Preparations are made for the recovery of the human population of New Caprica as Tyrol attempts to rescue Cally and Laura from the Cylons.
Cast
James Callis as Dr. Gaius Baltar
Edward James Olmos as Admiral Adama
Mary McDonnell as Laura Roslin
Katee Sackhoff as Kara “Starbuck” Thrace
Jamie Bamber as Lee “Apollo” Adama
Michael Hogan as Col. Tigh
Tricia Helfer as Number 6
Grace Park as Sharon “Boomer” Valerii
Tahmoh Penikett as Helo
Aaron Douglas as CPO Galen Tyrol
Dean Stockwell as Brother Cavell
Richard Hatch as Tom Zarek
Kate Vernon as Ellen Tigh
Luciana Carro as Louanne “Kat” Katraine
Kandyse McClure as Anastasia “Dee” Dualla
Callum Keith Rennie as Leoben Conoy
Nicki Clyne as Cally Henderson
Christian Tessier as Tucker “Duck” Clellan
Michael Trucco as Samuel T. Anders
Alessandro Juliani as Felix Gaeta
Rekha Sharma as Tory Foster
Synopsis
Tyrol moves to save Cally from the Cylons while Anders discovers a traitor in the resistance. Sharon proceeds with the plan to recover the launch keys from the Cylon compound, and D’Anna Biers visits a human Oracle seeking the meaning of her strange dreams.
High Points
- Starbuck and Casey
- People finally starting to figure out how slimy Ellen is
- Sharon’s encounter with D’Anna
Low Point
It might be considered that the resolution to the previous episode’s cliffhanger is a low point, as had we seen what we know in this episode it wouldn’t be much of a cliffhanger at all. I’m not going to complain too much though, because it probably wouldn’t have fitted well into the previous episode without spoiling the timing, and this episode remains well-paced and dramatic.
The Scores
Interestingly, this episode feels more original than the previous one despite being in the same situation. Perhaps it’s because things are rolling rapidly toward an attempted resolution of the occupation. Five out of six.
The effects appeared less often than last week, although I would be surprised if there were many shots which didn’t feature at least one effect, as there’s no way they built the entire city as a real set. As usual though, the effects are only noticeable where they depict something that is obviously impossible to film in a conventional manner. Six out of six.
Story-wise, things proceed with a good pace and there’s plenty going on to keep us interested. Another cliffhanger means we’re holding on for resolution still, and I feel slightly disappointed with only one Starbuck scene. Five out of six.
The acting was again superb. It’s clearly a true ensemble show, with everyone pulling their weight. Six out of six.
Production is good once more. One thing which particularly struck me was a scene in Galactica‘s rec room, showing the stark contrast between previous scenes set there when it’s full of celebrating pilots (as at the end of Scar) and now, when the Battlestar is clearly undermanned and it’s a dim, quiet place. Five out of six.
Emotional response is much the same as last time, although there’s a greater sense of both anticipation and threat as both sides move toward taking drastic action. Because we’re seeing the conflicts faced by individuals as well as by humans and Cylons as groups, we get more closely involved than we would otherwise have done. And poor Sharon. Six out of six.
Overall, six out of six. Another episode validating the course taken at the end of season two, and as I discussed with another Galactica fan after we’d seen it, this storyline is giving rise to the best episodes of the series so far.
Which gives Exodus, Part One a grand total of thirty-nine out of forty-two.
Great ep, great show
Still, did anyone else think it might be a mistake to reveal to Tigh that his wife is a traitor just before a critical operation?
Re: Great ep, great show
No. With a critical operation in the works it is more important than ever to know of any potential compromise in ones security.
Re: Great ep, great show
If anything, Tigh is the one person that needed to know since he would presumably be in the best position to retrospectively spot any other quirks in Ellen’s actions since his release.]
Re: Great ep, great show
Fair points. I wonder about the effect on a man they must realize is already on a psychological precipice.
It’ll be interesting to see how they play Tigh this season, given his particular experience of the occupation.
Slimey Ellen?
While I won’t attempt to defend her actions, her motives were pure, she was trying to save her husband’s life. Personally I love what the writers have done. Ellen is put into a tough spot and has a limited box of tools with which deal with things. Now Saul is wounded physically and emotionally. This is going to be some good television.
Re: Slimey Ellen?
I love it too, I called her slimy because she is! I’ve never liked her, but I think she’s a fantastic hook for some very good stories to tell.
Re: Slimey Ellen?
Tigh better kill that woman. Bros before hoes and all that.
Space babies
So we have two hybrid babies, one with a human mother, one a cylon mother. Who wants to bet that these become focal points of the story going forwards?
Also, what’s going to happen to Gallactica Sharon when she get confirmation that her baby is alive, and especially what is she going to think of Admiral Adama?
Lastly, is Starbuck going to leave, and if so, will she take her infant?
Damien
Re: Space babies
Good points, but you are takeing it on faith that the story given to a prisioner (that her captors are trying to "convince") is the truth.
It’s certainly possible, and could fit into the situation as we the audience know it… But I wouldn’t go so far as to actually believe that Casey is really Starbuck’s child. – Yet.
If they ARE both hybred, and the second (Casey) was more closely engineered than the first, I find it curious that they are both female. If the first hybred is female, why not make the second a male? It’s a trivial task when set along side the endevor of making a hybred. Why not allow/encourage the possibility of a second generation hybred? unless Casey wasn’t started until after they thought the first had died… But then the age descrepency is even worse.
But that’s assumeing the story Starbuck got was solid; And we all know what happens when you assume.
Re: Space babies
I so called it. That child being alive, and the nature of the deception will be a cause for great turmoil for Caprica Sharon(now Galatica Boomer #2, Gods this is going to get more and more confusing as the show goes on.) If Boomer gets any more truth out of the cylons or any more deception out of the humans the spit will hit the fan. I can already see flashbacks in over-done soft focus to the scene on Galatica where Helo and Sharon talk about symbols, uniforms, and loyalty.
More on that kid . . . "how far do we take it?" "Just don’t let it come to that." – That kid is as great a threat as it is a liability. The guard/overwatch force on that child is almost certainly in place to deny the cylons posession of the child[via liquidation] as it is to protect the child. Caprica Boomer is going to be so tweaked-off to think through the implications of the close guard.
Further on the subject of Leobens resurections that I commented on before: in light of the obviously increasing discomforts that come with repeated download/resurection [according to the Stockwell Cylon] we can only assume the fact that Leoben must be insane or have the mental fortitude of Ghandi.
The Stockwell model is the perfect match for Tigh. Hard core. "I found a shell casing and used it to scratch open my carteroid artery. Who knew skin was so tough." Again I am strengthened in my opinion that the Stockwell cylon is the biggest baddie in the bunch, no redeeming value (from the viewers point of view.)
The FX has to be busting their budget or they are really saving up for some seriously intense episode in the future. I’m bummed they didn’t give us a [fx]payoff on the comment about the "bullet heads not being able to tell the diffrence between the skinjobs." Remember when the first suicide bomber ended up face to face with a bullethead? I expected to see an echo of that with Boomer. They did give us a nice shot of the cylon airstrip though. A lot of traffic there. Do the cylons feel they need all those assets to bottle up such a small and lightly armed human encampment?
Obviously skinjobs can ID all the variants amongst themselves, even if bulletheads can’t.
The Lawless model that Caprica Sharron shot in the vault is going to be trouble for the Cylons. Not likely as a traitor, but as a mechanism for [radical]change in their relegion. She is focused on that child. Who is ready to cue of the last five minutes of the season one finale when Hallucination-Six gives Baltar the low-down on the child that is to come? Please come back here and let us know if anything relevant is revealed in light of what we have seen in these following episodes. Sorry, tangets, back to Lawless . . . she has taken up consulting with the human oracle. She comments on the fact that human and cylon blood are so much alike.
Also with Lawless but off the relegion . . . did anyone notice that just before that scene with the doctor she interacted with the dog…yeah…that dog, the secret message dog. Someone is going to get caught in the passing/picking up messages at that dead-drop. Was Gaeta in this episode at all?
On Tighs wife, I had already remarked that her deception of her husband not only directly harmed the resistance but robbed Tigh of a great tool for planting misinformation amonst the cylons.
You know, nothing happened in this episode. This episode was 100% setup for what was to follow.
Re: Space babies
I really feel like the writers are going to write a twist in both of these stories. I think that Sharon will find out, but I think the twist will be that she will find out on the Galactica after D’ana has taken the child back to the cylons. I also think that eventuall D’ana will bring her back to Sharon and the fleet.
As for Casey, I completely believe that she is totally cylon, engineered specifically to fool Starbuck, but still a complete toaster. I can’t forgive the continuity problem if she is anything else.
Re: Space babies
i posted this in the 3×01/02 thread:
My gut continues to tell me that Casey (Starbucks "daughter") is nothing more than a skin job designed for social experimentation with the humans. Her "accident" was all part of a scenario to see what it would take to break Starbuck. And I have a feeling the Cylons will now have an operative in plain site on board Galactica after the rescue.
Re: Space babies
All conjecture:
I can halfway believe that the Cylons took Starbuck’s ovary for other reasons, and that the partial cross-transference that took place with Baltar and Six may be a harbinger of a true, completely resurrected human consciousness, popped into a synthetic toaster body, just to keep things interesting.
Perhaps Baltar, or perhaps Starbuck … Casey may just be the intermediate phase to a Starbuck-patterned skin job. That slimey Leoben. :)
Then again, between the farms and the imprisoned populace on New Caprica maybe the Cylons can now just pop out new "original" skin job models, one-offs, that resemble other humans … :)
-Joe
Cliffhanger Editing
Was it just me, or was the editing of the Callie cliffhanger the true "low point" of this episode? Below is how I remember it all, sitting here typing…
In the previous ep, just before the credits roll, we see Callie being PUSHED DOWN A BANK before starting to run from away from the hillside where the road and trucks are located. Physically, she is now "LOWER" than the trucks and the rest of the captives when she starts to run. When the Cylon firing squad appears, they are effectively level with the humans still on the road they are about to shoot. From a running-by-her-side point of view (POV), we see trees in the background and SHE IS STILL RUNNING as the machine gun fire starts up. Fade to credits.
When we do the reboot rewind in the new ep, when we see Callie thru the binoc POV she starts running away from the trucks WITHOUT being pushed down the bank and covers ground on the same level as the trucks and Cylon firing squad. Furthermore, she is effectively running along a line connecting the Cylon firing squad and the human ambush squad.
Chief says to Machine Gun Woman "count to five" and heads out to tackle Callie and get her out of the line of fire. Ummm…just how far can he GET in five seconds? How about yelling "Callie !!! Hit The Dirt!!!"
So the human ambush squad opens up. Let’s ignore the fact that machine gun fire from a distance isn’t going to be quite as effective against a GROUP of Cylon toasters as the RPG the Galactica Marines were finding it necessary to use against a SINGLE toaster…
Nope, I’ve got two bigger qualms. First, unlike the previous fadeout, Callie is tackled BEFORE the machine gun fire starts up. Oops.
Even worse, once the humans start firing, there is a camera shot showing human muzzle flashes coming from cover FARTHER UP THE HILLSIDE. For Callie to obscure their view, she needed to be running UP the hill on the other side of the truck than where she really started. Oops again.
Hey, it was a very dramatic scene and very well done and I was totally absorbed in it at first viewing. It wasn’t until I started thinking about it later that I though it seemed a little off. It’s really like the knife scene in Psycho – you never see a knife touch flesh.
Flim editing is as much about human perception as logic and geometry, and this scene being so dramatic is proof.
Re: Cliffhanger Editing
Yeah, that’s what I came here to say. BAD cliff-hanger-cop-out. I expect more from BSG.
Low point
Sure that cliffhanger resolution isn’t great, and gets worse the more you think about it. But my low point is the dream and oracle that spoiled the secret existence of Sharon’s baby, Hera.
That fraking oracle just gave away vital tactical intel to the enemy. No sense of human loyalty, I suppose.
It all leaves me feeling cheated. How am I supposed to take the plot seriously when sensible things done by characters can be undone with such cheap plot devices? Could they not think of some reasonable way for the cylons to find out about the baby? This one sucked.
Re: Low point
The oracle is loyal to a calling beyond that of any loyalty to humans. She appears to be an interesting creature. A hybrid of a diffrent type. She "channels"(my word) not only the Gods of the humans but also the One God of the cylons.
How about that!
Re: Low point
Or maybe she just overheard about the hybrid by spying on Rosylin and is hoping to get a supply of candy by becoming the cylon’s spiritual advisor :)
Adama
Someone already pointed out that the cliffhanger resolution was bogus, so no need to get into that.
Can someone remind me if Adama actually does know about Sharon’s baby? I don’t recall.
And if he does then FOR FRACK’S SAKE, he’d better friggin come clean if/when she asks him about it or I’ll be really REALLY mad.
Also, it looks like the whole New Caprica thing is a short diversion and within a few episodes we’ll all be back in space.
Re: Adama
i agree. not only would it be easier to come clean sooner than later, it would make strategic sense ("Boomer, you have to understand that we wanted to be absolutely sure we could trust you."), by returning the child it may help them look better in the eyes of the other Sixe’s and Boomer’s, thus creating a possible rift amongst the skin jobs.
Quick Resolution to Story Line?
I have to say that if they do rescue the colonists next episode I’ll be a little dissapointed. I found the fast forward to the prison storyline last season disorienting and was expecting to spend a significant portion of the season on the planet. Considering the degree of the change if they get off next episode this storyline is going feel really rushed. However, considering how they’re setting everything up I can’t see how they won’t get off next episode since the cylons are getting ready to start mass executions and the humans are about to throw everything they have into the rescue effort.
When the humans do actually get off I predict that a couple things are going to happen. First Baltar is going to be left with the Cylons, I can’t see him escaping with the rest of the humans since if they don’t lynch him on the spot he’ll be left to rot in prison and be useless for any future story.
Second a good bunch of humans will be left with the cylons, this likely includes a lot of the police force. I don’t know if the cylons will leave them on the planet or take them hunting for the fleet but they’ll likely have the compliant population of humans that they were hoping for, which leaves the dilemma of what to do with the human fleet…
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
Going back to a comment about the cylon airport – they have ALOT of assets there. If you figure that Galatica is at best half strengthed he is going to be in for the fight of his life.
Galatica can’t be coming in for a stand up fight. Perhaps he can jump into a position that is masked from the cylon sensors . . . far side of the planet, outside the nebula, in the same orbit that the raptors use for clandestine signals exchange. Once in position we will likely see something as creative as Starbucks ploy where the decoys are revealed to be bait, but in truth contain the strike force.
Tangent –
Alot of relegious stuff going on in this episode. I loved the line out of salt. The Humans are polytheists, they have rituals that look like witchcraft. That salt could have been a [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_circle_(Wicca)"%5Dmagic circle[/url] done with a ruler instead of a compass.
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
Yes, I am a biiit dissapointed that the whole planet thing seems like it’s nothing more than a short diversion and/or temporary plot device.
I agree about BAltar staying with the Cylons. NOT that that’ll be much of a life. Especially if Six gets tired of him. Frankly they should just go off on their own.
I don’t think many other people will stay with the cylons. Not even the police. I see a future Pardon For The Police Force thing (or an Adama "We need to get over it" kinda speech).
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
In a rescue effort of this size some people are likely to get left behind (not by choice) in the confusion. It seems to me that the Police, the ones who will be in closest proximity to the cylons (and who will have the most interesting character interactions after the rescue), are most likely to be unable to get away.
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
I predict that during the rescue the Cylons will set off a nuke. I say this in light of a few things that have popped up:
The police force. These people can never be trusted again. Leaving them makes cleanup easy.
The subject has already been broached by the Cylons and there wasn’t immediate and strong push back.
In a similar vein we have already seen the more dominant of the Cylons take control and shoot Caprica 6.
Baltar will be left on the planet. After the nuke goes off we find out his real identity.
Spoiling the rescue of most of humanity with a nuke is a great way to provide a new rift between the Cylons who want to live in peace with humans and those that believe, rightly, that humans cannot be controlled.
I doubt Tigh will be left behind, but I can see Ellen being left behind and her death becoming yet another psychological issue for Tigh.
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
I have a feeling Starbuck might stay behind, depending on how thoroughly Leoben has messed with her head.
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
I will have serious serious problems with the show if Starbuck doesn’t get back on Galactica. Starbuck needs to resume kicking ass and taking names. I believe in the rescue she will discover that Casey is a full cylon. This will only make her rage against them stronger.
I just can’t take that much more abuse of Starbuck. Starbuck is supposed to be a strong character. Right now Starbuck has just been beaten down too much, the strong Starbuck needs to come back to the show.
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
No doubt. If only because no human has seen her sense the day the cylons came. They don’t even know if she is alive and obviously they can not communicate the plans for rescue to someone they don’t even know is alive.
Re: Quick Resolution to Story Line?
If Starbuck can sense the arrival of the Cylons that suggests either some kind of connection to the god(s) or some kind of telepathic/pre-cognitive abilities. It may explain the special treatment by Leoben (although he doesn’t fully realize this). Perhaps that explains what’s really happening with Starbuck’s child, eveyone has assumed that either the fall was an extremely convenient accident or that the child is in league with the Cylons. Perhaps the child is just like any other child, it wants the love of its parents and its parents to love eachother. Its telepathic (or other abilities) have given it the ability to contrive this plan whereby she convinced Leoben to bring her in with a potentially dangerous Starbuck and then had the accident to draw Starbuck towards her. The perhaps the child…
Wait a second…
You meant to type since NOT sense didn’t you?
You know this is how rumours get started!!