Faith
As usual, with a delay of a couple of days, I got the chance to watch "Faith", and I am hopeful again for the series. Back on track we are, here's the tone and voice of BSG. Before seeing this episode I couldn't help it bust spoiled myself by reading a few recaps and comments... and I find myself disagreeing with some things that were said there.
For one, Sam shooting Gaeta. I think Sam did the only possible thing to prevent Gaeta from activating the FTL. They were about to jump, for heavens' sake, and that would have ended everything. In this way, the writers have made Sam a pawn. I can't think of any other solution to the stalemate Kara and the rest of the crew were in, though. From Sam's point of view, his action makes sense in a variety of ways. For one, his loyalty to Kara is unshaken (even if she apparently believes he is nuts and refuses to talk to him after he shot Gaeta). Second, he sees the importance of Kara's mission, he absolutely believes her and has Faith in her, and this might have something to do with his being a cylon (as we came to learn in this episode). I guess he also felt a certain, let's call it curiosity about the cylon baseship - as we've also seen in this ep during several shot glances (Leoben, Eights etc), he is still grappling with his "roots", trying to define his identity as a cylon. On the baseship, I felt that Sam was torn between feeling human and feeling cylon. He was so confused, almost literally "out of his mind", i.e in the scene between the Sixes after Barolay's death. And the confusion only mounted after the hybrid's prophecy, and the conclusion that the Five would know the way to Earth (I'm a bit confused myself - who are those Three that she kept referring to? Has that got anything to do with the cylon civil war?). Ah, poor Sam. Let's see where he is headed.
The scene between the Sixes, there, that's a killer. In some reviews I read damning comments on Natalie for shooting Drowned!Six and how she cannot be trusted. However, I think what Natalie did was really clever and she emerged something of a moral victor from this scene. On the one hand, she managed to give the humans a sense of retribution for the death of Barolay, thereby playing into their hands. However, I believe her shooting Drowned!Six was really more an act of mercy, finally putting her sister out of the misery of having to relive that horrible drowning on Caprica again and again. Thus the kiss which wasn't gratuitous in my opinion but both an apology and a fond farewell. When she states "no resurrection ship around", it is with a horrible ambiguity: Natalie is fully aware of both sides of her action, but in the end this was a sacrifice for the alliance with the humans and served the higher goal. (I would really like to see Natalie and the President fight it out on a political stage!)
I liked Leoben a lot in this episode. I had a feeling that he is serious about helping Kara find her destiny, whatever it may turn out to be and whatever his ulterior motives may end up to be - him being the mind-frakker he is. Still, it struck me as somehow generous of him to make sure Kara has access to the hybrid, even going against Natalie and all odds to ensure it. His entire expression was gentle and supportive, he was a real guide for Kara here and he seemed relieved, delivered when Kara finally heard what she was meant to hear.
The hybrid herself also moved me. What a rare lucid moment from a hybrid, she even smiled as she re-cognized Kara. She reiterated a sentence which gives me hope for humanity three times: "The children of the one reborn shall find their own country". I take it that the "one reborn" is Kara in her sudden return and her subsequent quest... and following that train of thought, the hybrid's apparent joy at telling Kara that she is the harbinger of death yadda yadda seemed to imply that the hybrid herself is looking forward to the end (of the cylons! - since "the children of the one reborn shall find their own country" will certainly not mean they will die, it has to be the others that are lead to their end - unless something awesome is still around one of those bends in the writers' minds!).
The hybrid's smile was in stark contrast to the shock and disbelief of Kara. Kara was already aghast when she realized that her vision of the road to Earth was in fact the baseship circling the gas planet. What puzzled me a bit - I couldn't capture is acoustically, even if I rewatched the sequence the times- was the thing about hearing the baseship. What is it that Leoben says and that makes Sam jump there? What kind of music? I am looking forward to the resolution of the Kara/Cylon issue. We're still in for something.
Finally, Laura Roslin and Bill Adama summarised my feelings about Season 4 pretty well: "Something's happening and I don't really understand it, Bill." I have put down these feelings in a previous post. But as Bill says to Laura later on during that scene: "You have made me believe". And yes, that's what I feel again about BSG. I have Faith in the show again, and I don't think they're "going the wrong way" - whichever it may be.
ETA: Has anymore noticed the cruel irony at the beginning of the episode when President Roslin asks Tory to take on even more responsibilities and grants her more access to confidential stuff? I wonder if it would strike Roslin immediately dead if she knew Tory was a cylon... and what an evil one at that! Though airlocking is common practice between the two of them...
For one, Sam shooting Gaeta. I think Sam did the only possible thing to prevent Gaeta from activating the FTL. They were about to jump, for heavens' sake, and that would have ended everything. In this way, the writers have made Sam a pawn. I can't think of any other solution to the stalemate Kara and the rest of the crew were in, though. From Sam's point of view, his action makes sense in a variety of ways. For one, his loyalty to Kara is unshaken (even if she apparently believes he is nuts and refuses to talk to him after he shot Gaeta). Second, he sees the importance of Kara's mission, he absolutely believes her and has Faith in her, and this might have something to do with his being a cylon (as we came to learn in this episode). I guess he also felt a certain, let's call it curiosity about the cylon baseship - as we've also seen in this ep during several shot glances (Leoben, Eights etc), he is still grappling with his "roots", trying to define his identity as a cylon. On the baseship, I felt that Sam was torn between feeling human and feeling cylon. He was so confused, almost literally "out of his mind", i.e in the scene between the Sixes after Barolay's death. And the confusion only mounted after the hybrid's prophecy, and the conclusion that the Five would know the way to Earth (I'm a bit confused myself - who are those Three that she kept referring to? Has that got anything to do with the cylon civil war?). Ah, poor Sam. Let's see where he is headed.
The scene between the Sixes, there, that's a killer. In some reviews I read damning comments on Natalie for shooting Drowned!Six and how she cannot be trusted. However, I think what Natalie did was really clever and she emerged something of a moral victor from this scene. On the one hand, she managed to give the humans a sense of retribution for the death of Barolay, thereby playing into their hands. However, I believe her shooting Drowned!Six was really more an act of mercy, finally putting her sister out of the misery of having to relive that horrible drowning on Caprica again and again. Thus the kiss which wasn't gratuitous in my opinion but both an apology and a fond farewell. When she states "no resurrection ship around", it is with a horrible ambiguity: Natalie is fully aware of both sides of her action, but in the end this was a sacrifice for the alliance with the humans and served the higher goal. (I would really like to see Natalie and the President fight it out on a political stage!)
I liked Leoben a lot in this episode. I had a feeling that he is serious about helping Kara find her destiny, whatever it may turn out to be and whatever his ulterior motives may end up to be - him being the mind-frakker he is. Still, it struck me as somehow generous of him to make sure Kara has access to the hybrid, even going against Natalie and all odds to ensure it. His entire expression was gentle and supportive, he was a real guide for Kara here and he seemed relieved, delivered when Kara finally heard what she was meant to hear.
The hybrid herself also moved me. What a rare lucid moment from a hybrid, she even smiled as she re-cognized Kara. She reiterated a sentence which gives me hope for humanity three times: "The children of the one reborn shall find their own country". I take it that the "one reborn" is Kara in her sudden return and her subsequent quest... and following that train of thought, the hybrid's apparent joy at telling Kara that she is the harbinger of death yadda yadda seemed to imply that the hybrid herself is looking forward to the end (of the cylons! - since "the children of the one reborn shall find their own country" will certainly not mean they will die, it has to be the others that are lead to their end - unless something awesome is still around one of those bends in the writers' minds!).
The hybrid's smile was in stark contrast to the shock and disbelief of Kara. Kara was already aghast when she realized that her vision of the road to Earth was in fact the baseship circling the gas planet. What puzzled me a bit - I couldn't capture is acoustically, even if I rewatched the sequence the times- was the thing about hearing the baseship. What is it that Leoben says and that makes Sam jump there? What kind of music? I am looking forward to the resolution of the Kara/Cylon issue. We're still in for something.
Finally, Laura Roslin and Bill Adama summarised my feelings about Season 4 pretty well: "Something's happening and I don't really understand it, Bill." I have put down these feelings in a previous post. But as Bill says to Laura later on during that scene: "You have made me believe". And yes, that's what I feel again about BSG. I have Faith in the show again, and I don't think they're "going the wrong way" - whichever it may be.
ETA: Has anymore noticed the cruel irony at the beginning of the episode when President Roslin asks Tory to take on even more responsibilities and grants her more access to confidential stuff? I wonder if it would strike Roslin immediately dead if she knew Tory was a cylon... and what an evil one at that! Though airlocking is common practice between the two of them...