Oh, Boomer!
No, no really: Oh, Boomer.
Having the longest memory in the room means that I'm the only one who wasn't like "WTF?" when Boomer smacked Athena. I had (note the past tense) immense sympathy for Boomer. I, like the Chief, was totally swayed by the fact that she (sorta like Gaeta) just always made the right decision just at the wrong time. She never got a choice about shooting the Admiral, but when she did get a choice, she tried to make good and make up for it, she got New Caprica. It was too soon for anyone to accept Cylons. And now people are getting used to the 2/6/8s running around, and she's too late. And then you have Athena, who actively lied to the man she was on the run with, who was totally aware she was a Cylon lying liar who lies, who was, by dint of love and pregnancy, given just that little bit of leeway that Boomer never got (even though, again, she never had a choice) and got to have Boomer's old position. If I were Boomer, I would have smacked the ever-living shit out of Athena, too.
She's still wrong to beat up Athena, but that doesn't mean I don't get where Boomer's coming from. I go back to their one last meeting back in mid-season three. Boomer came over with D'Anna to negotiate for the Eye of Jupiter. Athena, standing outside the meeting hall, took one look at Boomer, pulled Tigh aside (HA HA HA!) and was like, "That's Boomer. Maybe it's not a good idea that she goes into the meeting with Adama." Tigh, of course, flipped his eye-patch and kicked her the hell off the ship. And then? Athena got Helo to kill her so she could resurrect over on the baseship to get Hera. And to protect Hera from Boomer, Boomer's only crazy, not-quite-fitting-in-any-more friend, Caprica, broke Boomer's fucking neck. Nobody loves Boomer. She is always, always wrong.
So I totally thought this was going to be her death knell--and she'd just have to die for being wrong with the right intentions (except for beating up Athena, which I just said, "Let her have it, she's mad"). EXCEPT NOT BECAUSE BOOMER IS STILL AWESOMELY WRONG AND PLAYED ABSOLUTELY EVERYONE AND IS STILL TOTALLY IN CAVIL'S POCKET, THAT WHORE!!!!
No, really, that shit was amazing. I was actually surprised. Boomer sucks, but she's heartbreaking at it. It's like if Cally were ever allowed to have a personality other than "harpy," that's how much Boomer is both sucky and fantastic. I was actually surprised that she totally used the Chief. Which was a nice turn of events because I saw the Kara-is-hallucinating-her-dad plot thing since last week when the Chief ignored her anvil-laden comment about the piano player. So, well played, BSG, you got me on something. You managed to set up a misleading (instead of entirely spoilery) promo and played it until the end. If the rest of the series goes this way, you might end on a grace note.
Speaking of notes: Yes, viridian called it, Kara is totally a hybrid. Daddy pianist taught her "All Along the Watchtower," so he is totally Daniel. I'm not thrilled--like I said above, saw this coming, both because of viridian and because of the anvils. (Didn't you see the anvils?) Once they established that Sam was the musician who taught everyone that music to call them back and that Daniel, the missing Cylon was the artist, there was just no going back. Because abso-fucking-lutely no one else is artistic on this show. At all. So then you have Kara with her piano-playing daddy and who was an artist herself, and it's QED, isn't it? I'm still not sure how her viper played the music that activated the Four, but if Kara knows the music, and Mommy tortured her so she'd be tough, yeah, I give up. viridian and the internets are right.
Which still makes hers and Anders' relationship totally incestuous, because EWWWW THAT IS YOUR GRANDFATHER. (On a side, sluttier note: Hey, Poppy. You look good--even without the hair!)
And on the subject of Sam: Once Anders became unresponsive two weeks ago, I figured the only place for him to go was a new body. Yes, the Hub is gone, but something tells me that Ellen Tigh wouldn't make hers or any of the Five's resurrection tech dependent on the stuff they gave their "children." We know that Cavil stole their bodies and kept them, but that doesn't mean he has any control (aside from boxing/killing/brainwashing them) over whether they do or do not download, Hub or no Hub. My suspicions on Ellen seemed true from the promo, but just in what she said last night--"What if we used Sam?"--makes me think girlfriend knows what I'm saying is true. If you kill Sam, he will download in a body. Ellen, from her comment, seems to think that body would be back with Cavil, so she thinks that maybe Hera isn't lost forever, and if they kill Sam now, he'll download over there and be able to...do something. I mean, I like Anders (he's a nice guy, which is more than I can say for anyone left at this point), but he's not as craftily manipulative as Ellen, and even she got played by Boomer (THAT IS SO AWESOME, YOU GUYS). What can he do, really?
But yeah, I had this half-imagined fanfic where the issue of Sam being a vegetable was fixed by his downloading over on Cavil's ship. Except, in my fanfic theory (written before last week's episode), I played more with the idea of Sam on Galactica being unresponsive for the foreseeable future. (Not the strangely active but not awake stuff he started doing.) And I got to wondering: if a Cylon were in a body that was unresponsive but not dead, would a body in a tub elsewhere start to partially wake up but be unable to? I mean, no Cylon would ever have to wait long to find out--before the Hub was gone, they would just have killed the old body off. But that's not an option right now, seeing as no one assumes that any Cylon--Final Five included--will be able to download. But if the Five are, as I assume, cheating (AND THE PROMO SEEMS TO CONFIRM THIS), Anders can download. In my fanfic that I will never write theory, Cavil noticed his spare body move above baseline consciousness, and then shocked it fully awake--killing Sam on Galactica. It seems they're going to do the same thing, only Ellen's going to do it, and I love that better because any time Ellen schemes a thing, it's a hundred times better. Except for the episode last week. But generally, I love Ellen's schemes, SHUT UP.
Now that Sam is going to be over on Cavil's ship (presumably, again, judging from Ellen's comment), I have "Anders rescues Hera, shoots Boomer in her stupid face and brings the body back for the Chief to airlock again to be sure" fic running around in my head. And I can only picture how the hell Ellen is going to try and kill Sam without Starbuck beating her in her stupid face...
So the problem is now that this episode had just enough to make me like it that I'm now getting my hopes up again. This is a bad thing. I think moonlightalice is right that anything good will be saved for the second half, of the second hour, of the very last episode, but this was decent enough. If it just gets better, hey, more power to 'em. I just shouldn't hold my breath that it will.
Having the longest memory in the room means that I'm the only one who wasn't like "WTF?" when Boomer smacked Athena. I had (note the past tense) immense sympathy for Boomer. I, like the Chief, was totally swayed by the fact that she (sorta like Gaeta) just always made the right decision just at the wrong time. She never got a choice about shooting the Admiral, but when she did get a choice, she tried to make good and make up for it, she got New Caprica. It was too soon for anyone to accept Cylons. And now people are getting used to the 2/6/8s running around, and she's too late. And then you have Athena, who actively lied to the man she was on the run with, who was totally aware she was a Cylon lying liar who lies, who was, by dint of love and pregnancy, given just that little bit of leeway that Boomer never got (even though, again, she never had a choice) and got to have Boomer's old position. If I were Boomer, I would have smacked the ever-living shit out of Athena, too.
She's still wrong to beat up Athena, but that doesn't mean I don't get where Boomer's coming from. I go back to their one last meeting back in mid-season three. Boomer came over with D'Anna to negotiate for the Eye of Jupiter. Athena, standing outside the meeting hall, took one look at Boomer, pulled Tigh aside (HA HA HA!) and was like, "That's Boomer. Maybe it's not a good idea that she goes into the meeting with Adama." Tigh, of course, flipped his eye-patch and kicked her the hell off the ship. And then? Athena got Helo to kill her so she could resurrect over on the baseship to get Hera. And to protect Hera from Boomer, Boomer's only crazy, not-quite-fitting-in-any-more friend, Caprica, broke Boomer's fucking neck. Nobody loves Boomer. She is always, always wrong.
So I totally thought this was going to be her death knell--and she'd just have to die for being wrong with the right intentions (except for beating up Athena, which I just said, "Let her have it, she's mad"). EXCEPT NOT BECAUSE BOOMER IS STILL AWESOMELY WRONG AND PLAYED ABSOLUTELY EVERYONE AND IS STILL TOTALLY IN CAVIL'S POCKET, THAT WHORE!!!!
No, really, that shit was amazing. I was actually surprised. Boomer sucks, but she's heartbreaking at it. It's like if Cally were ever allowed to have a personality other than "harpy," that's how much Boomer is both sucky and fantastic. I was actually surprised that she totally used the Chief. Which was a nice turn of events because I saw the Kara-is-hallucinating-her-dad plot thing since last week when the Chief ignored her anvil-laden comment about the piano player. So, well played, BSG, you got me on something. You managed to set up a misleading (instead of entirely spoilery) promo and played it until the end. If the rest of the series goes this way, you might end on a grace note.
Speaking of notes: Yes, viridian called it, Kara is totally a hybrid. Daddy pianist taught her "All Along the Watchtower," so he is totally Daniel. I'm not thrilled--like I said above, saw this coming, both because of viridian and because of the anvils. (Didn't you see the anvils?) Once they established that Sam was the musician who taught everyone that music to call them back and that Daniel, the missing Cylon was the artist, there was just no going back. Because abso-fucking-lutely no one else is artistic on this show. At all. So then you have Kara with her piano-playing daddy and who was an artist herself, and it's QED, isn't it? I'm still not sure how her viper played the music that activated the Four, but if Kara knows the music, and Mommy tortured her so she'd be tough, yeah, I give up. viridian and the internets are right.
Which still makes hers and Anders' relationship totally incestuous, because EWWWW THAT IS YOUR GRANDFATHER. (On a side, sluttier note: Hey, Poppy. You look good--even without the hair!)
And on the subject of Sam: Once Anders became unresponsive two weeks ago, I figured the only place for him to go was a new body. Yes, the Hub is gone, but something tells me that Ellen Tigh wouldn't make hers or any of the Five's resurrection tech dependent on the stuff they gave their "children." We know that Cavil stole their bodies and kept them, but that doesn't mean he has any control (aside from boxing/killing/brainwashing them) over whether they do or do not download, Hub or no Hub. My suspicions on Ellen seemed true from the promo, but just in what she said last night--"What if we used Sam?"--makes me think girlfriend knows what I'm saying is true. If you kill Sam, he will download in a body. Ellen, from her comment, seems to think that body would be back with Cavil, so she thinks that maybe Hera isn't lost forever, and if they kill Sam now, he'll download over there and be able to...do something. I mean, I like Anders (he's a nice guy, which is more than I can say for anyone left at this point), but he's not as craftily manipulative as Ellen, and even she got played by Boomer (THAT IS SO AWESOME, YOU GUYS). What can he do, really?
But yeah, I had this half-imagined fanfic where the issue of Sam being a vegetable was fixed by his downloading over on Cavil's ship. Except, in my fanfic theory (written before last week's episode), I played more with the idea of Sam on Galactica being unresponsive for the foreseeable future. (Not the strangely active but not awake stuff he started doing.) And I got to wondering: if a Cylon were in a body that was unresponsive but not dead, would a body in a tub elsewhere start to partially wake up but be unable to? I mean, no Cylon would ever have to wait long to find out--before the Hub was gone, they would just have killed the old body off. But that's not an option right now, seeing as no one assumes that any Cylon--Final Five included--will be able to download. But if the Five are, as I assume, cheating (AND THE PROMO SEEMS TO CONFIRM THIS), Anders can download. In my fanfic that I will never write theory, Cavil noticed his spare body move above baseline consciousness, and then shocked it fully awake--killing Sam on Galactica. It seems they're going to do the same thing, only Ellen's going to do it, and I love that better because any time Ellen schemes a thing, it's a hundred times better. Except for the episode last week. But generally, I love Ellen's schemes, SHUT UP.
Now that Sam is going to be over on Cavil's ship (presumably, again, judging from Ellen's comment), I have "Anders rescues Hera, shoots Boomer in her stupid face and brings the body back for the Chief to airlock again to be sure" fic running around in my head. And I can only picture how the hell Ellen is going to try and kill Sam without Starbuck beating her in her stupid face...
So the problem is now that this episode had just enough to make me like it that I'm now getting my hopes up again. This is a bad thing. I think moonlightalice is right that anything good will be saved for the second half, of the second hour, of the very last episode, but this was decent enough. If it just gets better, hey, more power to 'em. I just shouldn't hold my breath that it will.