One week late - Final Cut

[thepouncer.livejournal.com]

I was too busy this week to type up my notes about Final Cut until now. I know this is way late, and I do plan to comment on last night’s episode tomorrow.


Generally speaking, I like “day in the life” shows because they give us glimpses of things that would otherwise remain unseen. That this one had the overarching goal of reconciling the fleet to the Galactica’s crew after the chaos of Roslin’s removal from office, Adama’s shooting, and the resultant troubles makes it all the better. Adding delight was the fact that it focused in on the Gideon Massacre, including a threat to Col. Tigh and the plight of overworked pilots.

Seen on Camera

D’anna Biers is allowed aboard Galactica to prevent her from airing recently discovered footage of the Gideon Massacre, footage that ends with a small boy pleading for his no-doubt dead parents to ome get him. Ouch. Roslin and Adama present a united front against this journalist, who has a whiff of the muckraker about her. The President and Commander want a balanced story about Galactica’s crew as a means to pull the broken fleet back together, and D’anna will have unlimited access unless military security could be compromised.

The documentary filming starts immediately, and I loved the bit in the Raptor with Adama examining ld magazines, both his curiosity and that he told Racetrack to save them. The Colonials have so little of their past, and Adama wants to preserve all that he can.

Other things I liked about the documentary:

*Did you notice that the “filmed” segments were in an octagonal frame? I giggled when I saw that - it’s not just paper that has eight sides.

*Dualla’s first name is Anastasia and she had father problems. She “wanted to believe in something” when she joined the military, but her father saw it as a betrayal. Of Sagittaria’s place as downtrodden of the Colonies? The government kept them down, according to Tom Zarek, and by joining the military Dualla took her place with the oppressors. I keep remembering Dee in Bastille Day, the way she dismissed Tom Zarek’s means with extra fervor because he was from her colony. If my suppositions are correct, she had to deny Zarek, because if he were true than so was her father and she couldn’t bear that.

*Felix Gaeta Felix And he smokes and has a tiger tattoo. Silly boy. I loved that he was obsessed with being assigned to a Battlestar, then realized after the attacks that it was all that he knew and that wasn’t enough. He wants to explore the rest of life, but will he get the chance?

*Kat and another pilot romp through the corridors in towels. Of course, this scene features the incredible slipping Towel of Apollo. *rowr* Oh my god, thank you for that moment of gratuitous manflesh.

*Vice President Baltar’s not as important as he thinks he is - D’anna doesn’t leap to hear his words. While they tour Galactica, Baltar appears, twitchy and desirous of exposure as ever. He played the media game expertly back on Caprica, but that was when he had the delusion of invincibility instead of the knowledge that his weakness and sexual hunger led to the near-extermination of his race. Six goads Baltar while he mills around, always wanting him to advance himself in service of their future child. Six tells Baltar, “Trust me. This one can help us.” She knows D’anna is a Cylon, even if she doesn’t say so explicitly.

*The wall of pictures and candles and offerings is still there, solemn remembrance and object of veneration. Crewmembers still visit to mourn those they lost. Baltar may try to forget the deaths he caused; I wonder if he avoids the hallway containing the shrine to the dead?

I was interested in the juxtaposition of military thought demonstrated in the interviews, the way one pilot talked about how you had to turn off all emotion in battle and fly like you were dead, while Helo said that it wasn’t that easy in the field. The human part of you might get you killed, but what will removing it entire do? We know that Helo’s emotions are connected in ways that his fellow shipmates don’t understand. I have to wonder if D’anna knows that Helo was stranded on Caprica after the attack. I suspect that Adama is holding that information very, very close, along with the status of the extra copy of Boomer. Helo goes to visit Sharon and finds her hands red with blood.

While following a sick pilot to the infirmary, D’anna gets a glimpse of Sharon on camera. Adama refuses to let D’anna keep the tape, but she outsmarts him with a trick she probably learned as a cub reporter. This raises the question of censorship versus survival - which is correct way, and which way raises more risks that the Colonial way of life won’t survive this ordeal. D’anna says she’s “sick to death of people like you questioning my patriotism. We all want this fleet to survive.” She has different priorities, though, different ways to live in society. I keep wanting to contrast D’anna with Roslin, who wants humanity to find refuge, but not at the cost of their principles. All of Roslin’s actions are aimed at survival, yes, but only in the framework of Colonial law and culture. We know from Bastille Day that censorship isn’t unheard of in the Colonies - Zarek’s book was banned, for instance. So Roslin shouldn’t be averse to orchestrating events and dictating press coverage. Still, D’anna had a remarkable amount of freedom while filming and Adama doesn’t even really try to coerce her into staying silent about Sharon’s existence.

Later, Baltar’s official interview is interrupted by a Cylon attack. D’anna and her cameraman split up to cover both CIC and the hanger bay. There’s so much tension in this sequence - it’s very effective, the chaos of the response with Adama as the calm center of the action. The attack is intercut with Dee’s interview where she discusses her estrangement with her father and the way that the Cylons stole any chance to reconcile. The worried faces in the CIC and hanger bay tell us more than CGI space battles in this instance, as does the way D’anna doesn’t know where to point her camera; she doesn’t know enough about military engagements to follow their rhythm. And at the end, when she asks Dee if it ever get’s easier and Dee responds that “It gets harder” So true, because they know more and more what the stakes are, the consequences, and yet Gaeta’s voice is the essence of cool control when he tells the ship to stand down.

And then, of course, D’anna looks for a story amid the footage and notices a book of poetry.

Overworked Pilots

During filming, Starbuck and Apollo have to deal with the reality of their pilot shortage. There aren’t enough pilots to patrol the fleet, and fifteen hour rotations are the norm now because of “fallout from Tigh’s moment of glory,” according to Kara. And then there’s the scrawled threat to the Colonel’s life - Lee thinks Kara wouldn’t know Caprican poetry so she has to show him up, just like she did with the snazzy dress in Colonial Day. She adores overturning his expectations.

Lee is humorless about the filming process and doesn’t want D’anna and crew in the pilots duty locker. Later, in his interview he says that the pilots need their privacy for a reason: it’s the only place they can unwind. He feels that pilots deserve special consideration for their manner of service, the way that they’re always flying patrol and risking their lives. Lee believes in the importance of respect, another principle he can use to order his life amid chaos.

Kara just flat out can’t stand being watched. When Kat and Tyrol get into it over a leaking fluid line, Starbuck is the one to break it up. She confers with Lee afterwards - they have to enforce discipline, but they need the people too much to punish them effectively. Kara wants Kat off rotation, but they can’t spare her. Plus, Tyrol’s been especially touchy lately, maybe since his Sharon died? I loved Kara’s pugnacious “Did you get all that?” She so doesn’t want to be observed.

But she can still put on a good show when she needs to, like when D’anna finds her using the punching bag. Kara’s so hot, so fierce, here. She’s also healed from her wounds sustained on Caprica. Her answer to what she looks for in pilot recruits is classic Starbuck: coordination, good reflexes, total commitment, and enough craziness to follow her into battle.

Next up, Kara has to deal with a pilot crisis. Kat is on approach to the Galactica, but she’s messed up, and can’t feel the stick well enough to control her Viper. Starbuck tries to talk Kat in, and she’s all serious and concerned, won’t answer questions. Kat’s affect had been upbeat in her interview, and then she loses it. She was taking stimulants (and what a great reference to 33 ), riding the edge. Kat is out of control, freaks out in a fit akin to my toddler temper tantrums. Lee and Kara have to wrestle her onto a gurney. You know, Kat is probably saying what a lot of people are thinking here, about how they’re all going to die.

And then the Cylon attack comes, and there’s no time to brief pilots, just enough to tell them to follow Lee and Kara. At the end of it, I believed in Lee’s “We didn’t lose anyone. That’s a good day.”

A sickbay interview with Kat reveals her motivations, the lack of replacements driving her to drugs to keep going. But the thing she feels shame over is that she’s let her fellow pilots down. Esprit de corps, even in the novices.

Death to Tigh

Ellen Tigh can’t deal when she arrives at the quarters she shares with her husband to find a note written in red on a mirror: “From the darkness you must fall.” Someone with sharp eyes pointed out that the Cylons are associated with yellow (cf, Boomer finding “cylon” written on her mirror back in Water), so I suppose this is a clue that Tigh is really human. He’d be hard pressed to contribute more to the Cylon cause though. His weaknesses are well known, including the alcoholism, the hard line, the bad command decisions while Adama was in sick bay.

We learn via the documentary footage that at least some of the marines sent to the Gideon blame the higher-ups. One of them explicitly calls the deaths a “command frak up” by Col. Tigh, a sentiment I agree with. He didn’t plan adequately for taking supplies under hostile conditions, he didn’t send in personnel trained in crowd control, and most of all, he didn’t soothe the fears of the Colonials after Adama’s shooting left him in command. Instead, he goaded the ship captains with his hard line, setting up an “us versus them” dynamic that reaped a terrible harvest.

Tigh knows he’s “not the most popular guy in the fleet,” so he doesn’t want to go to a summit on Cloud Nine to discuss recent events. Adama knows feelings need to be vented, and the fleet’s ire needs a chance to focus on Tigh. Plus, his executive officer hasn’t had shore leave in a long time. If only the Commander hadn’t let it slip that Tigh drinks. Ooops. Before Tigh can leave for Cloud Nine, though, the Raptor he would take falls victim to sabotage. It fired too soon, an example of the dangers of the flight bay; risks are common even aboard Galactica. I have to wonder if this incident recalls for the Chief memories of first Cylon attack, the fire and Tigh’s command to vent the compartments. These people are living with so much trauma that it’s a marvel that they get out of bed in the morning, let alone keep performing their duty.

Ellen’s reaction when she hears of the latest incident shows that she does love her husband, even if it’s an incredibly dysfunctional kind of love. She hates thought of Tigh in targeted danger. Okay, question: where does Ellen get her wardrobe? So many girl frills, but of a type that screams Lady Who Lunches. Of course, Ellen isn’t as smart as she thinks she is. She sees conspiracy everywhere, maybe because she’s involved in one with Zarek, but doesn’t have an accurate picture of players and events. Her attempts to manipulate Tigh only work because of their long relationship, his familiarity with her methods rendering them transparent. Does Ellen really see her husbands as a “proud soldier, taking the heat?” She does think that she needs to look out for their interests because they’re “all alone out here.”

Tigh is touchy as ever in his official interview. And D’anna puts to good use Adama’s overheard comment about staying away from the bar and pours Tigh a drink. She brings up the death threat rumors and asks pointed questions about events on the Gideon. Tigh says he made a military decision, but he won’t answer her question about regrets because he thinks it’ll be a set up. Perhaps Ellen’s prompts are playing through his mind? And then, on his way out of the room, Tigh does the unforgivable and pushes D’anna around. It’s more grist for the mill, another nail in the coffin of public opinion.

When D’anna asks Adama why Tigh wasn’t charged over the Gideon incident, the answer is the same as always: scarcity of personnel. Adama needs Tigh to act as his executive, because there’s nobody to take his place. But Adama doesn’t see lack of brig time as a way to escape punishment. In his mind, having to live with their actions is punishment enough. None of them have escaped this situation unscathed.

The threats weren’t empty - Tigh returns to his quarters to find Ellen tied up on the floor and is hit over the head as he goes to help her. It turns out that the commander of the Gideon boarding party is responsible for threats. Guilt is eating him alive and he needs to expiate his sins, take revenge on the man who sent him to a civilian transport unprepared. It becomes a dilemma: justice or vengeance? And then Tigh takes responsibility, because the massacre on the Gideon was his fault: he did send troops there unprepared. From the pilot’s perspective, “Gideon was an accident” but the gun, the pulling of the trigger to kill Tigh in retribution “is a choice.” Tigh made the choice to send them to the Gideon, and now the pilot makes the choice to forgo his revenge.

It isn’t just the wife of this couple that feels love - witness the way Tigh comforts Ellen after the confrontation is over. He loves her too, even if it is a horribly unhealthy kind of love.

Final Cut

Adama and Roslin asked D’anna to put a “human face on the guardians of the fleet.” When she shows him her documentary, Tigh can only see the bad but Adama likes it, is proud of it. In the end, preconceptions are overturned: the crew of Galactica is not arrogant military, instead they’re people doing their jobs the best they can to keep everyone going. They never give up even knowing they’re it. They’re the last line. No relief troops. No requests for resignation. And then the theme from the original series God, I love that theme. Such stirring music, and suitable for D’anna’s message. People make bad decisions under pressure - most of the time those are the exceptions.

And then we move to the Toaster theater on Caprica. In many ways, the Cylons are fascinated by their creators. Six feels that their “resilience is remarkable” - she loves them so. Then they see Sharon in sickbay. The baby was saved, and the two raiders who attacked Galactica were used to relay footage. D’anna is a Cylon Eeeeee!!! All her previous actions must now be reevaluated; she may have been aware and manipulating or a sleeper agent doing her best to be human. That Sharon’s baby is alive is a miracle from God.