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Battlestar Galactica: Act of Contrition

"Pilots call me Starbuck. You may refer to me as God."

This is an amazing episode for such a young series.

The ship's resources are stretched to the limit, and they lose thirteen pilots in a freak accident. Again, just about the worst thing that could happen. As always, Battlestar Galactica is all about the shit continually hitting the fan.

Kara is my favorite character. There is such a voie de vivre about her that it was painful to see her so distressed. She made a critical mistake, to be sure – but she did it for love. It took remarkable courage for her to tell the full and unvarnished truth to Adama, a man she loves like a father, knowing full well he may never forgive her.

The flashbacks and flashforwards gave us some marvelous scenes: Kara's and Zak's affair, Adama and Kara meeting for the first time, Zak's funeral, and Kara's ship spiraling down to the planet, which of course was also symbolic of her emotional state and her disintegrating relationship with Adama.

Meanwhile back on Caprica, it was raining again, and lucky Helo and his Cylon buddy have found a fallout shelter with food, water, and meds. Good thing the enemy is helping them out, huh?

Bits and pieces:

— This week's Most Obvious Symbolism was the small bucket of red paint that Kara and Lee dropped on the deck, right before the explosion. "Someone's gonna have to pick that up."

— Our most prominent nugget, Costanza the washout a.k.a. Hot Dog, showed that he had the right stuff when he turned around and went after Starbuck. I sort of expected him to immediately die in a blaze of glory, and I'm glad he didn't.

— The card game scenes reminded me of Next Generation. I miss Next Generation.

— We got a glimpse of Lee and Zak's mother during the funeral scene. She didn't speak and was completely covered by a veil, which indicated to me that we may see her in a future episode and they wanted casting freedom.

— There are only 40 Vipers left. Wait: 39.

— We sort of got a 21 gun salute. Except it was only 18 guns.

— What does "dradis" mean? It's not in the dictionary. Write and tell me! (I've gotten several emails about this one. DRADIS is an acronym for Detection, Range and Distance. It's essentially radar.)

— Dr. Cottle smokes. He's a cliche. But he's a fun cliche.

— Gold acting stars for both Katee Sackhoff and Edward James Olmos. That final scene between them was a nail-biter.

— Laura: "I would like to explore alternate treatments." Dr. Cottle: "Prayer?"

This was the episode that made me a fan of this show. Four out of four stars,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

2 comments:

  1. Yes i agree this is the episode that made me sure that i will be with this show to the very end. Good flashbacks, the focus on my favorite character so far. And a setup to a possible Ememy mine scenario with crashed Starbuck. Plus focus on pilots and a dogfight at the end.

    I have to coment about the CGI. It is really great, the camera movements imitating real cameras present in the action. The ships. Very good.

    But one thing bugs me. So far the Cylon Raiders used missiles but the ships encountered here just used guns. Mistake or did the cylons learn that their missiles are too easy to shoot down from all the battles in "33"?

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  2. Another good episode - though not so good it was "the one" to hook me in - I think the miniseries and "33" already did that :)

    I remember loving this 1st series the first time I watched the show - it has aged well in the 8 (?) years since I first watched it for sure!

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