BSG Episode Review: s3 ep... ( 04? 05? who knows?) 'Collaborators'

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On the screen:

The previouslies run the gamut of Occupation's terrors: Kara in Leoben's grasp, Jammer's NCP predicament, Gaeta's anonymous help to the Insurgency, Ellen's betrayal in order to save Saul - and her death. The final hint shows Gaius being told again that there's a place for him among the Cylons.

Galactica looks battered; the camera zooms in on her port pod, and in the dark of a launch tube, a group of people - Anders, Connor, Tigh, Seelix and Barolay, with an uncomfortable Tyrol, march a hooded, gagged figure forwards. They force him down in a pool of light and uncover his face: it's Jammer. Calling themselves the Circle, they announce the charges he faces: carrying arms for the enemy. Carrying out raids on humans, including one on the Temple of Artemis in which 23 people were killed. When he denies it, Connor roughs him up, and Seelix reins him in, the rest looking on gravely. Tigh dismisses Jammer's protests of good intentions, but Anders is impatient to 'get this over with' - at least until Jammer calls on the chief, claiming to have helped Cally escape at the execution site. Tyrol agrees that Cally got away somehow, but Connors doesn't care: his son's on the list of people who died in the temple attack. The rest of the Circle defer to the Chief's decision: is Cally's rescue worth the rest of Jammer's mistakes?

When asked about the temple raid - Tyrol getting close to his former specialist, talking quietly - Jammer explains: the people in the temple came out with their hands up ... and then opened fire. Jammer didn't know who they were killing, not until it was too late. Tyrol looks away. "No," he says to the other judges: "it's not".

The Articles say the punishment for treason is death. On the third day of the second exodus, they leave Jammer in the launch tube and walk away, Anders growling that there's too much discussion, and then the tube seals behind them. Jammer's calling out that he's sorry, his words soundless through the observation window as Connor's hand comes down on the switch. Jammer's gone. Behind the glass, Connor grieves for his lost little boy, and Barolay leads him out crying. Anders mutters that this isn't what he signed up for, and Tyrol drops his head. Nobody looks happy to have done what they've done.

Galactica is packed to the rafters, families and military personnel crammed in together. Cally - baby Nick in her arms - apparently rates a bunk, though she's evidently back at work; Tyrol picks up his chubby little boy and remarks that 'mommy's much more comfortable'. Hee. He asks Cally about the execution site, if anyone helped her get away, and half-asleep, she seems barely to recall. But yes, someone did tell her to run, probably one of the NCP 'goons'. It wasn't something that she thought about, but when she asks how he knows, he shrugs it off. "Go back to sleep."

Title sequence rolls, and I note in the teasers that Six's red dress has even less fabric than last season. Was that possible? Now it's a series of horizontal bands covering pertinent areas and connected by shoestrings. Compared to this, the NuCap cylon wardobe looks positively puritan.

Adama and Tigh flank a soft-looking Laura, back behind her desk aboard Colonial One; the men suggest that 'he' had no choice, did the best he could, and Laura agrees: "no hard feelings?" Their subject is revealed: Gaius, looking surprisingly suave except for the hippy!hair, and somewhat surprised at their verdict. "Mistakes were made" he admits, but the past is the past. Six stalks in (there's the 'dress' again!) and berates the unconcerned trio: "He actively sought your deaths. Don't you have any self-respect?"

"They can't hear you", Gaius coughs. "Don't make me angry," she snaps, and then - surprisingly - Adama adds that Baltar wouldn't like her when she's angry." Then Laura steps around the desk and slides Gaius' glasses off, and it seems that not even Baltar's guilt-relief daydreams are an ego-free zone. He evidently realises it too: "I'm dreaming, aren't I?" he asks Laura, who agrees and bends in to kiss him as he wakes, abruptly. The ship around him is definitely alien: red neon lights and white spots and a couch that certainly didn't come from the Caprican version of Ikea. A white robe is hanging near him; he shrugs into it and notes the Centurion blocking the only exit. He stands in his corner, staring at it, and the camera pans out: he's on a base ship, and the fleet about it Resurrection Two and a number of other basestars.

Back among the humans, Anders wakes - alone - in a bunk and shoves the curtain back. Kara, her hair long and loose, is going through her possessions, and the bunkroom around her is crammed with military personnel, but she's not in uniform. She hasn't been sleeping. Anders tries to kiss her, but she's obviously uncomfortable with his touch. "Don't," she says.

Zarek - Roslin calls him "Mr. President! - talks about how soon the Quorum will reconvene, and how he's going to nominate her for VP, and then resign. Laura's not fooled: if he's not fighting for the job, it means he wants something. He's a realist, he says. Adama doesn't want him in power, and without military support, his position's untenable. But he's not giving in entirely: he wants to be part of what's going on, part of the government. Laura doesn't even hesitate: Tom resisted collaboration with the Cylons, he nearly lost his life for that resistance. He's Vice-president. They exchange smiles and handshakes.

The old Battlestar is obviously still in bad shape: all around CIC, lights are out and sparks fly as repairs continue. Gaeta walks in, but according to Tigh - in uniform and back in service - he's not welcome. Helo explains that Adama's ordered it: Gaeta's expertise in communications is needed while repairs are organized. Tigh doesn't like it: the old man needs his phones fixed, so everything's forgiven? Gaeta's uncomfortable, can't look at the Colonel, who is almost rabid as he asks Gaeta - seeing he was so cosy with the cylons - where his other eye is. He doesn't back off until Adama calls him off.

The two old men walk out of CIC, Bill telling Saul to get some rest, that there's a lot to be done, but Tigh says he's fine. "I'm still the XO" he snarls, and we glimpse a worried Helo. Bill tries to soothe him, takes his arm to turn him, and Tigh snaps. "Get your hands off me." When Adama says he's embarrassing himself, Tigh doesn't hesitate. "You're the one that should be embarrassed," he nearly shouts, "letting one of Baltar's henchmen walk around like nothing's happened." Adama's face is stony. "Go sleep this off. That's an order." And, evidently, a hint that Saul's back on the sauce. And not in the least bit cowed by Adama's stare, or willing to let things slide.

The Circle gathers around a table full of papers and photographs, voting on the guilt, or otherwise, of someone I don't recognise. They have quite a formalised method going on, this vigilante quorum. Again, Seelix, Tigh, Barolay, Anders, Connor and Tyrol state their guilty verdicts, though Tyrol is a little hesitant. Apparently the defendant's on another ship, and the Circle's agent there will take care of 'it'. And also, it seems they have fifty-seven more judgments to make and only three days to make them. Connors thinks he could get through fifty in an hour, but Tigh responds to that remark by slamming his head into the table. He really HAS been spending too much time with Kara.

It's not that simple, he says, sounding righteous and utterly certain. Jammer's conviction was given because there was evidence, the Circle isn't there to decide on a whim. It's about justice. And don't mistake: Tigh thinks Connor's a good guy, but they're not doing this lightly. And when Seelix flips open the next file - Felix Gaeta - there's a thick silence. He's charged with collaboration and crimes against humanity, and one wonders if they've already decided.

After the break, Tigh's angry: he doesn't like it, doesn't want to do it. Gaeta worked beside him for more than four years, that they were like family, but being chief of staff to Gaius Baltar is enough to convict anyone. But Anders disagrees: there's no hard evidence, no witnesses. And just working for Baltar doesn't make him a traitor. Tyrol agrees. Tigh brushes it off; Baltar was just a figurehead, he thinks. Gaeta was the one who did the work, signed the death lists. But Tyrol's not buying it. "How do you know that? Were you there?"

Tigh can play dirty, though. Gaeta's name is on the paperwork that includes the deathlist that has Cally's name on it - circumstantial, as Sam points out - but Barolay agrees. Gaeta saw the list, he did nothing, and in her book that makes him guilty. Connor calls the vote, and Seelix, Tigh, Barolay and Connor vote guilty. Sam, on the other hand, says he's done, he's not voting, not on this, not on any more verdicts. "War's over for me," he says, and walks out. Connor prods Tyrol for his vote, but Tyrol says voting's pointless unless there's six votes. "Screw that" Connor says, but Galen's playing tough: "No, screw you." They were set up with six votes, and they're going to play by the rules, or he's not playing, either. The others seem reluctant, but agree: they need a sixth.

Back aboard the Cylon ship, the centurion guarding Baltar clanks away, and a D'anna - a 'three' I should say - walks in, dressed in white and looking decidedly pretty. "How are you, Gaius?" she asks. He's alive, which he supposes is something. She hands him some pills, sits down on his couch, but he's twitchy, moves away. He's been aboard the ship, she tells him, for three days. Not forgotten, despite his interpretation of the delay; it's just that the cylons can't seem to agree whether or not he should even be there. Gaius - his ego evidently intact - can't believe that they're questioning his value. But Three tells him there will always be questions. After all, he's human. "Now look," he rebutts, "I helped you. I gave you Sharon's child." Three agrees, and that was definitely in his favour. But three models voted against him, three for him, and one is still undecided: Six.

Lee and Adama discuss missing persons reports; thousands were left behind, but the reports are more to do with people missing since then: it seems the Circle's effect has not gone unnoticed. Jammer's one, and Adama says he saw him the day before, but Lee says he's gone. Thirteen people are missing, two on Galactica and eleven elsewhere, all of whom are confirmed survivors. Adama frowns, requests that Lee keeps him posted on any more such cases. Then Lee excuses himself: he's got a date with a jump rope. Adama looks up, and Lee gets defensive. "Hey, I've dropped half a stone!" but that doesn't 'weigh' much with Dad. "Keep jumping." Lee looks resigned and hurt as he walks out.

In the mess, Kara picks at her food while Gaeta, alone at his table, tries to eat. To the surprise of her tablemates, she gets up, takes her plate over to Gaeta's; she looks very thin and drawn. All around the room, eyes flick over as she sits down and says 'hey.' Their conversation isn't exactly warm, but its evident that Felix is surprised. He asks how she's doing, mentions he heard what happened to her. Kara says she tries not to think of it, y'know, and suddenly it looks like she's trying to put him at ease.

It turns ugly quickly, because Kara says he's trying not to think, too. After all, he was the one sitting in Baltar's plushy office, doing all his dirty-work. "Probably never even thought about what was happening to me, right?" Gaeta says he didn't know about her, at the time, that he would have tried to help her if he had. He repeats - says he's done it fifty times, now - that he was serving the duly elected President of the Colonies. Kara wants to know if that's supposed to excuse him, and Gaeta gets mad. "What do you want me to say? When the Cylons landed, I thought it was important that I keep my job, to help from the inside." Sure it was, Kara thinks, helpful to prop Baltar up and let the Cylons walk all over them. And for the first time, Gaeta reveals that he was the source who fed information to the resistance, set up dead drops, a dog's bowl. "Right, Felix" she says, her tone soft but sarcastic. "You're a frakkin' hero." And all around the room, the other officers are walking away. He shuffles out through them, leaving Kara to the subtle scrutiny of Seelix.

The cylon fleet is swarming with raiders, but Six, blurry and indistinct to Gaius' eyes as he wakes up, looks surprisingly alone and anguished. She has to stop feeling what she feels for him, she tells him, because it's clouding her judgment. She's protected him, given humanity a second chance, turned against another cylon, even - for what? She somehow lost sight of the fact that she's a Cylon, one of many like minds. But Gaius reminds her of her individuality. "Much more than a machine" he tells her. "A real person, a woman. And you're in love with me... and it hurts." But he's the only one who can make it better for her, he says, but she walks out, leaving him yelling "you need me" to her back. He tries to follow - I need you, too" - but she's gone, and the centurion's back. He goes back to his couch. "Maybe I should have started with that."

The Circle is explaining what they're doing to their new recruit: Kara. Only the worst of the worst are due for judgment here, the ones that worked with the Cylons. "They're the real traitors." Kara looks unconvinced. "None of this is legal, right?" Tyrol assures her that it is; Seelix passes her the paperwork on Gaeta, and she's stunned. Tigh wants to know: is she in or out? She's in. But as she peruses the death list, she says that the whole thing's like a bad dream, only she woke up, and the traitors are still here. She's not slow to make up her mind: Gaeta's guilty. Tyrol's the decider, but before he can speak, Sam appears in the doorway: he wants to talk to 'his wife'. Now.

In a vast empty room, Sam tells her that he quit the Circle; he didn't want to kill anyone anymore. But Kara says she needs this, and he's disgusted. "Throwing a few people out of airlocks is going to make you feel better about yourself? Because they're not the people that locked you in that room." Kara doesn't care. "They'll do. And not just for me, but for every person we left back on that planet, someone's got to pay. So you can either get with it, or you can get lost." Sam abruptly shifts back to the intimate. "Is that what you want, Kara? You want me to leave?"

Tigh is holding forth back at the judgment table: liking Gaeta, knowing Gaeta, isn't reason to excuse him. The price of collaborating with the enemy is death, and even his wife paid it. Everyone likes Gaeta, but Tigh liked his wife more, and she wasn't exempt.

Kara's face is in shadow, but her voice is scratchy with emotion. She's in a different place, she says, like someone painted the world in different colours while she was locked up. Then there's a sudden note of real malevolence, like she's not really seeing him, but Leoben: she says she wants to tear his eyes out just for looking at her, that she wants to hurt people - even him. Then she's broken again. "You should probably go before that happens."

Seelix too sounds choked up: Baltar signed death warrants, and Tyrol agrees, but that was Baltar, not Gaeta. Tigh doesn't distinguish: "Its the same godsdamned thing." The Circle may be legal, may be about justice, but it's certainly not about conscience. Tyrol gives in. "Fine. Guilty."

Sam hands Kara her dogtag: "Remember this? I don't want this anymore." Kara looks absolutely gutted, grabs his arm as he walks away. Then she kisses him, standing on tiptoes, and shoves her tag in a pocket as she walks away instead. Haven't we seen this scene before?

Next Gaeta is expertly nabbed by Connor, Seelix and Barolay, and we're back in the launch tube. There's the trial jargon, and Gaeta looks unsurprised. Tyrol doesn't like this. "Come on, Felix. Talk." They prod at him verbally, trying to get him to admit something. "What's the point?" he responds, "I've already tried to explain. I'm not going to beg." Tigh's dismissive. "Too bad you didn't grow that spine four months ago." There's silence, and they start walking away, but Kara's not happy to leave him with his dignity. "Beg," she screams at him, and her face is as close to the face of Starbuck that we've seen all season. Tigh can't call her off. She starts ranting at him, spewing back the unconvincing words he'd given her in the mess, the information, the dead drops, the dog bowl.

Tyrol stops dead. The dog bowl? He knows about that. He urges Gaeta to explain. The bowl was a signal, it meant there was a message drop. Tyrol's stunned. "That was you?" He turns to the circle. He never knew his source, but whoever it was would be the only person who knew that signal - and the person directly responsible for making the rescue possible. "I did what I could," Felix says. "I don't know what else I could have done. Tyrol frees him, and he walks away. Kara stalks off, the others following more slowly, Tigh and Tyrol the last to leave, with the Colonel's face still eloquent of surprise.

Adama and Roslin confront Tom Zarek about the Circle: he legalized it. He filed the executive orders convening it, he signed death warrants for those deemed guilty. He did so as president. Adama's not satisfied: "Your presidency is a farce." Roslin says collaborators should be tried by jury, but Tom says they've had a jury. But there's no lawyers, no showboating, no media martyrs. And their blood is not on Roslin's hands, she's not responsible. Laura's not satisfied either: it's not up to the president to decide what law to obey and what to discard. Tom doesn't care; if proper trials occurred, it would take months, years, people lining up to testify. It'd be a circus for the mob, and she'd be signing death warrants every day. If he wasn't right it wouldn't be so scary, but she stands there, impassive and slightly smiling as Zarek describes the future in detail, and makes no answer.

We skip to Laura's inauguration: a male priest administers the oath, and she turns to face the press and the quorum, talks about the destiny they will have to shape, the past they cannot forget. Her voice continues over the image of Kara at her locker, the chain that's hanging there: one dog-tag and a ring. She hangs Sam's tag beside it. Tigh is unpacking, putting Ellen's clothes back in his closet with his own, setting up their photographs, as Laura explains that she's not setting up a tribunal. They're all victims, she reminds them. They all want justice and vengeance, but the dividing line is hard to find, and they are none of them impartial.

As Six, aboard the basestar, places some clothing for Gaius on his couch and walks away, Laura reveals that there will be no prosecutions. There will be a commission to hear and record the experiences of the colonists, but a general pardon is given to those who might have faced trial. Gaeta prepares to don his uniform as Laura admits that it won't be a popular decision; but humanity needs to move on, to reconcile and heal. Aboard Colonial One, Adama stands to applaud the new president, and the accolade quicky spreads. But Gaeta's still alone at his table... at least until Tyrol comes in and sits beside him.

In my head

Another linear episode: I'm glad of it. BSG has a tendency to use a little too much timeline chopping to try and fill in backstory as the plot progresses, and in an episode like this, I'm really happy they didn't. Apart from the minor flashes of Gaeta's dead-drop signal (Hi, Jake. I really hope someone rescued Jake), this was a smooth, forward-moving episode that did a good job of resolving looking back. I'm reminded of Litmus for the cogency of the trial idea, but the episodes aren't really comparable. Litmus is a pale shadow of Collaborators.

Yet despite the good structure and great acting - god(s), Katee Sackhoff, Michael Hogan, Richard Hatch and Mary McDonnell: you people can seriously fucking act - this episode has its downers. Anders confused me in the opening act: too much talk? Hurry up and get this over with? And then the crisis of conscience? Possibly one can interpret the former two as his discomfort with the entire Circle concept, but he still voted guilty, didn't he? Thirteen deaths, we find out. If it was bothering him, couldn't he stop? Same with the chief, though his evident unease makes his later capitulation even more unfathomable.

They're there, Tigh points out, to make decisions on the evidence... but apparently there's an exception for Felix, who has no evidence against him except that he did nothing. Which, if you ask me, could be said of Cally, who had a baby and did nothing to help the Insurgency. Or the Oracle. Or hey, any one of thousands of other people who just wanted to get on with their lives. The hypocrisy is blinding, but the scariest thing about it is that they really don't see it. Seelix is almost crying when she talks about the tacit approval in Gaeta's presence on Colonial One. Tigh's mounting fury, his discussion of affection making no difference, the revelation about his wife... they utterly believe that he's guilty, without a shred of proof, simply because Gaius is guilty.

I won't go into the political parallels it draws - but please note: it doesn't just draw parallels in the USA, and so I don't aim this at any particular audience - but I will say this: trial by jury implies that the mode of decision is in the hands of an impartial party, and as Laura says later, there is not even a possibility of impartiality in this case. Who can be impartial when faced with the deaths of children, let alone their own child? Tom Zarek WAS right when he explained the horrors of obeying the letter of the law as far as justice was concerned, but he negates the very idea of justice when he commits the decision to the hands of a man who's lost his son, another who's lost an eye and a wife, of soldiers who saw their comrades die and a woman who has literally lost everything at the hands of perpetrators who cannot be punished. Justice is impersonal, and - with the possible exception of Tyrol - not one person at that table has the ability to remove their own feelings from the situation.

However, as fine and honourable - and hopeful - as Laura's pardon and reconciliation council are as resolutions to the guilt or lack thereof of the survivors of NuCap, they don't solve anything for the people who actually suffered. Neither Baltar nor the Cylons can be punished, and now the remaining stooges of both are granted amnesty. Vengeance and the need for it might be destructive, but that isn't to say they're not needed, that the people who lost loved ones or limbs or their souls don't need to see something being done.

I don't have an answer. One of the reasons I quit my law degree halfway through was because for every ethical, honorable thing I could have done to uphold justice, there were ten or twenty excuses - reasonable, practical, humane and legal - for a different outcome. I think the simple truth to the issue is that humans are incapable of judging themselves, or anyone else, with the remove required. Everyone looks at a man accused of killing a child and thinks about their own children. Everyone looks at someone who killed someone in a fight or a crime of passion and remembers the times they lost their tempers, or overreacted or lashed out in personal anguish, even if they didn't kill. It's that condition - identifying with victim and with accused - that makes justice by jury possible... but it also makes it a long, drawn-out, rulebound and hidebound process that prevents justice as often as it facilitates it.

Blah, my personal hobbyhorse is a'rockin'. Let's move along.

Alessandro Juliani was impressive in this episode: Gaeta's quiet stoicism, so much a mainstay of his character in the early seasons, returned in this ep under the most difficult circumstances. He only lost it - lost it beautifully, I might add: given more screen time, I think Juliani could join the list of fine actors I started several paragraphs ago - when Kara approached him and reproached him in the mess. I liked his dignity. I liked the contrast with the guilty Jammer's sobbing apologies. I'm not (or, I'd like to think I'm not) cruel, but as untenable as Jammer's situation was, I'd like to think I'd have let the Cylons shoot me before I'd ever act to arrest innocent people and send them off to die. So much for my warbling about justice, right? I didn't hate Jammer's execution, and yet I would have hated Gaeta's. Not even the audience is capable of impartiality, I suppose.

One thing, though: our Adamas are getting so little screen time that I'm feeling somewhat off-balanced. The show portrays, for the most part, a marvelous sense of fulcrum between the Galactica and her civilian fleet. We might focus on the Battlestar, but the actions of the capital ship are always balanced with the needs of the rest... even when they're in conflict, as we saw with the Gideon last season. Yet the military is almost invisible in this episode: it's a framework for the characters, for sure, but there's almost no fleet focus at all. I keep catching sight of things - uniforms, dog-tags, mess-halls and CIC - but they're a backdrop. We might be off New Caprica, but the dust of NuCap is still very much on everyone's army boots. Here's hoping we get the battleship back soon; not that I don't like the other focus, but its unsettling for some reason. If anyone can explain why, please do so.

Of course, it might be because Lee's still on the fat side, Adama's approval is still on the thin side, and I really miss the Laura / Bill / Kara / Lee circle of focus and emotion. I guess I really am all about the family.

Oh, yes. Family, another thing concept they kept shoving at us all episode. Cally, Nick and Galen. Tigh plus (and minus) Ellen. The extended family of Galactica. Cylon family discord, and Six remembering that she has sisters as well as lovers. Sam and "his wife". Kids and their parents shoved into tiny quarters, those cosy little groups at the mess hall. Even the Circle: family. People they trust, love, sometimes hate. Themes like this feel even more disturbing against the backdrop of the airlock: what about the families of those who got spaced? Huh? The ones who filed the missing persons reports? What kind of justice did they get? Or was it only the ones nobody would really miss who actually got executed? I don't know. But it matters. And against the backdrop of this family stuff, the idea of the reconciliation thing seems a whole lot more necessary. Everyone's part of a family, even if it's not one of blood.

Or even one of minds: Gaius? You're on the verge of screwed, aren't you? Sharon, D'anna and I would guess Leoben vote to keep you, but Doral, Simon and Cavil want your ass out the cylon version of the airlock. And Six is finally questioning her own motives about love, and why she wants it. They didn't space you, but it may only be a week's worth of reprieve. Alone out of all the collaborators, Gaius - despite his misgivings - was the only one who acted purely from selfish motives: he didn't want to die, despite his claims: not enough to actually let them pull the trigger. And as his little fantasy in the first act shows, he can justify almost anything to himself, given time. It will be a lot of fun to see how he copes with the hive mind arrayed against him, where his charm - and his penis - can't sway public opinion all that much. The Cylons are a family too, it seems.

Which brings us to the real emotional sticking-point of the episode: Sam and Kara.

I want to state, first of all, that I completely understand where Kara's coming from here. If you've ever had a possessive, obsessive partner or been stalked, then you too will know what she's talking about when she says she wants to hurt Sam for just looking at her. The only reason I moved on from a fucked-up relationship I was in was because my best friend - the only male I've ever really trusted since - put up with my shit long enough to let me get over the experience. But it takes a while. It takes a long while to relearn trust, and three days isn't really long enough to make a dent in what Kara suffered.

That said, she is just as much a culprit here, just as focused on vengeance as Tigh or any one of the circle. That's unforgivable in some respects in all of them: they might very well have been 'legal' in their actions, but it wasn't really justice. Still, in Kara it's probably most forgivable, at least to me. As much as I like Tyrol, he and Seelix and Jean - and Sam - have no real personal axe to grind with the collaborators, no personal need for justice (comparatively), so I look at the ease with which they did this with total distaste. Tigh is self-deluded and griefstricken, Connor is righteously griefstricken, and Kara is full of impotent, unmanageable pain and rage. In those three at least I can understand the desire to lash out.

Slightly off the point, I shall perhaps fanwank that such is the reason Tyrol, Seelix, Jean and Sam joined the circle initially, that they felt the job would be more appropriately done by those who suffered relatively little. Perhaps they thought they'd be a restraining influence on the others? Even if so, they quickly bought in to the mob mentality.

Back to Kara: she's lost everything now. She can't face Sam without equating him with Leoben - unsurprising, but unfortunate... and right now, unfixable. She isn't really part of the Galactica yet, and there are no Cylons to kill, so the catharsis of fight and flight aren't in reach. She bartered her emotions to save a child who turned out not to be hers, and is probably more than ever equating love with vulnerability, and over all of it is this horrible inaction: she's just as much in that cell of Leoben's now as she was on that planet, because she can do nothing. So it is utterly unsurprising to me that she seizes the chance to be judge and jury with both hands and runs with it. It's making something happen, doing something about the waking nightmare of being free without actually being free.

That's not to say I like her very much while she's doing it. In fact, my heart's breaking for her all the way through - even while, especially while she's screaming at Gaeta in the end. A gentle going is not enough to salve her wounds; she wants to see regret. She wants to see some acknowledgment that her actions will change something, that they have changed something. And yet even while she watches, the action's completely negated.

I don't think she's angry that Gaeta's innocent, you know. I think she's just angry, that once again she's tried to do something and it's had no effect at all. I don't think she's insane enough to wish an innocent man dead - and she sends Sam away rather than make him a target - but she's broken enough to see herself still trapped in that frightful loop of killing Leoben and killing Leoben and killing Leoben and never changing a god(s)damned thing.

And Sam: I don't like that he gave in. I'd like to think that if I was Kara, my lover wouldn't be so quick to walk away, wouldn't be so impatient for the honeymoon to begin again. Three days isn't very long, Sam. If you waited four months, surely you can wait another few weeks before you scram? For all the 'my wife' determinism, he doesn't seem to be concerned for his wife so much as his wife... the woman that's his. It may not be meant like that, though, despite the repetition. I mean, calling her 'Kara' doesn't have the same family resonance, but at least it dulls the sense of 'this person belongs with me' ownership that I'm getting.

Still, I can see his perspective, too. She can't really touch him or be near him, she admits that right now he's just another man getting too close, and she's just walked into a role he discarded because he saw it becoming less about justice and more about payback. Right now it must seem to Sam that Kara isn't just pushing him away, but is pushing him out - out of her life, out of her thinking, out of the plans she makes or the decisions she's taking. He wakes up to find her unpacking her old life - one that doesn't include him - and given the theme of family we kept being reminded of, that's a pretty telling discovery. What Kara's doing now has nothing to do with Sam, but like most spouses I'd imagine he finds it difficult to adjust to a life where his wife has nothing to do with him.

I can't say I'm surprised at the split, but for once, I don't think it's bitter, or permanent. I think we'll see Kara and Sam together again, but I don't think that it'll be for the best. You can't take some things back, Laura told us. And you can't forget. Moving on means changing things, and if Kara is going to change, then the reasons she loves Sam must also change. I guess we'll have to wait and see whether there's more to this pair than their passion and mutual sense of rescue.

H'okay, down to the nitty gritty. We have little CGI to discuss, and the music was, as usual, brilliantly underplayed. The plot was very well realised and very effectively carried out. The climax of Gaeta's near-execution might have been a little pat (who honestly didn't think that was coming?!) but it was effective. And Laura's decision at the end was a fine resolution, one that surely was not expected by Zarek, who I thought nearly stole this episode. That one passage before an unflinching Roslin and a disgusted Adama? Brilliantly done.

The gaps, if you can call them that, are all just momentary jarring notes where backstory and plot don't quite mesh: Cally's indifference to her rescuer, Tyrol's reluctant guilty verdicts, the return of whiny!Lee and who's-your-daddy!Adama. Tigh and Kara continue to bookend the storylines brilliantly, though, and though the witchhunt was once again put end to by fiat, this episode outdoes Litmus by light-years. It might solve the issue a little too easily for everyone, perhaps voiding the necessity of following the collaborator issue any further (although I am foreseeing Adama being more than a little miffed when he finds out who was involved), but does so with grace and with that same moral grey area once again left to stare the audience in the face.

A very very good episode which didn't need action to support the storyline. I enjoyed it, even if I can't help but cringe for the schisms in the families. Eight out of ten.

This one word-counts at ... woah. Never mind. Hope you stayed awake!