Justin Cox Presents:

Battlestar Galactica: Season 1

A month ago I discovered what a Cylon is and decided it’d be worth further pursuing the matter. I’ve finished watching the first season of Battlestar Galactica and have some thoughts. Don’t read any further unless you’re alright with spoilers (I’m not using my spoiler tags this time).

The race to Earth is underway and the remaining fifty-thousand humans in existence are battling for survival — of course, there is question as to whether Earth actually exists or not. The season picks up about five days after the miniseries leaves off. Apparently the Cylons jump in and attack every 33 minutes. Needless to say everyone is exhausted and at the breaking point. The reason the Cylons constantly find the fleet are Cylon transponders placed on a few of the fleet ships. Proof there are still Cylons mixed in with the survivors — nine whom we don’t know what they look like.

Starbuck is basically the main character. Basically.

Various things happen and at the end of the season the fleet stumbles upon Kobol, which in the human mythology is the location of the original tribes and the home of their faith — and the location that will point them to Earth. I say in the human mythology because the Cylons apparently have a belief system of their own. The humans believe in multiple gods and the Cylons speak of the “one true god,” a god for both humans and Cylons. All of this is really just hinted at. It seems it’ll play a bigger role in seasons to come.

Although a complete season went through I know very little that ( didn’t know at the completion of the miniseries. Gaius’ Cylon detector is a complete sham and seems to have very little to do with anything. The only identified Cylons are the four that existed before: Sharon, Number Six, the smuggler and guy that Gaius “detected” in the miniseries. I was almost certain that we’d get the identity of at least one more upon the close of the season, but that didn’t happen.

Don’t get me wrong, the entire season wasn’t for not. A terrorist took over the prison shop and forced the President to commit to elections in six months. Gaius, upon urging from his own personal Number Six, ran for and was elected Vice President (mankind is doomed). After the election Starbuck slept with Gaius and immediately regretted it. Speaking of Starbuck, she “killed” a Cylon ship, figured out how to put it back together, and flew it back to Galactica without getting killed. Oh yeah, and alcoholic Commander Tigh’s wife showed up out of nowhere after three weeks with no memory of where she’d been or how she got there. Admeral Adama issued a Cylon test on her, but since the test is a sham, who knows what the truth is.

The season ends with a few large cliff hangers: 1) Starbuck finds an important artifact in the ruins of Caprica, along with Helo and a pregnant Cylon-Sharon (creepy). 2) Another Sharon copy delivers a nuke to a Cylon basestar above Kobol and in the process discovers she’s a Cylon. Upon returning to Galactica, she shoots Adama (suspenseful). 3) A team sent to survey Kobol crashes after clashing with Cylon interceptors. On the ground, Gaius is shown the purpose that god has for him through his personal in-head Number Six. Of course, this purpose isn’t revealed to us, though I think it might have something to do with human-cylon babies (freaky).

Galactica is a big, big ship.

I’m still not completely sold on Battlestar Galactica being this super awesome show that everyone raved about while it was coming to a close. Don’t get me wrong, it’s decient but it’s more slow then it is compelling. Though it seems just when I’m getting tired of nothing happening, it gets extremely compelling and won’t let me give up on it. The same thing happened in the miniseries. I was going to wait before watching Season 2 and re-watch Firefly but because of the very well developed cliff hangers, I’m going to jump directly into it. Firefly will have to wait.