkie says:

      Now I'm running through various actors in my head, trying to imagine how they'd deliver it. So far, Takei is winning.

    • chikzdigmohawkz says:

      One thing that always makes me laugh when thinking about the character of Gaius Baltar is the fact that Jon Cryer auditioned for it. I keep trying, but I just can't imagine Ducky as Baltar.

      • BSGfan1 says:

        Wow. I can't imagine that. I was surprised to read that John Barrowman auditioned for Lee Adama. I sort of can see it, but I don't think he would have had quite the chops to keep up with the rest of them.

    • Erica says:

      Yeah. Asking myself, "which BSG actor rocks the most?" is always an invitation for my head to explode, but no matter how you slice it James Callis is way up there. He does such awesome and subtle things with his voice.

  42. Erica says:

    My one big wish for the finale is that the creators had been given a little time to craft all of the mythology they'd already woven into the show into an ending, instead of trying to retrofit one quickly (which is what I think happened).

    Here's why. Battlestar Galactica is a show about many things. One of the biggest things it's about is fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, parents and children: how inevitably parents screw up, and kids try to run away, and eventually we all grow up enough to love one another. The humans and the cylons. The F5 and the cylons. Adama and Lee. Starbuck and all her convoluted variations of family. The Agathons. And Gaius.

    It's all right there already, and it works on an emotional level. I don't need to know that Hera is the Mitochondrial Eve, because I already know she is the shape of things to come. Hera is the curly-haired adorable manifestation of "love thine enemy," and that's all I need as far as destiny goes.

    Lee Adama, of all people, should know that language is technology, and that you have to learn it yourself. You can learn from your father, and your grandfather, but in the end it comes from you, like it did in the courtroom that day to save Gaius Baltar. Gaius gets it. Gaius can speak two different languages at the same time: truth and lies, hate and love, Aerelon and Caprican. Language is about taking the unknowable and giving it a shape we can deal with. Starbuck gets that. When Hera gives her the drawing, she knows it's musical notes. Starbuck is trying to read her own language, to figure out what meaning is poured into her shape, and when she figures it out the shape doesn't need to exist any more. Cavil doesn't get it, quite, because he sees Hera's drawings and just sees dots. Form without function. So he goes digging around in Hera's body for answers, when he should be digging into himself.

    And ironically, I think the finale makes almost the same mistake, trying to add form to impose a greater meaning instead of realizing that looking into the characters gives us mythology and then some. No one needs to teach us language. We've had it in us all along, and hopefully someday we'll figure it out again.

    • Karen says:

      And ironically, I think the finale makes almost the same mistake, trying to add form to impose a greater meaning instead of realizing that looking into the characters gives us mythology and then some. No one needs to teach us language. We've had it in us all along, and hopefully someday we'll figure it out again.

      Quoted For Truth.

  43. Dru says:

    See, here is the thing:

    Thrace’s actions had a consequence, and her death was real and had meaning…… She did what she was “destined” to do, and after saying goodbye in her own way to Lee Adama, she was gone.

    I will never, ever buy that the poof was a satisfactory ending for Kara, because I simply don't like the idea that she had no role and no purpose beyond leading the Fleet to Earth. And the whole "it's her destiny, so of course she has to die, come back and be gone" argument will never fly with me.

    Simply put, I HAVE seen shows – including one on your To Watch list – that killed off a protagonist in the service of her "destiny" and then brought him/her back, but did it without reducing them to their roles in that destiny.

    And honestly, if Kara hadn't looked so heartbroken when she broke the news, I might even believe it was good for her because she WANTED to go poof (and I can't believe it). But considering "see you on the other side" is a callback to her own words to Lee in Maelstrom, I do believe they'll see each other again. Until then, I think she and Laura can hang out together – I think of Laura's hand on the glass of the Raptor, and Kara's expression when she looks at her, as a message from one dying girl to a dead one.

    • tanbarkie says:

      I think my primary objection to the way Starbuck's story resolved is that it never once makes the case that her death in "Maelstrom" was necessary or important. I mean, think about it – they've been hinting, rather unsubtly, that Kara has some greater destiny since the first season. So even then, it was clear she was more than your average human. So why was it necessary to pull the "kill her off/ resurrect her" bait-and-switch, except to add some extra melodrama to Season 3? They don't really demonstrate that death changed her character in any way, and even the occasional explorations of the subject (Roslin's initial suspicion, finding her corpse on Earth, etc) don't end up going anywhere significant. Moore et al. could have just as easily written precisely the same character arc while omitting her death and resurrection entirely – and THAT to me, is the great failing of how Kara's story is handled.

      Mark, DO NOT read the following rot13:

      FCBVYREF SBE OHSSL ORYBJ (V ebg13rq guvf gb nibvq tvivat Znex rira gur FYVTUGRFG vaxyvat gung gur cbvag V'z znxvat vf fbzrubj eryrinag gb Ohssl)

      FREVBHFYL QBA'G ERNQ NAL SHEGURE VS LBH UNIRA'G FRRA OHSSL

      Pbzcner Xnen'f qrngu naq erfheerpgvba gb ubj Ohssl'f vf unaqyrq. Ohssl'f qrngu sbezf gur gurzngvp *naq* cybg pber sbe na ragver frnfba bs gur fubj – naq vaqrrq, gur rkgraqrq enzvsvpngvbaf bs ure erghea orpbzr n prageny gbcvp sbe gur erfg bs gur frevrf eha. Yvgrenyyl rirelguvat gung unccraf va Frnfbaf 6 naq 7 ner n qverpg erfhyg bs ure qrngu naq erfheerpgvba, gb gur cbvag gung vs lbh erzbirq ure qrngu sebz gur gvzryvar, abar bs gubfr riragf jbhyq znxr nal frafr ng nyy. Abg fb jvgu Xnen'f qrngu.

      • Dru says:

        That was part of my problem too – that Maelstrom, despite the heart-wrenching, was ultimately rendered rather….unnecessary, unless the Kara Thrace who led them to Earth had to be different from the Kara Thrace who we first saw in the miniseries. I can sort of accept that death might be the thing to take her where she needs to go, but it never really sat well with me.

        And if ambiguity was the endgame, then we've had it right from the moment Kara flew out of the Nebula in Crossroads 2, from the moment she found her corpse on nuked!Earth, from the moment in Islanded when Baltar tells the whole ship he tested her bloody tags. I'm fine with not having a clear-cut answer about what she was in the end, but I really don't think the poof did her justice. She deserved better.

        And the show you referred to in rot13 was EXACTLY what I was making reference to when it came to handling character deaths/resurrections, ng yrnfg O unf n yvsr orsber naq (rfcrpvnyyl) nsgre ure qrngu/f gung tbrf orlbaq whfg orvat gur Fynlre, lbh xabj? V yvxrq gung vg'f fbzrguvat fur npgviryl svtugf sbe naq ARRQF va ure yvsr, orvat Ohssl. Kara never got the chance to just be Kara, even after all she'd been through.

      • Dru says:

        and yeah, the show you referred to in rot13 basically reinforced the fact that its protagonist was not just a figure of destiny, it made the point at every turn that she was a character. BSG did the opposite – turned a three-dimensional, living human at the very end into a figurehead of destiny and decided she had no role beyond that.

        I will never like that.

        • tanbarkie says:

          Yes! Exactly. I have no patience for Chosen Ones that are Chosen and nothing more. Show me why I should care about the One, and only then will you have a chance in hell of convincing me that it's important that he/she was Chosen.

          • Dru says:

            And that's the thing – we came to love Kara long before we knew she was chosen. We loved her because she was the One, but the Chosen part decides she doesn't even have the right to exist once she is done with the task for which she is Chosen.

            (and in the process of embracing her Chosen One task, she is driven to commit suicide in the grip of a hallucination, AND THAT DEATH IS THE REASON SHE CAN'T LIVE ANYMORE. RAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE)

            *huffs*

  44. Albion19 says:

    I loved the final. I used to watch reruns of the original series so this was very satisfying.

    I think the angels are a very advanced race of beings. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

    I know some people don't like them together but I was so disappointed that Leoben and Kara didn't get a scene at the end. He was right about her destiny the whole time, even if that destiny was beyond him.

    Baltar's last line makes me cry every single time.

  45. shoroko says:

    I was ultimately pretty mixed about the finale. I wasn't bothered by it like a lot of people were – for one thing, I felt like we did pretty much get answers to everything, though I can understand why some wouldn't like those answers/would feel like "God did it" isn't a proper answer. The bottom line is that I was expecting all along that this would end somehow on Earth, likely with the implication that these humans/Cylons somehow led to us, and that there would be an underlying theme that some sort of divine intervention was involved. And… that's about what happened. (And I don't want it to sound like Oh I Figured It Out or something, it just seemed like a pretty likely scenario, and that's all pretty vague nonetheless.)

    The things I Really Did Not Like Were:
    1) Tory. This time around I muted the scene when Tyrol killed her and ran from the room when Tigh (who has never killed his wife except for the time when he did) practically congratulated him on it. I really hate that whole story line a lot.

    2) The way the Colonials talked about the early modern humans had an icky imperialist whiff to it.

    3) Matrilineal most recent common ancestor. That's what Mitochondrial Eve is. Honestly that one word wouldn't have totally ruined your story, RDM.

    4) While I think "God/Divine power/Thing did it" is an answer, I'll agree it's not a great one. I liked that earlier in the show, you could really take these things as either divine intervention or cosmic coincidence. I liked that if there was a God or divine power to it, it worked within the rules of the universe rather than beyond them. But Kara being a ghost or angel of some kind pretty much destroys it.

    That being said, this time when she disappeared I thought, "Gosh, Lee, not even Angel Kara Thrace cares about your desire to climb a mountain" and was amused enough that I didn't care so much.

    But I did get my Agathons (I really for sure thought that either Helo or Athena was going to die at some point), and Caprica/Baltar, and I thought all of the scenes involving them as well as those involving Adama and Roslin were pretty much perfect.

    I guess the thing about this finale is that I find myself ambivalently defending it more than particularly gushing on it or disliking it. Which I don't feel like doing too much at the moment. One thing I will say, because it came up a lot, is that I disagree with the view that, by having the humans and Cylons abandon their technology, the meaning of this was that technology is inherently evil or damaging. I really don't think that was the point. I'm not going to comment on the realism of people doing that, because I… just don't care that much (this episode also confirmed Angel Kara Thrace, after all), but my feeling is that the narrative is pretty much the same as it was earlier – it's based on notions of poison and pollution. That if the groundwork is spoiled, it will surface regardless of the intent of those involved. Both the Cylons and the humans were, at this point, independently incapable of carrying on their civilizations. In both cases, their civilizations were based on exploitation and murder, and those undercurrents would carry over if they tried to rebuild as they were. The only way the narrative was going to allow them to move on was to cut away the baggage both Cylons and humans were carrying, and that meant giving up pretty much everything they had. Including, essentially, themselves, as both died out: Hera's descendents are all there is left.

    Which, again, I am not saying this is something I personally believe (I don't) or that I think is a Great Thing to believe (I still don't), but I felt like that was the sort of narrative they were engaging in, and I wasn't surprised by it at this point.

  46. chikzdigmohawkz says:

    I cry for Roslin every time I watch the finale, but hers really is the most satisfying end, both in terms of emotion and plot. So I smile through the tears. And yes, Adama sitting by her grave is a wonderful moment, but I still wish that he hadn't 'left' Lee for good. Their father-son relationship is one of the most integral elements of the show, and I can't help but feel as if Adama is (yet again) abandoning Lee in favor of someone else in his life. Which is not to say that I didn't want Adama to be with Roslin, but Lee's line about Adama 'not coming back this time' kind of pisses me off.

    As for the MTE – it annoys me and I wish is wasn't there, but bad-science is not a new thing in TV (nor is it a new thing on the show itself), so I try to shrug it off. And the robot montage at the end – yes, it's very 'let's hit you over the head with our meaning', but I can't help but like it. It's probably the music.

    Some bits of trivia from the Battlestar Wiki:

    Before deciding that Galactica should reach Earth in prehistoric times, Moore toyed with the idea of having the Fleet arrive during the Hellenistic period and formed the basis of the ancient Greek religion and society. However, this idea was rejected as it suggested that the Colonials blessed only Western civilization with their knowledge rather than all of humanity, and it did not acknowledge Hera's importance. Moore read an article on the idea of a common human ancestor which he decided should be Hera. This also explains why the Fleet personnel landed in Africa (the network had been suggesting it should be North America, presumably to match the final shot of Season 3).

    – According to the podcast for the episode, the destruction of the Fleet and the spreading out of the surviving Colonials over the planet's surface was supposed to be a sign of humanity's committal to their new world, not necessarily promoting a Luddite agenda. The comparison that is drawn is Cortes burning his ships on the shores of central America so his men would not have a way of retreating if things got difficult. However, RDM later mentions that one of the last shots was to have been of the Colonials destroying their last Raptors, which suggests that the Luddite approach was more what they were aiming for.

    Personally, I think the 'Ancient Greece' idea was the way to go, but I understand the reasoning. (And I feel that I must point out that other civilizations have mythologies as well – there's no reason that the people of the fleet couldn't have settled in other parts of the world.)

    However, I can forgive just about everything because: Initially, Helo and Athena were supposed to die and Hera would be raised by Gaius Baltar and Caprica-Six. This would make sense as in the Opera House vision Baltar and Caprica-Six take Hera into the Opera House and Athena and Roslin don't make it inside. It also lends well for a symbolical structure of the series: Caprica-Six kills a child at the beginning and raises one at the end, they destroyed one civilization and then at the end they nurture the foundation of another one.

    RDM gave me my Fightin’ Agathons, so I’m happy. (And Athena making fun of Helo's hunting skills will always make me laugh.)

    Also, Baltar.

    Also, BEAR MCCREARY BEAR MCCREARY BEAR MCCREARY

    • Nobody says:

      Ancient Greece wouldn't work, because we know where the Ancient Greeks got their religion. (And the Hellenistic period is fairly late, as ancient Greece goes.) If they had arrived a few thousand years before the Greeks and settled among the Proto-Indo-Europeans, that would have worked nicely. It may have offended those who are not of Indo-European stock, as they would not be blessed with the superior Cylon mitochondria, but you can't please everyone all the time.

  47. Albion19 says:

    Mark now that you've seen everything when you go back and watch the mini series its so strange to see how young and fresh faced everyone is :')

  48. klmnumbers says:

    I love this finale. I've read a lot of angry reviews who say that it was too 'deus ex machina' (literally – bazinga!), and that all of the spirituality/religion was unexpected and not rooted in the show thus far.

    Those arguments just blow my mind. Faith, religion, and an unknown force controlling things have been a current THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE SERIES.

    Also, I said this in the liveblog, but I ugly cried at this finale and always do. It starts with the Kara & Sam scene (OTP FOREVER BTW. I DO NOT EVEN CARE.)

    • xpanasonicyouthx says:

      Again, I totally get people not liking it, but spirituality/religion has been there since season one! come on y'all!

    • @LizatLAX says:

      Yeah, people who don't LIKE it, I understand, but I've read those opinions too that the mysticism comes out of left-field and I just have to blink a lot in perplexity.

      And :hearts: to a fellow OTP-er. 😀 "See you on the other side." Thank all the Lords of Kobol and Ron that Katee, Trucco, and Michael Rymer let Sam keep a touch of his humanity in that scene. Because it was originally written for him to deliver it far more robotically, and I don't think my heart could've taken the realization that there was really nothing left of Sam at all.

    • Karen says:

      Sam and Kara are my OTP of the show for sure. So Sam is going to die by piloting the fleet into the sun and Kara is already dead and now they can be together forever in the afterlife.

  49. chikzdigmohawkz says:

    Okay, so this is ENTIRELY OFF TOPIC, SO DON'T READ IF YOU JUST WANT TO FOCUS ON BSG, but it just happened, and I have to share with someone (well, people) who will understand my rage at this (possible trigger for rape, sort of), and I really don't have anywhere else:

    One of my friends on facebook just posted: Alright. I'd say I look pretty rapeable tonight. #firstdate
    And my response was: [Name], do we need to have Words about the fact that YOU JUST MADE A JOKE ABOUT RAPE?
    And he wrote back: But it's about MY potential rape. That's okay, right?
    And then: And for the record, I'm not even sure that "rapeable" is a word.
    And then other people wrote: Please, people have standards, even in dark alleys. and cant rape the willing
    And that last person had a close personal friend who was date-raped in college.

    Like I said, I'm sorry for posting this here, but I just…I can't. I can't.

    In other news, I think I'm about to start a tumblr, so that I have somewhere to put such rage in the future…

    • BSGfan1 says:

      Sounds like some drunken facebooking. My answer would be harsh. I'd probably say something like , welp, if it happens to you, you'll probably realize that rapeablility is a poor criteria for judging your appeal to others. And it's not something to joke about. Followed by a fast unfriending of said friend.

      • chikzdigmohawkz says:

        I wish it was drunken facebooking, but it's 5 pm on Wednesday. And apparently he's going on a first date.

        This has, however, downgraded him from 'friend' to 'keeping you around for networking-type purposes'.

  50. BSGfan1 says:

    I say this all the time. I think "The Wire" is probably the best show ever produced but I still have BSG as my personal best.

    1a) The Wire
    1b) BSG

  51. cjeffery7 says:

    you know how bad ass Racetrack is? she killed millions of cylons WHILE DEAD. who does that? RACETRACK DOES THAT. so deal with it.

    Anders: "Perfection. That's what it's about. It's those moments when you can feel the perfection of creation; the beauty of physics; you know, the wonder of mathematics; the elation of action and reaction; and that is the kind of perfection that I wanna be connected to."
    —> i am an athlete and this statement perfectly sums up my feelings about being an athlete. i am not a huge fan of Anders, but this is the one moment where i do.

    i believe they found Earth twice. i can totally believe that due to the freaky laws of outer space physics in the time they were away more time passed on earth. also i find it symbolic to the idea of rebirth. even the nuclear devastated earth could renew to support life again. following this reasoning, maybe one day we'll find the 13 colonies fresh and new!!

    i would agree that like LOST the ending is more of a satisfying character ending than a complicated plot explanation. and i like it that way. i gasped as well when Starbuck disappeared and i too dreaded the moment when Roslin would die. and just reading your summary of the scenes made me start to BAWL.

    i've been waiting basically all season 4 to say how lovely and sad Baltar's line about farming is. it is an instant tear jerker for me.

    thanks you BSG. along with harry potter, you changed my life for the better.

  52. robin says:

    I'm so glad you ended up satisfied with the finale! I had a good feeling that you would be and I'm really happy that I was right.

    //" In that one moment, “Maelstrom” was given the weight and emotional force it had when I first watched it. Kara “Starbuck” Thrace’s actions had a consequence, and her death was real and had meaning. There was no shitty retconning of that plot, there was no attempt to deny her agency or free will, and there was no denial of her experiences in season four."// -> I AGREE WITH THIS SO MUCH. A++

    The Baltar farming line and Adam's line about the view just decimated me too. My favorite lines from Daybreak absolutely.

    I did wish for a bit more Leoben, though. We got a small clip of him, but as he was one of my favorite reoccuring characters I felt a little let down about closure on his storyline. oh well! I got a lot of other things I desperately wanted.

    Tory's death was brutal and tragic, but I do think it was needed because it gives a little closure to Cally fans. She too was not forgotten, in the end.

    • BSGfan1 says:

      [i]Tory's death was brutal and tragic, but I do think it was needed because it gives a little closure to Cally fans.[/i]

      I'm sorry but I disagree that Tory's death was brutal or tragic. She had it coming to her. And deserved to be sent out of the airlock. Being choked by another Cylon was too kind of a fate…IMO.

  53. Scott says:

    Caprica (Nf synjrq nf vg jnf) npghnyyl qbrf nqq gb gur zlgubybtl bs gur frevrf, naq fhogyl bssref fbzr cbffvoyr rkcynangvbaf gbjneqf gur rknpg angher bs Urnq Fvk, Urnq Tnvhf, Fgneohpx, naq rira gur frevrf’ Tbq

  54. Bill says:

    YES! FINALLY TIME FOR BUFFY! Your reviews inspired me to watch battlestar galactica, and I'm glad for that, but I'm so happy you will start buffy soon!

  55. robin says:

    I have 4 links to good alternate Season 4 fanfics (1 link in this comment, more in replies). As all links are from Archive of Our Own, you can download ebook copies for your ipad, kindle, nook, etc or a pdf to read offline. [click download button for options]

    Voice of Reason: http://archiveofourown.org/works/27166/chapters/3
    64,000 words. My personal favorite. Diverges after the mutiny episodes. “Sam Anders dies in the mutiny. He resurrects on the Colony, where Cavil is working to save his people. At the same time, Starbuck and Adama are trying to save the Fleet *from* his people… and Boomer, Baltar, and Tyrol are still trying to save everyone, each in their own strange way.” If you wanted Sam in the final episodes and/or wanted Doral, Simon, and Cavil to get a bit more screen time & depth then this will appeal to you. Also quite a bit of good Boomer stuff.

    • robin says:

      The Space Between Us: http://archiveofourown.org/works/69558
      115,000 words. Season 4.5 AU. Raptor 718 from the webisodes wasn't lost randomly. With the passengers of Raptor 718 being held prisoner on the Colony, the events on Galactica unfurl differently. Carefully plotted, good pacing. Full ensemble, lots of Gaeta, Hoshi, Adama, Lee, Roslin, Ellen, Tigh, Kara, Sam, Cylons OCs.

      Waltzing With Destiny: http://archiveofourown.org/works/85202/chapters/1
      42,000 words. AU from “No Exit”. ‘All Along the Watchtower’ connects the Cylons and Kara, so she uses it to wake Sam after the events of “Someone to Watch Over Me” and he returns like Ellen with all his memories. With such forces at work in the fleet, Kara and Sam must work together to fit the pieces of their destinies into the bigger picture, the one where the song and the Opera House are all helping Kara lead humanity to its end as the Hybrid foretold. I liked this one, but I didn't connect with the story as much as I think I would have if I'd been a big fan of the Kara/Sam romantic relationship.

    • robin says:

      Under a Shadowed Sky: http://archiveofourown.org/works/124436/chapters/
      59,000 words. 4.5 AU. "In the ruins on a gray Earth, Sam and Kara face the truth that the gods aren't finished with either of them yet. And while the Fleet crumbles under the dark weight of despair, some find hope in new wonders. Sex, death, violence, faith – it's BSG." This author tends to do stuff with mysticism and Cylons that I find fun. But if you aren't into the Angels mysticism & mythology part of BSG, or dislike the Kara/Sam romantic ship, then I might give it a pass. However, one of the (many) AU changes is that Dee sticks around so if you're a Dee fan there's an extra appeal there.

  56. ek_johnston says:

    I am not a fan of Gaius Baltar. I mean, I liked his plots, most of the time, but as a character I would have rather spent time with just about anyone else. And then. In his VERY LAST LINE. He made me love him.

    THIS SHOW.

    I was SO PLEASED by the ending of it! And, as always, I loved following along with you again. Thanks!

  57. threerings13 says:

    So, I have a lot of thoughts about this final hour of the show. As a whole, I like the finale. It's always incredibly hard to end a show, particularly a really good show, and I think BSG did a fairly good job at it. They managed to tie most things together, at least superficially. The characters generally have interesting and appropriate end-points.

    The one thing I really DIDN'T like the first time I watched it was what happened with Kara. Kara is my girl, and the focus of the show for me. It felt like she was robbed of getting to enjoy the fruits of her destiny. And from a selfish point of view, I wanted an answer about how she came back. And I think I originally assumed her disappearing meant she was an angel, and that bugged me, because Kara is SUCH a physical, flawed HUMAN. But now it doesn't really bother me. It's ambiguous, and she gets to go be with Anders. So I'm happy with it.

    I also really LIKED the modern Time coda the first time I watched it. I LOVE that BSG took place in the past and not the future. I like that Hera really DID have importance. I never thought about whether it was bad science or not, because it worked for me. The "God" thing annoyed a little, but it wasn't like it came out of nowhere. Now, having thought through some of the problems with the science, yes the coda bothers me a little, but not so much I can't still enjoy the finale.

    You know what ACTUALLY bothers me the most? HOW THE HELL ARE THESE PEOPLE GOING TO SURVIVE ON PREHISTORIC EARTH? I mean, a lot of them didn't even have the skills to work in the fuel ships and stuff, and they're going to somehow survive in a hostile environment with stone age technology? No medicine? And more than that, what REALLY REALLY bothers me is that all the main characters seem to have flown off to live alone for the rest of their lives. Like, WHAT? Why did Adama leave Lee (and Kara)? If you have to survive on a raw planet, you're definitely going to need to be with others. How is Adama going to eat up on his mountain? Why wouldn't you stick with your family and community? And what about Tyrol? Living by himself on an island? Seriously, this is not something humans cope well with. We are social animals. At least keep a Gilligan's Island sized crew around you.

    Honestly, that's the thing I can't get over: why all the isolation? Why do Adama and Lee act like it's obvious that they HAVE to separate and never see each other again. Honestly, I think the reason I've never been really devastated by Laura's death is because I can't get past this. I'm too busy trying to figure out what the hell is going on to spare tears for her. Not that I don't love Roslin, but her death always felt like the right ending.

    • @LizatLAX says:

      I always picture Bill coming back to the settlement eventually, despite what Lee said. ALthough Bill does have that last Raptor to get rid of, so I suppose its possible he does his own version of piloting into the sun with it…

      But I believe Tyrol went off to die alone. He just doesn't strike me as really giving a crap whether he lives or dies, and he wouldn't last long. It always surprises me that people count him as a survivor, since it's fixed in my head that he's basically dead man walking..

    • Erica says:

      When Lee said that I thought Bill was going to crash the Raptor or something.

      That was my big "huh?" in the moment, too. If I were a member of the fleet, I'd be going "ohhhhh no we are setting up some sort of settlement, because I have just been hauling myself through spacepocalypse for 4 years and I want to cool my heels." I can see some people going off on their own (I think his isolation makes perfect sense for him and what he went through) but not everyone.

  58. katherinemh says:

    Now that you're (almost) done with the series, have there been any threads where people have linked to good interview, Comic-Con, whatever… type… things? I know that I stumbled upon some kind of phone interview with Edward James Olmos a while ago that was entertaining. It was someone from a fan site, I think, interviewing him and I think the interviewer thought it was just with him, but Mary McDonnell was in the car, too, and she took the phone because he was lost and I swear this actually exists, but of course I cannot find it now.

    ANYWAY. I've seen pictures floating around from interviews and cons and stuff, but I was just wondering if anyone who watched the show as it aired (or not! whatever!) had any particular highlights or favorites! One of the things I love doing when I finish a series is watching interviews and behind-the-scenes stuff.

    • xpanasonicyouthx says:

      omg i would love it if people linked me to this stuff!!!!

    • chikzdigmohawkz says:

      I have to warn you that you will probably lose track of time as a result of seeing interesting videos in the sidebar and clicking on them.

      Katee Sackhoff Q&A at the Baghdad Theater, Portland, OR 3/13/2009 Part 1 (There are six parts, but I'm just linking to the first.): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEla4UgUZns

      Description below the video – Battlestar Galactica's Katee Sackhoff, better known as Starbuck, gave a QandA for the Portland audience after the show's series finale. She talked about behind the scenes stuff, what she has coming up next, Twitter and a slew of other offbeat moments.

      Katee Sackhoff: Team Edward or Team Jacob?: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqlppeebZqo

      Description below the video – Katee Sackhoff weighs in on her opinions of Twilight. From Shore Leave 2010.

      Katee & Tahmoh at Supanova 2011, Brisbane (There are many more videos in the sidebar, but I'm linking this one because Tahmoh's impression of Aaron Douglas makes me laugh, and although it's not my own personal view, I think Katee's idea about religion is very interesting.): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OoGRrBwCiA

      Description below the video – Katee & Tahmoh at Supanova 2011, Brisbane

      Battlestar Galactica: Katee Sackhoff on Starbuck (Paley) (Again, there are a gajillion of videos from this panel, but this particular one ALWAYS makes me laugh – probably because I've had similar drinking too much wine while watching something and then not being sure if stuff actually happened, or if it was the wine.): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruqEax1k350&fe

      Description from below video – Actress Katee Sackhoff (Kara Thrace aka Starbuck) talks about her elation at getting the role and the shock at finding out what the previous incarnation of Starbuck was like.
      *Note: You'll have to sign into youtube in order to see this one because apparently it is 'not rated'.

      • knut_knut says:

        OH MY GOD Katee's Rob story is the most ridiculous thing ever. As much as I hate Twilight, I also love it for bringing me Kristen and Rob who both hate Twilight more than anyone ever will. Endless entertainment

    • chikzdigmohawkz says:

      And because this deserves its own 'reply':

      BSG had a special UN retrospective in March 2009. Which is ridiculously awesome. So – the two links below are to articles about it (the second has a couple of clips, as well.)
      http://io9.com/5173862/the-night-battlestar-galac
      http://www.scifiscoop.com/news/battlestar-galacti

      The following link is to the videos on the UN Webcast Archive Footage page. You'll have to scroll until you hit 17 March 2009. They're all in Real Media format, so you need a player that can play .rm files. Enjoy.
      http://www.un.org/webcast/2009a.html

      P.S. Whoopi Goldberg was the moderator.

    • terracotta says:

      Any con panel or interview from anywhere with Mary McDonnell about BSG is worth watching. She's just the most articulate, smart, thoughtfully, funny person, and she always manages to take what could be ridiculous questions and answer them in such a way as to give you some kind of deep answer about Laura or the themes or the show.

      • terracotta says:

        Here's a couple:

        Mary McD and Jamie Bamber at MegaCon – Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6.

        Mary McD's SciFi Channel Q&A – I've linked to part one, but there are ten parts in all.

        There are tons more, and lots with the other cast members too, if you just have a quick search on YouTube.

  59. redheadedgirl says:

    One thing that struck me this rewatch was that recurring "all this has happened before, and all this will happen again." Within the universe of the show, the LBJ inauguration happened because it had happened before, with Roslin. Jack Ruby had happened before, with Cally. MINDFUCK.

  60. karate0kat says:

    I was so depressed after this finale. And I don't mean that in a flippant way, I mean I literally had a depression flare up and it sucked. But this show was so dear to me, and I was so happy the night the finale aired because I loved it, and then the next morning I woke up and everything was awful because there was no new Battlestar Galactica ever (yeah yeah, the Plan, not the point…) I admit, I'm one who didn't like the Lost finale. It wasn't the logic/mythology that failed for me, it was the emotion. It just felt too forced. They shoved the sentimentality down our throats, and it didn't help that a lot of those moments hinged around romantic couples where I only really cared about one or two of them and actively loathed several more. But the BSG finale? Hit every emotional moment right for me. The logic of it doesn't really work if you think too hard, but the emotional tone was perfect for me.

    And this was the first time one of my ships actually ended up together. I mean, they were both dead in the end, but according to Katee Sackhoff, Starbuck is somewhere playing Pyramid with Anders. That is canon enough for me.

    EVERYONE NEEDS TO GO READ THIS AWESOMELY AWESOME FACEBOOK RECAP/TIMELINE/WHATEVER OF THE FINALE

    And finally, I'm going to shamelessly self promote and post this video which was pretty much the first video I had ever made and I made it with crappy crappy Window Movie Maker but whatever I still love it. It's the perfect song for Gaius Baltar.

    Well, it was embedded, and then it wasn't, so here, just have the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOond9x_6Hk

    • chikzdigmohawkz says:

      battlestarbook was amazing, and there are so many great lines, but I think my favorites were:

      Lee Adama created a group: Papa Was a Rolling Stone.

      Nicky Henderson Costanza Tyrol joined the group Papa Was a Rolling Stone.

      Gaius Baltar created a group: Papa Was a Very Stationary Stone Who Taught Me About Farming.

    • monkeybutter says:

      That timeline is AMAZING. lol @ Lee and his hat and mountains. And this:

      <img src="http://i43.tinypic.com/28cejbs.png"&gt;
      I think I'm totally at peace with the finale now that I've seen this.

    • Karen says:

      ITA about the Lost finale. lol. I'm still bitter about it to this day. The emotion was totally inorganic in that finale. And the Ashes to Ashes finale had aired like two days before the Lost finale and A2A was perfection and beautiful and everything I could ever want from a finale, so that made the Lost finale pale even more in comparison.

      AND YES. STARBUCK AND ANDERS ARE TOGETHER IN THE AFTERLIFE. I REFUSE TO BELIEVE ANYTHING DIFFERENT.

  61. Dee says:

    I teared up again just reading the review!

    Things I loved:
    – The love that never wavers between Adama and Roslin. It's pure and true but not in a cheesy way.
    – What does not happen between Lee and Kara. If it was truly meant to happen, they would've gotten together legitimately ages ago.
    – The Agathons. Who would've thought from seeing them have sex in the forest in Season 1 that they would be the most solid and strongest unit. The way they chose to be a family and trust each other wholeheartedly.
    – Baltar and Six coming together without any pretensions or ulterior motives. They are free to be who they are deep down and be that way together.
    – Ellen. She may have been kinda a bitch in the beginning but her motives were pure and not malicious. This is maintained throughout the series – she would do anything for Saul out of love.
    – Ending the cycle by (one method) removing forms of technology. A great way to start fresh, unlike in New Caprica.

    Things I didn't like:
    – My face as I cried.
    – The fact that Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell did not win all the awards! Seriously what is wrong with you people! Give them both lifetime achievement awards just for BSG!
    – The series is over.
    – The new show 'Caprica'. Sorry folks, it's just not the same. I shouldn't have to watch cylons in a world where Adama and Roslin have not met!

    Can't wait for Buffy! Will watch it (again) when you watch it!!

    • Erica says:

      The fact that Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell did not win all the awards! Seriously what is wrong with you people! Give them both lifetime achievement awards just for BSG!

      Agree with this SO MUCH. Also Bear McCreary (where are the awards, people? Is there no justice in the world?) Also everyone. Please tell me there is an alternate universe where BSG cast and crew wins ALL THE AWARDS, so I can go and live there instead.

    • Dru says:

      If it was truly meant to happen, they would’ve gotten together legitimately ages ago.

      To me, they’re the ultimate star-crossed lovers and my OTP no matter what anyone else says. They make every other couple on tv look insipid in comparison.

      And considering Kara first said “I’ll see you on the other side” to Lee in Maelstrom, it gives me one tiny bit of hope that when Lee is done climbing his mountains and living his life, they’ll get to see each other again.

      PS: this STILL does not make me okay with Kara disappearing into thin air.

  62. bookyworm says:

    thankyouthankyouthankyou for the review!

    See, I have always loved the finale with only minor complaints and I was so afraid that you wouldn't like it and then everyone would be hating (because I can see why people don't like it) and I'd be this little voice in the corner.

    But basically you explained everything that made it WORK (in my opinion) despite the flawed science.

  63. TreesaX says:

    Oh thank God I can finally fully talk about my feelings about this show and that ending.

    I felt incredibly sad after the finale and not just because the show was over. And I mean really, really sad. It's hard to explain. With sci-fi shows (and most shows in general), the characters on the show are either supposed to be in this current timeline, or in a timeline in the future. I'll fall in love with characters and I can just think they're around somewhere in the world, or they'll be there in the future, and even though I won't ever meet them that's okay because they'll be alive later. But with the BSG characters, my beloved BSG characters, it hit me that these people have been dead for thousands and thousand of years. They were once alive, but now they're not, and I'll never ever meet them, but because of them I exist. It just really upset me for some reason.

    Yeah this makes me sound really crazy. Haha.

  64. Meenalives says:

    I know this is really late and I don't know if anyone will read it, but Lee's decision to have everyone give up technology has been rubbing me wrong ever since I watched the finale on Sunday. Lee is a strong, able-bodied young man, the exact population that needs technology for survival the least. The fact that he doesn't even consider the ramifications for the elderly, disabled, and childbearing women is horrifying to me. To me it's obvious that the most likely reason that the body of Hera that was found was that of a young woman is that she died in childbirth, the most dangerous period for women before the advent of modern medicine. She must have had at least a few children that survived to have been Mitochondrial Eve, so she must have started having children extremely young. I owe my own existence and my Mom's life to modern surgical techniques (without them, one or both of us would have died at my birth) and without antibiotics my sister would probably have died of pneumonia as a baby (she came terrifyingly close as it was). The thought that anyone that anyone would renounce that for a world in which probably a quarter of the children born will die before the age of five is unbelievable to me.

    • Meenalives says:

      And just a note: when historians (and probably anthropologists) talk about a "young woman" who lived before about the mid-19th Century, they aren't talking about someone under 35. Hera had to have been less than 25, perhaps under 20. There have been historical exceptions (like Elizabethan England, where the average age for marriage of women of all social classes was 24) but in most periods of history, childbearing began around puberty (which, granted, was generally a little later due to poor nutrition).

    • Wookie_Monster says:

      When you mess up, the adult and responsible thing to do is moving forward and learning from your mistakes. But that's not what these characters are doing. They may pretend to, but actually they're deliberately moving backward and covering up their mistakes. Ditching some kinds of technology may be reasonable, but if you ditch ALL of them, including, you know, any ways to record history and educate you descendants about your mistakes, there's a bit of a flaw in your plan.

    • Erica says:

      And this is even later, but I keep thinking about the finale.

      I was wondering if Lee's decision could be read as intentionally a bad one, that the creators were suggesting that he missed the point and we might screw up the cycle again. I don't think that's the case, though, because I don't think there's any evidence at all for that intention. I do like the open-endedness of things; there's hope that we won't mess up but also possible that we will. But I think Lee's decision was just a hasty way for the writers to get rid of technology so as not to conflict with the established history of earth, which is sad.

  65. stefb4 says:

    THE SERIES FINALE OF LOST WAS BEAUTIFUL AND I WILL DEFEND IT TO THE DEATH!

  66. Ryan Lohner says:

    Dare I hope that the surprise is season four of Breaking Bad? I'm still dying to hear Mark's thoughts on it.

  67. Brian Fowler says:

    I really, really, REALLY hate the actual "it's our Earth, and the other one wasn't, and it way in the past, and everyone will just give up technology" finish. I think it's a cop-out, and I can't buy humanity agreeing to that, at all. And just as the episode has completely worked me into a rage, every time I watch it, this happens:

    “You know, I know about farming.” And I cry. Best line of the series, one of the best lines I've ever heard in anything, period, and just a perfect end.

    Yeah, I thought the show kind of went off the tracks from time to time in the back half of the series (save Unfinished Business in season 3 and the Mutiny arc in season 4, which are the highlights of the whole run) and yes, I think the concept for the end was fucking horrible and a complete cop-out… But overall, it's a great show. Maybe not on the level of Buffy or Veronica Mars (nothing is) but a great series.

    “You know, I know about farming.” Perfect.

  68. breesquared says:

    The reason the finale bothers me — and why I seem to dislike it more each time I rewatch it — is because I don't understand WHY anyone would choose to ditch the technology.
    Ditch the ships? Cool, land's pretty sweet and they all did that before. Not build a gigantic city? Okay, understandable, would they even have the resources anyway? But they've spent YEARS fighting for access to a steady food supply, adequate health care, and et cetera, and just cos the fields are pretty…. 35,000 people agree to leave it all behind? They all just get backpacks?! And even with Lee's character development I can't see him being the proponent for this.

    • breesquared says:

      That said, I think the concept of all this being in the distant past rather than the distant future is SUPER cool. I just feel that needing to ditch the technology was too much shoe-horning. I think someone suggested they could've come into Earth!human history at a later time and it would've made sense.

    • Noybusiness says:

      I don't think they gave up their knowledge of medicine. It would just be lost eventually.

      • breesquared says:

        Well if they gave up the technology necessary to replicate things like vaccines and scanning… it definitely would be and everyone would know that.

  69. Ryan Lohner says:

    This pretty much sums up how I saw the Starbuck poof:

    [youtube iNIIsQqGqqY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNIIsQqGqqY youtube]

  70. @mfperez20 says:

    Wait, a lot of people didn't like the end of The Wire? HOW?! I just finished the series last night and I have to thank you for going on and on about it that I just had to check it out.
    Also, this finale was amazing, I'm so sad BSG is over!!

    • Ryan Lohner says:

      Because the entire final season forced us to put up from intrusions from the Baltimore Sun characters, who were completely one-dimensional and uninteresting, with a main plot thread that simply amounts to a man trying to figure out what we already know, and then doing nothing anyway.

  71. farfromdaylight says:

    I haven't commented here before but once or twice, but I've been following your BSG reviews since you began them (all the way back to midway through HP, actually), and I just have to say I'm so, so glad you watched this show. I haven't watched it since the first time I saw it in 2009 or 2010, but your review brought me to tears the same way I sobbed all the way through the end of Daybreak. Thank you so much for bringing us along with your on your journey through BSG.

  72. ChronicReader91 says:

    It’s not hard to see why fan opinion was divided on this finale. The first time I watched it, I was running high on emotion and head explosions, and didn’t really step back to think about the stuff that didn’t add up. And I loved it. The second time, I was watching with a more critical and informed eye and the problems were more readily apparent. Because I knew basically nothing about Mitochrondial Eve except that the concept existed, so my reaction to that revelation was “OMG BRILLIANT”. Until I went online to learn more about it and discovered… no, not really brilliant at all. And it’s harder to enjoy the happy endings when you consider that, without modern technology and medicine, their new lives are likely to be nasty, brutish, and short. 🙁

    But in spite of that, I still love it. The flaws just don’t bother me enough to ruin what is, in many ways, the perfect conclusion to this journey, the perfect goodbyes to characters I’ve come to love, and this show I never expected to become so invested in.

    Between Kara’s goodbye to Anders and everything with Bill and Laura, I used up multiple tissues. The dog tags. The ring. “I’ll see you on the other side.” Adama still planning to build the cabin. *sob* I was strangely happy that Laura got to see some pretty Africa wildlife before she died, though.

    I actually gasped and yelled “No!” when Kara vanished. Roslin I was expecting. Anders I was expecting. They gutted me, but I was somewhat ready for them. While I knew she was technically dead, she was still…there. I mean, she existed in a physical form. Couldn’t she have remained in that form to live a life of her own after her destiny was completed? (For that matter, why was her death necessary in the first place? I honestly can’t figure that one out.) It doesn’t seem fair.

    Tyrol. Dude. I completely understand why you’re in an “I’m so done with people” place right now, but is the right reaction to go off Robinson Crusoe-ing on an island somewhere? What if you, you know, change your mind in a year or two or ten?

    My thoughts, circa Miniseries: “Ugh, I hate this Gaius Baltar guy so much. Go DIAF dude. And his girlfriend is such a stereotype/male gaze fantasy. The evil sexy femme fatale- wow, that’s original! *eyeroll* ”

    My thoughts, circa Daybreak: “OMG Gaius and Caprica I love you guys so much, I’m so glad you’re together again in the end. Awww, Caprica can love someone and be loved back. *sniff* OMG their head people are leaving them. Oh god: ‘I know about farming’. Oh no, don’t cry Gaius. It makes me sad. And I already have something in my eye.”

    The Agathon’s getting to be happy! ABOUT TIME. (And Athena making fun of Helo’s hunting skills, LOL.)

    I can't get out of here without mentioning the music. I especially loved that parts of the series’ most awesome songs were included throughout. Of course, there was “All Along the Watchtower”, but I also heard “The Shape of Things to Come”, “Wander My Friends”, the Roslin/Adama theme, the Kara/Sam theme, and the time jump music from Season 2.

    One final thing: When I first watched the miniseries, I did so on an impulse. I was half expecting to hate it. If Mark hadn’t been planning to watch it, I probably never would have picked out the show myself. As I said above, I never expected to be so drawn in by this story and these characters, and I can’t even fully articulate why I invested so much in it. So basically, thank you, Mark, for watching this show, and thus getting me to watch it as well.

    • Dru says:

      Couldn’t she have remained in that form to live a life of her own after her destiny was completed? (For that matter, why was her death necessary in the first place?

      MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY. I didn’t really care what Kara was in the end either, but the poof was something that she didn’t have a choice about (free will, what free will?) and I will never like it.

  73. Dru says:

    I love this show, so, SO MUCH.

    Much as I hate Kara’s death and the poof, I didn’t particularly want to know what she was by the end, it was enough that she was THERE. Until she wasn’t. 🙁

    And I’m in a very, very tiny minority here but Lee and Kara are still my OTP and I don’t think even Kara’s poofing out will keep them apart for more than the length of his life – “See you on the other side” was what Kara told Lee when she was about to die in Maelstrom, and much as my heart breaks for them both, I believe it’s true. And no matter what does happen, he’ll never forget her.

    *sigh* oh, my star-crossed lovers. Screwed at first by plain terrible luck and then by their own guilt, fear and ultimately death. But how much I loved you both, and I don’t regret a second of it despite the heartbreak *sob*

  74. Noybusiness says:

    One of my livejournal friends sums up my feelings on the ending: http://rogueslayer452.livejournal.com/532493.html

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